http://www.stanislavgrof...012.HumanDestiny.Rev.pdf

After reading this article I want to launch a formal criticism of Stanislav Grof, M.D. I've seen him in person and all be rambled on about was prenatal memories and holotropic breath work.

I find so called scholars like Grof a danger to the ability of scientists to shift the publics awareness of psychedelic drugs for use in mainstream psychiatry or something similar because of his unfounded absurd claims and beliefs.

I hope by the end of reading this at least someone out there will recognize what a fraud this guy is and what a problem people like him create in getting the public perception to change.



He believes in astrology.



He thinks blood letting is useful for accomplishing non ordinary states. While it probably works its a sick and morbid practice used by a culture well known for human sacrifice.

Many people seem to forget that the Mayans had a sick twisted religion that involved human sacrifice. Priests would wear the skin of the people they sacrificed and dance around with it.



Oh yea name one?



T McKenna also later admitted that he was making it up and his ideas were pure speculation. Grof and many other convienently ignore that.



Again he admits his belief in the nonsense that is known as astrology. Astrology has been dis-proven so many times its not even funny.



Hah. Ok so before this sentence he describes how you can have visions of the future and past when in altered states. He provides no evidence or even describes an experience where such knowledge was gained. Then he goes on to act like other ancient religions knew the universe was billions of years old. Ok fine but the only way humans beings really figured out the universe and our world is so old is through science. Not altered states of consciousness which don't tell us anything about star formation, black holes, nuclear chemistry all of which tell us real facts about the universe.



He is obsessed with images like this. He always rambles on about prenatal this prenatal that. Makes me wonder whats really on his mind...



This draws on one of my central criticisms of Grof. He and others like him are part of the reason that mainstream psychology has a difficult time with changing its attitude towards psychedelic drugs. Any unbiased psychologist who goes to a conference and listens to someone like Grof talk about his version of how psychedelic drugs heal people (by making them reexperience and accept the violent trauma of birth and a bunch of other archetypical nonsense) they will be immediately turned off. They will clearly recognize the inconsistencies that I have pointed out in his reasoning. He also sounds a lot like Sigmund Freud except on acid instead of cocaine.

Psychedelic drugs have tremendous value but when they are described in a way and their value is described in a way that is only compatable with those who have spiritual beliefs that are similar to Grof's how can we expect mainstream science to change its attitude against them? Only when psychedelic experiences and their benefits are looked at objectively will the neccessary evidence be there to force the mainstream to change its mind. This is already happening with medical marijuana for example. Data being generated by real scientists is changing not only the publics mind but also the minds of the regulators and medical boards.

This is where I will end my criticism of Grof.

That's ethnocentristic. You can't judge a culture because it's practices seem strange to you. A reminder: Taking psychedelic practices is also considered to be "sick and twisted" by the majority of Europeans and USA citicens.



Aren't there translingual revelations and workings you simply can't express? That's why he said, that it's beyond_ everyday imagination.



Source please.



Stay classy

"Many people seem to forget that the Mayans had a sick twisted religion that involved human sacrifice. Priests would wear the skin of the people they sacrificed and dance around with it."


..uhh..is there even proof of this among the Maya? I know that there is among the Aztecs..but some people actually interprete the mayan drawing differently and think that most of it was all symbolic..shamanic death etc..

These same people think the Aztecs came later and misinterpreted all of it and they were the ones heavily involved in human sacrifice.

Not syaing it is that way but I have read that theory..does anyone know more about this?

I am sort of weary when I hear about these things being possibly so 2 sided..becasue of how the church likes to demonize everything and anything that doesnt go along with the church's regime..they destroyed alot of mayan stuff that would be a better link to what they were actually doing...

When people are taking lots of psychedelics like the Mayans were they tend to get into metaphorical things alot so it makes some sence that alot of that blood thirsty mayan scrifice type of imagry was psychedelic metaphore...maybe not though.

I think its pretty clear that they DID have sacrifices at the time, as there have been found not only drawings but also remains of people, bones, etc...

I also think people sacrificed themsleves back then..i cant remember where but I remeber a video where they were talking about how at certain celebrations people would eat lots of mushrooms and jump into some pit sacrificing themselves

I looked it up and apparently there is evindence of it through carbon dating..just wasnt as prominant as the inquisitors made it out to be.

Apparently most thought it was an honor to be sacrificed, and they were treated as gods before hand..some think it was population controll and some think that they thought the world would end if they did not sacrifice..glad I dont live back then.

I can most certainly judge a culture that kills people for a ritual that serves no real purpose the purpose is made up. Perhaps the only way I could cut them slack if that perhaps they thought it made a real difference in the functioning of the world that would happen through sacrifice. In that regard their ritual was based in ignorance. So it wasn't so much that they were evil but ignorant.



http://www.abc.net.au/rn/science/mind/s977930.htm

I don't think dr Grof is taken very seriously anymore in the academic world.

I see these sort of things as a harmless sort of science-fiction stories. Just like we often have on this site, talking bout entities and such, when we all know it's probably just neural short circuitingstuff.

Except by french philosophers. If you ever come across a philosophic text and it's written by a frenchman i can spare you the reading. It's almost as solid as the law of gravity: a philosophic text written by a frenchmen is always bullshit.
France has a tradition of bullshit philosphy, you see.

Did they do that? I thought that was the Aztecs. I know that the Maya sacrificed captured leaders. Europeans executed prisoners too (or 'just' disabled them, by cutting off their archery fingers, for example). From what I've heard, I've imagined the Mayans to have been a bit more civilised than Europeans were at the time.

Europeans publicly:
-burnt people at the stake in the name of god
-drowned them in the name of god
-had people hung, drawn and quartered (hung then cut down whle still alive, then their guts ripped out in front of their eyes, then cut up into four pieces)
-chopped off their heads, and stuck them on spikes over bridges and gateways
-flagellants self-harmed for their god (not so different from Mayan bloodletting rituals)
-and privately in dungeons, many hideous torture instruments were used

One major difference between the Mayans and the Europeans was their attitude to suicide. Suicide was a sin for Europeans, but the Mayans actually had a god of suicide. The story goes that King Pakal of Palenque committed ritual suicide, however knowing human nature I wouldn't be surprised if his son just murdered him to become king and called it suicide (pure conjecture). European royalty bumped off family members all the time.

Both MAYA and Azetc sacrificed humans (GREAT BOOK _The Lost History of Aztec and Maya. Phillips et al.). A common method of both cultures was to slice open the chest of live individual, and remove the dripping heart to offer to the gods. They believed it their religious duty to keep the earth fertile and many other reasons. Mayans also performed decapitation. Many of the mesoamerican cultures used sacrifice. As stated other cultures killed for ridiculous reasons (ROMANs). Some states even today do so (death penalty for drug distribution???). It is definitely unethical to kill people in the name of religion. It was out of ignorance. I agree it was a different time and place but it is also pretty messed up. I do not take this to mean however that their cultures or other beliefs are flawed. Both cultures are fascinating and had great accomplishments.

I also am not a fan of Stan Grof. I heard him speak once of consciousness and I felt he had little idea of what he was saying. I felt like he misunderstood the relationship between mind and matter and his views on psychedelics are completely ridiculous and unscientific. I think he is extremely biased and has taken and seen only what he wanted.

ohayoco I think you are quoting burnt there not me.

In my post where you got that from I was quoting burnt.
You are saying the same thing I thought..thay it mostly the aztecs who were really into sacrifice.

Sorry I'll edit- I pasted from your post instead of his original text by mistake. It's a little mission of mine to point out how European culture was at least just as nasty as Mesoamerican at the time the cultures met Bufoman- that's interesting to hear, thanks.

Burnt, let's be honest, a lot of the beliefs of psychedelic users would discredit psychedelics in the eyes of the general public. Anyone who doesn't share the public's beliefs is just plain crazy!

Its tough to describe what we mean when we say civilized. But I completely agree European culture has just as much baggage as any other culture. I think its safe to say that all human cultures did things many of us now consider evil sometimes out of pure evil and sometimes out of ignorance.



I also agree here and I do not mean to imply that these cultures were stupid ignorant savages. I do not think that at all. I just think its important to put it into peoples perspective that many ancient cultures were very ignorant about some major aspects of the world. This caused them to have very obnoxious rituals beliefs etc. But at the same time they made technological and social advances.

Many people seem to have this romantic vision of ancient cultures. They seem to think that they somehow had access to some kind of deep knowledge that western culture is completely blind too. I understand where this attitude comes from. But I do not agree with it. They Mayan's couldn't predict the future just like we can't now. We can only speculate and make predictions based on what we know about how things work.

But my complaint is this :arrow: Grof's thesis: Mayans were ancient and had some technological innovation mainly in this case astronomy. They did drugs. Therefore they had deep knowledge about the future. That's a pathetic case.

My second real complaint is who are the spokes people for psychedelics?

There are those who fall into the Grof, Leary, T McKenna category. I believe these individuals have really generated nothing but confusion about psychedelic drugs. They also scare away real scientists who wish to explore this area. That inspires me to write another thread so I'll stop here.

Yes, that's why the dreamer feels he has to keep his exploits to himself, because he doesn't want people thinking he believes stuff like these people do. People associate psychedelics with new age beliefs.

How can you even say that? You did not experience their culture, you don't even have the necessary information to have a well founded look from the outside. But WHAT you do have is a strong bias towards your own cultural values.

Thanks for the McKennna source. I never saw him as someone "serious" in the classic sense. He was more a poet and a visionary thinker to me, who presents entertaining possibilitys inspired by his psychedelic experiences.

burnt I do not much care for groffs obsession with the phenomena of prenatal experience and its relationship with transpersonal states of consciousness. But your reasons for discrediting him are of the lowest form of base criticism... if you had actually intelligent arguments based on his work,the work of his piers and the work within the field of transpersonal psychology i might actually respect what you have to say... but you dont and you are just kinda a intellectual who does not know what he does not know... which makes you the worst type of ignorant...
and I am not even defending groff, i dont even like his work! but at least hes done his work, and he knows what hes talking about, even if i dont agree with him, he has my respect... you on the other hand... deserve very little...

Dear burnt,

What Stanislav Grof is writing about in this essay is a culmination of several decades of work. You just see the summation, the result, not the way that led to this. Don't believe it was easy for him to step outside the scientific world view and begin to seriously entertain such far-fetched ideas. That's why I believe him. He began as a Freudian psychoanalyst but when started to experiment with LSD he found that the frameworks he was using - set up by traditional psychotherapy - were too limiting to account for the actual facts (experiences of his patients and the strange ways their medical condition was changed by those experiences).

I know this is a blatant violation of copyright, but I simply must share "Realms of the Human Unconscious", this 1975 book of dr. Grof with you. Therein you will find the history of the development of his ideas and how he came to believe in these - admittedly really far out - things. Together with case studies of his early LSD experiments.

I hope this book will shed a light on the matter and let you reconsider your point of view.

obliguhl



Its not like I am judging all mayan people and saying they are all evil. Its the same as I would not say all German people who lived during the reign of the Nazi's was evil. But I would certainly say Nazism is a sick and twisted cultural idea. Its the same with human sacrafice I think its sick. That doesn't mean I think all Mayans were or are sick.

How do you know what my cultural values are? My values probably don't entirely line up with the values of many people who are in my cultural backround.

ohayoco



Yes thats what kind of irritates me.


dorge



The fact that you consider transpersonal psychology a legit field of psychology shows why you can't understand why my criticism of Grof is so simple. I have no need to launch an all out scholarly argument against his claims because his claims are not even legitimately scholarly to begin with. They rely on MAJOR assumptions that are not backed by evidence.

Grof automatically assumes that astrology is true and uses that as one of the basis of his entire theory (in this article). Astrology is a complete and utter joke. The 2012 myth is a complete and utter joke because astrology is not true. There is no evidence that cosmic events like the position of the stars has any significant effect on human consciousness. There is plenty of evidence that it does not and that human consciousness is governed by our immediate environment our genetic backround and our life experiences.

He also assumes that Jungian collective unconscious ideas are true or evidence based. They aren't. He assumes spiritualism is true and that is not necessarily so either.



Yes I am ignorant because I have a criticism of someone who bases their entire theory on the idea that astrology is largely correct and that the position of our planet in the galatic scheme will changes our consciousness?



Just because hes done work doesn't mean his work is good or correct.


cellux



Freudian psychology was largely wrong. Psychoanalysis is not the best way of dealing with many mental illnesses. So you believe him because he moved beyond Freud? Thats not saying too much... Maybe in the early days of psychology is it was a big deal to see Freuds models were lacking but modern psychology has moved far far beyond that without relying on spiritual nonsense.



I agree that LSD can completely cure some mental crisis people have. But his explanations about why it happens are often stupid and rely on assumptions that his spiritual beliefs (which also come from his own experience) are true.

I am not going to read his book like I said I've seen him in person and he was completely uninteresting and sounded like Freud on acid.

guys, please, lets tone it down, yes? no need for personal attacks and swearing.. I hope you all will edit by yourselves the unnecessary parts and keep this discussion civil. Each one does his part in being reasonable, please lets not go with the 'he started first' thing

Grof believing in Astrology has nothing to do with the credibility of his statements. Astrology is perfectly viable - just because it does not exist in this world in the literal sense does not mean it doesn't exist. If a human were to fully believe in Astrology with all of their intent, then the Universe would read this and know to give this human what it needs through this. How else does the Universe communicate with us? If that human were to believe in the morning that truly his days would go exactly like they do in the saying, that doesn't mean they will but he will base his decisions during that day with that message in the back of his mind. If he were to not believe in this, then that message would not be there and the basis of his decisions would change depending on how much the belief could potentially impact him.

Grof probably realized that you can truly believe in anything you want - it's really all about your intentions. Your spirit does not lie. I believe in Astrology too, I just logically realize that it doesn't literally exist. That is OK with me, I can deal with that. It's just a neat way to get some answers.