Everyday insanity

Yesterday I learned that there may be an effort by members of my condominium association to remove a tree that stands directly outside my unit. When I woke up today, the first thing I found myself thinking about was the tree. The more I thought about it, the more exercised I became. I could not stand the thought of losing the tree. I spent most of the day dwelling on the problem, envisioning various strategies to protect the tree, and considering fallback positions if the tree should in fact come down. I put in a work order to have some groundcover cleared away by the landscaping crew so as to determine whether the root system of the tree poses any threat to the sidewalk or nearby driveway. I called a tree surgeon to arrange an appointment so I could get an expert opinion on the health of the tree and whether it ought to be removed. I was so distracted by this problem that I found it difficult to work, even though I'm overburdened with projects at the moment and have several deadlines I'm trying to meet.

And then at some point in the evening, a little ray of clarity broke into the turbulence of my thoughts. I found myself thinking, What the hell, man? It's only a tree.

At that point, I was able to step outside of my emotional connection to the tree, my feeling that any attack on the tree was an attack on me personally, my egoic attachment to this tree which is an extension of my home and therefore an extension of myself. That's not to say I was suddenly okay with the prospect of the tree coming down, if it is in fact healthy and not posing a threat to the sidewalk, etc. But at least during this period of clarity I was no longer fuming and obsessing.

Later, I happened to look out the window at the tree, and the simple sight of it immediately brought back a lot of the rage, frustration, and exasperation I'd been feeling. I could easily have gotten caught up in another whirlwind of negative thinking if I hadn't consciously pull back.

What this little episode illustrates, I think, is a simple point that has been made often enough by Eckhart Tolle and similar writers, but remains insufficiently appreciated–namely, the ego is insane.

I mean this literally. There is a sane part of us, but it is not the ego. The ego is capable of lucidity when lucidity serves its self-defined interests. But it is equally capable of brazen irrationality when irrationality serves its perceived interests. It is also very adept at disguising irrationality and making it appear perfectly sensible, at least to ourselves, and sometimes to others.

The ego is not our friend. The ego is looking out only for itself. The ego wants to enlarge itself, and it does so by getting us worked up, angry, righteous, obsessed, vindictive, frustrated, and defensive, among many other things. Occasionally it may actually be beneficial for us to experience one or more of these states of mind, but most of the time it is not helpful. Not helpful to us, that is. It is very helpful to the ego.

It is true that most of us identify with the ego and have trouble drawing a distinction between the "I"  and the ego. And that's just the way the ego likes it. The more we identify with it, the more power we give it and the less able we are to resist its siren song. People who are totally in the grip of the ego, without any ray of clarity from the higher self or true self, are psychotic. They may be walking around in public, they may be successful in their field, they may even be admired and envied, but they are still psychopaths.

It is entirely possible for a person to be very successful in a material sense, outwardly normal and even likable, and still be, in fact, insane. Actually, I think this state of affairs is more common than we like to admit.

But all of us have an ego, and all of us are insane to one extent or another. Maybe there are a few very enlightened gurus who have overcome the ego completely, though I wouldn't count on it. But the overwhelming majority of human beings on the earth, and probably every human being you or I will ever meet, is in the grip of the ego much of the time, and therefore is functionally insane for a good part of his or her life.

People wonder why they see so much cruelty in the world, so much craziness, so many examples of man's inhumanity to man. But if you consider that nearly all of us are insane at least part of the time, and many of us are insane most of the time, the cruelty, craziness, and inhumanity of the human species is less surprising. To be honest, it is a little surprising that things aren't even worse. The better angels of our nature do seem to temper our egoic tendencies more often than we might expect.

Lately on this blog, I've been talking a lot about manias, and specifically the idea that the heyday of Spiritualism as a cultural, social, and religious movement may have been characterized by an atmosphere of mania, or perhaps more accurately, by recurrent waves of mania erupting at different places in different times, not unlike the witch hysteria of an earlier era. But how can otherwise rational people become subject to any sort of mania? Well, perhaps they can't; but the trouble is, people are not “otherwise rational.” As creatures of the ego, they are insane for a good part of their lives, so it's not surprising that their individual insanity should sometimes coalesce into a group insanity, and that this insanity should seem perfectly reasonable to the people who are subject to it.

That's why I have to treat with skepticism even the most sober accounts of séances and other purportedly paranormal experiences if they were supplied by people whose rationality and objectivity had been compromised either by excessive personal enthusiasm or the larger insanity of a mass movement. These people were convinced that they had witnessed paranormal or supernatural phenomena of epochal importance. Naturally they became intensely committed to the reality of what they had seen. Their commitment was reinforced by sharing their experiences with others who felt they had seen the same things. This commitment became an extension of the ego, and any attack on that commitment–any questions raised about the validity of the phenomena–were felt as an attack on the ego. And the ego will go to astounding lengths to protect itself from such an attack. It will marshal all of its resources, including all of the intellectual capabilities of the mind it is using (and I do think the ego uses the mind, not in a symbiotic relationship but parasitically;  the ego is, in a sense, an alien entity that clings to the mind in order to sustain itself).*

A mind that has been hijacked by the ego can believe itself to be entirely lucid, objective, even unusually perceptive–while spouting sheer nonsense. Some behavioral psychologists use the term “thought attack” to describe the cascading avalanche of irrational thoughts that can lead to severe anxiety, depression, violence, etc. But all ego-based thinking is a thought attack to some degree. And while we are caught up in it, we are no more able to extricate ourselves from our racing thoughts than from a descending mountainside of snow.

I think we need to keep this in mind when we evaluate any eyewitness accounts or recollections of paranormal events, especially those from the frenetic halcyon days when Spiritualism, like Revivalism before it, was burning like a prairie fire across the nation. Again I have to say: the ego is not our friend. It is not interested in truth or facts or even logic and reason, except as these may be used to serve its own purpose, which is to survive and grow stronger. The ego is not a reliable guide. It will intentionally mislead us if, by leading us astray, it can aggrandize itself. The ego is not honest or rational or moral, though it may speak in the language of reason and morality when it pleases.

The ego is really the devil in us all, the original sin that taints us. We ignore it at our own risk. And nowhere is this more true than when matters of ultimate spiritual significance–the nature of life and death, and the meaning of it all–are at stake.

---

*It's possible that the relationship orginally was symbiotic, i.e., mutually beneficial, but it does not seem to fit that description today. At the very least, the relationship seems to do much more harm than good in modern society. 

Comments

[Cyrus]

I've listened to certain self help 'gurus' that have preached the importance of indifference, and 'waking up from the Matrix', learning to be totally unattached to things one would previously be obsessed about.

Some work related stresses occurred this week, stuff I kept running through my mind again, and again. I learned to find the source of the attachment, delete it, and re-discover that happiness is your DEFAULT state of mind. It's powerful stuff.

Anyway, as for spiritualism... Well, I don't know. The hysteria was very real, but there were certain scientists, such as Gustave Gelley, who I am not convinced were victims of hysteria, but people trying to cut through the nonsense and find what was really going on== often discovering that, in fact, spirits may have been coming through.

[Juan]

I've seen in other of your posts the distinction between ego and true self, and although a distinction is problematic, I can admit in general. What I would like to discuss is that the thesis that spiritualism might be an ego mania can turn around, whereas it is not in the heyday of spiritualism people saw things that did not exist, but in modern times people do not see things that exist. That is, the materialism as ego mania. An idea that is strengthened by the fact that strict spiritualism is as old as Humanity and today continues to remain a core of phenomena that have been added others such as near-death experiences and memories of past lives that are convergent evidence.

[Matt Rouge]

Thoughtful post, Michael. A good complement to your post "Becoming the witness":

http://michaelprescott.typepad.com/michael_prescotts_blog/2011/03/becoming-the-witness.html

The thing is, do we really understand the structure of the mind/spirit?

Any time there is a debate about psychology, this is the question I ask. For example, free will. We would know whether free will is "in there" if we could peer into the psyche.

That doesn't mean I think we don't know anything about the structure of the mind and spirit, but we don't know a whole lot.

Here's another tack: How much of what you attribute to ego could be attributed to simple selfishness? An organism has to serve itself in order to survive, so I'm not sure a separate "ego" has to exist in order to explain selfish and self-aggrandizing behavior.

In a way, it's like trying to explain obesity by positing the existence of an interior "fatto," when, in reality, wanting to eat a lot is an extension of needing to eat at least a little.

Yet, if we introspect, there *does* seem to be this part of the self that constantly needs to defend itself and raise itself up, so who knows.

Juan,

I loved your idea of materialism as an "ego mania"!

Matt

[j9]

I know what you mean, Michael. I am in a huge battle with Clorox Corp that I have no chance in Hades of winning because my school is vying for a grant that is based on how many people vote on line for your school against dozens of others (all of various sizes, so seems unfair to begin with).

Since the voting started, their site has been riddled with glitches, allowing some to vote sometimes, blocking them at others, etc. I contacted customer service and they told me basically, it must be me. I posted it on the grant's facebook page and found another poor soul at another school having a similar problem and Clorox deleted the posts.

Well, now I'm really angry. I took a video of the glitches occurring and have now sent it to their PR department as well as customer service asking why they think any of this is fair. No response. My ego won't let it go and I'm not going to stop. The unfairness of the process is so clear to all of us, yet, Clorox will grant the grant anyway, knowing, full well, they could never know who really won. One of the administrators here said that if Al Gore had me working for him with his voting dilemmas, he would have won. But, I can see it now, I am going to beat this thing into the ground and probably end up with a restraining order against me, lol

People can still text in a vote daily, if anyone feels sorry for us:-( but the next step is certified letter to corporate. Feel free to share ideas lol

[Michael Prescott]

"it's like trying to explain obesity by positing the existence of an interior 'fat to'"

I am definitely in touch with my inner fatto. It says, "Order pizza," and I obey.

[Ben]

A very thought-provoking post, Michael, but why hit on yourself? I suspect it’s because you’re overworked and overwrought, and didn’t want to spend time on something inconvenient Life has sent your way. Perhaps you have it the wrong way round? Is the ego actually the part of you that’s resisting your need to be involved and judging your reactions to the situation?

I think you were commendable to want to save the tree. Trees symbolise life! Look what happened to North Africa when the Romans cut them down. Look what happened to Easter Island. Look what’s happening in Indonesia.

In some cultures, insanity and mania have been embraced – e.g shamans, the Delphic oracle. Remember Parmenides? The descent into the underworld?

Rationality has its place, but it’s a very small part of being human. There are a million love songs, none about being rational.

Even our current economic situation in Europe is really about love. The politicians and economists love what we’ve got and want to hang on to it. So they’re inventing some more money (bad money) and throwing it after the good. Nothing rational here at all…but from a human point of view, quite understandable!

[.]

Me too,
only my fatto demands I order Kentucky....six delicious pieces and scrumptious chips. Yes !!!

[Bruce Siegel]

OK--I'm gonna play the part of loyal opposition here once more.

The problem is, I've never understood exactly what the ego is, or how to separate it from other parts of myself. It often seems to me a catchphrase for whatever it is we dislike in ourselves (as Matt is suggesting).

It's interesting that you refer to ego as the devil. Maybe the concept of ego has as much reality to it as the devil--no more, no less.

"What the hell, man? It's only a tree."

You may have been over-reacting, but aren't you also discounting something good in yourself, like your empathy for another living being, or your need for beauty?

(Ben made some nice points about that.)

"I was able to step outside of my emotional connection to the tree."

But there's another possibility, too.

I once saved a tree on my block. City workers were going to take it down, because one of its main limbs had fallen into the street, and they were saying that the rest of the the tree could come down at any time, creating a danger to the public.

They had chain saw in hand and were ready to go. But I love the trees in my neighborhood. I kept talking to those workers, and wouldn't let them do it. I just kept arguing with them, until, much to my surprise, they left.

Fifteen years later, the tree is still there, and I feel really good about having saved it.

I'm not saying what I did was better than what you did, Michael. I'm really not. I haven't the faintest idea what the specifics were at your condo, and taking down the tree may well have been for the "highest good of all."

You just reminded me of that story, and I wanted to present a different way of looking at things. The day I let my passion rule me. The day my involvement made a difference.

There's something sane about that, too, isn't there?

[Paul]

I was just about to post a similar comment Bruce (tho not as articulately). I am not sure what exactly my ego is supposed to be - is it something separate or simply some inbuilt response for self-preservation?

[Michael Prescott]

In my opinion, the ego is not the true self, but a facsimile of the self. Most of the time we identify with the ego and think of it as "me." But occasionally we step outside the ego and see it for what it is. These periods of clarity seldom last long.

The true self is the witness to the ego, which we access at those special moments.

It may be commendable to save a tree - I think so - but not to get tied up in emotional knots about it. It's possible to go about saving the tree in a calm, coolheaded, clear minded way. That would be a more egoless approach.

The tree has not come down, by the way. This will be a longterm issue, I'm sure. Nothing happens fast in condoland.

Incidentally, have you noticed that some people seem to have an obsessive hatred of trees and are always agitating to tear them down? In my observation, very often they are senior citizens. I think some retirees are seeking a sense of power and control, and since they can no longer get it from work, they try to obtain it by controlling the neighborhood and making drastic, visible changes in the landscape. It's a final, rather petty way of imposing their will on their environment (and, not to get too Freudian about it, maybe a subconscious urge to kill something that threatens to outlive them).

Or maybe they're just bored.

[Michael Prescott]

BTW, kudos to Bruce for saving a tree! You must have been very persuasive.

[Kathleen]

I see the ego as the false part of us that always has to be right, that strives to be better than others just for the sake of feeling superior. If you step outside of it for even a moment, you can see it's not real, and it's not real in other people either. I know I'm not engaging my ego when I'm peaceful and not struggling and striving, or thinking about an image of myself or how I'm "right." Assuming there is an afterlife, where does the ego go? This part of us most dissolve somehow and the real "I" emerge. How could Heaven be heavenly with the insanity of egos?

[dmduncan]

Well, speaking on behalf of the tree, thank you for your efforts, Michael. Trees are a visible connection to nature. You may not notice it until one is gone, but they make a huge difference to how your environment feels to you, so it is a worthy battle to fight.

[dmduncan]

To look at nature and feel no connection such that cutting down the tree is inconsequential — that seems madness to me.

When I was a kid, my friend had a large apple tree in his yard, and a bunch of us used to sit in it and eat apples. It didn't charge us anything. It was a good tree, and life felt good sitting in it.

Maybe some people never have that kind of experience, or they forgot.

[Bruce Siegel]

"BTW, kudos to Bruce for saving a tree! You must have been very persuasive."

Thanks. I think my persistence did the trick. :o)

And at least in this instance, being impulsive helped. Their chainsaw was ready to go.

[abcdefg]

And then, complicating our understanding of the ego is the way we can so easily turn against ourselves. I'm thinking of the way shame overtakes people who are abused. The ego is also a devil in that case, but its attacks aim inward and prevent a person from defending (or even perceiving) her interests.

Of course, it wasn't Michael's desire to save the tree that was egoic, it was the consuming quality of his obsession. Nothing egoic about hiring the tree surgeon either. That seems a reasonable thing to do. It's just the "attachment" that's insane. And, the Buddha pointed out, painful.

[jshgfcre98ijyds]

http://sped2work.tripod.com/huineng.html

One day the Fifth Patriarch told his monks to express their wisdom in a poem. Whoever had true realization of his original nature (Buddha Nature) would be ordained the Sixth Patriarch. The head monk, Shen Hsiu, was the most learned, and wrote the following:

The body is the wisdom-tree,
The mind is a bright mirror in a stand;
Take care to wipe it all the time,
And allow no dust to cling.

The poem was praised, but The Fifth Patriarch knew that Shen Hsiu had not yet found his original nature, on the other hand, Hui Neng couldn't even write, so someone had to write down his poem, which read:

Fundamentally no wisdom-tree exists,
Nor the stand of a mirror bright.
Since all is empty from the beginning,
Where can the dust alight?

The Fifth Patriarch pretended that he wasn't impressed with this poem either, but in the middle of the night he summoned Hui Neng. The Fifth Patriarch gave him the insignia of his office, the Patriarch's robe and bowl.

[Ben]

Coincidentally(?) I've just written a poem about a tree and I'm now writing another one about the tree of knowledge as the serpent persuades Eve to pick an apple.

"It's just the "attachment" that's insane."
I guess that makes me insane, abcdefg!

[realpc]

I agree that we should not identify with our ego, because what we call the ego is only one part of ourselves. But I don't agree that the ego is insane. It is, or is supposed to be, a practical friend that helps us to survive. But it has to stay in its place or we do become disturbed and unhappy individuals.

Another problem with your analysis is confusion between psychotics and psychopaths. The word "psychopath" is confusing because it does seem to mean insane, but it really doesn't.

A psychotic person is insane, according to our normal concepts of insanity. They are out of touch with reality and irrational, usually because something is wrong with their brain. A psychopath (actually called sociopath now) is someone who is asocial in various possible ways.

It may be true that a psychopath is ruled by their ego, and therefore overly concerned with pride, and unable to form meaningful social connections. They can function normally, and can be extremely successful. They are not insane, although of course they are disturbed and unhappy.

[abcdefg]

The word "insane" as used by Michael (and by me) is a reference to Eckhart Tolle's use of the word, which is different from a diagnosis in the field of psychology. Tolle uses the word jokingly in that by his definition, insanity isn't "abnormal," it's the norm.

[Roger Knights]

Here's a pome that was famous long ago--and now completely forgotten:

"Verses are made by fools like me
But only God can make a tree"
--Joyce Killmer

[Ben]

Some more thoughts:
I know, Michael, you are impressed by Jenny Wade’s “Changes of Mind”. In that book she refers to the different sub-minds we have as a result of evolution, each with its own agenda. But she seems to imply at the end that we can subsume all to a single authentic consciousness.

This is not the position taken by James Hillman in “Re-Visioning Psychology”. Following Jung, he says that we must beware of the tyranny of monolithic consciousness (forcing the rule of the ego or “personality number One”). Rather, to be free of self-tyranny, we should always pay attention to the voices of the partial personalities within us. In this way, he says we build soul rather than ego. Our psyches are a commune of many selves –they’re polytheistic or polycentric. As a writer, you doubtless do pay attention to your inner personalities –you place them in your novels. A personality not given enough attention projects outwards, finding its way into the world “outside”.

I had an idea about the tree: pin something on it saying it is not to be cut down. Something like: Warning: this tree is protected under a preservation order.

A religious person might be impressed by Genesis III 24: “So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.”

[Michael Prescott]

The tree surgeon who inspected the tree yesterday said it's in good health and that the roots are not threatening the sidewalk. I wrote a letter to the condo board containing this info. I also offered to have the tree trimmed and shaped if the board so desires. (This isn't necessary, but you have to offer them something.)

The tree guy also told me that it's a dogwood. I had no idea. No wonder I like it. I like dogs.

Ben, the ego does have survival value in some cases, but it seems out of control in our modern world.

[someone]

Does the none Ego that you're implying survives death contain any personality features and loves that the everyday self identifies with or is it impersonal as some self help gurus (like that german dude, my memory for names sucks). Just wondering?

[someone]

srry Meant non-ego

[Michael Duggan]

In defence of the ego:
I was born to a single parent on a council estate (The "Projects" in the US) and fairly disadvantaged in relation to my peers. Despite these shortcomings, through self belief and determination I managed a first class degree, Ph.D and high level job in industry and a lovely home (mortgage payed for) and overcame a HIV diagnosis! I think this would have been impossible without a certain attachment to an ego to get me through. (although I would be nothing without the help of others).
On a different tack, here is vid of the Al Sullivan "flapping arms" case:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-91QXXsyEc

[Bruce Siegel]

Wow, Michael, a dogwood--they can be stunning when in bloom. Maybe I missed this, but did the association say why they want to remove it?

I think it's a beautiful thing you feel attached to that tree and are going through such pains to save it.

[Michael Prescott]

Bruce, I honestly think it's just a power play by a newcomer to the community who finagled a position as association president and is throwing his weight around.

"Someone," I honestly don't know what, if anything, survives death. I used to be partial to the idea that the personality continues, but lately I've been leaning more toward the super-psi explanation of mediumship and other phenomena. This would not rule out an afterlife, but it would negate a lot of the evidence for it.

But I don't pretend to have any answers. In fact, it seems like the deeper I get in this field, the more questions I have. Maybe I'm just doing it wrong ...

[Bruce Siegel]

"Maybe I'm just doing it wrong ..."

Or missing out on the sort of direct, personal experience that can change your perspective in a hurry. (Though I know you have had some mystical experiences of your own.) Repeatedly, during my own deepest states of altered consciousness, I would think to myself, "How in the world will I ever be able to worry about death again?"

Of course, some will say that I'm crazy to give so much weight to what I'm thinking, feeling, and experiencing in those moments. That's why it's nice to have such compelling empirical evidence from so many areas that all point in the same direction.

[Juan]

Through some evidence we can conclude that what survives death is the enhanced self, which would include both the ego (or selfish desires) as our higher self. But according to theosophical sources consuming ego would go up cause the so-called second death, when the higher self is freed from the ego or selfish desires.

On the superpsi hypothesis, we note that the most likely many cases of mediumship are cases of psi among the living, but there are other cases of mediumship which clearly can not be of this type, because the comunications are more or less skilled to communicate independiently of mediums or sitters, there is a relationship between the quality of communications and the time that has passed since the death of comunicators, among other features.

[Hrvoje Butkovic]

I find Bill Plotkin’s take on ego refreshing and very useful. His writing on the subject doesn’t contain any aversion or hostility towards the ego, but sees it as indispensable to the human condition, not merely in the survival sense but also in living one’s life purpose.

Here are a few quotes from his book Soulcraft to illustrate:

“The initial goal of the descent is to cultivate the relationship between the ego and the soul, and that is underworld business, business that might, at first, make our surface lives more difficult or lonely, or less comfortable, secure, or happy. Soulcraft practices prepare the ego to abandon its social stability and psychological composure and to be reassigned as an active, adult agent for soul, as opposed to its former role as an adolescent agent for itself.
...
Imagine that the soul doesn’t really know how you ought best live it. After all, how you manifest soul in your everyday life will depend in large measure upon your historical epoch and culture, where you live and what materials are available to you, and what human language you speak. Forms of embodiment, language, and cultural knowledge are the ego’s domain, not the soul’s. The soul reveals to the ego the deep nature of its gift, but it is the ego’s task to fashion ways to give it.”

[Cyrus]

Certain Norse philosophies celebrate the ego as a healthy part of the whole. In some way, I agree. The ego tends to dominate the lives of the unwitting, but in reality some aspect of the ego seems very important to me. Just learn to tame the ego so it doesn't control your life. (Would I even want my ego to go up in flames? I don't know... once it happened, I would no longer have an ego to debate the issue!)

[sbu]

On the superpsi hypothesis, we note that the most likely many cases of mediumship are cases of psi among the living, but there are other cases of mediumship which clearly can not be of this type, because the comunications are more or less skilled to communicate independiently of mediums or sitters, there is a relationship between the quality of communications and the time that has passed since the death of comunicators, among other features.

Neuroscience has never located 'memories' in the human brain. If we extrapolate a bit on this 'problem' it could be argued that memories are 'stored' in some extradimensional place which could be a residue after the brain dies. Maybe it's just 'leftover' memories a medium tunes into and not a spirit consciousness. A theory like this combined with super-psi could explain the inconsistencies in medium communications.

[Juan]

Sbu

Your hypothesis seems the same as the Broad's idea on the psychic factor, but there are several reasons to reject it: first, if this hypothesis were true, then the comunicators only narrate events of his earthly life, but it is not, because there have been communicators who have narrated how they felt when they die, they have done after death, among other things. Second, mediumistic communicators not only show their memories, but also have their own motivation and initiative, as noted in the drop-in communications. Third, if this hypothesis were true, then there is no reason to expect that some communicators are more able than others to communicate, because all depend on the medium's ability to tune into the memories of the deceased, but this is not what we find, for some comunicators were more skilled at communicating than others. And fourth, on the inconsistencies of communicators, I wrote it may be that the spirits of the dead remained virtually the same beliefs as when they were alive, which can be as inconsistent as the living.

[Ben]

Bill Plotkin looks interesting, Hrvoje. I like Patrick Harpur's "A Complete Guide to the Soul" from a mythological and psychological persepective.

[sbu]

Juan - I wrote it may be that the spirits of the dead remained virtually the same beliefs as when they were alive, which can be as inconsistent as the living.

Personally I regard reincarnation research as the best existing survival evidence - it's nearly objective, 'repeatable' in the sense that new cases keeps coming up and it fits very badly with an alternative super psi explanation.

The 'inconsistency' MP wrote about in the previous thread, that reincarnation was a completely missing component in early spiritiual communications makes the entire case for spiritual communications really being 'spiritual' very bad. Obviously when you die the option to reincarnate isn't a detail you would expect the deceased not to mention at all during the first 50 years of the awakening of spiritualism.

[Hrvoje Butkovic]

Thanks for the tip, Ben. I'll have a look...

[Leo]

Sbu,

Its probably because reincarnation is a rare thing. Only few people, animals reincarnate. You may find this interesting and this was in the heyday of spiritualism. http://www.iisis.net/index.php?page=semkiw-reincarnation-penney-peirce-split-incarnation&hl=en_US.

[Leo]

Also forgot to mention work done by Allan Kardec in France, who compiled The Spirits’ Book (circa 1857).

[someon]

Why have you been leaning toward Super Psi Explanations?

[...]

"Why have you been leaning toward Super Psi Explanations?"

Because sbu is the regular skeptic on this blog and only believes in Science and tries to Poo Poo anything Paranormal because he thinks Science has all the answers.

[sbu]

Its probably because reincarnation is a rare thing. Only few people, animals reincarnate.

According to Ian Stevenson's research one one in five hundred children remembers a past life. This makes reincarnation a quite frequent phenomena.

[Michael Prescott]

"Why have you been leaning toward Super Psi Explanations?"

The problems with mediumship that I listed in my previous post have made me increasingly doubtful that actual spirit communication is going on. However, there are arguments that can be made in favor of the spirit hypothesis - for instance, cases of drop-in communicators, or the fact that some spirits simply seem to be better communicators than others, or the fact that spirits seem confused in early communications but more clearheaded later (Juan has made both these points).

[Matt Rouge]

Michael,

About super psi, what do you think of this argument?

OK, let's say that the mediums are only accessing *information,* not the spirit?

The question then is, What is the "plus alpha" were *real* spirit communication to occur? Is the spirit an *object* with which one might come in contact? And unless one comes in contact with that *thing*, is one not really engaging in *real* spirit communication?

My point being, What if spirits really are "just" information? Thus, if super psi is "just" accessing information, then it might be the same thing as accessing the spirits. In fact, if spirits are "just" information, then there would be no discernible difference between super psi and spirit communication.

That is what my gut tells me is true. Further, if we take a page from Art's holographic universe idea, then it doesn't really matter where you pull the super psi information from when you do the communication. If you are pulling information from Aunt Millie's head that is true about me in spirit, then that's just as good as pulling it from "me." Again, there may be no discernible difference.

Another way of approaching the problem is this. Is a spirit destructible? Could say, a powerful being in the universe simply annihilate the spirit so that it could never return, and no more spirit communication could be possible?

I would say most of our "guts" would tell us no. Destruction of a spirit is fundamentally, logically, mathematically impossible. And the reason is that information is indestructible. I don't mean mediated and recorded information. I mean information in the sense of "The writing finger having writ..." The "fact of the matter," as it were.

Seeing spirits as information also helps us understand why mediums never say, "I can't contact that person; they've reincarnated." The reason is because, while reincarnation is true, the information of the person as he or she used to be remains in existence.

The final point I'd make is that spirit is "living information." I.e., self-organizing. That's what makes it different from, say, the text of a book.

Cheers,

Matt

[someone]

Do you also now find survivalist claims of NDEs, Reincarnation cases, and other areas of survival research unconvincing?

[Simon Oakes]

"What if spirits are really "just" information?"

A passage from Michael Tymn's recently published 'The Afterlife Revealed' that particularly struck me concerned messages given by the psychic researcher, Sir William Barrett, through a medium after his death.

Sir William explained the sometimes confused and distorted nature of his messages as being down to the fact that, after death, our conscious and subconscious minds join to form a whole - but that when he returned to the physical sphere to effect these communications his mind had to fragment again, making it difficult to recall even proper names. BTW he still gave sufficiently detailed information to convince his surviving wife, Lady Barrett,that these messages were genuine.

I think an awful lot can be unpacked out of this simple sounding idea of our conscious & subconscious minds merging in the afterlife. This larger mind may still be in some sense us, but it could well be something much richer and more complex than what we are here. So much so that, without in anyway us having suffered 'exinction' in the athiestic sense, to all intents and purposes what we were here will have ceased to exist. But they'll still be something like Matt's living information field or spirit.

In other words, everytime such a spirit attempts to communicate through a medium, the 'old' self needs to be first reconstructed from this much richer information field - in a process, perhaps, akin to an archeological reconstruction of something not now there. If so, no wonder the quality of many of these communications is so poor and ambiguous!

[Juan]

Matt,

Do you affirm that there is no real difference between the afterlife hypothesis and the superpsi hypothesis? If so, then I disagree, because the information is not the same as the spirits of the dead: information is data only, spirits are minds that contain among other things data. The spirits are sentient beings with initiative, will, intelligence, personality and motivations, none of it be reduced to simple information.

Furthermore, the information appears to be just syntax, no semantics, so until someone proves me as the semantics reduces to the syntax, the meaning will remain irreducible to the information. You yourself have written that the spirits are living information, but that living are not reducible to mere information.

[Matt Rouge]

Juan,

Yes, what you say is literally true. I am saying that, perhaps, spirits are the "fact of the matter" instead of the matter itself. Or, rather, in the Afterlife, there is no difference between the matter and the fact of the matter.

So that there would be no distinction between accessing information *about* the spirit (super-psi) and accessing the spirit itself (spirit communication).

Another way of putting it is this: spirits are unmediated content. If this were not so, they would be objects, and thus destroyable.

Cheers,

Matt

[Juan]

Matt

I do not understand that it is "fact of the matter", but the difference between the afterlife and superpsi think is clear: according to the idea of ​​the afterlife, the individual is conscious when the medium is in trance is a human being who died and will remain conscious regardless of medium. According to the idea of the superpsi, the individual is conscious when the medium is in trance is the unconscious of medium and conscious only when called. I do not know how are you two ideas can be the same.

[Leo MacDonald]

According to Ian Stevenson's research one one in five hundred children remembers a past life. This makes reincarnation a quite frequent phenomena.

Yes only children too what about teenagers? adults?.

What do you think of that link i posted about a medium who gathered information about reincarnation during the heyday of spiritualism? as well as Allan Kardec's work?.

[Leo MacDonald]

I think Super Psi has been falsified there's no need to talk about it from my point of view.

[Matt Rouge]

Juan,

I am saying that the nature of consciousness is such Over There that there would be no real difference between super psi and not-super psi.

That's my guess, in any case.

Cheers,

Matt

[Sandy]

I hope your tree says put, Michael.

[Bruce Siegel]

Matt said:

""I am saying that the nature of consciousness is such Over There that there would be no real difference between super psi and not-super psi."

You may be on to something, though I think there's no way we can ever wrap our human minds around such a mystery. We try to use words to answer metaphysical questions, and it's like asking a cat to understand how a computer works--or even, what a computer IS.

Cat consciousness has evolved for a particular kind of knowledge and experience , and why should we expect that human consciousness isn't subject to exactly the same sort of limitation as it tries to grasp the Big Picture?

A great metaphor for this situation is the book Flatland. It's about 2-dimensional beings who have not the slightest hint that a 3-dimensional world exists, much less what it's like.

Then one day, a Flatlander has a mystical experience of sorts, and visits the 3-dimensional world. When he returns to Flatland, he remembers that he somehow traveled "Upward, yet not Northward", but no longer has the faintest idea what that means.

[Michael Prescott]

"Do you also now find survivalist claims of NDEs, Reincarnation cases, and other areas of survival research unconvincing?"

Not exactly. Here's where I am. In terms of earthly existence, I think there are three realities - the objective world, the subjective world, and a borderland or gray area of overlap. The objective world is characterized by regularity, i.e. by predictable laws like gravity, and by (relative) permanence. The subjective world is characterized by an ephemeral, non-rational quality epitomized by dreams; there are either no rules, or rules predicated on symbolism. The borderland is a region where the first two worlds intersect. Borderland phenomena have the appearance of objective reality, but do not conform to the rules of objective reality. They are ephemeral, elusive, maddeningly hard to pin down. They have a kind of quasi-reality, in that they are part of the objective world but only so long as our attention is focused on them. In some respects they are like functional entities, as described in a previous post.

Flying saucers, alien abductions, Bigfoot, the Mothman, apparitions of the Virgin Mary, and many other varieties of Forteana (when they are not hoaxes) are part of this borderland, which George Hansen describes in terms of the trickster.

ESP and PK are the mechanisms by which borderland phenomena are experienced and manifested. Telepathy allows imagery to spread rapidly throughout the collective unconscious, leading to spates of flying saucer sightings or mass viewings of Marian apparitions. PK somehow allows the mind (whether the individual mind or a group mind) to manifest imagery held in the unconscious.

A good deal of evidence for life after death probably belongs to the borderland. A mania for Spiritualism can help manifest the expected phenomena. Popularization of NDEs may actually be generating more NDEs as the unconscious mind taps into this increasingly widespread and powerful imagery. Reincarnation memories may be examples of the unconscious using retrocognition and clairvoyance to construct a narrative in line with popular ideas. Expectation of capturing spirit voices on tape may help produce that outcome.

Does this mean that all afterlife evidence can be categorized this way? It would be nice to think so, if only because all these disparate categories of evidence could be parsimoniously covered by a single hypothesis. But I'm not convinced this is the case. There are areas where the borderland idea seems to fall short - drop-in communicators, for instance. Also, if the mind has such powers, then it's hard to see why it should be helplessly dependent on the body.

So I don't think all the afterlife evidence can or should be classified as borderland ephemera, but probably a lot of it can be.

I could be entirely wrong, of course.

[Bruce Siegel]

"Reincarnation memories may be examples of the unconscious using retrocognition and clairvoyance to construct a narrative in line with popular ideas."

Michael, how does this square with the fact that the strongest evidence for reincarnation comes from children--even toddlers--at an age when they're not likely to have been influenced by these "popular ideas"?

[Michael Duggan]

I would think the behavioural and birthmark evidence from Stevenson (and lately, Jim Tucker), mediumship work revealing qualitative differences between deceased readings and psi readings (i.e., Beishell at the Windbridge institute), and some OBE research in the 70's (Osis) points to the uniqueness of survival evidence. IMHO, the issue is irrelevent; evidence for psi points to (very strongly) mind-brain independence, and the filter model. Probably where it becomes important is the nature of life after death, as typical survival evidence points to personality continuing rather than mind merging with an infinite cosmic consciousness.
MP, I wondered what your thoughts were on psychedelics? A lot of research is being done now, and a growing consensus speaks to the filter model from this work. info here:
http://www.maps.org/

[Bruce Siegel]

To continue my last comment: And often, as Carol Bowman and others make clear, the concept of reincarnation is painful and difficult to accept for the traditionally religious families of these children. So these kids are not being influenced by their parents towards belief in past lives.

Seems to me that "popular ideas" might be a factor with some adults who claim past lives. But that would pertain to those who are comfortable with Eastern or New Age beliefs, and many cases fall outside this category.

[Michael Duggan]

Sorry Bruce, didn't mean to jump in there. You must have posted before me.

[Bruce Siegel]

"Sorry Bruce, didn't mean to jump in there. You must have posted before me."

Michael D, you're always welcome to interrupt me with mention of great organizations like MAPS. ;o)

[someone]

"Popularization of NDEs may actually be generating more NDEs as the unconscious mind taps into this increasingly widespread and powerful imagery"
I wouldn't expect this to be to be the case as Kelly, Kelly and Greyson reported that NDEs before and after the explosion of NDE publication (R.Moody's Life after Life) were generally the same. The only difference was that less tunnel experiences were reported before the book was published.

[Michael Prescott]

"how does this square with the fact that the strongest evidence for reincarnation comes from children--even toddlers--at an age when they're not likely to have been influenced by these 'popular ideas'?"

Young children seem to exist in the borderland pretty much all the time, so they may be unusually receptive to its influences. The very young don't distinguish between objective and subjective, or even between truth and fantasy; they have imaginary friends, get caught up in play, think nightmares are real, etc. It's at least possible that if the idea of reincarnation is circulating in the collective unconscious they will pick up on it. Note that most of Ian Stevenson's cases were set in countries where belief in reincarnation is traditional and widespread, and that the reincarnation narratives typically match the expectations of those cultures - for example, in terms of the amount of time (if any) between lives, or in the occurrence of distinguishing birthmarks. Now that reincarnation has become more fashionable in the West, cases of the Stevenson type are beginning to emerge here.

The issue is not whether the child believes in reincarnation or even knows about it, but whether the idea is "in the ether," so to speak - in the collective unconscious of the culture.

Of course this is only speculation. The more straightforward explanation - namely, that souls do reincarnate - may be correct.

[someone]

Also in a previous post you mentioned that Alan Gauld in his book "Mediumship and survival" Thought that most cases could be handled by living agent psi. I did not get this impression. He at one time called the Super-ESP Hypothesis "most implausible" I could be reading it wrong though

[Bryan.A]

"Flying saucers, alien abductions, Bigfoot, the Mothman, apparitions of the Virgin Mary, and many other varieties of Forteana (when they are not hoaxes) are part of this borderland, which George Hansen describes in terms of the trickster."

Your implication is that in some of these cases you mention there are some cases which are legit.
Perception and wishful thinking can also turn people delusional.As is the case of a magician magically making the impossible possible such as the instance with Houdini being thought to be a medium.

"The objective world is characterized by regularity, i.e. by predictable laws like gravity, and by (relative) permanence.

For the most part in agreement but what is important is in what you classify as having predictable laws.In this you and I differ greatly of opinion.

"The subjective world is characterized by an ephemeral, non-rational quality epitomized by dreams; there are either no rules, or rules predicated on symbolism."

Symbolism sure, but there are rules.Advanced lucid dreamers can tell you.Some say everything is possible in dreams but even in such a subjective state there are limits that cannot be surpassed in a lucid dream or OBE hybrid.

"The borderland is a region where the first two worlds intersect. Borderland phenomena have the appearance of objective reality, but do not conform to the rules of objective reality."

Objective reality as you see it you mean.If we are to take spirits at their word a great deal if not everything in the afterlife has regular but different laws of nature.

Cause and Effect is one example.
Limits to what one can and cannot do in their circumstances in the afterlife.
Obviously this would depend which spiritual teachings we accept but discounting the possibility of all of them is just having a closed mind.Keep your action and the variables the same and supposedly the consequences-the effect remains the same.

NDE's happen in a universe that is not borderland,but objective on a different scale then you can invision.
Regular laws such as gravity exist in different forms.Spiritual forms,but they are regular laws nonetheless the same for Relative permanence.

[Michael Prescott]

"NDE's happen in a universe that is not borderland,but objective on a different scale then you can invision. Regular laws such as gravity exist in different forms.Spiritual forms,but they are regular laws nonetheless the same for Relative permanence."

How do you know all this? I'm not saying it's untrue, but as a belief system it needs to be tested and assessed critically.

[someone]

Have any of your other viewpoints changed (God, materialism, Global warming, ID ext ext)

[Michael Prescott]

I think you're overstating things, "someone." I'm playing around with an idea here -- a new way (for me) of looking at things. I do that a lot. It's boring to keep saying and thinking the same stuff over and over. I don't know if the borderland idea has merit or not. It's something I'm toying with, just like I'm toying with the "mania" idea with regard to Spiritualism. I don't want to be anybody's guru. I try not to make authoritative pronouncements on these matters, because what do I know, really?

[sbu]

MP - I don't want to be anybody's guru.

I think it's part of human psychology that it makes us feel safe and more confident in our beliefs if a well-known person supports us in these beliefs.

[Bryan.A]

"How do you know all this? I'm not saying it's untrue, but as a belief system it needs to be tested and assessed critically. "

Well in general you accept that some evidence can be best explained by the collective unconsious.

I believe that the strongest evidence favors the survival hypothesis.

Communication that comes through tested and confirmed mediums and other options I cross check with some info that comes through from NDE's,usually a pattern,but I accept easier info from veridical or other evidentiary provided NDE's.

It's not exactly a way to "test" the info.
But it's not about what can be tested when you put things in since it's more a question of having enough information to know where to place a specific topic.
If we accept that the afterlife exists we cannot draw a conclusion yet in which of your category it exists scientifically at least.But you can't prove either that if an afterlife exists it must be in a borderland area.

We can just speculate at this point when we go any further then the main conclusions we draw from in general.

[Bryan.A]

"I try not to make authoritative pronouncements on these matters, because what do I know, really? "

Figuratively in a society you would be a senator in the skeptic community in line to run for president.

As such your opinion holds great value to a many a open minded skeptic and even the closed minded ones seem to have some respect for ya.

Obviously when you talk with your creative and open minded and rational way of thinking, people listen.

Ps.Srry for double post

[no one]

"Maybe I'm just doing it wrong ..."

Yes, Michael, I think you may be.

I may completely disagree with your politics and concept of democracy, but my perspective alligns with yours concerning what you call a "borderland" etc.

However, I do not see you taking taking your own ideas to their logical conclusions.

It would appear that we are, first and foremost, some kind of energy and then that energy expressed as imagination. This is what you are calling the subjective world.

What you call the objective world is just lifeless physical matter reacting to physical laws.

However, you are trying to understand imagination in terms of physical matter. You can't do that. It can't be nailed down that way. It can only be felt and expressed.

In my experience, the more one tries to understand himself in terms of the objective world the more one misses the understanding of one's true nature and, consequently, the more the ego grows out of control.

Of course, you are not alone in this misdirection. It's a big club. Whether it is via an organized religion or something more esoteric, so many "seekers" really just want a canned formula. They want a tidy box to wrap that energy and imagination into. The most tidy box leaves room for little if any essence. It is total materialism. But all of the boxes are constructed from the same "objective" material. Some are just a little bigger than others.

What are we? What is our nature? Who am I really? What is it all about? These are questions that take a dedicated life time (or more?) to answer and the answer lies inside of you; not in a laboratory or a in book or in some guru's words. Then again, there are a few rare individuals who seem to have never forgotten. Mostly these are artists, muscisians, visionaries of various sorts and truly revolutionary inventors.

For example, as someone said on this or another thread, what is the difference if it is "super-psi" or traditional "survival"? If I am a feeling and information and imagination and if all of that is still out there and someone can pick up on that after my body is in the ground, then aren't I as alive as I was when I was walking around in a meat suit?

The oppostion to this concept, IMO, comes from the ego; which desires to cling to its materially based construction. It plays all sorts of tricks to divert from the true essence because the true essence is fatal to it once it has reached a critical mass. So it wants us to try to use "rationality" to understand the essence because it knows that we will become confused and give up and turn our backs on the essence. It wants us to be as material as concrete because its job, when it dose it right, is to manage the physical manifestation; the body. This is why yogis and similar spiritual practicioners go to extremes to control and deny the body. They want to de-emphasize it and, therefore, the ego's role.

BTW...Only an out of control ego would want to cut down a harmless and beautiful tree. I mean why would you do that? Perhaps that tree, to you, offers in some way a connection to essence. Hence your reaction.

In summary, the mistake is to try to develop a picture of the soul using materialistic methods. That is like trying to play a piano with a front end loader.

That said, these thoughts and discussions we have here (and elsewhere) can be interesting diversions.

[Michael Prescott]

"Figuratively in a society you would be a senator in the skeptic community in line to run for president."

Thanks, but I doubt I'd get many votes in the skeptic community!

I hope it's not true that my opinion carries any undue weight, because what I mainly like to do is noodle around with ideas and see what I can come up with. Said noodling results in many inconsistencies. One reason I've never tried to write a nonfiction book about the paranormal is that I'd have to nail down exactly what I think. A blog is a free-form forum that allows me to engage in an ongoing conversation while essentially thinking aloud.

[...]

Michael since you've posted about Remote Viewing in the past I think, I would like to know your opinion on Ed Dames if possible?

Do you think he really has the ability to Remote View specific targets or do you think when he predicted the Death of Steve Fossett he just lucked out? Because it seems to be the only thing he is known for as raises a lot of suspicion about his claims, Also what are your thoughts on Joe McMoneagle?

[Bruce Siegel]

"Also what are your thoughts on Joe McMoneagle?"

Bruce here, and if I can jump in, I think he's one of the most credible people on the scene. Some of his remote viewing results are beyond amazing, and I've heard little from anyone that would tend to make me doubt his abilities.

In Mind Trek, he wrote, "Making an honest appraisal of 15 years of remote viewing, I would be very surprised if my percentage of direct hits were better than 20-25%. It doesn't sound like much . . . but it's way beyond chance."

A realistic statement that makes me trust him all the more.

Maybe you've seen some of the detailed diagrams he drew of remote viewing targets. I believe they were done during experiments with Targ and Puthoff, whom I also believe to be trustworthy.

[...]

Thanks Bruce, If my memory serves me correctly I think it was him I seen on a TV show a number of years ago that was testing Psychics and Mediums and Remote Viewers.

They had a person standing outside LAX Airport and he had to draw the location of the person and the structure in his drawing was remarkably a lot like the Theme Building at LAX, I was quite impressed.

Now I know outright fraud can't be eliminated here, An explaination could be the Producers of the show were in on it and feeding him information about where the Person was, but I can't really see that, Anyway it was an ok show but was I not impressed by the Psychics on it at all.

[Roger Knights]

MP says: "noodling results in many inconsistencies. One reason I've never tried to write a nonfiction book about the paranormal is that I'd have to nail down exactly what I think. A blog is a free-form forum that allows me to engage in an ongoing conversation while essentially thinking aloud."

"Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes." --Walt Whitman

Montaigne's essays were noodlings too. He didn't worry about nailing things down. Go ahead and publish your thread-head essays--along with selections from the comments and your replies. It needn't be a paper book--a Kindle version would do. Plus a sister site containing such a selection, which would be easier for visitors to browse.

[Sandy]

Joe McMoneagle did this show on remote viewing:

http://www.lfr.org/LFR/csl/media/videoclips/NatGeo/natgeo.html

[Michael Prescott]

I don't know a lot about McMoneagle, but as Bruce says, he seems to have an excellent reputation.

Ditto for Ed Dames.

I'm afraid I haven't read up on remote viewing that extensively. But some of the SRI tests conducted by Puthoff & Targ seem very convincing. There was one test where the remote viewer was given only a set of geographical coordinates, and he produced a drawing of a large, complex structure that closely matched an actual scientific installation at that site (in Russia, I believe).

Remote viewing also apparently located a downed pilot during the Carter years. Jimmy Carter himself has reportedly vouched for the accuracy of this account.

[...]

Cool thanks for the response Michael, The link to the Video Sandy posted seems quite impressive too.

[Jose Luis]

"Incarnation is thus about wholeness. It is a wholeness-centered spirituality. Incarnation is about partnership: between ourselves and the world, between ourselves and each other, and between ourselves and the non-physical worlds. It's also about the internal partnerships that make us who we are, the partnering between soul and personality, the personal and the transpersonal."

http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/books/books.php?id=21400