Paul Bradford:
My point is I don't see how a diagnosis can reliably be made.
By paying attention.....something that is rarely done. Have you ever driven down your street, after years of living there and notice something "new" that isn't? Only by paying attention to your states and moving thru them are you going to notice them reliably. Most likely you will not notice the signs the first time unless you have a vigilant teacher who can point it out. Information shared here on the forum almost never has enough of the needed information to diagnose accurately....that is usually a conversation on skype or something.
Of course if you
1) have a good map
2) have studied it well
3) are paying attention
4) keeping notes about your practice as it happens
5) getting good feedback from someone knowledgeable
I think accuracy would be much higher then say... someone who read the map once, didn't study it very well, was not paying attention at the time, is relying on memory about their experiences, getting unqualified feedback from someone unknowledgeable over a forum. Varying degrees of accuracy based on many factors.
Of course sometimes the stages are not subtle and someone who has had abject fear, misery to their bones followed by disgust wonder how anyone could miss it? People who have subtle cushion only experiences have a harder time diagnosing....lucky for them.