Good articleNew Age has been listed as one of the Philosophy and religion good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
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DateProcessResult
May 19, 2009Peer reviewReviewed
November 14, 2010Good article nomineeListed
June 28, 2013Good article reassessmentKept
Current status: Good article

Conflation of Hindu and Buddhist thought with New Age.[edit]

A concern I have with this article is what seems to be the conflation of Hinduism and eastern religions with New Age. The perspective of the article seems to be that any western interest in the ancient religions of the east constitutes an expression of New Age thinking. This is problematic as it denies the ancientness of these traditions and assumes that western interest in them is pathological and misguided. 74.103.194.107 (talk) 16:45, 1 September 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

One thing or many things being artificially lumped together?[edit]

The article seems to lump together many disparate ideologies as one milieu while also, in several places, admitting that these people do not self describe as "New Agers." The article uses circular logic arguing that New Age "is typified by its eclecticism" while not giving any reason for all these various ideologies being grouped together under a single umbrella. Before reading the article, my understanding was that New Age only pertained to the idea of "Astrological cycles" very briefly described in the "Astrological cycles and the Age of Aquarius" section. It looks me like, rather than a unified movement or umbrella ideology, that people not understanding the beliefs and practices of certain (non-Judeo-Christian, non-atheist) white people have just mentally lumped them all together as "hippy stuff."

I suggest instead that the one thing unifying all these clearly distinct ideologies is that each has been a reaction against the lost of spiritual identity in modern, post-enlightenment materialism while also being unable to embrace modern Christianity. Many effects can have the same cause without the effects being classified as one thing.

The ideas of the article also smell of a kind of racism, as though the idea is, "All these white people aren't Christian, aren't atheist, and are doing very different 'spiritual' things, so it must be a singular movement." The fact that these people are described as getting ideas from ancient spiritual traditions indicates that the people described are individually seeking something missing in the broader culture and perhaps at times finding support with each other despite having differing beliefs rather than one movement which supports "supermarket spirituality" for each of its members.

IMO, either the entire article needs to be rewritten from the perspective that this is a conceptualization of a phenomenon (since apparently there have been academics who do conceptualize these various things as a singular), or the article needs to be split into several interlinked articles and reference that the behaviour, belief, or ideology has been described by specific individuals as New Age.

As support for my suggested rethinking of "New Age" compare the Japanese concept of shinshūkyō in the article Japanese new religions. Though these are completely different groups, the fact that so many groups have appeared since the Scientific Revolution could suggest similar causes as a reaction to the effects of the Scientific Revolution. 2604:2D80:DE11:1300:B19F:5802:1887:710F (talk) 20:31, 9 September 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

"the lost of spiritual identity in modern, post-enlightenment materialism while also being unable to embrace modern Christianity." While I would not add it to the article's text, my guess is that the rise of the New Age movements, the spread of modern paganism, and the secularization of much of the Western world have a common cause. A considerable number of people find traditional versions of Christianity to be unappealing, and search for an ideology which would satisfy their spiritual needs. In any case, do you have sources to support the changes which you propose? Dimadick (talk) 08:18, 12 September 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

So would is be okay to state that: "The New Age ideologies are a reaction against the lack of spiritual identity in an increasingly materialistic world. A world where people have lost the will and ability to embrace the idea of Christianity"? Also, could something be said about the way Christianity was made to seem of little value in the lives of people? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.29.103.48 (talk) 21:16, 9 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

If there's a reliable source supporting it, probably. I'd have to review the source to form an opinion. Schazjmd (talk) 21:25, 9 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

New Age, Aliens & Consciousness[edit]

New age is very individualized it can be a series or multiple series of new age practices.

Multiple Dimensions are usually brought up in most new age practices. 

Universal alien species aka aliens their origins of different species outside of Earth such as aliens from different planets are brought into theories mindsets & practices. Such terms as starseed

New age mindset 

Believing that one individual or a group of individuals is over a certain dimension, to raise the collective consciousness is a new age thought and belief pattern that is becoming more, and more popular. 2600:6C4A:717F:F8A5:15E1:9697:F5B8:7F57 (talk) 23:27, 29 November 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Where is Law of Attraction?[edit]

This article is not mentioning a very relevant principle for the New Agers, which is the Law of Attraction — the more you work on yourself, the better are the things you attract to yourself (this happens because of divine forces), and therefore it's your fault if things in your life are not going well (I don't think they like to view it that way, since they're more optimistic by seeing it as an opportunity to thrive out from the unpleasant situation they're initially in). One reference could be the book/film The Secret, by Rhonda Byme, from which other references can be derived aligned with the proper historical contextualization.

I'm sorry, I don't really have a big repertoire of references with me, but it's really not THAT hard to find this kind of material. Whenever you look on YouTube for binaural sounds subconscious work mediation for attracting better things to your life, you can see all those New Age concepts mixed with each other, you see holistic medicine of Chakras (a relevant concept in New Age, Reiki...), and money attraction through electromagnetic, radioactive, light and quantum forces, you see everything! That's a reality you see everywhere when you watch those YouTube videos, and whenever you put the word "quantum" before any random thing you search on the internet.

Many entrepreneurship courses currently use Law of Attraction for validating their success using New Age terms such as "energy", "vibration" and "frequency" so they can justify that other people can thrive in life just as they did, because the work is not just done by means of action, but most importantly through inner work, and this is how the Law of Attraction provides a phenomenon called Manifestation (the moment in which reality manifest what we've been working through our thoughts and we've been exercising with our emotional projections). Examples: Afiliagram, Tam Kaur, Lavendaire, Manifestelle, etc. On the internet, some will say you just need to think and look inwards, so you will be able to manifest anything. Others will say you need to contribute to your progress by actively acting on it (this idea is more common among entrepreneurs educators online). These entrepreneurs claim that since the feeling of shame is the lowest vibration you can see according to easy-finding online emotional energy graphs (yes, they don't use scientific-based Information), then it's necessary to make the reverse process by feeling more prideful about yourself (the emotion opposite to shame is pride). What I've been seeing lately on the internet is that the relationship between entrepreneurs who work as entrepreneurship educators through online courses and the New Age movement, both have been getting closer with each other.

So my suggestion is that researchers on the topic should get a closer look into this, and really see how those environments within such courses really operate, and how these irrational-based New Age movements have been used as an emotional pushing for common people who get into those courses to become entrepreneurs, and then make more courses telling people the same thing — that they have been working in themselves to elevate their energy to attract better things to themselves —, so that's a cycle. It's common both in USA, but also in Brazil, the country I'm from. In short, the New Age movement is closely related to the capitalist/financial relations in our digital age society. AndregustavoSoyJo (talk) 03:24, 28 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

AndregustavoSoyJo, here on Wikipedia, it is all about accurately summarizing what reliable sources say about the topic. The Secret (Byrne book) is most definitely not a reliable source. It is a pack of pseudoscientific nonsense. So, witing four long paragraphs without identifying a single reliable source is a waste of your time and that of other editors. Reliable sources are like gold on Wikipedia. Everything else is like sand, straw and horsefeathers. Cullen328 (talk) 03:34, 28 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
@Cullen328 New Age IS made of unreliable sources. Since I'm speaking about pseudoscience, of course, I'm bringing the source they use to justify their pseudoscientific beliefs, such as this book. AndregustavoSoyJo (talk) 09:37, 28 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
AndregustavoSoyJo, references to unreliable sources are forbidden everywhere on Wikipedia, except in very narrow circumstances. Coverage of fringe topics requires excellent references to indisputably reliable sources. Examples might be works by scholars who are experts in comparative religion, whose work has been published by university presses or respected peer-reviewed academic journals. Cullen328 (talk) 09:46, 28 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
@Cullen328 Everything I'm saying here is that this article is missing mention about the Law of Attraction. It's widely believed among New Agers that this is a real law.
I don't have all the answers, if I had all the research I would just edit the document, instead of entering a forum on Wikipedia. I'm just making a suggestion about the orientation of your research to make this information more complete to the readers. AndregustavoSoyJo (talk) 09:49, 28 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
AndregustavoSoyJo, if you want the Law of Attraction to be mentioned in this article, then the burden is on you to find a truly reliable source that explicitly makes the connection between the Law of Attraction and New Age. It is that simple. As for this talk page being a "forum", no it isn't. Please read WP:NOTAFORUM. Article talk pages are for discussing specific, actionable proposals to improve an article based on what reliable sources say". Cullen328 (talk) 19:51, 28 November 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
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