Whether it’s the ostensibly secular Nietzsche spinning his “higher man” theology or some hippy discovering LSD for the first time convinced that he’s unlocked the secrets of the universe, it’s the same thing. Intellectual or spiritual or both - if you think there is a higher state of being, you are not living in the real world, and if you are not living in the real world you are lying to yourself. Yeah, some people are wiser than others - generally the people who admit they really don’t know anything. Those who think they’ve glimpsed some exclusive vision of truth beyond what “normal man” is capable of grasping are trafficking in religion and mythology. Like religious myths, those myths may be useful - providing refuge for the frightened, an escape from the mundane, etc - but they are not realities. We are all human, we all have the same basic set of epistemic limitations. Einstein’s visions were replicable and explainable, they where not exclusive to him alone or an elite subset of his disciples - they can be made sense of by the average mentally capable person, and this is the proof that they are real - or at least, on the right track toward describing reality. If you see something exclusive to you, it’s called an illusion, not enlightenment. Enlightenment truths are those which are open, in principle, to anyone - those which can be explained and accounted for beyond the simple assertion that “I see it and if you don’t, you’re blind” - In other words: those “truths” who’s TRUTH DOES NOT depend intrinsically on the majority of people being incapable of grasping it.
I wouldn’t call it either, I’d call it “something exclusive to me”.
I kind of agree with your OP. But “transcendence” is a pretty simple concept. I occasionally need to remind myself that reality transcends any of my conceptions about it. “It”? haha
That is a bold statement. Do you not back it up because you take it for self-evident?
[/quote]
our epistemic limitations are biological, physical - they are more or less the same from person to person - i’m not saying no one is smarter than anyone else - i’m just saying that what can be known is defined by HUMAN limitations rather than individual ones
this thread is not about your mystique as an individual, Amor - as i am talking to you, it is clear i have an idea of who/what you are - you are a fellow philosopher on a message board - i have my own rational and psychological ideas about your constitution and personality (as i am sure you do about mine), but i am not here to discuss you - i’m here to talk about philosophy, and knowledge in general - not the intimate facts of my fellow posters’ lives, which really don’t bear on the topic . . .or, if you think they do, then explain how.
