Talk:Erhard Seminars Training/Archive 1

Neutrality of this article
Hi David - I'm dismayed that you did a blanket reversal of the edits I did on the est page on 18th November. All of the additions I did were in an honest attempt to restore a NPOV, which in my opinion is far from the case at present. It seems to me that the article as it has been restored goes out of its way to make negative insinuations without any counterbalancing comments, or much in the way of real factual information about the courses.

I'm tempted to re-insert them, but don't want to just start an edit war especially with a moderator. What was it that you objected to?

In my opinion the qualifying remarks about the Hunter Thompson quote which have also since been reversed were entirely fair comment and enhanced the neutrality of the article. What is the point of quoting from a work of fiction in an encyclopedia article unless the implication is that the quotation is objective and factual? As purported fact, the quote is unsupportable; as an illustration of opinions which est sometimes provoked, it is fair enough - but surely that needs to be made explicit?

What is your viewpoint on the whole est/Landmark issue? Mine is that I did the Landmark Forum almost three years ago and found it a positive and beneficial experience. I don't work for Landmark and I'm not in an Assisting Program, but I'd like to see it represented fairly and honestly. Lots of my friends have done it and almost all of them report varied tangible benefits (and one or two don't). I went to an est introduction in about 1980 and thought it too over the top for my taste, so didn't sign up. Several friends did it and seem to get worthwhile results.

PaulDC 11:36, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I reverted it because it appeared to be an anon IP shilling - hugely positive statements with no referencing or substantiation. It is nice to know that isn't the case.


 * Fear And Loathing In America is non-fiction political writing, not a work of fiction - you may be thinking of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Though I'm not really sure the quotation adds a lot to the article. Negativity per se is not evidence of NPOV violation.


 * At present I'm ridiculously busy (see links at top of my user page), but hope to get heavily back into the Wikipedia editing ASAP. In general, though, if you want to put stuff back in, it helps to reference it thoroughly; it's hard to argue with good references in most cases. In this case, your additions would definitely benefit from checkable references, as it would make them much more clearly defensible - David Gerard 17:48, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"One can perhaps best grasp the nature of the est program by reading through some of the many personal narratives available on the web." -- without actually providing any links, this is kind of a cop-out. It reads as "Hey, Wikipedia doesn't have any info about this, go try Google!" Metamatic 21:11, 24 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Breakdowns from est explained
Although there were no explanations available at the time there is a simple reason they happened.

The training sessions were a situation for Visual Subliminal Distraction to be created.

In the 1960's designers and psychologists solved a problem that had appeared when knowledge workers using the first close-spaced office workstations began having mental breaks.

The office cubicle became the solution for this phenomenon by 1968.

Sitting in lectures for hours, concentrating on the speaker, while others are making small detectable movements in peripheral vision contributes to exposure to reach a threshold and cause the eventual mental break.

The sessions alone would not have caused the mental breaks but those who had them would have been previously exposed in unprotected workspace.

http://visionandpsychosis.net/EST_Werner_Erhard.htm http://visionandpsychosis.net/Culture_Bound_Syndromes.htm

The reason there were positive effects is the same reason that Qi Gong and Yoga produce similar results. But when too many exercise sessions are done in a compact time frame both exercises produce a temporary psychotic episode.

http://visionandpsychosis.net/Kundalini_Yoga_Psychotic_Episode.htm

http://visionandpsychosis.net/QiGong_Psychotic_Reaction_Diversion.htm

L K Tucker 68.158.201.98 06:27, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

The timeline
Hi all,

<< conducted the first est seminar in San Francisco, California, in October 1971. >

This is not correct.

I first attended an 'est' event ober the New Year's holiday of 1970-71, and it had already been going for several months at least. I was in the Third Teen Training, conducted at he Jack Tar Hotel in San Francisco by Werner and his original staff, in 1971.

Sorry, but I cannot supply the exact/correct date(s), as I never knew them.

-Paul Carlson

Look, you idiots.
What the hell is est? What is it about?

Method of Referenced citation
I'm re-organizing the method of citation in the article from Parenthetical Documentation, to Endnote Citation. In this manner, the reader may look to the end of the article and refer to citations in one, uniform location.Smeelgova 02:21, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Unsourced Material
I have deleted the section entitled "The wit and wisdom of Werner Erhard", first, that would more likely belong in a biographical article, and second, all of the quotations were unsourced, without citations.Smeelgova 02:45, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

I've been there
I was a young child of 12 when my mother subjected me to the est training. She swore to me that it would change my life and that I would get "it" after it was over. Meanwhile, all of my friends were experiencing the summer of '81, swimming, having their first kisses, riding bicycles, being KIDS, and wondering why I had to sit at some hotel at the Hobby Airport in Houston for two entire weekends listening to a bunch of psychobabble that a 12-year-old child has NO interest in. During our very short 30 minute box-lunch periods, where we were served baloney sandwiches on white bread and an orange (much like jail food) I actually got to talk to some kids (the one name that sticks with me is Thorin, named after the King who reclaimed Erebor from Smaug in J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit", and many other neo-hippie children like myself) and the consensus was the same; we wanted to be kids. After it was all said and done my mother asked me what I had gotten out of "The Training" and asked if I had gotten "It" and I had to tell her that I really hadn't gotten anything out of it except a strong desire to never be put in a position like that ever again. She then explained to me how much money they had spen on this "Training" (I believe it was around $400.00 or so back then for the children's training) for me and then asked me again if I was SURE that I hadn't gotten ANYTHING out of it. That was the point where I finally told her "yeah, mom, I'm totally enlightened now and can now be a happy person and create my own reality..." My mother didn't have two dimes to scrape together, much less send her kid to some guru preaching some kind of vague self-realization course. I kept in contact with some of those kids through that summer, and we all pretty much forgot all about those two weekends of mindless sitting and rode bikes, played Donkey Kong and eventually all had our own first kisses and social interactions with no worries about whether or not we got "It" or not, just being kids, but I'm sure Werner appreciated our parents' checks all the same, although my mother's check probably bounced.
 * You can "sign" your comments by putting four "tildes" after your commentary. Thank you for sharing, by the way, a very interesting read.  Yours, Smeelgova 03:00, 20 October 2006 (UTC).


 * Thank you Smeel, but I purposely did not sign this talk.
 * Ah, understandable. Still, interesting read, nonetheless.  Yours, Smeelgova 12:05, 20 October 2006 (UTC).

Scientology Project and Template??
I can accept this article as a Scientology "Project" (with objection), but the template seems out of place. While est may be heavily influence by Scientology, it is not a "Part" of Sci, as the Template implies. I would think the numerous links to Scientology would be sufficient. Opinions? Ratagonia 06:28, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That sounds like a fair compromise, for now... Smee 06:52, 21 March 2007 (UTC).

Assessment comment
Substituted at 20:32, 2 May 2016 (UTC)