Books for Deception
Since the T. Lobsang Rampa books first began to appear - in about 1955 - Hoskins's example has been followed by many other writers. The market consisting of people who are willing to be fooled by such books is apparently vast. Books by other writers about such topics as the Bermuda Triangle, Flying Saucers (or visits from outer space), lost continents, mysterious archaeological features, astrology, spiritualism and so on have followed. The most successful writer of this kind is probably Erich von Dänikin. He has admitted that he made up a lot of his books. All these books are unreliable and are intended to be read by the uneducated. It may be that as well as fiction and non-fiction we need a third category of books: - books intended to deceive. Do the writers believe what they write? Some probably do.

How can you decide whether you are reading a book of this kind? This is a question about the reliability of information. How do we know when any book is reliable? Non-fiction books about any branch of knowledge must obey the rules of scholarship. The most important rule is that every fact and incident described must be testable. That is, the writer must explain how he knows what he states. He must refer to the work of another writer or scientist by quoting books and telling you where to find the information by giving the author's name, title of the book and place and date of publication. If he is reporting something he saw himself he can only be believed if he supplies reliable witnesses. The T. Lobsang Rampa books fail to provide these ties to the general world of scholarship. The incidents described are unusual but no independent witnesses are quoted and no reference is made to others' work. There is, for example, no bibliography or list of others' books. No other writer has ever described incidents of the kind Rampa takes part in.

If the Rampa books are a fraud you may ask why the publishers allowed them to be produced. The answer is simple. Publishers will produce anything that sells whether it is true or not, and the Rampa books sell well enough to continue making money for them.

There are in Britain, the United States and other countries weekly and daily papers which specialise in stories like Rampa's. Stories about alien spaceships (World War 2 Bomber on the Moon) and magic of all kind are made up in the offices of these papers, which to the inexperienced eye may look like newspapers. They usually contain sex stories as well, which may also be made up. They are of course bought by the uneducated and credulous.# They contain no news.

New Age
All these topics are often classified as New Age, from the belief that an astrological change is about to occur. Does this mean anything? Probably not.

Topics to watch out for and be suspicious about:

• Atlantis;
• Flying Saucers;
• Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs);
• Ancient Visitors from Outer Space;
• Bermuda Triangle;
• Spacemen Built the Pyramids;
• Aliens took me into their spaceship;
• Nostradamus;
• astrology;
• alleged cures of disease by methods not accepted by scientific doctors.

The proper scholarly attitude to topics like this is to ask for evidence of the same kind as we expect from any other topic of history or science. For almost all of them there is no reliable evidence. The conclusion from this must be to say that they are not to be believed.

Some of these books talk about such things as: Is there an unknown animal in a certain lake in Africa (or Britain)? There may be. But only reliable evidence acceptable to a zoologist will allow us to be sure. Were there ancient visitors from outer space? There is no evidence, so it is impossible to answer yes or no. But the distances of space are so large that it is unlikely. Only very good evidence would change this view. Can a soul (or the consciousness of a person) be transplanted from one body to another? It seems unlikely and Rampa provides no evidence which would make the scholar accept it.

The key word is evidence which is the basis of all systematic knowledge in science and history.

credulous - people who will believe anything without question or evidence.