I rather accept the best...the closest to the truth we can get and work on that.
Dr. Susan Blackmore (parapsychology-neuroscience)
I would rather be unhappy than fool myself into thinking something exists that doesn't exist.
Dr. Robert Lawrence Kuhn (neuroscience-contemplative researcher-Closer to Truth interviewer)
I believe consciousness is a primary aspect of nature. Infact, it is what physical reality is made of but it isn't enough to say that. We have to bring that into the scientific world view.
Dr. Federico Faggin (physicist-informational technology-neuroscience-contemplative research)
We tend to,in our culture, privilege the objective and so the subjective is unreliable and mooshy and soft and we really don't want to attend to that...
Dr. Marilyn Schiltz (Anthropology)
...[as we explore polyphasic levels of culture and begin explaining Life through different levels of consciousness] we see that consciousness is extraodinarily plastic...there are states of consciousness available to us that we really didn't know about...that consciouiness can be cultivated and developed...
[The hard problem: What is the relationship between matter and consciousness?]
Consciousness has much greater power, much greater plasticity and certainly seems more independent than our contemporary scientific research.
Dr. Joe Walsh (neuroscience-psychiatry-contemplative research)
Ontological Evidence and the Study of Consciousness
Ontology, by the way, is the philopsphical study of being and of knowing how we exist. The question arises, is there multiple ways of knowing how we exist?
I have had a life long desire to merge spirituality with science. I believe both fields of thought and "knowing" can be one...I truly do. I love the idea of using empirical evidence to validate the existence of the unseen and the unknown. (Isn't that what science is all about anyway? At one point subatomic particles were unseen and unknown, were they not?)
I am drawn into spiritual teachings (consciousness teachings) that do that. I want science to prove what I know in my gut to be so real...as "real".
I am more interested in understanding conciousness. I want empirical support for this postulate I have that says, "Consciousness exists both within and outside the body. It is the constant that never changes...that is eternal, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. It is who we are!"
That feels like "core truth" to me. My mind, however, will not settle without question on any idea. It needs to explore it and gain evidence for it. So, I look into both the "spiritual" teachings (most scientists would refer to this as the study of the contemplative practices or "idealism") and the scientific research done on this.
From a Yogi's Perspective
Yoga, to me, is the perfect merger between these two fields of thought. As a yogi, I study and experiment with consciousness from an inner perspective...my own mind and through my own human behaviour. My focus is on taming the ripples of my mind, understanding suffering and how to get beyond it, so I can obtain and maintain a state of true peace for myself, and therefore so I can serve the world at a higher level. My biggest desire is to prove that "consciousness (therefore who we truly are at the deepest level) exists outside and within the body and that it isn't just a function of brain activity."
Siddhis or Psychic Phenomena
I practice yoga but have no real need to reach the point of yogic understanding where the siddhis become a part of my reality. Siddhis are what most of us would refer to as psychic phenomena: telepathy, psychokinesis, clairvoyance etc. Some would even add the belief in reincarnation in there...(well that is a given for many eastern faith beliefs and possibly even for Christianity as documentated prior to the selective ommission of gospels by the church....but it is said that some very enlightened yogis could transverse through life times. ) (Getting pretty woo-woo, huh?) It is said that yogis who reach true samadhi will attain these "gifts".
Though I personally have no desire for these things in my own life...if someone, somewhere could prove the reality of their possibility...the theory about consciousness being expansive and "outside" the body would be proven true, would it not? So therefore, I look into things like mediumship, psychic abilities, Out of Body Experiences, Near Death Experiences, Past Life Regression etc.
No Evidence of Paranormal Reality
I am fascinated with psychics and wonder if they could be the links that teach us about the reality of an independent consciousness that is eternal. I watch certain psychics or mediums and question their sincerity. Though I truly want to believe they are legitimate, I often find myself saying "I didn't get a feeling they were sincere. No...that didn't make sense. That seemed like cold reading and mentalism more so than actually providing a validating piece of information. And wouldn't spirit...if they were putting all that energy into coming through...be more specific than "Who is the person that starts with A.?"
I feel so sad when I evaluate the evidence of paranormal activity and an expansive consciousness and see it as doubtful. I want so desperately for others to prove the reality of the expansive nature of consciousness to me. Truth is, I don't even know how to define consciousness in words. So I go from extreme materialism ( no consciousness) to extreme idealism ( all is consciousness) in my seeking outside of me for answers.
We are asking what is it [consciousness], when we haven't even got a definition of the thing we are trying to find what it is....we are grappling around with a mystery. I would say that the extreme materialism and the extreme idealism are utterly doomed.
Susan Blackmore
There is so much research out there. There are scientific research teams trying to prove the same things. Much, much qualitative research has been collected with subjective findings that lean heavily in the favor of this theory but so little quantitative research has proven anything objectively. For example, people have collected thousands and thousands of NDE reports that show the same phenomena amongst the experiencers, but experiments have often failed in showing that people can read minds or remote see what is in a box miles away.
Yes, I am skeptical to a point but also truly, truly want to believe. What does that make me?
I think that open minded skepticism is an incredibly healthy attitude and I think there is a tremendous amount of nonsense that isn't true and so to be able to develop some kind of discrimination about what is true and what isn't [is important]
Dr. Marilyn Schiltz
I feel almost sick when researchers, with the same pure intention, state openly that they have failed to prove the paranormal nature of consciousness. Of course, I do know that just because"science" says it hasn't proven the existence of such and such...it doesn't mean that such and such isn't real. It just means that it has not yet been proven true using the scientific measurement tools of the day. And at the other end of the stick...just because spiritual teachers claim such and such as truth...doesn't mean it is true either.
Anyway, I want science to prove what yoga has been claiming for years. I listened to Dr. Susan Blackmore yesterday with great hope she would put my mind at ease. She didn't. She is an Oxford Grad with a PhD in parapsychology. She started her undergrad with the intention of studying psychology and physiology (after my own heart) which probably meant she was interested in studying neuroscience, I assume. She had a drug induced OBE in her freshman year and from then on became obsessed with the paranormal and with the idea that she would prove its reality. She wanted to prove that consciousness existed outside the body. She got her PhD in parapsychology and spent twenty years researching psychic and paranormal phenomenon. She announced in the video I watched that she then left the field of parapsychology because of great frustration that she wasn't able to prove anything. Infact, her research findings lead her to believe that there were no paranormal phenomena. She returned to neuroscience to explain her OBE and then spent the rest of the video proving how altered brain function was responsible for the phenomenon experienced by those having OBE's or NDE's. Sigh!
I love the science and see how it makes sense in explaining these things. At the same time, my gut is screaming, "No! No! There is so much more to it than that! Her findings are explaining only so much!"
...perhaps the ontology or the model of reality held isn't wrong...it is just incomplete...
Dr. MarilynSchiltz
Is that resistance to what she said based on a deep desire for there to be more or on some inner knowing? I don't know. I really don't.
Like Dr. Walsh, I want to prove the fundamentals of ancient wisdom tradition true using science.
The challenge is how to bring these two streams of knowledge [contemplative and neuroscience] together...any true quest for wisdom and for knowledge really has to be willing to look at all the information we have, all the data both from those who have spent years exploring internally and those who are exploring the brain, the body, physics...all the mechanistic information we now have...
...the answers you get depend on how you examine the question...
Dr. Joe Walsh
Just as there are parapsychologists switching gears and turning to neuroscience to explain consciousness, there are hard core scientific minds who have previously focused on neuroscientific explanations for such phenonemna turning to a certain degree of parapsychology to explain consciousness. Look at David Bohm, Dr. Joe Wlash (above), Dr. Eben Alexander, and Dr. Federico Faggin....to name a few. What does that imply?
So... I went on another knowledge quest today and opened up to Closer to Truth Podcasts. Man, where have they been all my life? lol
Hmm! I guess, I will keep looking. I need proof either way. Of course, that truth will come for all of us when the body dies, won't it? We will all find out then.
All is well!
Dr. Susan Blackmore/ The Weekend University ( November 12, 2019) The Science of Out of Body Experiences. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VoixOyTPwg
Closer toTruth/Dr. Susan Blackmore (2024?) Susan Blackmore-Why is ESP so Intriguing? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Jp_qYnD0P4
Closer to Truth/ Dr. Susan Blackmore (2024?) Susan Blackmore-Toward a Science of Consciousness. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTlxcrB7yvE
Closer to Truth-Marilyn Schiltz (2024?) Marilyn Schiltz- Why is ESP so Intriguing? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2F5Kt1Oy7I
Closer toTruth-Roger Walsh (2024) Why is Consciousness So Baffling? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2pNiawiV0k
Science and NonDuality (2017?) Science is Ready for Consciousness: Federico Faggin. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14Q_W6H_nZk
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