[P2P-F] Spirituality and the internet

Mon Sep 12 06:53:11 CEST 2011

(Sorry, This was first posted under the wrong topic.) My comments are 
interlinear...

On Sunday, September 11, 2011 12:24:54 AM UTC-5, Michel Bauwens wrote:
>
> Dear Richard,
>
> I've read your contributions here with great interest, and as you say, 
> we're really broad agreement 'in practice' despite us reacting differently 
> to some semantic 'hot button' words ...

I agree, Michel. I think you will find that "spirituality" is a hot button 
word to many (not all of course) in the 
atheist/agnostic/free-thought/skeptic/scientific community. Thats a pretty 
big swath of the "techies" out there, not to mention the general public.

> Feel free to use my words in your blog.

Thanks. I think it will add much needed scope and nuance to my post on 
spirituality.

> I'm about to go on a 20-day lecture tour, I will need to engage with this 
> much later now, however much the topic is of interest to me. THank you so 
> much for engaging with my ramblings and letting me see better where you are 
> coming from. This is the true purpose of dialogue.

Have a great trip!

> Last thing: every modality has positive and negative potential, and that 
> includes both magical and rational thinking, both of which can be misused, 
> especially when not used in a integral or integrative fashion. 
>
> Michel
>

Agreed. I don't see any of the modalities of consciousness as independent 
nor as "*Non-overlapping magisteria*<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-overlapping_magisteria>" 
as posited by Stephen Jay Gould<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Jay_Gould>. 
  "Magical thinking", religious experience, and many other modalities of 
consciousness are being investigated by cognitive neuroscience. I don't 
think about any modality of consciousness, including rational thought, the 
way I used to.

When you return to the group, Michel, I hope we can continue this 
discussion. Perhaps others will join in the meantime.

At this juncture, I want to offer an example of a partial secular 
re-appropriation of certain aspects of spirituality. 

This regards the so-called mystical, transcendental, or cosmic experiences 
(often framed as religious experiences).

Such experiences (indistinguishable from "real" experiences)  can be induced 
by drugs, electrical and trans-cranial-magnetic stimulation of the brain, 
epileptic seizure, oxygen deprivation, brain injury, psychosis, hypnosis, 
chanting, rhythmic movement, and many other means. I have explored many of 
these means myself.

All this strongly suggests that even the "real" mystical experience might be 
something generated internally within the brain, or at least that it would 
be impossible to distinguish a "real" mystical experience from an artificial 
one* without some reliable method for doing so*. 

One of my mentors, John C. Lilly<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_C._Lilly>, 
(perhaps known best for his efforts to communicate with dolphins) in 
speaking about mystical and transcendental experiences, suggested three 
hypotheses concerning them. I recall his simple chalk diagram in my mind's 
eye. Paraphrasing Lilly, the *contained mind* hypothesis says all forms of 
consciousness, subjective experience, and "knowing" are generated entirely 
by and within the brain, even if most of the details are still a mystery. 
This hypothesis tends to be favored by many scientists, especially 
neuroscientists. The *uncontained mind* hypothesis (shared by many mystics, 
etc.) says that the individual mind, at a deep level not usually obvious to 
our conscious mind, forms a continuous fabric with other minds and/or with 
the universe itself. The *leaky mind* hypothesis, to which Lilly and I 
subscribe, says that for the most part, most of the time, the contained mind 
hypothesis is true, but that occasionally under special circumstances, or 
more often in very subtle and usually imperceptible ways, our minds interact 
with the cosmos outside of the channel of our normal senses. The leaky mind 
leaves open the question of whether we are dealing only with unknown senses 
or with extra-cranial intelligences in such cases.

I have previously proposed a hypothesis that DNA or other structures in a 
cell may act like an antenna and allow an organism to respond to signals in 
various kinds of natural and artificial radiation. There is much evidence 
that even non-ionizing radiation can cause responses in cells. Many 
single-celled organisms, often without any known mechanism, can respond to 
light, heat, magnetic fields, and radio frequency radiation. Natural 
radiation is not generally assumed to contain a "signal" as such, but even 
simple amplitude variations can carry information.  Signals could come from 
many sources, even off-world sources. Perhaps there is literally a cosmic "music 
of the spheres <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_the_spheres>" that our 
cells can "hear". In this way, neurons or networks of neurons may be 
"connected" to extra-cranial sources of information that may somehow get 
passed up to the conscious mind and there manipulated in some form.

There is also the possibility that DNA carries *embedded* information that 
is of a relatively cosmic or transcendental nature. An example might be 
information about the "essence" or "true nature" of the biosphere or other 
life forms with whom we share some genetic history. There may be ways that 
such information can be transmitted under certain conditions into the 
conscious mind where it may be greatly augmented or elaborated upon by the 
imagination.

Science is very limited in the extent to which it can explore such 
hypotheses today, but these are the kinds of hypotheses, expressed in the 
kinds of language, that science will probably eventually be able to prove or 
disprove.  

How do these hypotheses bear on magical thinking, etc? It does not 
invalidate magical thinking or mystical experience, but it may bear on the 
understanding, interpretation, and utility of such experience, if only to 
shake some of our confidence in our past and present assumptions about it. A 
good intro to the intersection of spirituality and neuroscience is the work 
of Sam Harris <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Harris_%28author%29>. 
(disclaimer: I do not adhere to his warmongering positions.)

Neuroscience should give us pause to review all our assumptions about the 
mind, including what we consider to be rational thought. A very good 
introduction to this topic is the work of Dan Ariely<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Ariely>
.

PR
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