Comments on: But can they heal my irony gland?

By: New York Rich

New York Rich — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 05:20:11 +0000

Um…. dear person who posted this initial rant(guy who runs this web-site I think):

Basically agree with you about these meditating confused individuals. Side note: I don’t see them mention ANY kind of god, so I’m not sure about your ‘prayer’ references…. are you some kind of liberal nut-job? Wait: are you one of those folks who hates all religions except islam or something? A supporter of CAIR, ACLU, and/or moveon.org ?

Your statement about the US casualty rate in Iraq “having risen since June 2006″, is proven untrue by YOUR OWN link to the icasualties.org web site.

Here is the data for the past few months cut and paste from that site:

May-07 126
Jun-07 101
Jul-07 79
Aug-07 84
Sep-07 34

How’s your math? I’m surprised an astronomer wouldn’t be a little more polished in that area. I believe those numbers indicate that the much-ridiculed ’surge’ is working. In truth: we should just build heavily fortified walls around all the oil wells and create military-protected roads and ports and just siphon out OUR oil while they have their civil war. Our Prez. Bush can give a global address: “we handed the Iraqis their own country and the idiots proved that they don’t deserve one…. similar to the palestinians”

Anyway astronomy-boy: you should go pray or meditate or return to school or something you U.S.-hating liberal clown.

Love,
Rich from NYC- atheist, patriot, soldier-against-islam, all-around genius and skeptic

By: Aaron Solomon Adelman

Aaron Solomon Adelman — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 13:40:49 +0000

Considering that TM seems to be derived from Vaishnavism (one of the major Hindu religions) and the Mahabharata is filled with references to humans exerting influence over gods (as opposed to the standard Abrahamic concept of prayer, where one merely hopes that the Deity will answer one’s prayer), I’m not surprised at TM claims of power through meditation, irrational and unrealistic as the claims are. Though if they have such power and are serious about exerting it, the Mahabharata indicates they ought to be prepared for the gods to whomp them really hard and really soon since the gods are paranoid about mortals gaining too much power.

Aaron

By: Daerin the Cluer

Daerin the Cluer — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 00:13:19 +0000

Irony upon irony: Google Ads placed the following image on this article:

http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/imgad?id=CIy735umg6_GKBDQAhiYAjIIMlH7z8n546Y

By: Astrolink [Global Edition] » Followup: irony gland on life support | Latest astronomy news in 11 languages

Mon, 13 Aug 2007 21:23:49 +0000

[...] several percent in just two days. But how is this possible? Isn’t the Aqua Teen Hunger Force Invincible America Assembly on the job, meditating us into as happy, bright [...]

By: Troy

Troy — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 22:28:28 +0000

I remember John Hagelin running for President in the 90s. The Natural Law party has a facade of being very reasonable. Look below the surface and you’ve got bouncing or excuse me “flying” mediators and a thread of lunacy that is exuded like a magician’s never ending handkerchief. Some thing his success in particle physics gives this lunacy credibility. I don’t think so, you’ve got a wide variety of people practicing a particular religion some have to be fairly intelligent in some area or another.

One thing I enjoy about predictions psychic OR loony doesn’t make a difference, is they usually end up being wrong. The U.S. and the world are heading for recession, all the signs are there. 17,000 bah I doubt it. And if I’m right don’t nominate me as a psychic, just guessing here! It is important to mentally or materially write down predictions so that you can verify their eventual dubious outcome. (Calenders work great!)

Yet another link http://www.hagelin.org/

By: eric

eric — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 18:18:28 +0000

Hi – Regular reader, first time poster. I agree with earlier commenters: there are distinctions to be made.

- Between meditation that is internally focused and meditation as … what these people claim to be doing, with measurable results in the world. I think these people were kooks before they were meditators. They just happened to pick something they call meditation as the vehicle of their kookery. But hey! If they can actually get something done, more power to them.

- Between prayer and meditation, or between “sitting around thinking about things” and meditation, or between religious dogma and meditation. Meditation is (or can be, or should be, in my view), a practice, an action. It is not a set of ideas to ponder or anyone’s explanation of what happens (or doesn’t happen) when you meditate. Any dogma or ideas or explanations or intellectual models of meditation are unimportant. The *practice* is what is (can be, should be) important.

It’s sort of like riding a bike. You could be an expert on human physiology and bicycle design and still be unable to ride a bike. The former involves intellectual models, representations. The latter is a practice, something you do. In both casesâ€”meditation and bike ridingâ€”the *less* you think about it, the better.

Of course there *is* a difference in that you can measure bike riding from the outside, but as a purely internal practice, typically the only one competent to evaluate meditative practice is the meditator herself. If you think that dooms meditation ontologically, that’s your business. Some pretty sharp people would disagree, but it doesn’t really matter. If you treat it as a practice, you can maintain complete intellectual skepticism of meditation but do it anyway!

(by the way, welcome to boulder! )

By: Gary Ansorge

Gary Ansorge — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 17:02:39 +0000

Meditation DOES work to lower blood pressure,,,so does walking two miles(I always walk a couple of miles, three hours before seeing my Doctor. Drops BP about 20 points). I guess meditation is something our passive population really loves, as it requires so few calories to be expended. Actively working for positive change is difficult(just ask Phil) but at least it keeps woo-woos down on the farm, well away from Paris,,,(and I don’t mean Hilton, though that is probably a good thing too,,,).

As most practitioners of yoga know, meditation is for ones internal peace and tranquility. The expectation that it could have any external effect is an example of woo-woo thinking. On the other hand, if 6.5 billion people concentrate really, really hard, then all that brain power(at about ten watts per brain) could possibly lift a pencil,,,or maybe not,,,i fear some brains have a negative power curve,,,ie, they’re energy sinks,,,like Hoagland,,,

I’m gonna go meditate on chocolate, then go out and pay hard earned cash to Hersheys,,,

Gary 7