BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation

Subject: BS: Mysticism the rational explanation
From: Pied Piper
Date: 25 May 05 - 05:37 AM

Mystic Brain

QED
PP

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: GUEST,Paul Burke
Date: 25 May 05 - 06:31 AM

This illustrates what might be a bug in Firefox- if a page doesn't have the extension .htm, it displays it as text- it doesn't auto- recognise the HTML format.

Otherwise, stuff like this has been going round for years. Read Dennett, 'Consciousness Explained', for a good overview. Maybe the mystics will one day be enlightened.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: GUEST,John O'Lennaine
Date: 25 May 05 - 07:23 AM

Like religion, science tends to assume that its latest revelation is the final one that completes the set. Neither discipline has a complete set yet. The truth is unfolding. This much is obvious.

So the brain has a bunch of little devices that simulate actual experiences? These devices obviously evolved from random mutations because they served a useful purpose in the continuation of the species.
Hmmm. I guess it has been beneficial for mankind to believe in non-existent concepts.

All will be revealed, but not by religion, and not by science.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Wolfgang
Date: 25 May 05 - 08:55 AM

science tends to assume that its latest revelation is the final one that completes the set (John O'Lennaine)

You will find not serious scientist to ever make that claim. It is completely opposite to what is taught to them. Science is very unlike religion in that respect.

Your idea about how and why simulation of actual experience has developed is also completely off the track.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: mack/misophist
Date: 25 May 05 - 10:23 AM

The original link isn't very informative for some one with bad eyes. Is this more or less what you were talking about?

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Amos
Date: 25 May 05 - 11:09 AM

This is kind of like one witch doctor trying to explain to another that the telephone is populated with little voices who talk to you, and asserting that he has figured out which wires, capacitors and switches actually are responsible for the little voices.

The premise of the article, self-fulfilling, is that the brain is the origin of experience, rather than merely an over-amped relay.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Bill D
Date: 25 May 05 - 12:21 PM

I didn't read it that way, Amos...it sounded to me like they were touting the brain as locus of all experience, and the source of 'some'. There's more & more experimental evidence everyday that various parts of the brain work in amazing ways to create our experience of ourselves and of the outside world. The hypothalamus has been found to control much of sexual orientation, for example. (I'm still trying to find some good references for some of the reports I have heard about, but not read.)

New research indicates that memory is not 'imprinted' in a 'spot', as once thought, but stored in pieces on various receptors, and reassembled for use, much as files on a computer are. This can easily lead to mistaken memories if not re-inforced and re-mapped. This is partly why we get confused and contradictory witnesses of car wrecks, for example, and explains how children can 'remember' abuse that never happened when interviewers 'suggest' too much. Memories + Dreams + suggestibility + peer pressure + who-knows-what-else can give us quite a varied mix of truth and fiction...all of which 'feels' very real. A lot more work to do,

(and I'm not sure that witch doctor analogy maps the situation too well...witch doctors begin with false premises....understandable, but leading to inaccurate conclusions, nonetheless)

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 26 May 05 - 03:32 AM

He's speculating. Look at his last paragraph alone: " it could be argued that…. Is this, perhaps, because… a person who lives a highly spiritual and mystical lifestyle, might perpetually…"

A lot of "mights" & "perhapses" & "could bes" in the whole thing.

And this always annoys me: "There is NO ONE to die."

I feel there is "someone to die." If this feeling is an illusion, _whose illusion is it?_

Think: an illusion cannot exist free-standing; there must be someone to be deceived. "Attention all cars; there's a hallucination standing at the corner of 4th and Sherman..." Not bloody likely.

Now, "He who dies" -- me in this case -- may not be who I think he is, but so what? If I'm mistaken in who I am, there still has to be someone to make the mistake, and that's the poor SOB who dies.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: GUEST,Paul Burke
Date: 26 May 05 - 06:13 AM

" And this always annoys me: "There is NO ONE to die."

I feel there is "someone to die." If this feeling is an illusion, _whose illusion is it?_
"

That's the illusion. "I think, therefore I am", it's the "I" that's the mistake. Consciousness is just what systems 'do' when they are complex enough- self consciousness when they have a sufficiently rich set of inputs and the evolutionary necessity to choose a correct response from many options. It's just a property of matter.

Science, also straightforward Buddhism. The void.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Pied Piper
Date: 26 May 05 - 09:19 AM

Amos's telephone analogy is spurious.
It's a strange telephone that when you alter it's internal workings it changes the personality of the voice at the other end.
People with brain damage can have radically changed personalities.
The problem with Amos and his ilk is that they do not seek to explain consciousness, but merely say it comes from somewhere else and is un-explainable.
For me this is a copout.
My hope is that as the research in this field proceeds, safe and reproducible mystical experiences will become available for all, at which point all the rococo intricacies of religious structure will be seen for what they are, mutually contradictory products of an overactive imagination.

Freedom at last.

PP

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Amos
Date: 26 May 05 - 10:53 AM

PP:

Your rebuttal of my analogy is spurious. I simply believe that the origin of consciousness is not encased in wetware. If your model of the universe does not allow of any such possibility, then of course you are constrained to the model of matter and energy only, which leaves a lot of data out of the picture. Me and my ilk are not a problem, erxcerpt you make us so. I have some of the finest ilk ever seen on this planet.



A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 26 May 05 - 12:47 PM

Amos, that's a wonderful sentence:

I have some of the finest ilk ever seen on this planet.

I love it!

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Bill D
Date: 26 May 05 - 12:52 PM

absolutely georgeous ilk

but this looks more like the ilk you ought to have around, Amos. ;>) (it, too is quite pretty!...take two, they're small)


ummm " If your model of the universe does not allow of any such possibility, then of course you are constrained to the model of matter and energy only,..." .....If my model of the universe is permitted to make assumptions about stuff I can't see, measure, explain, define,or locate, then the possibilites are, indeed, limitless. They would therefore allow for all the religious interpretations of creation and conciousness and 'spirit'. You leave the metaphysical door open, you can't control what sneaks in!

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 May 05 - 01:22 PM

For the record, I like Amos's ilk. But then, I like Bill D's ilk too.

My thinking is quite simple (simplistic?) when it comes to this kind of thing. I have frequently asked: If you believe only in things that can be seen or physically explained, do you believe in 'love'? Or do you believe that love just a rewards-based, mutual dependence on another being? (I am *not* speaking of lust here, but love , the visceral feeling one has for another's wellbeing)

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 26 May 05 - 01:57 PM

I'm sure self-consciousness is a property of matter, Paul. That's no reason to believe that it's an illusion. And again, whose illusion? Surely you don't believe in that free-standing illusiion I was talking about -- do you?.

I am willing to believe that "I" am not a "gaseous vertebrate' inhabiting the brain, but just because "I" am a process rather than an objeect does not mean that "I" don't exist. A candle flame is a process, and you can see it and burn your finger in it.

I am not an expert on Buddhism, but I believe they make a distinction between the Ego and the Self. And I don't know what the Void is, but I understand it is "no thing" rather than "nothing,"

I am conscious of sitting here trying to explain what I mean. lf I am mistaken in who & what I am, there must be a conscious entity to make that mistake. Perhaps an oblong blur rather than a gaseous vertebrate, but someone's here.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Amos
Date: 26 May 05 - 04:00 PM

No question there is a conscious entity. Trying to explain all that you see, know, perceive, feel and decide by gussying up the combinations of sparks in neurons is like trying to understand weight gain by inspecting the fan-belt in your car. You are no more identical to your wetware than you are to your Buick.

Ability is not an attribute of energy or matter. Neither is insight, understanding, affinity or decision/intent. Go figger.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: mack/misophist
Date: 26 May 05 - 05:27 PM

Having read a number of articles on Dr. Persinger, perhaps I can elucidate a bit. His basic claim is that when certain (fairly rare) conditions exist in the brain, even minor stimuli can produce experiences that have the force of a religious experience. He also says that the kind of stress that can produce a religious experience will create the same brain effects his machine does.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Bill D
Date: 26 May 05 - 05:55 PM

Ebbie... I don't find it at all difficult to experience and 'believe' in love, yet attribute it to mechanisms in my brain, just as I experience and 'believe' in beauty, happiness, evil..etc...

I have LONG explanations of why I see no conflict in this, but suffice it to say that I find it MUCH easier to just use working definitions than to posit some metaphysical phenomena that I can't get a handle on. Philosophers spent centuries trying to imagine that Plato's "eternal forms" were somehow independant of 'us', and very strange treatises were written about such matters! Fortunately, they have largely gotton beyone that approach.

And for the record, I think that the evidence FOR DR. Persinger's ideas is stronger every day.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 26 May 05 - 06:13 PM

"science tends to assume that its latest revelation is the final one that completes the set"

Hogswallop

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism the rational exlanation
From: John O'L
Date: 26 May 05 - 06:32 PM

The article is didactic. It makes no allowance for alternative explanations or future discovery. Lip-service is paid, but then countered:
"We are biological organisms, evolved in fascinating ways for NO purpose at all and with NO END in ANY MIND."
That is hogswallop.

Did God talk to Abraham, or was Abraham a lunatic? That is not a new question.
I don't know the answer and neither does the author of the article, but he has made a decision, taken a stance and wants to ram it down my throat.

No decisons can be made yet. All the information isn't in yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: GUEST
Date: 27 May 05 - 06:53 AM

John O'Lennaine said:
" 'We are biological organisms, evolved in fascinating ways for NO purpose at all and with NO END in ANY MIND.'
That is hogswallop."

Why is it? Which of the propositions don't you agree with:

We are not biological?
We have not evolved?
There is a purpose and/ or an end in mind?

Justify your statement.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Donuel
Date: 27 May 05 - 07:28 AM

Hogswallop you say. I side with Penn and Teller who call mysticism straight up Bull Shit.

If you want hogswallop I suggest you try on Intelligent Design (creationism) - its the "latest" fashion.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: John O'L
Date: 27 May 05 - 08:07 AM

Guest -

The content of the statement is unimportant.
It is important that the author presents opinions as if they are facts. They are not facts. They are opinions.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: LadyJean
Date: 28 May 05 - 12:10 AM

Darwin offered evolution. Then Thomas Morgan refined his ideas. Beijing Man was the oldest hominid, until Leakey excavated in Africa. Make a study of what very rational eighteenth and nineteenth century scientists said about women. Or what the very rational, very scientific Sigmung Freud said about the human psyche. They learned through observation, as scientists are supposed to. But their interpretations of the data were wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 28 May 05 - 02:48 AM

LadyJean-- Yes. And as I like to tell people, I'm old enough to remember when Mars had canals.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: *daylia*
Date: 28 May 05 - 08:08 AM

"The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious - the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science."

Albert Einstein
Living Philosophies, 1931

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Ebbie
Date: 28 May 05 - 12:58 PM

Yay, Albert! I love to speculate on the mysteries.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)
Date: 28 May 05 - 03:12 PM

"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."
_Science, Philosophy and Religion: a Symposium_ (1941) ch. 13

Einstein

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Bill D
Date: 28 May 05 - 05:57 PM

Einstein shoulda stuck to relativity.

"Science with religion is hamstrung, religion with science is redundant"

Bill D..Mudcat discussion, 2005

If Mudcat lasts 50 more years, maybe they'll be quoting ME...*grin*

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)
Date: 28 May 05 - 06:21 PM

No Bill D I doubt that very much. From your counter to Einstein I take it your music is merely variations of wave pressure?

Yours, Aye. Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Bill D
Date: 28 May 05 - 06:27 PM

"merely"? Not at all...music is variations of wave pressure which pleases me. *smile* The production of it is certainly not mystical or un-scientific, though science is not the primary medium I use to enjoy it.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: John O'L
Date: 28 May 05 - 06:47 PM

Science and religion are opposite sides of the same coin. That's why they can't see what each other sees.

I hope that explanation isn't too scientific for the mystically inclined among us.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)
Date: 28 May 05 - 08:35 PM

"It would be possible to describe everything scientifically, but it would make no sense; it would be without meaning, as if you described a Beethoven symphony as a variation of wave pressure." -- Albert Einstein

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Ebbie
Date: 28 May 05 - 08:39 PM

Oh, gawrsh, Bill D, it looks like Dr. Einstein anticipated your remark.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Bill D
Date: 28 May 05 - 09:29 PM

Dr. Einstein was a clever fellow, no doubt... ;>)... but prescient?

and I'm sorry, John,,,but science and religion are not " opposite sides of the same coin"...that metaphor simply doesn't track. Science & religion do, indeed, have different approaches to certain issues, but there is no 'coin' that serves as a ground of both conceptual frameworks.

I think you made YOUR point when you refer to "the mystically inclined". That is, basically, what we have. Some folks seem to emotionally need that approach, and will adopt its attitudes whether or not it fits the data. No one (at least not me) is claiming that they can DISprove mystical answers of certain kinds, but neither can the religiously inclined disprove scientific research just because it doesn't seem to fit some pre-digested view of reality they learned in church!

Science, when done right, adapts and changes its thinking as new information is discovered. Much religion wants to refuse to think anything that wasn't printed in some ancient text....and interpreted by leaders who have vested interests in the interpretation.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: John O'L
Date: 28 May 05 - 09:48 PM

Bill, couldn't the universe/cosmos/existence itself be thought of as their common ground? Isn't the explanation thereof the primary goal of both?

I used the word "religion" a little too freely. I don't like the word. I probably should have said "spirituality".
Certainly science is more adaptable than religion, but there are many of the mystically inclined who are trying to investigate and reinterpret those ancient texts and events from a logical scientific viewpoint.
There are many points where scientific and spirtual research overlap and are in agreement, but the popular view is still that they oppose each other.
They need not necessarily.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: John O'L
Date: 28 May 05 - 09:58 PM

The article at the top of the thread has a lot of interesting relevent stuff but the article itself is inflamatory and devisive.
It's a waste of good energy.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Kaleea
Date: 29 May 05 - 01:16 AM

I saw some wild mysticism back in '76 or '77 when I was in the orient. There was one beautiful Buddhist temple way out in the country which I visited where I had a terrific time conversing with an English educated monk. (went to a university in England)   He had spent much of his youth in a monastery & later studied science at a University (Birmingham, I think-if I can remember that far back). He said that there were certain centers of the brain which went totally unused in the "west" but that in the East, training is specifically given to use those regions of the brain. He even said that there was one spot in his head that would literally tingle when he was meditating or otherwise engaged in spiritual activities ie, prayer, chanting.    Funny thing is that over the years since, when I have spoken with folks seriously into meditation, & similar communing with God, they sometimes speak of a spot in the brain that tingles. I am presuming that these folks are not all on hallucinogenic drugs &/or did too much LDS in the sixties.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Amos
Date: 29 May 05 - 01:41 AM

Bill:

Science and religion are surely ways of knowing.

If you thought of spiritual and mental and emotional and material phenomena as a continuous spectrum, which they could arguably be, you could say that religion tries to embrace the spectrum from the top down, while material science fights for the same candle from the bottom up.

While it is true that religions often go into a sort of sclerosis, science has been known to get stuck in odd corners, too, for a while. I concur that so far, science's methods are greatly preferable. But ya never know! :D


A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: *daylia*
Date: 29 May 05 - 06:31 AM

When this mind and God mingle
this brain never tingles.
How could it, pray tell
with no touch-sensitive cells?
When I've asked 'God' for healing,
'It's' flowed through me like fire
and eased all my pain.
Does this make me a *liar*?

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: *daylia*
Date: 29 May 05 - 09:16 AM

It's hardly controversial to claim that happy people are healthier people. It's not only common sense, but there's plenty of scientific studies out there these days indicating that people who describe themselves and their lives as "religious" or "spiritual", and as primarily "joyful" and "thankful" suffer less disease and live longer than those who do not.

Here's a couple such studies: Positive affect and ... health related processes

Religion, Spirituality may slow Alzheimers

This insightful article is quite long, but well worth the read: Where is Happiness?

Spiritual Happiness

'Inner-based happiness' – or spiritual happiness, as I sometimes call it, since consciousness-energy is basically the same as 'spirit' – doesn't have the same problems as the other kinds of happiness we've looked at. It isn't subject to the law of diminishing returns or to adaption – no matter how often we experience it, it never fades in intensity. Because its source is inside us, it's not dependent on external conditions, and therefore much more durable and stable. And because it comes from a particular state of being – rather than from fixes of external stimuli which fade after a while – it's the only kind of happiness which can become permanent...

All of this suggests that, far from being unattainable, happiness is actually natural to human beings. Since our beings consist of consciousness-energy, the nature of which is well-being, happiness is our nature. We don't need good fortune or any new circumstances to be happy, and we don't need material goods, fun activities or success or power. It's possible for us just to be happy, without any reason at all, because happiness is just there, inside us, in the same way that the sky and the air are outside us.

In one of his most famous poems the Indian mystic Kabir compares human beings to fish who complain about being thirsty, without realising that they can drink the water they're swimming in. 'You wander restlessly from forest to forest,' he tells us, 'while the reality is within your own dwelling. The truth is here!'

Many of us spend our lives looking for happiness from external things, and all the time, while we go to the ends of the earth in search of it, it's nearer to us than anything else: in our own being. Once we turn our attention in the opposite direction, however, and begin to change ourselves rather than our circumstances, we realise that it was always with us, and always will be.


I like it! :-)   

And I wonder - does theorizing, hypothesizing, rationalizing, philosophizing or otherwise dissecting the mysteries of life inspire true joy, or gratitude, or love, or compassion, or peace in other people? I don't recall science classes - or other forms of scientific 'stimulation' - ever having that effect on me, anyway ....

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Amos
Date: 29 May 05 - 10:36 AM

Too much LDS leaves you bitchin' and mormon.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: JennyO
Date: 29 May 05 - 10:41 AM

Daylia, I've just read that article you linked to - "Where is happiness". It's excellent, and well worth the read.

Jenny

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: John O'L
Date: 29 May 05 - 06:28 PM

daylia -
Theorizing, hypothesizing, rationalizing, philosophizing or otherwise dissecting the mysteries of life is of great interest to some.

There's more than one way to skin an onion.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: *daylia*
Date: 30 May 05 - 07:24 AM

Yup there is ... and any way you slice it, you'll probably cry a bit.

Glad you liked the article, Jenny. I liked the quote of the day they had yesterday on that site too, but it's gone now *sniff* - went something like this:

A Native medicine man from the States was telling a friend there were always 2 dogs "inside" him, all the time - one nasty and vicious and negative and always looking for a fight, the other calm and friendly and loving and protective. The friend asked which was the strongest, and the medicine man replied "The one I choose to feed".

"merely"? Not at all...music is variations of wave pressure which pleases me. *smile* The production of it is certainly not mystical or un-scientific, though science is not the primary medium I use to enjoy it.

Interesting! So what do you think that "primary medium" you use to enjoy music is, BillD?   Scroll down to the section called "The Flow" in the article "Where is Happiness?" if you like - I think the author has it pegged - but I'm curious as to what term (if any) a non-mystically minded philosopher like yourself might find acceptable.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Bill D
Date: 30 May 05 - 12:06 PM

John O'Lennaine...sorry for delay, it's busy season here. Your reply to me is a good one and deserves a thoughtful reply. I'll try to get back and do it as soon as possible....maybe later today.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 30 May 05 - 02:53 PM

"The production of it (music) is certainly not mystical or un-scientific, though science is not the primary medium I use to enjoy it."

True, the production of sound is not mystical or un-scientific but the production of music _is_ mystical and un-scientific.

The essence of science is repeatability. If music were a repeatable experiment we could all play like Segovia by following the instructions. We all know there are people who can reproduce great performances note for note, but they don't sound the same.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 May 05 - 02:57 PM

Perceived rationality is often a function of cultural prejudice. What therefore, can absolutely be deemed rational depends on whom you ask about it, generally speaking.

Also, one can be entirely rational and still be wrong. :-) But it beats being entirely irrational. Mind you, I've never met anyone who was entirely irrational. If such a person could be found, it might prove very interesting as a test case.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Amos
Date: 30 May 05 - 05:00 PM

Perceived rationality is often a function of cultural prejudice

This is a very corkscrew definition of rationality, but it does point out that "perception" of reasoning can run into fiery walls of opinion.. In areas of aesthetics and cultural morals, opinions are the predominant commodity and have little basis other than random bursts of affinity, granted. But rationalism, as an approach, deals with the assessment of data which is relative to purposes, other data, and viewpoints. Within that framework, rationality is clearly different from cultural prejudice. Obviously what is rational for an engineer seeking to bridge a river is different from what is rational for a monk who wishes merely to meditate on a river; it is only obvious that frameworks define the validity of different paths of reason. But that doesn't make reason any less rational.

One of the problems rationalism runs into is a lack of a single seamless framework for human activity in general, which is so various it is easy to fall into the belief that "everything is arbitrary and based on opinion or impulse". But this is not necessarily true, it is simply a popular way out of thinking.

Three examples of rationalism led haywire by opinions, or insufficient analysis of available data, are the Bush administration, the spiteful sappery of certain spite-slingers on threads here from time to time, and the windbaggery of some Republican orators, here and elsewhere. I suppose some liberals as well subscribe to windbag rhetoric, but it seems of late to be coming from right wing reactionaries in more volume. Forwarding an aberrated agenda does not make one's rhetoric rational no matter how slick it is.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: GUEST,Wolfgang
Date: 31 May 05 - 08:19 AM

What finally makes the headlines in reports about scientific findings are the speculations at the end of an article. The hard findings come before that section. And they are much more likely to persist than the speculations.

Looking for physiological correlates is a very valuable way to gain knowledge. I see no alternative research program from the other side bringing even a fraction of the results. What we now know more about mystical experiences, schizophrenia, epilepsy etc. is more than two thousand years worth of philosphying.

PP is of course wrong in one title-giving aspect: it is not the rational explanation but a. I like it nevertheless.

Re 'Abraham': Did god talk to him or was he a lunatic are not the only alternatives. A whole branch of archeological and historical research thinks that there never was a single 'Abraham' but that the authors of the Pentateuch writing at much later times weaved some legends into a more or less coherent narrative and invented names to go with the legends.

The good thing is that mentioning such possibilities doesn't get one killed any longer like in the old times and like now still in Muslim countries. Mention the possibility that Muhammed might have had visions from the firing of his neurons and not triggered by god and you are in danger of life.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Amos
Date: 31 May 05 - 11:28 AM

...and how rational would that be?


Correlates between spiritual and mental states and brain-firing is a natural thing to a being who is closely anchored to using the body at all times. The question never addressed by physical science is whether any of the thousands of anecdotal reports of a being existing outside a body can be in anyway examined by a physical science. There have been random attempts to build meters that can react to ghosts, but they are pretty much fringe material. One reason there are no such tests in the main body of scientific research is that such a model lies well outside the current paradigm of consciousness, and therefore seems too odd to try to test.

Another reason is that it challenges an even larger paradigm that goes back to before Newton, that we are wholly contained by the framework of space-time, energy and matter -- there is no other "real" set of dimensions to address.

With these deep assumptions, the amount of thought that goes into exploring anything outside their boundaries will be marginal at best.

Which is in a way unfortunate, because it limits the territory and leaves out some very interesting phenomena, such as knowing itself, ironically. Understanding, intuition, the occasional burst of telepathic perception, the consciousness of being conscious, are all left at the pale.

As far as I have seen so far, the model for "knowing" as a brain-based event really can't be explained, but depends on invoking the "great complexity" defense which states that right now things are too complex to understand them, but we will get there as we gradually decode this great complexity.

To me this is about as reasonable as invoking imaginary playmates to explain things. "I know things because Harvey the Rabbit whispers them to me".   :>D






A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 May 05 - 03:08 PM

Whoo-weee! You're making my head spin, Amos. Believe me, old friend, I do not have the time today (or most days lately) to respond in similar fashion...

All I have time for is another brief cryptic statement, like...

People, without exceptions, see the outer world that perfectly reflects their own inner world. Therefore, do whatever you can daily to improve your inner world!

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: John O'L
Date: 31 May 05 - 06:40 PM

Amos -
I was with you right up to the point where you wrote off the "great complexity" defense as being of Harvey the Rabbit mentality.

If it can't be explained, and we have no way of attempting to explain it, what alternative is there but to admit it, relegate the explanation to the future, and keep on looking?

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: John O'L
Date: 31 May 05 - 10:27 PM

Nothing like a good monkfight

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Kaleea
Date: 31 May 05 - 10:47 PM

Harvey whispers in your ear? That dirty Pooka! He promised me he wouldn't do that any more. Typical Irish fella.

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Amos
Date: 01 Jun 05 - 12:09 AM

I merely said that claiming "it has to be all matter and energy, just too complex to explain yet" is about as reasonable as saying "I know it is SPirituals Weevils because Harvey the Rabbit told me so" -- both claim to be explanations but without offering any explanation.

KNowing you do not have enough data, or the right data, is a good start to finding more data or changing your model for what the right data might look like.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: *daylia*
Date: 01 Jun 05 - 07:36 AM

Monkfight

"it has to be all matter and energy, just too complex to explain yet"

Isn't this a bit redundant, seeing as (thanks to the irrationally mystical Einstein) we now know that E=mc²? How about "it has to be all consciousness and energy, and "consciousness" is still too new a field of investigation for science to explain yet."

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: *daylia*
Date: 01 Jun 05 - 08:03 AM

Some recent hypotheses in the Science of Consciousness...

The answer is right in front of us. As I said in my review:

"...the site of action of anesthesia, and the site of consciousness, is not a specific brain location or type of neuron or particular protein. The site/action of anesthesia and consciousness is a distributed phase of non-polar, hydrophobic solubility medium composed of discrete pockets in a group of proteins throughout the brain. In this hydrophobic phase, quantum mechanical forces rule."

In my opinion, consciousness happens in quantum pockets in hyper-neuron dendrite proteins. That is where the evidence points. That is where the quest for consciousness should be looking.



??!!??    phsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssst BANG!!!

oh no my hyper-neuron dendrites just blew a fuse ....

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: Amos
Date: 01 Jun 05 - 10:34 AM

Daylia:

No. The fact that mathematically e= mc² does not gainsay the fact that matter and energy are usually treated as separate but related domains.

ANd you are shifting the context of my statement -- which was, that those who espouse a material-only view of consciousness often resort to notions of complexity to cover the fact that they are leaving out the inexplicable bits and the "ruled-out" phenomena.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Mysticism -the rational explanation
From: GUEST,Paul Burke
Date: 02 Jun 05 - 03:52 AM

".... those who espouse a material-only view of consciousness often resort to notions of complexity to cover the fact that they are leaving out the inexplicable bits and the "ruled-out" phenomena."

Maybe so for some, but the scientific approach is to be agnostic about the inexplicable, and not to have 'ruled out' phenomena.

There have been many past attempts to draw a line and say that such-and-such a phenomenon can only be produced by living or conscious beings. Animal electricity and organic chemistry jump to mind. The fact that those notions were mistaken does not mean that any currently unexplained phenomenon must also ultimately prove to be material in origin; but anyone proposing alternatives to matter-and-energy have the duties of tentatively describing its properties, and of suggesting ways in which the hypothesis could be tested.

And nobody should reject an idea merely because the consequences are uncomfortable to them. The only criterion for acceptability is the robustness of the idea under objective testing.