Experience is part of physical reality

Sometimes -- well, actually, quite a lot of times -- I find people arguing on this blog, and in other places, that science doesn't know how to deal with personal experience.

Further, that because experience seems to be something ineffable, as is consciousness (likely there's no difference between experience and consciousness), this means that the most intimate part of our being is outside the domain of science, which deals with physical reality.

Galen Strawson, a philosopher, disagrees. I wrote about his take on consciousness in "The hard problem isn't the nature of consciousness, but of matter." 

Many make the same mistake [as Leibniz] today -- the Very Large Mistake (as Winnie-the-Pooh might put it) of thinking that we know enough about the nature of physical stuff to know that conscious experience can't be physical.

We don't. We don't know the intrinsic nature of physical stuff except -- Russell again -- insofar as we know it simply through having a conscious experience. 

We find this idea extremely difficult because we're so very deeply committed to the belief that we know more about the physical than we do, and (in particular) know enough to know that consciousness can't be physical. 

In Strawson's book, "Things That Bother Me," he makes a similar point as regards experience.

So what do we know for sure? When we ask this question we get, first, an old answer. We know, each of us individually, that we exist, as Descartes pointed out. We also encounter another more general certainty, as Descartes also pointed out

We encounter the fact of consciousness, conscious experience, experience, the fact of the subjective qualitative character or "phenomenological" character of experience. The existence of experience is a certainly known general fact about concrete reality.

It is, therefor, for anyone who takes the concrete real to be entirely natural, a certainly known natural fact. It is therefore, for any realistic naturalist, a certainly known physical fact. So we have our starting point. 

The necessary, inevitable starting point of genuine, realistic  naturalism, real naturalism, as I call it, is outright realism about experience, conscious experience. 

...It's true, of course, that experience seems utterly and bewilderingly different from toe-stubbing physical stuff as it is ordinarily conceived of in everyday life. But this doesn't give us any reason to think that experience isn't wholly physical.

It's also true that experience seems bewilderingly different from physical stuff as it is usually conceived of in the physics laboratory. But this, again, doesn't give us any reason to think that experience isn't wholly physical.

Comments

[um]

Well ... with your thumb and index finger of your right hand, rub the fleshy triangle between and beneath the same fingers on your left hand.

See, if you can describe it and measure it and what science can make of it.

[Roger]

You will be truly content when you engage with THINGS physical, emotional, psychological, or any combination thereof, as they are, and not how the confused and conditioned self-referential mind believes them to be.

The way you can know if you’re actually content, as opposed to believing you are, is to be consciously aware of the quality of your mind state in now-ness.

If you are reacting against some THING, you don’t like, or against the thoughts, speech or actions of another because you don’t like it, you have fallen into the trap of believing your own confusion.

When you take responsibility for the quality of your mental state in now-ness, blaming others becomes futile and unhelpful.

If you adopt a way of life that is based on doing the least amount of physical, emotional or psychological harm to yourself, others and the world around you, and take responsibility for what you think, say and do …………….. There is then no opportunity to blame others or external events, for the quality of your mental state in now-ness.

Self-regulation is freedom from the worrying mind.

[Appreciative Reader]

"Experience is part of physical reality"

This seems straightforward. Simply a question of separating the subjective from the objective.

And objective reality, so far as we know, in a best-working-model kind of interpretation (which is the only kind of interpretation that stands up to any real scrutiny), is completely physical. So far at least, nothing non-physical has been objectively showed to exist (other than in people's imagination), other than as emergent from the latter. Ergo, everything is a part of physical reality, which is the only kind of reality there is.

(The day we have convincing evidence of any other kind of reality, we'll be happy to change our tune. No shame in owning up to having been mistaken, and in switching to a very different worldview if it so happens that that is warranted. Indeed that kind of flexibility is the very hallmark of rationality and of a scientific worldview. All of that should go without saying.)

[um]

@ AR

Maybe it would be appropriate to say that science is restricted to the physical, given it has set boundaries for how knowledge can be accrued..

It remainds of a definition for IQ being "IQ is THAT what can be MEASURED with an IQ-test.

Instruments have a certain reach, beyond that reach the cannot "see" => measure. etc.

So science by its own set up and definition is RESTRICTED to the physical ... nothing more nothing less

[Ron E.]

I hadn’t really considered the question of experience, just simply passed it by as something the brain does – along with consciousness and all the other cognitive processes. Looking into it, I would say that experience is what the senses sense and the brain makes sense of those signals primarily in order for us to survive.

Summed up better by Jay Garfield in ‘Loosing Ourselves, Learning to live without a Self’ (A book you have reviewed Brian) “Perception, as all of us know, involves the transformation of information impinging on our sensory apparatus into neural impulses, and the transmission of those impulses along the sensory nerves to diverse areas of the brain, where further neural activity occurs, together constituting our experience of external objects.”

I guess this also speaks for our inner mental ‘objects’ as when we experience emotions, memories or thoughts, whether we form those thoughts as pictorial images or words. Either way, as this blog suggests, it is all connected to ‘physical stuff’.

[um]

@ Ron

What has always been strange to may is, that FIRST scientist state that whatever we see and accept as the "world"is fabricated by the brain and THEN the make also statements about what that world is all about.

As far as I understand drinking coffee, that is an impossibility of sorts.

[Ron E.]

Um, science is talking about apparent reality, the reality that we all experience and partake of to survive in our particular environments. Then it also points out, that although we exist in the everyday apparent universe, interestingly it is not what it seems. The brain does this purely for a species to survive. There is no duality in this, no contradiction. It is similar to the reality of a person we see and know and respond to and our assumptions with which we approach that person, and the reality of what that person is to themselves. Two different views but not contradictory – as we live and exist around such natural contradictions.

This is from an article from ‘Big Think’ and echoes what I would say is the legitimate limitations and honesty of science.
“Humanity has two old, profound questions. The first is about the origin of the Universe; the second about the origin of life.
Unfortunately, there are physical limitations that make research difficult. We can only see back in time to 300,000 years after the Big Bang. We don't exactly know what happened be-fore that.

In much the same way, biologists can trace all of life back to a single kind of organism. But we do not know what came before it.”

[um]

@ Ron

Maybe is it my lack of understanding maybe not.

In my understanding a car is driven by a person and cannot drive itself. AI driven cars are not an excluded.

So it is also my understanding that the body is needed to exist but not the source of existence.

The brain is needed, like the senses but they are not creators of content .. what matters is the content.

Science is limited by or has limited itself by its [1] instruments cq its limits [2] the theory, the limits of the use of variables in formulas [3] the limits of understanding of the scientist.

Nothing wrong with that as it has given us all what we have and use to survive in places where we do not belong by natural standards.

It is just limited knowledge and limited means there is MORE. Part of that more will become available in the future but their is another part that will be forever exclude.

[Appreciative Reader]

"@ AR
Maybe it would be appropriate to say that science is restricted to the physical, given it has set boundaries for how knowledge can be accrued..
It remainds of a definition for IQ being "IQ is THAT what can be MEASURED with an IQ-test.
Instruments have a certain reach, beyond that reach the cannot "see" => measure. etc.
So science by its own set up and definition is RESTRICTED to the physical ... nothing more nothing less"

(Posted by: um | February 01, 2023 at 07:11 AM)

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Hmmm, interesting point you’ve raised there, um. Food for thought there.

I see where you’re coming from. You’re suggesting that science begs the question, and raises what amounts to a circular argument about a physical, materialist worldview.

But, thinking about it a bit, I think you’re mistaken. Here’s why:

What you’re saying would apply if science were to start out by saying, “We’ll only consider these limited physical parameters within which to operate, anything outside of it we’ll ignore”. But that’s not how it’s happening, is it?

Science doesn’t advocate for any kind of “ism”, neither physicalism nor materialism. It sets out to study and investigate reality. And it so happens that the end result of all of that is a worldview that is materialist, physical.

So no, the begging-the-question objection that you present, I don’t think it holds up.

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In a way this reminds me of a longish discussion I had with our Osho Robbins some months back, and also another shorter exchange with someone called Grasshopper more recently. Don’t know if you’ve followed those exchanges. Essentially the argument they finally ended up making is, “Science doesn’t understand each and every thing, as it itself admits ---- so how can you claim that my claims about the One are wrong?”

To which I asked him, “So where do you get your ideas of the One from? By what mechanism do you know what you claim to know? Science is the only tool we have to understand reality properly. Agreed, science is a fallible tool, in that not everything it says at this point in time is immutable Gospel truth; but that mutability, that flexibility, is a feature not a bug; and in any case, what exactly do you suggest we adopt instead of science or in addition to science?
That we blindly accept what you’re saying? Why on earth would we do that?”

At which point he faded away, Grasshopper I mean to say. The exchange with Osho Robbins you were present at, so you know how that went.

----------

Agreed, the end result of this discussion is one partial point of acquiescence with the argument you’ve made here: and that is in understanding, always, that our understanding is fallible; in realizing, at all times, that our knowledge is not immutable but always provisional, and always subject to updation and revision.

If tomorrow we learn that gravity doesn’t always attract, and might also repel; well, then, we must be prepared to accept that. If tomorrow we learn that Hogwarts-style magic is possible, then that too we must be prepared to accept. Likewise if tomorrow we learn that reality is immaterial, or that the biblical God is real, or the that the Hindu triumvirate is real; well then, wherever the evidence leads us, we must be prepared to go.

That flexibility, that humility, that does follow from the argument you present here.

But that doesn’t mean staying ambivalent about what we do know. It was Carl Sagan I think who’d said, “We must keep our minds open, but not so wide open that our brains fall out.” Absolutely, flexibility and humility and acknowledgement of the provisional nature of our understanding is important; but it is equally important to realize that within the parameters of that provisional knowledge, there is a difference between right and wrong, correct and incorrect; it is important to know that there is a difference between what we know and have reason to believe, and what we have no reason to believe and so (provisionally) reject.

[um]

@ AR

I am not blaming Science, scientists of anything!

Nor am I saying what they should study.

I am just drawing attention to, as far as "I " came to understand, science, its tools and those working with these tools, they have restricted themselves to the study of the measurable , mathematical orginizable variables and that too in a manageable degree.

Data, has to fit the instrument, has to fit the statistic mathematic formulas and the mental capacity of the researcher ... at every step there is a matter of restriction, reduction going on and adaptation to the restrictions of the instruments, the theoretical models and last but not least the [world] view of the scientists.

So as far as I am concerned there is nothing wrong with science ...I am just stating that science is BOUND and restricted by its own starting points for what knowledge is scientific and what not

[Appreciative Reader]

No no, I understand where you're coming from, um. I realize you're not anti-science or anything.

What I was responding to was your very interesting and thought-provoking argument. I actually had to sit and think that through, to decide whether I agree with you or not.

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What you're basically doing is saying that science is bounded. And in as much it is bounded, therefore its conclusion that its results are within those bounds, is a circular argument, begging the question.

Like you say here, above: "science is BOUND and restricted by its own starting points for what knowledge is scientific and what not"

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What I'm saying is, there are no such bounds! There really aren't.

What those bounds turn out to be, is a function of what science happens to uncover while studying reality.

In other words, no, science did not start out with bounds. What bounds it sees around it, are dictated to by reality. Those are the bounds of reality itself, and not of science, which is only a tool for studying reality.

Science is free to study immateriality as well, magic also for that matter. And if it is true, then in theory at least there's no reason why tools mighn't be devised to study magic or immateriality, and to incorporate that into the scientific worldivew.

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There are no starting points, no bounds to science. Even if there were actually a non-physical, immaterial, all-powerful God sitting in heaven saying "Let there be light", while angels picked lice off of his long flowing beard with the strings of his harps, well then there's no reason why science shouldn't be able to study that as well. (In fact there actually has been research that studies the validity of prayer.)

---------

We're cool, I'm not saying you're anti-science. From our past exchanges, I know fully well that you're not.

But the circularity you see in science, the bounds you see and speak of --- which is a very interesting argument! --- is what I think is mistaken, for reasons that I've tried to explain.

[um]

@ AR

Probably its my English.

If I say that if you transport yourself from one point to another and use a particular vehicle to do so, you are bound by characteristics of that vehicle, I am not saying that whithin it the limits of these characteristics, the user of that vehicle cannot gor where he wants to go.

A car just has to use the highway AR

I am not saying also that scientist move in a circle. they simple do not.
Their instruments develop, their theoretical tools and their understanding.

But they are restricted by the "car they drive ... they for that reason can have access everywhere.

As a lover of logic etc You deserve a better and more sophisticated answer but alas, the rest keeps mum, if the take notice at all about what is going on here.

[um]

Shame on me ... they can NOT have that access

[Appreciative Reader]

Not to beat this to death, um; but as I see it, science is an all-terrain vehicle, and amphibian to boot, that can go anywhere at all. If all it's found so far are flat lands, and no hills and mountains or swamps, then the most reasonable explanation is that in that planet there is only flat land and plains, and no hills and swamps.

But we keep looking. The day we see a swamp, or a hill, we'll immediately update our map of that planet. But until we do, why should we assume there are hills that we can't see? It"s more parsimonious, more Occam's Razor, to conclude that we don't see hills because there are no hills.

It's an all-terrain amphibian beast, is science. Not a car that can only go on highways and nowhere else.

[um]

@AR

Call it an all terrain vehicle or whatever.

I Pointed out, that there will be an ever growing development of the vehicle and the place where it can go but it will for ever be restricted to the level of development at any point of time and the characteristics that are available.

What ever we have at our disposal and for that reason what we are and capable of is determined by it limitations.

As long as you stand on a given point, your reach and the power, ends at the fingertips of your outstretched arm. That range power is in detail studied by the founders of AIKIDO. That power is determined by the characteristics restriction of our body.

Science is a vehicle and whatever it is capable of is in any moment of time determined by the characteristics of the vehicle, the terrain and the driver.

The development of its possibilities will form an tangent curve ... in the beginning small changes bring a lots of advancement but later on enormous changes will offer little chane and the vehicle will be running against a wall

That wall was invisible already there from the onset AR is let us call it an construction failure.... the limitations were laid there by the same people that wanted to overcome them ....THEY were the ones that laid down the concept of what science is and not

In doing so they build their own vehicle, their own mental prisson.

I would I was an scholar, than I could explain it in your terms but alas AR I am a simple coffee drinker ... hahaha

[um]

@AR

In the beginning when people had an argument they would use their fist.
Then they developed the ide to throw their fist through the air by using stones.
Stones were refined in arrows and cannonballs
and by now in Hydro Bombs delivered by plains

In my understanding nothing has changed.
The hydrobomb is a sophisticated stone and the aircraft the arm.

So I do not deny the possibility of an ever growing refinement but what is refined is for ever the same.

The universe AR is build on and of an endless variation of the same.
Some are intrigued by the unique and endless stream of variation
and others by the sameness

[Appreciative Reader]

um, our appreciation of reality is certainly bound by the limits to reality itself. If reality itself is physical, then no one can find supra-phyzical attributes to it.

I appreciate your added nuance here, that our understanding of reality is further bound by limits intrinsic to us but not to reality itself.

To some extent science lets us overcome those bounds. Despite hearing and seeing limited frequencies, science lets us apprehend a much larger range. Ditto sizes and dimensions. Ditto the indirect apprehension of other dimensions, or fundamentally different kinds of matter, or whater the hell dark matter and dark energy turn out to be. Ditto even such things are QM, that are fundamentally different than our instinctual understanding.

But perhaps there are limits to our understanding. Perhaps we can never stretch our understanding further back than some time after the big bang. Perhaps there are aspects to reality, like other universes, that we can never apprehend. Is that what you mean, that kind of bound? If so, sure, it's possible.

But if we don't know something because it is fundamentally beyond our capacity to know, then, well, it"s all a moot point anyway. Like Osho Robbins's Oneness. He kept saying it is beyond science, beyond human conception even; but when pressed about how on earth he got to know about it then, he had no coherent answer.

Likewise, it is conceivable that some aspects of reality are beyond our understanding; but in that case it's simply moot, and for every purpose might not exist at all, so far as we are concerned.

-----

Tying this back to materiality: We only know of a material universe so far. If there is more to reality than that, and we humans are fundamentally unable to comprehend, then that is all moot anyway, and we might as well stop wasting time over what we simply can't ever apprehend. But if there is more to reality than the material, that is not completely beyond our capacity to apprehend, then science is how we apprehend it.

Which is why I likened science to an all-terrain amphibian vehicle, rather than a car that only traverses highways. Because it means that if tar covered roads are all we see, then Occan's Razor suggests that tar covered roads are all there are.

----------

After all, um, if you're going to claim that there is more to reality than the material and physical model science has presented us with, then you are going to have to explain, explicitly, clearly, how you have any conception of it. Isn't it?

So I'm not sure how these bounds to science you mention, the limitations of the vehicle that you speak of through analogy, would apply to science and reality in general, and our material/physical model of reality in particular.

[SantMat64]

Was the Sant Mat were were taught a corruption of earlier teachings? I'm starting to wonder if it was.

Perhaps "corruption" is too strong a word, but after looking more closely at the teachings of Kabir and Namdev, what Swamiji taught isn't a so much a continuation of early Sant mat as a deviation.

Kabir and Namdev's songs suggested the divine is within oneself, its non-duality, its presence and oneness in everyone and everything. In their extant teachings we can't find anything similar to the vast inner neo platonic cosmology of Swamiji's teachings. They present no huge superstructure of a path of return, a journey through inner planes, colors, sounds and even structures that, according to Swamiji and his successors, a Jiva must navigate through to get to God. What Kabir and Namdev taught is not only much simpler, I believe it's really distinctly different from what Swamiji and his successors taught, say as they will that Kabir and Namdev taught the same path.

Kabir and Namdev also both advocated for the same mantra, the one word, Ram. Isn't it a bit strange that they apparently had no concept of the necessity of 5 or 6 "charged" words, or the supposedly revelatory super mantra, Radhaswami?

Kabir said: "When you really look for me, you will see me instantly — you will find me in the tiniest house of time. Kabir says: Student, tell me, what is God? He is the breath inside the breath.” Neither Swamiji or his successors ever said anything like that, to my knowledge anyway.

We find nothing about Kabir or Namdev belaboring the sound current grand path of return theory, initiation, sitting in meditation for 10% of the day. Yes, these elder gurus may have touched on these things. But taking in the whole picture of their extant writings, can we really say they were teaching what the Sant Mat gurus teach today? I think many of us, myself included, just accepted that these older gurus were teaching "the same path" (contemporary Sant Mat gurus are forever stressing that the "path has remained the same." But has it really?

One reason why any of this matters is that Swamiji's Sant Mat is rather fraught with unrealistic concepts and demands. While some satsangis may have experienced the inner path as described by Swamiji, it's obvious that most have not and will not. Another issue is Guru Bhakti as taught by contemporary Sant mat; some might say it's an almost monomaniacal fixation of the person of the guru, rather than on God.

These are just some ideas I'm fleshing out, but I think the evidence is compelling that the Sant Mat were were taught not only contains many accretions that weren't present in the teachings of Kabir and Namdev (and other early gurus), but something fundamental in these early teachings has been changed. Contemporary Sant mat seems to have abandoned the religious and social universality of its early gurus for parochial guru worship.

[Dungeness]

@ AR [ But we keep looking. The day we see a swamp, or a hill, we'll immediately update our map of that planet. But until we do, why should we assume there are hills that we can't see? It"s more parsimonious, more Occam's Razor, to conclude that we don't see hills because there are no hills. ]

Indubitably correct. Science determinedly inspects, measures, disassembles
everything that can be apprehended through sensory input. The super ATV
of science however stalls out on "assuming there are hills we can't see" and
there are other doors of perception within consciousness itself. The mystic's
scientific methodology and rigorous path of devotion is an "backroad too far"
for the squeamish.

That's a good thing really though. The landscape is littered with vehicles run
aground. Ones who didn't heed the "Stay on the Trail" or hikers who ignored
"Caution: Don't Feed the Bears". There's plenty of exacting labor ahead no
matter which path you choose to follow. Stay in your lane until a better, more
compelling path beckons and there doesn't seem to be any other option.

[um]

@ AH

The problems I paint at are intrinsic to science itself.
We have defined what science is and what not and in doing so we have limited or restricted the field of research.

Scientists have set rules for what and how to observe, and how to handle the results.
There is the scientist, his theory and his instruments all have their own limitations as I have tried to point at.

So everything that passes their scientific strainer is left aside. They simple do not allow themselves for that reason to study what cannot be made visible in their world because then they leave the field of "demonstrable knowledge" and enter that of believe.

Their models tell them about deeper, further and broader of realities in terms of higher dimensions but they do not know how to transform that data into 3D. ...They managed to expand their 3d world a liitle. because they found ways to make the information visible = measurable etc

Actually all things that cannot be measured, problems that have to many variables going on are outside their range. ... due to the restrictions they have put upon themselves.

That said ... even in the 3D ... there are so many things that they do not study and cannot study, things that are so meaningful and valuable to humanity and even you ...hahaha

I do not know about your country but here we have divided University sciences in letters of the Greek alphabet Alpha for, literature, history, economy etc Beta for mathematics, astronomy, chemistry etc Gamma for humane sciences, psychology, sociology etc ... In the minds of many alpha and Beta scientists it is not uncommon to consider gamma science as NON-science given the extreme difficulties making their subject of study measurable.

Just think for a moment AR ... what that means!!

Whatever humans consider near and dear to them, the mental content that makes them human as different from other mammals, even for the scientists themselves, is considered as alien to them....

[um]

@SantMat64

All the topics you mention are in depth addressed and studied by a gentleman by the name of Mr. James. Bean. It should not be to difficult for you to have yourself informed as to what he has found and put on the Internet for all to read.

That said I take the freedom to write that: In order to turn one's back upon something as an mystical school, there is no need to search for and find shortcomings in the teachings and/or teacher.

If in a restaurant the food is not according your liking, there no need to say a word about the restaurant, the staff, the guests and its chef .... one's own feelings are enough to standup and leave the place never to return there again or giving a thought.

Sant Mat as it is offered by the man, many branches in Northern India, all offshoots of the teachings of Kabir is an "way to live" in the first place, if that is not according your likings, just don't do it.

Sant Mat, in all its forms, not only the branch that was created in Agra, is in fact a form of lay monastic life.

In a monastery /Ashram people have the same needs as those outside as they are all human. The only and real difference between those inside and outside, is the focus in their lives. Whatever they do in a monastery is related to what they call self and god realization. If that doesn't appeal to you ... just do not do it.

That is much and much simpler than finding fault with the teachings , the teacher and the organizations around them. ...and .. much comfortable and relaxter too.

It is YOUR life and it is up to you how you manage to find your way through the "rain forest, dessert, plains and mountains"of your culture.

[Jim Sutherland]

OCCULT INITIATION from SPIRIT to CONSCIOUSNESS with out HOLY BOOKS

We are here, ( in the Earth Light Zone, having left the Twilight Zone ) where ever we happen to be, at this very moment, imagining how our lives might be different, had we departed our place in the Spirit world, entered a womb, bonded with a fetus, and matured to being delivered into our present material bodies into this world of ,.....confusion.

Were we born with any particular Holy Book, or Scripture, or Owner's Manual hanging around our necks, instructing our parents how to care for us, or what we needed in order to reach self sufficiency and to be able to take care of our selves?

Imagine, that we arrived here, in our present material environment, that there had never been a single Holy Book written, not a single past human that had ever shared any religious or occult, or esoteric information with any human up to now!

We would have to decide on our own, all the mysteries of birth, life, death, and survival from the womb to the tomb. Could we do it, and remain human? Would society be better, or worse, with out all the religions, denominations, secret mystery schools, sects, with all the names we have become familiar with, and most of us have chosen to join one or more, and to become involved by either being followers, or leaders?

But, again, what if no Holy Books of instructions penned by inspired past humans had ever been written?
The only instructions we would be able to learn from, would be given to us orally, and by Teachers who we would choose to listen to, and we would be able to gauge what they told us by their actions! In other words, we could witness if they walked their talk, or talked their walk, or did they prefer to teach others, or us, to "do what we say, not what we do!"

But, considering that no Holy Books had ever been written by any past teachers, we would need to be taught by any one we chose as our teachers, by witnessing how they lived, how they treated their family and others, and we would be able to know most aspects of their lives, if we chose to follow in their foot steps, if we wanted to live as they do.

Now, considering the above, so far, are there ANY such individuals, who YOU would choose to follow and become a disciple of, by knowing that particular teacher or leader had never read a single holy book, or had ever been taught by any past leader that had read any such holy book of instructions, or had never been initiated into any secret society, fraternity, club, other than Consciousness, in the material body, having arrived from some mysterious place outside our present bodies?

That is exactly how our early human ancestors arrived in human bodies on planet earth, from where ever they came from. They arrived here with out Holy Books hanging around their necks, or written any where on their anatomy!

But, ....they all arrived with software that had to be down loaded into their hardware, and once the software packages were down loaded, and run through their planet earth Anti-Malware Virus programs, ( All Holy Books of instructions had been deleted from memory) they would need to OK new additions of software into their ( our) hardware, from then on!

Once we were on our own, and had graduated our parent guardian's care, we would need to choose our own ways to live in human society, that had grown to present from the beginning, with out any participant ever having access to, or having read a single holy book of religious instructions or myths.

We then would have to choose our own medicine or poison! WE would be constantly flooded with decisions of either rejecting, or accepting habits that our family, friends, and peers have already made part of their lives! And, we would be able to actually SEE and WITNESS the lives of those that we chose to participate, or reject in their habits or medicines.

Consider how our present lives might be different than they are presently, considering what we were spoon fed and forced to believe by our parents, teachers, gurus, priests, ministers, clergy, nuns, shamans, occultists, magicians, ....deceivers, heretics, and the list could be never ending.

I do not want to name any sect, but running searches on Google of denominations, religions, secret societies, etc, would take many life times just to wade through the basics of a few of them! Wikipedia could keep one busy reading an entire life time, alone!

But, our ancestors did not have Google, nor the Internet, and they relied on holy books, written by people we could not witness in action. Consider, further, any original thoughts written could have been changed, with other additional thoughts either added or deleted to suit their purposes of the times, by editors, scribes, etc. as well as translated from language to language, where many original thoughts were lost in translation. Our earliest ancestors arrived here with only their spiritual software, and survived. Could we now also survive, if we had to, and if so, would we be better or worse as humans?

Of course, we would need to include philosophy, and philosophers, in the same examples, because they are only another branch of non-religious religion, as well as Atheism, Deism, Occultism, Mysticism, Charletism, or any Isms!

We each would need to be led by only what our inherited software we arrived here with, and was installed in our hardware, ( brains) instructed us about how to live! But, considering all the present holy books haven been downloaded into our hardware, ( brains), our hardware has been turned into mushware!

Then, we would all be asked to consider accepting or rejecting opportunities in material life such as:

Diets: what should we eat, that would be the healthiest for nourishing our bodies, while doing the least damage to the planet earth, or taking life from other lower species?

Medicines: Would we participate or reject alcohol, tobacco, any kind of addictive drugs, or natural herbs?

Considering, none of us had ever seen or heard about any 10 Commandments, or any other "Thou shalt nots" from any prior holy books, we would need to make our own decisions based on what our elders shared with us, or told us, but we would be able to WITNESS what effect our elders choices had or was having on them!

Would we participate in war, if called to kill other human beings?

With out listing wrongs or rights, we each would be held responsible to either participate or reject, each opportunity for either further progression, or suppression of our individual spirit/souls,.....if we had implanted software that even registered such ideas.

The above is only food for thought, if we decide we might like to take personal inventories of our present implanted moral values.

How ever we arrived here, or Who or What ever sent us here,....will remain a mystery,. ....until we graduate these present earth suits.
Jim Sutherland

[Appreciative Reader]

Hey, Dungeness.

Maybe it's just that it's another day. Or maybe it's the big nice mug of black sitting at the side table next to my desk. But either way, as I read your comment now, and um's as well, rather than launching into a detailed discussion on the minutiae of them, what I find myself asking is this: What are we arguing about here at all?

As I read these last two posts addressed to me, yours, and um's as well, I don't really see any points of disagreement. We all seem to be riffing off of some aspect of a broader thesis that we're essentially in agreement about.

(um, Dungeness, do please correct me if I'm wrong in so concluding. I doubt it, I doubt very much that my Java-fueled lucidity would have led me astray, but if it has, and if either of you see anything to disagree with in any of my comments in this thread, then do point that out!)

Heh, it was nice jamming with you guys again. Been awhile since we did that, no?

[um]

@ AR

As I wrote before You deserve an sophisticated thinker .. playing chess with amateurs, is fun for one game but not for developping the skills.

AND ... I do NOT reffer to Dungeness, het is a skilled and knowledgeable writer

[SantMat64]

Um write: "All the topics you mention are in depth addressed and studied by a gentleman by the name of Mr. James. Bean. It should not be to difficult for you to have yourself informed as to what he has found and put on the Internet for all to read."

I suppose one could argue that, in the same way that Catholic apologists argue that it makes sense to have celibate priests, sacraments, doctrines on the Trinity, praying to saints, praying to the Virgin Mary, venerating icons, theories of limbo and purgatory, and many other things that were not a part of early Christianity.

One doesn't need James Bean to find the Sant mat doctrine of "all saints taught the same thing." He offers no new information, and is an apologists for the "all saints teach the same thing" theory that his guru no doubt told him to accept. It's a core teaching of all contemporary Sant mat gurus since Swamiji. What I'm saying is that this concept doesn't really hold together.

I'm not alone in thinking this, as there are scores of devotees of Namdev, Kabir, and other so-called Sant mat gurus who reject contemporary Sant mat as a deviation from what these early gurus taught. Let's be frank: contemporary Sant mat gurus like Kirpal Singh and Charan Singh taught umpteen things that sounded great, but on closer examination were historically incorrect.

My basic argument that contemporary Sant mat is a deviation from the early sant gurus is a simple one: If the teachings that Swamiji and his successors represent true Sant mat, then why aren't they found in the extant writings of earlier gurus like Kabir and Namdev? There's nothing in their writings about the guru being a Godman who escorts the jiva through numerous planes via light and sound with the passwords of the 5 names. The total absence of these supposedly vital aspects of Sant mat from the early gurus' teachings seems to me to strongly imply that what current Sant Mat gurus teach is fundamentally different from what early Sant Mat gurus taught.

The difference isn't just words and terms, but rather a fundamental difference in theology.

But of course, no contemporary Sant mat guru would admit this, nor would their followers, whatever their spiritual and intellectual pretentions. They would simply find reasons to claim "it's all the same." But neither would a Catholic admit that Matthew 16:18 isn't really proof that Jesus ordained the Catholic church as the only true and infallible church.

":It is YOUR life and it is up to you how you manage to find your way through the "rain forest, dessert, plains and mountains"of your culture."

The topic I raised doesn't really have anything to do with navigating human culture. To put it plainly, it has to do with the precise teachings that we have of the these gurus who say they hold the keys to our spiritual liberation.

[Appreciative Reader]

@ AR

As I wrote before You deserve an sophisticated thinker .. playing chess with amateurs, is fun for one game but not for developping the skills.

AND ... I do NOT reffer to Dungeness, het is a skilled and knowledgeable writer

Posted by: um | February 02, 2023 at 06:56 AM
----------------------------------------

Heh, no, um, please don't embarrass me by presenting my perfectly pedestrian abilities, through implication, as something more than they are!

As for this self-denigrating modesty of yours, see the latest article Brian's posted, and specifically the comment that I've just now happened to post in that thread. We've got this man Wolpert arriving at exactly the same insight that you were discussing yourself right here!

Cool, huh? Go on, then, stop the self-denigrating thing for just a minute, and swagger around a bit. You've earned the right to do that!

[um]

@SantMat 64

>>My basic argument that contemporary Sant mat is a deviation from the early sant gurus is a simple one: If the teachings that Swamiji and his successors represent true Sant mat, then why aren't they found in the extant writings of earlier gurus like Kabir and Namdev? <<

They are and for that very reason I refered to Mr. Bean as he has studied in deep and length the origin and history of all the topics you mentioned in your earlier message.

But .. if you evaluate his work as apologetic ...well ... in that case, there is very little to be said.

And .. I have nothing to say about his work beside that I got the impression that he for his own sake has tried to answer all the questions that were formulated by you.

You have made up your mind as to what is true and not and to whom you lend your ears as experts.

What are the teachings of all mystics in end about?!
Outside the consciousness needs the senses as an carrier.
People are searching for meaning and happiness, if possible lasting happiness
Due to the character of the universe, its change and durability it is not to be found in what the senses can put before the beholder.
They, say, based upon their personal experience, that such ever lasting happiness can be found by choosing another carrier for the consciousness, being sound and light.
It is all to be found in the sutra's of Patanjali.

Things, facts are what they are,
and can be described in many languages and many forms
but they are seldom what they look like
let alone how they are presented or made to be seen by people that have interest in doing so

[um]

@ Santmat 64

For a tree to be called a tree, it must have the characteristics of a tree, characteristics it shares with ALL other trees, irrespective their form.

That is true also for religions

also for :
- Yoga's
- spiritual schools
- meditation practices
- etc etc etc.
- sant mat

All what appears to be unique cannot but be as an unique VARIATION of the SAME.

[Dungeness]

@ AR / um [ Cool, huh? Go on, then, stop the self-denigrating thing for just a minute, and swagger around a bit. You've earned the right to do that! ]

I am in awe of the insights and elegant expression of ideas you've both
added to the blog. Self-denigration is useful only as a counter when
swagger eats away too much brain matter.

[Dungeness]

@ AR / um [ Cool, huh? Go on, then, stop the self-denigrating thing for just a minute, and swagger around a bit. You've earned the right to do that! ]

I am in awe of the insights and elegant expression of ideas you've both
added to the blog. Self-denigration is useful only as a counter when
swagger eats away too much brain matter.

[SantMat64]

Um wrote: "All what appears to be unique cannot but be as an unique VARIATION of the SAME."

There's no doubt in my mind that religions are always a product of social evolution. We can take any religion and see how it has progressed from what its founder specifically taught (including where he got his ideas), and how after he died later generations added this that and the other thing, ostensibly as an improvement to the original religion, but without changing its essence.

Whether this is true or not depends on the details. It doesn't work as a blanket statement. If it did, then it would follow that Charles Manson and St. Francis were just variations of the same.

I realize that contemporary Sant mat gurus have long argued that all religions are the same, but we all know that's far from an honest argument. Why? Because gurus like Kirpal and Charan also argued (or postured themselves, same thing) as being the only true gurus in a world of false, lesser gurus, and false, corrupted religions that had strayed from their origins (Sant mat, naturally, according to both Kirpal and Charan).

And so you can't have it both ways. You can't say all religions are the same, and also laud one contemporary Sant mat guru as being right, and also laud early sant mat gurus for being right when they didn't teach many things that these contemporary Sant mat gurus teach.

To put it more plainly, Sant mat gurus scold other religions for deviating from their pure origins, but these gurus ignore the many ways that their teachings differ from the early gurus. Significantly differ.

Difference is sometimes difference, and gurus are sometimes like other religious leaders: they'll say whatever to smooth over obvious differences.

[um]

@ Sant Mat 64

Do you think I am not aware of the differences between something that looks a tree but is not?!

I have not made a statement about any teaching or teacher, that are things for every individual to decide upon.

For me all practices of meditation are variations of the same ...IF ... they deserve that name.

I am not born to take notice of all there is to be known, let alone verify if they are true in the sense I think things to be true.

When we start a relationship, with a friend or a partner for live, we BELIEVE that is going to work otherwise we would not even begin at such an endeavor but it is just an believe.

Based upon believes we start almost all things in life as we can hardly ever know beforehand how it will work out.

Sant Mat like all other mystical schools cannot but be an believe to start with,... unless one had convincing inner experiences beforehand.

Whether or not we should embark on such an endeavor cannot be based upon outward variables to be found in teachings and teachers.

It is simple If you are not a chef yourself, the only basis you have is your opinion based upon like and dislike. That being the case I take my personal opinions as a guideline for further action. If the food in a given restaurant is not according my personal taste, i will never discuss the qualities of the staff let alone the chef. Nor Am I interested in the opinions of the columnists or writers of books on foods ... they are just an lame excuse for not accepting the personal responsibilities in life. So again, if it doesn't suit me I do not need to find fault with anybody or anything outside myself ... I just go away and find some other place to eat.

I was born In family, world, time etc life presents itself before me without asking me anything, I have no other option than to deal with what was offered .. even my own body and character .. I just try to survive and have little time to sit besides the road of life discussing what it is all about .. for me that is a waste of time.

[SantMat64]

@Um

"Do you think I am not aware of the differences between something that looks a tree but is not?!"
I have not made a statement about any teaching or teacher, that are things for every individual to decide upon."

Sure you have. You've said that all mystics teach the same thing.

"For me all practices of meditation are variations of the same ...IF ... they deserve that name."

Like I said, you say that all mystical teachings are essentially the same. But I note that like Sant Mat gurus, you qualify this by saying you're the judge of whether a tradition "deserves" legitimacy.

This is the double standard which I'm alluding to. You can't say that all mystical traditions and gurus are the same when they clearly differ.

You no doubt think I'm picking on your when I say that. But I'm not. I'm only interested in what Sant Mat gurus have said about the early gurus "teaching Sant Mat" when it's obvious, to me anyway, that the teachings of Swamiji and his successors mark a significant departure and deviation from the teachings of contemporary Sant Mat gurus.

"I am not born to take notice of all there is to be known, let alone verify if they are true in the sense I think things to be true."

We are all trying to verify the true from the false. Frankly it's tiresome to me when people claim to be above the human practice of discerning true from false and right from wrong, correct from incorrect, BS from honest talk.

"When we start a relationship, with a friend or a partner for live, we BELIEVE that is going to work otherwise we would not even begin at such an endeavor but it is just an believe."

And people believe lies every day. They often believe them on the strength of the social proof that comes with the lie. For example, someone billed as the Greatest Guru in the World tells a story of how what he teaches in the Original Religion that All Gurus have Taught. A certain # of people will believe this. It doesn't make it true. As we've seen, many Gurus have come who simply make things up about history. History deserves an honest telling. Dishonest history shouldn't be excuses because "we are all responsible for believing what we believe."

"Based upon believes we start almost all things in life as we can hardly ever know beforehand how it will work out."

But the Sant mat Gurus promise you that Sant mat will absolutely work out.

Surely you know this, or Have you not ever read any books about Sant mat?

"Sant Mat like all other mystical schools cannot but be an believe to start with,... unless one had convincing inner experiences beforehand."

Belief based on what? Belief based on what the Sant mat guru tells the person will be the fruits of the Sant mat Path, and the tacit assurance by the Guru that he himself KNOWS the Path is absolutely authentic and will deliver all to those who give their lives to it. The followers belief didn't just come out of nowhere -- he was made a solemn promise by the Sant mat guru about the Path.

The whole "personal responsibility" argument only goes so far. It's not the absolute you seem to be claiming it is. If it were, then we'd need no police, no courts, because everyone should just take personal responsibility for themselves, and if anything bad happens to them, well it's their fault. Obviously no one believes that. Likewise, if a Guru makes promises, he is complicit in responsibility for everyone who believes his promises.

"Whether or not we should embark on such an endeavor cannot be based upon outward variables to be found in teachings and teachers."

Joining and following Sant Mat is absolutely based on the promises of the Sant Mat guru. Yes, the people joining and following are making a decision, but to say the responsibility is 100% theirs and the guru bears no responsibility is a hollow argument.

"It is simple If you are not a chef yourself, the only basis you have is your opinion based upon like and dislike. That being the case I take my personal opinions as a guideline for further action. If the food in a given restaurant is not according my personal taste, i will never discuss the qualities of the staff let alone the chef. Nor Am I interested in the opinions of the columnists or writers of books on foods ... they are just an lame excuse for not accepting the personal responsibilities in life. So again, if it doesn't suit me I do not need to find fault with anybody or anything outside myself ... I just go away and find some other place to eat."

But here you are criticizing me for posing a question about Sant mat history. I am the Chef, as it were, and yet you're spending all this time rejecting my dishes.

To speak plainly If I may, I find it your attitude of "it's wrong to criticize my religion, the moral things is for you to shut up and go away" to be extremely tiresome. It's very common to every religious believer of every religion. I suspect that in the hearts of every enlightened true believer with that attitude is a knot of deep insecurity. The "shut up and go away!" is such a tell.

"I was born In family, world, time etc life presents itself before me without asking me anything, I have no other option than to deal with what was offered .. even my own body and character .. I just try to survive and have little time to sit besides the road of life discussing what it is all about .. for me that is a waste of time."

You're talking part in an argument about religion, and have been doing so here for over dozen years. You and I are not so different, as we both like to share our view with others.

[um]

@Sant Mat 64

Maybe others are willing and better suited the exchange views with you.

[um]

@ Sant Mat 64

For things to be different and at the same time the same ....

Just take two cups from you kitchen.
Whatever two cups you take, are never the same but they both have together the things that make you call them a cup.

It is a matter of string theory.

All cars are cars but not all cars are say FORD.

Maybe that helps to make you understand, not agree, my point of view.

All psychotherapies are also the same but not all are Freudian.

All meditation techniques are the same but they are not all the same as ZEN

Language does not allow us to describe the unique other than in the general.

When we say a cup is white we say that that item belongs to collection "CUP" and the collection "white" but it cannot describe that one particular item

Religion etc are words like house ... all houses share with oneanother being part of that concept HOUSE although all house may differ in architecture. The same is true for religion.

Maybe this helps

[SantMat64]

@ Um

"Maybe this helps"

You seem to interpret any critiques of Sant mat history as requests for spiritual counseling. Your views on life are I'm sure fine for you, but they nothing whatever to do with Sant mat history and the doctrinal evolution of the Sant mat religion.

[Appreciative Reader]

If civilization is not to break down utterly, and complete anarchy prevail, then we must have some absolutes that simply cannot be violated, no matter what. Like if you have a king that's a loon, but if you point at him and laugh in his face you'll be locked up; and rightly so. Like if you have a Pope that's a nutjob in a silly dress, a complete hypocrite of a freeloader, but if you voice that opinion aloud you'll be excommunicated, and in some places locked up. And rightly so.

Likewise this. Any criticism of Mr Bean is heretical, and indicative of a sick perverted mind that delights in subjugation of women and abuse of children.

Shame on you, old friend ---- if indeed that is you, lurking under that somewhat transparent Santmat64 mustache --- for this lapse in observance of the basic norms of decency and order.

*crosses himself, and invokes ancient holy mantras to clear the air of evil and blasphemy*

Ecce homo qui est faba.
Vale homo qui est faba

Amen

[Appreciative Reader]

Apologies if that mustache is real! Ignore this, and carry on, in that case.

[um]

@sant mat 64

Years ago, bein agitated for reasons of his own, stared at me and with a harsh demanding voice said: "why are you looking at me"?"
Surprised by his reaction I asked him: "How do you know?"

Success with your historical research

[Appreciative Reader]

Hm, no response to my last. Clearly not manjit, then.

Crossed wires, in that case. The mustache is real after all!

My bad, SM64, your posting style had led me to imagine you were a long-time commenter here, a friend, who hasn't posted here in a while, and who I thought had returned here. Imagined incorrectly, as it appears.

[um]

@ AR

As far as I understood, Manjit had by long left behind all academic interests for the history of Sant Mat and was solely occupied with digesting his own experiences .. besides .. his obvious annoyances with Gurinder and the "ignorant" blasting insights they didn't have overhere

[Appreciative Reader]

No no, um. Absolutely, the cream of his comments used to be about his remarkable experiences, that he'd recounted here, more than once at my request; but he's got a solid background in and knowledge of RSSB, and he'd often present excellent critiques both of RSSB as it is run, the surface thing, the administrative part of it as it were, as well as of its underlying theology.

Not saying I agreed with everything he said, not at all. We often disagreed, he and I. But regardless of whether his views and conclusions coincided with mine, his comments were usually very insightful, and deeply researched (or at any rate, if not directly researched, then borne of deep knowledge). And he had a great sense of humor, as well. Speaking for myself, it would have been a pleasure to have him back here.

But all of that is moot, because this is clearly not he.

[um]

@ AR

The last things I remember were his challenges towards people to take rather impressive doses of Psylocebine etc..
I hope he does well and has found some compassion and understanding for the ignorance of his companions that lacked the knowledge and experiences he had.... defeniding the mental home and herd ... hahahaha

[manjit]

Hi Um! I hope you are keeping well over there... :)

You wrote "The last things I remember were his challenges towards people to take rather impressive doses of Psylocebine etc.."

Well, I am not sure this summary description does justice to my "challenge", but it seems like spectacularly good advice to me nonetheless!

For instance....I am reminded of the general thrust of many of your posts here......that the "experience" of "mystics" cannot be had by everyone, and that you specifically haven't had them, that there is nothing one can do to have them, and hence people who share their experiences (like Spence?) are not creating good in the world because there is an unbridgeable gap between their experience and the reach of most people etc, or some such.

Which in turn reminds me of this "challenge" of mine.....take 7g+ of good quality dried psilocybin mushrooms in a quiet, dark environment, by oneself, and one will surely at least begin to understand whereof all "mystics" speak. It's as simple as that imo.

There is a saying, "shit or get off the pot". I cannot help but think of that sometimes when I read your absolute denials about the achievability of "mystical experiences" for the average person ;)

You wrote in reply to SantMat64's perceptive and insightful questioning "All the topics you mention are in depth addressed and studied by a gentleman by the name of Mr. James. Bean."

I am not sure you understood SantMat64's questions.

James Bean is a wonderful person and advocate for RS or "Sant Mat", and one of it's very best historians. However, SantMat64's questions are questioning the very basis of much of "Sant Mat's" claims and cosmology, and that surely is something you will never see James do. The history of "Sant Mat" is not the history of Nanak, Kabir, Namdev, let alone all mystics and mysticism. Sant Mat is a relatively new Indian religion, less than 200 years old. One can filter Nanak, Kabir and Namdev, and perhaps more bizarrely all mystical experiencers from all cultures and traditions, through the lens of "Sant Mat" and it's ideology, but I suggest that leaves one with a deeply impoverished world-view and reality. Perhaps even one where "escaping the world" is more important than love and compassion, which are merely seen as "exchanging iron chains for gold" or some such ideological rubbish!

Hi Appreciative Reader! Very long time no speak.....hope things are well! I don't post here anymore because, truth be told, I have absolutely no interest in RS, or the sceptical meanderings of our esteemed host. It would be somewhat disingenuous of me to post much. I came by at Xmas to post some greetings, but the content of both here and the RSS forum were less than appealing so I quickly lost interest in doing so. Anyway, hope all is well my friend :)

manjit

[um]

@ Manjit

Doing well, Thank you ...:-)

You are right not having so called inner experiences, neither "received" nor "DIY, homemade in one way or another, I have nothing to say about inner experiences only about how people deal with it in this world.

[Appreciative Reader]

Hey, manjit! Haha, great to have you back here again, even if not under the mustache-and-dark-glasses I’d (completely mistakenly) imagined you’d donned.

Just read your comment, that you’ve posted on the Open Thread, with pleasure. Classic manjit, that.

I’m a bit curious about what you describe as your apparent aversion to skepticism, or at any rate Brian’s flavor of it. I mean, closed-minded rejection of what one doesn’t know is futile, I agree; but then that isn’t really skepticism at all, though, is it. Should one want to stay away from skepticism, then the only other thing that might obtain is loose-jawed goggle-eyed imbecilic dogma: the relaying of it, and the swallowing wholesale of it. Can’t imagine why anyone would ever want that, assuming their intent is sincere and honest --- which I’ve not the slightest doubt yours is.

But hey, not to launch all over again into what might spiral off into yet another extended jamming session, eh? :--)

Do drop in when you can, manjit. Always a pleasure talking with you.