Re: Re: Etheric Body and Energy (was Candida diet)

[Guest guest]

My responses below. Why am I doing this at this hour?

On 9/15/05, Idol <Idol@...> wrote:

> -

>

> >Well, because it's often neither religion nor philosophy. As much as

> >I despise this, since we're basically disputing terms, here's what the

> >first dictionary I found says about science:

> >

> >a) The observation, identification, description, experimental

> >investigation, and theoretical explanation of phenomena.

> > Such activities restricted to a class of natural phenomena.

> >..etc

>

> That's a very loose definition. A much better one can be found in the

> Columbia Encyclopedia.

Fair enough - we'll work with the other.

>

> http://www.bartleby.com/65/sc/science.html

>

> It begins:

>

> >>For many the term science refers to the organized body of knowledge

> >>concerning the physical world, both animate and inanimate, but a proper

> >>definition would also have to include the attitudes and methods through

> >>which this body of knowledge is formed; thus, a science is both a

> >>particular kind of activity and also the results of that activity.

1

> >>

> >>The Scientific Method

> >>The scientific method has evolved over many centuries and has now come to

> >>be described in terms of a well-recognized and well-defined series of

> >>steps. First, information, or data, is gathered by careful observation of

> >>the phenomenon being studied. On the basis of that information a

> >>preliminary generalization, or hypothesis, is formed, usually by

> >>inductive reasoning, and this in turn leads by deductive logic to a

> >>number of implications that may be tested by further observations and

> >>experiments (see induction; deduction). If the conclusions drawn from the

> >>original hypothesis successfully meet all these tests, the hypothesis

> >>becomes accepted as a scientific theory or law; if additional facts are

> >>in disagreement with the hypothesis, it may be modified or discarded in

> >>favor of a new hypothesis, which is then subjected to further tests. Even

> >>an accepted theory may eventually be overthrown if enough contradictory

> >>evidence is found, as in the case of Newtonian mechanics, which was shown

> >>after more than two centuries of acceptance to be an approximation valid

> >>only for speeds much less than that of light. 2

OK - this sounds simply like a rigorous systematization of anyone's

everyday way of dealing with the world. Any person thinking and

seeking to understand will follow these steps, consciously or not.

> >>Role of Measurement and Experiment

> >>All of the activities of the scientific method are characterized by a

> >>scientific attitude, which stresses rational impartiality. Measurement

> >>plays an important role, and when possible the scientist attempts to test

> >>his theories by carefully designed and controlled experiments that will

> >>yield quantitative rather than qualitative results. Theory and experiment

> >>work together in science, with experiments leading to new theories that

> >>in turn suggest further experiments. Although these methods and attitudes

> >>are generally shared by scientists, they do not provide a guaranteed

> >>means of scientific discovery; other factors, such as intuition,

> >>experience, good judgment, and sometimes luck, also contribute to new

> >>developments in science.

Now we're getting somewhere. Quantification, control, repeatability -

all of these things make perfect sense in a technological science.

Even a science that seeks " explanation " of physical phenomena.

I've said it before, though: there are primary questions not subject

to such modes of inquiry. Instrumentation, physical models,

mathematics. Will these help toward discovering who writes these

words and asks these questions, for instance? Without prattering on

about it, I'd argue that it/they never will. That there's a part of

the human that resides in the dark, the irrational, and that no

attempt to force it to light will succeed. This is not to say that it

can't be understood in some sense, but the mode of investigation will

be one of feeling, never of thinking.

Even the hard sciences (and, surprisingly, that definition above)

acknowledge the inadequacy of intellection. Theoretical physics has

come full circle in a way; questions in quantum mechanics, string

theory etc involve as much intuition and imagination as rational

thinking. Sure, the mechanism and the math evolve around that

" spark, " but it seems much rarer to find it take the opposite

direction. E.g. Kekulé dreaming of a Uroboros that dissolved into the

structure of benzene.

> We can speak loosely or metaphorically, as in " the sweet science of

> pugilism " or " he's got poker down to a science " , or we can speak

> rigorously, as above.

>

> >Its [yoga's] " theoretical explanation "

> >will stick in many craws by virtue of the fact that it resists a

> >reduced material explanation. But as Jung explained with psychology,

> >it enters realms where the terms of science aren't enough.

>

> I know next to nothing about yoga, but if it doesn't make testable

> predictions, it's not a science.

In the end I don't feel it necessary to labor the argument about

whether X or Y is a science or not. Who cares, really. The question

ends up being whether the rational is adequate to some of the

(arguably) most important tasks.

> I am also dismayed by the way so many people feel that scientific

> explanations of reality somehow " aren't enough " . You imply that when you

> talk of a reduced material explanation. The actual physical universe is

> much more enormous, majestic, complex, and awe-inspiring than any of the

> mythologies we've created -- even when they incorporate useful, functional

> components.

That's exactly the argument I'm making (my dismay being equal but

opposite, to borrow from, who, Newton maybe?). Imaginal realms, all

that's possible unbound by law or observability or reason -- you'd

really argue that the " actual physical universe " can hold a candle to

this? Or, more importantly, that it can offer answers? I can't feel

anything but utter disappointment at agglomerates of gases, movements

of particles, strong and weak forces, etc etc.

Now the gulf between views gets too big, I think.

> >So a discipline like Yoga has by necessity to abandon the strictly

> >rational, repeatable experiment and draw from the remaining (large)

> >fraction of human sentient experience. The human questions of primary

> >importance require this fraction if there are to be answers.

>

> IOW your worldview holds that there's a separate spiritual reality which is

> not amenable to scientific investigation, and that this is where a large

> fraction of human sentient experience transpires? Why?

Seperate, no. Otherwise, I think I've answered this (inadequately) above.

As to the why: from seeing glimpses of it. From attempting in

earnest to uncover who I am. From dream, meditation, study, " active

imagination, " as Jung called it. A science. One that will meet with

little respect, I'm sure, but one necessarily unconcerned with others'

judgements.

I haven't gone far, but far enough to be absolutely convinced that

intellection must fail -- it can't get to the bottom, it's too far

down.

> >The language was often

> >esoteric (they were no democrats - some truths are too great)

>

> I have to admit I'm beginning to wonder whether profitable discussion is

> possible between us when our philosophical orientations seem to be so

> radically different.

>

> >Last night I recalled electricity and magnetism. Polarized fields and

> >opposite charges, so familiar and real. Ancient concepts -

> >polarization, opposite faces of the divine, light and dark, over and

> >under (water). The strictly " scientific, " this model, can never

> >divorce itself from the humanity from which it sprang. A humanity

> >possessed of the will toward the uncertain, a negative capability

> >(term stolen from Keats) that does push us toward.

>

> Huh?

Yeah, I know. This is too much for email. I'm going to back off here.

> >So maybe the point is not just that science mostly existed before.

> >Maybe it's the extent to which they refused its pursuit that's

> >important. That the real questions would never be subject to it.

> >Leptons do not a Self discover. Or something.

>

> The charitable way for me to put this would be that you're losing me here.

Haha - fair enough. There was a joke in there somewhere I think, but

I'm not laughing either.

Sorry, I just don't have the words. Anyway, best maybe for both to be

free of the need to convince. I know I've been obtuse enough for one

evening.

PS, here's Herman Melville saying it better than I ever could:

When on that shivering winter's night, the Pequod thrust her

vindictive bows into the cold malicious waves, who should I see

standing at her helm but Bulkington! I looked with sympathetic awe and

fearfulness upon the man, who in mid-winter just landed from a four

years' dangerous voyage, could so unrestingly push off again for still

another tempestuous term. The land seemed scorching to his feet.

Wonderfullest things are ever the unmentionable; deep memories yield

no epitaphs; this six-inch chapter is the stoneless grave of

Bulkington. Let me only say that it fared with him as with the

storm-tossed ship, that miserably drives along the leeward land. The

port would fain give succor; the port is pitiful; in the port is

safety, comfort, hearthstone, supper, warm blankets, friends, all

that's kind to our mortalities. But in that gale, the port, the land,

is that ship's direst jeopardy; she must fly all hospitality; one

touch of land, though it but graze the keel, would make her shudder

through and through. With all her might she crowds all sail off shore;

in so doing, fights 'gainst the very winds that fain would blow her

homeward; seeks all the lashed sea's landlessness again; for refuge's

sake forlornly rushing into peril; her only friend her bitterest foe!

Know ye now, Bulkington? Glimpses do ye seem to see of that mortally

intolerable truth; that all deep, earnest thinking is but the intrepid

effort of the soul to keep the open independence of her sea; while the

wildest winds of heaven and earth conspire to cast her on the

treacherous, slavish shore?

But as in landlessness alone resides highest truth, shoreless,

indefinite as God- so better is it to perish in that howling infinite,

than be ingloriously dashed upon the lee, even if that were safety!

For worm-like, then, oh! who would craven crawl to land! Terrors of

the terrible! is all this agony so vain? Take heart, take heart, O

Bulkington! Bear thee grimly, demigod! Up from the spray of thy

ocean-perishing- straight up, leaps thy apotheosis!

(From Moby Dick, " The Lee Shore " chapter)

[Guest guest]

--- Idol <Idol@...> wrote:

>

> >Anyway, a study was done and

> >what was found was, when these people cut

> themselves,

> >endophins were released and I believe serotonin

> levels

> >rise. Well, there's the answer. This type of

> thing

> >may be what is occuring in accupuncture as well.

>

> Acupuncture, though, is supposed to be either

> painless or the next thing to

> it, whereas cutters definitely feel pain but kind of

> get off on it and get

> a sense of control over their lives and bodies by

> being able to cut

> themselves, so I'm not sure that this analogy holds

> water.

>

> >

> -

>

,

Another thought. While you say this analogy might not

hold water, my analogy was meant as a supposition.

This was because in both accupuncture and cutting,

endorphins are released. That's as far as I meant to

take it. Whether accupuncture does other things as

well, that's another subject for discussion.

jafa

>

__________________________________________________

[Guest guest]

On 9/16/05, Furbish <efurbish@...> wrote:

<snip>

> As to the why: from seeing glimpses of it. From attempting in

> earnest to uncover who I am. From dream, meditation, study, " active

> imagination, " as Jung called it. A science. One that will meet with

> little respect, I'm sure, but one necessarily unconcerned with others'

> judgements.

<snip>

A better way to put this might be that it's a science that requires no

permission. That each of us can be possessed of such a science (and

its observed phenomena) and find local truths that may never apply (or

be untrue!) outside*. This is of course my (studied) belief and

something that may seem absurd.

* This is why I had mentioned Keats' " negative capability " in a

previous note. To quote from his letter to <I forget whom> on 21 Dec.

1817:

" ...several things dove-tailed in my mind, and at once it struck me

what quality went to form a Man of Achievement, especially in

Literature, and which Shakespeare possessed so enormously - I mean

Negative Capability, that is, when a man is capable of being in

uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after

fact and reason-Coleridge, for instance, would let go by a fine

isolated verisimilitude caught from the Penetralium of mystery, from

being incapable of remaining content with half-knowledge. This pursued

through volumes would perhaps take us no further than this, that with

a great poet the sense of Beauty overcomes every other consideration,

or rather obliterates all consideration. "

He only applies this to literature, but people like Olson (and

many others, I'm sure) took it much farther. c.f., if interested at

all, the (wonderful and dense!) essay-poem " Proprioception " by Olson.

[Guest guest]

Sorry for the long backquote; just trying to give enough context.

On 9/16/05, downwardog7 <illneverbecool@...> wrote:

>

>

[, earlier]

> > >Its [yoga's] " theoretical explanation "

> > >will stick in many craws by virtue of the fact that it resists a

> > >reduced material explanation. But as Jung explained with psychology,

> > >it enters realms where the terms of science aren't enough.

[]

> In the end I don't feel it necessary to labor the argument about

> whether X or Y is a science or not. Who cares, really. The question

> ends up being whether the rational is adequate to some of the

> (arguably) most important tasks.

[]

> Yoga is a philosophy, a discipline for knowing the self. It was

> organized into a science by a pioneer named Patanjali.

>

> Here's the deal: every pose has a specific benefit, which creates a

> biochemical change in the body.

> B.

I should probably back off my rational/irrational stuff with respect

to Yoga. It's really more of a Jungian concept (though hinted at by

the alchemists).

[Guest guest]

> > $$$ Quack quack quack $$$. FTC.

> > FDA. You can fool some of the people ...

>

> I don't respond to nonsense.

>

> > Whoopdifunkingdoo. They ain't emitting light. Ah haaa haaa haaaa!

>

> You're going to feel awful silly for this statement when I provide the

> link to the article showing that fingers emit light, then.

Oh, this is just way too much fun!

My allotted hour of email time is up and I've still got 130 posts left to

read on this list alone. And I'm off to NLP class for the rest of the

weekend. More unscientific nonsense, eh?

Y'all have a great weekend.

Ron