This reflective essay examines the intersection of cognitive science, philosophy, and mysticism in understanding human consciousness and the nature of suffering. Drawing on The Discovery of Inner Space, the paper considers how neurochemistry, cultural conditioning, and competing worldviews shape human experience. It contrasts materialist, media-driven orientations with Eastern and Zen perspectives that emphasize presence and inner peace. The essay argues that as science increasingly blurs the boundary with mysticism, individuals are empowered to move beyond suffering and materialism toward a more mindful, self-aware engagement with the world.
Traditionally, cognitive science incorporates concepts and methods from philosophy, psychology, biology, and chemistry to try to understand the way the brain and mind work — under what stimuli, and for what patterns of behavior. We now realize that our thoughts, far from being the "forms" the Ancient Greeks envisioned, are a combination of neurochemicals that result from various stimuli expressed in different situations. However, after reading The Discovery of Inner Space, it seems increasingly clear that we are patterned in a world that exists between many dimensions: our object consciousness, memory consciousness, cultural consciousness, and whatever forms of reality we seem to engender.
If we follow myth from almost the very beginning, we are told "we make our own reality" — the so-called "laws of attraction." If this is the case, why is there suffering, hardship, or even any negativity in the world?
What the author of The Discovery of Inner Space seems to be saying is that there is really no positive and negative, or good or bad — no value judgments for energy or for what simply is. We as a species have evolved so that we can be introspective: we can think about what we know, what we do not know, what we perceive, and what we desire — all in a split second. We have convinced ourselves that in order to grow and evolve, we must suffer, and that suffering, rather than meaning "undergoing" as was apparently its original intent, has come to mean facing painful reality and unhappiness.
As our society has evolved, we tend to opt for one of two different worldviews:
1) We are born into a world in which suffering must exist to teach us a lesson. We are born bad, we are born needing control — through government or religion — and are not capable of knowing or making our own decisions. Yet we may suddenly, and hopefully, realize as Peggy Lee sings, "Is that all there is?" and throw off these shackles and keep dancing.
2) We are part of a world filled with karmic vibrations rooted in Eastern mysticism, in which the point of living is either to address something we did not quite resolve in a previous existence or to serve as a guidance system toward a different path.
"Television and materialism as barriers to authentic thought"
"Blending science and mysticism toward mindful living"
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