An Analysis and Critique of Li Hongzhi's "Scientific Views"
Li Hongzhi’s "extraordinary science" and "broad and profound science" can be analyzed from the following perspectives:
First, the "science" Li Hongzhi speaks of is not science in the modern sense; it is a heterogeneous "science" intermingled with ghost stories. In his discourse on "extraordinary science" and "broad and profound science," his tactic is first to employ hyperbole and mystification. Li Hongzhi begins by aggrandizing himself, dressing himself up as a modern "superman" and the "highest" and "greatest" "god" since ancient times, claiming to be omniscient and omnipotent. Consequently, the "science" he discusses is naturally "extraordinary" and "broad." A "pseudo-master" with only a junior high school education, relying on his fabricated "capabilities," claims not only to be able to spout nonsense about every civilizational achievement in human and prehistoric history, but also to hold forth [1] on ancient, early modern, and contemporary scientific achievements. This is what Li Hongzhi self-titles as "divine powers" and "divine transformations"—the "extraordinary thinking" and "special thinking" possessed by the contemporary supreme "god." Secondly, he deifies "Falun Dafa." Li Hongzhi and the "elite" followers he lured into joining sing hymns of praise to "Buddha-law" [2], calling it "the most mysterious," "the highest," "the newest," "extraordinary," and "impossible for man to create," etc., to intimidate people first. Then, he draws connections across disparate fields, mixing in stories of gods, demons, and ghosts, legends, and specious "evidence" to prove his "scientific" fallacies that are "without precedent or successor." Such fallacies are stated however he pleases, as grandly as he desires.
To list some of Li Hongzhi's discourses on "extraordinary science" and "broad and profound science": for instance, "now instruments have detected atoms on qigong masters"; "the 'origin' of the material space where we humans live is our 'human water'"; "the moon was man-made in prehistory"; "the 'emergence of the primordial spirit' [3] can discern the internal structure of matter"; "humans live in a space composed of molecules, while 'gods' live in a space composed of microscopic particles smaller than molecules"; "universal gravitation is generated by 'gods' creating a certain special substance within a specific range around the Earth," and so on. As Mr. Lu Xun [4] said: "There is currently a class of people fond of talking ghost stories who hate science the most. Because science can clarify logic and make people's thinking clear, it does not allow for 'ghosting around,' and thus naturally becomes the enemy of those who talk ghost stories. Consequently, these storytellers must find a way to exclude it. Among these, the most ingenious method is to cause a disturbance. First, they pull science hither and thither, mixing in ghost stories, making it impossible to distinguish right from wrong, until even science takes on a demonic air." "One who causes even more violent disturbances is a 'prodigy' who produced the Illustrated Explanation of the Three Thousand Great Thousand Worlds. He took the dregs of Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and Christianity, mixed them into a chaotic mess, and densely inserted ghost stories. He claimed to see conditions in heaven and on earth; the 'Earth Star' he saw did not differ much from what we know, but once he reached other planets, it became a motley variety. Because he possessed the 'Heavenly Eye,' his abilities were superior to those of scientists" (Taken from Random Thoughts No. 33, published in New Youth [5], Vol. 5, No. 4). These two passages by Mr. Lu Xun strike precisely at Li Hongzhi’s vital point.
Second, Li Hongzhi’s so-called "extraordinary science" and "broad and profound science" represent an alternative science that plays between modern scientific concepts and illusory, boundless, and groundless mystical fallacies. Li Hongzhi's "alternative science" plays two cards:
The first card is to exploit the limitations of modern science to argue for the "impotence" of science—its inability to explain the "extraordinary" and "broad" nature of his "science." Li Hongzhi says: "The so-called empirical science is limited only to the material space that human eyes can see"; "The reason modern science is unscientific is that the current definition of empirical science is very narrow; besides what can currently be seen and touched, it recognizes nothing else. Its definition of science is fundamentally unscientific, and it completely restricts people." (This fully reflects Li Hongzhi’s ignorance of science. Is the research object of modern science dependent on "seeing" with eyes or "touching" with hands?)
The "limitations of science" Li Hongzhi speaks of are not what we mean by the limitations of science. When we speak of scientific limitations regarding unknown phenomena that cannot yet be verified or explained, it refers to: first, the characteristics of the object of cognition have not yet been fully exposed (Is it illusory? Or real?); second, existing knowledge and cognitive abilities are limited; third, the level of human practice has not yet reached that point. This requires humanity to constantly pursue and explore, as there can be no "ultimate truth." However, Li Hongzhi and his followers say, "The limitations of modern empirical science make it impossible to fully verify the discourses of Falun Buddha-law on time-space, the human body, life, and the entire universe." Li Hongzhi, on one hand, disparages modern science, claiming "modern science is not science," "the starting point of science was wrong from the beginning," and "modern science is the greatest superstition"; yet on the other hand, he exploits the fruits of modern science, using modern scientific concepts and language to argue how "extraordinary" and "broad" his "extraordinary science" and "broad and profound science" are. With the evasive excuses that "modern science has limitations" and "modern science is not science," Li Hongzhi can arbitrarily fabricate scientific "facts" and scientific "conclusions."
Such examples are ubiquitous in the works of "Falun Gong." In Zhuan Falun, in the section arguing that "Qigong is prehistoric culture," it is stated: "After human civilizations were hit by devastating blows multiple times, only a few people survived, living primitive lives, and gradually multiplied into new humans, entering new civilizations. Then they moved toward destruction again, and multiplied into new humans again; it has gone through such cyclical changes one after another." When someone asked Li Hongzhi how to explain the "mirages people see," Li Hongzhi replied: "I say it is simply the scenes of another space flashing through by a freak combination of factors. The buildings over there are not only ancient-style; there are also modern buildings like those today. Moreover, some of the spaces over there can move." In the promotional materials of "Falun Gong," the description of the "emergence of the primordial spirit" is depicted as follows: "...When my primordial spirit became small, as small as a molecule, I jumped into the molten steel. The temperature of the molten steel was 1,700 or 1,800 degrees. In the molten steel, I saw all kinds of compounds or elements, such as C, Si, Mn, S, P, oxides, silicates, etc. I only saw the molecular state; I could not yet enter the interior of the atom. I saw it very clearly, and instantly saw the reaction of smelting aluminum alloy directly from ore. This reaction is very complex. After I finished watching, my main primordial spirit returned quickly"; "There are three thousand great thousand worlds in a grain of sand"; "A car can run inside a human pore." Similar feverish nonsense—all conclusions with no evidence—can be found everywhere.
The second card is to use fabricated or distorted "evidence," or no evidence at all, to create Li Hongzhi’s "alternative science." For instance, Li Hongzhi and his disciples say: "The view regarding the existence of prehistoric civilizations and the cyclical nature of human development has been confirmed by a large amount of solid archaeological evidence and is recognized by many scientists." In Zhuan Falun and on the Internet, works and articles signed by some practitioners titled "Not Superstition, but Broad and Profound Science" and "'Falun Gong' is Not Superstition and Pseudoscience, but True, Extraordinary Science" list many passages citing archaeological findings to argue for "prehistoric culture" and "prehistoric civilization." Much more such "evidence" could be listed. "Archaeological discovery" is another category of knowledge; its relationship with "natural science" is one of exploration, inspiration, and verification—especially for new "scientific discoveries" and debated issues like the "origin of humanity," "cosmogony," and "geological structure," where "archaeological discovery" has special reference value. However, it is not a "test of evidence" that is both necessary and sufficient for natural science. Furthermore, the dating of archaeological finds is a very difficult matter to determine. The determination of archaeological dates in the aforementioned examples is merely a conjecture; from an archaeological perspective, they are difficult to believe, let alone serve as "evidence" for "prehistoric culture" and "prehistoric civilization."
The "evidence" mentioned most frequently and in the greatest detail by Li Hongzhi and his disciples is the "discovery of a 2-billion-year-old nuclear reactor in the Oklo mine of the Republic of Gabon" and the "mystery of the ancient Egyptian pyramids." Regarding these two events, many scientists have already conducted investigations and provided explanations. While these are certainly debated issues that can be researched and discussed, as scientific proof, they are insufficient.
The first event involves an American scientist in the 1950s proposing that "2-billion-year-old uranium ore might produce a natural chain reaction," suggesting that if this conjecture held, "nuclear reactor theory could be applied to geochronology... and provided the conditions for a natural uranium reactor." In the 1970s, French scientists discovered natural uranium ore and found such ore in the Oklo mine of Gabon. The crux of Li Hongzhi and his followers using this event as "evidence" for "prehistoric civilization" lies in: first, fabricating that "the uranium ore had all been artificially refined" and "the uranium mine was a large-scale nuclear reactor with a very rational layout," using this to claim that prehistoric people already possessed the technology to refine Uranium-235 from Uranium-238 and had built large-scale nuclear reactors with rational layouts. (Conditions for nuclear reaction: pure U-235. Most natural uranium is U-238 with a half-life of 4.5 billion years and is not easily fissionable, while U-235 has a half-life of 700 million years and is fissionable; since U-235 accounts for only 0.7171% of uranium, naturally occurring uranium is mostly U-238). Second, they fabricate that the reactor had "operated for 500,000 years" and was "impossible for people today to create." This is also Li Hongzhi’s nonsense. As stated above, the probability of obtaining U-235 is so low, and the conditions for a nuclear reaction are both complex and stringent, let alone a natural fission chain reaction. If 2 billion years ago the Earth's climate and environment formed the conditions for a natural fission reaction, in what year exactly did it occur? When did it stop and become a relic? How could it be calculated that this reactor operated for 500,000 years? This event was explained as early as 1976 by George A. Cowan in an article titled "A Natural Fission Reactor" in Scientific American. Twenty years later, it was still regarded by Li Hongzhi and his followers as the most powerful archaeological "evidence." It is truly another farce in Li Hongzhi’s repertoire. As for saying it is "impossible for people today to create," this is Li Hongzhi’s habitual tactic of demagoguery; the atomic bomb was created in the 1940s, and in the latter half of the last century, the United States built a 2,300-megawatt nuclear power plant.
The second incident, concerning "the mystery of the ancient Egyptian pyramids," is an ancient proposition that has been debated for nearly a century. This involves two issues: first, the date of the pyramids' construction—whether they are as ancient and represent as high a civilization as Li Hongzhi claims; and second, the nature of the many mystical legends surrounding the pyramids. Of course, even with the advancement of science today, these two issues cannot be said to have definitive answers. However, more than a hundred years of debate have given us a relatively clear understanding of the truth. Regarding the date of construction, according to investigations by pyramid scholars, the heyday of construction in Egypt occurred during the reigns of the Third through Sixth Dynasties of the Old Kingdom (2686–2181 BCE), a period known as the "Pyramid Age." Construction continued thereafter until the Eleventh and Twelfth Dynasties (2133–1786 BCE). Over a span of more than 900 years, approximately 80 pyramids of various sizes were built, centered around Memphis on the west bank of the Nile. According to research, if we trace back one or two generations from Khufu of the Fourth Dynasty—who built Egypt's largest pyramid—to the construction of scattered small pyramids, and then forward to the reign of Pharaoh Ramesses II (fourteen centuries after Khufu built the Great Pyramid), the pyramid construction reflected in the stone inscriptions described in the Old Testament of the Bible does not exceed five thousand to seven thousand years ago. Li Hongzhi's claim—that the ancient Egyptian pyramids "are actually a type of prehistoric culture that sank to the bottom of the sea; later, as the earth changed and continental plates shifted multiple times, they rose back up, were discovered and utilized by the Egyptians, who later imitated them to build some smaller pyramids"—is entirely inconsistent with the facts.
As for "prehistoric civilization" and "prehistoric culture," these remain subjects of exploration and debate. The debate generally centers on the following issues: First, there is significant disagreement over whether "prehistoric civilization" and "prehistoric culture" even exist and when they began. Some historians of science argue that these concepts originate from myths, legends, and religious classics, making them illusory and absurd [6]; thus, their origins cannot be determined. Others suggest they date back tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, or even billions of years. Second, the "facts" regarding the existence of "prehistoric civilization" and "prehistoric culture" are essentially descriptive and speculative; with few observations and little evidence, a vacuum is left for logical reactions to mystical events. Third, from an archaeological perspective: archaeologists always strive to obtain data systematically and scientifically, but any conclusion reached cannot exceed the limits imposed by that data. Due to the incompleteness and uncertainty of archaeological data, as well as the limitations of measurement techniques (Carbon-14 dating for buildings and eras is currently only reliable within 5,000 years), using archaeology as evidence for "prehistoric civilization" and "prehistoric culture" is insufficient. Fourth, according to current astronomical observations and theories, the Earth's rotation is stable. The claim that "terrestrial civilization" undergoes periodic changes or has been destroyed many times lacks evidence. Li Hongzhi's assertion that the Earth has been destroyed 81 times is nothing but baseless nonsense. From the above analysis, it is clear that Li Hongzhi’s judgments regarding the pyramids are entirely deceptive clamor intended to confuse the public, lacking any foundation in either archaeology or science.
Mystical legends regarding the pyramids flourished in the 19th century. These legends basically involve whether the construction of the pyramids was due to divine or human power, the mystery of pi ($\pi$), the distance between the Earth and the Sun, the number of days in a year, and the pyramids' orientation, shape, and purpose. Around these issues, various mystical legends and scientific "miracles" emerged for over a century. The most representative figure was Charles Piazzi Smyth, the Astronomer Royal for Scotland and a professor at the University of Edinburgh. His book Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid, published in 1864, pushed pyramid research to a new height. In the book, Smyth provided a series of explanations for the aforementioned issues. Like his predecessors, Smyth used self-defined units of measurement to derive a series of conclusions. For example, he claimed that the height of the pyramid multiplied by $10^9$ equals the distance from the Earth to the Sun; the length of the base of the Great Pyramid divided by the width of the casing stones equals 365; using the "sacred cubit" (the width of a casing stone) and the "pyramid inch" (1/25th of a sacred cubit), he derived the average density of the Earth, the cycle of precession, and the average surface temperature. He reiterated that the ratio of the perimeter of the base to twice the height equals $\pi$, and that the distance between the Earth and the Sun is exactly $10^9$ times the pyramid's height. These seemingly "scientific" issues were, in reality, attempts to find a basis for religious doctrine. Smyth treated one "pyramid inch" as a year and remarkably measured "significant dates" of past and future Earth history within the galleries and chambers of the pyramid. For instance, he claimed the world was created in 4004 BCE; that the birth of Jesus was marked by the start of the Grand Gallery leading to the burial chamber; and that the years of the Atonement, Passion, and Resurrection could all be found within the complex layout of the pyramid's internal passages. He even proposed that the volume of the pyramid, expressed in cubic pyramid inches, equaled the total number of people since God's creation, and so on.
In summary, Smyth's work on the pyramids accomplished two things: first, it relatively systematically attempted to use numbers and symbols to express the ancient, long-lost science of Egypt; second, it used a vast amount of imaginative, subjective, and exaggerated speculation (in fact, Smyth never performed precise measurements of the Great Pyramid) to prove the existence of God and the truth of Biblical scripture. Following this, others continued along his line of thought—either believing, supplementing, revising, or opposing it—ensuring that "Pyramidology" continues to this day. Although Smyth’s use of the "Biblical Pyramid" label Greatly diminished the prestige of this once-trusted astronomer, his work opened two directions in pyramid research: investigating the pyramids from the perspective of long-lost ancient Egyptian science, and establishing the methodology for "Biblical Pyramidology." Subsequent "Pyramidology" research has generally followed these two paths. In 1880, William Flinders Petrie, hailed as the father of modern archaeology, arrived in Egypt and conducted a comprehensive survey and measurement of the Great Pyramid, refuting some of the figures and boastful claims listed by Smyth. This provided reliable data for later "Pyramidology" research. From a survey perspective, the Great Pyramid was indeed built according to an ancient Egyptian unit of measurement. As for whether the construction was divine or human, the pi mystery, or the orientation, shape, dimensions, and purpose—as research has deepened, there is no longer any mystery to speak of. Taking the Great Pyramid of Khufu of the Fourth Dynasty as an example: according to the research of the Greek scholar Herodotus, who traveled to Egypt in the 5th century BCE, the Great Pyramid was built over 20 years during Khufu’s 22-year reign. It is estimated to use 2,300,000 stone blocks, averaging 2.5 tons each. In three-month cycles, 100,000 people were conscripted, utilizing the Nile's flood season to transport the stones by water to a site near the construction area...
In fact, with the development of science today, the "mystery of the pyramids" is no longer a secret. It is only in this pluralistic era and world that some people, enthusiastic about the pyramids, hold different motives—either to project their individuality, explore mysteries, or sing praises for religion and seek divine inspiration. Regarding the inheritance of Charles Piazzi Smyth’s "Biblical Pyramidology," the most influential figure today is Erich von Däniken of Switzerland. Following the path of "Biblical Pyramidology," he continues to search for "prehistoric civilizations" in an attempt to demonstrate the existence of a supernatural God. In his 1968 book Chariots of the Gods?, he discussed the "mystery of the Great Pyramid" at length, ranging from the divine workmanship and power displayed in its construction to the scientific "miracles" it contains. Däniken argues that all of this fully demonstrates that a highly advanced civilization once existed on Earth. He claims such "super-civilization" was beyond the capabilities of ancient Egyptians and the imagination of modern humans. Everyone knows the pyramids symbolize Egypt, and Egypt has close ties to the Bible. Consequently, Däniken logically deduces that a supernatural God must have existed to accomplish all this. This happens to coincide with the many startling miracles performed by God in Egypt recorded in the Old Testament book of Exodus. This is how Däniken proves the existence of God, and through him, "Biblical Pyramidology" has been carried forward.
(This column is co-organized by the China Anti-Cult Association)
References ① Explication of the Contents of Zhuan Falun, Falun Buddha Law Publishing House, November 1997. ② Betrayers of the Truth: Fraud and Deceit in the Halls of Science, William Broad and Nicholas Wade, trans. Zhu Jinning and Fang Yuzhen, Shanghai Scientific and Technological Education Press, December 2004. ③ Analyzing Western Superstitions, ed. Shen Zhenyu et al., Beijing Publishing House, April 1992. ④ Science and the Paranormal, ed. George O. Abell et al., trans. China Institute for Popular Science, Shanghai Scientific and Technical Publishers, September 1989.
About the Author: Xin Peng is a Research Fellow at the China Institute for Popular Science.