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> every argument I've read so far triggered my "religious/spiritual mumbo jumbo" detector quite hard. Agreed. Sounds like a number of people have found a spir

> every argument I've read so far triggered my "religious/spiritual mumbo jumbo" detector quite hard. Agreed. Sounds like a number of people have found a spiritual way to look at this, which seems a bit like a kind of quasi-religion, similar to the mystical aspects of Zen or yoga. You wrote that? What I don’t think is healthy to new ideas is bashing anything seemed spiritual with rationality and science. They can coexist just fine so long as either side isn’t too dogmatic. Personally, I think it's too common that people conflate spirituality and religion with shady institutions, which exist just as much in science and engineering as anywhere else.

TeMPOraL 3y ago
I don't think ideas need to be bashed just because they seem spiritual, or are presented in such terms. The idea may be good, and my disliking a particular flavor of explanation could be like me disliking a particular physics textbook - the information is good, just the style doesn't resonate. But it's a different case where you have a whole thread of comments that reject out of hand the obvious framework of thinking that yields good results and good predictions, to replace it with a more fuzzy framework of thinking that goes against observable evidence, and recounting stories of "getting it" after meditation or doing yoga for 5 years or such. It's one thing to enjoy and recommend different kinds of experiences of self, and we know the mind is quite malleable in that regard. But the brain/body split isn't just an experience, it's an actual model that's useful in dealing with objective reality. If someone is trying to replace that with some embodied wholesome "me is my body" or "me is universe" view, then that is pushing spiritual mumbo jumbo into scientific and pragmatic areas of life, where it doesn't belong. And if someone bashes people for having that more mechanistic/objective model inform their perception of self, then... well... when did it become bad to look at the world with clear eyes instead of having your head in the clouds? Or is it the dreaded, bad, no-good "Western philosophy" again?

TeMPOraL 3y ago

I don't think ideas need to be bashed just because they seem spiritual, or are presented in such terms. The idea may be good, and my disliking a particular flavor of explanation could be like me disliking a particular physics textbook - the information is good, just the style doesn't resonate. But it's a different case where you have a whole thread of comments that reject out of hand the obvious framework of thinking that yields good results and good predictions, to replace it with a more fuzzy framework of thinking that goes against observable evidence, and recounting stories of "getting it" after meditation or doing yoga for 5 years or such. It's one thing to enjoy and recommend different kinds of experiences of self, and we know the mind is quite malleable in that regard. But the brain/body split isn't just an experience, it's an actual model that's useful in dealing with objective reality. If someone is trying to replace that with some embodied wholesome "me is my body" or "me is universe" view, then that is pushing spiritual mumbo jumbo into scientific and pragmatic areas of life, where it doesn't belong. And if someone bashes people for having that more mechanistic/objective model inform their perception of self, then... well... when did it become bad to look at the world with clear eyes instead of having your head in the clouds? Or is it the dreaded, bad, no-good "Western philosophy" again?