Philosophical Speculations

And from the beginning Sam Harris has articulated why 'new-atheists' is a horrible term. He's articulated why 'atheist' isn't his preference for framing his particular arguement against the notion of a God up in the Sky who controls things. And, to boot, Sam Harris has explained in detail why he ch...

Lots of posts are missing here, but I just wanted to update things: Bernardo is now publically claiming that Sam Harris is acting free from an Eastern tradition and just teaching that meditation is to make us calm and feel good. Trust me, you can love Bernardo and his work and be very curious as to...

Must this dead horse really be beaten again? We must guard against disrespectful, disparaging, and criticizing thoughts. We must try to practice reverence and devotion in our thinking at all times. Rudolf Steiner Context. Thinking. Discernment. The borders of these other special sciences must be cr...

The whole enigma lies in inner utterances of the kind "... nothing but consciousness arranging itself". It is quite clear that as long as we speak this thought in our mind, it is inevitable the we objectify consciousness - we're creating thought-image of consciousness that thinking contem...

So the percept and concept are ideal in essence, as both essentially reflect inner meaning. Thanks Ashvin. From what I've read (which is limited), Steiner doesn't come out and say that percepts are ideal. But I'll lock your response here as part of the jigsaw puzzle. I look forward to your next ess...

Hi guys: Let me preface this by saying when it comes to intellectual discussion (I know there's a lot of intuition involved here but there's a lot of surface intellect as well; not a criticism or judgment just an observation) my interest is almost entirely in challenging the materialist view - whic...

Dana, It could be helpful if you pointed to a specific timestamp in the video where this idea is discussed. Well the excerpt from The Life Divine is about the threefold process by which the soul completely emerges in its human expression, to which the entire passage is pertinent. So an excerpt of t...

Ashvin, thanks for the post previous to this, which I found helpful ... I'm also curious as to what the proponents of Steiner might make of this from Aurobindo on the soul's complete emergence ... Dana, It could be helpful if you pointed to a specific timestamp in the video where this idea is discu...

Thanks for adding this, Dana. After browsing the link, it seems like Aurobindo is generally describing the polar essence of Reality (One-many), which we often comment on here. Steiner also discusses the polarities of spiritual essence and evolution at length in various places. I will have to take a...

Another of Don's criticisms of Steiner is that, I quote, "he doesn't seem to understand much if at all about the One and the Many or That which is beyond both" , which is a key understanding at the core of Aurobindo's explication of 'exclusive concentration' in The Life Divine . So along ...