
Can Transcendence Be Taught? - Vigier
http://www.chronicle.com/article/Can-Transcendence-Be-Taught-/237994
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javajosh
My uncle passed away 2 years ago, and he was an erudite man, having read (and
memorized) countless books. He never used any of his vast knowledge in his
work, and his (nuclear) family "put up" with his penchant for reading and
accumulating a vast library. He did not, to my knowledge, discuss science,
philosophy, or religion with his wife or kids, all of whom are eminently
practical people, dutifully hustling real-estate agents who don't read for
pleasure.

We spoke at length while he was in the hospital, many times. He faced his
death with serenity. His primary concern was for his wife's well-being, who he
knew would miss him terribly.

All of his knowledge died with him, which I found troubling, but he did not.

~~~
solipsism
I find the fact that you were troubled troubling. Sounds like your uncle read
for fun. Sounds like he did it a lot. This is good. Lots of people suffer
their entire lives.

But you're troubled you couldn't squeeze the concentrated knowledge out of him
like an orange?

You'll have to read all the books yourself i guess.

~~~
javajosh
I'm not sure why I can't flag this post, but if I could I would.

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taneq
I find it interesting how they conflate "finding comfort" with "finding
truth." In my experience, in the existential sense, the latter is the
antithesis of the former.

~~~
mcguire
One reply: The truth is the truth. If you don't find it comfortable, you are
the one who needs to change.

~~~
Koshkin
Truth is almost never comfortable. And, generally, _ignorance is bliss_ (which
is true, however uncomfortable that may be).

~~~
notduncansmith
You're talking about whether the truth "is comfortable" or not; the truth,
fact, the history of the motion of particles through space and time, simply
is. The notion of "comfortable" is a filter that exists in the mind, through
which you can choose to perceive the truth.

~~~
Koshkin
This looks reductionist and therefore most likely is false. Feeling
uncomfortable has some objectivity to it, and no amount of "transcendence" can
change that which is objective.

I was talking about less fundamental truths, such as the realization that
one's parents are idiots, life is being wasted, every minute a person is
getting murdered somewhere in a most horrifying way, girlfriend is getting
ugly, etc. Try to get comfortable with that...

~~~
notduncansmith
Well, the feeling of mental discomfort definitely is a physical phenomenon at
the neuron level. However, because we have the ability to reflect on our
feelings as we feel them, we have the ability to consider them as one signal
out of many. The feeling of happiness or sadness or discomfort or fear is a
single signal; others include situational awareness, memories, goals, etc (not
describing a strict ontology here).

My impression of "transcendence" is the ability to consciously take these
signals as input, rather than subconsciously by following feelings. The
prerequisite to this is a deep understanding of oneself, the different signals
one can perceive, and what real-world phenomena correspond to those signals
(vs what the signals themselves say).

There's also a lot of anecdotal evidence that various psychedelics aid in this
process, with one theory being that because they often delay or otherwise
distort the link between your perception and reality, you have to think
logically about how to compensate for the difference between your perception
and what you consciously know to be reality. Throw the especially pensive
nature induced by some variants of marijuana or LSD into the mix, and you've
got a recipe for enlightenment.

By the way, if that sounds plausible, consider that the euphoria associated
with consuming those substances may be an evolutionary adaptation. Seeing
really is believing; humans have a hard time properly attributing weight to
factors they can't directly perceive (even our own suffering isn't enough to
motivate us if it's far enough in the future to be abstract to our current
selves). As a result, most people don't acquire the ability to consciously
perceive their input signals (and compensate for them) until the difference
between perception and reality is made literally visible, e.g. by
psychedelics.

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Animats
Why we are here? It's an accident of evolution.

Why we live only to suffer and die? Because otherwise old animals would
consume resources needed for growth, and thus there's evolutionary pressure
for limited lifespans.

It's not that those are hard questions. It's that people don't like the
answers.

Deal with it.

~~~
hueving
Limited lifespans have nothing to do with resource constraints. There is just
nothing to select for longer lifespans beyond the time it takes to reproduce.

~~~
jomamaxx
"There is just nothing to select for longer lifespans beyond the time it takes
to reproduce."

Definitely there is. If humans spent a long time learning, and were more
productive and fruitful in their later years, developing more intelligent
systems, they would theoretically out-compete a civilization that wasn't able
to develop such advanced skills and learning - especially related to passing
on information.

The missing issue not obvious in genes is the amount of cultural information
and learning passed on. A genetically 'superior' race of beings (faster,
smarter, more disease resistant) would surely be 'beaten' by a group of lesser
beings who were able to cooperate, learn, cognize, master tools, pass on
wisdom etc...

~~~
rubberstamp
This is the same conclusion I came to as well thinking about stuff. There are
a lot of genes that we don't know what it does. Unless evolutionary feature
development is throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks, there
definitely is information (not just physical description of how features
should be and how it should function, but many valuable data as well) passing
from parents to siblings via genes. I came across two some orphaned puppies.
They grew up and knew how to do certain stuff and I didn't see anyone teaching
them those stuff.

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M_Grey
There are a lot of assumptions worked into that, with one of the biggest
being, "Who needs transcendence? We suspect humans do."

~~~
jasonkostempski
I was thinking more like is transcendence even an actual thing? The Google
definition is "existence or experience beyond the normal or physical level."
Which in turn needs a definition for "normal" and "physical". Beyond "normal"
I can maybe buy into, but beyond "physical", I'm doubting anyone has a
convincing example of.

~~~
catawbasam
I had an experience which I found, and still find, utterly convincing. But if
I tried to describe it to you, you probably wouldn't be at all swayed.

William James writes about this in 'The Varieties of Religious Experience'.

~~~
M_Grey
The same could have been said for Einstein, but the trick was that he could
prove it math, and observations. If what you found was real, do you think it
could ever find some real expression that's testable? If not, maybe it only
felt real, which would make sense if it happened entirely within the realm of
your own senses.

~~~
orasis
What if your assumption that things happen outside "the realm of your own
senses" is false?

The color blue does not exist outside the realm of our senses. Neither does
the concept of a "table".

~~~
M_Grey
And yet you could establish criteria for both. Blue is defined by specific
wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation, and a table is an object. Both
provide testable predictions, "Light of this wavelength will appear 'blue',
and I can bang my shin against this table..."

People who have never met can report having the same experiences with both
"Blue" and "Table".

~~~
orasis
It's no different with private subjective experience - it's just that most
people lack precise language to describe "transcendent" experiences.

For example, there are mind states called "jhana" that can be reliably
accessed by experienced meditators. The language used to describe them is
along the lines of "as piti subsides and suka becomes more prevalent, you are
entering the 2nd jhana".

We even have language to describe what it's like to experience without an
experiencer:

In the seeing, only the seen. In the thinking, only the thought...

~~~
M_Grey
None of what you're saying addresses any of what I said, you've just
sidestepped it with claims of inexpressibility as well as untestability.

~~~
orasis
I agree with what you're saying about the scientific method being a useful
tool for discovering repeatable cause and effect.

I'm simply trying (and failing) to offer a perspective that possibly nothing
occurs outside of personal sense experience. The experience of blue does not
exist within the wavelengths of light, it exists as consciousness. A rock does
not experience blue when those wavelengths hit it.

If it is true that we only exist as our senses and consciousness then a
transcendent spiritual experience is as real as anything else.

If I haven't convinced you, then I am merely poor at describing what I'm
getting at and for that I apologize.

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drewmassey
As possibly the only musicologist on this site, mad props for the
chronicle.com link. Also, dying is pretty inconvenient, isn't it?

------
devereaux
TLDR: You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your
eternity in each moment -- Thoreau

~~~
pmoriarty
I don't think that's a fair summary. It's like summarizing _The Hitchhiker 's
Guide to the Galaxy_ as "42".

This article touches on so many points and looks at so many approaches to the
issues it raises that it just can't be adequately summarized in a single
sentence or even a paragraph.

Some points that it touches on:

\- Why are we here?

\- Is there any meaning to life, death or suffering?

\- Can science, academia, philosophy, or theology offer satisfying answers to
these questions?

\- "Are we teaching students everything without teaching them anything
regarding the big questions that matter most?"

and many others.

It's a deep article, worthy of careful reading and consideration.

~~~
Retra
You'd find the same things with careful reading and consideration for a
shallow article too.

~~~
pmoriarty
I really don't understand what you mean. Are you saying this article is
shallow?

~~~
Retra
No, I'm saying "careful thought and consideration" are sources of depth
regardless of what kind of article you apply them to.

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Myrth
If you're interested in the topic, highly recommend Peter Watts' "False
blindness" and "Echopraxia"

