[ A Confession | Western-style Meditation | Suspect Plagiarism Standards in Asia | It's Universal ]
I must confess to an embarrassing secret first. As a student during 1982–85 I scrupulously read Newsweek or the Time Magazine. There was no Internet those days (if such a time can be imagined) and I rarely watched television during prime time so I gathered all my news from these magazines. Why should this cause me embarrassment now? In 1987 a wise colleague Dr Bruce Gatland, at the University of Auckland, told me of a popular view that the Time Magazine is for those who cannot think and the Life Magazine is for those who cannot read. No sooner Bruce had uttered these words a flash went off in my head. In an instant a lot became clear. After that, for this and other good reasons, I stopped reading those magazines. I was contented not to worry about the news as seen through the eyes of the Time Magazine.
During the last few years we have again started subscribing to the Time Magazine, mainly for our children. Why do I expose them to blatant propaganda? I have, with copious examples, tried to make them sensitive to propaganda so that they can concentrate on facts alone. The Time Magazine has access to people and places that most other news organisations don't, so if you learn to look for information only, the magazine might still be good value for money. Moreover, to make it easier for readers to swallow their blatant propaganda they employ talented writers and it's their style of writing (to forcefully and convincingly make a point) that I want our children to observe and learn from and employ in the service of truth. Enough of this apology now for the main part.
In an article entitled How to get smarter, one breath at a time: Scientists find that meditation not only reduces stress but also reshapes the brain, in the Time Magazine, January 16, 2005, p. 61 (Australian edition), it says the following referring to studies which claim that meditation physically changes the brain:
"Unlike in previous studies focusing on Buddhist monks, the subjects were Boston-area workers practicing a Western-style of meditation called mindfulness or insight meditation. "We showed for the first time that you don't have to do it all day for similar results", says Lazar. What's more, her research suggests that meditation may slow the natural thinning of that section of the cortex that occurs with age.
The forms of meditation Lazar and other scientists are studying involve focusing on an image or sound or on one's breathing."
Please consider the emphasised text above (emphasis mine). I haven't practised pranayam and meditation myself but still I know that focusing on an image or sound or on one's breathing is NOT a Western-style of meditation. There are entire books on each of these meditation styles and it is stretching our credulity to the extreme in suggesting that those books were inspired by a Western-style of meditation.
When I say this to people, including our family, their immediate response is, write a letter to the Time Magazine. Does anyone in their right mind think that the Time Magazine doesn't know what it's doing? They are not so foolish as to believe that focusing on an image or sound or on one's breathing is a Western invention. They know that their core readership, as Bruce pointed out, cannot think and so they quietly suggest it to them, without any fear of being challenged, that look we even have our own Western-style of meditation.
Most people use the media not to be informed or educated but to reinforce their own prejudices. The service provided by the TV, newspapers, and magazines in this regard is extraordinary. The most miserable person in the West can watch or read news and instantly feel blessed for living in the West when compared to the images of the starving and superstitious masses in the developing world. I have no quarrel with the media's chosen role but please don't confuse it with objective news and information.
One can easily accuse me of making a mountain out of a molehill. Not so, I think. I have plenty of examples but not the time and resources to collect and present them. If you are sensitive to this type of propaganda either you are already aware of plenty of examples or you will yourself discover them in a short time.
Let me give you another example of one Dr Andrew Weil, M.D., who has written an article in the same issue of the Time Magazine on p. 66, entitled You (and your brain) are what you eat. He had written another excellent full-length article on health a few months back for Time. In that article he suggested an effective breathing exercise from his experience and claimed, "This is the most effective breathing exercise that I have discovered." It so happens that that breathing exercise is also common knowledge in India.
Zero tolerance on plagiarism is the new academic mantra. In a plagiarism workshop I attended a few months ago there was a discussion on the need to make the Asian students in the Australian universities aware of the plagiarism standards in Australia. Examples were given of Asian students who cut-and-paste and don't realise that it's plagiarism.
My view is that people who are responsible for educating Asian students about plagiarism should also be aware of the examples of blatant plagiarism in one of the most sacred Western citadels of elite journalism. I present the above example with a request to the eductors for them to keep in mind that what Indians would consider (Western-style of meditation) blatant plagiarism, if not outright theft, is an acceptable thing in the West. Similarly there could be instances where a thing could be acceptable to Asian students which might be unacceptable under the zero tolerance policy in Australia.
We will leave for a later discussion what makes Asian students and Australian educators think differently.
Before you denounce me as a narrow-minded Manuvadi obscurantist who doesn't realise that Pranayama and Meditation are universal and everyone has an equal right to it and it's not anyone's personal property, let me say that I realise the universal nature of these techniques without reservation. And if the current trend continues, the West may soon have just as many, if not more, people practising Yoga (in all its forms) as India.
My insistence is on the truthful acknowledgement of the source. This is not only to satisfy the vanity of Indians. It is important for the people practising meditation to know its true roots in case they want to go beyond its presently advertised material utility.