Law of Skepticism

These are referenced by wikipedia and include additional comments by me.

• At the beginning of the movie, it is stated that humans only use 10% of their brains.  This is an old self-help claim devised for marketing.  You are only using 10%, we can get you to 50%!  100%!  Almost all of the brain is being used in some fashion all the time.  There are ZERO statistics supporting this claim.
• The movie states humans are “90% water” when in fact newborns have around 78% body water, 1-year-olds around 65%, adult men about 60%, and adult women around 55%.  If they are trying to come off as scientific, why would they get such a simple to find fact wrong?  Well, it does help serve their purpose when they are talking about thoughts affecting water crystals, if they’ve got you thinking that you are practically a big water crystal…
• The movie relates a story about Native Americans being unable to see Christopher Columbus’ ships.  However, there is no mention of this in any of the journals of those voyages, and the oral traditions of the local population were lost in the following 150 years of Spanish rule.  Totally fabricated.
• It is also claimed in the movie that 20 amino acids are created in the human body.  However, only 12 can be synthesized by humans; the remaining 8 amino acids are essential and must be acquired through food consumption or dietary supplementation.

Do you really want to accept their “science” when they can’t even get facts straight that could be found within a few clicks on google or in the pages of elementary school science books?

This scene is a (mis)application of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.  Basically this principle says that when studying objects on the level of quantum mechanics, as the accuracy of measuring the position of an observed object goes up, then the accuracy of measuring its momentum goes down.  If one can measure the absolute position of the observed object, then the momentum cannot be measured.  So we know the electron is likely roughly in some cloud around the nucleus of an atom, but we’re not sure where.  The closer we get to observing where it was at any particular instant, the less we know about its momentum.

The basketball scence of What the Bleep completely misapplies this principle.  The last time I checked, one of the components that makes up an atom was not a basketball.  Please let me know if your research indicates anything differently.

A basketball can be represented by classical mechanics.  The reason quantum mechanics was created is because classical mechanics is unable to accurately describe everything going on at the atomic level and below.  One can most certainly observe determine the absolute position of a basketball, as well as its momentum. 

What the Bleep implies that the basketball only exists where the observing person thinks it is.  The idea is that the observation of it creates the reality of it.  It actually can be bouncing around almost anywhere, but because I think it’s a foot in front of my right hand, that’s where it is.  If I thought it was actually bouncing around behind me, that’s where it would be. 

This is a complete falsehood.  So why would they state such a thing?  The scene implies that the ball can be teleported and placed wherever the the observer is thinking about it, a mind technique no doubt there are some classes you can sign up for down at Ramtha’s School of Enlightenment.

Everything put out by Ramtha’s school of peeps (The Secret, What the Bleep) misuses the term quantum mechanics or quantum physics.  They would explain the behavior of boulders knocking and moving eachother with their quantum mechanics.  Here is an actual definition, from wikipedia:

Quantum mechanics is a fundamental branch of physics with wide applications in experimental physics and theoretical physics that replaces classical mechanics and classical electromagnetism at the atomic and subatomic levels. Quantum mechanics is a more fundamental theory than Newtonian mechanics and classical electromagnetism, in the sense that it provides accurate and precise descriptions for many phenomena that these “classical” theories simply cannot explain on the atomic and subatomic level.

The underlined emphasis is mine; this field of science is concerned with behavior at the atomic level and below. This is NOT at the human cell level. Or at the BASKETBALL level!!

First off, is this really a law??  Hmm…

Anyway there is much clamor about this movie now, and the “law of attraction”.  The wiki definition is as follows: 

It states people experience the corresponding manifestations of their predominant thoughts, feelings, words, and actions and that people therefore have direct control over reality and their lives through thought alone. A person’s thoughts (conscious and unconscious), emotions, beliefs and actions are said to attract corresponding positive and negative experiences “through the resonance of their energetic vibration.”  The “law of attraction” states “you get what you think about; your thoughts determine your destiny.”

The “law” includes the following steps:

1. Know what you want and ask the universe for it.
2. Feel and behave as if the object of your desire is on its way.
3. Be open to receiving it.

As repeated several times in the movie, the universe is simply a huge catalog for you and you can have anything you desire.  You just need to think of it and follow the steps above.  If you are always focusing on things going wrong, then things are always going to get botched up for you.  If you always focus on things going right then everything will go smashingly! 

I have heard some say that the message in The Secret is that there is action required.  I have not read the book but have seen the movie.  In the movie I heard no such mention of this; that is part of the power of the secret, you just think and these things will manifest.  There are the three steps above - and absolutely no mention is made of taking action.  I don’t have to work harder to get promoted; because I’m thinking it, it will just happen. 

To break it down to the basics - input is your thoughts and what you are focusing on.  Output is reaching your goal.  The Secret says that you WILL reach the outcome if you follow the steps above.  Your thoughts resonating with the universe will harmonize into you reaching what you desired.  I agree with the input and output, although to put them more rationally, if the mind is focusing on something, then the odds of reaching that goal have a significantly increased of it being obtained. 

The stuff in the middle is where I fundamentally differ.  The universe aligning to your desires is purely a metaphysical idea, along with the law of attraction.  I believe the outcome can be rationally explained through psychology.  Whether making a conscious effort or not, if one is always keeping some thought or goal in mind, it will affect their behavior and steer them towards that goal.

Let’s say Bob is thinking about getting rich and building wealth.  Then at a party he meets Jim, who owns a manufacturing facility.  Then Bob remembers that idea he had for a new widget 3 years ago!  He brings this up to Jim, and together they begin manufacturing and selling the widget.  Bob gets rich.

For the sake of argument, let’s say if Bob was walking around thinking about beer and tits all week, that he would have still met Jim at this party.  He would have shook his hand, then proceeded to talk about tits while pounding the beer down at the party. 

Now let’s say we are in the above situation, where Bob was focusing on making money.  The law of attraction explanation for Bob getting rich is basically that Bob was sending out this vibe, and that Jim picked up on it.  The universe arranged their meeting and they were drawn together so that Bob could achieve his goal.  The psychological belief I have instead is that Bob’s unconscious mind recognized this opportunity for achieving his goal, and pushed that memory of the new widget idea into his conscious mind for him to seize the opportunity of meeting Jim.  It recognized that there was potential here to reach that goal.

Like most metaphysical ideas if not all, it is impossible to either prove or disprove the law of attraction explanation of why the outcome was reached.  However I think psychology to common sense would lead people into the more rational explanation of it just being the human mind.  Focusing on a goal DOES work, and it’s also a message that has been in self-help books for many many years.

So why the metaphysical explanation for this?  I believe it is to warm the consumer of this information up, it’s the outer ring of the onion mentioned in the cult video.  It’s not a very wild idea.  Some people may have already thought things worked this way, and the message in The Secret “confirmed” it for them.  If I told you Hey!  You can use your mind to bend spoons!  You’d say yeah, whatever.  But if I first got you to believe that you could manifest things just by thinking about them, I’d be buttering you up to easily swallow down spoon bending in a year from now. 

The Secret is brought to you by the same organization as What the Bleep, including some overlapping cast.  The organization represented by both movies is Ramtha’s School of Enlightenment - which operates like and what many feel is a cult.  Ramtha is seen in both movies, much more heavily in What the Bleep.  Those however are topics for subsequent blogs!

“Writing for a penny a word is ridiculous, if a man really wanted to make a million dollars, he would start a religion.” - L. Ron Hubbard

There is question of the validity of this exact quote, however similar things were said and the idea appears to be absolutely there.  I have copied this page below, just in case the original goes down.  Copy as follows:

For years I have preached the story of the Heinlein-Hubbard Wager. Any time Scientology or Hubbard came up in conversation, I would merrily launch into the tale of the wager and do my pedantic duty to relay poorly researched information. It never occurred to me that it may not be true. It seemed so plausible, especially so once I read some of the Scientology theological history.

The most common version of the story goes something like this:
Robert Heinlein and L. Ron Hubbard, two good friends and legendary contributors to the golden age of science fiction, are sitting at a bar/dinner table/convention table and discussing the nature of religion/mass hypnosis/writers wages when Hubbard exclaims “The way to make a million dollars is to start a religion” or “Writing for a penny a word is ridiculous, if a man really wanted to make a million dollars, he would start a religion.” or one of several variations on the same theme. The legend continues by claiming that Heinlein and Hubbard then entered into a wager to see who could start a religion the fastest and make the most money. Heinlein’s entry was Stranger In a Strange Land.

The myth was spread and gained popularity for many of the same reasons that all myths persist, it has the potential to be true and it has a root in fact. It’s an easy story to believe, two men renowned for their outspoken opinions decided to create religions, one of them succeeds with Scientology and the resultant theology sounds strikingly similar to most of his fiction. Few people besides Scientologists take Scientology seriously or even consider it a religious faith. For many people this only further reinforces the idea that Scientology is contrived and has certainly aided in the belief that its genesis was a wager.

Eventually someone I was doing the disservice of attempting to spread this myth to called me on it and asked me to produce proof. I no longer remembered where I had received the information from myself, but I seemed to recall that Harlan Ellison had been the source of it. I commenced to researching the topic and the more I discovered the less likely it seemed that the myth was true. The only evidence available in favor of the myth were second hand accounts or different variations of the same story I had been telling.

An associate claimed that Larry Niven told her a variation of the myth while doing the waltz at a convention. Another claimed, as I had believed, that Ellison had mentioned the same thing in an interview. Others believed the wager was made at a Los Angeles convention in the 50’s but had heard it from someone who was present although not engaged in the conversation personally.

I decided that I was going to get nothing but the same rhetoric by searching google.com, and interviewing acquaintances. What I needed was an authority on either man to give me some details. So far no one I had asked had offered any counterproof, only the same vague assertion that the wager had happened but the details were fuzzy. I wasn’t about to contact the church of Scientology for their slant on the subject. Their version would be inescapable and terribly biased. Instead I decided to contact someone with authoritative information on Heinlein

I wasn’t likely to get a response from his surviving wife, Virginia, as I couldn’t find any way to contact her. Even if I did have contact information for her, I have too much respect for the man to go around bugging his wife for details regarding something that had the potential to be a touchy subject. Instead, I began a correspondence with Bill Patterson, Chairman of the Heinlein Society, to see if any light could be shed on the subject. His help has been instrumental in straightening out some of the details, false logic and misinformation that have helped this myth persist.

The simple truth of the matter is that a wager never took place. It never happened, end of story. Having said that however, the possibility does exist that a series of conversations between the two authors and commentary made by Heinlein, may have been the catalyst for Hubbard’s authorship of Dianetics. Heinlein and Hubbard were close friends and Hubbard greatly respected Heinlein, his opinions and his ideas.

Mr. Patterson revealed to me, “RAH and LRH had one or more discussions during 1944 and or 1945 when they were both in Philadelphia, and RAH pointed out to LRH that religions had an inordinate amount of legal latitude in the U.S. and that churches could engage in a great many activities otherwise thought of as secular, under the tax and other protection churches enjoy. He had already explored these ideas in some of his stories and was to revisit these notions in their original form in Stranger. It is possible that this conversation or series of conversations took place as late as December 1945 or early 1946 and in Los Angeles.”

The theme of money and religion was apparently a very popular one for Hubbard as he seems to have mentioned it at several other informal discussions around the same time. In a 1978 interview Harlan Ellison commented “Scientology is bullshit! Man, I was there the night L. Ron Hubbard invented it, for Christ Sakes!…We were sitting around one night… who else was there? Alfred Bester, and Cyril Kornbluth, and Lester Del Rey, and Ron Hubbard, who was making a penny a word, and had been for years. And he said “This bullshit’s got to stop!” He says, “I gotta get money.” He says, “I want to get rich”.”

Editor and Author Sam Moskovitz claimed a number of times that Hubbard had made similar remarks at a convention he hosted in Newark in either 1947 or 1948. Another respected SciFi author, Theodore Sturgeon, revealed to Mike Jittlov, himself a respected filmmaker, an incident in the 1940’s when Hubbard had become upset and said, “Y’know, we’re all wasting our time writing this hack science fiction! You wanta make real money, you gotta start a religion!” Lloyd Arthur Eshback related in his autobiography, an incident in either 1948 or 49, “I think of the time while in New York I took John W. Campbell, Marty Greenberg, and L. Ron Hubbard to lunch…The incident is stamped indelibly in my mind because of one statement that Ron Hubbard made. What led him to say what he did I can’t recall–but in so many words Hubbard said: “I’d like to start a religion. That’s where the money is!”.”

Several of these claims have been refuted, but others have not. The Church of Scientology takes these matters very seriously and has won several court cases in regards to the issue of Scientology’s origins and disparaging remarks made against it. The origins of Dianetics and Scientology may still be a little clouded but it seems clear to me now that a wager between the two authors, or anyone else for that matter, was not responsible and while it’s possible that Heinlein planted the seed for Hubbard’s Dianetics, Mr. Patterson cautioned me to remember, “Both LRH and RAH were talkers of the first water. This particular conversation was one of many they had at the time — it only looks significant when we see it through the historical lens of experience of what LRH did with the ideas, long after he and RAH had fallen out of intimate personal contact.”

This is the alien history story on this YTMND site.

But I’m a Scientologist and I’ve never heard of that!

I have Scientologist friends and they don’t believe in aliens!

How easy would it be for me to get you into my cult if I started talking to you about aliens right away? 
Come on, let’s use some commons sense now people.  You gotta start off small, there’s an art to brainwashing.  You can’t force everything down someone’s throat at once, you have to feed them pieces over time.  If you get to the upper levels of Scientology however - this is what they teach.  It costs a lot of money to gain this knowledge.  Scientology is also quick to stop the spread of it in any way they can, but the internet is fighting back!  I have not read Dianetics, but apparently there are references to this alien world as well.  Note in the cult video under the Definitions category the “friendly approach” and the peeling an onion analogy.

Follow up YTMND site here.

See part 1 before watching this one.  As a side note - YTMND has been contacted and threatened for hosting these slideshows as well.

YTMND site here.

 The first time I saw this it honestly gave me goosebumps.

It should be noted that a lot of thoughts/arguments/etc I have seen about metaphysical things comes down to being gibberish double talk.  While some people may say/think not understanding their rant or blurb means that well, they are too smart or too deep for you, in reality it is because what they said is nonsensical.  There is a difference between presenting a concept that is challenging to understand and presenting a concept that is unable to be understood. 

Psychologically people like to think they are all smart and all deep, whether they are or not, and it seems when challenged about some metaphysical ideas some will smugly act like one isn’t intelligent enough to understand them.  The reality is most difficult concepts can be broken further down to easier to consume pieces if need be.  I can break down difficult computer related topics to the point that they are understandable by my mom if it’s necessary.  This is often done with many scientific concepts as well, especially when it is difficult to observe the objects of study. 

Here are some interesting bs generators for fun:
Business: Mission Statement Generator
Computer Science: CS Paper Generator - I love the graphs it produces.

This needs to be cleared up, because many people do not appear to understand what they are reading or watching.  Or what science truly is.  Your high school physics book was science.  The Law of Attraction is metaphysics.  You can get your definitions for these words anywhere.  Personally I like the wikipedia entry for science, it feels more thorough than the dictionary versions.  I have provided multiple sources for metaphysics.

Science

In the broadest sense, science (from the Latin scientia, ‘knowledge’) refers to any systematic methodology which attempts to collect accurate information about the shared reality and to model this in a way which can be used to make reliable, concrete and quantitative predictions about events, in line with hypotheses proven by experiment. In a more restricted sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on the scientific method, as well as to the organized body of knowledge gained through such research.

Beautiful definition!

Metaphysics

(dictionary.com) - The branch of philosophy that treats of first principles, includes ontology and cosmology, and is intimately connected with epistemology. 

(American Heritage Dictionary) - The branch of philosophy that examines the nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and matter, substance and attribute, fact and value.

(Wikipedia) - Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the ultimate nature of reality, being, and the world.  Its name derives from the Greek words μετά (metá) (meaning “after”) and φυσικά (physiká) (meaning “those on nature”), “those on nature” referring to those works on nature by Aristotle in antiquity.

(Online Etymology Dictionary) - Medieval Gk. (ta) metaphysika, from Gk. ta meta ta physika “the (works) after the Physics,” title of the 13 treatises which traditionally were arranged after those on physics and natural sciences in Aristotle’s writings.

There seems to be complete misunderstanding on the part of many people as to the distinction between the two, especially in the field of quantum physics (quantum mechanics) - I have seen (many) people discussing aspects of how they feel/think something works, and thinking they are talking about “quantum physics”.  Of course, this is a real branch of science and not something that the uneducated layperson can just start talking about how they think it works.  I get the feeling that these people think they can reason, evaluate and debate out the nuances of quantum mechanics, as if they were discussing forms of government or society or something.  The latter of course being a philosophical argument.  I am surprised people seem to accept this as actually talking about science, because even to the layperson I would think it apparent that the discussions are fundamentally different between science and philosophy.  It also doesn’t occur in any other fields, ie. people uneducated in chemistry talking about how they think various elements will react to one another. 

Of course the material in The Secret and What the Bleep do nothing but encourage this type of behavior either.  They portray their own philosophy/metaphysics as real science to the consumer of information, especially in Bleep.  This can be seen in The Secret as well, namely the Law of Attraction – keyword being LAW.  This is a very powerful word in science, and to use it in the context of masquerading metaphysics as science is just complete abuse.  Here is an excellent set of definitions for scientific terms. 

Scientific Law: This is a statement of fact meant to explain, in concise terms, an action or set of actions. It is generally accepted to be true and univseral, and can sometimes be expressed in terms of a single mathematical equation. Scientific laws are similar to mathematical postulates. They don’t really need any complex external proofs; they are accepted at face value based upon the fact that they have always been observed to be true. Specifically, scientific laws must be simple, true, universal, and absolute. They represent the cornerstone of scientific discovery, because if a law ever did not apply, then all science based upon that law would collapse.

Some scientific laws, or laws of nature, include the law of gravity, Newton’s laws of motion, the laws of thermodynamics, Boyle’s law of gases, the law of conservation of mass and energy, and Hook’s law of elasticity.

Hypothesis: This is an educated guess based upon observation. It is a rational explanation of a single event or phenomenon based upon what is observed, but which has not been proved. Most hypotheses can be supported or refuted by experimentation or continued observation.

Theory: A theory is more like a scientific law than a hypothesis. A theory is an explanation of a set of related observations or events based upon proven hypotheses and verified multiple times by detached groups of researchers. One scientist cannot create a theory; he can only create a hypothesis.

In general, both a scientific theory and a scientific law are accepted to be true by the scientific community as a whole. Both are used to make predictions of events. Both are used to advance technology.

By this one can see that (at best) it’s not really the Law of Attraction. It’s the Hypothesis of Attraction. That doesn’t sound as catchy though, and probably won’t sell too many books nor convince nearly as many people.  Of interest is the criticism section on the wikipedia entry.