Skepticism vs. Curiosity
B. Alan Wallace in interview at the Skeptiko.com, quote:
Skepticism may be a hideout for both fundamentalists and relativists, it only being a matter what one is skeptical about. In itself, it often means nothing, except a reluctance to really find out. Thanks to WH for heads up.
Listen to the interwiew. Time 54:05 Also available for download.
"…this is what bothers me about many of the so called skeptics… what they are doing is defending the status quo which doesn’t take a whole lot of guts. They are about as skeptical as Pat Robertson or Billy Graham. They too have a congregation behind them. They all agree; they’re skeptical of other religions, they’re skeptical of materialism, and so forth. I just don’t see much difference in the skepticism of a religious fundamentalist and a hard-core, committed, scientific materialist."
Skepticism may be a hideout for both fundamentalists and relativists, it only being a matter what one is skeptical about. In itself, it often means nothing, except a reluctance to really find out. Thanks to WH for heads up.
Listen to the interwiew. Time 54:05 Also available for download.
2 Comments:
Thanks, Hokai. It's an interesting subject. I listened to part of the audio . . .
I think it's more than just a place for fundamentalists and modernists to hang out--I think, without demonizing it, we might say that it's a place for the ego to hang out in general. When it knows something, it's made itself something a little more tangible and solid, and it can feel secure and superior relative to people who don't know what it knows. Also, it's a fortification against the upcoming subtle death.
I'm basically giving you what I've learned from Andrew Cohen. "Already knowing" is the position of the ego; "not knowing but wanting to know" is the position of the authentic self. I'm not sure these words or Andrew's get it just right, but it's an interesting way of looking at it. Shunryo Suzuki was saying the same thing with Beginner's Mind, eh? He also knew something about the evolutionary perspective, I believe. He said that we should "always be improving things," though I've never been able to find that quote after first reading it.
This is from an Andrew Cohen essay:
"The perfect posture for the self to assume in order to be able to evolve is a miraculous middle place between not already knowing, on the one hand, and wanting to know, on the other. Not already knowing, at the deepest level, aligns us with the ground of all being, that primordial emptiness, inherently free and already liberated, that is the Self as unmanifest consciousness. Wanting to know, passionately, energetically wanting to understand, aligns us simultaneously with the Authentic Self, which is the evolutionary impulse or deepest manifest expression of consciousness. So the perfect evolutionary posture is one that is dynamically poised between those two opposites."
From this page:
http://www.andrewcohen.org/teachings/spiritual-inquiry.asp
A. H. Almaas seems to be talking about the same thing with his open-ended inquiry.
"Inquiry doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re always thinking about things or formulating questions in your mind. You are simply aware and curious; you love to know and feel reality fully and clearly. You’re happy to know reality as deeply and precisely as possible. If experience is not clear, you are simply curious about it. Openness to experience becomes dynamic, challenging experience to reveal its truth. Once in a while, this curiosity might formulate itself into a specific question. You recognize that you don’t understand something, and out of love, you wish to understand it. So questions come on their own when necessary. The ongoing practice is therefore more an awareness of your experience, a recognition of when you are transparent and when you are opaque. Your interest is in understanding, and clarity will itself bring the Diamond Guidance, which will reveal the truth of the experience. (Spacecruiser Inquiry, pg 372"
From this page:
http://www.ahalmaas.com/glossary/i/inquiry.htm
Andrew usually uses the word "cynicism" to describe the already knowing posture, and I am very appreciative that he pointed it out to me: "Ah, I already know that!" It's a defense, isn't it? A move towards superiority and away from the source. Profound humility in not knowing but, paradoxically, certainty as well.
Any ideas?
Best,
David
Thank you, David - great comments. I believe both Cohen and Almaas quotes give great views on un/knowing. However, in this case, it's not just a matter of already knowing something as an obstacle in itself, but a certain distrust of other methodologies. In a positive sense, skeptics are those that question the veracity and groundedness of a truth claim. In an extreme form, skepticism an inability to approach any sort of knowledge that potentially questions your espoused truth claim. All 1st tier knowledge is in this sense, susceptible to skepticism: from mythic absolutism to scientism to extreme relativism, they all present forms of strong distrust to novel knowledge, even when it's been around for centuries.
I surely agree that true humility brings certainty.
Hokai
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