John B,
<<Thanks for the link to the critiques of Wilber, Glenn.
You're welcome.
I'm happy to see that you agree with some of the criticisms.
Personally, I think I agree with all the criticisms in these
links. I'll try to state my case below where we disagree.
<< Other criticisms, such as the bald assumption that all mystic experience is
<< the result of epilepsy or other brain dysfunction, must be considered a
<< possibility, but would require much more substantiation than the critics
<< provide, before I would give them much credence.
To be clear, Stinson is not talking about the run-of-the-mill mystic
experience, like the guy who looks at his hand with wonder after a heart
attack, or the feeling of awe you might experience looking out over the
ocean or a mountain vista, but the full-blown variety.
If you do a search for "mystical experience" in your favorite search engine
you'll find a number of people who have had the "Phaedrus experience",
but unlike Pirsig, are willing to share the nitty-gritty details of the
experiences they've had. For starters, try
http://home.earthlink.net/~sallyclay/z.book/Reins.html for a gripping
account, beautifully told.
You'll find that many of these people believe these experiences
are a gift and have attributed spiritual significance to
them even as they also readily acknowledge them as a curse.
One reason they do this is because the alternative explanation
says they are mentally ill and diagnosed as epileptic, manic/depressive,
schizophrenic, or whatever. More than this, the experiences they
have overwhelm all their normal senses as well as their psychic
feelings, making it seem that they are genuinely observing an
alternative objective reality. To the afflicted, it's powerful stuff,
and convincing them otherwise is no easy task. You can see that
Pirsig is in this kind of denial, too.
Manic/depressives, schizophrenics, epileptics, and people having
traumatic experiences (near death) or who take psychoactive drugs
have all reported so-called mystical experiences. Meditation induces
them as well and enhances the experiences further in people predisposed
to them. There's an interesting article about the drug ketamine and
how it induces the near death experience: http://leda.lycaeum.org/Documents/Using_Ketamine_to_Induce_the_Near-Death_Experience.9260.shtml
I've read cases where people are changed, and it seems permanently.
Christian mystic Bernadette Roberts reports looking inward
while meditating and going to her silent place. Then one day, after she
finished meditating, the silence remained and never left. I read another
report of an epileptic who after meditating intensely over a ten year period
had his vision permanently altered as a result. He sees everything with a
glimmering clarity in his entire field of vision and foreground and
background are flipped so that objects are not the first thing he notices.
This should fascinate you, John. A permanent Gestalt shift!
STINSON:
In my case, I was diagnosed with temporal lobe epilepsy as a youth and
years later delusively believed myself to be making "spiritual" and
meditative "progress" when all my weird "mystical" experiences started (as
a result of intensive and protracted meditation practice). To this very
day, these experiences are always with me, in varying degrees and forms,
and never cease. I do wish, however, that they would stop, forever, and
never plague me again.
Now I think these people have either transcended or damaged their brains
irrevocably. Which seems more likely?
<< One of the most significant aspects of much of the criticism is the tone of
<< overt hostility it displays. I am always suspicious of those who feel so
<< threatened by another's ideas that they feel it necessary to vilify or
<< patronise the person. In contrast, while Wilber argues with many of his
<< critics, he usually maintains an integrity in his disagreements which I
<< greatly admire.
Wilber has a professional reputation to worry about. He argues
primarily with other professionals who also have reputations to
protect. They often review each other's books. This kind of
environment necessitates a respectful decorum, even when
fundamental disagreements are aired. But by these standards
Wilber has been known to be harsh (he has quite an ego), and has
caused enough rifts among others in the transpersonal movement
that he know longer calls himself one of them.
Clay Stinson is probably not a professional writer. What
does he care how he sounds, if that's how he feels? He'll never
meet Wilber. Wilber will never respond to his open letter. But I
know what you mean, John, about the tone of hostility and the
suspicion it arouses. I usually feel the same way as you. But this
time I got the feeling he was expressing righteous indignation,
and for this I can forgive the hostility.
<< The criticisms you have indicated, Glenn, are a mixed bunch, I think, but
<< some are in my view quite potent, and will certainly temper my enthusiasm
<< for Wilber, without causing me to consign him to the dust bin. He is still
<< the best big picture cartographer of the human situation I know.
Well thanks for taking the time to read them. I offered them with
mostly you in mind. I'm not trying to dissuade you from taking up
meditation. The vast majority of people who do it suffer no ill
effects and some at least claim it relaxes or invigorates them,
as I'm sure you know.
Glenn
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