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The comparison with the average U.S. figures shows no dramatic changes at all, with the exception of 1976. In that year the TM movement was in full swing in Fairfield—remember, with thirteen times the necessary 1 percent—and there was a jump of 18 percent! And in Fairfield itself, where the Effect should be most spectacular, officials have noted no change.

As for unemployment, Job Services of Iowa supplied the following facts: 1.The amount of unemployment in the State of Iowa varied at essentially the same rate as that of the U.S. in general through this period. 2.The variances in the Fairfield area were somewhat higher during most of the period covered, lower only at one point—in 1977, by 0.3 percent.

The noted small decrease in unemployment seems even more inconsequential when we realize that it reflects the movement, birth, or job change of only twenty-six persons!

Let's hear it for the Maharishi Effect! It's obviously a roaring success . . . and all these wonderful results from only thirteen times the required minimum percentage of TM devotees. It seems that the Effect should be renamed "The One-Percent Non-Solution."

Dr. Hyman describes Dr. Rabinoff as a typical representative of the TM movement—well dressed in a sparkling white suit and neatly groomed. What he presented, however, was less palatable, being heavily spiced with the jargon of TM. Phrases like "the field of all possibilities," "pure intelligence," and "cosmic consciousness" abounded, serving to cover up the lack of answers to direct, simple, yes-or-no questions.

Dr. Rabinoff described the sidhis program as a system that enables one to achieve "whatever one desires"—hardly a modest claim. The mind reels just contemplating the possibilities. Visions of Sophia Loren, sacks of gold nuggets, flying carpets, and unmentionable delights crowd my mind immediately. But more mundanely, the professor described the MIU campus as a place where no tensions exist, everyone is eager for learning, and no learning difficulties arise. This, he told the audience, was because all students had direct access to cosmic consciousness, the source of everything.

But, cautioned Dr. Rabinoff, even though he himself had instant access to pure and omniscient understanding, it could not be expected that he would know all about, for example, the science of chemistry when his field was actually physics. But through TM, he explained, he now felt "an intuitive familiarity and comfort with chemistry." Okay, you figure that one out. I can't.

Reports Hyman: "As a student of physics, he [Dr. Rabinoff] says he used to have to read the text two or three times before he gained sufficient understanding to attempt the exercises. Now, through TM and the TM sidhis program, he can read textbooks in physics only once and find himself ready to do the exercises. Thank goodness for the TM program. If now, after studying physics as an undergraduate, then as a graduate student, and finally as a teacher, he could not read and understand textbooks in physics, then TM must truly be wonderful to enable him to do this!"

The general party line of TM was espoused in great detail and at great length by Rabinoff. It involves something called "pure bliss," which sounds fascinating indeed—a state during which students gain all knowledge (though not about chemistry, it seems) and are open to all possibilities. This state was compared to the state of a vacuum. This latter observation perhaps sums it all up accurately.

When we speak of the Maharishi and the TM movement of a few years back, we speak of a different organization than what we find before us today. There has been a radical step taken by the Maharishi of late, and it has been picked up by the press and highly publicized—and ridiculed—around the world, though the criticism fails to faze the believers. Anyone who has in any way followed the matter has seen the posters and brochures illustrating the latest in chic miracles—the process of levitation. Astonishingly enough, the Maharishi, seeing