On May 6, 2009, at 6:16 PM, sparaig wrote: >> You're missing one of the biggest TM org thought stoppers: >> >> "Pure Consciousness". >> >> We were supposed to think "wow, what could be better that PURE >> consciousness?" I don't need to look and farther or look into this >> any more, if it's pure (and the experience they're telling me I will >> have is Pure Consciousness), then I need look no further. >> >> But what's happening is other meditation researchers are seeing >> through this screen of re-definition. the Cambridge Handbook of >> Consciousness, the standard textbook in neurological and >> consciousness research pointed this out several years ago. Before >> that neurologist and Zen master James Austin pointed out how the word >> was being used in a misleading kind of way, without any "profound >> proof" for this profoundly named experience. '"The phrase ��pure >> consciousness�� continues to sow confusion more than a >> decade after Forman pointed to its semantic pitfalls. When someone >> employs the term today, it remains unclear whether its usage >> describes an early moment, an intermediate step, or some ultimate >> stage among the several optional varieties of consciousness." He then >> goes on to describe in detail how the word is being used by TM >> researchers to claim an exalted state, when in fact they're actual >> attaching the thought-stopper (pun intended;-)) to a very rudimentary >> state. >> >> It looks like the tom-foolery has been exposed. >> >> Beyond the thought-stopper is the further tendency 'if you repeat a >> lie enough times, people will begin to believe it.' Despite being >> caught at their act, I'm certain TM researchers, teachers and >> professors will still continue to use "Pure Consciousness" as a >> description. The fact is, at this point in the game, if they were >> forced to abandon their use of this word, as applies to TM and it's >> results, they'd have to rewrite websites and revise the entire >> literature of TM, Maharishi Vedic Science--virtually ALL of the MUM >> curriculum! It's all based on this (LOL) thought-stopper! >> > > > You're assuming that Austin has evidence of the more "exhalted" > states, > did you notice?
Well, I'm taking his own extensive experience of higher states of consciousness as valuable. I personally found his accounts very believable, incredibly detail and insightful. > And who decides which laternate state is "exhalted" > in the first place? Well I don't believe that is specifically Austin's observation on PC. Austin's observation seems to me to be one common for people familiar with staged forms of meditation experientially who then encounter a single-stage meditation techniques which claim the ability to access very high stages: they experientially know and recognize the folly. His written comments, where he criticizes the ambiguous use of TM buzzwords like "pure consciousness" and "cosmic consciousness" are based both on his own direct experience of thought-free states back in the early part of his meditative retreat experience and how further "higher" more unitive states follow thereafter. He feels, as do many other experienced meditators, that the words used and research claims are not congruent with the actual experiences that are traditionally known to belong to them. Instead the states being described by TM researchers are "shallow preludes" of higher states of consciousness. This is hardly surprising since both TM/TMSPers and TM teachers are never really given any further stages of meditation beyond the most rudimentary (although one could say the original night technique is an exception).
