Greetings.
This message comes to you in the spirit of clarity, and it is my hope it is received as such. My observations are based within the context of just having listened to several Entitled Opinion podcasts, which include three episodes with your friend Thomas, an episode regarding the advent of agriculture, and most recently, an episode on Schrodinger. I enjoyed them very much, as well as benefitted intellectually. I would like to point out a couple of my hesitations regarding your reasoning on the show.
It is evident to me that you strongly adhere to the feelings or notions of wonder, spirituality, transcendence, and mysticism. These terms seem to have their place within certain conversations, but seem out of place when used on your show. By out of place I mean used as antonyms to science, reductionism, reason, etc. I infer that the framework for your understanding of science does not include wonderment, spirituality, etc. It seems as though if one were able to explain existence and experience in scientific terms, beauty and wonder would vanish. On the contrary, I submit to you that beauty, wonder, and feelings of transcendence can flourish just as wildly regardless of being a reduction-bent mad scientist or a boxcar-jumping poet. Once a month, I find myself floating in the tropical waters of the Gulf of Thailand. The "transcendent" experience that occurs, to me, is indescribable and inexplicable. If God or neuroscientist Sam Harris raced to my location to interrupt my experience of wholeness and bliss in order to explain why this experience is occurring, I would would kindly offer them both a "thanks, but maybe later, for the validity and joy of my ethereal experience does not rely upon having a scientific or mystical reason." Later at the beachside cafe, I imagine hearing Sam's neurologically-based explantation, as well as God's spiritual one--neither amplifying or muffling what had occurred while floating in the sea. Because an orgasm can be explained in scientific terms doesn't negate the fantastic adjectives the poets ascribe to it. Let the poets and scientists wax on as humanity revels in their experiences and existence.
There seems to be a nebulous quality in the idea of mysticism, spirituality, and magic that lends itself to an opposition of scientific understanding. For quite some time, I have sought out the reason for such interest in things that are magical, spiritual, and mystical. The best I can come up with is that the commonalities which ties these ideas together is ignorance: a lack of understanding causes. There is something so attractive about experiencing an unexplainable phenomenon such as ESP or "divine revelations". Would such phenomena be as attractive if they could be explained? My observation is that often, a large portion of people don't want to hear scientific reasoning. From this I conclude that many people find some sort of affective utility in all things magical, mystical, or spiritual. I urge audiences to engage the question as to why they so ardently deviate from a data-driven understanding.
I feel it is accurate to point out that science does not provide all of the answers. However, is it really such a bad place to start? Let's explore our unexplainable experiences through a variety of lenses and filters. Let's engage how these experiences may be linked to unobservable entities. In an attempt to achieve a deeper and more accurate relationship with reality, experience, and existence, it is my hope that the experiencer refrain from patterns of thought that lend to cognitive dissonance and slippery and disjointed scaffolding. I don't feel that science and scientifically-minded individuals will every be able to claim the peak of Complete Understanding, and it would be arrogant to do so. Let's make the same point clear to our mystics, scribes, messiahs, and the people who buy their books.
On a more specific note, you quoted Sherington on a recent broadcast: The mind has no native home in the brain. I would like to know how accurate that statement is when a very small parts of the brain, like the Brocca's region, can get damaged and result in very profound loss of cognitive ability. Minor physical damage to the brain often results in loss of very profound and "unexplainable" cognitive faculties such as memory, emotion, etc. How does Sherington's statement remain accurate today? Sherington's statement seemed to be used by you as ammunition against science, and as a tool for mysticism. If that was in fact your intension, I hope you bring your intension under further scrutiny. (In addition, would it really be so bad if consciousness could one day be explained in reductionist terms? Would our wonderment and joy cease to thrive in the presence of empiricism and scientific methodology? Would the poets and clergy go mute, the passion for life evaporate?)
I eagerly look forward to further broadcasts of Entitled Opinions. Please keep them coming.
