[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Bhairitu noozguru@... wrote: Curtis, I think you studied hypnotherapy? Does it make you wonder if Lenz did some sort of mass hypnosis? Sorry I missed this first time around Bhairitu. The way I'm thinking about it is that he didn't have to DO anything. He had a group that was accustomed to going into a state where there was an erosion of the distinction between inner and outer perception. Sitting together should be enough allow some of the qualities of hypnosis to emerge naturally. And this can be a very good thing. It is key to the creative process where an artist see an outer sunset and draws it into his own mind for reproduction on his canvas. He may experience time distortion as he sits there letting the qualities of the sunset he will paint be absorbed. I think the term mass hypnosis has a far fetched quality to it, but creating the conditions for hypnotic qualities to emerge is much more common. Once they are in place anything you can imagine can be experienced as if it is a outside sensory perception. On the other hand I don't suspect any leader of this kind of spiritual group is completely innocent of knowing how to give his followers the biggest bang for their buck. As an aside, Milton Erickson's favorite way to induce the shift into this state was to bore the shit out of his clients! Makes you think about those long hours waiting for Maharishi and then how wonderful the darshon felt when he finally showed up. It might have all been a different experience if we all had smart phones back then and didn't just have to sit like zombies all that time! I even remember times being told to sit with eyes closed but not meditate. WTF! There was this Sci-Fi series called Stormfront was based on a series of books about a supernatural investigator by a martial arts instructor. In one episode a character was doing shape shifting but winds up explaining to the protagonist that his body didn't actually change shape but the technique he had made somebody think he did. That said, my tantra teacher said he has floated and said I probably would but haven't. He didn't indicate there was any specific technique involved but he just noticed something funny during meditation and opened his eyes enough to see he was floating several feet off the ground. Probably like others I have dreams where I just step up into space and sail along like surfing through air. It seems ridiculously simple and confuses the mind when you wake up as to why it just doesn't work that way. On 09/06/2012 10:46 AM, curtisdeltablues wrote: Thanks for weighing in Barry because this demonstrates what I was trying to get at with Robin. I was looking for the reasons he has for giving these accounts credibility. Your reasons are transparent, you witnessed it. Even then you show some restraint in evaluating what it all means and I believe that is appropriate given the conditions under which you saw these things. But the reasons for your belief are present. And you are not extending the claim very far beyond your own experience. I have always enjoyed this wrinkle in the fabric of skepticism to have you say you saw this many times. I am not inclined to go any further than that you are reporting that you saw it. I can't verify if others did, or that they all saw the same thing, and I am not inclined to immediately assume that this guy actually could break the known laws of physics. It goes into my category of the relationship between perception and conception in our sensory perception for me. It is not a mechanical process and as we learn more how our minds construct our reality out of the jumble of choices available, it makes me less rather than more confident of our ability to sort this kind of perception out. Does this make me flawed as a skeptic because I don't automatically take your word for what it means? No, in fact it aligns me with your own caution about its objective reality. People can see weird shit. Now the personal implications of how this would affect a person is a different story. This sounds like the potential for some heavy cognitive dissonance and I don't envy your position...or maybe I do! Shit I would love to see someone floating above a desert. But if I had to bet, I would say that the chances of its objective reality might be diminished a bit by the fact that this amazing thing didn't cause more of a stir or was recorded somehow for outsiders to evaluate. Like Maharishi the guy seemed to like PR and this sure would have put him over the top if he could do it for the cameras with magician's present. My best guess is that it has a connection to the darshon experiences I had with Maharishi. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Susan wayback71@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: Susan, I'd like to do what I forgot to do when first replying, and thank you for the way in which you asked your questions. That is, curious and more than a little skeptical, but not hostile. That is rare, and why I don't talk about this stuff here very much, and why I won't talk about it again for a while after this post. You're welcome. And thanks for taking the time to answer all the questions I had. Not a problem. You're always a pleasure to chat with, and I think I can even put words to WHY. You tend to almost always come across as agenda neutral when you post. The vibe I get is curiosity and a desire to explore the world of ideas, in a kind of interactive way with other people who feel the same. I have a now deceased friend who was with Rama, too, and talked of these things. I have no doubt whatsoever that you and he saw Rama do these miraculous things. But, like you, my question is what does it mean? I'm not sure it means anything. It's just what was. I too do not equate the ability to do siddhis or miracles with enlightenment. Rama did not call in the TV cameras and perhaps the purpose was to just stretch the mindsets of his viewers. I think that part of the issue was that he had no interest in convincing large numbers of people of things; he was looking for a small number of students with whom to work intimately and interactively. Or maybe there was no purpose, he was just goofing and having fun. That is also a possibility. In his better moments, he was still the funniest, most spontaneously humorous person I've ever encountered on this rock, faster on his feet in many ways than even Robin Williams. But the fundamental question is how do you integrate seeing this with the seemingly concrete world around us, the laws of physics, the need to have explanations for events, and also the need to believe in something greater and different than we have all around us. Well, I think a lot of your question depends on predilection. Speaking for myself, I feel no need to come up with explanations for things that Just Are. I also have no need to believe in something greater. The World As It Is seems more than enough to inspire my sense of wonder and awe. Glad you got to see Rama do this. I am at a point in life where I think Enlightenment is possible, but that it might only be a style of brain functioning where you kill off the ego part (perhaps by slowing down the whirlwind of interconnections and messages so that the sense of self and doing and are undone) and are left feeling calm, happy, and infinite. Not bad at all in many ways, but not mystical. I can certainly groove behind this idea of enlightenment. But I am not sure that there is anything after the body dies, only energy or consciousness. I have suspicions or intuitions that something continues after physical death, but naturally I won't know that for sure until after I kick the bucket. And if there is nothing after death but the Big Black, I won't know it even then because there won't be any I to know diddleysquat. :-) This half-baked and evolving view could accept other realities that coexist with ours, and still not necessarily believe in God or life after death. Indeed. I do not believe in God, but certainly believe in congruent and coexistent multiple realities. The whole thing is pretty amazing and as I have said before, I really would love to be around for the scientific progress of the next hundred years or so. I suspect many advances will be made, but I suspect that the state of science when it comes to understanding how the brain works or understanding how life works will be no closer to how these things really work 100 years from now than they are now. They'll claim other- wise, of course, just as scientists do today, but that won't be true. From my point of view, the important thing about my first post on this subject yesterday was the last sentence: Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think. THAT is really the bottom line. THAT, if there was one, was the benefit of having witnessed extraordinary things. NOT the having done it, but the having to *live with* having done it. What do you DO with having experienced something that you and everyone around you knows could not have happened, if the world is really as it has been described to us all our lives? Do you talk about it? Do you try to convince others that it was real, and tell them what you think it meant? Good luck with that. :-) You CAN'T ever convince someone who hasn't seen or experienced something like this that it was real. My brother and his wife and kids
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
turquoiseb: turquoiseb: I really *DO* feel that I can get a good intuitive sense of the overall vibe or *intent* of a post from the first 10-20 words of it I see in Message View... Actual photo of Fredrick Lenz levitating. http://www.rickross.com/groups/lenz.html The odd thing is that, not a single person on the entire internet has posted anything about seeing Lenz levitate in front of large groups of students. Go figure. So, perception is Reality? Rama's levitation was apparently just a parlor trick in order to get girls, heck, I once saw a UFO and was abducted into a ship and experienced time travel to a distant universe and back again in a matter of minutes! No biggie. LoL! You simply can't go back to them weeks or months or years later and accurately recapture what went down. So much more so when you try to remember events that happened forty years ago when you were stoned on LSD! LoL! 'Take Me For A Ride' by Mark Laxer http://www.ex-cult.org/Groups/Rama/ http://www.ex-cult.org/Groups/Rama/
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Richard J. Williams richard@... wrote: Well, if you are so worried about your online reputation, maybe you'd want to skip the 'ball gag' jokes! Lol! I am always confused when you bring this up because when you do a search on this term, you have to go back to Jan 09 for my last use of the term in a joke, with a few more in 08, but you have usee the term dozens of times ever since in a misguided shame campaign. If you are trying to shame me for using it here your obvious obsession with the term isn't working. If you think it never should have been mentioned in this polite society,why are you using it so often? Are you trying to point out that the bluesguy sometimes uses risque humor? Is a little edgy? Is that really a newsflash? Have you heard the songs I wrote and recorded? Do you know what rock 'N Roll actually means? I think it is time for you to give this one a rest Richard. You have now exceeded my use of the term by a factor of 10. And it isn't the most hateful term for people into that stuff. For non apparatus people it seems a little funny and contrived, like Opera to non opera lovers. But it isn't a term that should warrant years of bringing it up as if I cooked a pot full of puppies and brought it to my local church's potluck dinner. (It's the cumin that makes it special.) It isn't as bad as trying to make sure that a passing visual joke stays alive for years for no comedic purpose. Do you want a personal apology for repeating an image used in one of my favorite movies, Pulp Fiction, whose script I sometimes quoted when I used the image as a joke? Were you personally offended because you found out that for all these years your own pleasure was cut short because of your lack of knowing such a device existed? Did my bringing it up get in your craw because it is a touchy subject for you somehow, having once been left with one on past your repeated use of the safe word? (In my defense it was a little hard to understand you with that thing in so I thought you were saying Please hit me with the Cat-O-nine harder because I have been a naughty naughty boy and my master needs to turn my bare bottom into a Jackson Pollock of pure pleasure.) Or is this some kind of heavy handed guy joke thing where you punch my arm a little too hard in a joke and later I'll make sure the football hits your nuts when we throw the football around and we both think that is hilarious? If it helps any, your constant repetition has killed any use of it as a comic device now. Your overuse accompanied with your finger wagging spin has turned the term into the most boring image I could invoke. You killed it Richard. It is dead. Diseased. 'E's not pinin'! 'E's passed on! This joke image is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't repeated it so often since I used it 'e'd be pushing up the daisies! 'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisibile!! THIS IS AN EX JOKE IMAGE!! (Thanks Monty) So time to take off your Edwardian dress with the too tight corset and putting on your full head leather gimp mask and leopard print handcuffs, easing yourself into the swing in your makeshift dungeon that used to be your kid's playroom before they grew up and left home, and do whatever it is people do who are obsessed with this stuff. For me the use of this joke served its purpose and died an undeserved death. I would appreciate your not pulling it out of the grave and hitting it with the electro shock paddles every time you want to tweek my nose. Get some new material Richard. Apply yourself. ...do you really think this particular post of Ravi's was geared towards harming your online reputation? curtisdeltablues: Yes I do and I'll tell you why. This is the second time he has accused me of making threats online... Well, if you are so worried about your online reputation, maybe you'd want to skip the 'ball gag' jokes! Lol! http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/message/307220
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Well, if you are so worried about your online reputation, maybe you'd want to skip the 'ball gag' jokes! Lol! curtisdeltablues: I am always confused when you bring this up because when you do a search on this term, you have to go back to Jan 09 for my last use of the term in a joke... A ball gag joke on a spiritual forum that has a bunch of ladies on it. LoL! It was a joke, Curtis. Get it?
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
I have no trouble believing Lenz is levitating in this photo. What I can't believe is that there are really mountains that beautiful on this earth. Now that is a stretch in terms of credibility, a true wonder. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Richard J. Williams richard@... wrote: turquoiseb: turquoiseb: I really *DO* feel that I can get a good intuitive sense of the overall vibe or *intent* of a post from the first 10-20 words of it I see in Message View... Actual photo of Fredrick Lenz levitating. http://www.rickross.com/groups/lenz.html The odd thing is that, not a single person on the entire internet has posted anything about seeing Lenz levitate in front of large groups of students. Go figure. So, perception is Reality? Rama's levitation was apparently just a parlor trick in order to get girls, heck, I once saw a UFO and was abducted into a ship and experienced time travel to a distant universe and back again in a matter of minutes! No biggie. LoL! You simply can't go back to them weeks or months or years later and accurately recapture what went down. So much more so when you try to remember events that happened forty years ago when you were stoned on LSD! LoL! 'Take Me For A Ride' by Mark Laxer http://www.ex-cult.org/Groups/Rama/ http://www.ex-cult.org/Groups/Rama/
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Richard J. Williams richard@... wrote: Well, if you are so worried about your online reputation, maybe you'd want to skip the 'ball gag' jokes! Lol! curtisdeltablues: I am always confused when you bring this up because when you do a search on this term, you have to go back to Jan 09 for my last use of the term in a joke... A ball gag joke on a spiritual forum that has a bunch of ladies on it. LoL! It was a joke, Curtis. Get it? Well Sir if y'all ahr implying that the fairer genda is unfamiliar with the activities between the gendas that only men know about and mustn't singe their pretty little ears with such unwholesome talk, then ah suggest that you stop repeat'n it so often. Why I suspect that a few years time since the last time ah ill-advisedly used this bawdy term in mixed company would be enough for the ladies in the group to recover their composure and reapply their powders to hide the glow they developed when they heard the term which both repulses and attracts a lady with memories of when they had to submit to the wonton desires of their husbands when they did their duty to make babies so long ago. To all the ladies here I have a little ditty designed to help them recover from their vapors: Today is the day they give babies away with a half a pound of tea. So if you know any ladies who want any babies, just send them around to me!
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Richard J. Williams richard@ wrote: Well, if you are so worried about your online reputation, maybe you'd want to skip the 'ball gag' jokes! Lol! curtisdeltablues: I am always confused when you bring this up because when you do a search on this term, you have to go back to Jan 09 for my last use of the term in a joke... A ball gag joke on a spiritual forum that has a bunch of ladies on it. LoL! It was a joke, Curtis. Get it? Well Sir if y'all ahr implying that the fairer genda is unfamiliar with the activities between the gendas that only men know about and mustn't singe their pretty little ears with such unwholesome talk, then ah suggest that you stop repeat'n it so often. Why I suspect that a few years time since the last time ah ill-advisedly used this bawdy term in mixed company would be enough for the ladies in the group to recover their composure and reapply their powders to hide the glow they developed when they heard the term which both repulses and attracts a lady with memories of when they had to submit to the wonton desires of their husbands when they did their duty to make babies so long ago. To all the ladies here I have a little ditty designed to help them recover from their vapors: Today is the day they give babies away with a half a pound of tea. So if you know any ladies who want any babies, just send them around to me! There's nothing like the South.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Darlin', take two tent revivals and a dose of sausage gravy and call me in the morning. From: curtisdeltablues curtisdeltabl...@yahoo.com To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Saturday, September 8, 2012 8:39 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Richard J. Williams richard@... wrote: Well, if you are so worried about your online reputation, maybe you'd want to skip the 'ball gag' jokes! Lol! curtisdeltablues: I am always confused when you bring this up because when you do a search on this term, you have to go back to Jan 09 for my last use of the term in a joke... A ball gag joke on a spiritual forum that has a bunch of ladies on it. LoL! It was a joke, Curtis. Get it? Well Sir if y'all ahr implying that the fairer genda is unfamiliar with the activities between the gendas that only men know about and mustn't singe their pretty little ears with such unwholesome talk, then ah suggest that you stop repeat'n it so often. Why I suspect that a few years time since the last time ah ill-advisedly used this bawdy term in mixed company would be enough for the ladies in the group to recover their composure and reapply their powders to hide the glow they developed when they heard the term which both repulses and attracts a lady with memories of when they had to submit to the wonton desires of their husbands when they did their duty to make babies so long ago. To all the ladies here I have a little ditty designed to help them recover from their vapors: Today is the day they give babies away with a half a pound of tea. So if you know any ladies who want any babies, just send them around to me!
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend authfriend@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend authfriend@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stanley@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y Q.E.D.! And this is a joke to make us think you're more credulous than you are so you can accuse us of being too stupid to see the irony. Or am I joking in assuming no-one else realised the irony and want to call you stupid for thinking I'm not clever enough to see what everyone could see instantly and considered not worth commenting on. Q.E.D. = quod erat demonstrandum, it has been demonstrated (literally, which was to be demonstrated) In this case, salyavin, what is it that Robin is saying has been demonstrated? Careful, now. You might want to review what has gone before. Irony sometimes has more than one layer. Erm, you didn't have to take that seriously you know... OK, you didn't get beyond the top layer. Too bad. The next layer down is funnier. I think you've gone and drifted off into a little superior world of your own.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wayback71 wayback71@ wrote: Barry, when you saw Lenz levite 1. had you heard before that he did this sort of thing? No. Not the first time I saw him/it. Susan, I'd like to do what I forgot to do when first replying, and thank you for the way in which you asked your questions. That is, curious and more than a little skeptical, but not hostile. That is rare, and why I don't talk about this stuff here very much, and why I won't talk about it again for a while after this post. From my point of view, the important thing about my first post on this subject yesterday was the last sentence: Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think. THAT is really the bottom line. THAT, if there was one, was the benefit of having witnessed extraordinary things. NOT the having done it, but the having to *live with* having done it. What do you DO with having experienced something that you and everyone around you knows could not have happened, if the world is really as it has been described to us all our lives? Do you talk about it? Do you try to convince others that it was real, and tell them what you think it meant? Good luck with that. :-) You CAN'T ever convince someone who hasn't seen or experienced something like this that it was real. Some people actually are so freaked out by what they realize are the implications of having seen something like this that they try to make the experience GO AWAY. For example, I once took an ex-girlfriend, a die-hard TMer who still is one to this day, to see Rama. I didn't push it on her, because I knew what a stick-up-her-butt TM TB she was, but she asked, so I brought her along to a public talk. At one point during one of the meditations, she, sitting right beside me, opened her eyes and looked at Rama and said Oh my God! I opened my eyes and looked at her and she was quivering, shaking. I looked up at Rama and sure enough, he was hovering about a foot above the sofa he had been sitting on. I whispered to her, What are you seeing? She said, He is levitating. She stared at him for some minutes, clearly somewhat shaken by the experience, and then closed her eyes again and meditated. After the talk, I asked her about it and she said, Yes, there is no question about it...he was levitating. Not bouncing, levitating. Two days later I ran into her, and she denied ever having said that, or ever having seen it. Some weeks later I heard through the gravevine that she now denied ever having gone to see Rama in the first place, because that would have been perceived as Off The Program. THIS is the thing that people who think All we'd have to do to get everyone to sign up to learn TM is to demonstrate real flying don't understand. They really don't get the power of denial, and of clinging to what they've been told about the world and how it works, even *in the face of their own experience to the contrary*. That is one of the things that appealed to me about the Carlos Castaneda books. I discovered them *after* having seen many of the extraordinary things he wrote about, in the desert with Rama. What resonated with me, however, is that Carlos was honest about what seeing these things *put him through*. He was sitting there shaking in his boots during many of these experiences, because they HAD just rocked his world, and changed his perception of that world in ways that -- if he was honest with himself about having seen what he just saw -- he could never go back to his previous way of seeing it. He had been changed forever by the experience. Many people don't WANT to be changed forever. They may claim that they do, but that's a pile of crap. They want enlightenment to be as it was described to them by MMY, a slow and linear process, in which waking state is followed by CC and then CC is followed by GC and all of these transitions are easy and don't really rock your world all that much. That is not my experience of how such things often happen. IMO, the different states of consciousness are not linear, they are coexistent and congruent, ALL of them happening to ALL of us at once, simultaneously. We just focus on and get attached to one of them at a time, that's all. I've bounced in and out of various of Maharishi's Seven states of consciousness for years, and not one of them was IMO any better than another, or all that different from one another. It was more like turning the dial on a TV and choosing to listen to and watch a different show, that's all. And it was the SAME show, only totally different because you'd changed the subjective point of view from which you were watching it. But now imagine having experiences of CC or GC or UC and trying to tell someone who has never experienced them about them. Should they believe you?
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: You are not interested in the argument that can be made against your judgment on this issue of miracles, Curtis--and your way of making sure your judgment remains as it is, is to insinuate a protocol of debate which actually does not even exist inside of your mind. That anything could ever be said which would substantiate these claims that certain Catholic Saints levitated, or flew. Or any other spiritual phenomenon. Curtis is easily the most fanatically anti-spiritual soul who has ever graced this forum.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wayback71 wayback71@ wrote: Barry, when you saw Lenz levite 1. had you heard before that he did this sort of thing? No. Not the first time I saw him/it. Susan, I'd like to do what I forgot to do when first replying, and thank you for the way in which you asked your questions. That is, curious and more than a little skeptical, but not hostile. That is rare, and why I don't talk about this stuff here very much, and why I won't talk about it again for a while after this post. From my point of view, the important thing about my first post on this subject yesterday was the last sentence: Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think. THAT is really the bottom line. THAT, if there was one, was the benefit of having witnessed extraordinary things. NOT the having done it, but the having to *live with* having done it. What do you DO with having experienced something that you and everyone around you knows could not have happened, if the world is really as it has been described to us all our lives? Do you talk about it? Do you try to convince others that it was real, and tell them what you think it meant? Good luck with that. :-) You CAN'T ever convince someone who hasn't seen or experienced something like this that it was real. Some people actually are so freaked out by what they realize are the implications of having seen something like this that they try to make the experience GO AWAY. For example, I once took an ex-girlfriend, a die-hard TMer who still is one to this day, to see Rama. I didn't push it on her, because I knew what a stick-up-her-butt TM TB she was, but she asked, so I brought her along to a public talk. At one point during one of the meditations, she, sitting right beside me, opened her eyes and looked at Rama and said Oh my God! I opened my eyes and looked at her and she was quivering, shaking. I looked up at Rama and sure enough, he was hovering about a foot above the sofa he had been sitting on. I whispered to her, What are you seeing? She said, He is levitating. She stared at him for some minutes, clearly somewhat shaken by the experience, and then closed her eyes again and meditated. After the talk, I asked her about it and she said, Yes, there is no question about it...he was levitating. Not bouncing, levitating. Two days later I ran into her, and she denied ever having said that, or ever having seen it. Some weeks later I heard through the gravevine that she now denied ever having gone to see Rama in the first place, because that would have been perceived as Off The Program. THIS is the thing that people who think All we'd have to do to get everyone to sign up to learn TM is to demonstrate real flying don't understand. They really don't get the power of denial, and of clinging to what they've been told about the world and how it works, even *in the face of their own experience to the contrary*. That is one of the things that appealed to me about the Carlos Castaneda books. I discovered them *after* having seen many of the extraordinary things he wrote about, in the desert with Rama. What resonated with me, however, is that Carlos was honest about what seeing these things *put him through*. He was sitting there shaking in his boots during many of these experiences, because they HAD just rocked his world, and changed his perception of that world in ways that -- if he was honest with himself about having seen what he just saw -- he could never go back to his previous way of seeing it. He had been changed forever by the experience. Many people don't WANT to be changed forever. They may claim that they do, but that's a pile of crap. They want enlightenment to be as it was described to them by MMY, a slow and linear process, in which waking state is followed by CC and then CC is followed by GC and all of these transitions are easy and don't really rock your world all that much. That is not my experience of how such things often happen. IMO, the different states of consciousness are not linear, they are coexistent and congruent, ALL of them happening to ALL of us at once, simultaneously. We just focus on and get attached to one of them at a time, that's all. I've bounced in and out of various of Maharishi's Seven states of consciousness for years, and not one of them was IMO any better than another, or all that different from one another. It was more like turning the dial on a TV and choosing to listen to and watch a different show, that's all. And it was the SAME show, only totally different because you'd changed the subjective point of view from
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Ravi Chivukula chivukula.ravi@... wrote: That's my reading of the situation. No you don't get to claim this after both parties have refuted this interpretation. What you are doing it trying to repeat an unsupported accusation meant to give a false damaging impression of my participation online. Please take this needy, whiny, drama queenery elsewhere. You post as an anonymous poster, no one knows your last name. This is also untrue. Through a quick search anyone can find both my real last name and my professional name from this board. And if you are in the DC area, there is only one guy named Curtis involved with Delta blues. Of course as a computer professional yourself you know this, so this is all smoke screen for your bad online behavior. I post as myself - my online reputation is being more harmed by you than the other way around. You have chosen to represent yourself the way you have and must live with it. But you don't get hired the way I do, job by job. So if your employer is happy with how you are online you are gunna be fine. The slanderous lies you have chosen as your troll bait here are particularly damaging to me in my career. I didn't realize what you were up to last time till it was too late. This time I am defending myself upfront. I'm talking to Emily here, so to use Barry's phrases - Bzzt..back off. This is dishonest, you were slandering me. It is also hypocritical since you were butting into a post we were making to each other and both understood so you could interject your troll tourette's damaging phrase. If you weren't butting into conversations I have been having with others, we would have no interaction here. Stop stalking me. Stop being such an attention vampire. You are not in my list of interesting persons. This is so revealing on so many levels I will leave it without commentary.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeDgIvlonhYfeature=player_embedded#! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeDgIvlonhYfeature=player_embedded#! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: snip (I just got my magazine page from the 1930s of Santa with a cigarette in his hand, it is my kind of Christmas cheer!) snip Today the depiction of any character, particularly one that appeals to children, as a smoker of any kind would be shocking and horrifying to politically correct adults and traumatic to their overly-protected children. But back in the Analog Age pipe smoking just seemed like a nice, warm thing that friendly grandfatherly types like Santa do: http://www.advertisingtimes.fr/2010/08/60-publicites-inimaginables-aujou\ rdhui.html http://www.advertisingtimes.fr/2010/08/60-publicites-inimaginables-aujo\ urdhui.html The oldest and most bizarre cigarette ad with Santa You've come across seems one from 1919 for a long-gone brand, Murad Turkish Cigarettes. A scary, sinister-looking Santa smokes one through a long holder and claims that the grown-ups all wanted Murads for a present. http://izismile.com/2009/06/16/old_ads_40_pics.html http://izismile.com/2009/06/16/old_ads_40_pics.html [http://img.izismile.com/img/img2/20090616/bonus//3/old_ads_27.jpg] Alan Hale, Sr. (the Skipper's dad) played a smoking Santa (also using a cigarette holder) in a Chesterfield ad from 1947, offering lots more smoking pleasure and A Hale and Hearty Good wish. Note the nice Christmas cigarette cartons featuring Santa. for Lucky Strike, too [http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_KNKNrrvs9Es/THe8OHbRBjI/F6M/TnG2Z2ZuM\ zk/s1600/alan-hale-as-santa.jpg] And jolly old Santa himself exhales that smooth, unfiltered smoke from a Pall Mall without bothering with a cigarette holder, guarding against throat-scratch, in a 1950 magazine ad. [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_KNKNrrvs9Es/THe8h3JnkQI/F6c/x_ofKJq0x\ gg/s320/odd_santa_ads_8.jpg] Santa reading your post curtisdeltablues : [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LKxUIX0W1G0/TRbwErTFdUI/AMw/gcONH509n\ Oc/s320/38430b.jpg] but hold on hold on there is a solution: [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_KNKNrrvs9Es/THfMypPYUZI/GBg/fY-ca0o6n\ sM/s1600/arrow_shirts_xmas_06.JPG] The buttonholes, the sizing, the facing, the characters Printed in black on neckband and tail. The shape, The label, the labor, the color, the shade. The shirt. touches his neck and smooths over his back. It slides down his sides. It even goes down below his belt down into his pants. Lucky shirt. PS plead forgiveness for snipping as always the better and blessed are left out... [:D]
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: You are not interested in the argument that can be made against your judgment on this issue of miracles, Curtis--and your way of making sure your judgment remains as it is, is to insinuate a protocol of debate which actually does not even exist inside of your mind. That anything could ever be said which would substantiate these claims that certain Catholic Saints levitated, or flew. Or any other spiritual phenomenon. Curtis is easily the most fanatically anti-spiritual soul who has ever graced this forum. Gee Nabby, thanks! Let me return the favor that I have found you the most omnivorous believer of unfounded claims of anyone I have run into here. Your bar for admission into your eclectic beliefs is so low that an aphid, finding your epistemological bar in the way of a delicious sap filled flower, would simply step OVER it without losing one step of momentum in the gate of his tiny, tiny legs.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeDgIvlonhYfeature=player_embedded#%21 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeDgIvlonhYfeature=player_embedded#! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, .. so how about you do it-- wasn't stardust this reindeer cornflakes --whatever it is that made the children who walk on air or what what would happen if you would you support me- stronger self-explanatory and you make a difference flat environment like this Christmas Two http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeDgIvlonhYfeature=player_embedded#! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeDgIvlonhYfeature=player_embedded#! --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: snip (I just got my magazine page from the 1930s of Santa with a cigarette in his hand, it is my kind of Christmas cheer!) snip Today the depiction of any character, particularly one that appeals to children, as a smoker of any kind would be shocking and horrifying to politically correct adults and traumatic to their overly-protected children. But back in the Analog Age pipe smoking just seemed like a nice, warm thing that friendly grandfatherly types like Santa do: http://www.advertisingtimes.fr/2010/08/60-publicites-inimaginables-aujou\ rdhui.html http://www.advertisingtimes.fr/2010/08/60-publicites-inimaginables-aujo\ urdhui.html The oldest and most bizarre cigarette ad with Santa You've come across seems one from 1919 for a long-gone brand, Murad Turkish Cigarettes. A scary, sinister-looking Santa smokes one through a long holder and claims that the grown-ups all wanted Murads for a present. http://izismile.com/2009/06/16/old_ads_40_pics.html http://izismile.com/2009/06/16/old_ads_40_pics.html [http://img.izismile.com/img/img2/20090616/bonus//3/old_ads_27.jpg] Alan Hale, Sr. (the Skipper's dad) played a smoking Santa (also using a cigarette holder) in a Chesterfield ad from 1947, offering lots more smoking pleasure and A Hale and Hearty Good wish. Note the nice Christmas cigarette cartons featuring Santa. for Lucky Strike, too [http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_KNKNrrvs9Es/THe8OHbRBjI/F6M/TnG2Z2ZuM\ zk/s1600/alan-hale-as-santa.jpg] And jolly old Santa himself exhales that smooth, unfiltered smoke from a Pall Mall without bothering with a cigarette holder, guarding against throat-scratch, in a 1950 magazine ad. [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_KNKNrrvs9Es/THe8h3JnkQI/F6c/x_ofKJq0x\ gg/s320/odd_santa_ads_8.jpg] Santa reading your post curtisdeltablues : [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LKxUIX0W1G0/TRbwErTFdUI/AMw/gcONH509n\ Oc/s320/38430b.jpg] but hold on hold on there is a solution: [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_KNKNrrvs9Es/THfMypPYUZI/GBg/fY-ca0o6n\ sM/s1600/arrow_shirts_xmas_06.JPG] The buttonholes, the sizing, the facing, the characters Printed in black on neckband and tail. The shape, The label, the labor, the color, the shade. The shirt. touches his neck and smooths over his back. It slides down his sides. It even goes down below his belt down into his pants. Lucky shirt. PS plead forgiveness for snipping as always the better and blessed are left out... [:D]
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Like what you say here Raunchy, especially about filing in anything is possible and remaining open to wonder. Yay! From: raunchydog raunchy...@yahoo.com To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Friday, September 7, 2012 9:01 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wayback71 wayback71@ wrote: Barry, when you saw Lenz levite 1. had you heard before that he did this sort of thing? No. Not the first time I saw him/it. Susan, I'd like to do what I forgot to do when first replying, and thank you for the way in which you asked your questions. That is, curious and more than a little skeptical, but not hostile. That is rare, and why I don't talk about this stuff here very much, and why I won't talk about it again for a while after this post. From my point of view, the important thing about my first post on this subject yesterday was the last sentence: Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think. THAT is really the bottom line. THAT, if there was one, was the benefit of having witnessed extraordinary things. NOT the having done it, but the having to *live with* having done it. What do you DO with having experienced something that you and everyone around you knows could not have happened, if the world is really as it has been described to us all our lives? Do you talk about it? Do you try to convince others that it was real, and tell them what you think it meant? Good luck with that. :-) You CAN'T ever convince someone who hasn't seen or experienced something like this that it was real. Some people actually are so freaked out by what they realize are the implications of having seen something like this that they try to make the experience GO AWAY. For example, I once took an ex-girlfriend, a die-hard TMer who still is one to this day, to see Rama. I didn't push it on her, because I knew what a stick-up-her-butt TM TB she was, but she asked, so I brought her along to a public talk. At one point during one of the meditations, she, sitting right beside me, opened her eyes and looked at Rama and said Oh my God! I opened my eyes and looked at her and she was quivering, shaking. I looked up at Rama and sure enough, he was hovering about a foot above the sofa he had been sitting on. I whispered to her, What are you seeing? She said, He is levitating. She stared at him for some minutes, clearly somewhat shaken by the experience, and then closed her eyes again and meditated. After the talk, I asked her about it and she said, Yes, there is no question about it...he was levitating. Not bouncing, levitating. Two days later I ran into her, and she denied ever having said that, or ever having seen it. Some weeks later I heard through the gravevine that she now denied ever having gone to see Rama in the first place, because that would have been perceived as Off The Program. THIS is the thing that people who think All we'd have to do to get everyone to sign up to learn TM is to demonstrate real flying don't understand. They really don't get the power of denial, and of clinging to what they've been told about the world and how it works, even *in the face of their own experience to the contrary*. That is one of the things that appealed to me about the Carlos Castaneda books. I discovered them *after* having seen many of the extraordinary things he wrote about, in the desert with Rama. What resonated with me, however, is that Carlos was honest about what seeing these things *put him through*. He was sitting there shaking in his boots during many of these experiences, because they HAD just rocked his world, and changed his perception of that world in ways that -- if he was honest with himself about having seen what he just saw -- he could never go back to his previous way of seeing it. He had been changed forever by the experience. Many people don't WANT to be changed forever. They may claim that they do, but that's a pile of crap. They want enlightenment to be as it was described to them by MMY, a slow and linear process, in which waking state is followed by CC and then CC is followed by GC and all of these transitions are easy and don't really rock your world all that much. That is not my experience of how such things often happen. IMO, the different states of consciousness are not linear, they are coexistent and congruent, ALL of them happening to ALL of us at once, simultaneously. We just focus on and get attached to one of them at a time, that's all. I've bounced in and out of various of Maharishi's Seven
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: You are not interested in the argument that can be made against your judgment on this issue of miracles, Curtis--and your way of making sure your judgment remains as it is, is to insinuate a protocol of debate which actually does not even exist inside of your mind. That anything could ever be said which would substantiate these claims that certain Catholic Saints levitated, or flew. Or any other spiritual phenomenon. Curtis is easily the most fanatically anti-spiritual soul who has ever graced this forum. Gee Nabby, thanks! Let me return the favor that I have found you the most omnivorous believer of unfounded claims of anyone I have run into here. Your bar for admission into your eclectic beliefs is so low that an aphid, finding your epistemological bar in the way of a delicious sap filled flower, would simply step OVER it without losing one step of momentum in the gait of his tiny, tiny legs.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wayback71 wayback71@ wrote: Barry, when you saw Lenz levite 1. had you heard before that he did this sort of thing? No. Not the first time I saw him/it. Susan, I'd like to do what I forgot to do when first replying, and thank you for the way in which you asked your questions. That is, curious and more than a little skeptical, but not hostile. That is rare, and why I don't talk about this stuff here very much, and why I won't talk about it again for a while after this post. You're welcome. And thanks for taking the time to answer all the questions I had. I have a now deceased friend who was with Rama, too, and talked of these things. I have no doubt whatsoever that you and he saw Rama do these miraculous things. But, like you, my question is what does it mean? I too do not equate the ability to do siddhis or miracles with enlightenment. Rama did not call in the TV cameras and perhaps the purpose was to just stretch the mindsets of his viewers. Or maybe there was no purpose, he was just goofing and having fun. But the fundamental question is how do you integrate seeing this with the seemingly concrete world around us, the laws of physics, the need to have explanations for events, and also the need to believe in something greater and different than we have all around us. Glad you got to see Rama do this. I am at a point in life where I think Enlightenment is possible, but that it might only be a style of brain functioning here you kill off the ego part (perhaps by slowing down the whirlwind of interconnections and messages so that the sense of self and doing and are undone) and are left feeling calm, happy, and infinite. No bad at all in many ways, but not mystical. But I am not sure that there is anything after the body dies, only energy or consciousness. This half-baked and evolving view could accept other realities that coexist with ours, and still not necessarily believe in God or life after death. The whole thing is pretty amazing and as I have said before, I really would love to be around for the scientific progress of the next hundred years or so. From my point of view, the important thing about my first post on this subject yesterday was the last sentence: Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think. THAT is really the bottom line. THAT, if there was one, was the benefit of having witnessed extraordinary things. NOT the having done it, but the having to *live with* having done it. What do you DO with having experienced something that you and everyone around you knows could not have happened, if the world is really as it has been described to us all our lives? Do you talk about it? Do you try to convince others that it was real, and tell them what you think it meant? Good luck with that. :-) You CAN'T ever convince someone who hasn't seen or experienced something like this that it was real. My brother and his wife and kids and several adult friends and many adult patrons saw something odd in Costa Rica years go- a large round disc (just like your would think a UFO would look) hovering silently on a mountainside just about 50 yards from where they sat in a restaurant. It stayed there for a good 10 minutes, then flew off at lightening speed, silently. They never talk about it!! None of them You can't explain it to others and so you file it away. Some people actually are so freaked out by what they realize are the implications of having seen something like this that they try to make the experience GO AWAY. For example, I once took an ex-girlfriend, a die-hard TMer who still is one to this day, to see Rama. I didn't push it on her, because I knew what a stick-up-her-butt TM TB she was, but she asked, so I brought her along to a public talk. At one point during one of the meditations, she, sitting right beside me, opened her eyes and looked at Rama and said Oh my God! I opened my eyes and looked at her and she was quivering, shaking. I looked up at Rama and sure enough, he was hovering about a foot above the sofa he had been sitting on. I whispered to her, What are you seeing? She said, He is levitating. She stared at him for some minutes, clearly somewhat shaken by the experience, and then closed her eyes again and meditated. After the talk, I asked her about it and she said, Yes, there is no question about it...he was levitating. Not bouncing, levitating. Two days later I ran into her, and she denied ever having said that, or ever having seen it. Some weeks later I heard through the gravevine that she now denied ever having gone to see Rama in the first
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
...do you really think this particular post of Ravi's was geared towards harming your online reputation? curtisdeltablues: Yes I do and I'll tell you why. This is the second time he has accused me of making threats online... Well, if you are so worried about your online reputation, maybe you'd want to skip the 'ball gag' jokes! Lol! http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/message/307220
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words!
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Oh, I like your wordy responses. I'll give it five minutes next time.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. RESPONSE: No, they seem to have stopped because they stopped. God--or the supernatural grace which precipitated this miracles--said: Fuck it! I've had it. I'm going to change up the game. And ever since then (just before our lifetime) there ain't no miracles (or if there are, they are not being done through the agency which determined the miracles in this article). I think if cinema had been around in the 13th to 16th centuries in particular, the Holy Ghost might have permitted there to be a few miracles filmed. But maybe not. It might have destroyed the meritorious value of faith. Show me the nail marks, Jesus, baby--that is, if you really resurrected. The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all what is said in this article, find my skepticism significantly challenged. I suspect that it what happened to you--when you began reading. No, the present ontological context of the universe would make Saint Francis of Assisi probably an honest existentialist (of the atheistic variety). No one will levitate or fly in my lifetime. This seems certain to me, because I sense zero miracle potential in the universe. But when I read these accounts *it is a very different metaphysic* I encounter. A metaphysic which simply does not exist and therefore would seem never to have existed. I think your reaction a normal and healthy one.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all what is said in this article, find my skepticism significantly challenged. Come on Robin, the sources for these outlandish claims are not even given. It doesn't rise to even the level of the proven to be unreliable eyewitness accounts. This is at best hearsay through the distortion filter of many years and an obvious agenda to promote a cause. This is the telephone game played through centuries. You can't make any realistic distinction between these claims and sightings of aliens or bigfoot. These are stories, told by people with a purpose to inspire others that their internal experience was extraordinary just as Maharishi did with his flying promises. They may never have been meant to be taken literally, but if they were. there is no good reason to take these claims seriously. Or if we do just accept any old claim we have to include all the nonsense people have claimed to have witnessed. Oh hell, I should have just left it to the 16 words I haven't helped this cause at all! But if you have a case to make that I have missed some good reason to take these claims seriously I would be happy to read it. Start with how you build credibility for an unknown source. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. RESPONSE: No, they seem to have stopped because they stopped. God--or the supernatural grace which precipitated this miracles--said: Fuck it! I've had it. I'm going to change up the game. And ever since then (just before our lifetime) there ain't no miracles (or if there are, they are not being done through the agency which determined the miracles in this article). I think if cinema had been around in the 13th to 16th centuries in particular, the Holy Ghost might have permitted there to be a few miracles filmed. But maybe not. It might have destroyed the meritorious value of faith. Show me the nail marks, Jesus, baby--that is, if you really resurrected. The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all what is said in this article, find my skepticism significantly challenged. I suspect that it what happened to you--when you began reading. No, the present ontological context of the universe would make Saint Francis of Assisi probably an honest existentialist (of the atheistic variety). No one will levitate or fly in my lifetime. This seems certain to me, because I sense zero miracle potential in the universe. But when I read these accounts *it is a very different metaphysic* I encounter. A metaphysic which simply does not exist and therefore would seem never to have existed. I think your reaction a normal and healthy one.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Curtis, the fanaticism of your disbelief is more unyielding to reality--or any ontological contingencies--than the fanaticism of those Evangelical Christians who tried to make you Accept the Lord into you life. I don't quite understand it, but there is a ferocious intransigence there, almost as if you secretly believed in these accounts more than anyone could on FFL. I am sorry, but you are the guy who if Santa Claus appeared at your fireplace on Christmas night--with his full compliment of reindeer--you would shout him out of your house, and even as you saw him flying away in the sky you would be cursing him (undoubtedly with some very barbed wit). There is a terrible and tragic compulsion in you to simplify this business of what is real, Curtis. You will accuse me of failing to address your question, but the coercive intent of your dogmatic view of the matter of the mystery of Why there is something rather than nothing? just vacuums up all the space that I think should be there were your convictions originating in an innocent experience. This is the problem between us, Curtis: It was an intellectual love fest in the beginning [Robin realizes he has totally lost Curtis at this point in his post: Curtis's FPOT is erupting in disgust]; but gradually it turned to intellectual estrangement of a very high order. I dont want to go down that road again with you, Curtis; but know this: there is an argument to be made for the veracity of the phenomenon described in these accounts and it is dramatically more complex and multi-layered and interesting than your simple and outright--and nonempirical--denial. Let's just be friends, Curtis. We are looking at the universe--and all the beings inside of it--from very different perspectives. Let us leave it at that. The writers, the witnesses, the Saints, in this article they are not fairly represented by an idea that makes of all this the equivalent of someone insisting the earth is really flat, or that my pet unicorn threw up in the sink this morning. You have a reflex about this, Curtis. If in the end it is proven there is a God you will tell him he doesn't exist. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all what is said in this article, find my skepticism significantly challenged. Come on Robin, the sources for these outlandish claims are not even given. It doesn't rise to even the level of the proven to be unreliable eyewitness accounts. This is at best hearsay through the distortion filter of many years and an obvious agenda to promote a cause. This is the telephone game played through centuries. You can't make any realistic distinction between these claims and sightings of aliens or bigfoot. These are stories, told by people with a purpose to inspire others that their internal experience was extraordinary just as Maharishi did with his flying promises. They may never have been meant to be taken literally, but if they were. there is no good reason to take these claims seriously. Or if we do just accept any old claim we have to include all the nonsense people have claimed to have witnessed. Oh hell, I should have just left it to the 16 words I haven't helped this cause at all! But if you have a case to make that I have missed some good reason to take these claims seriously I would be happy to read it. Start with how you build credibility for an unknown source. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. RESPONSE: No, they seem to have stopped because they stopped. God--or the supernatural grace which precipitated this miracles--said: Fuck it! I've had it. I'm going to change up the game. And ever since then (just before our lifetime) there ain't no miracles (or if there are, they are not being done through the agency which determined the miracles in this article). I think if cinema had been around in the 13th to 16th centuries in particular, the Holy Ghost might have permitted there to be a few miracles filmed. But maybe not. It might have destroyed the meritorious value of faith. Show me the nail marks, Jesus, baby--that is, if you really resurrected. The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stanley@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y Q.E.D.!
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. RESPONSE: No, they seem to have stopped because they stopped. God--or the supernatural grace which precipitated this miracles--said: Fuck it! I've had it. I'm going to change up the game. And ever since then (just before our lifetime) there ain't no miracles (or if there are, they are not being done through the agency which determined the miracles in this article). I think if cinema had been around in the 13th to 16th centuries in particular, the Holy Ghost might have permitted there to be a few miracles filmed. But maybe not. It might have destroyed the meritorious value of faith. Show me the nail marks, Jesus, baby--that is, if you really resurrected. I think you've inadvertently hit the nail on the head (sorry) these things are all about faith, specifically the church keeping its flock enthralled by the supposed power of devotion. If the only evidence people have is of the leaders they have been brought up to believe have a hotline to the almighty, then a few stories like this would sure help the donations flood in and if people suddenly had a way of checking for themselves the miracles would dry up, which we all agree they have done. The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all what is said in this article, find my skepticism significantly challenged. I suspect that it what happened to you--when you began reading. I've heard it all before actually, levitation, sea serpents, UFOs from venus, they all disappear once understanding increases to the point that the objects of faith can't even fit into the way we now see the world as being. UFOs are a particular favourite subject of mine, the speed at which the angelic beings from Venus stopped visiting us once we discovered that it rains flouro-sulphuric acid on their home world is amazing. All of a sudden the aliens came from much further away. Levitation might have been a poetic way of saying saints can get close to god or be drawn to heaven but once the four fundamental forces were nailed down and realised to be *not* optional without the universe falling apart the saints were seen as mere flesh after all and the miracles stopped. No, the present ontological context of the universe would make Saint Francis of Assisi probably an honest existentialist (of the atheistic variety). No one will levitate or fly in my lifetime. This seems certain to me, because I sense zero miracle potential in the universe. I don't know about that, religion still seems to be the order of most people's day. I think god is missing a trick in not manifesting something paranormal now. But when I read these accounts *it is a very different metaphysic* I encounter. A metaphysic which simply does not exist and therefore would seem never to have existed. I think your reaction a normal and healthy one.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stanley@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y Hmm, I suspect that this is a left wing plot to discredit the republicans. Am I right?
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: Curtis, the fanaticism of your disbelief is more unyielding to reality--or any ontological contingencies--than the fanaticism of those Evangelical Christians who tried to make you Accept the Lord into you life. I don't quite understand it, but there is a ferocious intransigence there, almost as if you secretly believed in these accounts more than anyone could on FFL. I am sorry, but you are the guy who if Santa Claus appeared at your fireplace on Christmas night--with his full compliment of reindeer--you would shout him out of your house, and even as you saw him flying away in the sky you would be cursing him (undoubtedly with some very barbed wit). There is a terrible and tragic compulsion in you to simplify this business of what is real, Curtis. You will accuse me of failing to address your question, but the coercive intent of your dogmatic view of the matter of the mystery of Why there is something rather than nothing? just vacuums up all the space that I think should be there were your convictions originating in an innocent experience. This is the problem between us, Curtis: It was an intellectual love fest in the beginning [Robin realizes he has totally lost Curtis at this point in his post: Curtis's FPOT is erupting in disgust]; but gradually it turned to intellectual estrangement of a very high order. I dont want to go down that road again with you, Curtis; but know this: there is an argument to be made for the veracity of the phenomenon described in these accounts and it is dramatically more complex and multi-layered and interesting than your simple and outright--and nonempirical--denial. Let's just be friends, Curtis. We are looking at the universe--and all the beings inside of it--from very different perspectives. Let us leave it at that. The writers, the witnesses, the Saints, in this article they are not fairly represented by an idea that makes of all this the equivalent of someone insisting the earth is really flat, or that my pet unicorn threw up in the sink this morning. You have a reflex about this, Curtis. If in the end it is proven there is a God you will tell him he doesn't exist. I think if Santa appeared it would be the same as someone levitating, case proved. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all what is said in this article, find my skepticism significantly challenged. Come on Robin, the sources for these outlandish claims are not even given. It doesn't rise to even the level of the proven to be unreliable eyewitness accounts. This is at best hearsay through the distortion filter of many years and an obvious agenda to promote a cause. This is the telephone game played through centuries. You can't make any realistic distinction between these claims and sightings of aliens or bigfoot. These are stories, told by people with a purpose to inspire others that their internal experience was extraordinary just as Maharishi did with his flying promises. They may never have been meant to be taken literally, but if they were. there is no good reason to take these claims seriously. Or if we do just accept any old claim we have to include all the nonsense people have claimed to have witnessed. Oh hell, I should have just left it to the 16 words I haven't helped this cause at all! But if you have a case to make that I have missed some good reason to take these claims seriously I would be happy to read it. Start with how you build credibility for an unknown source. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. RESPONSE: No, they seem to have stopped because they stopped. God--or the supernatural grace which precipitated this miracles--said: Fuck it! I've had it. I'm going to change up the game. And ever since then (just before our lifetime) there ain't no miracles (or if there are, they are not being done through the agency which determined the miracles in this article). I think if cinema had been around in the 13th to 16th centuries in particular, the Holy Ghost might have permitted there to be a few miracles filmed. But maybe not. It might have destroyed the meritorious value of faith.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stanley@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y Q.E.D.! And this is a joke to make us think you're more credulous than you are so you can accuse us of being too stupid to see the irony. Or am I joking in assuming no-one else realised the irony and want to call you stupid for thinking I'm not clever enough to see what everyone could see instantly and considered not worth commenting on.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
-- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@... wrote: Curtis, the fanaticism of your disbelief is more unyielding to reality--or any ontological contingencies--than the fanaticism of those Evangelical Christians who tried to make you Accept the Lord into you life. I don't quite understand it, but there is a ferocious intransigence there, almost as if you secretly believed in these accounts more than anyone could on FFL. No the ad hominem route doesn't cut it Robin. You and I share a similar proof system if a guy on the street handed us a bottle of pills and said take these and you will be better in every way. We would go through the same realistic questions concerning the claim, where did they come from, who made them, what is in them, how do you know what they do etc. You have deviated from this reasoning process in the case of the fantastic claim that people flew a long time ago and I am wondering why? You proposed that these claims ring true and you have turned it into an accusation that I am somehow deficient for asking what you are basing this confidence in. I am sorry, but you are the guy who if Santa Claus appeared at your fireplace on Christmas night--with his full compliment of reindeer--you would shout him out of your house, and even as you saw him flying away in the sky you would be cursing him (undoubtedly with some very barbed wit). Well I might be asleep and dreamed that I saw him, would it be unreasonable to check that out first? Would it be wrong to ask if someone else saw him? I have the same cognitive gaps you do Robin. You are building a case that I am somehow uniquely flawed by unreasonable skepticism, but you reject many ideas that I do and often from the same analysis of the baselessness of their claims. I suspect that you didn't attend any services for the late Sun Myung Moon because the Lord died, right? Does that make you this same guy you are trying to paint me as because you didn't find substance in his claims that he and many followers made that he was God on earth? There is a terrible and tragic compulsion in you to simplify this business of what is real, Curtis. You will accuse me of failing to address your question, I will because you are. You know better to slip an ad hominem attack in place of reasons Robin. but the coercive intent of your dogmatic view of the matter of the mystery of Why there is something rather than nothing? Just finished a great book by a physicist on this very subject. It turns out that from the physic's perspective nothing is less stable a state than something. Of course this doesn't clear up the mystery for a non physicist like me, but it does a bit better than just interjecting the word God as if that word explains it all. just vacuums up all the space that I think should be there were your convictions originating in an innocent experience. You are making a subjective assessment of how innocent my experience is here. You are of course welcome to make it, but don't think it advances your epistemological solitary, it is more ad hominem. It is a more gentile way of saying my pants are full of poop and yours are not so you don't have to give any supporting reasons for believing unsourced accounts of people flying posted on the Internet should be taken seriously. This is the problem between us, Curtis: It was an intellectual love fest in the beginning [Robin realizes he has totally lost Curtis at this point in his post: Curtis's FPOT is erupting in disgust]; Hey I liked you a lot and still do Robin (when you aren't trying to make a case that I am uniquely flawed for thinking differently than you do or challenging assertions you make), because of our disagreements as much as where we agree. but gradually it turned to intellectual estrangement of a very high order. I would rather discuss how we are putting our world views together differently, the reasons we have rather than long discussions of my personal faults through your perspective. Take a look at this very discussion Robin. I have challenged you for dodging my specific question about what you base your confidence on for those claims. I have further shown you where I specifically label what you have written as an attack on me as a person instead of rather than supporting your belief. What I have not done is to go into a list of what this means about the kind of person you are. I am not attacking you personally or characterizing you as a Bah Humbug Santa denier. (I just got my magazine page from the 1930s of Santa with a cigarette in his hand, it is my kind of Christmas cheer!) I dont want to go down that road again with you, Curtis; but know this: there is an argument to be made for the veracity of the phenomenon described in these accounts and it is dramatically more complex and multi-layered and interesting than your simple and outright--and nonempirical--denial.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stanley@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y Q.E.D.! And this is a joke to make us think you're more credulous than you are so you can accuse us of being too stupid to see the irony. Or am I joking in assuming no-one else realised the irony and want to call you stupid for thinking I'm not clever enough to see what everyone could see instantly and considered not worth commenting on. Q.E.D. = quod erat demonstrandum, it has been demonstrated (literally, which was to be demonstrated) In this case, salyavin, what is it that Robin is saying has been demonstrated? Careful, now. You might want to review what has gone before. Irony sometimes has more than one layer.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-fligh\ ts-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Just to pour gasoline on already-roaring flames, and to save a certain someone from bringing it up in an attempt to demonize me :-), I shall weigh in on the subject of levitation from a unique point of view. Other than Nabby, whose credibility I submit is in the same ballpark as Rush Limbaugh's or Paul Ryan's, I think I'm the only person here who has claimed to have witnessed real, hang-there-in-mid-air levitation. And I have. Not once, but dozens of times, over a period of 14 years. And it wasn't only me. Often I was one of a group of 200-500 students watching the guy do this, in various locations, ranging from out in the desert in the middle of the night to the Los Angeles Convention Center to Carnegie Hall. In those environments, Rama - Frederick Lenz didn't hop on his butt like a frog, he just lifted gently up off of the sofa or the sand he was sitting on or standing on, and hovered there in mid-air in exactly the way that a brick doesn't. For extended periods of time -- minutes, not seconds. That said, I can tell you nothing whatsoever about the nature of what it was that I saw other than I and others saw it. I do not know whether video or movie cameras trained on the guy as he lifted off would have captured it; I strongly suspect that they would not have. If I had to speculate, I would suspect that the phenomenon we witnessed was -- if it truly existed -- taking place on an alternate level of reality that might not have been captured by technology on this level of reality. I am equally comfortable with the notion that it didn't really exist at all, but that brings up more unanswerable questions. I don't know about you, but I have a harder time with the notion that someone can hypnotize 200-500 people at a time into seeing the same thing -- *without ever pre-announcing what it was that they were going to see* -- less believable than that something was actually happening. Something else. WHAT that something else was, I have no idea. Do I feel somewhat uncomfortable saying this? You betcha. I share almost all of Curtis and salyavin's skepticism about such things. But I really *did* see this shit. Over and over and over, for an extended period of time. Am I supposed to *deny* that I saw it, or come up with some convenient skeptic's explanation for what it was I and hundreds of others saw? That, to me, would be the easy path, a cop-out. I *did* see it. I have NO FUCKING IDEA what exactly it was that I saw, only that I saw it. Many times. Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: snip I think if cinema had been around in the 13th to 16th centuries in particular, the Holy Ghost might have permitted there to be a few miracles filmed. But maybe not. It might have destroyed the meritorious value of faith. Show me the nail marks, Jesus, baby--that is, if you really resurrected. I think you've inadvertently hit the nail on the head (sorry) these things are all about faith, specifically the church keeping its flock enthralled by the supposed power of devotion. If the only evidence people have is of the leaders they have been brought up to believe have a hotline to the almighty, then a few stories like this would sure help the donations flood in and if people suddenly had a way of checking for themselves the miracles would dry up, which we all agree they have done. Is it just purported miracles that could be checked out that have dried up? Or have purported miracles for which there is no good explanation dried up as well? On the other hand, have donations stopped flooding in? The veracity or purported veracity of an eyewitness account is of course a special field of investigation. But, even were I totally skeptical, I would, in going through all what is said in this article, find my skepticism significantly challenged. I suspect that it what happened to you--when you began reading. I've heard it all before actually, levitation, sea serpents, UFOs from venus, they all disappear once understanding increases to the point that the objects of faith can't even fit into the way we now see the world as being. You're using faith here in the generic sense--i.e., not just religious faith. (There are still Nessie and similar sightings, by the way, so maybe sea serpents isn't the best example here.) Are there other examples that increased understanding has failed so far to explain? BTW, to have one's skepticism significantly challenged is not the same as to make a believer out of the skeptic. UFOs are a particular favourite subject of mine, the speed at which the angelic beings from Venus stopped visiting us once we discovered that it rains flouro-sulphuric acid on their home world is amazing. All of a sudden the aliens came from much further away. And this isn't a very good example either, because the aliens are still coming (or still being reported), despite the knowledge that they're unlikely to be coming from Venus. Venus was a perfectly reasonable guess at first since it's the closest planet to us. There are good cases to be made as to why alien visitation in general is unlikely, but that Venus is inhospitable to life ain't one of them. For that matter, we keep discovering that life can exist on earth in more and more apparently inhospitable places (not just more and more places, but places that are more and more inhospitable). Levitation might have been a poetic way of saying saints can get close to god or be drawn to heaven but once the four fundamental forces were nailed down and realised to be *not* optional without the universe falling apart the saints were seen as mere flesh after all and the miracles stopped. What's the specific chronology?--of once the four forces were nailed down etc. and the miracles stopped? My intention here is not to disagree with you but rather to get you to tighten up your case. To paraphrase Robin's comment on reports of saintly levitation: There is an argument to be made for the veracity of certain apparently miraculous phenomena that is dramatically more complex and multi-layered and interesting than most skeptics are willing to take into account. That's unfortunate, IMHO. We learn much more about a controversial issue when each side addresses its opponent's best case.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-fligh\ ts-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Just to pour gasoline on already-roaring flames, and to save a certain someone from bringing it up in an attempt to demonize me :-), Barry has never been demonized by me for reporting his experience of seeing Lenz levitate. Bad start to an otherwise unusually honest and thoughtful post. I shall weigh in on the subject of levitation from a unique point of view. Other than Nabby, whose credibility I submit is in the same ballpark as Rush Limbaugh's or Paul Ryan's, I think I'm the only person here who has claimed to have witnessed real, hang-there-in-mid-air levitation. And I have. Not once, but dozens of times, over a period of 14 years. And it wasn't only me. Often I was one of a group of 200-500 students watching the guy do this, in various locations, ranging from out in the desert in the middle of the night to the Los Angeles Convention Center to Carnegie Hall. In those environments, Rama - Frederick Lenz didn't hop on his butt like a frog, he just lifted gently up off of the sofa or the sand he was sitting on or standing on, and hovered there in mid-air in exactly the way that a brick doesn't. For extended periods of time -- minutes, not seconds. That said, I can tell you nothing whatsoever about the nature of what it was that I saw other than I and others saw it. I do not know whether video or movie cameras trained on the guy as he lifted off would have captured it; I strongly suspect that they would not have. If I had to speculate, I would suspect that the phenomenon we witnessed was -- if it truly existed -- taking place on an alternate level of reality that might not have been captured by technology on this level of reality. I am equally comfortable with the notion that it didn't really exist at all, but that brings up more unanswerable questions. I don't know about you, but I have a harder time with the notion that someone can hypnotize 200-500 people at a time into seeing the same thing -- *without ever pre-announcing what it was that they were going to see* -- less believable than that something was actually happening. Something else. WHAT that something else was, I have no idea. Do I feel somewhat uncomfortable saying this? You betcha. I share almost all of Curtis and salyavin's skepticism about such things. But I really *did* see this shit. Over and over and over, for an extended period of time. Am I supposed to *deny* that I saw it, or come up with some convenient skeptic's explanation for what it was I and hundreds of others saw? That, to me, would be the easy path, a cop-out. I *did* see it. I have NO FUCKING IDEA what exactly it was that I saw, only that I saw it. Many times. Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think. And bad ending. But we can and should appreciate what comes in the middle.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend authfriend@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: I've heard it all before actually, levitation, sea serpents, UFOs from venus, they all disappear once understanding increases to the point that the objects of faith can't even fit into the way we now see the world as being. You're using faith here in the generic sense--i.e., not just religious faith. (There are still Nessie and similar sightings, by the way, so maybe sea serpents isn't the best example here.) Sea serpents are a great example as they used to be reported all over the world. They either died out (unlikely without good reason) or, most likely, they got reclassified as whales when man got interested in *actually* knowing what was out there. The descriptions people gave prior to that were seen as exaggerations of half-glimpsed features. No sea serpents have ever popped up, alive, dead or even fossilized to defend themselves. That people still see Nessie is funny more than anything else, there isn't enough food to support a breeding population of large predators in Loch Ness and the whole place has been mapped with sonar many times. Try telling that to the locals though... UFOs are a particular favourite subject of mine, the speed at which the angelic beings from Venus stopped visiting us once we discovered that it rains flouro-sulphuric acid on their home world is amazing. All of a sudden the aliens came from much further away. And this isn't a very good example either, because the aliens are still coming (or still being reported), despite the knowledge that they're unlikely to be coming from Venus. Venus was a perfectly reasonable guess at first since it's the closest planet to us. It wasn't a guess, it's where they said they were coming from to the contactees of the 50's. There are good cases to be made as to why alien visitation in general is unlikely, but that Venus is inhospitable to life ain't one of them. For that matter, we keep discovering that life can exist on earth in more and more apparently inhospitable places (not just more and more places, but places that are more and more inhospitable). Sure life can *adapt* to bizarre conditions but I was talking about humanoid life, breathing air, speaking English that claimed to come from somewhere that turns out has a surface temperature that would melt lead. Nowadays they all come from other dimensions or the Pleidaes, which actually have their own entertainingly serious problems preventing life like ours from evolving. The channellers should have researched it first methinks. What life needs to get going is another story. What it might need to be able to bypass the physical laws that underpin its existence is another one again. Levitation might have been a poetic way of saying saints can get close to god or be drawn to heaven but once the four fundamental forces were nailed down and realised to be *not* optional without the universe falling apart the saints were seen as mere flesh after all and the miracles stopped. What's the specific chronology?--of once the four forces were nailed down etc. and the miracles stopped? My intention here is not to disagree with you but rather to get you to tighten up your case. Why bother? My case is that times change and people are more versed in science and the way things really are and demand better evidence than the word of a dead religious person. A lot of people anyway, plenty still take the holy word for it but it has to be said miracles are a bit thin on the ground since we've had ways of recording them. To paraphrase Robin's comment on reports of saintly levitation: There is an argument to be made for the veracity of certain apparently miraculous phenomena that is dramatically more complex and multi-layered and interesting than most skeptics are willing to take into account. That's unfortunate, IMHO. We learn much more about a controversial issue when each side addresses its opponent's best case. Well I'm going to take my foot off the paradigm clutch if that was the best case for levitation.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend authfriend@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stanley@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y Q.E.D.! And this is a joke to make us think you're more credulous than you are so you can accuse us of being too stupid to see the irony. Or am I joking in assuming no-one else realised the irony and want to call you stupid for thinking I'm not clever enough to see what everyone could see instantly and considered not worth commenting on. Q.E.D. = quod erat demonstrandum, it has been demonstrated (literally, which was to be demonstrated) In this case, salyavin, what is it that Robin is saying has been demonstrated? Careful, now. You might want to review what has gone before. Irony sometimes has more than one layer. Erm, you didn't have to take that seriously you know...
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Thanks for weighing in Barry because this demonstrates what I was trying to get at with Robin. I was looking for the reasons he has for giving these accounts credibility. Your reasons are transparent, you witnessed it. Even then you show some restraint in evaluating what it all means and I believe that is appropriate given the conditions under which you saw these things. But the reasons for your belief are present. And you are not extending the claim very far beyond your own experience. I have always enjoyed this wrinkle in the fabric of skepticism to have you say you saw this many times. I am not inclined to go any further than that you are reporting that you saw it. I can't verify if others did, or that they all saw the same thing, and I am not inclined to immediately assume that this guy actually could break the known laws of physics. It goes into my category of the relationship between perception and conception in our sensory perception for me. It is not a mechanical process and as we learn more how our minds construct our reality out of the jumble of choices available, it makes me less rather than more confident of our ability to sort this kind of perception out. Does this make me flawed as a skeptic because I don't automatically take your word for what it means? No, in fact it aligns me with your own caution about its objective reality. People can see weird shit. Now the personal implications of how this would affect a person is a different story. This sounds like the potential for some heavy cognitive dissonance and I don't envy your position...or maybe I do! Shit I would love to see someone floating above a desert. But if I had to bet, I would say that the chances of its objective reality might be diminished a bit by the fact that this amazing thing didn't cause more of a stir or was recorded somehow for outsiders to evaluate. Like Maharishi the guy seemed to like PR and this sure would have put him over the top if he could do it for the cameras with magician's present. My best guess is that it has a connection to the darshon experiences I had with Maharishi. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-fligh\ ts-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Just to pour gasoline on already-roaring flames, and to save a certain someone from bringing it up in an attempt to demonize me :-), I shall weigh in on the subject of levitation from a unique point of view. Other than Nabby, whose credibility I submit is in the same ballpark as Rush Limbaugh's or Paul Ryan's, I think I'm the only person here who has claimed to have witnessed real, hang-there-in-mid-air levitation. And I have. Not once, but dozens of times, over a period of 14 years. And it wasn't only me. Often I was one of a group of 200-500 students watching the guy do this, in various locations, ranging from out in the desert in the middle of the night to the Los Angeles Convention Center to Carnegie Hall. In those environments, Rama - Frederick Lenz didn't hop on his butt like a frog, he just lifted gently up off of the sofa or the sand he was sitting on or standing on, and hovered there in mid-air in exactly the way that a brick doesn't. For extended periods of time -- minutes, not seconds. That said, I can tell you nothing whatsoever about the nature of what it was that I saw other than I and others saw it. I do not know whether video or movie cameras trained on the guy as he lifted off would have captured it; I strongly suspect that they would not have. If I had to speculate, I would suspect that the phenomenon we witnessed was -- if it truly existed -- taking place on an alternate level of reality that might not have been captured by technology on this level of reality. I am equally comfortable with the notion that it didn't really exist at all, but that brings up more unanswerable questions. I don't know about you, but I have a harder time with the notion that someone can hypnotize 200-500 people at a time into seeing the same thing -- *without ever pre-announcing what it was that they were going to see* -- less believable than that something was actually happening. Something else. WHAT that something else was, I have no idea. Do I feel somewhat uncomfortable saying this? You betcha. I share almost all of Curtis and salyavin's skepticism about such things. But I really *did* see this shit. Over and over and over, for an
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, authfriend authfriend@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Alex Stanley j_alexander_stanley@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html Proof that God heals amputees: http://youtu.be/PmH1YggCQ7Y Q.E.D.! And this is a joke to make us think you're more credulous than you are so you can accuse us of being too stupid to see the irony. Or am I joking in assuming no-one else realised the irony and want to call you stupid for thinking I'm not clever enough to see what everyone could see instantly and considered not worth commenting on. Q.E.D. = quod erat demonstrandum, it has been demonstrated (literally, which was to be demonstrated) In this case, salyavin, what is it that Robin is saying has been demonstrated? Careful, now. You might want to review what has gone before. Irony sometimes has more than one layer. Erm, you didn't have to take that seriously you know... OK, you didn't get beyond the top layer. Too bad. The next layer down is funnier.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
TurqB, if this took some courage to post, which I'm guessing it did, I thank you for that. Also for scrambling my brains nicely in reference to my opinions about you. This scrambling will definitely take some time to settle out. IMHO, you are the Biggest Mystery Man on FFL. And given the presence of So And So and You Know Who, that's saying a lot. From: turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, September 6, 2012 11:21 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Just to pour gasoline on already-roaring flames, and to save a certain someone from bringing it up in an attempt to demonize me :-), I shall weigh in on the subject of levitation from a unique point of view. Other than Nabby, whose credibility I submit is in the same ballpark as Rush Limbaugh's or Paul Ryan's, I think I'm the only person here who has claimed to have witnessed real, hang-there-in-mid-air levitation. And I have. Not once, but dozens of times, over a period of 14 years. And it wasn't only me. Often I was one of a group of 200-500 students watching the guy do this, in various locations, ranging from out in the desert in the middle of the night to the Los Angeles Convention Center to Carnegie Hall. In those environments, Rama - Frederick Lenz didn't hop on his butt like a frog, he just lifted gently up off of the sofa or the sand he was sitting on or standing on, and hovered there in mid-air in exactly the way that a brick doesn't. For extended periods of time -- minutes, not seconds. That said, I can tell you nothing whatsoever about the nature of what it was that I saw other than I and others saw it. I do not know whether video or movie cameras trained on the guy as he lifted off would have captured it; I strongly suspect that they would not have. If I had to speculate, I would suspect that the phenomenon we witnessed was -- if it truly existed -- taking place on an alternate level of reality that might not have been captured by technology on this level of reality. I am equally comfortable with the notion that it didn't really exist at all, but that brings up more unanswerable questions. I don't know about you, but I have a harder time with the notion that someone can hypnotize 200-500 people at a time into seeing the same thing -- *without ever pre-announcing what it was that they were going to see* -- less believable than that something was actually happening. Something else. WHAT that something else was, I have no idea. Do I feel somewhat uncomfortable saying this? You betcha. I share almost all of Curtis and salyavin's skepticism about such things. But I really *did* see this shit. Over and over and over, for an extended period of time. Am I supposed to *deny* that I saw it, or come up with some convenient skeptic's explanation for what it was I and hundreds of others saw? That, to me, would be the easy path, a cop-out. I *did* see it. I have NO FUCKING IDEA what exactly it was that I saw, only that I saw it. Many times. Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Yup, Barry, the upsurge in creative posts is inspiring. From: Share Long sharelon...@yahoo.com To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, September 6, 2012 11:27 AM Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true TurqB, if this took some courage to post, which I'm guessing it did, I thank you for that. Also for scrambling my brains nicely in reference to my opinions about you. This scrambling will definitely take some time to settle out. IMHO, you are the Biggest Mystery Man on FFL. And given the presence of So And So and You Know Who, that's saying a lot. From: turquoiseb no_re...@yahoogroups.com To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, September 6, 2012 11:21 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-flights-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Just to pour gasoline on already-roaring flames, and to save a certain someone from bringing it up in an attempt to demonize me :-), I shall weigh in on the subject of levitation from a unique point of view. Other than Nabby, whose credibility I submit is in the same ballpark as Rush Limbaugh's or Paul Ryan's, I think I'm the only person here who has claimed to have witnessed real, hang-there-in-mid-air levitation. And I have. Not once, but dozens of times, over a period of 14 years. And it wasn't only me. Often I was one of a group of 200-500 students watching the guy do this, in various locations, ranging from out in the desert in the middle of the night to the Los Angeles Convention Center to Carnegie Hall. In those environments, Rama - Frederick Lenz didn't hop on his butt like a frog, he just lifted gently up off of the sofa or the sand he was sitting on or standing on, and hovered there in mid-air in exactly the way that a brick doesn't. For extended periods of time -- minutes, not seconds. That said, I can tell you nothing whatsoever about the nature of what it was that I saw other than I and others saw it. I do not know whether video or movie cameras trained on the guy as he lifted off would have captured it; I strongly suspect that they would not have. If I had to speculate, I would suspect that the phenomenon we witnessed was -- if it truly existed -- taking place on an alternate level of reality that might not have been captured by technology on this level of reality. I am equally comfortable with the notion that it didn't really exist at all, but that brings up more unanswerable questions. I don't know about you, but I have a harder time with the notion that someone can hypnotize 200-500 people at a time into seeing the same thing -- *without ever pre-announcing what it was that they were going to see* -- less believable than that something was actually happening. Something else. WHAT that something else was, I have no idea. Do I feel somewhat uncomfortable saying this? You betcha. I share almost all of Curtis and salyavin's skepticism about such things. But I really *did* see this shit. Over and over and over, for an extended period of time. Am I supposed to *deny* that I saw it, or come up with some convenient skeptic's explanation for what it was I and hundreds of others saw? That, to me, would be the easy path, a cop-out. I *did* see it. I have NO FUCKING IDEA what exactly it was that I saw, only that I saw it. Many times. Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think.
Re: [FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Curtis, I think you studied hypnotherapy? Does it make you wonder if Lenz did some sort of mass hypnosis? There was this Sci-Fi series called Stormfront was based on a series of books about a supernatural investigator by a martial arts instructor. In one episode a character was doing shape shifting but winds up explaining to the protagonist that his body didn't actually change shape but the technique he had made somebody think he did. That said, my tantra teacher said he has floated and said I probably would but haven't. He didn't indicate there was any specific technique involved but he just noticed something funny during meditation and opened his eyes enough to see he was floating several feet off the ground. Probably like others I have dreams where I just step up into space and sail along like surfing through air. It seems ridiculously simple and confuses the mind when you wake up as to why it just doesn't work that way. On 09/06/2012 10:46 AM, curtisdeltablues wrote: Thanks for weighing in Barry because this demonstrates what I was trying to get at with Robin. I was looking for the reasons he has for giving these accounts credibility. Your reasons are transparent, you witnessed it. Even then you show some restraint in evaluating what it all means and I believe that is appropriate given the conditions under which you saw these things. But the reasons for your belief are present. And you are not extending the claim very far beyond your own experience. I have always enjoyed this wrinkle in the fabric of skepticism to have you say you saw this many times. I am not inclined to go any further than that you are reporting that you saw it. I can't verify if others did, or that they all saw the same thing, and I am not inclined to immediately assume that this guy actually could break the known laws of physics. It goes into my category of the relationship between perception and conception in our sensory perception for me. It is not a mechanical process and as we learn more how our minds construct our reality out of the jumble of choices available, it makes me less rather than more confident of our ability to sort this kind of perception out. Does this make me flawed as a skeptic because I don't automatically take your word for what it means? No, in fact it aligns me with your own caution about its objective reality. People can see weird shit. Now the personal implications of how this would affect a person is a different story. This sounds like the potential for some heavy cognitive dissonance and I don't envy your position...or maybe I do! Shit I would love to see someone floating above a desert. But if I had to bet, I would say that the chances of its objective reality might be diminished a bit by the fact that this amazing thing didn't cause more of a stir or was recorded somehow for outsiders to evaluate. Like Maharishi the guy seemed to like PR and this sure would have put him over the top if he could do it for the cameras with magician's present. My best guess is that it has a connection to the darshon experiences I had with Maharishi. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-fligh\ ts-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Just to pour gasoline on already-roaring flames, and to save a certain someone from bringing it up in an attempt to demonize me :-), I shall weigh in on the subject of levitation from a unique point of view. Other than Nabby, whose credibility I submit is in the same ballpark as Rush Limbaugh's or Paul Ryan's, I think I'm the only person here who has claimed to have witnessed real, hang-there-in-mid-air levitation. And I have. Not once, but dozens of times, over a period of 14 years. And it wasn't only me. Often I was one of a group of 200-500 students watching the guy do this, in various locations, ranging from out in the desert in the middle of the night to the Los Angeles Convention Center to Carnegie Hall. In those environments, Rama - Frederick Lenz didn't hop on his butt like a frog, he just lifted gently up off of the sofa or the sand he was sitting on or standing on, and hovered there in mid-air in exactly the way that a brick doesn't. For extended periods of time -- minutes, not seconds. That said, I can tell you nothing whatsoever about the nature of what it was that I saw other than I and others saw it. I do not know whether video or movie cameras trained on the
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
Barry, when you saw Lenz levite 1. had you heard before that he did this sort of thing? 2. can you recall if you and others present all described seeing exactly the same thing, including small variations, without cuing each other and leading each other? In other words, did the reports of individuals match exactly without talking to each other or anyone about the experience first? So - it you had all been asked to write about what you saw before saying a word to each other, would those descriptions match? 3. what other out of the ordinary experiences like levitation did you witness with him? If this happened now, people would whip out their phones and begin photographing him. Did people try to take photos of these events with regular cameras? What was Rama's explanation for what was going on? Did any of his students develop the same levitation ability? What that part of the training he gave? Did Lenz himself have training in magic/sleight of hand? I wonder what someone like Ricky Jay would say about this - if he could provide an explanation of how you go about appearing to levitate in the desert in front of hundreds. How far off the ground did he appear to go? I think I recall a friend saying he was in the clouds, or else that he moved clouds. To me, the alternate reality theory sounds likely - kind of explains a lot we can't explain - ghosts, angels, levitation and other miracles. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, curtisdeltablues curtisdeltablues@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, salyavin808 fintlewoodlewix@ wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Robin Carlsen maskedzebra@ wrote: http://www.miraclesofthesaints.com/2010/10/levitation-and-ecstatic-fligh\ ts-in.html It's just a shame that they seem to have stopped just before the invention of cinema. I am so glad that I didn't offer my wordy response before you nailed everything I could have said in just sixteen words! Just to pour gasoline on already-roaring flames, and to save a certain someone from bringing it up in an attempt to demonize me :-), I shall weigh in on the subject of levitation from a unique point of view. Other than Nabby, whose credibility I submit is in the same ballpark as Rush Limbaugh's or Paul Ryan's, I think I'm the only person here who has claimed to have witnessed real, hang-there-in-mid-air levitation. And I have. Not once, but dozens of times, over a period of 14 years. And it wasn't only me. Often I was one of a group of 200-500 students watching the guy do this, in various locations, ranging from out in the desert in the middle of the night to the Los Angeles Convention Center to Carnegie Hall. In those environments, Rama - Frederick Lenz didn't hop on his butt like a frog, he just lifted gently up off of the sofa or the sand he was sitting on or standing on, and hovered there in mid-air in exactly the way that a brick doesn't. For extended periods of time -- minutes, not seconds. That said, I can tell you nothing whatsoever about the nature of what it was that I saw other than I and others saw it. I do not know whether video or movie cameras trained on the guy as he lifted off would have captured it; I strongly suspect that they would not have. If I had to speculate, I would suspect that the phenomenon we witnessed was -- if it truly existed -- taking place on an alternate level of reality that might not have been captured by technology on this level of reality. I am equally comfortable with the notion that it didn't really exist at all, but that brings up more unanswerable questions. I don't know about you, but I have a harder time with the notion that someone can hypnotize 200-500 people at a time into seeing the same thing -- *without ever pre-announcing what it was that they were going to see* -- less believable than that something was actually happening. Something else. WHAT that something else was, I have no idea. Do I feel somewhat uncomfortable saying this? You betcha. I share almost all of Curtis and salyavin's skepticism about such things. But I really *did* see this shit. Over and over and over, for an extended period of time. Am I supposed to *deny* that I saw it, or come up with some convenient skeptic's explanation for what it was I and hundreds of others saw? That, to me, would be the easy path, a cop-out. I *did* see it. I have NO FUCKING IDEA what exactly it was that I saw, only that I saw it. Many times. Lemme tell you, that is a great deal harder to live with than those who think that witnessing levitation would be a Good Thing That Would Make Their Incarnation might think.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Share Long sharelong60@... wrote: TurqB, if this took some courage to post, which I'm guessing it did, I thank you for that. He has told this story again and again for many years before you arrived. I don't doubt his story, but suspect he is telling it to gain weight and credibility for his lifelong project; to bash Maharishi and the TMO as much as possible and in a subtle way introduce Buddhism as sooo much better. In other words, it's a trick to make him more believable in the eyes of gullible readers.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, nablusoss1008 no_reply@... wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Share Long sharelong60@ wrote: TurqB, if this took some courage to post, which I'm guessing it did, I thank you for that. He has told this story again and again for many years before you arrived. This is true. Didn't take any courage per se. But it's unusual in that the concomitant bashing was minimal. I don't doubt his story, but suspect he is telling it to gain weight and credibility for his lifelong project; to bash Maharishi and the TMO as much as possible and in a subtle way introduce Buddhism as sooo much better. In other words, it's a trick to make him more believable in the eyes of gullible readers. I think the project is just to promote Barry. Bashing MMY/the TMO and/or touting Buddhism are means to that end. The main point of the story is to make himself seem Important. But this was a good post on its own terms.
[FairfieldLife] Re: Eyewitness accounts of levitation that ring true
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wayback71 wayback71@... wrote: Barry, when you saw Lenz levite 1. had you heard before that he did this sort of thing? No. Not the first time I saw him/it. 2. can you recall if you and others present all described seeing exactly the same thing, including small variations, without cuing each other and leading each other? In other words, did the reports of individuals match exactly without talking to each other or anyone about the experience first? No, they did not. That is one of the things that makes me believe that if the phenomena like levitation and invisibility and others were actually happening, they were happening on a more subtle alternate plane of existence, literally Carlos Castaneda's separate realities. So people could see the same basic event taking place, but with variations. One of the things that still makes it all fascinating to me is that many of these experiences really were *not* pre-announced or set up. He'd just be talking away, teaching about some odd piece of philosophy or whatever, and then go all invisible, fade out like the Cheshire Cat, so first you could see through him, and then there was no him, and then he'd come back. All the while there has been no mention of this. He was talking about something completely different. At the end of it all, several people ask, UH...did you just disappear? And then he laughs. When polled, most of the people there saw it happen. But not all. So it -- whatever it was -- was somewhat subjective, and no, not everyone saw the same thing. Same general thing, but with variations. The same, I would imagine, as if you polled people about more normal events; not all of them would see/remember them the same way. So - it you had all been asked to write about what you saw before saying a word to each other, would those descriptions match? Not necessarily, but they often did. If you can still find the scanned PDF of it on the Web, see The Last Incarnation, a series of stories about the dude written by his students. Some of the stories are about the same events, and some agree, some don't. 3. what other out of the ordinary experiences like levitation did you witness with him? Too many to even begin to talk about. If you think that seeing someone violate the laws of nature as we know them by levitating or going invisible would fuck with your mind, consider what witnessing things that even more couldn't happen would do to you. Not gonna get into it here. I said pretty much all I have to say about the whole thing in Road Trip Mind. If this happened now, people would whip out their phones and begin photographing him. Did people try to take photos of these events with regular cameras? I don't know. I know I didn't. I did make audio tapes of talks while in the desert, but no photographs. It was usually nighttime, after all, and thus one would have needed flash. What was Rama's explanation for what was going on? I just do what I do, and people report their experiences. There was clearly no technique involved in doing what he did, in the sense that he had to sit a certain way or meditate first or work himself up to it. He'd just lift up off the ground or go all invisible kinda at will. I think that if he ever described these powers and how he got them it was in terms of having remembered them from a previous life, not ever having tried to attain them in this one. Did any of his students develop the same levitation ability? What that part of the training he gave? No. See above. He never taught these things, only demo'd them. Did Lenz himself have training in magic/sleight of hand? No. I saw him try to do a simple card trick once, and he was terrible at it. *I* was better. :-) I wonder what someone like Ricky Jay would say about this - if he could provide an explanation of how you go about appearing to levitate in the desert in front of hundreds. I'd love to hear him try, but I won't hold my breath waiting for it, because he would be looking for an explanation based on the assumption that it didn't really happen, and was some kind of trick. I find that difficult to accept. In the desert we're talking about hiking into places that are just sand, surrounded by nothing from which to suspend wires or anything. I once saw Rama levitate off the naugahyde benches of a Denny's late at night, ferchrssakes. I don't think he managed to pre-arrange some kind of apparatus in that Denny's. :-) How far off the ground did he appear to go? I think I recall a friend saying he was in the clouds, or else that he moved clouds. He moved clouds around and made them disappear. As far as I ever saw, he never got more than a few feet off the ground. To me, the alternate reality theory sounds likely - kind of explains a lot we can't explain - ghosts, angels, levitation and other miracles. Sounds right to me, too. It goes along with many other experiences I've had of
