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Carl Sagan on Transcendental Meditation

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Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 18, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/18/98
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The late, great scientist, mass communicator, and humanitarian Carl
Sagan was not known to mince words whether speaking about the cosmos or
those who offer cosmic consciousness for sale. These two passages are
from his New York Times Bestseller, *The Demon-Haunted World: Science as
a Candle in the Dark*:


Perhaps the most successful recent global pseudoscience--by many
criteria, already a religion--is the Hindu doctrine of Transcendental
Meditation (TM). The soporific homilies of its founder and spiritual
leader, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, can be seen on television. Seated in
the yogi position, his white hair here and there flecked with black,
surrounded by garlands and floral offerings, he has a *look*. One day
while channel surfing we came upon this visage. "You know who that is?"
asked our four-year-old son. "God." The worldwide TM organization has an
estimated valuation of $3 billion. For a fee they promise through
meditation to be able to walk you through walls, to make you invisible,
to enable you to fly. By thinking in unison they have, they say,
diminished the crime rate in Washington, D.C., and caused the collapse
of the Soviet Union, among other secular miracles. Not one smattering of
real evidence has been offered for any such claims. TM sells folk
medicine, runs trading companies, medical clinics and "research"
universities, and has unsuccessfully entered politics. In its oddly
charismatic leader, its promise of community, and the offer of magical
powers in exchange for money and fervent belief, it is typical of many
pseudosciences marked for sacerdotal export

As amusing as some of pseudoscience may seem, as confident as we may be
that we would never be so gullible as to be swept up by such a doctrine,
we know it's happening all around us. Transcendental Meditation and Aum
Shinrikyo seem to have attracted a large number of accomplished people,
some with advanced degrees in physics or engineering. These are not
doctrines for nitwits. Something else is going on.


Carl Sagan was a candle of enormous brilliance and warmth. We have been
left in a noticeably dimmer world by his passing.

--Andrew Skolnick http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick
http://members.xoom.com/askolnick/photographs.htm
I speak only for myself, not for any other individual or organization.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 18, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/18/98
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Nope, Andrew, Carl Sagan was an apologist for the status quo, an
astronomer who misguidedly pronounced upon subjects far removed from his
field of expertise. That so many gullible souls have been taken in by
his rhetorical skills is a sad commentary on the lack of education in
those who enthuse over him. Funny how those who critique religion for
invading scientific territory are all too frequently those who commit
the same error in reverse.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 18, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/18/98
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Well, that's your opinion and you're entitled to one. But it's a safe
prediction that history will remember Carl Sagan as a brilliant
scientist, communicator, and humanitarian. You, however will be long
forgotten, who ever you are.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Thanks, Andy, I'd rather be forgotten than to be remembered and
venerated by proponents of scientism who hold to the superstitious view
that science is a tiny flickering candle in the darkness of
pseudoscience and New Age barbarism. Your attitude is typical of the
dutiful Saganite whose rose-tinted spectacles of piety blind him to a
more objective view of the Great Pontificator.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Dear Foot,

Do you know who you remind me of? Archimedes. Well, actually not
Archimedes -- the venerated proponent of scientism -- but the Roman
soldier who came upon Archimedes on a beach drawing a geometrical figure
in the sand and slew the greatest genius before Isaac Newton; you know,
the soldier, what's-his-name.

History just records him as a foot soldier. Any relation?

BASQUE

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Like Carl Sagan says in one of his books, "Science is my Religion". IT is
for me too!
VJB
BASQUE a écrit dans le message <6me1fm$2pi$1...@garnet.nbnet.nb.ca>...
>I agree totally with Andrew on Carl Sagan. This man was a genious and a
>great scientist. I am presently reading a 3rd book of him "Cosmos" and it's
>excellent! We should be more skeptic in life like Sagan mentions. The world
>is too naive and "gullable".
>I urge everyone to read all Carl Sagan's books, they are a refreshing
breath
>of science.
>VJB.
>Andrew A. Skolnick a écrit dans le message <358A6F...@nasw.org>...

BASQUE

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
>
> Thanks, Andy, I'd rather be forgotten than to be remembered and
> venerated by proponents of scientism who hold to the superstitious view
> that science is a tiny flickering candle in the darkness of
> pseudoscience and New Age barbarism. Your attitude is typical of the
> dutiful Saganite whose rose-tinted spectacles of piety blind him to a
> more objective view of the Great Pontificator.

The Foot Soldier tips his hand here. He can't seem to see any middle
ground, how one can respect a man for his contribitions, his art, and
his humanity without worshiping the hem of his garments. Neither I nor
any other fan of Carl Sagan ever showered him with flowers and money. We
don't call him "His Holiness" or put icons of him up on nearly ever
vertical surface and in every book, pamphlet, and jar label within
reach. We didn't think that Sagan, as smart and as talented as he was,
was any closer to Heaven than is the rest of humankind. Sagan has no
followers of devoted people who believe they have been specially chosen
to help their guru bring Enlightenment to the world. And, unlike the
followers of Maharishi and Shoko Asahara, Sagan's fans didn't think the
astronomer could levitate.

Foot Soldier apparently is bristling over my having posted Carl Sagan's
comparison of TM and Aum Shinrikyio. While there are similarities
between the two groups of worshippers and the pseudoscience they preach,
I agree there is an important difference: While Aum Shinrikyio's follow
a guru that likes to gas people, TMers follow a guru who prefers to
giggle.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Thanks again for the ad hominem attacks, Andrew, you do your mentor CS
proud! CS abandoned science when he ventured away from astronomy into
fields in which he had no competence whatsoever, such as psychiatry,
psychology, theology, sociology, "ufology", mysticism, and new
religions. His "skeptical" writings show no skepticism toward his own
deeply-held but questionable assumptions. If skepticism, like charity,
ought to "begin at home", a true skeptic's views would be tempered with
humility and a reluctance to say too much on too many subjects not in
the skeptic's own areas of expertise. But not CS: his magic realm
includes brain science, neonatal neurology, dream psychology,
atmospheric science, hypnotism, perceptics, optics, photography, radar,
cereology, and a host of other classes of phenomena and fields of study
which less overconfident writers would be content to study in detail and
with an aim toward nuanced conclusions. Let a theologian or professor
of religion attempt such a sweeping synoptic range of commentary -
especially with the goal of discrediting - and see how far he or she
would get among CS lovers.
Andy, in your seething anger at my lampooning your sacred cow, you
have likened me to a murderer - the soldier who killed Archimedes. It
is you who have tipped your hand here. Ad hominem attacks, comparisons
of your opponent to a murderer, are very much the tools employed by
denizens of CSICOP, but are not methods becoming a serious student.
And with your guru, CS, you find TM an easy target. Your total
misunderstanding of the true guru-disciple relationship is as vast as
the Unhappy Astronomer's was. The psychology of master and sangha has
completely eluded you. Or, if you think you have a grasp of it, your
critiques ought to consist of rational criticism rather than the bombast
you hurl about (for instance) the guru's photograph being in high
evidence among disciples and in their habitats. And while the externals
of any religion, whether new or old, can look absurd to a nonpracticing
observer, the same can be said of the "disciplined practices" of
science. They may not make sense to the untrained, but for those inside
the discipline, they not only make sense, but are indispensable for the
furtherance of that discipline. The same applies to the externals of
many religions.
No, Andy, I would not have killed CS for propogating nonsense. I
would have appealed to his learning capacity and offered him a library
card. I'd do the same for you, but you are still too much in Defending
the Indefensible mode.

Bob Casanova

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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On Thu, 18 Jun 1998 20:32:27 -0700, in sci.skeptic, "Mr. Foot Grenade"
<eas...@proaxis.com> wrote:

>Nope, Andrew, Carl Sagan was an apologist for the status quo, an
>astronomer who misguidedly pronounced upon subjects far removed from his
>field of expertise.

Then you should have no trouble providing a few examples, right?

<snip>


Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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No, Bob, no examples since Andy didn't post any - just CS's meanderings
about TM, which you can take as an example. His Demon Haunted World is
of course the prime example, as are the Parade Magazine excerpts, The
Dragons of Eden, Broca's Brain, his appearances on NOVA on PBS regarding
UFO's, his interview last year on NPR's Science Friday, etc. The source
material is there but I am no more obligated than is Andy to provide
specifics.

Judy Stein

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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In article <358A58B6...@proaxis.com>,
"Mr. Foot Grenade" <eas...@proaxis.com> wrote:

> Thanks, Andy, I'd rather be forgotten than to be remembered and
> venerated by proponents of scientism who hold to the superstitious view
> that science is a tiny flickering candle in the darkness of
> pseudoscience and New Age barbarism. Your attitude is typical of the
> dutiful Saganite whose rose-tinted spectacles of piety blind him to a
> more objective view of the Great Pontificator.

Andrew's also a devout (literally) James Randiite, having
worshipfully addressed him on sci.skeptic a while back as "St.
George" slaying "the dragons of pseudoscience" and claiming The
Great Amazing as his mentor.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+ Judy Stein * The Author's Friend * jst...@panix.com +
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Judy Stein

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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In article <358AAF...@nasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

> Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
> >
> > Thanks, Andy, I'd rather be forgotten than to be remembered and
> > venerated by proponents of scientism who hold to the superstitious view
> > that science is a tiny flickering candle in the darkness of
> > pseudoscience and New Age barbarism. Your attitude is typical of the
> > dutiful Saganite whose rose-tinted spectacles of piety blind him to a
> > more objective view of the Great Pontificator.
>

> The Foot Soldier tips his hand here. He can't seem to see any middle
> ground, how one can respect a man for his contribitions, his art, and
> his humanity without worshiping the hem of his garments.

Actually it's Andrew tipping his own hand here. There may be
some few TMers who worship the hem of MMY's garments, but this is
very distinctly frowned on; they do it entirely at their own
behest, not because it's required or encouraged.

On the other hand, see the selection of quotes below from Sagan's
followers.

Neither I nor
> any other fan of Carl Sagan ever showered him with flowers and money.

Flowers are definitely part of the TM mise en scene (it's a
cultural thing in India), but I'm not aware of anyone ever having
showered Maharishi with money. Are you, Andrew?

On the other hand, donations are being actively solicited for the
Carl Sagan Memorial Fund, and the Mars Pathfinder Lander has been
renamed The Dr. Carl Sagan Memorial Station.

> We don't call him "His Holiness"

TMers don't call MMY "His Holiness" either (except in formal
contexts, as I've pointed out to Andrew before). If you read the
archives of the newsgroup, you'll find virtually the only people
who use "His Holiness" to refer to MMY are the anti-TMers like
Andrew.

> or put icons of him up on nearly ever vertical surface

Vast exaggeration, and they aren't "icons" in the sense of
religious images any more than the images of the sitting
president in the offices of congresspersons are icons.

Have a look at the scores of Carl Sagan memorial sites on the
Web. Just about all of them come complete with picture of the
Great Man (even some *paintings* of him).

> and in every book, pamphlet, and jar label within reach.

Yes, TM does do that. It's in the nature of a logo that
immediately and unmistakably identifies the material or product
as TM-authentic, sorta like the picture of himself Paul Newman
puts on all his products.

We didn't think that Sagan, as smart and as talented as he was,
> was any closer to Heaven than is the rest of humankind.

We don't think that about MMY either. If we did, we'd be
rejecting his own teaching.

On the other hand, now that Sagan is dead, it's not impossible
that *he* is closer to Heaven than the rest of us. Quite a few
of his followers seem to think so, at least.

Sagan has no
> followers of devoted people who believe they have been specially chosen
> to help their guru bring Enlightenment to the world.

Again, perhaps some few TMers feel they were "specially chosen."
Most of us just feel we were really lucky to have fallen into TM
and feel a responsibility to share it with others.

Not too dissimilar to the scores of Sagan devotees who have left
on the Web pages and pages of effusive thanks to the Great Man
whose television series "Cosmos" inspired them to go into
science.

For instance:

All of us who read his work and appreciate his mind have a great
responsibility with future generation and with the world; we are
the science generation with a great visionary as leader. Dr.
Sagan is a intelectual leader for a whole generation who are
building the transition to the shores of the cosmic ocean where
humankind has its destiny.

Carl brought a torch into this Demon-Haunted World and sparked us
all. Many of us do what we do because of Carl Sagan -- we are
part of his legacy. Let us not allow his light to grow dim, but
go forth with renewed vigor and commitment to realize the dreams
and visions we have all shared.

> And, unlike the followers of Maharishi and Shoko Asahara, Sagan's
> fans didn't think the astronomer could levitate.

Hmm, no. But here's a selection of comments I found in a few
minutes looking at the Carl Sagan sites:

A giant has fallen.
A giant has left us.
I believed in him and thought of him as a hero.
Carl Sagan seemed like a father to the whole damn planet.
[The news of his death] was the saddest words I have ever
heard in my life.
A loss for all mankind.
The intellectual father for a whole generation...a great
visionary.
One of the greatest visionaries of our time.
One of the most extraordinary men that have ever lived.
One of the greatest human beings who has ever lived.
Dr. Sagan was a beacon in the darkness....Who will save us now?
Being a believer in the eventual discovery of life elsewhere, I
am happy to know that he is now discovering that life.
I hope that Dr. Sagan will continue to teach us with his
wisdom. Stars are waiting for him.
MAY DR. SAGAN'S SPIRIT SAIL FOREVER THROUGH THE "COSMOS".
If you seek Odysseus, look around you; he sails the solar wind.
[His] words mean more to me than those of any church.

One follower writes of "my Pilgrimage to Dr. Sagan's grave." He
observes, "An odyssey to the stars and back is complete."
Leaving a burning candle at the gravesite, he muses, "Like all
messages to the stars, we cannot yet know if any have been
received."

Another follower suggests, "He is now truly out there among God's
cosmos, he is home."

Still another writes, "I see him in the Heavens passing by to
take an occasional apple from one of his trees and taste the
nectar of God."

Another (not one of his better students) yearns, "I hope and pray
that we will meet again."

And finally, "His students at Cornell worshiped him."

Had these been paeans to MMY made by TMers, Andrew would be
pointing to them as "proof" that we had turned him into a god.

> Foot Soldier apparently is bristling over my having posted Carl Sagan's
> comparison of TM and Aum Shinrikyio.

Oh, I doubt it. That's just one among many wild inaccuracies
packed into the excerpt you quoted.

> While there are similarities between the two groups of
> worshippers

Oops. TMers aren't "worshippers." (Although apparently Sagan's
Cornell students were.)

> and the pseudoscience they preach,

Hmm, what *are* the similarities between the TM teachings and
what is taught in Aum Shinrikyo?

> I agree there is an important difference: While Aum Shinrikyio's follow
> a guru that likes to gas people, TMers follow a guru who prefers to
> giggle.

Amazing. An accurate observation for once.

Judy Stein

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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In article <3589D6...@nasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

<snip>


> Carl Sagan was a candle of enormous brilliance and warmth. We have been
> left in a noticeably dimmer world by his passing.

Gee, Andrew, a fellow by the name of Dave Eicher seems to have
plagiarized your carefully crafted words. He is quoted on the
net as having remarked about Sagan's death, "The universe shines
a little more dimly now."

(Some skeptic's skeptic commented that this is actually a
statement of faith, since we won't know whether the universe is
in fact shining a little more dimly for a very, very long time,
on the order of hundreds of thousands if not millions of years.)

Judy Stein

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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(I'm setting followups to this thread to alt.m.t as well. I'm
doing Andrew a favor, since the denizens of sci.skeptic he so
hoped to engage have shown little interest in his attempted
trashing of TM.)

In article <3589DF...@nasw.org>,

"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

> Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
> >
> > Nope, Andrew, Carl Sagan was an apologist for the status quo, an
> > astronomer who misguidedly pronounced upon subjects far removed from his

> > field of expertise. That so many gullible souls have been taken in by
> > his rhetorical skills is a sad commentary on the lack of education in
> > those who enthuse over him. Funny how those who critique religion for
> > invading scientific territory are all too frequently those who commit
> > the same error in reverse.
>
> Well, that's your opinion and you're entitled to one. But it's a safe
> prediction that history will remember Carl Sagan as a brilliant
> scientist, communicator, and humanitarian.

Sure, it's a safe prediction, for precisely the reason Foot
Grenade states: the lack of education of Sagan's fans and their
susceptibility to personal charisma and rhetorical skills.

You, however will be long
> forgotten, who ever you are.

Not such a safe prediction, given that we *don't* know who Foot
Grenade is.

Judy Stein

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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In article <3589D6...@nasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

> The late, great scientist, mass communicator, and humanitarian Carl
> Sagan was not known to mince words whether speaking about the cosmos or
> those who offer cosmic consciousness for sale.

(Hmm, how might one "mince words" when speaking about the cosmos?
Are you saying Sagan might have phrased his criticisms of the
cosmos in more delicate terms but chose courageously to speak out
plainly against it?...Watch those empty rhetorical flourishes,
Andrew.)

Sagan was not known for getting his facts straight when writing
about anything other than science, as your excerpt amply
demonstrates.

But that doesn't matter, does it, Andrew? After all, the "truth"
is that TM is wrong, wrong, wrong. Therefore, there should be no
objection to, um, "modifying" the facts to lead one's readers to
this conclusion.

I don't think Sagan was doing intentionally what you do
deliberately, though. He just figured if he was an authority on
matters scientific (although even that has been questioned),
therefore he was qualified to speak authoritatively on everything
else as well.

He didn't *cynically* twist the facts, in other words. He was
just sloppy and arrogant.

<snip>


> Carl Sagan was a candle of enormous brilliance and warmth. We have been
> left in a noticeably dimmer world by his passing.

He was certainly a charmer and a skillful popularizer, a colorful
media icon who stood in for The Scientist in the public mind.

Whether he really contributed anything significant to science or
society (other than the memorable phrase "billions and billions
of stars" and a rather compelling fantasy about little green men
at the other end of the universe listening raptly to Bach)
remains to be seen.

On the other hand, Sagan (like another skeptical scientist, Heinz
Pagels) was an authentic mystic. From the introduction to
"Cosmos":

The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. On this
shore we've learned most of what we know. Recently, we've waded a
little way out, maybe ankle-deep, and the water seems inviting.
Some part of our being knows this is where we came from. We long to
return. And we can't, because the cosmos is also within us. We're
"made" of star stuff. We are a way that the cosmos can know itself.

The similarities with what MMY says are rather striking. Sagan
continues:

The journey for each of us begins here. We're going to explore the
cosmos in a ship of the imagination, unfettered by ordinary limits
on speed and size, drawn by the music of cosmic harmonies. It can
take us anywhere in space and time. Perfect as a snowflake, organic
as a dandelion seed, it will carry us to worlds of dreams and
worlds of facts. Come with me. (music in background)

He was frequently asked about his attitude toward religion. From
his responses, it was clear that what he so firmly disbelieved in
was only a limited subset of religion, with an anthropomorphic,
paternalistic God who dictates narrow sets of rules and
regulations, punishes those who disobey, and rewards those who
submit with eternal life. Whether he was even aware there were
other forms of spirituality isn't clear.

Sagan insisted he was an agnostic, not an atheist. Asked to
describe what sort of notion of God would not do violence to his
intellectual convictions, what he came up with--and it was
clearly something he'd thought very deeply about--bore a
startling resemblance to the Upanishads' Brahman.

He put little if any thought into his denunciation of TM. He
didn't bother to actually learn anything about it other than
consulting a few reports written by other skeptics (and
perpetuating their inaccuracies and biased distortions). TM was
no more than a rhetorical football for his knee-jerk reflex to
kick about.

If TM was led by a little bearded brown-skinned dude in sheets
and beads and flowers, why, then, it must be one of those
religions he so detested, and accordingly anything it might say
about science could not possibly be anything other than pseudo.

Robert

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:

No, Andy, I would not have killed CS for propogating nonsense. I
would have appealed to his learning capacity and offered him a library
card. I'd do the same for you, but you are still too much in Defending
the Indefensible mode.


Hello

If that isn't the pot calling the kettle black, I don't know what is.
Use your own library card. You can learn the same things that Sagan
knew. All you have to do is try.

Bruce Hutchinson

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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"Mr. Foot Grenade" <eas...@proaxis.com> scribed:

>... his magic realm


>includes brain science, neonatal neurology, dream psychology,
>atmospheric science, hypnotism, perceptics, optics, photography, radar,
>cereology, and a host of other classes of phenomena and fields of study
>which less overconfident writers would be content to study in detail and
>with an aim toward nuanced conclusions. Let a theologian or professor
>of religion attempt such a sweeping synoptic range of commentary -
>especially with the goal of discrediting - and see how far he or she
>would get among CS lovers.

It always amuses me to see this type of attack on Carl Sagan. True, he did
not hold any degrees in the subjects mentioned, but then neither do you!
So what standard level of competance do you use that qualifies you to
pronounce the writings of Carl "misguded" and "apologist for the status
quo"?

I have read the works of Sagan, and while I do not agree with him 100%, his
writings on subjects outside of his degreed expertise in astronomy,
mathematics and physics tend to be observational, rather than scholarly.
Combine that with the amount of reading he engaged in (check the
bibliography- they are extensive and filled with the best), his evident
facilities in observation, his rare ability to render complex subjects
understandable to the layman, and his obvious brilliance combine to make
Carl one of the best science writers ever.

If you want to claim that that he was in gross error in the subjects you
listed above, you are, of course free to do so. But it would be nice if
you could offer a reasoned and researched refuting of Carl's observations,
rather than a blanket condemnation devoid of any factual backing.

I, and posterity, will stack his credibilty far above empty attacks from
people like you who have absolutely no credentials what-so-ever other than
a fevered belief system that you fear is under attack.

> And with your guru, CS, you find TM an easy target. Your total
>misunderstanding of the true guru-disciple relationship is as vast as
>the Unhappy Astronomer's was. The psychology of master and sangha has
>completely eluded you. Or, if you think you have a grasp of it, your
>critiques ought to consist of rational criticism rather than the bombast
>you hurl about (for instance) the guru's photograph being in high
>evidence among disciples and in their habitats.

What you said above can be said about the critique of any religion.
However, you missed most of Carl's point by mistakenly thinking that Carl
was attacking your "guru-disciple relationship". He didn't. What he did
attack was TM's rather magical claims about passing through walls, "flying"
etc., as well as the smattering of pseudo-scientific babble to explain the
effects. But he did admit that he was perplexed by the acceptance of TM by
some well educated science types.

>And while the externals
>of any religion, whether new or old, can look absurd to a nonpracticing
>observer, the same can be said of the "disciplined practices" of
>science. They may not make sense to the untrained, but for those inside
>the discipline, they not only make sense, but are indispensable for the
>furtherance of that discipline. The same applies to the externals of
>many religions.

True, except science is based on observational facts, while religion is
based on faith. Big difference.

> No, Andy, I would not have killed CS for propogating nonsense. I
>would have appealed to his learning capacity and offered him a library
>card.

I'll stack not only the sheer volume of research and reading Carl did in
his lifetime against two of your lifetimes, but the range of subjects he
covered as well. His learning capacity was legendary. Even his detractors
in the world of hard science never doubted Carl's abilities in research,
nor his capacity to understand his subject du jour.

hutch

"Once an idea is created, it never disappears, no matter
how often it is disproved" -- as quoted by Milton Rothman

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
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Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
>
> Thanks again for the ad hominem attacks, Andrew, you do your mentor CS
> proud!
> CS abandoned science when he ventured away from astronomy into
> fields in which he had no competence whatsoever, such as psychiatry,
> psychology, theology, sociology, "ufology", mysticism, and new
> religions.

Says who? You? A computer key pecker with neither credentials or name?
While you're entitled to an opinion, it would be more appropriate if you
identified it as such instead of strutting and pontificating so.

> His "skeptical" writings show no skepticism toward his own
> deeply-held but questionable assumptions.
> If skepticism, like charity,
> ought to "begin at home", a true skeptic's views would be tempered with
> humility and a reluctance to say too much on too many subjects not in

> the skeptic's own areas of expertise. But not CS: his magic realm


> includes brain science, neonatal neurology, dream psychology,
> atmospheric science, hypnotism, perceptics, optics, photography, radar,
> cereology, and a host of other classes of phenomena and fields of study
> which less overconfident writers would be content to study in detail and
> with an aim toward nuanced conclusions. Let a theologian or professor
> of religion attempt such a sweeping synoptic range of commentary -
> especially with the goal of discrediting - and see how far he or she
> would get among CS lovers.

Your comments make little sense. "His magic realm"? What are you
talking about?

Any theologian of professor of religion who could write with Sagan's
eloquence and depth of knowledge would be well received by many fans of
Sagan's writings.

> Andy, in your seething anger at my lampooning your sacred cow, you

What *are* you talking about? Seething anger? Are you projecting?

> have likened me to a murderer - the soldier who killed Archimedes. It
> is you who have tipped your hand here. Ad hominem attacks, comparisons
> of your opponent to a murderer, are very much the tools employed by
> denizens of CSICOP, but are not methods becoming a serious student.

I said you reminded me of Archimedes and the soldier who slew him. The
world will always remember the great thinker, scientist, mathematician,
philosopher, and military engineer. The soldier, like you, will remain
unknown. That was the sole point of the comparison. If you want to call
that an ad hominem attack, go right ahead. But it's hardly more an ad
hominem attack that your vilification of Carl Sagan -- and he's not
here to defend himself.

> And with your guru, CS, you find TM an easy target.

My guru, CS? What are you babbling about? Have I ever sent him any
money? Have I ever given him flowers or carried a deerskin for him to
sit upon? Do I have even a single picture of him in my home or office?
Do I refer to him as "His Holiness" the way you refer to your guru? Did
I ever pay large sums of money to take his courses? Get yourself a
reality check.

> Your total
> misunderstanding of the true guru-disciple relationship is as vast as
> the Unhappy Astronomer's was. The psychology of master and sangha has
> completely eluded you. Or, if you think you have a grasp of it, your
> critiques ought to consist of rational criticism rather than the bombast
> you hurl about (for instance) the guru's photograph being in high

> evidence among disciples and in their habitats. And while the externals


> of any religion, whether new or old, can look absurd to a nonpracticing
> observer, the same can be said of the "disciplined practices" of
> science. They may not make sense to the untrained, but for those inside
> the discipline, they not only make sense, but are indispensable for the
> furtherance of that discipline. The same applies to the externals of
> many religions.

Thanks for your eloquent but murky defense of Aum Shinrikiyo and its
half-blind, madman leader. I should have known that the thousands who
follow Shoko Asahara can't all be wrong. I guess I didn't see it because
the "psychology of master and sangha has completely eluded me." True, I
did think that the string of murders and nerve gas attacks carried out
in Asahara's holy name looked "absurd." But your right, with the proper
"training" and "discipline," I too may see the "sense" of poisoning
thousands of innocent people with nerve gas. Thank you for opening my
eyes.

> No, Andy, I would not have killed CS for propogating nonsense. I
> would have appealed to his learning capacity and offered him a library

> card. I'd do the same for you, but you are still too much in Defending
> the Indefensible mode.

*You* would have offered *him* a library card?! What arrogance! What a
farce!
I predict that libraries will feature Sagan's writings for a long, long
time to come, Your comments on these newsgroups, however, will be blown
away like meaningless chaff.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/19/98
to

But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,
the science of knowing the contents of one's own being. This is the
function of "gnosis" in the field of spirituality - "knowing" in the
sense of enlightenment. It's not faith-based except in the exoteric
forms of religion. The inner core of religion is not faith, but inner
observation and knowing, e.g., the divine union mysticism in
Christianity, the Hassidim and Cabalists in Judaism, the Sufis in Islam
- the underground current of "the left-hand path" of Tantra is the
source of spirituality. Objections that knowing can only be directed
outward to material processes, or that knowledge comes only through
sense data, is contradicted in spirituality, which supplements the quest
for outer knowledge by offering methods by which to discover knowing of
inner processes.
Your point - that I may have no credentials by which to critique
Sagan or the fields he wrote about - if valid, equally applies to Sagan
who had no credentials - except "observational" - in subjects oustside
of his expertise.

Bruce Hutchinson

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

"Mr. Foot Grenade" <eas...@proaxis.com> scribed:

>But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,


>the science of knowing the contents of one's own being.

Well, we could get into the never-ending go-'round about your "science" of
inner-observation, but you have to agree that there is a very fundamental
difference about the observation of a physical object, and the observation
of the psychye.

(snip)

> Your point - that I may have no credentials by which to critique
>Sagan or the fields he wrote about - if valid, equally applies to Sagan
>who had no credentials - except "observational" - in subjects oustside
>of his expertise.

Well, I think you will find his "credentials" in the bibliographies
appended to his many articles and books. He might not have had a degree,
but he certainly researched the subjects throughly, and was able to discuss
the subjects accurately and intelligently.

Again- Carl was a VERY well read man, and, as a scientist, he knew full
well the dangers inherent when discussing any subject from a position of
ignorance. You obviously do not agree with some of his ideas and
conlusions. But you cannot dispute that he did his research first.

Jamie Schrumpf

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

In article <358B302A...@proaxis.com>, eas...@proaxis.com says...

>
>But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,
>the science of knowing the contents of one's own being. This is the
>function of "gnosis" in the field of spirituality - "knowing" in the
>sense of enlightenment. It's not faith-based except in the exoteric
>forms of religion. The inner core of religion is not faith, but inner
>observation and knowing, e.g., the divine union mysticism in
>Christianity, the Hassidim and Cabalists in Judaism, the Sufis in Islam
>- the underground current of "the left-hand path" of Tantra is the
>source of spirituality.

Of course, this kind of internal "observation" is indistinguishable from
hallucination, since it is impossible to independently verify. It's that kind
of "observation" that Sagan attacked in his writings.

>Objections that knowing can only be directed
>outward to material processes, or that knowledge comes only through
>sense data, is contradicted in spirituality, which supplements the quest
>for outer knowledge by offering methods by which to discover knowing of
>inner processes.

I believe that Sagan objected to "knowledge" which cannot be demonstrated -- or
as he stated in _The Demon-Haunted World_, "can you prove you know what you
know?"

> Your point - that I may have no credentials by which to critique
>Sagan or the fields he wrote about - if valid, equally applies to Sagan
>who had no credentials - except "observational" - in subjects oustside
>of his expertise.

Yes, Sagan had his moments of inaccuracy that are well-known. However, he
readily admitted to them, as evidenced by his several mea culpas in _The
Demon-Haunted World_.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jamie Schrumpf http://www.access.digex.net/~moncomm
"No physicist started out impatient with commonsense notions, eager to replace
them with some mathematical abstraction... Instead, they began, as we all do,
with comfortable, standard, commonplace notions. The trouble is that Nature
does not comply." -- Carl Sagan, _The Demon-Haunted World_


Sten Rasmussen

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 09:04:40 -0500, "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org>
wrote:

>Dear Foot,


>
>Do you know who you remind me of? Archimedes. Well, actually not
>Archimedes -- the venerated proponent of scientism -- but the Roman
>soldier who came upon Archimedes on a beach drawing a geometrical figure
>in the sand and slew the greatest genius before Isaac Newton; you know,
>the soldier, what's-his-name.

It didn't happen on a beach but inside the walls of Siracusa on Sicily. The
Roman field commander Marcellus explicitly ordered his troops to spare the life
of Archimedes when they finally made it into the the town in 212 BC. Archimedes
exclaimed when he was slain: "Don't step in my circles!" (fearless and oblivious
to the killings and looting going on around him while making drawings in the
sand) but then it was too late for the Roman soldier to undo. He was probably
executed while Archimedes got a magnificent funeral.

....circles in the sand... Pi is the square root of 10 said the Indians. Pi is
a number between 3 1/7 and 3 10/71 said Archimedes. Pi is transcendental said
Lindemann.

Sten Rasmussen,
speaking for Marcellus


Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

More tripe from Andy. I never promoted TM or the Japanese cultists. I
said that Andy has no grasp of the psychology of the master-disciple
relationship.

Andy denies that CS is his guru, but observe his defense mechanisms
kick in. CS misrepresented many of the ideas and religious expressions
which he criticised; thus I offered to give him a library card in order
that he might perform better research. Observe Andy's knee-jerk
reaction. As if CS's research could be faulted! Unthinkable! As if CS
can be taken to task for any number of fauxes pas and errors in logic!
Beyond the pale!

Anybody can read books and paraphrase their content; anybody can
"observe" second-hand and pontificate on what he has "learned"; anybody
can consult the literature of others in agreement with his own position
and parrot their ideas. In this, CS was just "anybody" and his opinions
about spiritual matters far beyond his expertise are just that -
opinions, not science. They are not based on personal observation and
experiment, but on "CS has rehashed articles from The Skeptical
Inquirer", or "CS heard about ["X": UFOs, new religions, New Age ideas,
"mysticism", you name it], and he doesn't like what he hears", or "CS
read about the crop circle 'blokes' and now he has it all explained", or
"CS saw a photo of the TM guru sitting in yogi posture, CS's kid
misidentified guru as 'God', guru says paranormal powers may be awakened
in devotees... and CS is compelled to write something unpleasant", etc.
In all this CS resembles an old minister of the Gospel preaching to
the choir. In telling his audience what they want to hear, CS indeed -
as Andy points out - has ensured his place, parochial as it will likely
turn out to be, on bookshelves, just as Billy Graham's books can be
found worldwide. The choir is admittedly a sizeable one, but widely
accepted opinion is not necessarily equivalent to truth.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
>
> But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,
> the science of knowing the contents of one's own being. This is the
> function of "gnosis" in the field of spirituality - "knowing" in the
> sense of enlightenment. It's not faith-based except in the exoteric
> forms of religion. The inner core of religion is not faith, but inner
> observation and knowing, e.g., the divine union mysticism in
> Christianity, the Hassidim and Cabalists in Judaism, the Sufis in Islam
> - the underground current of "the left-hand path" of Tantra is the
> source of spirituality. Objections that knowing can only be directed

> outward to material processes, or that knowledge comes only through
> sense data, is contradicted in spirituality, which supplements the quest
> for outer knowledge by offering methods by which to discover knowing of
> inner processes.
> Your point - that I may have no credentials by which to critique
> Sagan or the fields he wrote about - if valid, equally applies to Sagan
> who had no credentials - except "observational" - in subjects oustside
> of his expertise.

You keep missing Hutch's point and mine. Sagan's writings and opinions
were based on objective evidence -- evidence we can all check out. Yours
here are based on your own mind games. Hutch challenged you to provide
evidence for your negative opinions of Sagan and all you do is turn to
your inner "reality" for references (what I prefer to call ritualized
psychosis). Well, we just saw some works of people whose lives are
directed by such "inner observations." For example, all those people in
Nike shoes trying to hitch a ride with the UFO behind Comet Haley with
the help of booze and sleeping pills and a plastic bag over their heads.
If you had been in the Tokyo subway a while back, you could have gotten
an even better whiff of what can come of ritualized psychosis. Yet in
your previous post, you pointed out that the "psychology of master and
sangha has completely eluded me," when I condemn the insanity of cults
like Aum Shinrikiyo.

Thank the stars that it has, otherwise I might be lobbing nerve gas
Grenades at innocent subway riders or flower pedals at the Maharishi.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
>
> Thanks, Judy, for counterbalancing Andrew's idolatrous treatment of CS.
> Has Andrew compared you to the murderer of Archimedes yet?

A translation is needed here:

idolatrous treatment of Carl Sagan = not sharing Foot's contempt for the
scientist and author.

Foot apparently sees the world divided into black demons and white
gurus. His polarized mind apparently does not let him grasp how anyone
could admire and respect a man without worshiping him.

No wonder he won't use his name: If I had such disordered thoughts, I
wouldn't use my real name either.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Sten Rasmussen wrote:
>
> On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 09:04:40 -0500, "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org>
> wrote:
>
> >Dear Foot,
> >
> >Do you know who you remind me of? Archimedes. Well, actually not
> >Archimedes -- the venerated proponent of scientism -- but the Roman
> >soldier who came upon Archimedes on a beach drawing a geometrical figure
> >in the sand and slew the greatest genius before Isaac Newton; you know,
> >the soldier, what's-his-name.
>
> It didn't happen on a beach but inside the walls of Siracusa on Sicily. The
> Roman field commander Marcellus explicitly ordered his troops to spare the life
> of Archimedes when they finally made it into the the town in 212 BC. Archimedes
> exclaimed when he was slain: "Don't step in my circles!" (fearless and oblivious
> to the killings and looting going on around him while making drawings in the
> sand) but then it was too late for the Roman soldier to undo. He was probably
> executed while Archimedes got a magnificent funeral.

Which is what is metaphorically happening to Foot Soldier right here.
:-)

Love these discussions of Archimedes. Would like some references. I only
have *Isaac Asimov's Biographic Encyclopedia of Science & Technology."

> ....circles in the sand... Pi is the square root of 10 said the Indians. Pi is
> a number between 3 1/7 and 3 10/71 said Archimedes. Pi is transcendental said
> Lindemann.

My inner stomach tells me that pi tastes good, said Foot Soldier.



> Sten Rasmussen,
> speaking for Marcellus

Say hi for me,

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Really, Jamie, internal observation is indistinguishable from
hallucination? "I love you" is indistinguishable from "I love your five
heads and eighteen arms"? Buddha' Eightfold Path is indistinguishable
from Charles Manson's Helter Skelter?

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

It was for the followers of Charlie Manson.

A more accurate question would be:

"Is 'I love your *face*' indistinguishable from 'I love your five heads
and eighteen arms." (There's a vast difference between loving a person
and loving a physical feature.)

The answer depends upon what you're really asking.

Is the "internal observation (love) indistinguishable? Most likely.
There's no way that anyone can know for sure what a person is feeling
when he or she reports the feeling of love.

Is the "halucination" distinguishable from reality. Absolutely (at least
to those who believe an external reality exists and that we can learn
somethings about it). We know that no one on this planet can love
someone's five heads and eighteen arms.

Unless of course Foot has a something he would like to share with us.
(I've been wondering why he chose such an odd code name.)

Stephen Harris

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
>
> Really, Jamie, internal observation is indistinguishable from
> hallucination? "I love you" is indistinguishable from "I love your five
> heads and eighteen arms"? Buddha' Eightfold Path is indistinguishable
> from Charles Manson's Helter Skelter?

The question is not if everyday subjective experiences are valid.
Mystics enter a state they call cosmic consciousness. This is a
subjective experience. Mystics *interpret* this experience to
make a statement about the nature of objective reality. This
interpretation is questioned to have any more validity than
people believing in unicorns. There is the same amount of proof.
People who say I love you are not claiming that love makes the
world go round. People who endorse cosmic consciousness also
claim that sidhis(powers) result, such as bilocation, walking
through walls, or levitation. People are not generally aware
that these phenomena have occurred, or can occur. The burden of
proof rests upon those who make the extraordinary claim. Just
like people who claim they have been abducted by UFOs. Introspection
is commonly agreed upon. You use the word introspection in an
extended sense to describe meditative states of higher consciousness.
There is no proof that this is introspection or the result of
continuing the process of introspection. That is not scientifically
verified. It remains a claim of belief or faith, undemonstrated
for those who do wish to accept hearsay evidence. I don't challenge
that people experience such states as cosmic consciousness that
much. That is they can label such an experience. It is the meaning
attached to it, I question more. Levitation, which is physical
sidhi supposedly experienced by some meditators requires that
physical laws be undone by the mind. That connects the mind's
subjective experience to objective reality, because other people
can see someone levitate, like they can see a tree or a car.
I find no evidence that this subjective reality of cosmic consciousness
extends to objective reality except provided by hearsay from people
like yourself whether they lived 10 years or 100 years or 1000 years
ago. It doesn't make it any more credible just because the stories
have been handed down. The word hallucination refers to the imagination
and the word delusion is probably more accurate use of the imagination
function involved.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Judy Stein wrote:
>
> In article <3589D6...@nasw.org>,

> "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
>
> <snip>
> > Carl Sagan was a candle of enormous brilliance and warmth. We have been
> > left in a noticeably dimmer world by his passing.
>
> Gee, Andrew, a fellow by the name of Dave Eicher seems to have
> plagiarized your carefully crafted words. He is quoted on the
> net as having remarked about Sagan's death, "The universe shines
> a little more dimly now."

Once again, Judy supports my suggestion that clients for her editorial
services are not likely getting their money's worth. Judy here seems
unable to understand the differences between these sentences.

Who here would ever give her a plug nickle to edit their writing? Let's
see a show of tentacles.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+ Judy Stench * The Author's Fraud * jst...@anix.com +
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

In Andy's narrow little universe, inner reality means psychosis.
Apparently he's never had a thought of his own, or he has dismissed his
own thinking as psychotic. Andy's unfamiliarity with the meditative
traditions leads him to make silly statements to the effect that only
objective material is verifiable(linking this idea to the verifiability
of Carl Sagan's references).

But subjective material is verifiable by one's own inner "Witness".
The suicidal UFO cultists Andy identifies with spiritual practitioners
obviously didn't know their ass from a teakettle, and this is precisely
because they didn't know the first thing about discernment - a flaw they
certainly share with Andy, who, like Carl Sagan before him, mixes
various distinct religious categories up in a rationalist/materialist
Irish Stew. How convenient for Andy to equate UFO suicidalists with the
mainstream of spiritual traditions - note that he will not humble
himself by citing positive examples from those traditions. In this,
Andy joins the fundamentalist horde who love to take bad examples from
among their opponents and use these examples to issue blanket
condemnations. Let's duplicate Andy's Deep Thoughts here: "UFO
suicidalists came from a nonscientific new religion." Our equally
shallow response: "It wasn't religion, but science, that gave us
Hiroshima and Nagasaki." Really, Andy, thinking people will not allow
themselves to be duped by your shallow and one-sided rationalism.

You maintain that one's inner processes cannot be verified. That's
not true. They cannot be verified objectively in most cases, but they
can be verified subjectively. When Buddha said to meditate, he wasn't
proposing an article of faith. He was proposing hands-on experience.
You don't need faith to know that sugar on corn flakes will sweeten the
cereal: all you need to do is to try it. The same holds true for
spiritual practices. You don't need to take Buddha or Jesus at their
word - all you have to do is practice their words. If you find the
cereal not to be sweet, that is another issue altogether. The matter at
hand is your willingness to put your own Witness into use and to have
the courage - not the faith, because you don't need it - to explore your
inner depths.

My own discomfort with Andy's viewpoint is that taken to its logical
conclusion, his perspective will abolish the human self. If everything
needs to be objectively verifiable, then (for example) the formula
"E=mc2" becomes more valuable than the mind that produced it; cybertech
(for example) will be seen as more valuable, more real, than those who
develop and use it; and, worst of all, from Andy's point of view: the
ink, paper, and printing processes of The Demon Haunted World, The
Dragons of Eden, Cosmos, and Contact, will - because they are
objectively measurable and verifiable - be viewed as more real than the
*person* who created them. A cold, crystalline universe, Andy: and
you're welcome to it.

A sage once said, "Of what use is the illumination of the entire
world, if the self is in darkness?" But in Andy's world, the
"unverifiable" cosmos of the self is a mere phantom, the ghost in the
machine which cannot be explored and evaluated for its light or for its
darkness. Andy's world is composed of nothing but objectively
verifiable material processes. The pursuit of morality, human dignity,
freedom of thought, freedom of religion, are all foreign to Andy's
materialist framework. Let's stick to the objectively verifiable, by
all means, and leave behind the childish things of poetry, music,
devotion, love, curiosity - and all the other toys of the phantom Self.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

The ever-desparate Andy resorts to more ad hominem attacks, a barrage of
pathetic red herrings littering the bandwidth. Andy needs all and
sundry to be objectively verifiable. That's why he can never know if he
has a headache or if he's really pissed at Mr. Foot Grenade.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Good post, Stephen Harris, but I do not distinguish among subjective
experiences, that is, someone knowing they have a headache is no
different subjectively than knowing cosmic consciousness or
enlightenment. For the experiencer, his/her own enlightenment is as
valid as the experience as a headache. It's not a matter of faith, but
of experience, and as you say, the interpretation of the experiencer.
It is a matter of faith only for those who are unwilling to undergo the
discipline which purportedly leads to the experience. But of course,
this "faith" is not genuine religion - it is placebo religion wherein
the experience of the founder is substituted for having one's own
experience, i.e, "I'm not enlightened, but I believe my master is", etc.

It boils down to the fact that religious experience and scientific
knowing are both forms of inner conclusion. If the results of
scientific thinking are "out there" in terms of formulae or other
objectively verifiable things, it remains that the thinking itself is an
inner phenomenon - sometimes inspired by fantasy or dream - and so is
the agreement that the phenomenon has been verified. SOMEONE is doing
the formulating, SOMEONE is doing the agreeing. The subjective cannot
be eliminated from scientific knowing any more than it can from
religious knowing, since both fields presuppose a knower. "E=mc2" does
not stand alone and apart from the mind that conceived it, or from the
minds that perceive and verify it. Scientifically verifiable evidence
begins with an inner activity before it ends in an outer expression.

Alien abductions may be an extraordinary claim, but I do not put
(say) advaita monism in the same category. The one is a claim that
alien supertechnology is interfering in human life, while the other is
that we, as creatures of the cosmos, can come to a spiritual as well as
a physical recognition of this fact. The latter claim is naturalistic
and poses a question that needs to be asked, and proposes methods for
applying that question. The latter claim may not be true, but it is
testable in a way that purported alien abductions are not.

Lawson English

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

Jamie Schrumpf <ja...@dcd00745.NOSPAM.slip.digex.net> said:

>Of course, this kind of internal "observation" is indistinguishable from
>hallucination, since it is impossible to independently verify. It's that
kind
>of "observation" that Sagan attacked in his writings.

Actually, in the case of TM, the "thing observed" during TM isn't as
important as the process of "observation" itself. Insights gained during TM
must be validated using the same rational analysis that any other insight
must be validated by. The point of TM practice is not to gain some unique
mystical observation, but to remove stress from the nervous system that
prevents you from making more consistently valid observations, regardless
of when/how you make them or what, specifically, they are.

Presumably, long-term TM practice leads to a new state of consciousness,
but no-one is expected to endorse that state of consciousness as "good"
merely because some guru says so. That new SOE is said merely to be the
result of the removal of stress from the nervous system via the rest that
occurs during TM practice.

In TM theory, this new SOE is the natural state that any adult should have
if their nervous system is sufficiently stress-free. The aspects of this
state are perceived as "mystical" by people not in this state merely
because they are not in the state and have no experience with it. An
anology can be made to post-Piagetian states (see thread on
enlightenment-as-template in a.m.t. for more in-depth discussion), where
the person in the previous state has little-to-no understanding of what it
is like to be in the post-Piagetian state, and simply CANNOT have such an
understanding because his/her nervous system doesn't yet support the
cognitive functioning of that state.

By anology, for a young child, the insight of the older child that both the
tall, thin glass and the short, squat glass can hold the same amount of
water, makes no sense and might be viewed as "indistinguishable from
hallucination."

Likewise, some "insight" of the "enlightened" person might be held as
"indistinguishable from hallucination" because there is no way for the
"unenlightened" to "understand" the first person's POV and recognize it as
valid.

It certainly is a quandry, isn't it? What if "enlightenment" exists and is
a post-Piagetian state, as I've suggested? How would we be able to tell if
this is actually the case? What would the implications be for Science and
Society? Most importantly, what if this state is demonstrably worth
attaining AND is easy to attain for virtually all normal adults?

That last is the TM premise.

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Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Judy Stein wrote:
>
> In article <358AAF...@nasw.org>,
> "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
>
> > Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
> > >
> > > Thanks, Andy, I'd rather be forgotten than to be remembered and
> > > venerated by proponents of scientism who hold to the superstitious view
> > > that science is a tiny flickering candle in the darkness of
> > > pseudoscience and New Age barbarism. Your attitude is typical of the
> > > dutiful Saganite whose rose-tinted spectacles of piety blind him to a
> > > more objective view of the Great Pontificator.
> >
> > The Foot Soldier tips his hand here. He can't seem to see any middle
> > ground, how one can respect a man for his contribitions, his art, and
> > his humanity without worshiping the hem of his garments.
>
> Actually it's Andrew tipping his own hand here. There may be
> some few TMers who worship the hem of MMY's garments, but this is
> very distinctly frowned on; they do it entirely at their own
> behest, not because it's required or encouraged.

Yeah. Right. Only a few TMers worship the Maharishi's hem. And Judy has
some prime real estate to sell you real cheap. It's right under the
Brooklyn Bridge in New York.



> On the other hand, see the selection of quotes below from Sagan's
> followers.

Yes. We'll soon get to Judy's sordid attempt to demean a dead man.



> Neither I nor
> > any other fan of Carl Sagan ever showered him with flowers and money.
>
> Flowers are definitely part of the TM mise en scene (it's a
> cultural thing in India), but I'm not aware of anyone ever having
> showered Maharishi with money. Are you, Andrew?

Estimates in newspapers and other media put the Maharishi's empire as
worth more than $3 billion. O.K. he's not Bill Gates.

Oh, BTW, worshiping gurus are "a cultural thing in India."

> On the other hand, donations are being actively solicited for the
> Carl Sagan Memorial Fund, and the Mars Pathfinder Lander has been
> renamed The Dr. Carl Sagan Memorial Station.

Judy, how much of this money is Dr. Sagan going to get? How much Judy?
You really are a low-life for trying to equate the millions and millions
of dollars that go into Maharishi's empire each year with the modest
donations made to projects named after a deceased scientist. It is
customary to name moon features and astronomical objects after deceased
scientists. While you and your fellow worshipers of Maharishi put "His
Holiness'" picture and name on anything and everything in your movement.
(That's probably the only reason Maharishi Ayur-Veda does not market a
line of toilet paper.) You're snearing comments about the memmorials to
Carl Sagan reveal the size and temperature of your heart.



> > We don't call him "His Holiness"
>
> TMers don't call MMY "His Holiness" either (except in formal
> contexts, as I've pointed out to Andrew before). If you read the
> archives of the newsgroup, you'll find virtually the only people
> who use "His Holiness" to refer to MMY are the anti-TMers like
> Andrew.

If you read the movement's copious literature you will see "His
Holiness" all over the place. Judy's right that TMers don't use "His
Holiness" on a.m.t. Its use in front of the unconverted is discouraged.

> > or put icons of him up on nearly ever vertical surface
>
> Vast exaggeration, and they aren't "icons" in the sense of
> religious images any more than the images of the sitting
> president in the offices of congresspersons are icons.

Vast exaggeration? Not icons? Yeah, right. Here comes Judy with her
deeds to the land below the Brooklyn Bridge. Funny, but the last time I
saw a picture of a U.S. president in any federal office, it didn't have
an aura around the president's head and he wasn't identified as "His
Holiness, the President."

Now here it comes, Judy at her slimiest:


Judy, slinking lower than usual (but somehow miraculously still able to
reach her key board), equates the expressions of loss that followed the
too-early death of a great scientist, teacher, and author, with the
mindless cult-like devotion that devout TMers show daily towards -- in
their words -- "His Holiness, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi."

To see how absurd this devotion gets, read Ned Wynn's hilarious account
(in *We Will Always Live in Beverely Hills*) of how he and other TMers
vied for the exalted honor of carrying the Maharihisi's deer skin ass
cloth for the Yogi to sit upon.

Judy Stein's attempt to equate the *daily* and bizarre devotion to gurus
like the Maharishi and Shoko Asahara with the memorials that followed
the passing of a noted scientist, teacher, and author is one of the
sleaziest things she has attempted in a long, inglorious history of
sleazy posts. Compare the naming of the Mars Pathfinder Lander with
vying for the honor of carrying a deer skin cloth for the Maharishi's
bottom. Pretty sickening.

Judy refers to Sagan's colleagues, friends, students, family, and public
as his "followers," "devotees," and "worshipers." By doing so, Judy
Stein attempts to denigrate the sincere expressions of respect and loss
that these people felt. In so doing, she denigrates Carl Sagan and the
many contributions he made.

Why is she doing this? Because Carl Sagan dared to call Transcendental
Mediation "pseudoscience" and he dared to compare Maharishi's followers
with members of the Aum Shinrikiyo cult. Judy will persistently
visciously attack anyone who criticizes her guru or his teachings. She
apparently feels that this is her purpose in the Cosmos.

Lawson English

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Mr. Foot Grenade <eas...@proaxis.com> said:

>Good post, Stephen Harris, but I do not distinguish among subjective
>experiences, that is, someone knowing they have a headache is no
>different subjectively than knowing cosmic consciousness or
>enlightenment. For the experiencer, his/her own enlightenment is as
>valid as the experience as a headache. It's not a matter of faith, but
>of experience, and as you say, the interpretation of the experiencer.
>It is a matter of faith only for those who are unwilling to undergo the
>discipline which purportedly leads to the experience.

But it is quite possible for someone to believe that they are in a higher
state of consciousness when in fact they are not. While it may be possible
to distinguish between higher states and dellusional states based on
physiological measures, the most practical way of dealing with this issue
is to simply not worry about it.

If you're enlightened, great. If not, great. Regardless, the only way you
have of dealing witht he world is to perform actions that are as rational
as you can make them. If you are delusional, you can't act any better than
you can decide to act. Ditto, if you are enlightened. That being the case,
why worry about it?

But of course,
>this "faith" is not genuine religion - it is placebo religion wherein
>the experience of the founder is substituted for having one's own
>experience, i.e, "I'm not enlightened, but I believe my master is", etc.
>

How sweet of you to decide what is genuine and what isn't. In Yoga, one of
the paths to enlightenment is "bhakti" or devotion. While that isn't the
path that TMers generally take, the fact is that many people in all
cultures and religions are considered to have attained "enlightened" merely
via their faith in their guru/God/whatever. Presumably, one could attain
enlightenment via worship of Satan, but the behaviors expected of such a
practice would probably preclude them from ever attaining the state.

Love is a powerful force in the human psyche, even if it isn't easily
quantifiable.

> It boils down to the fact that religious experience and scientific
>knowing are both forms of inner conclusion. If the results of
>scientific thinking are "out there" in terms of formulae or other
>objectively verifiable things, it remains that the thinking itself is an
>inner phenomenon - sometimes inspired by fantasy or dream - and so is
>the agreement that the phenomenon has been verified. SOMEONE is doing
>the formulating, SOMEONE is doing the agreeing. The subjective cannot
>be eliminated from scientific knowing any more than it can from
>religious knowing, since both fields presuppose a knower. "E=mc2" does
>not stand alone and apart from the mind that conceived it, or from the
>minds that perceive and verify it. Scientifically verifiable evidence
>begins with an inner activity before it ends in an outer expression.
>
> Alien abductions may be an extraordinary claim, but I do not put
>(say) advaita monism in the same category. The one is a claim that
>alien supertechnology is interfering in human life, while the other is
>that we, as creatures of the cosmos, can come to a spiritual as well as
>a physical recognition of this fact. The latter claim is naturalistic
>and poses a question that needs to be asked, and proposes methods for
>applying that question. The latter claim may not be true, but it is
>testable in a way that purported alien abductions are not.
>

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Lawson English

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Andrew A. Skolnick <asko...@nasw.org> said:

>Yet in
>your previous post, you pointed out that the "psychology of master and
>sangha has completely eluded me," when I condemn the insanity of cults
>like Aum Shinrikiyo.
>

Actually, I believe that he was referring to the common practice amongst TM
teachers of displaying pictures of MMY on walls and coffee tables. Of
course, I suspect that you knew this.

>Thank the stars that it has, otherwise I might be lobbing nerve gas
>Grenades at innocent subway riders or flower pedals at the Maharishi.

And yet, for the vast majority of TMers, MMY is NOT their "master" and they
do not lob flower "pedals" at them. BTW, the only person that I've ever
seen do that was Brihaspati Dev Triguna, former head of the All-India
Ayurveda Congress, Honorary Traditional Physician to the President of
India, and one of the co-authors of the JAMA article that you blasted as
not being about Ayurveda. He is NOT a disciple of MMY by any stretch of the
imagination, and in fact, the signficance of the flower petals in this
instance is that according to legend, the Hindu gods throw them at the feet
of heros when they have done something signficantly heroic.

For B.D. Triguna (that non-Ayurvedic writer, according to you), whose
family has likely practiced Ayurveda in India since before the Common Era,
MMY's establishment of Ayurvedic centers in virtually every country in the
world may have seemed "heroic," although I can understand why you might
disagree with him.

Afterall, you discredited everything that Triguna asserted was Ayurvedic in
his JAMA article by claiming that they were merely commercial products and
services offered by MMY's organization, so anything that such a man as
Triguna might say or believe about issues pertaining to Ayurveda must
necessarily be invalid.

[Of course, the fact that the Indian government recently awarded Triguna
with the Padma Bushan (the highest civilian award given by the Indian
federal government to non-Prime Ministers) for his 50 years work in
Ayurveda, merely establishes the Indian government as a non-authority on
the subject of Ayurveda, right?]

Lawson English

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Stephen Harris <mulc...@pacbell.net> said:

>Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
>>
>> Really, Jamie, internal observation is indistinguishable from
>> hallucination? "I love you" is indistinguishable from "I love your five
>> heads and eighteen arms"? Buddha' Eightfold Path is indistinguishable
>> from Charles Manson's Helter Skelter?
>
>The question is not if everyday subjective experiences are valid.
>Mystics enter a state they call cosmic consciousness.

Actually, James (?) referred to it as "cosmic consciosness," but used the
term as a catch-all phrase for any mystical state.

TM terminology reserves Cosmic Consciousness for one of the states of
consciousness identified in Yoga where the pure consciousness state found
during the practice of meditation (or falling asleep) has been made a
permanent part of your reality (hence cosmic) even during waking, sleeping
or dreaming.

This is a
>subjective experience. Mystics *interpret* this experience to
>make a statement about the nature of objective reality.

True. But that is true of all sensory perception, also. More people have
common sensory perception than common mystical states, and hence have
agreed to the commonality of the nature of reality based on these commonly
experienced perceptions.

This
>interpretation is questioned to have any more validity than
>people believing in unicorns.

Why?

> There is the same amount of proof.

There is EXACTLY the same ammount of proof that you are reading this
article. It's a matter of common experience establishing a commonly
accepted Nature.

>People who say I love you are not claiming that love makes the
>world go round. People who endorse cosmic consciousness also
>claim that sidhis(powers) result,


Depends. CC in TM parlance can entirely be explained in neuro-physiological
terms. HIGHER stages might require the existence of paranormal (siddhis
"powers") but existence of a state of consciousness where the person always
(aside, perhaps from unconsciousness resulting from drugs or injury) has a
self-aware mental component doesn't require the existence of the
paranormal.

> such as bilocation,

Frowned upon in Yoga since this is obviously NOT a unifying experience and
all of Yoga is directed towards Unity


walking
>through walls, or levitation.

Held to be natural phenomenon that can occur when one achieves a specific
state of consciousness.

> People are not generally aware
>that these phenomena have occurred, or can occur. The burden of
>proof rests upon those who make the extraordinary claim.

Certainly. However, in the case of TM, the practice of the sidhis
techniques (e.g. levitation) is done in order to promote the growth towards
a "higher" state, and not specifically to gain the power inherent in that
sidhi (siddhi means "perfection" and refers to the perfection of the
connection between consciousness and matter in a specific channel or
modality of expression of consciousness -recall that consciousness creates
matter in Vedic Cosmology).

Just
>like people who claim they have been abducted by UFOs. Introspection
>is commonly agreed upon. You use the word introspection in an
>extended sense to describe meditative states of higher consciousness.

So?

>There is no proof that this is introspection or the result of
>continuing the process of introspection. That is not scientifically
>verified.

Who says? There have been hundreds of studies published in peer review
journals on the practice of TM alone, not to mention many hundreds more
that haven't made it into the journals.

It remains a claim of belief or faith, undemonstrated
>for those who do wish to accept hearsay evidence. I don't challenge
>that people experience such states as cosmic consciousness that
>much. That is they can label such an experience. It is the meaning
>attached to it, I question more.

Of course.

Levitation, which is physical
>sidhi supposedly experienced by some meditators requires that
>physical laws be undone by the mind.

Or that physical laws have aspects that are not yet completely understood
that the mind can activate.

That connects the mind's
>subjective experience to objective reality, because other people
>can see someone levitate, like they can see a tree or a car.
>I find no evidence that this subjective reality of cosmic consciousness
>extends to objective reality except provided by hearsay from people
>like yourself whether they lived 10 years or 100 years or 1000 years
>ago. It doesn't make it any more credible just because the stories
>have been handed down. The word hallucination refers to the imagination
>and the word delusion is probably more accurate use of the imagination
>function involved.
>

I've practiced the TM levitation technique for 14 years. I've never claimed
to have levitated nor to have seen anyone levitate. I know people who claim
to have levitated and/or to have seen someone levitate. I don't distrust
them, but merely their judgement in this case.

That neither invalidates the practice of levitation (in order to promote
the growth towards higher states of consciousness) nor the possibility that
someone might actually be able to levitate. PErsonally, I find the practice
to be mildy entertaining, but nothing to write home about. If I ever find
myself actually PERFORMING it, I might or might not change my attitude
towards it.

Your understanding of the purpose of the TM-Sidhis Program is quite lacking
and your objections to it and everything else TM appears to be based on
some quite erroneous assumptions.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Wrong, wrong, wrong. What all your fuzziheaded thinking prevents you
from grasping is that I know when I have a headache. What I cannot know
is whether you're heaving a headache.

You and your fuzzy arguments are giving me a headache. But you'll have
to take my word for this, because there's no way for you to know whether
I am really getting one.

However, if I told you that I am having an out of body experience, that
right now I'm right hovering above you in your room, I would obviously
be deluded (or making it up.) No matter how real the feeling may seem to
me, trust me, I'm not hovering above you.

To your mindset, my hovering above you would be just as real as is the
image on my computer screen. I'll side with Carl Sagan in dismissing
such views as either delusional of fuzzyheaded.

Lawson English

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Andrew A. Skolnick <asko...@nospamnasw.org> said:

>> Actually it's Andrew tipping his own hand here. There may be
>> some few TMers who worship the hem of MMY's garments, but this is
>> very distinctly frowned on; they do it entirely at their own
>> behest, not because it's required or encouraged.
>
>Yeah. Right. Only a few TMers worship the Maharishi's hem. And Judy has
>some prime real estate to sell you real cheap. It's right under the
>Brooklyn Bridge in New York.
>

Andrew, roughly 1% of the adult population of the USA learned TM in the
last 40 years. Most don't practice it with any degree of regularity, if at
all, but even among those who do, MMY isn't all that important.

Think about it: of the 2+ million people who learned TM in this country,
less than 10,000 live in any kind of TM-associated community. I'd venture
to guess that more than 1/2 of all the True-Blue Guruite TMers live in
those communitiies, so that makes 20,000 True-Bluers out of 2 million
possibles. That's at most1%, which is a rather small minority, wouldn't you
agree?

Stephen Harris

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Lawson English wrote:
>
> Stephen Harris <mulc...@pacbell.net> said:

> This is a
> >subjective experience. Mystics *interpret* this experience to
> >make a statement about the nature of objective reality.
>
> True. But that is true of all sensory perception, also. More people have
> common sensory perception than common mystical states, and hence have
> agreed to the commonality of the nature of reality based on these commonly
> experienced perceptions.

You are not able to see the difference between percieving a stone
which you can pick up and throw and some insight about reality
which does not depend upon an external perception. They register
in the mind. They are hardly in the same category. It is not sensory
perception -- external input to internal mind reading.
>
Try reading some Clifford Geertz.


> Just
> >like people who claim they have been abducted by UFOs. Introspection
> >is commonly agreed upon. You use the word introspection in an
> >extended sense to describe meditative states of higher consciousness.
>
> So?
>
> >There is no proof that this is introspection or the result of
> >continuing the process of introspection. That is not scientifically
> >verified.
>
> Who says? There have been hundreds of studies published in peer review
> journals on the practice of TM alone, not to mention many hundreds more
> that haven't made it into the journals.

Because nobody has claimed self-realization yet. Therefore any claim
will be short of something scientifically tested. Your statement is
about alpha states or something. Nobody knows what brain state is
attached to Cosmic Consciousness. Nobody in TM claims it.
>

> That connects the mind's
> >subjective experience to objective reality, because other people
> >can see someone levitate, like they can see a tree or a car.
> >I find no evidence that this subjective reality of cosmic consciousness
> >extends to objective reality except provided by hearsay from people
> >like yourself whether they lived 10 years or 100 years or 1000 years
> >ago. It doesn't make it any more credible just because the stories
> >have been handed down. The word hallucination refers to the imagination
> >and the word delusion is probably more accurate use of the imagination
> >function involved.
> >
>
> I've practiced the TM levitation technique for 14 years. I've never claimed
> to have levitated nor to have seen anyone levitate. I know people who claim
> to have levitated and/or to have seen someone levitate. I don't distrust
> them, but merely their judgement in this case.
>
> That neither invalidates the practice of levitation (in order to promote
> the growth towards higher states of consciousness) nor the possibility that
> someone might actually be able to levitate. PErsonally, I find the practice
> to be mildy entertaining, but nothing to write home about. If I ever find
> myself actually PERFORMING it, I might or might not change my attitude
> towards it.

You might or might not. Sounds to be a skeptical observation to me.


>
> Your understanding of the purpose of the TM-Sidhis Program is quite lacking
> and your objections to it and everything else TM appears to be based on
> some quite erroneous assumptions.
>

I have already gone over this half a dozen times with Judy.
My statement has been about the claim that levitation can
be manifested--that it is real. And I say it is not generally
known. I never bring up the question about motivation to practice
TM-Sidhis. I speak about what the observation of such a sidhi as
levitation says about the physical world. I do not say the TM
practice does not make you feel good. The statements you and Judy
make about always address imaginary positions you think I hold.

However, since you have irritated by doing this once again, I will
address some TM issues. TM and MMY claim to have recovered some lost
techniques that accelerate self-realization. Originally the claim
was 5 years. Now after 20 years, nobody including MMY has claimed
to have attained this Cosmic Cosnciousness permanently. Except some
Dr. which you TMers are skeptical of. And that Dr. hasn't shown
any physical sidhis. Something that would verify his claim.

The benefits of meditation are taught by other approaches. What is
supposed to make TM better is the accleration of self-realization.
There is no evidence of this. Such a claim by TM remains unproven.
Since the original claim was 5 years, there is already evidence of
a fraudulent claim having been made. So MMY re-evaluated his position
on this. If he could not get it right on his first guess, how does
that strengthen his other guesses.

So what you have is a commercial enterprise that sells you mantras
which are free and charges an exhorbinant amount of money for a
meditation technique that has not been shown to be any more effective
than a standard meditation technique that can be obtained at a
1/10 or less of the cost of TM. There is no reason to buy TM when
other methods just as effective as TM has shown to be are available.
The only reason you can endorse TM over some other yoga is that it
mitigates a feeling that would arise of being a kingsize sucker by
spending a lot more money than you needed to.

This does not even get into the issue of whether any yoga system
actually accomplishes self-realization. Going from reducing stress
to self-realization is just another untested theory at this point.
TM was just started in MMY's lifetime. And he has already proven
that he does not know the full details of the lost techniques he has
supposedly rediscovered. What makes him special compared to the other
gurus; that MMY had the special talent for rediscovering these lost
techniques. Nothing. He has proven quite adept at making 3 billion $.

Stephen Harris

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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> Alien abductions may be an extraordinary claim, but I do not put
> (say) advaita monism in the same category. The one is a claim that
> alien supertechnology is interfering in human life, while the other is
> that we, as creatures of the cosmos, can come to a spiritual as well as
> a physical recognition of this fact. The latter claim is naturalistic
> and poses a question that needs to be asked, and proposes methods for
> applying that question. The latter claim may not be true, but it is
> testable in a way that purported alien abductions are not.

How is it testable. Not by claims because UFO abductees make claims.

You can test gravity by dropping a pillow on somebody's head.
One cannot test an idea having a consequence for someone else
just by an idea. A physical action is required.

Cosmic Consciousness claim the development of physical sidhis
as a result of meditation. One supposedly, by mind alone can
levitate a pillow or someone's head and then release it.

This is the category of mind over matter which is contray to science.
In science you think up an idea and then build it. A by-product for
some people which has nothing to do with their motivation for
practicing meditation is physical sidhis. Manifestation without
the physical intermediary process that science uses. Demonstrations
of physical sidhis are in short supply. Science uses predictable
responses, everybody sees cars operate. Part of your position that
I snipped dealt with subjective experiences. Most people are going
to differentiate between schizophrenia and sanity thought they both
arise in the mind. One is called real the other imaginary. That extends
to what is personally real that is shared with other people called
collective reality. People who say they can fly have to prove it.

Cosmic Consciousness makes a claim for physical sidhis.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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You're right, Lawson, I *am* sweet.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Then we agree on one basic, Andy. If you know you have a headache
that's subjective knowing. Of course I don't know if you have a
headache, at least until headaches become measurable events. However,
without opening another can of worms, there is some *anecdotal* (I know,
I know) evidence for out of body experiences not derived from insanity
or hallucination. But real spirituality - although it may incorporate
out of the body experiences as steps along the way - is about knowing
oneself to be more than the ego, as part of deity or of the cosmos,
etc. This is not dependent on violations of the "laws of science" such
as walking through walls is. It is a question of acquiring one's own
birthright. As Joseph Campbell pointed out, the myths are not about
Jesus or Odysseus or Buddha - the myths are about us. As long as we
figure in such symbolic narratives, our quest will be inner as well as
outer, whether or not objectively verifiable or not.

Bruce Hutchinson

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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"Mr. Foot Grenade" <eas...@proaxis.com> scribed:

> Andy denies that CS is his guru, but observe his defense mechanisms
>kick in.

Look... NObody here has promoted Carl Sagan to "guru"... except you! We
have simply defended against your un-warranted attacks on the opinons
expressed by Carl. You could have said the same thing about Issac Asimov,
Clarke, or Jerry Pournelle, and the reaction would be the same. If you
would like to avoid a pissing match, please refrain from this kind
mis-representation.

>CS misrepresented many of the ideas and religious expressions
>which he criticised;

No he didn't. He simply expressed his OPINION. I happen to agree with
him, and I have had "relatively" close contact with TM, as both my brother
and my mother were TM instructors.

>thus I offered to give him a library card in order
>that he might perform better research.

Kinda late now. But judging from the range of topics Carl studied, I doubt
your card was missed.

>Observe Andy's knee-jerk
>reaction. As if CS's research could be faulted! Unthinkable! As if CS
>can be taken to task for any number of fauxes pas and errors in logic!
>Beyond the pale!

Talk about "Knee Jerk Reactions".... Carl expressed a opinion that he found
the TM movement more charismatic than believable- yet admitted that he was
perplexed by the acceptance of TM by some educated scientists. He even
ventured an observation that that "there must be something else going on".

You, on the other hand flew off in a snit- attacking Carl's education,
reading habits, motives....

Why didn't you simply post a polite note saying that you disagreed, and
these are the reasons why?

> Anybody can read books and paraphrase their content;

Can they? Take any graduate course book on the mathematical concepts of
Space-Time, then post here your version, explaining the concepts in laymans
language.

You really have no concept of how incredibly difficult it is to take
complex subject matter and render it understandable to the "common man".
Only a few people can do it, and Carl happened to be one of them.

(balance of rant snipped)

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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Lawson English wrote:
>
> Andrew A. Skolnick <asko...@nospamnasw.org> said:
>
> >> Actually it's Andrew tipping his own hand here. There may be
> >> some few TMers who worship the hem of MMY's garments, but this is
> >> very distinctly frowned on; they do it entirely at their own
> >> behest, not because it's required or encouraged.
> >
> >Yeah. Right. Only a few TMers worship the Maharishi's hem. And Judy has
> >some prime real estate to sell you real cheap. It's right under the
> >Brooklyn Bridge in New York.
> >
>
> Andrew, roughly 1% of the adult population of the USA learned TM in the
> last 40 years. Most don't practice it with any degree of regularity, if at
> all, but even among those who do, MMY isn't all that important.
>
> Think about it: of the 2+ million people who learned TM in this country,
> less than 10,000 live in any kind of TM-associated community. I'd venture
> to guess that more than 1/2 of all the True-Blue Guruite TMers live in
> those communitiies, so that makes 20,000 True-Bluers out of 2 million
> possibles. That's at most1%, which is a rather small minority, wouldn't you
> agree?

Still spaced out, Lawson? TMers are not people who learned TM's
meditation technique. TMers are the people who worship the ground the
Maharishi levitates over. Doing one or two things in common with a cult
or religious group does not make that person part of the cult or group.
The fact that I colored Easter eggs as a kid does not make me a
Christian.

The term TMer is commonly used to describe those who are working their
sore-from-bouncing butts off trying to bring about their guru's "Heaven
on Earth." Those are the people we were talking about.

Judy Stein

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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In article <358b41f9...@news.cris.com>,
bhu...@nospamcris.com (Bruce Hutchinson) wrote:

> "Mr. Foot Grenade" <eas...@proaxis.com> scribed:
>

> >But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,
> >the science of knowing the contents of one's own being.
>

> Well, we could get into the never-ending go-'round about your "science" of
> inner-observation, but you have to agree that there is a very fundamental
> difference about the observation of a physical object, and the observation
> of the psychye.

Bruce, do you have vivid fantasy experiences while you're asleep?

Prove it.

The point: dreaming is an example of an "inner-observation"
phenomenon science accepts as "real" (the phenomenon, not the
content of the dreams) without question.

Why? Because there's a very broad consensus that it occurs. And
the "means" to achieve dreaming are pretty standardized: turn off
the light, lie down, close the eyes...

Also there are certain objectively measurable parameters the
changes in which are very highly correlated with subjective
reports.

Granted, the science of inner observation is not yet advanced
enough for there to be a broad consensus about subjective
phenomena other than dreaming.

But given that science does not pooh-pooh the existence of
dreaming simply because it can't be put on a table and measured
by different people who then agree their measurements match,
there's no reason to reject *in principle* the possibility of a
science of inner observation.

Again with the exception of dreaming, inner phenomena have been
pretty much ignored by science ("hard" science, at least) because
there has not been a highly systematized methodology for
producing them. This is where TM could be extremely useful in
developing a science of the subjective, since it *is* a highly
systematized methodology.

Science tends to have a blind spot about the "scientific method,"
thinking it can *only* be employed on an empirical basis.

But in fact the basic principles of the scientific method can be
applied to other modalities of knowing than empirical
observation. As outlined by Ken Wilber, they are (1)
instrumental injunction (if you want to know *this*, do *that*);
(2) apprehension of data according to (1); and (3) communal
verification of results among others who have taken the first two
steps.

These steps can be applied with regard to empirical inquiry,
intellectual inquiry, and transcendental ("religious" or
spiritual) inquiry. Empirical inquiry is obviously the easiest
and least complicated, but the other two are by no means
impossible in principle.

<snip>
> Well, I think you will find [Sagan's] "credentials" in the bibliographies
> appended to his many articles and books. He might not have had a degree,
> but he certainly researched the subjects throughly, and was able to discuss
> the subjects accurately and intelligently.

He certainly failed to do so in the case of TM, however. And as
I pointed out in another post, his comments on religion appear to
have been based on his knowledge of only a very limited subset of
spiritual systems. I've also read remarks of his on astrology
that were based on not only a very limited but an incorrect
understanding of what astrology involves and what it claims.
(Not that there aren't very solid objections to astrology; but
they can't be made by someone who hasn't studied it thoroughly.)

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+ Judy Stein * The Author's Friend * jst...@panix.com +
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Judy Stein

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
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In article <358B2F...@nasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

> Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
<snip>
> > And with your guru, CS, you find TM an easy target.
>
> My guru, CS? What are you babbling about? Have I ever sent him any
> money?

What TMers send MMY money, Andrew?

> Have I ever given him flowers

What's your problem with flowers, Andrew? They're a cultural
thingie.

> or carried a deerskin for him to sit upon?

If Sagan had required a certain kind of cushion to relieve a bad
back, you can be damn sure there would have been flunkies
carrying it around from appearance to appearance to ensure his
comfort.

> Do I have even a single picture of him in my home or office?

Congresspersons always have a picture of the sitting president in
their offices. Given the plethora of effusive tributes to Sagan
on the Web, I'd be very surprised if at least some of his fans
didn't have his picture in a place of honor.

> Do I refer to him as "His Holiness" the way you refer to your guru?

As noted, if you check the archives of alt.m.t, you'll find that
virtually nobody but anti-TMers refer to MMY as "His Holiness."
That title is used only in formal contexts. I'd venture to
suggest, however, that large numbers of devotees of Sagan
addressed and referred to him as "Dr." or "Professor" Sagan in
other than formal contexts.

> Did I ever pay large sums of money to take his courses?

Maybe you didn't, but lots of others have.

> Get yourself a reality check.

You're projecting again, Andrew.

> > Your total
> > misunderstanding of the true guru-disciple relationship is as vast as
> > the Unhappy Astronomer's was. The psychology of master and sangha has
> > completely eluded you. Or, if you think you have a grasp of it, your
> > critiques ought to consist of rational criticism rather than the bombast
> > you hurl about (for instance) the guru's photograph being in high
> > evidence among disciples and in their habitats. And while the externals
> > of any religion, whether new or old, can look absurd to a nonpracticing
> > observer, the same can be said of the "disciplined practices" of
> > science. They may not make sense to the untrained, but for those inside
> > the discipline, they not only make sense, but are indispensable for the
> > furtherance of that discipline. The same applies to the externals of
> > many religions.
>
> Thanks for your eloquent but murky defense of Aum Shinrikiyo and its
> half-blind, madman leader.

Notice once again Andrew's calculated attempt at misdirection,
since he was completely unable to respond to the point Foot
Grenade was making.

Judy Stein

unread,
Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

In article <358BD2...@nasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
<snip>

> You keep missing Hutch's point and mine. Sagan's writings and opinions
> were based on objective evidence -- evidence we can all check out.

Good lord, Andrew. No, they were not, not by a long shot. Some
were, some were not. His beliefs about the nonexistence of an
afterlife, for instance, were not based on objective evidence
anyone can check out (at least not until they die, that is). His
take on religion generally is not based on objective evidence.
And see another post of mine quoting a review of his last book,
"Billions and Billions," for a whole buncha his opinions that
were not based on objective evidence.

Judy Stein

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

In article <358BDF...@nasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
<snip>
> Foot apparently sees the world divided into black demons and white
> gurus. His polarized mind apparently does not let him grasp how anyone
> could admire and respect a man without worshiping him.

Andrew's projecting again...

Judy Stein

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Jun 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/20/98
to

In article <358C1D...@nospamnasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

> Judy Stein wrote:
> > In article <358AAF...@nasw.org>,
> > "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

<snip>


> > > The Foot Soldier tips his hand here. He can't seem to see any middle
> > > ground, how one can respect a man for his contribitions, his art, and
> > > his humanity without worshiping the hem of his garments.
> >
> > Actually it's Andrew tipping his own hand here. There may be
> > some few TMers who worship the hem of MMY's garments, but this is
> > very distinctly frowned on; they do it entirely at their own
> > behest, not because it's required or encouraged.
>
> Yeah. Right. Only a few TMers worship the Maharishi's hem. And Judy has
> some prime real estate to sell you real cheap. It's right under the
> Brooklyn Bridge in New York.

I say again, only a few TMers worship the Maharishi's hem (or
even Maharishi himself). The "prime real estate" gambit has
become Andrew's mantra when he doesn't have a meaningful
comeback.

> > On the other hand, see the selection of quotes below from Sagan's
> > followers.
>
> Yes. We'll soon get to Judy's sordid attempt to demean a dead man.

Wow. "Demeaning a dead man"?? Where did Andrew come up with
*that*?

> > Neither I nor
> > > any other fan of Carl Sagan ever showered him with flowers and money.
> >
> > Flowers are definitely part of the TM mise en scene (it's a
> > cultural thing in India), but I'm not aware of anyone ever having
> > showered Maharishi with money. Are you, Andrew?
>
> Estimates in newspapers and other media put the Maharishi's empire as
> worth more than $3 billion. O.K. he's not Bill Gates.

Actually he's a lot more like Bill Gates than a guru whose
followers shower him with money. The vast majority of the
movement's "empire" comes from fees paid for courses and other
products and services. A small part of it comes from donations,
but they're made to fund movement projects; they don't get
"showered on Maharishi."

This is such a good example of the way Andrew likes to twist
words to give an impression contrary to fact.

> Oh, BTW, worshiping gurus are "a cultural thing in India."

(*Is* a cultural thing.) Yes, it is. Fortunately TM hasn't
adopted that custom.

> > On the other hand, donations are being actively solicited for the
> > Carl Sagan Memorial Fund, and the Mars Pathfinder Lander has been
> > renamed The Dr. Carl Sagan Memorial Station.
>
> Judy, how much of this money is Dr. Sagan going to get? How much Judy?

Andrew, how much of the $3 billion does Maharishi get? How much,
Andrew?

Thanks for making my point. Maharishi gets enough of it to allow
him to live comfortably and pursue his responsibilities
efficiently. Carl Sagan got enough from the fees from his
lectures and books and courses and tapes to allow him to live
comfortably and pursue his responsibilities efficiently.

Maharishi doesn't get "love offerings," contrary to your
implication.

> line of toilet paper.) You're snearing comments about the memmorials to
> Carl Sagan reveal the size and temperature of your heart.

Are you hallucinating or what? I didn't "snear" [sic] at them, I
merely quoted them. The closest I came to a sneer was my
observation that the person who said she hoped to meet Sagan
again wasn't one of his better students--an obvious reference to
his lack of belief in an afterlife.

And that, if anything, was a sneer at Sagan, not at the person
who was mourning him. But it really wasn't even a sneer at
Sagan. I feel sorry for him that he felt he had to deny himself
that hope in the last months of his life. He said somewhere that
he wished he could *let himself* believe in an afterlife. What
harm would it have done when he was terminally ill?

> > TMers don't call MMY "His Holiness" either (except in formal
> > contexts, as I've pointed out to Andrew before). If you read the
> > archives of the newsgroup, you'll find virtually the only people
> > who use "His Holiness" to refer to MMY are the anti-TMers like
> > Andrew.
>
> If you read the movement's copious literature you will see "His
> Holiness" all over the place. Judy's right that TMers don't use "His
> Holiness" on a.m.t. Its use in front of the unconverted is discouraged.

Read my lips: TMers don't use the phrase except in formal
contexts, such as in movement literature. We do not use it among
ourselves. I have *never*, not in 23 years, heard a TMer refer
to MMY as "His Holiness" unless s/he was delivering a speech at a
formal presentation.

And think a minute; you've just contradicted yourself again. You
note, correctly, that TM uses the phrase on its promotional
literature--literature that is aimed right smack at the general
public (the "uncoverted").

> > > or put icons of him up on nearly ever vertical surface
> >
> > Vast exaggeration, and they aren't "icons" in the sense of
> > religious images any more than the images of the sitting
> > president in the offices of congresspersons are icons.
>
> Vast exaggeration? Not icons? Yeah, right. Here comes Judy with her
> deeds to the land below the Brooklyn Bridge.

Yes, it's a vast exaggeration, and no, they aren't icons. Too
bad you don't have a more convincing comeback, Andrew.

I had a picture up on my wall of Eldridge Cleaver for many years
in my semiradical days (even named my beloved cat after him).
Didn't mean I *worshipped* him, for pete's sake! (I had the
famous nude centerfold of Burt Reynolds up for a while too. That
may have been closer to an icon, come to think of it.)

Funny, but the last time I
> saw a picture of a U.S. president in any federal office, it didn't have
> an aura around the president's head and he wasn't identified as "His
> Holiness, the President."

Er, no, "His Holiness" isn't the president's title last time I
checked, and I don't see any aura around MMY's head in his
pictures.

> Now here it comes, Judy at her slimiest:

(I'm snipping a hundred lines or so of comments from Sagan's
mourners that Andrew quoted but made no comment on. Even though
readers have now seen them twice, Andrew will undoubtedly claim
I'm trying to hide what I put in the post by snipping what he
quoted.)

> > And finally, "His students at Cornell worshiped him."
> >
> > Had these been paeans to MMY made by TMers, Andrew would be
> > pointing to them as "proof" that we had turned him into a god.
>
> Judy, slinking lower than usual (but somehow miraculously still able to
> reach her key board), equates the expressions of loss that followed the
> too-early death of a great scientist, teacher, and author, with the
> mindless cult-like devotion that devout TMers show daily towards -- in
> their words -- "His Holiness, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi."

You got my point, Andrew, but you seem to have turned it around
180 degrees. Here it is the right way up: The expressions of
loss are no more mindless cult-like devotion to Sagan than are
TMers' feelings about Maharishi.

The fact that you don't like Maharishi and you did like Sagan
doesn't make TMers' feelings about MMY mindless cultlike devotion
and Saganites' feelings about Sagan somehow more respectable.
They're the same feelings. What *you* feel about MMY and Sagan
doesn't affect what others feel about them.

And once again, "His Holiness" is not how we refer to MMY except
in formal contexts.

> To see how absurd this devotion gets, read Ned Wynn's hilarious account
> (in *We Will Always Live in Beverely Hills*) of how he and other TMers
> vied for the exalted honor of carrying the Maharihisi's deer skin ass
> cloth for the Yogi to sit upon.

As I believe I suggested, there are a *few* TMers who go bananas.
The rest of us tend to roll our eyes at them, just like Ned Wynn
does.

> Judy Stein's attempt to equate the *daily* and bizarre devotion to gurus
> like the Maharishi

Excuse me, Andrew, but could you give us some evidence of this
"daily and bizarre devotion" you believe TMers exhibit? You
know, evidence that we can go see for ourselves?

> and Shoko Asahara

Andrew just can't resist the cheap shot.

with the memorials that followed
> the passing of a noted scientist, teacher, and author is one of the
> sleaziest things she has attempted in a long, inglorious history of
> sleazy posts.

Andrew would try to portray the Virgin Mary as sleazy if he
thought it would serve his agenda.

Compare the naming of the Mars Pathfinder Lander with
> vying for the honor of carrying a deer skin cloth for the Maharishi's
> bottom.

I beg your pardon? *You* brought up the deer skin, Andrew, I
never mentioned it. You really ought to get your hallucinations
checked out.

> Judy refers to Sagan's colleagues, friends, students, family, and public
> as his "followers," "devotees," and "worshipers." By doing so, Judy
> Stein attempts to denigrate the sincere expressions of respect and loss
> that these people felt. In so doing, she denigrates Carl Sagan and the
> many contributions he made.

Hysterical. That's how Andrew referred to TMers, of course,
carefully characterizing Sagan's followers as "fans." I switched
the terminology around, and now Andrew's freaking out. It's
perfectly OK for him to denigrate TMers, but if you point out
that there is very little difference between TMers and Saganites
in terms of how they express their respect for someone they
consider a great man, look out!

And *I* didn't refer to Sagan's devotees as "worshippers." One
of his devotees did; I just quoted him. Shoot that messenger,
Andrew!

> Why is she doing this? Because Carl Sagan dared to call Transcendental
> Mediation "pseudoscience" and he dared to compare Maharishi's followers
> with members of the Aum Shinrikiyo cult.

No, actually if you check the context, I'm doing this in response
to your post suggesting that TMers get all goofy over Maharishi
whereas Sagan's followers *do not* get all goofy over Sagan.

Obviously, they do. And TMers *will* undoubtedly get all goofy
over Maharishi when *he* dies. But with rare exceptions (and I'm
sure there were a few during Sagan's lifetime as well), TMers do
not get all goofy over MMY *now*.

My response to Sagan's thoughtless characterizations of TM is in
a separate category and has been made in other posts.

Andrew, I'm denigrating neither Sagan nor his followers here.
I'm denigrating *you*.

Judy will persistently
> visciously attack anyone who criticizes her guru or his teachings.

I guess I should be persistently and "visciously" [sic] attacking
myself, then, since I've done my share of criticizing MMY and his
teachings. Andrew never fails to manage to block this out of his
mind completely. And he must have missed the recent post where I
praised Bob Brigante's Web page criticizing the movement and
recommended that folks go check it out.

> She apparently feels that this is her purpose in the Cosmos.

(But Andrew, of course, doesn't feel it's his purpose in the
Cosmos to persistently and "visciously" [sic] attack TMers. It's
just something he does as a hobby, for fun. Like the "difficult
and time-consuming" investigation he's doing of my resume.)

I haven't attacked Sagan, Andrew, except with regard to the
sloppiness of his musings on TM. Again, I'm hardly the only
person to have criticized him for venturing into areas in which
he wasn't qualified to comment (see the quote from the book
review in another post, just for one example).

Just for the record: there are *many* things that can be
legitimately criticized about the movement and Maharishi and
Vedic Science and the whole ball of wax. But before one can make
*legitimate* criticisms, one has to (a) know what one's talking
about (which Sagan obviously did not) and (b) be honest and
fairminded. Andrew doesn't qualify on either count.

Jamie Schrumpf

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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In article <358BEE14...@proaxis.com>, eas...@proaxis.com says...

>
>Really, Jamie, internal observation is indistinguishable from
>hallucination? "I love you" is indistinguishable from "I love your five
>heads and eighteen arms"? Buddha' Eightfold Path is indistinguishable
>from Charles Manson's Helter Skelter?

Once you've made an external statement, it does become independently
verifiable. And in fact, "I love you" is very different from "I love your five
heads and eighteen arms," if only because "you" is not "your five heads," etc.

If you're going to define "internal observation" so loosely as to include love
and philosophy, you will indeed have difficulties determining what is reality.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jamie Schrumpf http://www.access.digex.net/~moncomm
"No physicist started out impatient with commonsense notions, eager to replace
them with some mathematical abstraction... Instead, they began, as we all do,
with comfortable, standard, commonplace notions. The trouble is that Nature
does not comply." -- Carl Sagan, _The Demon-Haunted World_


Bruce Hutchinson

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
to

jst...@panix.com (Judy Stein) scribed:

>In article <358b41f9...@news.cris.com>,
>bhu...@nospamcris.com (Bruce Hutchinson) wrote:
>
>> "Mr. Foot Grenade" <eas...@proaxis.com> scribed:
>>
>> >But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,
>> >the science of knowing the contents of one's own being.
>>
>> Well, we could get into the never-ending go-'round about your "science" of
>> inner-observation, but you have to agree that there is a very fundamental
>> difference about the observation of a physical object, and the observation
>> of the psychye.
>
>Bruce, do you have vivid fantasy experiences while you're asleep?
>
>Prove it.
>
>The point: dreaming is an example of an "inner-observation"
>phenomenon science accepts as "real" (the phenomenon, not the
>content of the dreams) without question.

It is ALSO an emperical observation, as anyone with a college psych course
can tell you. It is the _interpretation_ that that can be questioned, as
no two analysts will totaly agree.

To classify dreaming as directly justifying your "inner-observation" claims
is a fallicious argument.

>Granted, the science of inner observation is not yet advanced
>enough for there to be a broad consensus about subjective
>phenomena other than dreaming.

So very true. So why do you claim otherwise? (see below)

>But given that science does not pooh-pooh the existence of
>dreaming simply because it can't be put on a table and measured
>by different people who then agree their measurements match,
>there's no reason to reject *in principle* the possibility of a
>science of inner observation.

Here again- you are blurring the question. There is No Doubt that dreams
occur. As you implied, it is the Interpretation that can't be quantified.
Don't blurr the two together.

>Again with the exception of dreaming, inner phenomena have been
>pretty much ignored by science ("hard" science, at least) because
>there has not been a highly systematized methodology for
>producing them.

That's not what other's claim. Check out the claims made by Freudians,
Buddhists, Hindus, Jungians, Timothy Leary, etc,etc.

Of course- not one of them agrees with another. (...surprise! :)

>This is where TM could be extremely useful in
>developing a science of the subjective, since it *is* a highly
>systematized methodology.

Given my last statement, don't you think it just a tad presumptive to claim
that TM has not only all the answers, but the only correct ones?

By the way- what do you call the extensive work done in the past 50 years
in the fields of psychiatry and psychology?

>Science tends to have a blind spot about the "scientific method,"
>thinking it can *only* be employed on an empirical basis.

I'm sure theoroetical phsysicists, psychologists, and the many other
scientists who deal with the "what if" realms of science might want to take
issue with that blanket condemation.

>But in fact the basic principles of the scientific method can be
>applied to other modalities of knowing than empirical
>observation. As outlined by Ken Wilber, they are (1)
>instrumental injunction (if you want to know *this*, do *that*);
>(2) apprehension of data according to (1); and (3) communal
>verification of results among others who have taken the first two
>steps.
>
>These steps can be applied with regard to empirical inquiry,
>intellectual inquiry, and transcendental ("religious" or
>spiritual) inquiry. Empirical inquiry is obviously the easiest
>and least complicated, but the other two are by no means
>impossible in principle.

Yes they are, because of (1). Scientists that deal with the "what if"
scenarios are _always_ well grounded in observational facts and/or solid
theory. The mistake that you and many others make is that you continually
use an unproven or unverifiable idea or theory as a starting point, then
try to use scientific analysis to extend that line of "inquiry". It is a
lot like using division by zero to prove a mathematical therom.

><snip>
>> Well, I think you will find [Sagan's] "credentials" in the bibliographies
>> appended to his many articles and books. He might not have had a degree,
>> but he certainly researched the subjects throughly, and was able to discuss
>> the subjects accurately and intelligently.
>
>He certainly failed to do so in the case of TM, however.

That is purely your opinon. I found his brief comments quite accurate,
based on my experiences. You didn't. (...shug)

>And as
>I pointed out in another post, his comments on religion appear to
>have been based on his knowledge of only a very limited subset of
>spiritual systems. I've also read remarks of his on astrology
>that were based on not only a very limited but an incorrect
>understanding of what astrology involves and what it claims.
>(Not that there aren't very solid objections to astrology; but
>they can't be made by someone who hasn't studied it thoroughly.)

Bottom line- Carl didn't appreciate, endorse, or approve of TM.
Therefore, according to you, this proves he did not bother to do any
research, nor did he attempt to try and understand TM. Same goes for
astrology.

Right?

Do you have any idea how incredibly conceited, ignorant, and
holier-than-thou a statement that is? Just because someone does not agree
with you does NOT imply that they failed to research it. Your presumptous
statement is the same one everyone uses- whether it is TM, Scientology,
Shamanism, Christianity, Amway Distributors, VooDoo, Paranormalists,
Satanism, est, Witchcraft, Astrology, Psychics, Dowsers, UFOers, Flat
Earthers, etc., etc- they ALL make the same plea... and use the same
fallicious arguments.

Why don't you all sort this out among yourselves, then get back to us?

Lawson English

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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Andrew A. Skolnick <asko...@nospamnasw.org> said:

>Still spaced out, Lawson? TMers are not people who learned TM's
>meditation technique. TMers are the people who worship the ground the
>Maharishi levitates over. Doing one or two things in common with a cult
>or religious group does not make that person part of the cult or group.
>The fact that I colored Easter eggs as a kid does not make me a
>Christian.
>
>The term TMer is commonly used to describe those who are working their
>sore-from-bouncing butts off trying to bring about their guru's "Heaven
>on Earth." Those are the people we were talking about.
>

Actually, amongst TMers, the term describes anyone who learned the official
TM technique and still practices it.

Interesting how you define OUR term to fit YOUR bigotry.

My son's mom practices TM maybe once a month, if that, in order to fall
asleep easier. That's hardly the best way to do it, IMHO, but that still
makes her a TMer. She could give a SHIT about MMY.

My son practices TM twice-daily, and has once-a-month contact with a TM
checker for 15-20 minutes in order to have his meditation checked. He has
NO interest in the theory behind the practice, as far as I can tell, and
yet he is ever bit a "TMer" as the TM teacher who taught him. He's
expressed no interest in learning more about TM or MMY or anything related,
but he's still a "TMer."

Amongst us TMers, the derogatory term is usually "Bliss Ninny." The
townspeople of Fairfield, Iowa, where the TM university is, refer to TMers
as "roos," because they follow the guRU.

Here's a bit of graffiti found on a restroom wall in Fairfield:

Q: How is TM different than a cult?
A: A cult is better organized.

We make fun of *ourselves*, Andrew.

The founder of the TM university, R. Keith Wallace, PhD, once commented
about the first Yogic Flying Competition, held in Washington, DC:

"Who would have thought that the goffiest thing that we could possibly have
done would have produced the best publicity that the TM Movement has seen
in years?"


Your extreme bias against all things TM makes you very suspect as a judge
of what is good, bad or indifferent about the TM organization or its
practices and techniques. Most people notice this about you within an
article or two. It is interesting that you STILL are obsessed with the TM
organization, years after the lawsuit was dismissed.

Have you considered therapy?

Lawson English

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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Bruce Hutchinson <bhu...@nospamcris.com> said:

>
>It is ALSO an emperical observation, as anyone with a college psych course
>can tell you. It is the _interpretation_ that that can be questioned, as
>no two analysts will totaly agree.
>
>To classify dreaming as directly justifying your "inner-observation"
claims
>is a fallicious argument.
>

Meditation (specifically TM) often has observable correlates that suggest
that it might induce a major SOE in some practitioners. The
*interpretation* of this state is open to debate, but if the reported
correlates are valid, then the state exists and likely has SOME
significance.

Lawson English

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
to

Judy Stein <jst...@panix.com> said:
> > "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

>
> Compare the naming of the Mars Pathfinder Lander with
>> vying for the honor of carrying a deer skin cloth for the Maharishi's
>> bottom.
>
>I beg your pardon? *You* brought up the deer skin, Andrew, I
>never mentioned it. You really ought to get your hallucinations
>checked out.

I missed this one. It's kinda insulting to all sorts of people for Andrew
to say this kind of thing. The deerskin thing is very important in some
Yogic circles and is an important part of their religion. The honor is that
you get to be around the guru and do something for him on a regular basis,
or so it would be with me, NOT that you get to carry a dead animal skin.
And yes, for those who find the presence of a person that they believe is
divine/holy in some way, being selected to carry that deerskin WOULD be a
great honor, rivaling anything that Andrew might feel was important.

Different strokes for different folks, but Andrew only finds acceptable
those strokes that he deems personally worthy and can't EVER put himself in
another's shoes.

For myself, when these guru-worshiping issues arise, I always recall the
book _Hermit in My House_ (AKA _Maharishi at 433_) where it was noted that
MMY closest's friend was his host's mother because she was the only one who
didn't take him seriously. Given THAT bit of info, I try not to take MMY
too seriously either. Obviously, he doesn't.

Robert

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
to

Bruce Hutchinson wrote:
>
> "Mr. Foot Grenade" <eas...@proaxis.com> scribed:
>
> > Andy denies that CS is his guru, but observe his defense mechanisms
> >kick in.
>
> Look...

<courteous snip>

Hi Bruce

He's not on this newsgroup. Those folks are cross-posting over here
from their transc-med group.

Your reply now appears over there as well as here.

-Robert :-)

Bob Casanova

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 18:07:44 -0700, in sci.skeptic, "Mr. Foot Grenade"
<eas...@proaxis.com> wrote:

For the purpose of continuity, the preceding post:

[begin]

<Grenade>:

>Nope, Andrew, Carl Sagan was an apologist for the status quo, an
>astronomer who misguidedly pronounced upon subjects far removed from his
>field of expertise.

<Me>:

Then you should have no trouble providing a few examples, right?

[end]

>No, Bob, no examples since Andy didn't post any - just CS's meanderings
>about TM, which you can take as an example. His Demon Haunted World is
>of course the prime example, as are the Parade Magazine excerpts, The
>Dragons of Eden, Broca's Brain, his appearances on NOVA on PBS regarding
>UFO's, his interview last year on NPR's Science Friday, etc. The source
>material is there but I am no more obligated than is Andy to provide
>specifics.

A simple "Sorry, but no, I can't." would have been sufficient.

And BTW, "field of expertise" isn't *necessarily* limited to one's
area of formal schooling. Although this is usually the case, there
*are* exceptions. IMNSHO, Sagan was one of the exceptions, as was
Isaac Asimov. YMMV.


Bob Casanova

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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On Sat, 20 Jun 1998 11:20:03 -0500, in sci.skeptic, "Andrew A.
Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

<snip>

>
>Love these discussions of Archimedes. Would like some references. I only
>have *Isaac Asimov's Biographic Encyclopedia of Science & Technology."

Interesting reference here, particularly since I referenced Asimov in
another post...

I wonder if Mr. (Ms?) Grenade has the same level of respect for Asimov
(whose only "real" degree was in Biochem) as for Sagan. Asimov was
another polymath whose knowledge in a wide range of subjects actually
exceeded Sagan's, and who *also* didn't have much sympathy for fuzzy
thinking.

Any comment, Foot?

>
>> ....circles in the sand... Pi is the square root of 10 said the Indians. Pi is
>> a number between 3 1/7 and 3 10/71 said Archimedes. Pi is transcendental said
>> Lindemann.
>
>My inner stomach tells me that pi tastes good, said Foot Soldier.

<Groan...>

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
to

Bob Casanova wrote:
>
> On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 18:07:44 -0700, in sci.skeptic, "Mr. Foot Grenade"
> <eas...@proaxis.com> wrote:
>
> For the purpose of continuity, the preceding post:
>
> [begin]
>
> <Grenade>:
>
> >Nope, Andrew, Carl Sagan was an apologist for the status quo, an
> >astronomer who misguidedly pronounced upon subjects far removed from his
> >field of expertise.
>
> <Me>:
>
> Then you should have no trouble providing a few examples, right?
>
> [end]
>
> >No, Bob, no examples since Andy didn't post any - just CS's meanderings
> >about TM, which you can take as an example. His Demon Haunted World is
> >of course the prime example, as are the Parade Magazine excerpts, The
> >Dragons of Eden, Broca's Brain, his appearances on NOVA on PBS regarding
> >UFO's, his interview last year on NPR's Science Friday, etc. The source
> >material is there but I am no more obligated than is Andy to provide
> >specifics.
>
> A simple "Sorry, but no, I can't." would have been sufficient.

Mr. Foot in mouth says he won't provide any examples in which Carl Sagan
"pronounced upon subjects far removed from his field of expertise" even
though he made this claim. He says he won't give examples because I
won't. Which leaves us to wonder whether Foot in mouth is being stupid,
dishonest, or both: I did not claim that Sagan pronounced upon subjects
removed from his field of expertise. So I don't have to provide
examples.

However, I will provide an example of others who "pronounced upon
subjects removed from their field of expertise": Louis Pasteur, was a
chemist, not a physician. As a chemist, he became famous for his
discovery that tartrate crystals occur in two slightly asymetrical forms
and that each form polarizes light differently. He then went on to,
among other things, develop vaccines for rabies and antrax and other
diseases of humans and animals; invent the process of Pasteurization,
which has saved countless lives; explain the process of fermentation and
saved the wine and beer makers enormous losses due to lactic acid
producing microorganisms; disprove the theory of "spontaneous
generation," and saved the French silk industry from ruin from a
silkworm parasite. Did I leave anything out? Oh, yes, discovered and
proved the germ theory of disease -- what Isaac Asimov and others have
called the "the greatest medical discovery of all times." The nerve of
that man to pronounce upon subjects removed from his field of expertise!

(As a matter of fact, during Pasteur's life, there were more than a few
Foots who tried to kick him for "pronouncing upon subjects removed from
his field of expertise." The gripes of those little men were drowned out
by the loud acclaim that followed Pasteur's brilliant experiments and
accomplishments.)

> And BTW, "field of expertise" isn't *necessarily* limited to one's
> area of formal schooling. Although this is usually the case, there
> *are* exceptions. IMNSHO, Sagan was one of the exceptions, as was
> Isaac Asimov. YMMV.

--Andrew Skolnick http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick

Judy Stein

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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In article <B1B228E...@206.165.43.104>,
"Lawson English" <eng...@primenet.com> wrote:

> Judy Stein <jst...@panix.com> said:
> > > "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
> >
> > Compare the naming of the Mars Pathfinder Lander with
> >> vying for the honor of carrying a deer skin cloth for the Maharishi's
> >> bottom.
> >
> >I beg your pardon? *You* brought up the deer skin, Andrew, I
> >never mentioned it. You really ought to get your hallucinations
> >checked out.
>

> I missed this one. It's kinda insulting to all sorts of people for Andrew
> to say this kind of thing. The deerskin thing is very important in some
> Yogic circles and is an important part of their religion.

It's an important part of *Maharishi's* religion. Nobody denies
MMY is himself a deeply religious man.

The honor is that
> you get to be around the guru and do something for him on a regular basis,
> or so it would be with me, NOT that you get to carry a dead animal skin.
> And yes, for those who find the presence of a person that they believe is
> divine/holy in some way, being selected to carry that deerskin WOULD be a
> great honor, rivaling anything that Andrew might feel was important.

The fact is that "fans" of anyone who is considered exceptional
in any way, whether it be a movie star or a charismatic
politician or a prominent scientist, are very likely to vie to
assist the person in implementing something *that person* thinks
is important. It's always an honor to be in a position to
perform some useful task, no matter how lowly or even bizarre,
for a Great Person.

If you happen to believe the Great Person is *holy*, obviously
it's even more of an honor, because you're presumably serving God
as well.

But vying to be able to carry an item the Great Person thinks he
needs to sit upon does not in and of itself prove those vying for
the honor consider the person divine. If Carl Sagan had required
a doughnut cushion for his hemorrhoids (I'm not saying he had
them, it's just a hypothetical), the member of his entourage who
got to carry it around would have felt him/herself honored.

Likewise, a Jew might feel honored to be able to hand the Pope a
glass of water--because of the Pope's *status*, not because the
Jew worships him. Father Andrew Greeley, I would imagine, has
fans, who may well not be Catholics, who are thrilled to perform
small tasks for him when he appears for a TV interview, say--not
because he's a priest and therefore holy, but because he's a
popular public figure.

> Different strokes for different folks, but Andrew only finds acceptable
> those strokes that he deems personally worthy and can't EVER put himself in
> another's shoes.

Truer words were never spoken, especially the last part. This is
Andrew's biggest failing, and it is a monumental one.

Check out his article published in the newsletter of the National
Association of Science Writers (available on his Web site)
concerning his disastrous experience teaching journalism in
Shanghai. TMers' shoes aren't the only ones he can't put himself
into.

Judy Stein

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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In article <358C82...@nospamnasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

<snip>


> Still spaced out, Lawson? TMers are not people who learned TM's
> meditation technique. TMers are the people who worship the ground the
> Maharishi levitates over. Doing one or two things in common with a cult
> or religious group does not make that person part of the cult or group.
> The fact that I colored Easter eggs as a kid does not make me a
> Christian.
>
> The term TMer is commonly used to describe those who are working their
> sore-from-bouncing butts off trying to bring about their guru's "Heaven
> on Earth." Those are the people we were talking about.

Huh. Learn something new every day. I and everyone else I know
about use "TMer" to mean "someone who practices TM." Now we find
it means only those who practice TM *and* the TM-Sidhis *and* who
work for the movement.

Oh, yes, and who worship Maharishi.

Now, having conveniently redefined the term from its common usage
for four decades, Andrew can declare, without fear of
contradiction, "TMers worship Maharishi."

(And Andrew criticizes *TMers* for twisting the meanings of
words...)

Judy Stein

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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In article <358c9988...@news.cris.com>,
bhu...@nospamcris.com (Bruce Hutchinson) wrote:

> jst...@panix.com (Judy Stein) scribed:
>
> >In article <358b41f9...@news.cris.com>,
> >bhu...@nospamcris.com (Bruce Hutchinson) wrote:

<snip>


> >> Well, we could get into the never-ending go-'round about
> >> your "science" of inner-observation, but you have to agree that
> >> there is a very fundamental difference about the observation of a
> >> physical object, and the observation of the psychye.
> >
> >Bruce, do you have vivid fantasy experiences while you're asleep?
> >
> >Prove it.
> >
> >The point: dreaming is an example of an "inner-observation"
> >phenomenon science accepts as "real" (the phenomenon, not the
> >content of the dreams) without question.
>
> It is ALSO an emperical observation, as anyone with a college psych course
> can tell you.

No, it is not an empirical observation. Empirical observations
can be made of the changes in various neurophysiological
parameters (as I went on to note), such as brain waves and muscle
tone; empirical observations can be made of rapid eye movement.

No empirical observations can be made of the inner experience of
the person dreaming. However, since the empirical observations
that *can* be made correlate very highly with *subjective
reports* of dreaming--we can predict with a high degree of
accuracy, in other words, what someone will report they were
experiencing when awakened after those specific changes appear on
the instruments--we *assume* there is a real internal phenomenon
taking place.

There could be other explanations for those observed
correlations, but science doesn't feel it needs to entertain
them or rule them out.

It is the _interpretation_ that that can be questioned, as
> no two analysts will totaly agree.

Right. I'm not talking about interpretation here, either of the
nature of dreaming or of the content of dreams.

> To classify dreaming as directly justifying your
> "inner-observation" claims is a fallicious argument.

You're missing my point. I'm saying that science accepts the
fact that dreaming occurs even though it cannot directly observe
the internal phenomenon. I never said dreaming "directly
justifies" anything *except* the possibility of scientifically
investigating inner states that cannot be observed empirically.

One of the reasons science has no trouble accepting that dreaming
is a real phenomenon is that very large numbers of people report
that they dream, whether or not they've been hooked up to a lot
of measuring instruments. Most of the scientists who study
dreaming undoubtedly also dream. Even before the correlations
were made of subjective reports with empirical measurements, I
don't think many scientists doubted that dreaming was a real
phenomenon, because they experienced it themselves.

> >Granted, the science of inner observation is not yet advanced
> >enough for there to be a broad consensus about subjective
> >phenomena other than dreaming.
>
> So very true. So why do you claim otherwise? (see below)

Um, I didn't claim otherwise. Where do you think I did??

> >But given that science does not pooh-pooh the existence of
> >dreaming simply because it can't be put on a table and measured
> >by different people who then agree their measurements match,
> >there's no reason to reject *in principle* the possibility of a
> >science of inner observation.
>
> Here again- you are blurring the question. There is No Doubt that dreams
> occur. As you implied, it is the Interpretation that can't be quantified.
> Don't blurr the two together.

I'm not blurring them, I'm taking great pains *not* to blur them.
That's why I said, with emphasis, *in principle*. I said nothing
whatsoever about interpretation.

Do you realize how much you've been reading into what I wrote?

> >Again with the exception of dreaming, inner phenomena have been
> >pretty much ignored by science ("hard" science, at least) because
> >there has not been a highly systematized methodology for
> >producing them.
>
> That's not what other's claim. Check out the claims made by Freudians,
> Buddhists, Hindus, Jungians, Timothy Leary, etc,etc.

I'm not sure what any of these folks have to do with what I'm
saying. Could you elaborate?

My point is that *science* doesn't have such a methodology
(except via drugs, if that's why you mentioned Timothy Leary, but
that isn't what I'm talking about).

> Of course- not one of them agrees with another. (...surprise! :)

Right, because the methodology is not highly systematized. You
can't begin to come to a consensus about interpretation if your
methodology and results are all over the lot.

> >This is where TM could be extremely useful in
> >developing a science of the subjective, since it *is* a highly
> >systematized methodology.
>
> Given my last statement, don't you think it just a tad presumptive to claim
> that TM has not only all the answers, but the only correct ones?

Uh, where did I claim this, please?

> By the way- what do you call the extensive work done in the past 50 years
> in the fields of psychiatry and psychology?

I don't call it exploring the production of specific inner states
via a highly systematized methodology.

> >Science tends to have a blind spot about the "scientific method,"
> >thinking it can *only* be employed on an empirical basis.
>
> I'm sure theoroetical phsysicists, psychologists, and the many other
> scientists who deal with the "what if" realms of science might want to take
> issue with that blanket condemation.

Scientists who deal with "what if" realms are quite clear that
they're speculating.

> >But in fact the basic principles of the scientific method can be
> >applied to other modalities of knowing than empirical
> >observation. As outlined by Ken Wilber, they are (1)
> >instrumental injunction (if you want to know *this*, do *that*);
> >(2) apprehension of data according to (1); and (3) communal
> >verification of results among others who have taken the first two
> >steps.
> >
> >These steps can be applied with regard to empirical inquiry,
> >intellectual inquiry, and transcendental ("religious" or
> >spiritual) inquiry. Empirical inquiry is obviously the easiest
> >and least complicated, but the other two are by no means
> >impossible in principle.
>
> Yes they are, because of (1). Scientists that deal with the "what if"
> scenarios are _always_ well grounded in observational facts and/or solid
> theory. The mistake that you and many others make is that you continually
> use an unproven or unverifiable idea or theory as a starting point, then
> try to use scientific analysis to extend that line of "inquiry".

You're not making any sense here. Here's an example of the sort
of instrumental injunction I'm talking about:

If you want to know whether it is possible for human beings to
experience consciousness itself without an object (i.e, devoid of
mental activity), sit easily, close the eyes, [and follow the
rest of the instructions for TM].

Or: If you want to know whether human beings have vivid fantasy
experiences while they sleep, turn out the light, lie down, close
the eyes, and relax.

Here's an empirical example: If you want to know whether heavy
objects fall at the same speed as light ones, go to the top of a
tower and drop a heavy and a light object over the edge.

At the time Galileo performed his famous experiment, most people
assumed light objects would fall *more slowly* than heavy ones.

I don't know whether what Galileo thought prior to his
experiment, but I'll bet he suspected the objects would fall at
the same rate.

Most people don't think it's possible to experience consciousness
by itself without an object. But you can't tell whether this is
the case or not unless you perform experiments employing
instrumental injunctions, apprehension of data, and communal
confirmation of results using a statistically significant sample
of people.

If it *were* possible, this would be a useful bit of information
for those studying the nature of consciousness. It's always
valuable to know about a *simple* state of something that is
ordinarily quite complex.

Of course, there's a question as to whether those who report
experiencing consciousness without an object are describing their
experience accurately. Is it *really* devoid of any objects, or
is it just a very quiet state where mental activity is so subtle
as to be unnoticeable? But that's something that could be
explored further. And in any case, again being able to produce
even a state where mental activity is unnoticeable would be
useful for research purposes on how consciousness operates when
there is noticeable activity.

I'm not talking about anything more elaborate than this, for
starters. There are lots of different possibilities for
expansion.

Also, it isn't either proven or verifiable that people have vivid
fantasy experiences while they're asleep. There's an excellent
case to be made that they do, certainly, because so many people
report it and because those reports can be correlated with
empirical observations.

But the folks who first undertook to *make* those observations
and derive those correlations did not do so on the basis of
"observational facts." They did so on the basis of widespread
reports (and personal experience) of an internal phenomenon.

<snip>
> >> [Sagan] certainly researched the subjects throughly, and was

> >> able to discuss the subjects accurately and intelligently.
> >
> >He certainly failed to do so in the case of TM, however.
>
> That is purely your opinon. I found his brief comments quite accurate,
> based on my experiences. You didn't. (...shug)

Don't know what your experiences were, but see my analysis of the
Sagan quote in another post.

> >And as
> >I pointed out in another post, his comments on religion appear to
> >have been based on his knowledge of only a very limited subset of
> >spiritual systems. I've also read remarks of his on astrology
> >that were based on not only a very limited but an incorrect
> >understanding of what astrology involves and what it claims.
> >(Not that there aren't very solid objections to astrology; but
> >they can't be made by someone who hasn't studied it thoroughly.)
>
> Bottom line- Carl didn't appreciate, endorse, or approve of TM.
> Therefore, according to you, this proves he did not bother to do any
> research, nor did he attempt to try and understand TM. Same goes for
> astrology.
>
> Right?
>
> Do you have any idea how incredibly conceited, ignorant, and
> holier-than-thou a statement that is?

Yes, it's incredibly conceited, ignorant, and holier-than-thou.
However, if you'll notice, I didn't make it. You made it up and
put it in my mouth.

In fact, I indicated pretty clearly that this was *not* what I
was saying; see the parenthetical at the end of the quote from my
post above. The same applies to TM. There are solid objections
to be made to it, but you have to be well acquainted with TM to
know what they are.

I have other reasons to support my contention that Sagan did
little (not "no") research and made little effort to try to
understand TM. Same with astrology.

Just for example, in the case of astrology: From what I've seen,
Sagan based his argument against astrology on the fact that the
planets do not have any significant physical effects on human
beings, and there is no evidence that any other kinds of effects
exist, therefore the planets cannot be said to cause events and
behaviors.

But most astrologers, these days anyway, don't make that claim.
They believe there is an *acausal correlation* (Jung's
"synchronicity") between planetary positions and circumstances on
earth.

Now, there are excellent arguments to be made against the
correlation idea as well, but Sagan doesn't make them (that I'm
aware of). His argument is essentially a straw man. Perhaps not
incidentally, his argument is a lot easier to make than the
argument questioning correlation.

Just because someone does not agree
> with you does NOT imply that they failed to research it.

Absolutely right. Nor did I suggest this was the case. However,
when they make inaccurate factual statements about it, this
*does* imply their research was limited.

Your presumptous
> statement is the same one everyone uses- whether it is TM, Scientology,
> Shamanism, Christianity, Amway Distributors, VooDoo, Paranormalists,
> Satanism, est, Witchcraft, Astrology, Psychics, Dowsers, UFOers, Flat
> Earthers, etc., etc- they ALL make the same plea... and use the same
> fallicious arguments.

Remember this is a statement and a plea and an argument *you*
manufactured and put in my mouth, not anything I said.

If you're going to continue this discussion, please try to avoid
this sort of thing. It really doesn't make for very intelligent
conversation.

Judy Stein

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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In article <358d519f...@news.clark.net>,
nos...@buzz.off (Bob Casanova) wrote:

> On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 18:07:44 -0700, in sci.skeptic, "Mr. Foot Grenade"
> <eas...@proaxis.com> wrote:

<snip>


> >No, Bob, no examples since Andy didn't post any - just CS's meanderings
> >about TM, which you can take as an example. His Demon Haunted World is
> >of course the prime example, as are the Parade Magazine excerpts, The
> >Dragons of Eden, Broca's Brain, his appearances on NOVA on PBS regarding
> >UFO's, his interview last year on NPR's Science Friday, etc. The source
> >material is there but I am no more obligated than is Andy to provide
> >specifics.
>
> A simple "Sorry, but no, I can't." would have been sufficient.

(Actually I believe what Foot Grenade said was, "No, I won't.")

Last night I posted excerpts from a review of Sagan's last book
that gave several examples. Did it not get out onto the net?

Briefly, the review mentioned the following: Sagan's espousal of
"nuclear winter" and "the triune brain," his wildly alarmist
predictions about the consequences of the Persian Gulf oil fires
(which scared a friend of mine just about silly), the "remote
cosmic justice" of white-skinned people being more prone to skin
cancer, and the notion that the US and Russia were equally
culpable in the cold war.

I would add his arguments against astrology and, of course, his
ill-informed denunciation of TM (see another post of mine for a
close analysis).

On the other hand, the reviewer's last paragraph is one of the
best-put tributes to Sagan I've seen:

Carl Sagan was interesting even when he was wrong, and even those
who disagreed with him were compelled to recognize his formidable
intelligence and intellectual curiosity. He provided a
much-needed voice for science, and a living rebuke to the many
scientists who regard public understanding of their work as a
secondary or impossible mission. Future popularizers of science
will be hard-pressed to match his eloquence and range.

I have no quarrel with this whatsoever. He was also (at least in
his public persona) just downright *charming*, an absolute
delight to listen to.

One might even say he had an "odd charisma." <evil grin>

Judy Stein

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Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
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In article <358BFB...@nospamnasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

> Judy Stein wrote:
> >
> > In article <3589D6...@nasw.org>,


> > "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

> > <snip>
> > > Carl Sagan was a candle of enormous brilliance and warmth. We have been
> > > left in a noticeably dimmer world by his passing.
> >
> > Gee, Andrew, a fellow by the name of Dave Eicher seems to have
> > plagiarized your carefully crafted words. He is quoted on the
> > net as having remarked about Sagan's death, "The universe shines
> > a little more dimly now."
>
> Once again, Judy supports my suggestion that clients for her editorial
> services are not likely getting their money's worth. Judy here seems
> unable to understand the differences between these sentences.

What Judy is pointing out here is the distinct similarity of the
ideas expressed.

"Every English dictionary I have seen defines plagiarism as the
stealing of words OR IDEAS [emphasis added] of others and passing
them off as one's own," writes Andrew in an article on his Web
page ("Goldfish Out of Water," published in the newsletter of the
National Association of Science Writers).

Perhaps Andrew wants to declare the differences in wording more
important than the similarity of the ideas because it wasn't
Eicher who plagiarized Andrew...

As Andrew went on to note in the above-cited article:

"I pointed out that it's close to impossible to prove theft of
ideas unless words also are stolen."

Just change "universe" to "world," rephrase the sentence so you
can use "noticeably dimmer" rather than "a little more dimly,"
omit the word "shines," make a few other adjustments, and there
you are. Nobody can prove a thing!

I don't think Andrew *really* plagiarized Eicher, however. The
idea that the world or universe is left dimmer by the death of a
Great Person is a well-worn cliche. I just thought I'd twit him
a bit.

Mainly, I was looking for an excuse to cite the amusing comment
that followed in my post--that if the universe had indeed grown
dimmer, we wouldn't know about it for a very long time.

> Who here would ever give her a plug nickle to edit their writing?

(That would be "plugged nickel.")

Lawson English

unread,
Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
to

Stephen Harris <mulc...@pacbell.net> said:

>Lawson English wrote:
>>
>> Stephen Harris <mulc...@pacbell.net> said:
>
>> This is a
>> >subjective experience. Mystics *interpret* this experience to
>> >make a statement about the nature of objective reality.
>>
>> True. But that is true of all sensory perception, also. More people have
>> common sensory perception than common mystical states, and hence have
>> agreed to the commonality of the nature of reality based on these
>commonly
>> experienced perceptions.
>
>You are not able to see the difference between percieving a stone
>which you can pick up and throw and some insight about reality
>which does not depend upon an external perception. They register
>in the mind. They are hardly in the same category. It is not sensory
>perception -- external input to internal mind reading.
>>

That tall, thin glass holds just as much water as the short, fat one.

What do you mean that you don't trust what I said?

Here, I'll show you.

What do you mean, you still don't trust what I did?

I'll show you again.

What do you mean, you still don't trust what I did?

I'll show you again...

What do you mean, you still don't trust what I did?

[verifiable reaction of young child to older child's demonstration that
volume can be conserved between tall and short containers]

Please explain to me the difference between the mystic in an hypothetical
post-Piagetian state, trying to explain the insights inherent in being in
such a state to the normal adult and the older child demonstrating to the
younger child that the short glass holds just as much water as the tall
glass?

Answer: you can't.

There may or may not be such a post-Piagetian state, but you can't prove to
me or anyone else that there isn't, based on claims of sensoral proof. The
older child DOES furnish the younger child with such sensoral proof but it
is rejected, out-of-hand.

Likewise, the adult rejects, out-of-hand, the claims of the mystic that he
has sensoral proof that the entire world is comprised of "Self."


As the Vedic aphorism goes: "Knowledge is structure in consciousness."

You're literally not going to be able to "get it" unless you are in the
"right" state. Now, this doesn't prove that such a state exists, but it
DOES indicate why you simply WON'T "get it," if the state DOES exist.

Wayne Fellows

unread,
Jun 21, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/21/98
to

> But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,
> the science of knowing the contents of one's own being. This is the
> function of "gnosis" in the field of spirituality - "knowing" in the
> sense of enlightenment. It's not faith-based except in the exoteric

No it's not. Religion is based on organized make-believe.

DrSagan11

unread,
Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

>Judy Stein's attempt to equate the *daily* and bizarre devotion to gurus
>like the Maharishi and Shoko Asahara with the memorials that followed

>the passing of a noted scientist, teacher, and author is one of the
>sleaziest things she has attempted in a long, inglorious history of
>sleazy posts. Compare the naming of the Mars Pathfinder Lander with

>vying for the honor of carrying a deer skin cloth for the Maharishi's
>bottom. Pretty sickening.

>
>Judy refers to Sagan's colleagues, friends, students, family, and public
>as his "followers," "devotees," and "worshipers." By doing so, Judy
>Stein attempts to denigrate the sincere expressions of respect and loss

Amen, what a load of crap, judy! Why don't you just leave the mourners of Sagan
alone. Your pathetic projection of your feeling towards mmy toward people who
admire Carl is very sad. Carl Sagan was no Guru, he was simply a very
intelligent and compassionate scientist who spoke wonderful of his love of
science.Judy, what did mmy contribute to our understanding of the universe? Not
a damn thing!

Dan

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

>Well, that's your opinion and you're entitled to one. But it's a safe
>prediction that history will remember Carl Sagan as a brilliant
>scientist, communicator, and humanitarian. You, however will be long
>forgotten, who ever you are.

Carl who?

Dan

Andrew A. Skolnick

unread,
Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Judy Stein wrote:

> Truer words were never spoken, especially the last part. This is
> Andrew's biggest failing, and it is a monumental one.
>

> Check out his article published in the newsletter of the National


> Association of Science Writers (available on his Web site)
> concerning his disastrous experience teaching journalism in
> Shanghai. TMers' shoes aren't the only ones he can't put himself
> into.

That's at http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm

So now Judy, liar extraordinare, speaks up in defense of students who
cheat, lie, and plagiarize. Why am I not surprised that Judy's crooked
feet would find the shoes of cheaters and liars a comfortable fit?

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+ Judy Stein * The Cheater's Friend * jst...@penix.com +
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

As for my "disastrous experience teaching journalism in China," one of
the approximately 50 students I taught proved himself to be courageous,
honest, bright, and eager to learn. Tom, his adopted English name, had
both the courage and knowledge to stand up to his classmates and
challenge their dogmatic beliefs and the Communist party line. The
following year, I helped to get him into Stamford University, where he
is now a graduate student studying journalism and mass communications.
Tom plans to return to China after his studies here. When he does, I
believe he will become a leader in helping to establish a freer, more
responsible press. (The press in China is already taking some first
steps towards exposing corruption and making the government more
responsible. It's got a long way to go and it will need the help of
young journalists like Tom.) "Disastrous experience"? Every teacher I've
spoken to says that finding just one rare student like Tom to help is
what teaching is all about.

Lawson English

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Andrew A. Skolnick <asko...@nospamnasw.org> said:

>Judy Stein wrote:
>
>> Truer words were never spoken, especially the last part. This is
>> Andrew's biggest failing, and it is a monumental one.
>>
>> Check out his article published in the newsletter of the National
>> Association of Science Writers (available on his Web site)
>> concerning his disastrous experience teaching journalism in
>> Shanghai. TMers' shoes aren't the only ones he can't put himself
>> into.
>
>That's at http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm
>
>So now Judy, liar extraordinare, speaks up in defense of students who
>cheat, lie, and plagiarize. Why am I not surprised that Judy's crooked
>feet would find the shoes of cheaters and liars a comfortable fit?

Welcome to the wonderful world of foreign cultures.

You were told repeatedly that it was NOT a sin for these things to occur in
the setting in which they occured and still persist on judging the people
as though they were Western students. You can't go into another culture and
expect everyone to conform to YOUR ideas.

Now, if they came to the USA and behaved as you described, thigns would be
different, but as described, you were on THEIR turf, and the old adage
applies: "When in Rome..."

TIMOTHY GUEGUEN

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Judy Stein (jst...@panix.com) wrote:
: In article <358B2F...@nasw.org>,
: "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

: > Mr. Foot Grenade wrote:
: <snip>
: > > And with your guru, CS, you find TM an easy target.
: >
: > My guru, CS? What are you babbling about? Have I ever sent him any
: > money?

: What TMers send MMY money, Andrew?

Given that the Maharishi is in charge of a organisation supposedly worth
3 billion dollars its pretty obvious someone is giving him large sums of
money.

tim gueguen 101867

Lawson English

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

TIMOTHY GUEGUEN <ad...@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca> said:

>: What TMers send MMY money, Andrew?
>Given that the Maharishi is in charge of a organisation supposedly worth
>3 billion dollars its pretty obvious someone is giving him large sums of
>money.


???

Really? That doesn't follow.

Steve Jobs is in charge of an organization worth $3 billion, also. Up until
January, he was not compensated monetarily in any way for his tenure as
"Interum" CEO of Apple Computer.

There are other reasons besides money for someone to decided to work long
hours, you know.

Jason Mathews

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Judy Stein wrote in message ...

>Sure, it's a safe prediction, for precisely the reason Foot
>Grenade states: the lack of education of Sagan's fans and their
>susceptibility to personal charisma and rhetorical skills.


WordWarrior mode: ON

And your substantiation for this is?

sci.skeptic added.

--
Desktop Mercenary |AKA Mind Control Officer #171, Rabid Jo-Boy,
xi...@swbell.net |SKEP-TI-CULTIST Usenet Hacker, AntiAstroClone,
|and writer of text/plain ISO-8859-1 viruses.
First Prophet of the Paranoid Network Intruder Ministries
#81-17642-003 of the mighty SKEP-TI-CULT

Judy Stein

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

In article <B1B34E8...@208.253.45.113>,
"Wayne Fellows" <wfellows@*stop_spam*earthlink.net> wrote:

Ah, another supremely well-informed skeptic heard from...

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Judy Stein

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

In article <6mlsn6$1lb$3...@missing.its.to>,
ad...@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca (TIMOTHY GUEGUEN) wrote:

> Judy Stein (jst...@panix.com) wrote:
> : In article <358B2F...@nasw.org>,
> : "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:

<snip>


> : > My guru, CS? What are you babbling about? Have I ever sent him any
> : > money?
>

> : What TMers send MMY money, Andrew?
>
> Given that the Maharishi is in charge of a organisation supposedly worth
> 3 billion dollars its pretty obvious someone is giving him large sums of
> money.

Right, the vast bulk of which are fees paid for courses,
products, and services offered by the TM organization.

Not "love offerings," which was the image Andrew was attempting
to invoke (knowing it was a misrepresentation).

Judy Stein

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

In article <358DE7...@nospamnasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

> Judy Stein wrote:
<snip>

> > Check out his article published in the newsletter of the National
> > Association of Science Writers (available on his Web site)
> > concerning his disastrous experience teaching journalism in
> > Shanghai. TMers' shoes aren't the only ones he can't put himself
> > into.
>
> That's at http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm
>
> So now Judy, liar extraordinare,

As Andrew knows, I *never* lie. He's been trying for years to
come up with or manufacture evidence of deception from me that he
can make stick, and he's failed ignominiously every single time.

speaks up in defense of students who
> cheat, lie, and plagiarize. Why am I not surprised that Judy's crooked
> feet would find the shoes of cheaters and liars a comfortable fit?

Can anyone find anything in what I said that defends cheating,
lying, and plagiarism?

Nope. Andrew made that up.

I'm not defending the students, I'm criticizing Andrew.

> As for my "disastrous experience teaching journalism in China,"
> one of the approximately 50 students I taught proved himself to
> be courageous, honest, bright, and eager to learn.

Yup, and you made it quite clear to the rest of them that you
considered them to be dishonest, stupid cowards. No wonder they
rebelled.

> "Disastrous experience"? Every teacher I've spoken to says that
> finding just one rare student like Tom to help is what teaching
> is all about.

Right, and if you hadn't alienated the rest of them by behaving
like such an arrogant, self-righteous Ugly American, you might
have found a lot more than one.

What hypocrisy! Read the article, folks, and see whether it is,
as Andrew attempts to suggest here, a story about how gratified
Andrew was to find this one chunk of gold among all the dross.

Tom was exceptional in that he was able to look past your
disdain; he was a bigger person than you. Or perhaps he saw the
advantage to himself of behaving in a way that would please you,
of making himself a contrast to the other students.

Either way, it wasn't to your credit, it was to his. You could
have helped many more of your students if you had the slightest
shred of empathy.

You didn't have to *approve* of the system or compromise your
principles in any way--just realize that you weren't dealing with
a gang of dishonest malingerers but rather with students who were
behaving according to the standards of their own culture. If you
found those standards unacceptable, you should have started where
they were and tried to lift them up, rather than denouncing them
from on high.

What you did was akin to taking in a stray dog that has never
been toilet trained and then beating it for crapping on the
carpet. (And even that analogy is insulting to the Chinese
students, but I'm trying to get something very basic across to
Andrew here.)

If you didn't understand what was going on, you should have asked
for an explanation and advice on how to handle it as soon as you
realized it was going to be a problem, rather than bullheadedly
insisting on doing things your way when you were obviously not
getting through to the students.

(It's rather ironic that I find myself referring to *Andrew's*
principles, as if he held himself to the same standards he
demanded of his students. He may not plagiarize, but he is very
far from a shining example of the Western journalistic integrity
he was holding up to the students as the ideal.)

Judy Stein

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

In article <B1B37B9...@206.165.43.106>,
"Lawson English" <eng...@primenet.com> wrote:

> Andrew A. Skolnick <asko...@nospamnasw.org> said:

<snip>
> >So now Judy, liar extraordinare, speaks up in defense of students who


> >cheat, lie, and plagiarize. Why am I not surprised that Judy's crooked
> >feet would find the shoes of cheaters and liars a comfortable fit?
>

> Welcome to the wonderful world of foreign cultures.
>
> You were told repeatedly that it was NOT a sin for these things to occur in
> the setting in which they occured and still persist on judging the people
> as though they were Western students. You can't go into another culture and
> expect everyone to conform to YOUR ideas.
>
> Now, if they came to the USA and behaved as you described, thigns would be
> different, but as described, you were on THEIR turf, and the old adage
> applies: "When in Rome..."

Andrew didn't make the slightest effort to understand why the
students were behaving as they did. There's no reason he
shouldn't have attempted to persuade them that there was a Better
Way, but not from a condemnatory stance--as you say, as though
they were Western students who knew they were breaching their
*own* ethical standards.

The students did a lot better at understanding where Andrew was
coming from. They realized he was at a loss to grasp what was
going on and tried to communicate with him, leaving him a
discrete note of explanation. He copied it up on the blackboard
and corrected the grammar, humiliating them.

When he pulled an exam they weren't expecting and obviously had
no idea how to complete, most of them walked out; five others
collaborated on writing an essay on the topic he'd assigned,
plagiarism, titling it "The Plague of Prejudice." Andrew
describes its content: "The gang of five accused me of
intolerance and American cultural imperialism. There is more than
one version of truth, they claimed, and cheating and academic
integrity are not the same in all cultures."

He scorns this as "sophistry." By Western standards, maybe, but
he completely missed the insight the piece provided into how
Chinese students see things. And their charge of intolerance and
"cultural imperialism" was on the nose. If you're going to try
to "reform" what you consider a "backward" culture, you damn well
better not let it *show* that you consider it backward, or all
you'll generate is resentment.

The one student who behaved by standards acceptable to Andrew
tried to explain to him how Chinese schools are run. The dean
called Andrew in for a conference and tried to explain to him
what's expected of the students. Andrew delivered a pompous
lecture to the dean on why this was all wrong.

It's an amazing article. Anyone with even a touch of sensitivity
to the delicate problems of dealing with cultural differences
will wince all the way through it at Andrew's arrogant behavior
and the fact that he is utterly oblivious to anything but his own
self-righteousness.

What's the Piagetian stage where one becomes able to appreciate
that what's true for you isn't necessarily true for everybody
else? Andrew seems to have gotten stuck in the previous stage.

Lou Minatti

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Judy Stein wrote:
>
> In article <6mlsn6$1lb$3...@missing.its.to>,
> ad...@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca (TIMOTHY GUEGUEN) wrote:
>
> > Judy Stein (jst...@panix.com) wrote:
> > : In article <358B2F...@nasw.org>,
> > : "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
> <snip>
> > : > My guru, CS? What are you babbling about? Have I ever sent him any
> > : > money?
> >
> > : What TMers send MMY money, Andrew?
> >
> > Given that the Maharishi is in charge of a organisation supposedly worth
> > 3 billion dollars its pretty obvious someone is giving him large sums of
> > money.
>
> Right, the vast bulk of which are fees paid for courses,
> products, and services offered by the TM organization.

Sounds alot like a business.


--
This post courtesy of Lou Minatti, Esq.
2nd Lt., Wholeflaffer's Heroes
http://www.concentric.net/~Slaroche/
Now including new photos of Agent Wholeflaffer!

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Judy Stein wrote:
>
> In article <358DE7...@nospamnasw.org>,
> "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:
>
> > Judy Stein wrote:
> <snip>
> > > Check out his article published in the newsletter of the National
> > > Association of Science Writers (available on his Web site)
> > > concerning his disastrous experience teaching journalism in
> > > Shanghai. TMers' shoes aren't the only ones he can't put himself
> > > into.
> >
> > That's at http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm
> >
> > So now Judy, liar extraordinare,
>
> As Andrew knows, I *never* lie. He's been trying for years to
> come up with or manufacture evidence of deception from me that he
> can make stick, and he's failed ignominiously every single time.


As Andrew knows, Judy never lies, when obfuscation will do. When
obfuscation won't do, the lies just pour from Judy's amazingly fast
finger tips.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Lawson English wrote:
>
> Andrew A. Skolnick <asko...@nospamnasw.org> said:
>
> >Judy Stein wrote:
> >
> >> Truer words were never spoken, especially the last part. This is
> >> Andrew's biggest failing, and it is a monumental one.
> >>
> >> Check out his article published in the newsletter of the National
> >> Association of Science Writers (available on his Web site)
> >> concerning his disastrous experience teaching journalism in
> >> Shanghai. TMers' shoes aren't the only ones he can't put himself
> >> into.
> >
> >That's at http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm
> >
> >So now Judy, liar extraordinare, speaks up in defense of students who
> >cheat, lie, and plagiarize. Why am I not surprised that Judy's crooked
> >feet would find the shoes of cheaters and liars a comfortable fit?
>
> Welcome to the wonderful world of foreign cultures.
>
> You were told repeatedly that it was NOT a sin for these things to occur in
> the setting in which they occured and still persist on judging the people
> as though they were Western students. You can't go into another culture and
> expect everyone to conform to YOUR ideas.

Lawson, despite the fact that we beat you up and dunk you into your
teapot every time you speak without the foggiest idea what's going on,
you persist.

Why don't you try to learn what's going on before shooting your mouth
off? Don't you tire of making a jackass of yourself?

If you had bothered to read the article you pretend to be commenting on,
you would know that I was INVITED by the Chinese government to come to
China to teach American Journalism.

> You were told repeatedly that it was NOT a sin for these things to occur in
> the setting in which they occured

Lawson, you are such an unmitigated ass. You never know what you're
talking about but hey, so what? You just love the primordial sounds of
your own words.

The Chinese NEVER say that cheating, lying, or plagiarism is o.k. They
condemn those sins. Lawson, you just got your face rubbed in the shit
you aimed at Baptists. Now you're maligning the Chinese. You just won't
learn.

> You can't go into another culture and expect everyone to conform to YOUR ideas.

My ideas? Since when are prohibitions against cheating and plagiarism MY
ideas? As far as I know, no society on earth condones cheating on
school exams or plagiarism in school papers. You are an utter jackass,
Lawson, to imply that China condones cheating and plagiarism.

I was INVITED by the Chinese government to teach students western
journalism. The Chinese authorities ASKED me to come and teach *my
ideas.* And what ideas are you saying I unfairly imposed on my students?
Copying from each other's tests? Turning in assignments written by
someone else? Lawson, face the facts: your mind has been anaesthetized
by so much of the Maharishi's Bubbly Bliss, you are incapable of
following a simple conversation or thread. All you ever do is blather
and malign large numbers of people with empty-headed generalizations,
with a mind that is too numb to realize what you're doing.

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

Andy accuses Lawton of "maligning large numbers of people with
empty-headed generalizations" but this is exactly what Andy and mentor
Carl Sagan have done with religions new and old. The arrogance is
astonishing, but only to be expected from these circles. Finely-hewn
conclusions and nuanced perspectives on religions seem not to be Andy's
or CS's strong points.

Bruce Hutchinson

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

jst...@panix.com (Judy Stein) scribed:

>In article <B1B34E8...@208.253.45.113>,
>"Wayne Fellows" <wfellows@*stop_spam*earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>> > But, hutch, religion is also based on observation - inner observation,
>> > the science of knowing the contents of one's own being. This is the
>> > function of "gnosis" in the field of spirituality - "knowing" in the
>> > sense of enlightenment. It's not faith-based except in the exoteric
>>
>> No it's not. Religion is based on organized make-believe.

No- not true. Religion's core is an attempt to explain *life*-- what/why
it is. The fact that the origin of ALL religions (sects are not counted as
separate religions) occured well before the dawn of *science* marks it as
mans attempt to provide answers to some of life's most fundamental
questions.

Most religions I am familiar with combine social requirements, oral
histories and a innate human desire to be led by a higher power into a
religion of rules to govern human actions. Not surprisingly, most
religions also take on a very strong political role as well. No surprise
either that since most religions "explained" the universe to the followers,
the resistance to science has been, in some cases, enormous.

You might want to call it "make believe", but to the followers, it is
very, very real.

hutch

"Once an idea is created, it never disappears, no matter
how often it is disproved" -- as quoted by Milton Rothman

Mr. Foot Grenade

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Jun 22, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/22/98
to

I concur with hutch that most religions were formulated in a
pre-scientific time. However, the questions religion addresses are not
- except in a very narrow literalist sense - the questions of science.

That is, science is the product of the analytical mind pursuing
empirical questions. Religion, on the other hand, is based on the
personal experience or "revelation" of the founder and his or her
initiates. This "gnostic" experience is nonrational inasmuch as the
mind which produces it is nonrational - the "soul's" issues are not,
except by coincidence, the issues of the rational scientific mind. It
is not a fair comparison to make, that the analytical mind, because it
is rational, is superior to the nonrational (not necessarily or always
"irrational") religious mind. The two psychic functions correspond to
two differing needs and perceptions.

Science and religion do indeed address the question of origins, but
here they immediately diverge, with science concerning itself with the
material, causal derivation of What Is; and with religion concerning
itself with the meaning-for-the-soul of What Is. Science's Big Bang or
the creation of "world-stuff" in stars is as peripheral to religion as
religion's (for example) Father-Mother Creator or the Law of Dependent
Origination is to science.

This is why so few myths are truly explanatory in a "rational",
"scientific" sense. Certainly, a horse-shaped rock formation (for
instance) may lend toward a horse-origin legend. But beyond obvious
physical correspondences of this type, myth goes its own way, and does
not approach the world in such a cuase-and-effect "scientific" manner.
In fact, it is myth's most striking feature that it circumvents the
"laws" of cause and effect - even before they were known as "laws".

This does not invalidate myth, nor does it cheapen science. It is
simply to say that pre-scientific humankind was pre-scientific. Myths
are not generally theories of origin, but rather explanation-tales
narrated to anchor the nonrational, emotive, imagining soul in the
world. Thus it is incorrect to say that with the advent of modern
cosmology, the old myths are "wrong". They never functioned, nor would
they have been meant to function, as scientific creation theories. The
two categories address two separate needs in the human psyche.

Bruce Hutchinson

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
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jst...@panix.com (Judy Stein) scribed:

>In article <358c9988...@news.cris.com>,
>bhu...@nospamcris.com (Bruce Hutchinson) wrote:


(big.. HUGE snip)

Farnkly I don't have the energy tonight to go through line-by-line on a 300
line post. And even if I did, it would make any difference on your
beliefs... right?

However... You, as a practising TMer, appear quite comfortable with your
"tools" and rational for your working with, and understanding, what you
call the "inner observation" of ones self. So be it. It works for you,
and by my lights, that should be enough. I chose a different route, and
that works for me.

But, to get back to the origin of this thread, I am reasonably sure that
you have not taken extensive courses on psychology (college psych 101
dosen't count!), nor have you studied what I would call *secular*
sociology. Before you jump on that, I am not saying that to "flame", but to
simply pont out the divergent points of view between you and the background
of Carl.

F'instance, what you call the 'inner observation" would correlate to what
Carl would have called the sub-concience. The difference appears to be the
perception by these two schools as to the importance of the [pick one] to
the individual and the role it plays in ones life. Again... so be it.

If that was all we were concerned about, then this whole thread means
nothing.

But what got Carl going, and me too, is when anyone gets a tad too carried
away (and science can be guilty of that too... cold fusion?) and starts
making wild claims that have no basis except as a selling tool. I mean...
"flying through walls"?

Ahh well. You go your road, I'll go mine. You are misguided :),
specially when to comes to astrology (The TM I can/did live with), but
that's your belief set, and you appear to be comfortable with it.


BTW- you most certainly noticed that I made some assumptions above about
your education and research in what I would call the *secular" study of the
mind. This was based on some obvious errors I noted in your statements
about the field of psychology, and the work that has been done in field of
dreams.

I may have guessed wrong, then again, maybe not. However, I made those
assumptions based solely on the admittedly flimsy evidence of your posts.
You made the same assumptions when you criticised Carl.

Andrew A. Skolnick

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
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A.M.T.'s resident bigot Judy Stein wrote:

Not knowing (or caring to find out) what happened when I was invited to
teach journalism in China, Judy takes my report published in the
National Association of Science Writers and invents a bizarre
interpretation full of weird twists and outright falsehoods.

But her sentence that pisses me off the most is one more example of her
malicious and petty bigotry. To tear me down, she seeks to dismiss the
courage, hard work, and honesty of my Chinese student by saying:

> Or perhaps he saw the advantage to himself of behaving in a way that
> would please you, of making himself a contrast to the other students.

Judy portrays my student Tom as a toady currying my favor. What
constituted this "toadying?" His hard work, his honesty and disdain for
cheating, his knowledge of history and current affairs, his scholarly
excellence? Toadying? Well if so, then it's the kind of toadying that
got him into Stamford University graduate school with a full tuition and
a comfortable stipend.

This is so typical of Judy Stein; to strike at her enemies she'll insult
and demean anyone. Tom's honesty, courage, and hard work were insincere
postures to curry my favor, she suggests. When the Carter Center awarded
me a prestigious fellowship in mental health journalism, she said I was
given the great honor because the Carters are Christian Fundamentalists
and hate TM. She brazenly continues to defend that bigoted and totally
unfounded statement. More recently, she went after the late Carl Sagan,
saying that he took one look at the "little brown-skinned dude in sheets
and beads and flowers" and concluded that the science Maharishi teaches
"could not possibly be anything but pseudo."

The bigotry that Judy accuses others of, clearly rests in her own
twisted mind. So blinded by hate, she cannot see how transparent it is
to others.

Judy Stein

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
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In article <358EF6...@yahoo.com>,
Lou Minatti <loumi...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Judy Stein wrote:
> >
> > In article <6mlsn6$1lb$3...@missing.its.to>,
> > ad...@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca (TIMOTHY GUEGUEN) wrote:
> >
> > > Judy Stein (jst...@panix.com) wrote:
> > > : In article <358B2F...@nasw.org>,
> > > : "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
> > <snip>
> > > : > My guru, CS? What are you babbling about? Have I ever
> > > : > sent him any money?
> > >
> > > : What TMers send MMY money, Andrew?
> > >
> > > Given that the Maharishi is in charge of a organisation
> > > supposedly worth 3 billion dollars its pretty obvious someone is
> > > giving him large sums of money.
> >
> > Right, the vast bulk of which are fees paid for courses,
> > products, and services offered by the TM organization.
>
> Sounds alot like a business.

It's a nonprofit business, yes, indeed.

Gee, you snipped the part where I pointed out that Andrew was
trying to convey the deliberately misleading impression that we
all sent money to MMY as "love offerings."

I'm sure that was just an accident, right?

Judy Stein

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
to

In article <358EFA...@nospamnasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

> Judy Stein wrote:
> >
> > In article <358DE7...@nospamnasw.org>,
> > "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:
> >
> > > Judy Stein wrote:
> > <snip>

> > > > Check out his article published in the newsletter of the National
> > > > Association of Science Writers (available on his Web site)
> > > > concerning his disastrous experience teaching journalism in
> > > > Shanghai. TMers' shoes aren't the only ones he can't put himself
> > > > into.
> > >
> > > That's at http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm
> > >
> > > So now Judy, liar extraordinare,
> >

> > As Andrew knows, I *never* lie. He's been trying for years to
> > come up with or manufacture evidence of deception from me that he
> > can make stick, and he's failed ignominiously every single time.
>
> As Andrew knows, Judy never lies, when obfuscation will do. When
> obfuscation won't do, the lies just pour from Judy's amazingly fast
> finger tips.

(Notice that Andrew is unable to mount a reply to the substance
of my post.)

No, Andrew is lying here. What Andrew knows is that I never lie,
nor do I ever obfuscate. (Intentionally, that is; Andrew is
prone to deliberately misunderstand something I've said and then
claim I'm obfuscating. He's also prone to masssive
incomprehension, because he has a very limited, constricted,
literal mind.)

What Andrew also knows is that he is mired so deep in his own
lies and intentional obfuscations he ain't *ever* going to be
able to dig himself out.

That's why he keeps accusing me of lying, despite the fact that
he has NEVER ONCE managed to demonstrate that I've lied about
anything, despite scores and scores of attempts.

He thinks if he says it enough times, people will start believing
it. But nobody with any intelligence who has followed our
exchanges will have overlooked the fact that Andrew has never
caught me in a lie, and I've caught him in probably hundreds by
now.

There have been several dozen *blatant* lies from Andrew just in
this most recent exchange.

Judy Stein

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
to

In article <358FA4...@nospamnasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

> A.M.T.'s resident bigot Judy Stein wrote:
>
> Not knowing (or caring to find out) what happened when I was invited to

> teach journalism in China, Judy takes my report published in the


> National Association of Science Writers

You mean, your report published in the National Association of
Science Writers was not a reliable account of what happened when
you were invited to teach journalism in China?

and invents a bizarre
> interpretation full of weird twists and outright falsehoods.

Nope, no weird twists, no falsehoods outright or otherwise.
You'll notice, typically, that Andrew makes the charge without
actually *citing* anything.

Read the article, folks. You have to *check up* on Andrew. If
you take anything he says at face value, you have nobody but
yourself to blame for being misled.

http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm

> But her sentence that pisses me off the most

Andrew looked very hard through my post, and managed to find *one
sentence* he could twist to his own malicious use.

is one more example of her
> malicious and petty bigotry. To tear me down, she seeks to dismiss the
> courage, hard work, and honesty of my Chinese student by saying:
>
> > Or perhaps he saw the advantage to himself of behaving in a way that
> > would please you, of making himself a contrast to the other students.
>
> Judy portrays my student Tom as a toady currying my favor.

What bullshit. I suggested he might have used you for his own
advantage, while you were busy preening yourself about having
"rescued" him from what you considered to be the moral and
intellectual wasteland of this elite Chinese university. That
isn't to dismiss this student's intelligence and initiative, it's
to portray you as the puffed-up, bigoted fool you are.

> What constituted this "toadying?" His hard work, his honesty and
> disdain for cheating, his knowledge of history and current
> affairs, his scholarly excellence? Toadying?

Notice how Andrew puts his own word in my mouth and then goes on
at great length to condemn it. Another typical Andrew tactic.
He even puts the word in quotes in an attempt to make readers
forget it was his word, not mine.

What *I* was suggesting was that the student was sharp enough to
recognize you were his ticket to the fulfillment of his
ambitions.

Well if so, then it's the kind of toadying that
> got him into Stamford University graduate school with a full tuition and
> a comfortable stipend.

Precisely. Now you've got it, Andrew. And good for him.

> This is so typical of Judy Stein; to strike at her enemies she'll insult
> and demean anyone.

No, Andrew, only you. You try to *paint* me as having insulted
and demeaned others by quite deliberately misreading what I've
said, as in this case. It's a function of your desperation and
your utter lack of any kind of integrity.

Read the article, folks. Note how consistently and disdainfully
Andrew demeans his Chinese students throughout (even referring to
their writing as "Chinglish"!), with that one exception.

At one point he compares the students who collaborated on an
essay rebuking him for his high-handedness and lack of
sensitivity to the Red Guard "when they turned on their teachers,
beating, torturing, and killing them for daring to teach what was
no longer allowed."

Tom's honesty, courage, and hard work were insincere
> postures to curry my favor, she suggests.

Nope, didn't suggest that at all.

When the Carter Center awarded
> me a prestigious fellowship in mental health journalism, she said I was
> given the great honor because the Carters are Christian Fundamentalists
> and hate TM.

Nope, didn't say that.

She brazenly continues to defend that bigoted and totally
> unfounded statement.

Neither bigoted nor unfounded, as I originally wrote it, not as
Andrew has mendaciously attempted to portray it. Let's just look
at the statement one more time:

To the Carters, who are fundamentalist Christians and very
distrustful of TM, Andrew's "expose" of TM in JAMA undoubtedly
counted as evidence of his worthiness to receive a fellowship.

More recently, she went after the late Carl Sagan,
> saying that he took one look at the "little brown-skinned dude in sheets
> and beads and flowers" and concluded that the science Maharishi teaches
> "could not possibly be anything but pseudo."

Which Andrew with *astonishing* stupidity attempted to turn into
an accusation that Sagan was a bigot.

Readers will find that Andrew will not attempt to rebut any of
the specific errors I pointed out in the paragraph he posted of
Sagan on TM.

As I say, Andrew is *really, really* hard up.

> The bigotry that Judy accuses others of, clearly rests in her own
> twisted mind. So blinded by hate, she cannot see how transparent it is
> to others.

What I'm bigoted against are people who lie and mislead and
misrepresent in the service of their own pathetic egos, as Andrew
does once again in the post I'm responding to.

For a quite remarkable, explicitly documented example of one of
Andrew's latest lies, see another post from me headed "Smoking-
gun lie from Andrew."

Judy Stein

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
to

Andrew dumps on Lawson for citing what Andrew says in Andrew's
article, denying he ever said what Lawson cited. I provide
quotes proving Andrew said precisely what Lawson said he did.

In article <358F04...@nospamnasw.org>,

"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

> Lawson English wrote:
<snip>


> > You were told repeatedly that it was NOT a sin for these
> > things to occur in the setting in which they occured and still
> > persist on judging the people as though they were Western
> > students.

[Andrew huffs, mendaciously:]
> The Chinese NEVER say that lying, cheating, and plagiarism is

> o.k. They condemn those sins.

<snip>


> As far as I know, no society on earth condones cheating on
> school exams or plagiarism in school papers. You are an utter jackass,
> Lawson, to imply that China condones cheating and plagiarism.

The following quotes are from the article we're talking about,
the one Andrew wrote about his experience in China.

http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm

They're what Lawson based his comments on that Andrew is now
scornfully rejecting:

I spent most of the semester trying to find a way to overcome
years of negative conditioning. I finally succeeded: I got them
angry enough to openly challenge me. The way I did that was by
denying them the Mao-given right to plagiarize and cheat.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Andrew's account of the essay five of his students collaborated
on:

There is more than one version of truth, they claimed, and
cheating and academic integrity are not the same in all

cultures....Unfortunately, I wasn't able to keep this brilliant
justification for cheating.

Quoting from a paper of the one student he approved of, whose
honesty Andrew vigorously defends in another post (against an
imaginary challenge):

"For universities in China, plagiarism is indispensable. Without
it, most professors would find it hard to publish 'fine' books.
Most students would not be able to write their graduate
thesis.... The schools would not run 'properly' without
plagiarism."

Andrew goes on:

And plagiarism doesn't stop after graduation, he says. For his
student internship he worked on the business page of a Chinese
newspaper, where the business editor routinely copied articles
from foreign newspapers.

Andrew reports what he is told by the dean:

The students were not doing anything wrong by copying the words
of others. Plagiarism is the copying of ideas, not words, he
said. In studying English, Chinese students are encouraged to use
the writing of others as "models."

(Andrew goes on to pompously lecture the dean about how
plagiarism *is* the copying of words, as well as ideas.)

"The Chinese NEVER say that lying, cheating, and plagiarism is
[sic] o.k. They condemn these sins."

And Lawson is an "utter jackass" to imply that China condones
cheating and plagiarism.

Even though Lawson got this idea from Andrew's very own article.

Now, either Andrew was lying in his article when he reported what
his students and the dean told him, or he's lying now when he
asserts that China doesn't condone cheating and plagiarism.

Which is it, Andrew? You have a bit of a problem here. On the
one hand, the purpose of your article was to hold up to public
scorn what you saw as the inferiority of Chinese schooling and
morals.

On the other hand, you need to find a way to discredit those who
have pointed out the self-righteous cultural bigotry in that
article.

So now you've got yourself into the extremely awkward position of
having to defend the Chinese against the very accusations you
leveled at them in your article, while accusing *us* of bigotry
for having cited the very accusations you made.

I'd suggest Andrew doesn't find this uncomfortable at all,
because his positions have no anchor in reality. He is perfectly
capable of holding in his mind the notions "The Chinese have no
integrity" and "Lawson and Judy are bigots for suggesting the
Chinese have no integrity" WITHOUT SEEING ANY CONFLICT BETWEEN
THEM.

This is *pathological* lying, people. This is the solipsistic
mental process of someone for whom there is no reality other than
the one he constructs to serve his purposes from moment to
moment.

Judy Stein

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
to

Here's a bunch more lies from Andrew Skolnick.

In article <358F04...@nospamnasw.org>,
"Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nospamnasw.org> wrote:

> Lawson English wrote:
<snip>
> > You were told repeatedly that it was NOT a sin for these
> > things to occur in the setting in which they occured and still
> > persist on judging the people as though they were Western

> > students. You can't go into another culture and expect everyone
> > to conform to YOUR ideas.
>
> Lawson, despite the fact that we beat you up and dunk you into your
> teapot every time you speak without the foggiest idea what's going on,
> you persist.
>
> Why don't you try to learn what's going on before shooting your mouth
> off? Don't you tire of making a jackass of yourself?
>
> If you had bothered to read the article you pretend to be commenting on,
> you would know that I was INVITED by the Chinese government to come to
> China to teach American Journalism.

Lawson said nothing whatsoever that suggested Andrew had not been
invited; and everything Lawson has written about what Andrew's
article says has been factually right on the nose. Indeed,
Andrew knows, on the basis of what Lawson said, that Lawson *did*
read his article.

Check it out, folks.

http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm

> > You were told repeatedly that it was NOT a sin for these
> > things to occur in the setting in which they occured
>

> Lawson, you are such an unmitigated ass. You never know what you're
> talking about but hey, so what? You just love the primordial sounds of
> your own words.

> The Chinese NEVER say that lying, cheating, and plagiarism is
> o.k. They condemn those sins. Lawson, you just got your face

> rubbed in the shit you aimed at Baptists.

I've dealt with the first whopper in another post, so let's look
at the second: Lawson aimed no "shit" at the Baptists; the shit
was all coming from Andrew and Barwell, who consider
"fundamentalist" a dirty word. Not only that, Andrew and Barwell
are mistaken, and Lawson is right (notwithstanding his later
retraction, which he did not need to make). It's Andrew and
Barwell who are wiping the shit off their faces.

> Now you're maligning the Chinese. You just won't learn.

Oh, man. Go read Andrew's article and see who you think is
really maligning the Chinese.

http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick/goldfish.htm

<snip>


> I was INVITED by the Chinese government to teach students western
> journalism. The Chinese authorities ASKED me to come and teach *my
> ideas.* And what ideas are you saying I unfairly imposed on my students?
> Copying from each other's tests? Turning in assignments written by
> someone else?

From Andrew's article:

As I expected, the dean of the School of Communications called me in
for a meeting (the only one I ever had with anyone at the school
except for informal meetings with Tai). The dean said that there was
an "unfortunate misunderstanding." The students were not doing


anything wrong by copying the words of others. Plagiarism is the
copying of ideas, not words, he said. In studying English, Chinese
students are encouraged to use the writing of others as "models."

Obviously the dean of the university which had invited Andrew
felt Andrew was unfairly imposing his ideas on his students, or
at least that's what Andrew reports.

Lawson, face the facts: your mind has been anaesthetized
> by so much of the Maharishi's Bubbly Bliss, you are incapable of
> following a simple conversation or thread.

Lawson does have trouble following the extraordinary contortions
of your mind, Andrew. Most people would. A chronic liar's
conversation is designed to be impossible to follow.

Judy Stein

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
to

In article <358f2858...@news.cris.com>,
bhu...@nospamcris.com (Bruce Hutchinson) wrote:

> jst...@panix.com (Judy Stein) scribed:
>
> >In article <358c9988...@news.cris.com>,
> >bhu...@nospamcris.com (Bruce Hutchinson) wrote:
> (big.. HUGE snip)
> Farnkly I don't have the energy tonight to go through line-by-line on a 300
> line post. And even if I did, it would make any difference on your
> beliefs... right?

Well, that would depend on what you said, wouldn't it?

<snip>


> But, to get back to the origin of this thread, I am reasonably sure that
> you have not taken extensive courses on psychology (college psych 101
> dosen't count!), nor have you studied what I would call *secular*
> sociology. Before you jump on that, I am not saying that to "flame", but to
> simply pont out the divergent points of view between you and the background
> of Carl.

I don't take it as a flame, but it isn't clear what point you're
making. The exchange we've been having hasn't been about
psychology or sociology. I would never claim to know as much
about academic/clinical psychology or sociology as Sagan did. I
do claim to know a great deal more about religion and
spirituality than Sagan did. I am probably also better informed
about the issues involved in the study of the nature of
consciousness than he was.

> F'instance, what you call the 'inner observation" would correlate to what
> Carl would have called the sub-concience. The difference appears to be the
> perception by these two schools as to the importance of the [pick one] to
> the individual and the role it plays in ones life. Again... so be it.
>
> If that was all we were concerned about, then this whole thread means
> nothing.

Well, if by "sub-concience" you mean *subconscious*, no, that
wouldn't be the same as what we've been referring to as "inner
observation" at all.

Which means you haven't understood any of what I've been talking
about.

> But what got Carl going, and me too, is when anyone gets a tad too carried
> away (and science can be guilty of that too... cold fusion?) and starts
> making wild claims that have no basis except as a selling tool. I mean...
> "flying through walls"?

You're making another assumption here, aren't you? A couple of
assumptions, actually.

There is, in fact, an *extensive* basis for the claim that
supernormal powers are possible. You might not *agree* with
it--especially if you haven't examined it closely--but to leap
from your disagreement to the conclusion that those who *promote*
the notion are using it only as a selling tool is unwarranted.

If Sagan or you were to inform yourself about that basis and
present your analysis of it as support for your disagreement, I'd
certainly listen. But you haven't done this, nor did Sagan.

> Ahh well. You go your road, I'll go mine. You are misguided :),
> specially when to comes to astrology (The TM I can/did live with), but
> that's your belief set, and you appear to be comfortable with it.

You make another assumption here, that I "believe in" astrology.
I don't. I don't *rule it out*, but I'm extremely dubious. And
I made it clear that was the case when I noted that there were
excellent arguments to be made against it. My point was that
Sagan didn't know enough about it to make those arguments.

> BTW- you most certainly noticed that I made some assumptions above about
> your education and research in what I would call the *secular" study of the
> mind. This was based on some obvious errors I noted in your statements
> about the field of psychology, and the work that has been done in field of
> dreams.

Hmm, yes, errors so obvious you can't be bothered even to list
them. You'll pardon me if I don't accept your judgment simply on
the basis of your assertion here. You may find it more difficult
to pardon me if I suggest you wish to avoid having to enumerate
those errors because there really aren't any, but I'm afraid
that's what leaps to mind.

You could, of course, dispel that suspicion pretty easily, and I
cordially invite you to do so.

You're quite right that I haven't formally studied psychology or
sociology, not even in introductory college courses. I wasn't
the least bit interested in science when I was in college.

However, since then I've done an awful lot of reading in
psychology and sociology and related areas. That doesn't make me
an expert, certainly, but I'm by no means an ignoramus.

> I may have guessed wrong, then again, maybe not. However, I made those
> assumptions based solely on the admittedly flimsy evidence of your posts.
> You made the same assumptions when you criticised Carl.

With a very important difference: I enumerated the errors Sagan
made in the quote Skolnick posted, and I posted excerpts from a
review of his last book that cited other examples.

Not only have you not cited any of the errors you believe I've
made, you haven't refuted my citations of Sagan's errors.

Seems to me it would have been a lot better either for you to get
rested up and then take a crack at a meaningful response, even if
it's delayed a day or two, *or* not to respond at all.

You probably should have done that with your previous response as
well, come to think of it, since my reply to it--which you
purportedly didn't have the energy to answer--consisted largely
of my pointing out where you'd made all kinds of unfounded
assumptions and read your own preconceptions into what I said.

It can take an inordinate amount of energy for some people to
say, "Oops, sorry, I misunderstood," or "I jumped to conclusions
there."

Which is another reason I'll decline to accept your assertion
that I made "obvious errors" unless and until you can revive
yourself enough to cite them, and they prove to be actual errors
rather than your misreadings.

Stephen Harris

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
to

> > > > Given that the Maharishi is in charge of a organisation worth
> > > > supposedly 3 billion

> > Sounds alot like a business.
>
> It's a nonprofit business, yes, indeed.
>
To clarify, that means it does not distribute dividends to shareholders.
All businesses need to operate at a profit or fail. Non-profit does
not indicate the amount of profit a business makes.

Lou Minatti

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
to

Judy Stein wrote:
>
> In article <358EF6...@yahoo.com>,
> Lou Minatti <loumi...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > Judy Stein wrote:
> > >
> > > In article <6mlsn6$1lb$3...@missing.its.to>,
> > > ad...@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca (TIMOTHY GUEGUEN) wrote:
> > >
> > > > Judy Stein (jst...@panix.com) wrote:
> > > > : In article <358B2F...@nasw.org>,
> > > > : "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org> wrote:
> > > <snip>
> > > > : > My guru, CS? What are you babbling about? Have I ever
> > > > : > sent him any money?
> > > >
> > > > : What TMers send MMY money, Andrew?
> > > >
> > > > Given that the Maharishi is in charge of a organisation
> > > > supposedly worth 3 billion dollars its pretty obvious someone is
> > > > giving him large sums of money.
> > >
> > > Right, the vast bulk of which are fees paid for courses,
> > > products, and services offered by the TM organization.
> >
> > Sounds alot like a business.
>
> It's a nonprofit business, yes, indeed.

It's not a religion? Hmm. Well, if it's non-profit, shouldn't it be
helping someone other than the fat bearded guy and a few higher-ups? TM™
makes a lot of claims, which never pan out once impartial research is
done on their claims.

> Gee, you snipped the part where I pointed out that Andrew was
> trying to convey the deliberately misleading impression that we
> all sent money to MMY as "love offerings."
>
> I'm sure that was just an accident, right?

Nope. I was commenting on your admission that TM™ is a business.

Lawson English

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Jun 23, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/23/98
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Lou Minatti <loumi...@yahoo.com> said:

>> It's a nonprofit business, yes, indeed.
>
>It's not a religion? Hmm. Well, if it's non-profit, shouldn't it be
>helping someone other than the fat bearded guy and a few higher-ups?
TM™
>makes a lot of claims, which never pan out once impartial research is
>done on their claims

Citations, please?

Sten Rasmussen

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Jun 24, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/24/98
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On Sat, 20 Jun 1998 11:20:03 -0500, "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org>
wrote:

>Sten Rasmussen wrote:
>>
>> On Fri, 19 Jun 1998 09:04:40 -0500, "Andrew A. Skolnick" <asko...@nasw.org>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >Dear Foot,
>> >
>> >Do you know who you remind me of? Archimedes. Well, actually not
>> >Archimedes -- the venerated proponent of scientism -- but the Roman
>> >soldier who came upon Archimedes on a beach drawing a geometrical figure
>> >in the sand and slew the greatest genius before Isaac Newton; you know,
>> >the soldier, what's-his-name.
>>
>> It didn't happen on a beach but inside the walls of Siracusa on Sicily. The
>> Roman field commander Marcellus explicitly ordered his troops to spare the life
>> of Archimedes when they finally made it into the the town in 212 BC. Archimedes
>> exclaimed when he was slain: "Don't step in my circles!" (fearless and oblivious
>> to the killings and looting going on around him while making drawings in the
>> sand) but then it was too late for the Roman soldier to undo. He was probably
>> executed while Archimedes got a magnificent funeral.
>
>Which is what is metaphorically happening to Foot Soldier right here.
>:-)
>
>Love these discussions of Archimedes. Would like some references. I only
>have *Isaac Asimov's Biographic Encyclopedia of Science & Technology."

Got a copy of "Asimov's Biographical Encyclopedia of Science and Technology".
Have it in front of me now. Where exactly did you come upon "Archimedes on a
beach"? In your imagination? Can't be, because of your reference to Isaac
Asimov's book *after* both Legion and I mentioned that the slaying of Archimedes
couldn't have taken place on a beach.
And why do you want to know the source of our versions if Asimov's version (in
this respect) is the same?
Page 29: "....Still, the siege *was* a long one and it was not until 212 B.C.
that Syracuse was beaten down. ... During the sack of the city, Archimedes, with
a magnificent and scholarly disregard for reality, engaged himself in a
mathematical problem and was bent over the geometrical figures he had marked in
the sand. A Roman soldier ordered him to come along, but Archimedes merely
gestured imperiously, 'Don't disturb my circles.'
"The Roman soldier, apparently a practical man with no time for fooling, at once
killed Archimedes and went on. Marcellus, who had given orders for Archimedes to
be taken alive and treated with distinction...."

Where is the beach, Andrew ???

Do I have to turn to Judy for an explanation?

>> ....circles in the sand... Pi is the square root of 10 said the Indians. Pi is
>> a number between 3 1/7 and 3 10/71 said Archimedes. Pi is transcendental said
>> Lindemann.
>
>My inner stomach tells me that pi tastes good, said Foot Soldier.

Patience and respect for circles in the sand could have saved you.

>> Sten Rasmussen,
>> speaking for Marcellus
>
>Say hi for me,


>
>--Andrew Skolnick http://nasw.org/users/ASkolnick
>http://members.xoom.com/askolnick/photographs.htm
>I speak only for myself, not for any other individual or organization.

hi!

BTW, try a Yahoo-search on Archimedes....Archimedes - from Drexel
University....Death of Archimedes....Sources or Illustrations. You will find 9
illustrations. How many beach scenarios?

Sten Rasmussen,
speaking for Marcellus


Sten Rasmussen

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Jun 24, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/24/98
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Sten Rasmussen

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Jun 24, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/24/98
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Lou Minatti

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Jun 24, 1998, 3:00:00 AM6/24/98
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Lawson English wrote:
>
> Lou Minatti <loumi...@yahoo.com> said:
>
> >> It's a nonprofit business, yes, indeed.
> >
> >It's not a religion? Hmm. Well, if it's non-profit, shouldn't it be
> >helping someone other than the fat bearded guy and a few higher-ups?
> TM™
> >makes a lot of claims, which never pan out once impartial research is
> >done on their claims
>
> Citations, please?

How about TM™'s claims that TM™ reduces crime. Would you like to delve
into that subject? Then there's the levitation bit.

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