No one could be so far gone that they believe that Rama levitated hundreds of times in front of hundreds of people at Denny's in L.A. But, if you donated thousands of dollars to the Rama cult I can see why you'd be so invested in telling that story.
---In [email protected], <turquoiseb@...> wrote : I once would have thought this, that no one could be so far gone as to believe that yagyas actually do anything, but the figures you posted the other days shocked me into realizing that I was trying to give people more credit than they deserved. I mean, let's face it...any group that actually spend FIVE MILLION DOLLARS PER YEAR on this demented psychobabble really isn't sane. I mean, let's face it - anyone that would give Rama THOUSAND DOLLARS A MONTH for a decade just to watch him slowly lift up off of a sofa, isn't very sane. The question is, that why are you still telling us about Rama levitating after your story has been debunked on alt.sci.skeptic? From: salyavin808 <[email protected]> ---In [email protected], <mjackson74@...> wrote : It was apparently the suggestion that MIU/MUM has gotten its accreditation by bribery with cash and whores that outraged our Dome Centric friend here on FFL. Of course that was satire, but were it to turn out to be fact in part or in whole I would not be surprised. Actually that would surprise me but I got the humorous intention behind it. Especially as it was adapted wholesale from the bit that "Buck" posted. It's funny how Doug can get upset about an obvious joke like that but not get upset about the news that the national yagya program (cash for completely ineffectual prayers) costs people he probably knows millions every year. The fact that the supposedly scientific MUM hasn't even attempted to validate such an impressive cash cow surprises me. They try and prove that other supernatural powers exist but here's an obvious one that would elevate their standing in the world of science immeasurably. Proving the efficacy of prayer! They'd be legends overnight and people would flock to the movement and bring about the golden age in a heartbeat.. I suspect that there's a reason they haven't attempted to validate this and that is that even they know it's a load of deluded crap. That's people you know Doug, getting conned. Doesn't that rile you at all? It does me. Maybe not but I just think they are deluded - religiously deluded. I think they need to be saved from themselves but they are probably all happy in their world. It's a clever process, you know how it works, the TMO carefully cultivates a nonsense belief system based on unified fields and cosmic consciousness and how our minds can affect the world from its fundamental level, they talk a load of tosh about science validating it all and then introduce a special programme to negate returning bad kharma that can be seen by their jyotishees and create positive influences instead. Who wouldn't go for it once they've brought everything else? I like to think that I wouldn't have. After all, I managed to figure out that the siddhis were a scam only a few months after I learned them, back in 1977. So I bailed from the whole organization. I like to think that had I had the misfortune to stick around, any mention of Ayurveda, Jyotish, Rajas, or S-V would have had me bolting for the door, long before they trotted out yagyas. :-) It doesn't matter to me whether it yagya's were invented to deliberately con people, but the TMO is in a position to test them scientifically but doesn't even try. I asked Fred Travis why things like MVVT and yagya's never get properly tested if they are going to be paid for and he agreed with me that all things the TMO sells should be tested! But he won't, if they did that they'd have to admit the whole thing was crap, of that I have no doubt. And it's a lot of moolah to lose... The relevant mantra in this situation really is "Ka-Ching." I'd like someone to ask David Lynch about it at a public meeting. See if he ducks and dives. He managed to dodge the "the problem with Hitler was that he didn't succeed" debacle in Germany. He does the SIMS Shuffle even better than we old SIMS teachers did it, so I figure he'd be able to brush off any such questions without actually addressing them.
