Theos-Talk Archives (November 2006 Message tt01216)

Hopefully it helps narrow the gap between scientific knowledge and philosophical  wisdom?  Also I need to get out of the timewarp that currently exists on TW.!
Cass

MarieMAJ41@aol.com wrote:                                   Thank you Cass. I used to subscribe to this magazine, but got behind in my reading and when the subscription was up, I did not renew. Hmm....wonder what the meaning of the timing of your message could be?
 Marie
  
  
  
 -----Original Message-----
 From: silva_cass@yahoo.com
 To: theos-talk@yahoogroups.com
 Sent: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 10:16 PM
 Subject: Theos-World Noetic Science
 
 Marie
 Thought you might enjoy this
 TWM
     
     
       
       
     
     
       Noetic
 Sciences Review,
 Winter 1998 pages 32-33 
 
 What
 Are Noetic Sciences? 
 
 Willis
 Harman
     
     
        
     
     
       What is noetic science and why is it
 important?
 We need to remind ourselves from time to time why this endeavor in
 which
 we have joined seems significant, and to reassess where we are. 
 
 A new science is arising, a science of the human
 mind
 much broader than psychology has been to date. We have called it "noetic"
 science, after the Greek word for intuitive knowing. Perhaps it
 is somewhat inaccurate to speak of it as though it were totally new; it
 might be better to refer to a noetic emphasis in the human sciences.
 But
 the radical nature of the developments should not be underestimated. It
 is the second stage of a two-stage process. 
 
 The first stage, the rise of modern
 materialistic
 science, is one of the most important evolutionary leaps in human
 history.
 Its essence embodies a remarkable proposition, namely that knowledge of
 the objective sense-perceived world should not be based on religious or
 traditional authority, nor the guarded property of an elite priesthood,
 but should be empirically based and publicly verifiable, open and free
 to all. Thus there is not Russian chemistry and American chemistry, or
 Hindu physics and Christian physics. There is only science â?? the best
 framework
 of empirical relationships and conceptual models currently available,
 continuously
 tested in public by agreed-upon procedures. 
 
 The goal of the second stage, just begun, is
 creation
 of a similar body of knowledge, empirically based and publicly
 validated,
 about the realm of subjective experience. For the first time in
 history we are beginning to create a growing, progressively funded body
 of established experience about humanity's inner life â?? and
 particularly
 about the perennial wisdom of
 the
 great religious traditions and gnostic groups. For the first time
 there
 is hope that this knowledge can become â?? not a secret repeatedly lost
 in
 dogmatization and institutionalization, or degenerating into manifold
 varieties
 of cultism and occultism â?? but rather the living heritage of all
 humankind. 
 
 This extension of scientific exploration, which
 we have
 termed noetic, differs from the materialistic science of the
 past in
 a number of ways. It is centrally concerned with subjective
 experience where materialistic science has dealt almost entirely with
 objective,
 sensory experience. To the reductionistic models of materialistic
 science
 it adds holistic models; to deterministic explanations of
 events
 it adds teleological, purpose - recognizing explanations.
 Where
 materialistic science was largely value - inattentive, noetic science
 is
 centrally concerned with value issues. Materialistic science
 has
 tended to test knowledge by noting whether it leads to the ability to
 predict
 and control; while the consensus on validation of noetic sciences has
 not
 yet emerged, it seems clear that it will have more to do with understanding
 than prediction, and more with joining than
 control.Furthermore,
 it seems likely that the noetic sciences will
 evolve in a way quite different from the evolution of materialistic
 science.
 The latter dealt with genuinely new discoveries, and as a result the
 changing
 view of reality in the culture tended to lag behind that of the
 scientists.
 In the case of the new science of subjective experience it is
 otherwise.
 In part, at least, we are dealing here with rediscovery of
 truths
 that in some sense have been discovered over and over again, and have
 left
 their track in the culture more rapidly than in the scientific
 community.
 Changes in the view of reality held in the culture tend to lead to
 corresponding
 changes in the sciences; for example, the role of psychological
 attitudes
 such as faith in healing, and the conviction of spiritual reality that
 comes with certain altered states of consciousness. 
 
 Because the noetic sciences are partially a
 process of
 rediscovery it is possible to anticipate what some of the essential
 characteristics
 will be. The new science is not really new. It is the esoteric
 core
 of all the world's religions, East and West, ancient and modern,
 becoming
 exoteric, "going public." As Aldous Huxley describes this "perennial
 wisdom,"
 it "recognizes a divine Reality substantial to the world of things and
 lives and minds ... finds in the soul something similar to, or even
 identical
 with, divine Reality ... places man's final end in the knowledge of the
 immanent and transcendent God of all Being." 
 
 Whether it is implied by extrapolation from
 biofeedback
 training or psychic phenomena and the evidence for psychosomatic
 origins
 of illness, or whether arising from immediate intuitive experience, the
 fundamental profound insight appears to be recognition that in some
 important
 sense "I am cause and creator." In some sense much more fundamental
 than
 is implied in conventional psychology, our belief systems create our
 reality. 
 
 The fact that the key characteristics of the
 emerging
 knowledge can be anticipated is very significant. It means that there
 is
 no need to wait decades, until the new science begins to take more
 definite
 shape, before beginning to act on its basic principles. The influence
 of
 these principles can be brought to bear on social and business
 decision-making
 right now. 
 
 It is generally recognized that industrialized
 society
 is at a crisis point. Choices relating to energy, environment,
 control
 of technology, growth, employment, land use, economic incentives,
 government
 and business roles, all seem to present more and more unpalatable
 trade-offs,
 and seem in this fact to indicate an underlying fundamental change of
 direction.
 Western political tradition, based in a Judeo-Christian ethic, a force
 that has declined as the industrial-era paradigm has gained in
 influence,
 is wracked with self-doubts. Nation after nation is retreating from
 democracy.
 Contemporary political, economic, environmental, and social crises are
 reflections of an underlying moral and
 spiritual
 crisis of industrial civilization. Their resolution depends on the
 resolution of that crisis. 
 
 A noetic science â?? a science of consciousness
 and
 the world of inner experience â?? is the most promising
 contemporary
 framework within which to carry on that fundamental moral inquiry which
 stable human societies have always had to place at the center of their
 concerns. We do well also to recall that it was this nation more than
 any
 other in recent times which has clearly â?? at its inception â?? given this
 knowledge the capstone position, as symbolized by the All-seeing Eye in
 the Great Seal on the back of the dollar bill. 
 
 Public acceptance of the validity of a noetic
 emphasis
 in the human sciences has been rising. More importantly, there is
 widespread
 recognition of the need for deeper
 understanding
 of our spiritual nature and of the essential goals and
 characteristics
 of a workable humane society.
     
     
       Reprinted from IONS Newsletter, Vol. 6,
 No. 1, Spring
 1978. Willis Harman was president of the Institute of Noetic Sciences
 from
 1978 until his death in 1997.
     
     
       
 
 BACK
       
     
     
        
 
 http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~sai/Noetic_Sci.html
 
 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
 
 Yahoo! Groups Links
 
 __________________________________________________________
 Check out the new AOL.  Most comprehensive set of free safety and security tools, free access to millions of high-quality videos from across the web, free AOL Mail and more.
 
 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
 
 
     
                       

 
---------------------------------
Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]