Sunday Seminar August 2005
“Dangers of Impersonally
Objectifying the Inner Life –
A problem shared by Freud,
Jung and Korzybski?
Does God live in the right
pre-frontal cortex?
Is "objective brain language"
chasing out inner feeling and spiritual expression?
How can general-semantics and scientific
method clarify and enrich our personal insights?”
Presenter: Robert James
~ The
Agenda ~
"Catching-up"
"Objectifying"
Does God live
in the right pre-frontal cortex?
Meditation -
A Window to the subconscious?
Movie:
"Chasing God"
~~ Luncheon
~~
The DiSC
Profile
Emotional
Intelligence
Experiential
and Didactic learning
Near-Death Experiences
and the Perfect Day Fantasy!
Translating
Fantasy into Reality!
Monthly
Business
Fees
AGS Web Domain name?
Meeting with SDN 20-21 August (Next Week!)
AGS Annual
General Meeting
AGS Financial Statement and Annual Report
Election of Officers
End
* 0 *
David Oliphant at the Jung Soc.
Language is so fundamental.
Extraordinary dumming-down of
language right across the board - Public language is often complete rubbish -
jargonistic, full of cliches.
Anyone seen lists like this of phrases
which can be stuck together in any sequence to sound good but be without any
useful meaning ..
The use of this language is not
revealing anything of the speaker or of the issue at hand.
Much of our personal daily language
is not revealing of ourselves to each other.
Where would Jung be ... ?
.. fear of exposing ourselves.
(See "Background
Briefing" about psycho-pathology among managers)
A potted history ...
Russell mears & William James:
"Understanding Self Journal"
John McMurray Philosopher - A huge
influence.
How we've seen ourselves in the
European West, since the Renaissance
Rise of modern science.
To think of ourself as "a
thing"
"I think, therefore I am"
A cute field between self as a
thinker, and the world as an object of the thinking.
After the breakdown of the
Mediaeval period ...
developed an extraodinary culture
From an epistomological unit of God
/ Church / Commoners hierarchy, which had a sense of order.
Reformation was the start of the
breakdown of this: Everyone can have their own direct relationship with God -
Their own ideas.
Trying to understand ourselves.
Descartes - The Goodness of God
We became cut off from the world
around us under the duality of Descartes.
Certain knowledge had to be framed
in a certain way
Science found its knowledge in a
certain way
A knowing subject
"Cannot have real knowledge
perverted by mere feelings!"
"Get human consciousness out
of it, to get certainty!"
The nature of science is that the human
self is removed from it - seeking objectivity!
The more that we can feel that it
is objective, the more we can be certain about it.
The moral? of subjective response
to life
Science, to be true to itself, must
remain open to new evidence, to ditch its favourite theories!
The Cartesian formula enables
removal of self.
The self is a very isolated
thinking being.
The hing we're most assured of is
our own existence.
Totally isolated in our reflective
selves ...
Next major development
Science move from physical world,
applying scientific method to living organisms - Evolution.
Next major shift: Conception of the
Self.
The German romanticist Russeau
considered self as an organism - Darwin's Theory of Evolution
Etiology: A developing process towards
an end ... ?
Brings in the feeling side of the
human self: Mankind as not just thinkers, but also as feelers.
Determine value - sense of an
"end"
Theory of Evolution has put us back
...
Science retains that sense of
objectivity
We're still locked in that
developmental concept of the Self
Produces a different understanding
of our place on the planet.
If, as a society, we're developing
towards some ultimate goal ("The good life" (alone or together?) )
Communism (and Fascism?) - An
organic model.
Marx believed that "the good
life" could be had now.
Feeling-based concepts: harmony,
beauty ...
Also at the heart of liberal
democracy: an individual version of totalitarianism: More power and wealth, a
privatised version ...
More adequate than a religious
conception of the self ?
Science from mid 19th. Century,
particularly when it became to be supported of a form of logic labelled
"Logical Positivism" said "If it's not scientific, don't worry
about it!"
The great incarnation of science is
technology.
Not knowledge from relationships,
but highly impersonal.
Ultimate outcome of this: When we
lose connection with the world.
Martin Luthur was very aware that
we are slipping under the "I-It" relationship.
Personal community is being lost
from our society. Allows us to be real
persons, to grow, to transcend ...
Freud
Has an interesting place in the
story
With psychology, the whole process
of development of science reaches its chrisis??? because in Psychology, we're
making the self the subject of study.
because it's scientific, we've got
to get the self out of it
Jaynes(?) (Head of Psychology at harvard) was not enamoured? by
experimental psychology
Was an acute observer of human
beings - Introspective insight
Why is behaviourism a legitimate
science?
How to take the phenomenon of
consciousness out of science?
Consciousness is intensional;
everything I experience is intensional, meaning is not in itself but in the
item.
eg the doors at the Capitol Theatre
at manuka carried meanings
(People rushed for them, had to
push down the bar to open .. )
All consciousness carries a
personal meaning!
Problem: A personal meaning vs
reality?
Psychology tends to impute mdels
and run experiments to test them.
Freud attempted the impossible in
Psych, to find a way to connect personal meaning to a scientific explanation.
Wanted to be a "biologist of
the mind" to bridge the gap.
He knew that he would have to have
a base outside consciousness to set up an explanatory system.
ie: Drives and Instincts: A
hypothesis that is more fundamental than consciousness that has personal
meaning ...
But gave up personal meaning to the
individual, it was now universalised.
(eg anything sticking up in the air
was a phalus)
One of the problems with Freud is
that intension comes from the conscious ?
When we thing of ourselves, it
takes explanation ...
Puts a lot of power in the hearts
of psychoanalysts
"I
just can't help you if you're not willing to change ..."
This is similar to religion -
Explain in terms of the interpretive world.
"Get out of
here, Sinner ... ! "
The truth of ourselves lies outside
ourselves -
Just about every feeling has been
mapped into some part of the brain>
"God lives in the right
pre-frontal cortex"
Conflict between Science and The
Arts:
We talk about "our seratonin
levels" - Use objective language.
Freudian analyst will refer to our
lives in terms of drives and instincts.
The growth of an inner life:
-
Not using labels, but
-
Finding language to express our really-truly selves!
Jung
Wanted to be thought of as a
scientist
Concept of the archetype: Something
you can identify in your own inner-life, not just a concept.
Best therapy is not in explaining
the concept, but explaining and discovering an experience!
Have I experienced an archetype, eg
a God-Experience - Something powerful and frightening - ????????
When God delas with you, He doesn't
push you around - A psychotic episode, or on the inside of an archetype
If you sit outside - use labels -
like Freud ..
So Jung sits somewhere in the
middle
Carl Rogers gave away Freud's
instincts and works with feelings.
Not out of publicised explanatory
concepts, but by direct experience of the inner life
operated in a psycho-analytic world
...
An adequate concept of the human
soul that takes adequate account of feelings etc to provide a framework for
education etc.
What distinguishes us as human
beings is not that we can act rationally, but that we can think rationally ! ??
We need to grapple with our
language. Words act strongly in our
lives, and to be sensitive to when we're using a pseudo-language rather than
truly revealing ourselves.
Stoicism:
Sets up a dichotomy between
"Reason" and "Passions"
Some denominations cannot trust
true feelings.
As a soul, we cannot be complete
without account of the feelings.
Feelings as a genuine source of
knowledge
There is nothing more banal than an
intellectual commenting on a painting - eg Geoffrey Smart on Radio National.
I go around looking for emotional
connection.
Scientific method: Gave us a way to
test our thoughts against reality.
If the connection works, then I've
got TRUTH!
There is nothing wrong with objectivity
as such, only when it becomes totally impersonal, and we get cut off.
If I'm feeling something, it may be
totally egocentric, or it may be that I'm reading someone else's feelings ...
Need to test, and if I get a match,
then I'm cooking with gas ...
Maturity: That's how we operate:
Our experiences matches reality.
We need better concepts of the
self, called to individuality, we don't have any option.
Have feelings about "the
other" - Test them!
"Love"
Nice feeling - Motivated by who the
other person is.
S.method: The pattern of life is a constant process of engagement and
withdrawal. It one is really hurt by
the engagement, one may withdraw for ever!
The whole idea of psychotherapy
(about relationships):
* No research
* Doesn't think like that ..
How to monitor if language is
authentic?
* Does it carry inner depth?
* Seratonin is not suitable as a demon!
There is a mythalogical side to
Science!
*** * ***
Somehow the base of our experience is
how we experience what goes on inside ourselves.
Often this takes the form of
poetry, metaphore.
When this occurs effectively it is
very helpful.
Stories are so important about real
communication
Religion and mysticism are at a low
ebb in our society.
A community that is trusting enough
for us to reveal something of ourselves allows us to self-transcend, to grow
...
That's what we need!
We need to abandon the concept of
"scientific proof" - recognise the mythological basis of Science.
The apotheosis of Science -
careless language:
* Science has shown such-and-such"
* Canberra Decided ...
The more we can give effective
language to inner states the better, because then we can stand in an objective
stance to reality.
Children start to do this at about
18 mths. old.
Without this language, the child
stands to have serious developmental problems.
The basis of our behaviours, as
opposed to out actions, is learned rather than instinctual.
Personal community happens from time
to time in the Church.
What about the Buddhist conception
of the transience and meaninglessness of earthly things"
Dichotomy of thoughts-feelings
Etiology: Study of causation
Does God live in the right
pre-frontal cortex?
God lives in the right, pre-frontal
cortex of our brain. Objective brain
language is chasing-out inner feeling and spiritual language. How can we assert that equal validity of
other forms of knowledge alongside the scientific, which keeps alive our rich
and cultural heritage?
(Updated 06/08/2005)