Eva Durant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>[Mike Hollinshead (? - attribution was dropped -) had written:
>> It is false to see spirituality as irrational. It is direct experience of
>> the natural world.
>>
>> It is not self-delusion, it is seeing and observing in a different way.
>>
>> It is also a rational response to the limits of science to describe the
>>world.
>>
>It is not consistent with reality, therefore it cannot be
>and observation of it, at most it is the observation of
>the human psyche. And you have to have self-delusion to deny reality
>and to accept imaginary "reality".
>
This is drifting off-topic, but an important point has to be made here.
The psyche _is_ reality. It is the only thing we really know for sure.
The external universe of physical objects and forces, while remarkably
testable and consistent, is nevertheless only known via inference from
the data we receive through the intermediary of our senses. To be true
to the scientific method of questioning all assumptions, and testing
all hypotheses, and striving to see the world only as it really is,
we must recognize this fundamental fact. Consciousness is prior to
all our knowledge of the mechanisms of the world, while being invisible
to all but incisive introspection. Like water to fishes, something so
fundamental and pervasive is necessarily of profound significance,
and at some point in the future will yield to our investigations,
revealing some unimaginable profound insights into the nature of reality,
while doubtless vindicating some of the insights wrested from it
by the dodgy methods of research employed by traditonal introspection
schools. Researchers in the orthodox western tradition of hard
science, who seek the truth by whatever means works, are by no means
blind to this aspect of the world - which does not mean that they
currently pursue it. The reason for the limited research into the
nature of consciousness is that there is currently a lack of effective
mechanisms for getting a handle on it. Like the Mulla Nasrudin searching
for his keys under the lampost half a block from his darkened doorstep where
he dropped them, we do our work in the areas where our methods produce
immediate results.
-Pete Vincent
(at the TRIUMF particle physics lab)
