“The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical.
It is the power of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger,
who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead.” - Albert Einstein.
Mysticism and reported mystical experiences, like claims of becoming one with a God or
absolute reality, are often dismissed today as interesting, but ultimately
unimportant events fully explained by neurological processes in the brain.
However, mystical events, whether real or fictional, have significantly shaped the course
of human history. All the world’s major religions have started from reported mystical experiences
such as the angel Gaberial manifesting in front of the
virgin mary or the Buddha experiencing intial nirvana under the Bodhi tree.
Mystical experiences have been reported to radically alter the trajectory of
experiencers’ lives, in many cultures and societies, including the non-religious.
Plus, if just naturalistic neural events in the brain fully explain
all mystical experiences, this raises a philosophical question.
Does identifying neural correlates of mystical experiences prove they are
mere naturalistic brain events or does it just identify the brain
activity that occurred during a genuine mystical experience?
Regardless of epistemology, should we put more effort into understanding and
experiencing these events to improve our well-being if they indeed, as reported,
radically change the way we view our life?
This video will serve as a brief introduction to the philosophy and
psychology of mysticism. In it we’ll cover what mystical experiences are,
explore their categories and attributes, examine how beneficial they are, and if they can serve
as a doorway to something about reality beyond our comprehension we should seriously explore.
So first, what exactly is mysticism, and what is a mystical experience?
Mysticism is a group of practices, discourses, texts, institutions, traditions,
and experiences that may refer to any kind of transformative or altered state of consciousness.
According to philosopher Jerome Gellman, a mystical experience can be thought of in a wide
and narrow sense. The wide sense definition is: a (purportedly) super sense-perceptual or sub
sense-perceptual experience granting acquaintance of realities or states of affairs that are of a
kind not accessible by way of sense perception, somatosensory modalities (denoting a sensation
such as pressure, pain, or warmth which can occur anywhere in the body), or standard introspection.
What does this mean? By the term super sense-perceptual we’re
talking about a sense experience not appropriate to the regular way
we normally sense things. We’re talking about something otherworldly,
beyond our physical understanding of reality, such as Mary witnessing an angel. Sub sense-perceptual
means we’re experiencing an a-typical conscious event, but there’s no otherworldly
experience or phenomena occurring. In fact, we’re not even fully aware of specific thougts,
concepts, or objects anymore. Think of a state of pure consciousness where thoughts and the
sense of a self drops away, such as those reported by experienced Buddhist meditators.
The narrow definition is; A (purportedly) super sense-perceptual or sub sense-perceptual
unitive experience granting acquaintance of realities or
states of affairs that are of a kind not accessible by way of sense-perception,
somatosensory modalities, or standard introspection.
The only difference here is the word ‘unitive’, which refers to an often-discussed subclass of
mystical experience where the sense of a self fades away and the experiencer has a nonduastic
‘one-ness’. Examples include in the Christian mystical tradition a friar forming a union with
God or in the Hindu tradition atman, or our soul, becoming Brahman or ultimate reality.
In both uses of the term, the mystical experience can be both religious or non-religious.
Individuals have reported a variety of mystical experiences
in all types of cultures throughout human history.
For example, Joan of Arc at a young age began hearing voices of Saints
and believed God chose her to lead France to victory over England. She was so convinced,
Charles of Valois allowed her to lead the county’s army to victory in Orleans.
Mystic and polymath Hildegard of Bingen wrote about 10 mystical visions,
including a mystical experienced described similar to an ecstatic loss of consciousness,
in her visionary work Liber Divinorum Operum. She believed these visions helped
illustarte the relationship between God and his creation with humankind as the pinnacle.
Philosopher Henry David Thoreau seemed to
experience a benevolent oneness with nature in Walden writing;
“I was suddenly sensible of such sweet and beneficent society in Nature,
in the very pattering of the drops, and in every sight and sound around my house,
an infinite and unaccountable friendliness all at once, like an atmosphere, sustaining me…
Every little pine-needle expanded and swelled with sympathy and befriended me.
I was so distinctly made aware of the presence of
something kindred to me, that I thought no place could ever be strange to me again."
Mystical events have been reported in the 20th and 21st centuries, too. ,Albert Einstein,
a self-described agnostic and denier of any sort of afterlife, wrote about
mystical experiences in which one feels oneness with the universe.
“Still there are moments when one feels free from one’s own identification with human limitations
and inadequacies. At such moments, one imagines that one stands on some spot of a small planet,
gazing in amazement at the cold yet profoundly moving beauty of the eternal, the unfathomable:
life and death flow into one, and there is neither evolution nor destiny; only being.”
Reported events and practices of mysticism have
existed for centuries around many cultures and societies.
For example, practices like Shamanism purposely facilitate mystical events in individuals.
Evidence shows that shamans, or priests who communicate directly with plant spirits,
in Mexico, Peru, Brazil, and more worked with naturally occurring
psychedelic substances like Ayahuasca for therapeutic healing reasons.
Also, Buddhists for centuries have sought to achieve mystical-type experiences
through meditation practice with the four jhana states. Jhanas have been described
in the Pali Canon as trance-like states of deep peace completely without desire
and craving. The fourth jhana state includes a feeling of "pure equanimity
and mindfulness" (upekkhāsatipārisuddhi), with the self fading away to pure consciousness.
So, getting more specific, what do philosophers specify as the types and attributes of mystical
experiences? William James, dubbed the father of American Psychology, wrote
the first serious work on mystical experiences titled The Varieties of Religious Experience.
It assigned several characteristics to mystical experiences,
two of the most important being ‘noetic’ and ‘ineffable’.
Noetic means the experience involves knowledge of what a subject apprehends, whether it comes at the
time of the experience or later. Ineffable means the experience is indescribable to others. Think,
‘you had to be there to see it’. Of course, there appears to be a logical contradiction. As stated
by St. Augustine, “God should not be said to be ineffable, for when this is said something
is said. And a contradiction in terms is created, since if that is ineffable which cannot be spoken,
then that is not ineffable which is called ineffable”
Basically, how can we say a mystical experience is ineffable when using the
term ineffable to describe the very experience? Plus, how can we be sure we received knowledge
from an experience that’s ineffable in itself. Isn’t this sort of a paradox?
Well, there are some initial responses.
First, suppose the experience is of the sub sense-perceptual experience
where there is no indescribable phenomenological material present. In that case, it may be able
to be described by natural means even though there is an indescribable feeling toward it.
Another is to apply first-order attribution and labels to the experience and have ineffability
a second-order term about specific first-order terms.
Another philosopher William Alston states that the term ‘ineffable’ actually refers to the
difficulty of literally describing the experience, rather than by metaphor, analogy, and symbols.
Think of hearing a strange new piece of music. The experience is ineffable,
but we can use metaphors and analogies like ‘dark and mysterious’ to help someone else understand.
Effable is just a term William James used to help us begin thinking about mystical
events, and many of these experiences or parts of them may be describable.
So, scholars have set out to understand these experiences
by assigning them certain attributes and categorizing them.
Scholars, including James, began attempting to understand mystical events
from the ‘perennialist’s approach.’ This means to separate a mystical event from its historical
and cultural context. Perennialists believe mystical experiences all point to one
universal transcendental reality. These experiences should be privatized
and separated from the historical and cultural context they emerged.
Philosophers have several categories to help classify types of mystical experiences.
Perannialist philosopher Walter Terence Stace, in his book Mysticism and Philosophy (1960),
distinguished two types of mystical experience: extrovertive and introvertive. Extrovertive
mysticism is an experience of the unity of the external world where objects and concepts exist.
Introvertive mysticism is an experience of unity devoid of perceptual objects; it is literally an
experience of nothing being there. There are no objects, concepts, thoughts during this type of
event. We look inward, not outward. However, there is debate if inward mystical experiences
exist as it seems a full emptying out of experiences would be pure unconsciousness.
Another is dualistic vs. monistic. With dualistic, there is still
a subjective and object such as God and the mystic observing God. Monist is the
self of self dissolves and there is absolute unity of everything.
R. C. Zaehner identified three types of mystical consciousness: (1) “panenhenic”,
meaning an extrovertive experience of oneness of nature with one’s self included, (2) “monistic,
meaning an experience of an undifferentiated unity transcending space and time, and (3) theistic,
meaning an experience where there is a duality between subject and the object
of the experience i.e. seeing an angel. However, scholars are abandoning the
perannialist strategy for a more contextual and constructivist approach. Constructivism has to do
with the notion that mystical experiences are great, if not fully constructed by the ideas,
symbols, and practices that mystics are familiar with when they occur.
What is being experienced is being determined by the expectations and the conceptual background of
the mystic. Our very culture constructs our mystical event right from the start of it.
Someone in the middle ages in Europe who had a mystical experience would believe the noetic
quality had to do with the Christian God as that was the most rational explanation at the time.
But, scholars poke holes in the constructivist approach to understanding and gaining knowledge
from mystical experiences. For one, how do we fully trust the historical reports of mystical
experiences and traditions for a specific time or culture? The Buddha’s transcendental event
was passed down orally for centuries before it was ever written down,
and Buddhists certainly don’t agree on one canon of literature. Plus, there have
been reported unorthodox or innovative mystical experiences within the traditional mystic culture
such as those by the heretical Meister Eckhart in the Christian tradition. Or what about different
types of religious experiences reported by someone who doesn’t practice religion.
Another type of classification system philosophers are using is inherentism vs attributionism.
Inherentism means the a-typical conscious event itself has some ‘baked-in’ mystical or religious
quality or content to it. At the time of an event, we understand that we’re experiencing a union
with, say, God a universal consciousness. Attributionism contrasts where only after
this ineffable event will we begin to assign meaning to it, such as deeming it religious.
In the book Religious Experience Reconsidered (2009) a leading attributionist scholar Ann Taves
draws upon modern empirical research of the brain to suggest that the mystic initially
experiences what she calls a ‘special’ event, not inherently religious or divine.
Afterward, the noetic content is processed and one may deem it religious.
So perennialism, constructivism, attributionism and others are
interesting ways to begin classifying and understanding mystical experiences.
But, how do we know for sure a mystic truly had, say a divine experience
or made contact with something outside of our current understanding of reality.
If we experience a mystical event ourselves, how do we fully trust the noetic content and
know it’s not our minds playing tricks on us? Even if the divine event seems real beyond a doubt,
that’s not enough to objectively prove it was indeed caused by divine origin.
Is there a solid epistemological framework,
epistemology having to do with the nature and origin of knowledge,
we can use to derive true knowledge from these events and thus understand their true nature?
Well, there have been rationalistic arguments, meaning certain truths exist
and that we can use logically to form correct conclusions that attempt to
show mystical experiences come directly from a God such as the Christian God.
Or, in say, believers in panpsychism come from a universal consciousness substance.
The problem with rationality is that the entities from which mystical experience originates haven’t
been fully proved to exist without a doubt, either using rational or empirical evidence.
So, that leaves empiricism, or sense-experience knowledge,
to attempt to understand mystical events. But, the science of the mind is not a true science and is
subject to pure falsification. We can probably never obtain someone else’s conscious experience
of a mystical event or just regular everyday life. So, we can perhaps use secondary types
of empirical data to form rational guesses at what mystics or ourselves experienced.
One such example may be survey data. Mystical events, after all, are being reported
by many all across the globe today. Buddhists and adapt meditators often report the same sensations
and experiences while meditating without knowing each other. Users of entheogens such as psilocybin
mushrooms report similar mystical feelings and experiences, often correlating with dosage use.
Using technology like MRI or CT scans to understand mystical experiences inside the brain,
scientists could explain the origins and content of such events as naturalistic,
brain-based events. Naturalistic, meaning only thing real is nature
and the known laws of nature—nothing supernatural or otherworldly here.
Increasing research, including that from d’Aquili and Newberg 1993 and 1999, shows that decreased
activity in the temporal lobe could lead to unification-type mystical events. They claim
the temporal lope is involved in the feeling of ‘I’ and generates the feeling of self.
Decreased or cut-off activity can stimulate mystical feelings,
whether from substance use, seizure, or something else.
Long-standing research shows that epileptic seizures are linked to this temporal lope
leading to the thought that epileptic episodes could trigger a mystical one-ness event.
Devinsky, in his work (2003), "Religious experiences and epilepsy",
suggests many religious, mystical figures may have just had epilepsy.
Research from scholar Fabienne Picard suggests that dysfunction in the anterior insula, a part
of the brain involved with aspects of certainty, may be involved in the experience being ineffable,
yet a strong certainty that we experienced something otherworldly.
But, neurological data and theories can do no more than explain what happens in
the brain during a mystical experience, not the specific origin of the event. Perhaps the
CT scan is simply witnessing how the brain acts when influenced from an otherworldly phenomenon.
The truth is, we can’t know for sure, only guess at the cause using what evidence we
have today. After all, if true propositional knowledge does exist, it exists as a degree
of probability. So, to say naturalistic explanations, meaning explanations that only
involve the way scientists think nature and its laws work today, can explain all
mystical-type experiences now and forever is perhaps as unscientific and unphilosophical
as religious zealots claiming all mystical experiences are caused by their particular god.
But, if you’re experiencing what seems like mystical experience or
otherworldly hallucinations, they are probably of brain-based, naturalistic origin. So it’s
best to see a doctor or psychiatrist instead of building that doomsday shelter in your backyard.
Even if mystical events are found to be entirely caused by naturalistic factors in the brain, that
doesn’t mean they’re not of significant importance for us to study and attempt to seek out.
After being shunned as harmful and illegal substances
for decades in the west, psychedelic compounds such as LSD, psilocybin,
DMT, mescaline, and MDMA are starting to be used to treat mental disorders.
John Hopkins, University of California, Berkeley, Yale and other institutions have
established psychedelic and consciousness research divisions. They are beginning to publish studies
showing how these mystical-experience compounds are helping individuals overcome disorders
such as OCD, major depressive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and more.
The induced “mystical experience” is the key part of the individuals overcoming their afflictions,
as noted in studies like those at John Hopkins.
Although the specifics to how these experiences are helping people
appear to increase neuroplasticity, the brain’s ability to reorganize thought patterns, and
increased empathy. These experiences are thought to help perhaps individuals get outside their
stories of anxiety, depression, and trauma and find new ways to process these and overcome them.
Although psychedelics are still highly illegal drugs as of the recording of this video, available
only for qualified therapy candidates now, some have suggested that everyone should participate in
psychedelic therapies and other uses to improve subjective well-being. After all, humanity has
had a tradition going back centuries to bring about mystical experiences for a better life.
If mystical experiences really do bring about such
radical life-changing experiences as reported. Shouldn’t we do a better
job understanding them and learning how to apply them safely to all our lives?
It seems strange that mystical events have had such an importance in almost
every culture and society dating back thousands of years, yet so little is known about them.
So there is far more to the philosophy and psychology of mysticism and mystical experiences.
Let me know what you think of this topic. Have you or anyone you know
had what could be considered a mystical experience?
Do you agree that more effort should be taken to understand these events and allow more people
access to have safe experiences? If you liked thsi video please like it and subscribe for more.