Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id MAA02301 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 18 Sep 2000 12:22:09 +0100 Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3101745A23@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: solipsistic view on memetics Date: Mon, 18 Sep 2000 12:19:46 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Thanks for your responses Robin.
>Please explain why you think we're using different definitions of
>experience. (Regarding "you have to just accept and believe", see
below.)
>Wrong. It's experience in general that is valued, not particular
>xperiences.
>I didn't say I couldn't define it. I'm just stubornly refusing to
do a
>Wade, and resort to the dictionary, because I prefer to call you on
your
>smokescreen attempt. I repeat, I do not believe any of our
difficulties
>stem from "experience". If you still disagree, please explain.
So you've spent twenty years researching and investigating this approach,
and yet you can't define experience? I'll come back to this in a moment.
>It is not "secret knowledge". It is wide open to anyone with
sufficient
>interest to get off their backside and do a little research. But
if you'd
>rather sit back and continue to recite your
atheist/skeptic/rationalist
>mantras, be my guest.
And what kind of research would you recommend? The rationalist approach of
testing hypotheses?
>Do you have any evidence that breatharianism stems from
breath-centred
>meditation? Or are you just throwing mud in the hope that some
will stick?
The whole point of breatharians is that they believe that breath-centred
meditation is all you need to survive; that you don't need to eat or drink.
In other words the central belief of the entire movement is based on the
power of breath-centred meditation.
>What I'm questioning there is the meaning of "evaluating
experiences".
>Evaluation of interpretations is something else altogether. You
seem to
>doing just what you accused me of: confusing experience with
interpretation.
>I repeat, yet again, mysticism is not about interpretation, but
about
>valuing and enhancing experience.
We're clearly going to go round in circles here, since I think it's you who
are confusing experience with interpretation. My evidence for that is what
you claimed is the result of breath-centred meditation. Also if you are
going to evaluate experiences, then you do so from within an evaluative
framework- whether you consciously are aware of it or not. It is
unavoidable.
>"Elevating experience" is a principle, to enhance experience is to
put
>that principle into practice.
>Not really, no. Equanimity is advised, and the chasing of
sensation
>deprecated.
'advised' and 'deprecated'- who by?
>There is no judgement of experiences -- all are allowed to come and
go
>"without let or hindrance"? As to the practices, the short answer
is
>simply "trial and error".
Trail and error is a method, and using any method has to have a purpose,
some goal beind it which shapes the way that method is used. The selection
of method is based upon its perceived viabiity for achieving success.
My point here is that nothing of what you are saying is somehow innate, and
value-free. Consciously or otherwise, you are judging and evaluating
experiences and the methods by which those experiences are achieved, and one
of the judgements you are making is inherently false. And that false
assumption is that because you are seeking what you define as
non-communicable 'knowledge' you must be gaining knowledge that is
value-free, rather than communicable knowledge which is value-laden.
>I don't think that one was. I cited insights into the nature of
>self/other boundaries, etc.
Ok, let's leave that one- any others?
> > Let me explain my position:-
>
> <big snip>
>
>
> (I see myself as postmodernist)
Try reading Sokal & Bricmont's 'Intellectual Impostures' for a rather
successful slaughtering of post-modernist thinkers.
It's quite interesting that much of your education and work has been in
areas that have traditionally been very closely tied to rationalist
approaches, and yet you've veered away from that to a degree, whereas my
educational and working background has been in disciplines far less
rationalist (in some ways anyway) and I've moved increasingly towards such
an approach.
>Why don't you just accept that the word has a much more specific
meaning,
>about which you previously had not clue #1, and that you should do
some
>reading on it, before you spout off any more about it? Is that too
much
>to ask?
Because, you have entirely failed to offer a satisfactory explanation of
that "specific meaning" and benefits of mysticism as an alternative approach
to rationalism. You brought the subject up, and my comments and questions
have been about trying to get you to convince me that this position is
valid. So far you have a) refused to define key terms calling such
questions 'smokescreens', b) have contested a range of definitions offered
by Wade without offering any coherent alternative (I certainly recognised
those definitions as representing my understanding of the term), and c)
failed to offer more than one, contested, example of mysticism's benefits
over rationalism.
If you want me to shut up, you're going to have to improve your argument.
I'd have thought that after 20 years in the field you could do better than
what you've done so far. Much of what you've presented so far is accusatory
comments, not evidenced argument. Convince me and I'll shut up.
Vincent
> --
> Robin Faichney
>
> ===============================================================
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
> For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Sep 18 2000 - 12:23:25 BST