STUDY EXAMINED:
Reference: Orme-Johnson, D.W., Alexander, C.N., Davies, J.L., Chandler,
H.M., & Larimore, W.E. (1988). International peace project in the Middle
East: The effects of the Maharishi Technology of the Unified Field. The
Journal of Conflict Resolution, 32, 776-812. (Reprinted in Scientific
Research on Maharishi's Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi Program:
Collected Papers, Vol. 4, pp. 2653-2678.)
Claimed results: "Increasing numbers of participants in Maharishi's
Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi program led to improved quality
of life in Israel." Charted result "shows the strong correspondence between the
numbers of TM-Sidhi participants and a composite quality of life index
comprising many variables, including war intensity and war deaths in
Lebanon, Israeli national stock market prices and national mood, and
auto accident rates, number of fires, and crime rates in Jerusalem and
Israel."
"[1]
Basis for results: "Coherence group: World Peace
Assembly of Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi program participants
fluctuating in size from 60 to 240 (200 is the square root of 1% Israeli
population), during August and September 1983 in Jerusalem."[1]
COMMENTARY:
The "coherence group" included roughly 38,000 non-Sidhi meditators in
Israel and 2,000 more in
Lebanon. However, the TMO provides "no information
about the geographic distribution of these meditators or evidence to
support their assumption that they were in the area and meditating during
the vacation month of August which comprises half the test period."
Lagged effects were not specified prior to the research. The TMO "researchers
then interpret any significant correlation at any non-negative time lag
for any indicator as supporting their theory." A number of specific factors
were not included in the TMO analysis but readily could
have influenced the dependent variables. The TMO "research
design also prevents us from knowing how many other factors may have
contributed to a spurious correlation."
As stated in summary of
the evidence below, "ME predictions cannot be derived from the MT." Also,
"The claim that MT
provides the only plausible explanation of these data cannot be sustained.
There are alternative explanations that do not depend on esoteric or
paranormal influences."[2]
PEER REVIEW:
Mordecai Kaffman. The Use of Transcendental Meditation to Promote
Social Progress in Israel. Cultic Studies Journal, Volume 3, No. 1,
1986, pp. 135-141.
A criticism of TM's "International Peace Project in the Middle East"
which later appeared in the Journal of Conflict Resolution in December
1988.
The methods of TM Peace Project researchers are dismissed as
unscientific, and their claims of positive results in the Israeli
context are deemed unconvincing, anecdotal, and based on a conceptual
error. The TM theory of the "unified field" is stated to be no more
credible than was Blondot's 1913 claim--supported by many papers from
his collaborators--that metals gave off N-rays.
PEER REVIEW:
Prof. Evan Fales,
Prof. Barry Markovsky.
Evaluating Heterodox
Theories.
1997, The University of
North Carolina Press. Published December 1997 in Social Forces Volume
76 (2):511-25.
The following are excerpts from the Markovsky & Fales study
which analyzes the "Maharishi Effect" (ME) and the 1983 Lebanon "coherence
group":
"This brings us to interpretation of evidence. The MT [Master Thesis of the
'Maharishi Effect']
predicts correlations
that are supposed to support its causal claims. Against those claims we
have launched, in descending order of importance, (1) arguments that offer
concrete explanations of findings without invoking the ME; (2) more
speculative arguments from plausible serendipity; and (3) arguments that
do not explain a correlation between two variables, but that suggest the
dependent variable can be fully explained without recourse to Sidhi group
sizes. In the first class fall our suggestions concerning fires, auto
accidents, national mood, and the immediate consequences of the Begin
resignation; in the second category, our speculations about the lull in
the war during part of August; and in the third, our mention of some of
the many factors affecting the vicissitudes of the war generally. Even
without quantitative support, this sort of defense of normal science is
sufficient to undermine claims of plausibility on behalf of unorthodox
theories that claim quantitative support. The low prior probability of a
heterodox challenger suffices to establish a presumption of guilt."
Do Predictions Derive From the Theory?
"To be credible, MT must explain (1) how group meditation affects the
unified field, (2) how these effects in turn cause changes in the actions
of individual human beings, and (3) how those individual actions have their
claimed social impact. Not clear in the theory is how meditators’ brains
spontaneously synchronize to produce "coherence," how coherence modifies
physio-chemical structures within the brains of distant others, why
coherence only causes phenomena that happen to be defined socio-culturally
as "positive," and how the distribution of behaviors is affected at the
population level.
"Hagelin (1987:69) concedes that MT does not explain how meditators affect
the ostensible unified field, and the emotions, thoughts, and behaviors of
people within it. Moreover, if the material world is presumed to be
influenced by collective meditation (as it must be if the unified field is
affected), then more direct measures are possible: inanimate ME-detectors
should be placed at varying distances from the meditation group. As it
stands, causal linkages from individual TM practitioners to, for instance,
a diminished likelihood of Nebraskans wrecking their cars, are hidden in a
very 'black box.'
"Another indication that predictions do not derive from the theory is that
lagged effects were not specified prior to the research. The researchers
then interpret any significant correlation at any non-negative time lag
for any indicator as supporting their theory. This multiplies the
likelihood of finding "supportive" evidence, but opens the door to Type II
errors even wider.
"The ME equation, from which specific hypotheses might have been derived,
was ignored completely in the research. The time-series analysis employed
each day’s higher number of Sidhi meditators rather than its square, and
the number of non-Sidhi meditators was not included in the test. There
also were periods during the study when meditation group size fell below
assumed thresholds for affecting Lebanon, or both Lebanon and Israel, but
Sidhi-group size rather than zero was used as the independent variable.
In fact, the Sidhi group should not have been powerful enough to influence
the Lebanese war, or even most of Israel. O88 argue that the roughly
38,000 non-Sidhi meditators in Israel and 2,000 more in Lebanon provided
the needed boost. However, O88 provide no information about the geographic
distribution of these meditators or evidence to support their assumption
that they were in the area and meditating during the vacation month of
August which comprises half the test period.
"In sum, ME predictions cannot be derived from the MT. There are gaps in
the causal chain from group meditation to the phenomena supposedly
affected, there are no specified time lags for the ME, and despite the
capacity of MT’s formal component to generate specific ME predictions,
the model is ignored. Thus, evidence offered for the ME cannot
significantly increase confidence in the veracity of the MT."
Can Alternative Hypotheses Explain the Evidence?
"O88 presented their empirical findings several ways, but the most compelling
showed superimposed graphs of (1) a daily composite index of Jerusalem
crime rates, auto accidents and fires; Israeli crimes and "national mood,"
and Lebanese war intensity; and (2) the number of meditators in the larger
of each day’s two meditation groups. Time-series analyses confirmed a
statistically significant relationship between the number of meditators
and the composite index for lags 3 0. Our analysis focuses on a few
specific factors that were not included in the analysis but readily could
have influenced both the meditators’ decisions to participate
and the
social indicators used as dependent variables. Importantly, the research
design prevents us from knowing how many other factors may have contributed
to a spurious correlation.
"Holidays and Vacation Month. O88 recognize that mundane events affect
both meditation group size and their social indicators: Their statistical
model compensates for weekend effects and for three Jewish holidays. There
are other factors for which the authors failed to invoke statistical
controls, however. Perhaps the most obvious omission was that of three
other major Jewish holidays during the study period -- Succoth, Shemini
Azeret, and Simhat Torah. Nearly all of the meditators who participated
in the research came from the liberal end of the Jewish religious
spectrum. As was clear in the graph of meditation group sizes, they were
willing to travel and meditate on the Sabbath and holidays. In contrast,
Orthodox Jews do not cook, light fires, or travel in cars on religious
holidays or the Sabbath. Undoubtedly the holidays also produce some
elevation in mood, and may coincide with reductions in war hostilities
measured from nearby Lebanon. Therefore, the same factors that increase
meditation group sizes at certain times would also correspond to the
abstinence from cooking and travel for a very significant portion of the
Israeli population. We might then expect to find not only a heightening in
national mood at the same time larger numbers of meditators turned out for
the study, but also coincident reductions in domestic fires and automobile
accidents.
"Another effect, obvious in the graph of meditation group sizes, is
attributable to August being vacation month in Israel. During August
Israelis leave the country in large numbers. Critically, the investigators
did not take into account the effects on fires and auto accidents of the
lower population in Israel during August, of the tendency to cook less
during hot weather, and of the potential for reduced war hostilities in
the desert heat. It may be difficult, but the burden of eliminating
these possibilities rests upon the researchers.
"The Lebanon War. O88 highlighted the negative effects of meditation group
size on war intensity in Lebanon. Hostilities in the Lebanon war involved
an enormously complex interaction between a multitude of social, political
and military forces. A good sense of this complexity can be gleaned from
The New York Times Index "Middle East" entries for this period. We offer
several observations:
"O88 make no mention of the many widely-publicized military and political
events that may have both influenced the Lebanon war and induced
meditators’ patterns of participation. Many such events occurred around
the midpoint of the study, coinciding with the wildest fluctuations in
group size and war intensity. For example: (1) Israel announced it would
withdraw its army from the Shouf mountains overlooking Beirut to a line
along a river to the south. Major fighting erupted in Beirut just before
the announced withdrawal date. (2) During the study period Prime Minister
Begin both announced his intention to resign, and did so. (3) The Lebanese
army completed a successful sweep of Beirut. A lull then occurred until
the Israelis withdrew from the Shouf. Fighting promptly erupted among
various factions. (4) Within days battles were being waged over the Shouf
by U.S. and Druse militia, and the U.S. congress voted to keep the Marines
in Lebanon for 18 more months. No effort was made to ask meditators why
they showed up or stayed home in droves at various times during this
period of the study.
"In sum, it is hardly unreasonable to suppose that the fluctuations of the
dependent variables measured by O88 would have remained exactly as they
were even if there had been no meditators at all. The claim that MT
provides the only plausible explanation of these data cannot be sustained.
There are alternative explanations that do not depend on esoteric or
paranormal influences."[3]
Notes to Text:
[1] Source: TMO's Maharishi University of Management
http://miu.edu/m_effect/29_lebanon/index.html
[2] Excerpts taken from: "Evaluating Heterodox Theories", Markovsky, Barry &
Fales, Evan. 1997, The University of
North Carolina Press. Published December 1997 in Social Forces Volume
76 (2):511-25.
[3] Footnote references edited. Article with footnotes may be viewed in
its entirety at
http://www.lightlink.com/trance/research/markovsky2.shtml
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