The Power of Belief

When the Soviet Union fell, and I was a just-turning-thirty year old, I was very surprised at the sudden flourishing of strange beliefs and bizarre cults in the once state-atheist-nation.

I was surprised because suddenly it was all things that flourished in the west under the influence of heavy drugs, or various “scams” that wouldn’t fool a child of eight, but which got massive following in the newly liberated Russia.

I was surprised because I didn’t understand the mechanisms behind it...