Well, if Chopra ever had any scientific credibility, it’s now in shreds. Listen to the part of this video (laughably labeled “Two great minds question HIV/AIDS—Scam/Hoax?”) that starts at 22:15. Chopra is interviewed by Tony Robbins, wealthy lifestyle guru and “self help” author. Here’s a bit of the interchange:

Chopra: HIV may be a precipitating agent in a susceptible host. The material agent is never the cause of the disease. It may be the final factor in inducing the full-blown syndrome in somebody who’s already susceptible. Robbins: But what made them susceptible? Chopra: Their own interpretations of the whole reality they’re participating in. Robbins: Could that be translated into their thoughts, their feelings, their beliefs, their lifestyle? Chopra: Absolutely. . .

It goes on and gets worse as Chopra discusses what he calls “so-called AIDS”

Let’s look at the facts. If you don’t have the virus, regardless of your interpretation of reality, you won’t get AIDS. If you do have the virus, you’re certain to get a disease that is highly likely turn into full-blown AIDS without medical treatment. I don’t know of any studies showing that an “interpretation of reality” is 100% correlated with the presence of the disease (although the presence of the virus is). So which one of these is the more likely “cause”?

I suppose that, according to Chopra, no disease is “caused” by a microbe.

Chopra is reprehensible, suggesting that you can avoid AIDS by not using condoms, but by having the right interpretation of reality. So far his quackery has been either amusing or mildly harmful. Here it becomes dangerous, as Chopra denigrates drug treatments like AZT. (As we’ve long known, the drug slows the replication of the virus, and prolongs life, but is not a “cure”.)

When both Chopra and Robbins laugh at AZT, Chopra suggests that it was promulgated by drug companies because they were interested in money. Now if that’s not a pot/kettle moment, I don’t know what is!

h/t: Ben Goren