Maharishi showed a lot of creativity in marketing TM. I recall reading an article by a sociologist (I think) in the 'Skeptical Inquirer' about TM mentioning how he completely changed the image of the movement from your basic Hindu/Vedic base virtually over night by introducing new language, science. I think he was fearless in trying things and also dropping things that did not work. He did not succeed in erasing the Hindu connexions, and I suspect many followers did not like the change to the new terminology (Charles Lutes for example), and that might be a reason why it has acted more as a drag on the movement than it could have, however the Hindu core of teaching, the puja etc., makes it difficult to cover that up. This is what is called isomorphism, translating concepts from one set of intellectual symbols to another. Maharishi was particularly good at that. Translating spiritual concepts to science is a dangerous game because science requires a higher standard of belief, and the lax approach to evidence in religion and spirituality in general is a great handicap.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote : Maharishi was more modern than those 50 years younger, always moving forward, showing infinite flexibility. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <dhamiltony2k5@...> wrote : As much as people want to dump on Maharishi as being some secreted ultra-traditional nationalistic hindoo-ist, the record shows they guy to be quite a modern and spiritual human. He was incredibly consistent looking at the whole progression as science, spirituality in consciousness, and policy as the larger spiritual movement built through a span of time and developed to what we see. -Buck Anartaxius writes: Buck, Maharishi did a lot of interesting things. In the world of science, however, it is data and confirmation of hypotheses that drive forward. A scientist that has a successful career is basically working to extend knowledge, and does so by superseding, by surpassing his mentors, and in science that means showing what your mentors did was in some way wrong, and that the newer knowledge is less wrong (still might not be right though). The question here is does TM and its related things accomplish what it is said to do? Does it work uniformly or non-uniformly on those who practise it? What percentage of practitioners truly reach the stated goals? How good is the data? Was the data processed properly? I think the results, which were eventually good for me, are nonetheless very uneven, and essentially, because movement science is largely ignored by the wider community, unproved. Once the Heidelberg color presses were purchased [early 1970's] Maharishi published in cycle through the decades major volumes that he edited that show the progression of the science, thought, and programs. It was all for linking modern science research in spirituality. He was remarkably progressive, visionary and revolutionary all at once. I feel you guys should respect him more as the rishi, teacher, and scientist he was. -Buck Nope. Well, Turquoiseb is in error about his 1978 assertion and you are wrong for thinking he is right. I am not. I was there, and was on one of the first TM Sidhi courses, *while working at the TM National Center*, so I am pretty aware of how these courses were marketed and what was said about them at that time. There was NO MENTION of any "group effect" from the TM Sidhis before I left the TM movement in 1978. Any mention of the "Maharishi Effect" in the original 1976 Collected Papers was added later, in editions that had been subjected to "revisionist history." The term hadn't even been *invented* in 1976. If you think differently, prove it. Otherwise I have the right to consider you as delusional as I often do anyway. You guys just want to hate on Maharishi at every turn. The Meissner-Like Effect of consciousness coherence in the “Maharishi Effect” in publication goes back to at least [ 1976 ] with the publishing of paper 98 in The Scientific Research on Transcendental Meditation, Collected Papers, Vol 1 and its introduction and preface in such. It was known and talked around before that on courses and conferences as the early 1970's research was being published in a sequence. You guys obviously were not there. -Buck mjackson74 writes: I have never seen that article before - give great historical perspective - especially the comment that they expected several thousand sidha permanently in Fairfield - guess they got that one wrong - also love the comment about Marshy's stretch limo. -------------------------------------------- On Fri, 4/4/14, TurquoiseBee <turquoiseb@... mailto:turquoiseb@...> wrote: Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Research Shows Group Meditation Can Reduce Crime Rates To: "FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com"; <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Date: Friday, April 4, 2014, 10:25 AM Anticipating comments from cult apologist masters disputing this, and claiming that the "idea" of the Maharishi Effect has been present since 1960, I challenge you to come up with a mention of the "Maharishi Effect" *per se* in *any* publication before 1978 (the years covered by my account below), and applying to the TMSP *per se*, not just to "total numbers of people practicing TM," or the old "1% of the population" idea. The earliest mention of any "group effect" I could find after a few rounds with Google's Advanced News Search page was this article from 1984, and that only mentioned the buzzword in effect at the time, "super-radiance effect" -- The Maharishi Wants Everybody to Levitate for Peace, but Some Iowans Are Hopping Mad Unless you can find a publication before 1978 with a verifiable date (meaning *not* revised later in an attempt at "revisionist history" as many of the current TM publications have been) talking about a "mass effect" caused by the TM-Sidhi program, and in particular using the term "Maharishi Effect," I think my point has been made. Which is that the "ME" is a made-up term that was "late to the party," invented *long* after the TMSP had been invented and had already been marketed for other reasons for years. My broader point is that some TM apologists have been so trained to perform "revisionist history" in their own brains that they'll claim it was present at the beginning of the TMSP program, *even though they themselves weren't*. Besides, the old 1984 "People" article is pretty funny, given the current state of Fairfield and the fact that the TMO can't find people to bounce around in the domes even when they PAY them to do so... :-) From: TurquoiseBee <turquoiseb@... mailto:turquoiseb@...> To: "FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com"; <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Friday, April 4, 2014 11:28 AM Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Research Shows Group Meditation Can Reduce Crime Rates From: TurquoiseBee <turquoiseb@... mailto:turquoiseb@...> To: "FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com"; <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Friday, April 4, 2014 10:45 AM Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Research Shows Group Meditation Can Reduce Crime Rates The point I don't understand, Lawson, is WHY anyone would want to do "research" to validate or "prove" something as ludicrous as "We can affect other people and the world by bouncing around on our butts on slabs of foam." Please explain to me HOW anyone could develop enough of an attachment to such a dumbfuck idea as to want to "prove" it. It occurs to me that someone should provide a little history about the TM Sidhis for those who weren't around when they first came out. That is, in the beginning there was NONE of this "Maharishi Effect" crap or even the *concept* that we were "doing it for the world" or anything like that. The TMSP was marketed to us True Believers at the time as: 1) a way to master superpowers like levitation, and 2) a way to (supposedly) progress more quickly towards one's *own* enlightenment. In the beginning, during the early courses, reason #1 was the one emphasized in any sales spiels. As the courses progressed and NO ONE ever manifested any siddhis, then they shifted their sales pitch to emphasize #2. By this time I'd given up on the whole thing and bailed from the whole TM movement, and *at no point had anything ever been mentioned about the TMSP benefiting anyone other than the person practicing it*. The whole "Maharishi Effect" nonsense was invented later, after they had realized that not only the original reason #1 for practicing it was never going to happen, but that #2 wasn't going to ever happen, either. People had spent literally thousands of dollars learning to "fly" without flying, and had spent similar amounts learning to "become enlightened" without that ever happening, either. Many people were beginning to quit TM and walk away from the TM movement, *including* many who had learned the TMSP. So what they did was to invent two mechanisms to keep people hanging on, still chasing carrots at the end of the stick. The first was that the TMSP didn't "work" properly unless you were in a big roomful of people doing it with you. This was supposed to create a "herd" mentality and cause people to identify with the group, and of course it worked. The second was to invent the made-up "Maharishi Effect" and pretend that doing the TMSP was somehow benefiting other people, and the world. This worked, too, because it gave people a reason to keep practicing it, plus it made them feel self-important, because they were "saving the world." I just thought it was important to remind people of this, because some here like to pretend that the way the TMSP is currently marketed is how it always was. And they like to pretend that the idea of the ME was always present, and always part of the sales pitch. Neither is true. .
