dmb said:
"This sort of scientist would need to be well trained and highly competent
just like a physicist or biomedical researcher but they'd be skilled in
their own area of study, of course."
Krimel asked:
What is that supposed to mean? Trained in what? What are they studying? What
would it accomplish? Where are the new bits of information to be evaluated?
How has the scientific enterprise been expanded through these techniques?
dmb says:
We're talking about mysticism. They would be trained to achieve, observe and
report on mystical experiences. I wasn't trying to be vague by describing in
in terms of the scientific method, which is a very specific model. And was
trying to be even more specific by describing the limits of the traditional
form of scientific empiricism, a.k.a. sensory empiricism because it excludes
such areas. This was what I was also getting at in talking about the dif
between reading the EEGs and actually having the experience. Flatland
excludes these interiors as merely subjective and so focuses on physical
objects, like brains. The purpose, of course, is to learn something further
about these states of consciousness. Except for the adaptations needed to
accommodate non-sensory experience, the scientific method is not altered.
The same basic rules apply. Its just that "observation" takes on a broader
meaning and in describing the observations we ought not expect the kind of
mathematical precision that we use to describe "objects". But I don't know
who said "the scientific enterprise has been expanded through these
techniques". At this point we're just talking the philosophy of science, not
describing a tradition that we can point to. This is just being born as we
speak. I mean, the scientific method already has a good track record as a
technique and the meditation techniques developed in the East are reliable
enough that various systems have a long history of success. The idea here,
is to get those kids together and see how a marriage works out.
Krimel said:
Titchener, in what is generally regarded as a distortion of Wundt's methods,
began a school of research in the United States that did something like you
suggest. Practitioners went through extensive training at recognizing and
categorizing their self observations. The results of their efforts were just
about zilch. It was a confused mass of nonsense.
dmb says:
Sounds like Cartesian phenomenology, not mysticism. I don't think that's
quite the right idea.
Krimel said:
But hope springs eternal. Perhaps a revitalization of interior analysis
could proceed. What would it tell us? Your psychonaught goes through his
training. He attains oneness with the universe. What vocabulary would be
adequate to convey the results of this "research"? What conclusions could be
drawn from such singular phenomena?
dmb says:
It looks like the vocabulary will come from the East, from the systems
they've already developed and where they already talk about such things all
the time. And the peers who will scrutinize his reports and who will try to
repeat the experience based on those reports will have to be trained in the
vocabulary. Finally, if we knew what conclusions could be drawn we wouldn't
need to experiement. The point is to learn some things about consciousness.
Some people think that's interesting and otherwise worth exploring.
Krimel said:
You persist in this "flatland' rubbish but have yet to say anything to
address my previous statements on this subject. Oh wait, there was a post
that demonstrated your total lack of knowledge of Abbott's book from which
Wilber lifted the title of his meaningless distortion.
dmb says:
Oh, so now you're admitting that I'm not just making it up, this problem
with flatland. And so what if I haven't read Abbott's book? I never said I
did. Its obvious that Wilber is only using the term as an analogy for his
criticism of scientific materialism. Do you really expect me to have read
Wilber's sources because I quote Wilber? Is that even possible? That is a
ridiculous standard. All I can do is try to understand the stuff I read and
to be coherent in making my assertions.
Krimel:
But to address your final question: Do this make sense? Seriously, Dave, not
even a little bit.
dmb says:
Well, I think that the solution makes no sense to you because you don't
understand the problem. You just deny it, call it meaningless, a subjective
fantasy. Ironically, this forum is dedicated to discussing a book that lays
out this problem in great detail and another that spells out a solution to
it. So I don't know what your problem is. I don't expect you've read
everything written by the people mentioned in Pirsig's books. In fact, you
should have a pretty clear idea of what the problem is with SOM (aka
flatland) just from reading Pirsig's first book. Does that make sense? A
little bit?
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