Van: "Integral World" Aan: Onderwerp: Meaning and Purpose Datum: zondag 13 april 2014 16:34 INTEGRAL WORLD MAILING LIST =========================== http://www.integralworld.net Newsletter Nr. 499 Amsterdam, April 13rd, 2014 UNDERSTANDING THE IMPROBABLE - Exploring Jeffrey Kripal's Supernatural Challenge - DAVID CHRISTOPHER LANE & ANDREA DIEM-LANE Jeffrey Kripal's recent article, "Visions of the Impossible: How 'fantastic' stories unlock the nature of consciousness" for the Chronicle of Higher Education has caused a minor stir amongst academics for its positive slant on paranormal experiences. Jerry Coyne writing for the New Republic has penned a scathing critique of Kripal's piece entitled, "Science is Being Bashed by Academics Who Should Know Better". Coyne summarizes Kripal's overall thesis in just two sentences: “People have had weird experiences, like dreaming in great detail about something happening before it actually does; and because these events can't be explained by science, the most likely explanation is that they are messages from some non-material realm beyond our ken. If you combine that with science's complete failure to understand consciousness, we must conclude that naturalism is not sufficient to understand the universe, and that our brains are receiving some sort of 'transhuman signals.'” Read more: http://www.integralworld.net/lane71.html LIFE, DEATH, MEANING, AND PURPOSE - ELLIOT BENJAMIN Sometimes I wonder if I lack a gene, or perhaps have an extra gene, that makes me “different” from other people. I never learned how to make chit-chat small talk, I never got the hang of picking up girls at bars, and parties where you just go around and get into conversations with everybody were always very uncomfortable for me. In a similar way, I wonder if I am just missing something here—or perhaps having too much of something here—when I read essays like David Lane's recent Integral World essay Understanding the Improbable (written with Andrea Diem-Lane) where they strongly defend having a materialistic view of the world as being at least as, if not more, “meaningful” than having a spiritual view of the world. Read more: http://www.integralworld.net/benjamin64.html To SUBSCRIBE to this Integral World Newsletter or change your email address, click here: http://www.integralworld.net/pommo/user/subscribe.php To UNSUBSCRIBE, update your account by logging in. For explanation, see: http://www.integralworld.net/nl_faq.html