Gaia: The Integral Pod - Chapel Perspicacious - Spiritual Atheism

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 20:05:58 GMT

couldnt agree with you more arthur.

ken's framework can really help to structure this kind of debate if everyone present is aware of it.

i don't think that dawskins actually is just a flatlander. he may not be integrally informed, but he has a powerful respect and appreciation for nature and evolution that we would recognize as spiritual - though he would take issue with the term, and i see his point...

the video talk and q&a here are very to the point and some of what he reads form his book is really beautiful. let's not forget that this is one of the greatest intellects alive today. i think in some ways it's a little unfair to judge dawkins and harris on not being integral. they are doing something else, very important for our times and it is up to us to transcend and include their work in a more integral way - which i am trying to do!

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://aqalicious.gaia.com — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 19:20:42 GMT

I haven't had much chance to read through this thread (or several others that have taken off lately - lots of good stuff to read through soon, wheeeeeeeee!) but I did watch the the debate that Julian linked to, so I'll just briefly give my initial impressions.

It was somewhat interesting to see Dawkins as a rational flatlander duking it out with religious people, but I felt quite disappointed - and not at all surprised - that the level of the debate was so low. I was hoping someone would bring up levels of spiritual/religious consciousness, but that was nowhere to be seen - all of religion/spirituality was lumped together and dismissed wholesale by Dawkins, and that went completely unrecognized and unchallenged. Another problem I had with it, which didn't come up for me until a while after I watched it, was that all the terms were undefined. What did people mean by "god," "spiritual," "faith" etc.? Everybody was talking about different things, it seemed to me. I feel more appreciation for Ken Wilber's point that when people have these kinds of debates, such terms are almost never clearly defined, and so you just get an incoherent mess.

Toward the end, Dawkins was challenged as having faith himself - based on a statement from his book, something like, "probably intelligent aliens exist which are vastly superior to humans, to the point where they would seem like gods to us," and he replied, "You've got to be kidding me!" I felt total sympathy for him in that moment, because it was a completely invalid criticism.

I would have loved it if someone had brought up points about the evolution of worldviews, situating rationality as part of an ongoing development; if terms had been defined more clearly; and if someone had made points about doing an actual investigation of consciousness and ultimate reality by such practices as prolonged meditation.

Anyway, those are my initial thoughts on watching the video. I look forward to reading through this thread, and maybe I'll have more to say on the subject at that time.

spirals,
arthur

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 21:26:51 GMT

c4

this is a wonderfully commentary.

i want to invite you to the pre/trans thread and my most recent post there.

i have a jumping off point form the limited and partial but accurate perspective of the new atheists that includes:

a) cognitive development
b) shadow work
c) inquiry-based spiritual practice

i think that this is a more comprehensive way of addresing what they are so unrealistically hoping to change through pure rational force.

Re: Spiritual Atheism

Sun, 07 Jan 2007 18:21:46 GMT

This is for anyone it pertains to.

I use the word regression in the sense that it is only relative within the context of the arising. My belief is that anyone who is directly attached to a dysfunction within a ‘we’ space are regressing in some way within their psyche until it’s authentically functional.

Examples:

If a persons words are causing resistance in another then that person is responsible for the dysfunction.

If a person is resisting what another person is saying and responding in an aggressive nature that person is responsible for the dysfunction.

People who observe and say nothing are also directly responsible to the dysfunction. Their passive nature can also help or hinder the resolve.

The responsibility of creating the most efficient resolve pertains equally to all perspectives involved. The most efficient resolve includes all of them.

Any dysfunction is a regressive dynamic within all who are attached to it (whether they’re conscious of it or not) and once healed the word regression becomes obsolete.

I am you, you are me… we are all it.

Seth

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 05:50:32 GMT

hey lauren - you posted this right after i got a lot more busy and so i hadnt responded.

ma rig pa (or Lol ) called me out on avoiding some of your challenges over on the pre/trans thread that i started after this one - so i responded there to what he thought was important.

i liked the attitude of your post, but you will see that the two main things Lol thought i was avoiding struck me actually as logical fallacies and not particularly good arguments.

i didn't say so right away, because i thought it would be more skillfuil to invite you to say more on the topic over there.

an invitation which i extend again, as i would love to hear some more voices actually offering their ideas about the differences between pre and trans rational spirituality.

i hope this finds you well
~julian

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://coolmel.gaia.com — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 05:48:24 GMT

Sam Harris also posted this article, 10 Myths and 10 Truths About Atheism, on RichardDawkins.Net. i posted a response on my blog. allow me to repost it here.

------

1) Atheists believe that life is meaningless.

"On the contrary, religious people often worry that life is meaningless and imagine that it can only be redeemed by the promise of eternal happiness beyond the grave."

Yes, this is true. But since Sam Harris is generalizing here, I'll say, forget "beyond the grave", most people find meaning and happiness with the promise of waking up tomorrow and being alive in the next few days, months, and years. And I would presume that that include Atheists as well. But according to some research, religious people are happier than non-religious people. Does that mean that religious people find more meaning in life than people who are non-religious?

3) Atheism is dogmatic.

"Jews, Christians and Muslims claim that their scriptures are so prescient of humanity's needs that they could only have been written under the direction of an omniscient deity. An atheist is simply a person who has considered this claim, read the books and found the claim to be ridiculous."

Yes. It's true. It's not fair to blame those crimes on Atheism. But what Sam Harris didn't mention was that Atheism also has qualities of fundamentalism. Why? Because just like religion, Atheism has levels of development. There are pre-conventional atheists, there are conventional atheists, and there are post-conventional atheists (Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins are post-conventional). Dogmatism (which is a quality of pre-conventional to conventional level) on any religion or idea or philosophy results from the levels of development of the individuals and society. In short, you can be highly religious and non-dogmatic at the same time, and you can be a highly reasonable Atheist but still dogmatic.

4) Atheists think everything in the universe arose by chance.

"Although we don't know precisely how the Earth's early chemistry begat biology, we know that the diversity and complexity we see in the living world is not a product of mere chance. Evolution is a combination of chance mutation and natural selection. Darwin arrived at the phrase "natural selection" by analogy to the "artificial selection" performed by breeders of livestock. In both cases, selection exerts a highly non-random effect on the development of any species."

In other words: Atheists think that everything in the universe arose by evolution? Now how many Atheists out there really understand the theory of evolution? Can they differentiate between cosmological evolution, biological evolution? How many Atheists out there just believe and have faith on what the highly scientific Atheists would say about evolution? I'm just asking because Sam Harris appears to be saying that Atheists fully understand evolution. So here's a question for Sam Harris, does consciousness evolve?

6) Atheists are arrogant.

"When scientists don't know something — like why the universe came into being or how the first self-replicating molecules formed — they admit it. Pretending to know things one doesn't know is a profound liability in science. And yet it is the life-blood of faith-based religion."

I agree. But, um, this still sounds very arrogant to me:

"I am optimistic that the physicists of our species will complete Einstein's dream and discover the final theory of everything before superior creatures, evolved on another world, make contact and tell us the answer. I am optimistic that, although the theory of everything will bring fundamental physics to a convincing closure, the enterprise of physics itself will continue to flourish, just as biology went on growing after Darwin solved its deep problem. I am optimistic that the two theories together will furnish a totally satisfying naturalistic explanation for the existence of the universe and everything that's in it including ourselves. And I am optimistic that this final scientific enlightenment will deal an overdue deathblow to religion and other juvenile superstitions."

-- Richard Dawkins

Well, don't take it from me. I don't know if Mr. Wilczek is an Atheist but he has a less arrogant view, IMHO.

"I'm optimistic that physics will not achieve a Theory of Everything.

"That might seem an odd thing to be optimistic about. Many of my colleagues in physics are inspired by the prospect of achieving a Theory of Everything. Some even claim that they've already got it.(Acknowledging, to be sure, that perhaps a few i's remain to be dotted or a few t's to be crossed.) My advice, dear colleagues: Be careful what you wish for. If you reflect for a moment on what the words actually mean, a Theory of Everything may not appear so attractive. It would imply that the world could no longer surprise us, and had no more to teach us."

-- Frank Wilczek

7) Atheists are closed to spiritual experience.

"There is nothing that prevents an atheist from experiencing love, ecstasy, rapture and awe; atheists can value these experiences and seek them regularly. What atheists don't tend to do is make unjustified (and unjustifiable) claims about the nature of reality on the basis of such experiences."

That's true. And it really sucks that most major religious institutions make stupid claims. Instead of coming up with theories and logical hypothesis, most religion stick to their dogmas instead of studying and recreating the spiritual experiences of their founders.

8) Atheists believe that there is nothing beyond human life and human understanding.

"From the atheist point of view, the world's religions utterly trivialize the real beauty and immensity of the universe. One doesn't have to accept anything on insufficient evidence to make such an observation."

Um, we're "programmed" by our experiences to accept things. We can't even differentiate between free will and destiny. But do we have to have sufficient evidence for everything to accept and enjoy it? Man, I have no sufficient evidence for my wet dreams. All I know was that I enjoyed it. My only evidence was my soiled boxer brief. My point? Our interior experiences (during waking, dreaming, and even dreamless sleep) are just as real even if we don't have sufficient evidence to show for them.

10) Atheism provides no basis for morality.

"We have made considerable moral progress over the years, and we didn't make this progress by reading the Bible or the Koran more closely. Both books condone the practice of slavery — and yet every civilized human being now recognizes that slavery is an abomination. Whatever is good in scripture — like the golden rule — can be valued for its ethical wisdom without our believing that it was handed down to us by the creator of the universe."

I agree. We don't need a mythic belief in God to be moral. But is it moral to poop on everyone else's religion? And what level of morality are we talking about here?

What arrogant Atheists seldom understand is that religion is a function of culture. Telling people to give up their religious beliefs is like telling them to sever their familial and social ties. Most religious people reject the Atheist arguments not because they are illogical or because people are stupid, but because their social ties are threatened--those ties are as strong, if not stronger, than their religious beliefs.

Championing Atheism in a monotheistic nation is a dirty job. But someone has to do it. Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and Daniel Dennett are doing that dirty job. I'm grateful to them for taking this debate out in the public arena. No matter how partial their beliefs are.

~C (for Christian Atheist)

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 05:42:54 GMT

seth i have barely any idea what you are talking about. i feel like we have hardly engaged. i am glad you feel like you are recieving gifts from the exchange though, such as it is.

be well
~julian

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 05:41:30 GMT

c4

yeah i have watched that conference and have it linked off my blog.

i love sam harris' clarity and intelligence.

i agree dawkins is all of those things. and i too agree with his position.

nice to hear from you
~julian

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://coolmel.gaia.com — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 05:21:19 GMT

hey Julian,

thanks for the video link. will check that out.

although i pretty much agree with Dawkin's scathing critique of religion, his approach is too flat and arrogant in championing science and demanding for evidence for everything thus collapsing the human quality for capacity of having "faith."

"My sense is that existentialism, postmodernism and, yes, atheism are almost necessary prerequistes for trans rational spirituality. At the very least they seem to me to be indicators of a certain threshold being crossed."

exactly!

case in point: even Sam Harris is open to the paranormal and mysticism and even digs meditation.

for more debates on Atheism, check out this link: Beyond Belief 2006 Conference

~C

Re: Spiritual Atheism

Sun, 07 Jan 2007 01:30:50 GMT

I’ve given you gift upon gift and I acknowledge the reciprocal. It’s all just a relative loop between me and you at this point.

If I’m called to jump back into dialog with you, I will.

Have a good one!

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 00:27:43 GMT

seth,

i trust you will check out my point by point response to lol viz some of what you appear to be agreeing on regarding what i was saying or not saying...he went into some depth cutting and pasting what he wanted me to respond to...

i am not sure how i would have given you that same damned if you do and damned if you don't feeling.

what do you mean?

~julian

Re: Spiritual Atheism

Sun, 07 Jan 2007 00:12:43 GMT

"well seth. i feel like i am little damned if i do and damned if i dont with you right now."

I feel the same way towards you, Julian.

I’ve never felt ‘we’ dynamics like the ones I’ve been feeling of late. I think we’re both in the ‘right’ place.

This all seems healthy to me.

Seth

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 20:29:42 GMT

well seth. i feel like i am little damned if i do and damned if i dont with you right now.

on the one hand the feedback is i am writing too much. on the other you are asking for specific case histories to back up my points.

i think i will just say that i have been working for some time clinically and researching/studying/practicing in this area and i feel fairly secure in the conclusions i am drawing. yes, alot of this is based in actual case histories. it sounds like maybe you are not familiar with some of the dynamics i am describing?

i am not sure if you are suggesting that i am just making this up? i am not.

also, forgive my ignorance on this point - but i have absolutely no idea what you mean by "rational regression." please explain.

seth i am very interested in hearing your position on the issues you sem to have taken great exception with me on.

i hope this finds you well.
~julian

Re: Spiritual Atheism

Sat, 06 Jan 2007 03:39:03 GMT

Julian,

Can I ask without causing defense, on some of the actual case studies you’ve experienced as a practitioner so I/we know this isn’t all about your own rational regression?

You can smudge the details of your story to maintain the oath between you and your patient/s.

I’m glad to see your dialog is more inclusive within the forum… still a little long though. :)

Seth

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 02:00:13 GMT

hey balder and lauren in particular, and everyone else too!

first i want to suggest two extraordinary books about truma and healing: waking the tiger by peter levine and most especially: the inner world of trauma by donald kalsched.

at the risk of sounding like a pompous ass :O) let's all read the pre/trans fallacy essay again as we get deeper into the new thread. what are the real world psychological implications of this observation? personally i think it gives us a powerful lens to look at the boomeritis spirituality of the green new age collective we are all a part of, willingly or not.

i think the points you two are bringing up begin to get at the heart of what the pre/trans thread i started will hopefully be - a discussion on how we make distinctions between pre and trans. i look forward to hearing more from you about these ideas specificallly that perhaps go a little deeper into exactly which states/beliefs and why you think should not reside in the prerational camp....

this is obviously a dense and complex conversation and not one that remains contained within the boundaries of theory. it has so much to do with our worldviews, emotions, and longing for meaning and grace.

my position is very simple so far.

all mythologies, metaphysics, magical claims (which we shall define here as anything outside the laws of physics), archetypal beings or symbolic constructs are:

a) taken literally at the prerational level as historic, present or yet to come, facts.
b) shot to pieces as completely non-existent at the rational level (no proof exists for ANY of them)
c) analysed and understood at the transrational level for their metaphoric value and as a beautiful (if partial and often flawed) sign of the extraordinary intuitive symbol generating power of the psyche in it's attempt to interact with the great unknowns of our existence.

the rational gaze, once uplevelled to the transrational, is not put aside. it is the foundation on which transrational interpretation and revelation/epiphany rests. transrational cognition has nno problem making very clear distinctions betwee what is literally real and what is symbolic - neither does it balk at evaluating different interpretations of symbolic material as deeper or more superficial.

easy example:

a) the virgin birth of jesus is believed to be literally true by mythic level prerational christians. this is a prerational belief - by definition.

b) at the rational level we recognise that this is simply an impossibility and is an idea common to several myths/religions that has no basis in fact and yet is held onto by prerational people as a jolly good reason to from time to time butcher and murder those who do not agree, be they religious adherents of another stripe or rational atheists.

c) at the transrational level we become engaged by the poetic wonder of mythology and while recognizing the origins of all mythology as resting in the human psyche, we start to see the sacredness in that mysterious process of meaning making, symbol generating, projecting into the mystery. at this level we being to become adept at interpreting the symbolic references in the mythic material and applying it to our lives and our internal process, without the need to "believe" in it literally (prerationally) and with all the sacredness intact and all the superstition surrendered. so the virgin birth might represent a spiritual kind of birth, a new life taht awakens in the heart and mind, a sense of altruism or compassion that springs forth from no ulterior motive and is therefore uncaused or virgin and mysterious in it's origin...

now i think these three categories are pretty straightforward and i see no need to equivocate about them.

you'll notice that the awe-inspiring relationship to the mystery is absolutely central and that i have ALL THE SPACE IN THE KOSMOS for it. :O)

at the same time i am entirely comfortable DIFFERENTIATING pre from trans and feel that this is important from a theoretical and experiential standpoint.

here's an example of why:

i work one on one with people all the time and i train people to do one on one bodywork/dialog process.

now let's say someone comes in and tells me that they saw jesus last night in their bedroom and he said the end of the world will happen tomorrow at 2 pm.

of course the first question is: have you taken any drugs recently. if not, i would do everything i could to kindly, gently diplomatically, but firmly insist that this person get a thorough psychiatric evaluation. it would be unethical in my opinion not to do so

now many spiritual healers and teachers i know, even licensed therapists would not have this response.

and this is one of the things that is dangerously wrong with the green relativist romanticism that plagues the alternative community.

or how about the person who comes in talking quite seriously about their spirit guides and the literal ghost that haunts them?

now obviously in both cases i am going to be very gentle and much more cautious than i would on a forum with peers. but what would happen for me internally is that i would get as grounded as i can and prepare to hold space for some really powerful and probably unconscious PSYCHOLOGICAL TRAUMA that is being telegraphed to me by this symbolic (but literalized) language.

now of course this is completely different from someone who comes in speaking of having difficulty integrating very expansive meditation experiences with their daily living or with the unfortunate persistence of their emotional triggers.

it is also different than someone coming in and saying that their heart is broken open to the suffering of the world and they have a mind-blowing epiphanic revelation of what jesus or the image of the bodhisattva represents on an archetypal/feeling level.

what i have found over the years is this:

the tendency to literalize (or concretize) spiritual symbols/material is 99% of the time a red flag of one or both of two things:

1) the person has tapped into a very regressed aspect of self that was really traumatized at some point or is operating from a magical defense against feeling some very painful emotions or dealing with intense trauma. (when we are children we have a prerational worldview)

2) the person has suffered a breakdown of the membrane between the conscious and the unconscious mind such that they are in the grips of a psychotic or semi-psychotic delusional state. (meister eckhart- the madman is drowning in the same waters the holy man swims in)

neither of these two states are fun, spiritually advanced, or levels of perception that are more clear, complex, beautiful or rich than ordinary rational, grounded awareness. though they represent a powerful opportunity for growth if handled well )and if we are lucky) they are actually decompensated, degraded states of being that psychology, spirituality and healing should properly attempt to resolve.

they should not be mistaken with transrational spiritual openings. i have no problem stating unequivocally that for example the paranoid schizophrenic is not experiencing access to a higher truth.

again part of what is so dangerous about the alternative community is that practitioners who do not know the difference between pre and trans will often encourage and fetishize fragmented and dissociated states in their client/students - which only makes them worse and everyone more confused....

so again i think it is about making good distinctions.

pathological. healthy. prerational. ratiional. transrational. accurate. delusional.

to me it is more harsh, more erroneous, more of an insult to the human spirit not to make these distinctions out of a kind of pious "respect" or vague allegiance to "possibility" (that to me just sounds like green relativism) thatn too make the distinctions and actually be of service to people in terms of identifying and resolving pathology, identifying and guiding stagewise healthy growth, identifying and processing issues that have derailed or distorted awareness in any of the lines or at any of the levels of growth.

the difference between pre and trans. pre is at odds with rationality. trans transcends yet includes and rests upon rationality.

all magic fantasy, all mythic literalism, all superstition, all unproven accounts of the laws of physics being eluded are by definition prerational.

this in no way excludes awe at the mystery.

it just puts that awe right back where it belongs: right back in the real world/universe that we live in and the extraordinarily improbable consciousness that is in relationship to it.

this in no way excludes any possibility that there is much to learn and that our understanding of reality will keep deepening.

this in no way is a tyrranical opression of anyone's right to think whatever they want.

it is an attempt to unpack the meaning of certain integral ideas that for me begin with wilber's roots in transpersonal psychology.

se on the next thread - i am excited to hear you flesh out your position on what is pre and trans and why!

:O)
peace and have a great weekend!
~julian

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 23:12:08 GMT

hey balder - i will not abandon this thread, but will come back when i have a chance to get into the responses you are pointing out....thanks for the reminder!

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 23:00:09 GMT

well mascha, i hear your concern, but i don't agree. in fact i am trying to be as discriminating as possible and the whole thrust is an attempt to differentiate (specifically not lump together) pre from trans. though i am sure we might disagree as to what goes in those categories - hence the new thread - which is precisely about exploring and backing up and making sense of those differences in opinion. i look forward to your input., as it sounds like you have some strong opinions of your own - even if they are strong opinions about not having strong opinions! :O)

yes i have strong ideas and opinions on these matters. i am very happy to have a forum to express them as part of the preparatory and polishing work i am doing on a book.

my apologies if i sound authoritative in a way that irks you, it may just be that i have made my mind up about a great deal of the things i am bringing up for discussion and as an opportunity to refine and clarify my arguments.

i am having a great time doing that and find it incredibly instructive - and having checked in with a few others have found that to my delight though feathers may get ruffled, most are on board and enjoying the ride - evenn if we don't agree on all things..

now, of course, you are free to object to this style, but i bow deeply to you and disagree with your charcterization of it.

what you might see me doing all the way through these four related threads is trying to clarify the meaning of certain technical terms and their application to spirituality. imo this is a good thing.

as part of the integral community i find myself fascinated in nailing down some of these terms that get thrown around kinda vaguely, oftentimes without seeing how they apply to our lives and times...for me the integral operating system, spiral dynamics and the whole process of philosophical inquiry and spiritual practice is all about this level of dialog. and, yes, it is still a dilog if one or more party's are really sure of certain positions they hold. and, no, one doesnt have to be open to being wrong about certain thing if one is willing to back those positions up and have serious (fun) debate about them....until that changes. :O)

i hope this finds you well and as commited to your form of inquiry as i am to mine.

respect
~julian

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://Mascha.gaia.com — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 21:13:38 GMT

Hello Julian, ah, you're being a good sport :-D) First off, I'm replying here only to keep some continuity. It gets a bit confusing if we have to repeat points in another thread. You know, I didn't even see your reply to my above post until the next day because this feature, where new replies show up in the middle of threads, is a novelty for me. Now I wonder - perhaps you did see my point after all? The following sentence may indicate an opening towards extending the inquiry far enough to also include the subject, thus questioning what, if anything, can be known as an objective reality separate from the perceiving subject. To illustrate, I've underlined the second half of a sentence where you have graciously modified your language so as to leave room for something you might acknowledge as scientifically valid: good ole Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle: "as such no-one knows what happens after death and it appears most likely that nothing at all happens based on the data." My answer to your questions a) and b) is yes. Though I don't keep much of what Wilber says in mind after I've read it, I'm so intrigued with my own authority, however faulty and bungling it may still be. Finally, what bothers me at times is what I view as the standard mix of "reddish-orange" dogmatism inherent in some of your repeated claims; the dismissive vengefulness and ridicule apparent in the tone; and the indiscriminate lumping together of pre- and trans-rational phenomena. This combination strikes me as posturing, assuming the position of an 'ultimate authority' in search of recruits, admirers, yea-sayers, followers in short - the exact same pitfall you're railing against. Why this bothers me is very clear: I want to get past that kind of mental positioning in myself. I long for an authenticity that doesn't need to fight & oppose. Yes, your honor, guilty as charged. Fact is, I only join conversations such as this anymore because Balder and Jane and - oh, you know who your are, I don't have to list all your names - because there are people here who can debunk a debunker without much of a personal charge. Love to all always, M

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://brucealderman.gaia.com — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 04:55:56 GMT

Julian, I know you've had a number of posts addressed to you in the past couple days and there's only so much time in a day to keep up with them, but I hope you find time to respond either to Lauren's recent post or my last post to you here.

I've been following the Pre/Trans thread and plan to contribute something there soon, as well.

Best wishes,

Balder

Re: Spiritual Atheism

http://julianwalkeryoga.gaia.com — Thu, 04 Jan 2007 21:04:04 GMT

again jane this is quite beautiful.

i would make athe wilberian distinction between peak experiences and how we interpret those experiences.

peak experiences are available to alll human beings regardless of age an/or cognitive or psychological level of development.

HOWEVER - how they interpret the peak experience once they are again in the steady state will be ENTIRLEY a reflection of their present level of development.

isnt this fascinating? it means that a similar altered state/spiritual opening can beexperienced by people at all three broad levels of development - but it will be interpreted as proof of preational beliefs, rational beliefs or transrational beliefs depending on the person!

it is important to bear in mind that emotionally convincing experiences don't necessarily imply absolute truth.

this leads nicely into the new thread on pre and trans...

see you there
~j

ever taken any drugs?