The Mystic way of knowing (for the skeptics)

[Howard Is]

The views that I and many other mystics are offering are very relevant to science. Eastern thought focuses on the nature of consciousness. This is the same focus of many scientists, and they have not explained consciousness. An increasing number of scientists consult with the Dalai Lama and other mystics so this should tell you something.

You also call the Eastern approach "subjective". The subjectivity in meditation is very different from the subjectivity you refer to. In the Western thought, subjectivity is limited to "mind", like the thoughts and feelings. In meditation, the experience is personal or private but it is not associated with the mind.

I have been a meditator for fifty years. Meditation is a central aspect of my life.

I also have a scientific mind, and have worked developing digital technologies.

Meditation is not in the same domain as science.

Your claims are just silly.

 

[dybmh]

Thanks for the reference.


Interesting way of looking at it. I am not a philosopher so I can't break down what knowledge means. I can say that you can't have knowledge without awareness.

The difference, I think, is certainty.

Knowledge requires it; awareness doesn't.

If you go back and look at the article in the OP and listen to the way it describes 'knowledge' ( see below ), I think you will see what I mean..

"The first and most direct outcome of the moment of illumination is belief in the possibility of a way of knowledge"

Notice the uncertainty? It's a "belief in the possibility".

Immediately after this first sentence, the author shifts from the word, "knowledge" to "intuition". And then result of this intuition is described as:
"a conception of a Reality"
"thinly veiled by the shows of sense"
"intellectual sympathy"
"inexpressible"

Even if the spiritual world is leaping towards the human psyche ( as the article suggests ), it's still a conception, veiled ( albeit thinly ), requires sympathy intellectually, and is inexpressible. All of those describe something which is uncertain in the material world.

Awareness of this "inexpressible Reality" is perhaps the best that the the human brain can accomplish. And that brings us back to knowledge vs. awareness.

Scientists would probably define knowledge as "certain". But awareness doesn't require it. Compare an electronic smoke detector to the human sense of smell. The smoke detector is certain. The human sense of smell isn't. And that's why the word knowledge is not ideal in this context if scientists are the audience. A scientist is expecting knowledge to maintain a standard of certainty that is not included in the mystical approach described in the OP. A scientist intends to develop a smoke detector which will work every time. And a scientist/engineer is able to design an electronic smoke detector that is, indeed, certain to detect smoke. This is because they are certain that they know the mechanisms involved in the design. They have certain knowledge. Or more simply, just 'knowledge'.

But, please understand. The mystical approach has its benefits too. Who knows what amazing discovers could be made by cultivating the inborn human sense of smell? Maybe it could lead to massive advances in medicine? There's potential for huge rewards... but... it's uncertain.

That's why I think the word awareness is better fit. It's not really about defining knowledge philosophically. It's about speaking to your audience in a language that is easily understood. Is the audience a scientist? Then knowledge implies certainty.

Does that help?

 

[George-ananda]

I'll wait for you to actually interact with the substance of the critiques. Dr. Ryman identifies multiple basic flaws in both Schwartz's methodology and his interpretation of results.



I eagerly wait for such debate.

I have seen Schwartz's responses to the critics and I am not going to re-live that tangent here again. I think Schwartz as an academician can handle the debates for himself.

At some point what becomes important to me is the consideration of the source. I believe people that write for things like Skeptic's Dictionary start with the task of providing the best materialist attack on anyone or anything suggesting the reality of the paranormal. I'll consider what these skeptics say but I also 'consider the source'.

What kind of "reasoned analysis" of such anecdotes would you do that's not scientific? What methodology do you use to select the anecdotes? What methodology do you use to analyze them?



"Proof" is the stuff of math and logic. In science we look at evidence and our conclusions are probabilistic. I'm, again, fascinated to hear what non-scientific analysis you do to reach conclusions beyond a reasonable doubt.

It's just reasoned analysis that I use that takes everything into consideration and forms a judgment. Reasoned analysis is much like what a jury does when coming to a verdict on criminal case for example.

That's always going to be the case with magic/God/the supernatural, because by definition those explanations can break any known rules of how the world works, so they can therefore be used to explain literally any data. That's why explanatory power is not enough to establish that a model is more accurate than its competitors. Models have to be falsifiable.

If this reality is non-physical then by definition science will never and can never detect it. So again, how did you determine it's there?



Science is not merely restricted to the physical "at this time," it's restricted to the physical by definition.

When you describe an explanation that operates exactly how magic is supposed to, as an unfalsifiable catch-all that defies physical laws and can literally explain any data, then I'm going to continue calling it magic. It's not derogatory, it's accurate. ​

At this time I am not claiming a model that is testable and falsifiable. I am not doing hard science. What I am doing is looking at all things and forming a judgment as to what is most reasonable to believe.

Oh come on.

Can you imagine how amazing it would be if people could actually read other people's minds, or talk to dead people? I'd be thrilled! We would never have another cold case ever again. Innocent people would never languish in prison under false charges. Guilty people would never get off scott free.

My skepticism has nothing to do with not wanting these things to be true. It has to do with these claims not passing basic scientific scrutiny.

There you are making an assumption that if certain psychic abilities exist that they can be perfectly honed to have binding legal status even. The reality is that these certain psychic abilities you mentioned are real but not sufficiently honed for the practical applications you talk about.

 

[QuestioningMind]

We have flying planets and you don't call that magic? Magic is the mother of science. The whole cosmos is magical.

You have a rather bizarre definition for magic, since most people I know consider 'magic' to be a force or power that defies the physical laws of nature. Planets following orbits does not defy the physical laws of nature, thus most people don't consider it to be 'magic'. .

 

[Milton Platt]

In another discussion, I tried to introduce my idea that scientists need to accept Eastern thought. The consequence of not doing this would leave science without answers to the big questions, the origin and nature of Universe, life, and consciousness. A lot of misunderstanding of my view seems to be centered around how the Eastern approach leads to "knowledge". I will explain further by reference to a good article on Mysticism vs. Reason.

This is taken from Bertrand Russel's essay, Mysticism and Logic.
"The first and most direct outcome of the moment of illumination is belief in the possibility of a way of knowledge which may be called revelation or insight or intuition, as contrasted with sense, reason, and analysis, which are regarded as blind guides leading to the morass of illusion. Closely connected with this belief is the conception of a Reality behind the world of appearance and utterly different from it. This Reality is regarded with an admiration often amounting to worship; it is [10]felt to be always and everywhere close at hand, thinly veiled by the shows of sense, ready, for the receptive mind, to shine in its glory even through the apparent folly and wickedness of Man. The poet, the artist, and the lover are seekers after that glory: the haunting beauty that they pursue is the faint reflection of its sun. But the mystic lives in the full light of the vision: what others dimly seek he knows, with a knowledge beside which all other knowledge is ignorance.

[…These more or less trite maxims may be illustrated by application to Bergson's advocacy of "intuition" as against "intellect." There are, he says, "two profoundly different ways of knowing a thing. The first [(intellect)] implies that we move round the object: the second [(intuition)] that we enter into it. The first depends on the point of view at which we are placed and on the symbols by which we express ourselves. The second neither depends on a point of view nor relies on any symbol. The first kind of knowledge may be said to stop at the relative; the second, in those cases where it is possible, to attain the absolute."[4] The second of these, which is intuition, is, he says, "the kind of intellectual sympathy by which one places oneself within an object in order to coincide with what is unique in it and therefore inexpressible" (p. 6). In illustration, he mentions self-knowledge: "there is one reality, at least, which we all seize from within, by intuition and not by simple analysis. It is our own personality in its flowing through time—our self which endures" (p. 8)."
----------------------------------------------------
Bertrand Russel is very intelligent. He "read" about the way of the mystic but he did not experience it for himself. Under the yogic system, becoming one with an object is called "samadhi". Using this approach, you can become one with the Universe, life, and consciousness which will reveal their true nature.

So how many exoplanets have mystics discovered? Galaxies? Super novas? Discoveries in biology? Quantum physics? Breakthroughs on cancer treatment?

 

[Left Coast]

I have seen Schwartz's responses to the critics and I am not going to re-live that tangent here again. I think Schwartz as an academician can handle the debates for himself.

If you're not going to bother responding to criticisms, I'm not going to bother offering them. There's a reason Dr. Schwartz is out on a limb here professionally and you don't see a bunch of other scientists replicating his findings and corroborating his claims. His research is shoddy.

At some point what becomes important to me is the consideration of the source. I believe people that write for things like Skeptic's Dictionary start with the task of providing the best materialist attack on anyone or anything suggesting the reality of the paranormal. I'll consider what these skeptics say but I also 'consider the source'.

1) The two sources I posted were from a 5 minute Google search. If I took more time, I'm quite confident I could find other research for you from peer-reviewed academic sources detailing the lack of robust evidence for the paranormal. Since you don't want to even take the time to respond to the specific critiques I did cite, I'm not going to take the time to find even more for you.

2) Dr. Ryman, who wrote one of the two articles I posted, is a professor of psychology at the University of Oregon. He's not some random lay atheist blogger.

3) Your gripe is that scientists treat paranormal claims skeptically and attempt to falsify them. Well: welcome to science. That's what scientists do with all claims. The entire point of the scientific method is to test ideas rigorously and attempt to find fault with them. Only hypotheses that survive many rounds of testing and replication (ie attempted falsification) get taken seriously.

It's just reasoned analysis that I use that takes everything into consideration and forms a judgment. Reasoned analysis is much like what a jury does when coming to a verdict on criminal case for example.

Oh, ok. You're aware psychic evidence isn't permissible in court, right? Jurors have to stick to the empirical facts of a case to make a determination.

At this time I am not claiming a model that is testable and falsifiable. I am not doing hard science.

Ok, then please stop saying you have a better model of reality than any scientific one. Because if your model isn't testable/falsifiable, you literally have no rational way to establish that.

What I am doing is looking at all things and forming a judgment as to what is most reasonable to believe.

Yes, I know you've formed a judgment, that much is obvious. I'm asking about what methodology you used, which you've said is not scientific, to arrive at that judgment.

There you are making an assumption that if certain psychic abilities exist that they can be perfectly honed to have binding legal status even. The reality is that these certain psychic abilities you mentioned are real but not sufficiently honed for the practical applications you talk about.

LOL and there you go making the assumptions that 1) people have these "psychic" abilities, even though 2) they're not sufficiently "honed" to be useful in any practical application.

The reality is, that's exactly how useful the "abilities" of frauds are, too. So the question is, how do you tell the difference between a fraud whose "abilities" are useless, and an actual psychic whose abilities are useless?

 

[Shelter]

I accept that magic doesn't work but out of all of the scientific tools you posted you left out consciousness. Consciousness is not magic. Everything that we know of is based on our "awareness" of it. It is not too much of a leap to say that not only is "knowledge" based in our consciousness but all of the "Universe" is as well.

The Eastern mystics discovered that you don't need the bodily senses to "know". If anything, the senses only lead to an illusion that everything is separate from yourself. In the pure conscious state (without sensory and mental input) you perceive reality differently. Instead of perceiving the moon as seperate, you realize that you and the moon are one - there's really no separate existence. You can even experience as the moon experience.

@Swami Are you saying that Eastern thought and meditation can be used to directly make scientific discoveries in all fields of science (geology, biology, etc), without the need for the scientific method?

The only area where I would expect it could make a direct contribution would be in the science of consciousness itself.

But, I do think meditation, mysticism and non-Western ways of thinking (from many cultures) can make indirect contributions. The scientific method is how we test hypotheses. But what about coming up with hypotheses in the first place? What about coming up with a great idea for an experiment to test your hypotheses? What about thought experiments? We always need innovation in those areas, we need creative and out of the box thinking to do this. Science goes through “fads” and gets stuck in ruts just like any other field. And without new ways of thinking, we won’t break out of our cognitive biases and personal biases.

There are many stories of scientists coming up with ideas or solutions in dreams or the like. Mendeleev is quoted as saying the arrangement of elements in his periodic table originated in a dream, and he only had to make one correction.

 

[Shelter]

We use tools and peer review to eliminate our conscious or unconscious biases.

Scientists are human and are affected by all the flaws, cognitive biases, self-centeredness, cultural unawareness, etc. that affect all of us. This includes peer reviewers (I am speaking as a peer reviewer for several journals). And, if there is an unconscious bias that we don’t recognize is impacting our scientific work, we won’t use tools to correct it. Looking back at the history of science you can see many examples of this. I’ve witnessed a scientist refusing to accept the data in front of him because he was too invested in the received knowledge he learned in school.

 

[Wandering Monk]

Scientists are human and are affected by all the flaws, cognitive biases, self-centeredness, cultural unawareness, etc. that affect all of us. This includes peer reviewers (I am speaking as a peer reviewer for several journals). And, if there is an unconscious bias that we don’t recognize is impacting our scientific work, we won’t use tools to correct it. Looking back at the history of science you can see many examples of this. I’ve witnessed a scientist refusing to accept the data in front of him because he was too invested in the received knowledge he learned in school.

Good thing that SINGLE scientists aren't the source of scientific knowledge. There are others checking his work trying to falsify it.

 

[syo]

Perhaps amazing or awesome would be more accurate.

Exactly, amazing and awesome. The cosmos is amazing.

 

[Shelter]

Good thing that SINGLE scientists aren't the source of scientific knowledge. There are others checking his work trying to falsify it.

That’s true, and it is a very good thing. It’s not a perfect process though. If almost everyone currently working in a scientific field has the same misconceptions or the same biases in a certain area, no one will have the insight to correct those biases or step outside the current paradigm. Data that contradicts current ways of thinking is less likely to get published. This is especially true because there are often a few very prominent scientists in a field who people hesitate to contradict. See this article:

How scientific culture discourages new ideas

Examples of the biases I’m talking about include…

A bias in favor of investigating in directions we can already measure/that we have good tools for, even if there’s no rational reason to reject alternatives we don’t yet have tools to test.

A bias toward going in the directions that get a lot of grant money today or that the journals are more likely to publish.

A bias toward going in the direction that makes some corporation a lot of money (this is huge in medicine and agricultural science).

A bias toward thinking the theories we have can explain everything (if you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail).

A bias toward maintaining the established paradigms that people were trained in and have put their life’s work toward.

A bias toward generating hypotheses that fit with your own experience (which makes it risky to have most scientists come from similar socioeconomic backgrounds… this affects some fields more than others)



Bias in science can affect any step… the decision of what problems to tackle, the hypotheses we generate, the process of deciding on approaches to testing those hypotheses, the acceptance of the results in the larger community.

All of the above steps are essential to progress in science, while falsification only comes in at the last two steps. We really need independent thinkers and innovators, AND falsifiers. And we all need to work on avoiding cognitive traps (but this isn't something most scientists are trained on in school)

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

Bertrand Russel is very intelligent. He "read" about the way of the mystic but he did not experience it for himself. Under the yogic system, becoming one with an object is called "samadhi". Using this approach, you can become one with the Universe, life, and consciousness which will reveal their true nature.

So, if this is possible, then would it be safe to assume that some people in history (or contemporarily) have achieved this? That is, that they have "become one with the universe/life/consciousness" and that this "revealed the true nature" of that with which they "became one"?

If so, and that has happened, then can you tell me what useful information those people were then able to impart to the world or utilize for themselves? That is to say, if you suddenly understood the "true nature" of the entire universe (for example) what useful information that can then be utilized by you would this reveal/uncover/allow-discovery-of? Is there anything? And if not, then doesn't that sort of render this process of "becoming one" with something kind of NOT USEFUL?

 

[Polymath257]

That’s true, and it is a very good thing. It’s not a perfect process though. If almost everyone currently working in a scientific field has the same misconceptions or the same biases in a certain area, no one will have the insight to correct those biases or step outside the current paradigm. Data that contradicts current ways of thinking is less likely to get published. This is especially true because there are often a few very prominent scientists in a field who people hesitate to contradict. See this article:

How scientific culture discourages new ideas

Examples of the biases I’m talking about include…

A bias in favor of investigating in directions we can already measure/that we have good tools for, even if there’s no rational reason to reject alternatives we don’t yet have tools to test.

Which seems reasonable. We can't investigate those areas where we don't have tools. On the other hand, we *can* speculate (this is done) and attempt to discover new tools (this is done also).

A bias toward going in the directions that get a lot of grant money today or that the journals are more likely to publish.

Yes, this is a bias. But, since the grant money and journal publications are generally based on peer review, it is a bias towards competence in the subject, which is good.

A bias toward going in the direction that makes some corporation a lot of money (this is huge in medicine and agricultural science).

Yes, this badly distorts the progress of science in many ways. On the other hand, there is an expectation that money given to scientific exploration will pay off with practical benefits. These benefits tend to make money.

A bias toward thinking the theories we have can explain everything (if you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail).

I think this is more likely to be a public perspective about scientists than the actual views of most scientists. In fact, most scientists are faced on a daily basis with things we cannot (yet) explain. That is sort of the point of doing science.

A bias toward maintaining the established paradigms that people were trained in and have put their life’s work toward.

Yes, there is a bias against massive change based on little data. As there should be. However, pretty much every area of science has shown the ability to change paradigms when sufficient evidence is given to warrant such a change.

A bias toward generating hypotheses that fit with your own experience (which makes it risky to have most scientists come from similar socioeconomic backgrounds… this affects some fields more than others)

I'm not sure how to even interpret this. An experimentalist probably *should* be making hypotheses based on their experience, or suggesting to theoreticians that such should be done. I'm not sure why socioeconomic background would be relevant to interpreting, say, biology or physics.

Bias in science can affect any step… the decision of what problems to tackle, the hypotheses we generate, the process of deciding on approaches to testing those hypotheses, the acceptance of the results in the larger community.

Which is why it is good to have a wide variety of perspectives looking at the data and willing to criticize methods and interpretations.

All of the above steps are essential to progress in science, while falsification only comes in at the last two steps. We really need independent thinkers and innovators, AND falsifiers. And we all need to work on avoiding cognitive traps (but this isn't something most scientists are trained on in school)

I'd suggest that if you actually look at science journals you will see a LOT of innovative thinking in a wide variety of directions. I can certainly say this is the case in physics, for example.

 

[George-ananda]

If you're not going to bother responding to criticisms, I'm not going to bother offering them. There's a reason Dr. Schwartz is out on a limb here professionally and you don't see a bunch of other scientists replicating his findings and corroborating his claims. His research is shoddy.



1) The two sources I posted were from a 5 minute Google search. If I took more time, I'm quite confident I could find other research for you from peer-reviewed academic sources detailing the lack of robust evidence for the paranormal. Since you don't want to even take the time to respond to the specific critiques I did cite, I'm not going to take the time to find even more for you.

2) Dr. Ryman, who wrote one of the two articles I posted, is a professor of psychology at the University of Oregon. He's not some random lay atheist blogger.

3) Your gripe is that scientists treat paranormal claims skeptically and attempt to falsify them. Well: welcome to science. That's what scientists do with all claims. The entire point of the scientific method is to test ideas rigorously and attempt to find fault with them. Only hypotheses that survive many rounds of testing and replication (ie attempted falsification) get taken seriously.



Oh, ok. You're aware psychic evidence isn't permissible in court, right? Jurors have to stick to the empirical facts of a case to make a determination.



Ok, then please stop saying you have a better model of reality than any scientific one. Because if your model isn't testable/falsifiable, you literally have no rational way to establish that.



Yes, I know you've formed a judgment, that much is obvious. I'm asking about what methodology you used, which you've said is not scientific, to arrive at that judgment.



LOL and there you go making the assumptions that 1) people have these "psychic" abilities, even though 2) they're not sufficiently "honed" to be useful in any practical application.

The reality is, that's exactly how useful the "abilities" of frauds are, too. So the question is, how do you tell the difference between a fraud whose "abilities" are useless, and an actual psychic whose abilities are useless?

Well we are now getting into multiple subjects and we can debate each one forever. I am now going to hone our debate down to the thread topic "The Mystic Way of Knowing".

I have come to believe to believe mystics can reach a deeper level of consciousness than we can reach with the thinking mind. I also find a consistency among them that I have come to hold as likely real. My take-away view is the philosophy of Non-Dualism (meaning God and creation are not-two). This take-away comes after decades of consideration of all things.

Now before you argue that science does not work that way let me say I agree actually but not being a disciple of so-called 'Scientism' my interests beyond mainstream science also include the paranormal, psychic abilities and mysticism. These latter things can effect my personal view of reality.

 

[Swami]

I have been a meditator for fifty years. Meditation is a central aspect of my life.

I also have a scientific mind, and have worked developing digital technologies.

Meditation is not in the same domain as science.

Your claims are just silly.

This depends on what you are using meditation for. Eastern thought, especially the Yoga Sutras, describe steps to attaining 'samadhi' - which is oneness with the object of meditation. There are many different types of meditation and it's clear that you do not practice the type of meditation that I have practiced.

It would be wise if you were willing to first learn before dismissing.

 

[halbhh]

becoming one with an object is called "samadhi". Using this approach, you can become one with the Universe, life, and consciousness

yeah, you know...in my experience, this is so...automatic and easy -- effortless, if one just relaxes and gazes for a while. I sorta assumed most anyone could do it, if they were inclined to simply stop being preoccupied and really gaze and something, and relax, and let their mind be...natural. I mean I could always do this, and it seems to me that most children can and do.

It's more like many adults learn to be in another state of consciousness, than that this one is hard to access. They just....lose track of that ability, is what I've assumed.

It's not unimportant. Emerson and Lao Tzu, for instance, both are using it.

To me, then, you see, it's not... goal (though very good!). It is important. Like being able to love someone, it's of fundamental value. A natural ability. Like the advantage of having two arms instead of only one arm.

So...I see it as more just a basic ability, and not the end goal. It's a tool for going somewhere. It's not the destination, but it's the means of movement (or one of the 2 legs to walk on).

 

[Swami]

The difference, I think, is certainty.

Knowledge requires it; awareness doesn't.

If you go back and look at the article in the OP and listen to the way it describes 'knowledge' ( see below ), I think you will see what I mean..

"The first and most direct outcome of the moment of illumination is belief in the possibility of a way of knowledge"

Notice the uncertainty? It's a "belief in the possibility".

Immediately after this first sentence, the author shifts from the word, "knowledge" to "intuition". And then result of this intuition is described as:
"a conception of a Reality"
"thinly veiled by the shows of sense"
"intellectual sympathy"
"inexpressible"

Even if the spiritual world is leaping towards the human psyche ( as the article suggests ), it's still a conception, veiled ( albeit thinly ), requires sympathy intellectually, and is inexpressible. All of those describe something which is uncertain in the material world.

Awareness of this "inexpressible Reality" is perhaps the best that the the human brain can accomplish. And that brings us back to knowledge vs. awareness.

Scientists would probably define knowledge as "certain". But awareness doesn't require it. Compare an electronic smoke detector to the human sense of smell. The smoke detector is certain. The human sense of smell isn't. And that's why the word knowledge is not ideal in this context if scientists are the audience. A scientist is expecting knowledge to maintain a standard of certainty that is not included in the mystical approach described in the OP. A scientist intends to develop a smoke detector which will work every time. And a scientist/engineer is able to design an electronic smoke detector that is, indeed, certain to detect smoke. This is because they are certain that they know the mechanisms involved in the design. They have certain knowledge. Or more simply, just 'knowledge'.

But, please understand. The mystical approach has its benefits too. Who knows what amazing discovers could be made by cultivating the inborn human sense of smell? Maybe it could lead to massive advances in medicine? There's potential for huge rewards... but... it's uncertain.

That's why I think the word awareness is better fit. It's not really about defining knowledge philosophically. It's about speaking to your audience in a language that is easily understood. Is the audience a scientist? Then knowledge implies certainty.

Does that help?

I understand your expanation. The article talks about the method of knowing as being "possible". Then goes on to talk about knowledge itself with the same terms that you use but I disagree with the author. There are some mystical experiences that are very expressible, and I'm speaking from experience.

Here's one example of a mystical experience (notice the certainty):

"I was home alone, walking through the living room, not thinking of anything in particular, when suddenly my consciousness erupted. It no longer ended at the surface of my body but expanded outward, filling the surrounding space. I experienced everything around me as inside me and absolutely identical to myself. I was no longer Linda Johnsen; I was everything. The bliss of that single moment was beyond description.

It wasn’t “as if” I was the universe. I really “was” the universe. It happened spontaneously, and even though it only lasted a few seconds, I emerged from it changed forever. Any confidence I had in the materialistic scientific paradigm collapsed. So did my naive belief that heaven—the most joyful place I’d heard of before that moment—was a physical site with streets paved in gold. I suddenly understood that the entire universe is held within an all-pervading, blissful awareness."
https://yogainternational.com/article/view/use-yoga-science-to-understand-mystic...

 

[Wandering Monk]

I understand your expanation. The article talks about the method of knowing as being "possible". Then goes on to talk about knowledge itself with the same terms that you use but I disagree with the author. There are some mystical experiences that are very expressible, and I'm speaking from experience.

Here's one example of a mystical experience (notice the certainty):
"I was home alone, walking through the living room, not thinking of anything in particular, when suddenly my consciousness erupted. It no longer ended at the surface of my body but expanded outward, filling the surrounding space. I experienced everything around me as inside me and absolutely identical to myself. I was no longer Linda Johnsen; I was everything. The bliss of that single moment was beyond description.

It wasn’t “as if” I was the universe. I really “was” the universe. It happened spontaneously, and even though it only lasted a few seconds, I emerged from it changed forever. Any confidence I had in the materialistic scientific paradigm collapsed. So did my naive belief that heaven—the most joyful place I’d heard of before that moment—was a physical site with streets paved in gold. I suddenly understood that the entire universe is held within an all-pervading, blissful awareness."
https://yogainternational.com/article/view/use-yoga-science-to-understand-mystic...

 

[Swami]

So how many exoplanets have mystics discovered? Galaxies? Super novas? Discoveries in biology? Quantum physics? Breakthroughs on cancer treatment?

I am not trying to replace Western science. I am trying to supplement it- give it what it is lacking. There is a reason why scientists can not figure out the origin and nature of the Universe, life, and consciousness. This missing part of the puzzle exposes their limitations and Eastern thinkers on this forum are more than willing to offer our insight. They have discovered consciousness beyond what your scientists know about.

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

I have come to believe to believe mystics can reach a deeper level of consciousness than we can reach with the thinking mind.

May I ask what it is that you feel this "deeper level of consciousness" provides the people who attain it? What benefit is there to achieving this, and what can one expect when attaining it? Is this something that is "different for everyone" - such that there is then no responsibility for the advocate of such things to actually provide any sort of assessment of the worth of the practice? Or is there some known/demonstrable benefit that anyone/everyone can expect to receive if they seek this out and attain it?