***
It's not just cosmological science that I eagerly misinterpret and/or oversimplify. I also find myself drawn to include findings from biological studies. About a year and half ago, I bought a big biology textbook to use as a sort of grand compendium of possible metaphors and/or symbols. (I haven't read it yet, but it was still a good idea.)
In particular, neuroscience interests me a great deal, at least in the popularized form that I can sort of understand. If I am interested in mind, I can't very well ignore what scientists are discovering about the brain, all of which overflows into the problem of soul and spirit. Currently, my position is that I accept (more or less) the proposition that reality, including consciousness, is founded upon a material basis, but I also keep in mind that (to my understanding) no one quite knows what matter is. So the statement that "all is material" actually points to a lot more mystery, even Mystery, than is commonly allowed.
At any rate, even if mystical experience is fully dependent on the brain, it's still a necessary and (at least sometimes) accurate mode of consciousness—maybe the brain at its peak functioning, in fact.
One thing neuroscience makes clear (at least in my version of it) is that the world we typically experience is like a little movie produced by our brains. It seems to derive from sense perceptions of what is presumably a "real" world, but the version we experience is smoothed out and altered according to our neuropsychic needs. A lot is left out. So, the idea that the world we experience isn't quite reality turns out to have some validity after all.
Anyway, I just like reading this brain stuff. For me, it is a way of resituating Tantric and Romantic ideas about the primacy of imagination in a more securely 21st-century context. What we get is our brain's imagining of life, which, because the brain is part of that life, is life re-imagining life. This makes me happy.
I do think, however, that poets (and other artists) must continue to tap into intuition and imagination directly. Artists should not be mere followers of science; they just should not ignore it. Psyche has its own rules, is its own system, and is more significant, even if not foundational.
And, to be honest, I do suspect there is some sort of energy (or whatever you want to call it) that is unmeasured (and perhaps unmeasurable) by science, which mystics (even if using their brains) can perceive.
Holy! Holy! Holy!
In particular, neuroscience interests me a great deal, at least in the popularized form that I can sort of understand. If I am interested in mind, I can't very well ignore what scientists are discovering about the brain, all of which overflows into the problem of soul and spirit. Currently, my position is that I accept (more or less) the proposition that reality, including consciousness, is founded upon a material basis, but I also keep in mind that (to my understanding) no one quite knows what matter is. So the statement that "all is material" actually points to a lot more mystery, even Mystery, than is commonly allowed.
At any rate, even if mystical experience is fully dependent on the brain, it's still a necessary and (at least sometimes) accurate mode of consciousness—maybe the brain at its peak functioning, in fact.
One thing neuroscience makes clear (at least in my version of it) is that the world we typically experience is like a little movie produced by our brains. It seems to derive from sense perceptions of what is presumably a "real" world, but the version we experience is smoothed out and altered according to our neuropsychic needs. A lot is left out. So, the idea that the world we experience isn't quite reality turns out to have some validity after all.
Anyway, I just like reading this brain stuff. For me, it is a way of resituating Tantric and Romantic ideas about the primacy of imagination in a more securely 21st-century context. What we get is our brain's imagining of life, which, because the brain is part of that life, is life re-imagining life. This makes me happy.
I do think, however, that poets (and other artists) must continue to tap into intuition and imagination directly. Artists should not be mere followers of science; they just should not ignore it. Psyche has its own rules, is its own system, and is more significant, even if not foundational.
And, to be honest, I do suspect there is some sort of energy (or whatever you want to call it) that is unmeasured (and perhaps unmeasurable) by science, which mystics (even if using their brains) can perceive.
Holy! Holy! Holy!
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