QUOTE
the purpose of spiritualism is to acheive it using the spirit alone
Let's not forget that any magical tool is just rudimentary "technology" used to facilitate the magical process. Words, signs, everything except the thought alone. Sure electricity can power your home, but only when properly wired. Most magical practitioners do not pursue magic with mind or spirit alone, yourself included if you actually utilize the information you have thus far posted to the forums regarding ritual and spell work.
The use of other kinds of technology to achieve various brain changes is essentially similar in my opinion, perhaps made even more efficacious by treating them like magical tools. Eventually it becomes easier and easier for your brain to go into those states, and you find that over time you are able to shift into them naturally. This is a matter of getting your brain used to the state, and nothing more - any normal person should have this experience in other words.
Using that state magically is different than just achieving it, of course. A brain state is just that - a brain state. Inasmuch as everything is inherently spiritual, it in itself has no intrinsic spiritual value. Spiritual experience is not the same thing as brain experiences, and these programs will not give you spiritual experiences - but neither will meditating into these states. It is what happens after that point, if we are seeking it, that we encounter the spiritual through practice.
peace