Some interesting correspondence on world views, altered states, animism, materialism, suppression of the bright shadow, Dismissive Materialism, etc. that, with Matt Colborn’s permission, I’m sharing. 3-17-11 Hi Charles – I’ve just been doing some corrections to the manuscript of my book Pluralism and the Mind and as a result been thinking a lot about different [...]
Continue reading about World Views, Animism, Dismissive Materialism
Many of you know that one of my primary interests is building bridges between first-class science and first-class spirituality, so they can stimulate each other. My The End of Materialism book in 2009 was a major effort in this direction, arguing that, given scientific evidence, it is reasonable to be both scientific and spiritual in [...]
Continue reading about Toward An Evidence-Based Spirituality for the 21st Century
I will be offering a basic parapsychology class online for the first time at ITP in the Winter quarter of 2011. For those who are interested in a good reading list on parapsychology or an idea of what my course is like, I have included a shortened (leaving out stuff about writing standards for student [...]
Continue reading about Parapsychology Class at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology
My wife Judy and I are at a 10-day Tibetan Buddhist retreat in San Diego this week (November 26 through December 6, 2010), run by Lama Sogyal Rinpoche and his Rigpa Fellowship organization. We’ve been coming to these retreats for more than 20 years, and I have enormous respect for Rinpoche’s knowledge and compassion. But [...]
As part of the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology’s planned revisions to make our accredited PhD program more accessible to graduate students who cannot afford to come full time to a residency program for several years, we are thinking about offering some of our courses online, so a student could have more flexible timing each week [...]
Continue reading about Basic Parapsychology Course may be offered online
In a discussion groups of parapsychologists I host, we’ve been thinking about why religion, Western religion in particular, is often against the paranormal. There are a couple of obvious reasons, such as an establishment of priests (human being with their own hopes and fears) not wanting possible competition from people directly dealing with spiritual and [...]
Continue reading about Religion: Toward Evidence-Based Spirituality
Recently I asked my old friend and leading transpersonal psychologist Arthur Deikman to look over the draft of an article I will be submitting to the journal Subtle Energies, based on my Presidential address earlier this year for ISSSEEM (The International Society for the Study of Subtle Energies and Energy Medicine), where I advocate that [...]
Continue reading about Why Am I Trying to Bridge Science and Spirituality?
My recent interview on the Buddhist Geeks web radio show (www.buddhistgeeks.com), noting scientific evidence for a Buddhist idea like reincarnation, has resulted in some spirited comments on their website. I think my response to these, dealing with the nature of science and whether there is really scientific evidence for something like reincarnation or whether science [...]
Continue reading about Buddhism, Reincarnation, Science, Parapsychology
I have been having a discussion with some parapsychologist colleagues about whether or not the existence of psi argues for a duality of existence in the world, a “spiritual” level or reality as I argue in my recent The End of Materialism book. Some argue that materialism will eventually explain psi, while I call that [...]
Continue reading about Promissory Materialism, “God of the Gaps,” and Pragmatic Interactive Dualism
I recently received a most surprising email from a young man from abroad, I’ll call him Aaron, regarding my recent book, The End of Materialism: How Evidence of the Paranormal is Bringing Science and Spirit Together. He wanted my permission to pirate it! Here’s his email, and my response. Interesting…. name: Aaron email: topic: Piracy [...]
Continue reading about Letter from a Polite Pirate on “The End of Materialism”