The exploration of the beginning of this sacred process focuses on the examination of my ten hour religious experience. The structure of that religious experience lies at the foundation of all great religions, as can be seen from stages 11 and 12 of Table I below. My 10 hour religious experience occurred in early April 1962 when I was 30 years old. In the West this religious experience is often called purgation culminating in mystical union. This combined experience consists of stages 11 and 12 of Table I. For convenience, I will call this combined experience PMU. The experience occurred spontaneously without the use of drugs or herbs or meditation techniques.
The immediate aim of the examination of PMU, particularly purgation, is to scientifically comprehend my 10-hour religious experience. There is a sequence of two very different paths the experiencer must take in order to scientifically comprehend this great experience of PMU. Both paths are necessary for this scientific comprehension. The first path is doxa/belief, followed by the path of episteme/knowledge. The path of doxa/belief is not scientific. Nevertheless, doxa/belief is capable of giving the experiencer the ability to comprehend PMU in a practical way during the relatively short time (10 hours in my case) when he or she is actually experiencing PMU. This comprehension is attained by using an imaginative scenario, generated by the experiencer during the early phase of purgation, particularly during the release of the first knot. This scenario is briefly narrated in the long paragraph, four paragraphs below. (Figure 1 and Figure 3 will assist the reader in comprehending this scenario.) This doxa/belief path to comprehension is practical, because it is used by the experiencer to save him or her from panic and a nervous breakdown during purgation, particularly during the release of the first knot. Doxa/belief steadies the experiencer as he or she "walks the plank" during purgation.
If doxa/belief is not used, which means belief and imagination and prayer are not used, the experiencer will panic and he or she will fail in the attempt to "walk the plank." The result is the experiencer will not be able to pass through the deep 10 hour experience of purgation and attain the great 4 to 7 second experience of mystical union. Without having experienced PMU the experiencer will not be able to travel on the scientific, episteme/knowledge path to the knowledge of God. This is because he or she will not have experienced God during mystical union (stage 12) and will not have phenomenological data to work with, which is the remembrance in long term memory of core consciousness during the experience of purgation (stage 11).
On the other hand, if the path of doxa/belief succeeds, the path of episteme/knowledge is capable of giving the experience of PMU a scientific comprehension. The path of episteme/knowledge is a scientific analysis of purgation, requiring considerable intellectual, mathematical, and analytical skills. This path enables the experiencer to profoundly and scientifically comprehend purgation, but only after a long and carefully developed system dynamics (SD)- based phenomenological analysis of core consciousness during purgation. The powerful scientific methodology I am using during the episteme/knowledge path to truth is called Feedback Phenomenology (FP). It is the rigorous, mathematical science of philosophy that the phenomenological philosopher, Edmund Husserl, quested for throughout his long career in phenomenology, but never attained. This formalized methodology will be briefly described in Chapter 6. I have been working steadily on this episteme/knowledge path or road to truth from December 1984 to the present time. My present scientific comprehension of purgation, resulting from my work on that analytical path, is briefly summarized in the five paragraphs just below Figure 3.
Only with both paths or approaches can the experiencer obtain a scientific understanding of his or her experience of PMU. Such an understanding of PMU is fundamental. For example, the FP analysis is able to model and simulate core consciousness, moment by moment, during purgation. Such an analysis leads to a profound understanding or comprehension of religion and the religious life. More importantly, an understanding of PMU is fundamental to a profound understanding of the unsurpassable Greatness, experienced during mystical union. The unsurpassable Greatness is known in the world by such names as God, Brahman, Allah, No Thing, etc.
Now, let us be more specific. The practical understanding of my experience of purgation is obtained by means of the path of doxa/belief. This practical understanding occurred like this: During my desperate and intense 10-hour experience of purgation (see Figure 1) my imaginative, doxa/belief system began to interpret that experience according to the following scenario:
My heart was spontaneously opening for some divine reason (see simulation #2 in Figure 1). After about an hour of opening, my heart began to encounter a knot in my heart (see simulations #1, 3, and 4 in Figure 1). This first knot, the 12th from last knot, tended to restrict the further opening of my heart (see simulation #2 in Figure 1). In addition, the tension resulting from those two opposing forces brought about intense psychic stress and fear of death (see simulations #3 and 4 in Figure 1). I began to pray (see simulation #2 in Figure 3), because I was so scared and so desperate. Also, I knew this was some kind of divine experience. So, through the process of intense, sincere, and all-out prayer I did not panic. Instead, both my heart and my mind were able to bravely stand their ground, despite the presence within me of extreme psychic stress and fear of death (see simulations #2, 3, and 4 of Figure 1 from the 240 minute mark to about the 540 minute mark). Then, after those intense hours of deep, desperate, sincere, and imaginative praying in the presence of the knot, the restricting knot in my heart finally gave up the battle and let go (see simulation #1 in Figure 1 at the 555 minute mark). Then, the intensity of psychic stress and fear of death immediately lessened. The alleviation started from the desperate state of 90% of maximum bearable intensity and fell to almost zero (see Figure 3). So, the first knot could not stand up to profound, intense, desperate, and sincere prayer and finally had to back down and release itself (see Figure 1). My heart then slowly opened further until it encounted another knot: the second knot (or the 11th from last knot). Because the first knot to be released had released itself through the above process, I knew that through prayer and the grace of God I would be able to bear, without panicking, the oncoming second knot and the series of knots that I knew were coming. So, I had dealt with the first of the 12 knots I had to face. During the release of the first knot I found out why the knots were present: Each of the knots that I would be encountering had been caused by a past sin. I somehow knew that the Lord would be with me under this great threat of panic and death. I knew that I would not panic if only I intensely and bravely prayed for forgiveness of each sin with great integrity and sincerity. So, this purgation process repeated itself for about 12 knots until the last knot had finally been released. (To understand the knot release mechanism, please study the release of the 5th, 4th, and 3rd from last knots, simulated in Figure 3). Then, when all the knots had been released and, correspondingly, all my sins had been purged from my heart through prayer and the grace of God, the door was open and I had the great 4 to 7 second experience of mystical union."Then sings my soul, my savior God to Thee: How great Thou art; how great Thou art." (from a beloved gospel song)
I am categorizing this PMU scenario as doxa/belief. My belief is presented above in what Husserl would have called the "natural attitude." Chapters 1, 2, 3, and 4 of PART I - together with paragraph 13 of the Summary that immediately follows this Introduction - will carefully develop this doxa/belief path toward the practical comprehension of PMU.
Here is my present summary of the results emerging from my scientific work on the episteme/knowledge path to truth about purgation: Cramped or paralyzed muscles in my heart, which were caused by a childhood sexual trauma that I had experienced at the age of 9 or 10, were spontaneously released or abreacted at the age of 30 during purgation. These cramped or paralyzed muscles had been released, one by one, during those 10 hours of purgation (see Figures 1 and 3).
Now, the above comprehension of my experience of purgation by means of episteme/knowledge is based on my scientific analysis that has been going on from December 1984 to the present time. Figures 1, 2, and 3 were generated during the system dynamics (SD) phase of that analysis. My scientific analysis of purgation is given in Chapter 7 of PART II of this book. That system dynamics-based analysis of core consciousness during purgation is now finding that the flow diagram or noema for core consciousness during my experience of purgation, shown below in Figure 2, is structured as a second order feedback system (Forrester 1968b). At the present time I am conjecturing that the structure of a second order feedback system is the same structure as that which would result if one were to model the dynamics of the release of cramped heart muscles. Underlying that conjecture is the fact that muscles act in an antagonistic way. For example, the sympathetic system and the parasympathetic system act antagonistically on any muscle pair. So, eventually a detailed, formalized, SD analysis of the release of cramped heart muscles could be performed by a biomedical specialist, skilled in SD. If the biomedical specialist's SD model is shown to be a second order feedback system, it would indicate there is a high probability that core consciousness during the experience of purgation was transcendentally grounded in the neurophysiology of my heart muscles [look for (Kim 2003) in the bibliography for a link to the writings of the neoKantian philosopher, Paul Natorp, on transcendental grounding].
However, the big question for the biomedical specialist is: Where were the cramped/paralyzed muscles in my heart located? I was an athlete in my youth and in college. Generally speaking, my heart was sound. Therefore, I am conjecturing that the cramped/paralyzed muscles were probably muscles associated with the vagus nerve or other areas of the heart that were not associated with the pumping action of my heart.
As for mystical union, that which is sacred and formless and timeless was revealed to me during the 4 to 7 second experience of mystical union. Indeed, that which is sacred and formless and timeless was revealed to every cell in my brain and body during those moments. There is a name given to that which is experienced during mystical union by those who abide in doxa/belief: That sacred, formless, timeless, and unsurpassable Greatness experienced during mystical union is referred to by mystics as God, Allah, Brahman, No Thing, etc. The experience of the unsurpassable Greatness by the various mystics of all religions is the same, but the name they give to it is different in each religion. My name for that unsurpassable Greatness is God, the name my precious mother spoke to me about when I was a boy.
Ever since that blessed experience of mystical union, the Greatness of the qualities of God that I experienced within me during mystical union have been remembered. These qualities have coalesced over the years and have become my ego ideal. I try to use the rememberance of those supreme qualities as references during critical decision points in my daily life: Some of the most striking qualities I associate with God are supreme freedom, supreme trueness, supreme integrity, supreme love. To live from moment to moment, aware of those qualities in one's memory, tends to make one aware of the holiness of life.
The above five paragraphs summarize the present results of my episteme/knowledge path to the truth about PMU: purgation and mystical union. However, as explained, the analysis is not completed yet. Among other things, it awaits the SD analytical work by a biomedical specialist to confirm the conjecture that the dynamics of the specific heart muscles is that of a second order feedback system.
While we wait for the confirmation, here is a statement of Sherrington (1906) on the dynamics of muscles in the heart.
"the contractions of particular sets of muscles in the heart must entail the suppression of activity of other muscles for coordinated movements of the heart to emerge."
At this point in the Introduction I need to say that one of the reasons for placing this recent draft of my book manuscript on the web is because it enables me to make personal confessions, such as those confessions given above. Keep in mind, though, each specific thing or action I am choosing to confess or reveal is central or critical to an understanding of the GTR. Also, keep in mind I will only confess these things when my heart feels ready or ripe to reveal them, in the very deepest way. I am finding that making such personal confessions to the entire world via the web is having a deep and good effect on my soul. Also, these confessions are tending to bring to life the formalized mathematical analysis underlying the GTR.
So, the above presentation explains how I am beginning my exploration of the sacred process. In other words, the above presentation explains how I have been going about untangling the complexity underlying this great 53 month, 14 stage religious crisis. Once sorted out and untangled, the essence of the sacred process will begin to become clear. Indeed, in order for human culture to achieve its potential for greatness, mankind needs to clearly and simply comprehend this great experience and its culmination. We need to do this, because this legendary experience has held the whole of human civilization in its sway from the very beginning of human existence. This experience and its culmination lies at the very heart and core of life and the very heart and core of religion.
My experience of PMU occurred in 1962. My careful system dynamics based, phenomenological analysis of PMU began in 1984, 22 years after I had experienced PMU. That is, in 1984 I began to sort out this great experience of PMU. My analysis proceeded in the following way during the years between 1984 to 1994: First, I used the causal loop diagramming technique. Then, I used Jay W. Forrester's system dynamics (SD) to formally describe the experience of purgation (see steps I and II of the Feedback Phenomenology [FP] Methodology in Chapter 6). Essentially, I did this by recalling core consciousness during purgation from long term memory and then mathematically modeling and simulating it. In this model core consciousness is structured as a multiloop nonlinear feedback system. This is the same structure as the nervous system underlying core consciousness. So, around 1994 my simulations of consciousness during purgation had given me a moment by moment description of how I had experienced purgation in the natural attitude. It had also clarified the dynamics of consciousness in the natural attitude during the experience of purgation. Then, since 1994, I have been trying to study and to analyze what was going on within my body during the experience. I wanted to know the physiological correlates of consciousness during purgation. I sensed in a deep way that these correlates would have the same dynamics as consciousness in the natural attitude would have had during purgation. So, I began using simulations of the experience in the natural attitude, together with ideas and concepts from Husserl's transcendental phenomenology, to determine these correlates. Although I didn't know it at the time, my tasks were as follows: To go from doxa to episteme, to go from belief to knowledge, to go from the natural attitude to the transcendental grounding of the experience in the physiology and neurophysiology of my body. These tasks have enabled me to deeply understand how my behavior - developed during my religious life for the 40 years that followed PMU - had been conditioned during the experience of PMU.
Eventually, during the period between 1999 to 2003 I began to realize from my analysis of PMU in the natural attitude that my religious experience occurred at the same time as the effects of a trauma were being released from muscles within my heart. That is, the effects on my heart muscles of a childhood sexual trauma, that occurred when I was 9 or 10 years old, were being released. Put another way, cramped or paralyzed muscles in my heart were being spontaneously released and causing the phenomena of the spontaneous religious experience. So, not only was I getting at the root of religion by analyzing PMU, I was also beginning to get at the root of psychiatry by analyzing the release of a childhood sexual trauma. Indeed, I was deep into a scientific probing of the dynamics of my central nervous system (CNS) during the release of a trauma. Most importantly, my analysis was proceeding in a formalized scientific way.
From the writings above one might get the impression that episteme is always superior to doxa: That doxa is merely something akin to illusion. Its not quite as simple as that. As we shall see in paragraph 13 of the Summary, immediately following this Introduction, doxa or belief saved me during purgation. It saved me during the time when the first of the 12 cramped muscles was being released. I believe the period just before the release of the first knot is the most dangerous time during the abreaction of a trauma: Doxa in the simple form of my religious belief saved me from panic and saved me from having a nervous breakdown. Most importantly, doxa/belief saved me from some sort of disorganization of my nervous system. Without doxa/belief that disorganization would have resulted during the panic and breakdown and would have led to serious mental illness. So, doxa/belief saved me during my extremely stressful 10 hour experience of purgation. I want to emphasize that panic and a nervous breakdown would have occurred during my encounter with the first knot, if I had not employed doxa/belief in the form of prayer. Paragraph 13 of the Summary is of great importance here. The reader should focus on paragraph 13 to understanding the value of religious belief for a culture. All brave men on the battlefield know of the importance of doxa in the form of religious belief.
Here is something else that is worth thinking about: My discovery between 1999 and 2003 that the release of a trauma was underlying my 1962 religious experience of PMU shook my religious life of 40 years to its foundations. PMU had been at the very heart of my 40 year religious life from 1962 to 2002. Now, between 1999 and 2003 my analysis of PMU slowly and unexpectantly began to undermine the purgative stage, or stage 11, of my religious life. What had happened was my analysis of purgation had brought about a profound change in my understanding of purgation: My behavior or my religious life for the 40 years that followed PMU had been conditioned during PMU. My analysis of purgation had gone from doxa to episteme during the period from 1984 to 2002. It is important to note here that while my analysis of purgation had undermined my religious life of 40 years, it had not undermined the very root or source of that religious life: mystical union. That root consisted of the unsurpassable Greatness, experienced in stage 12. The main qualities of the root were supreme freedom, supreme trueness, supreme integrity, and supreme love. The root also consisted of stage 14 of Table I, the Divine Stage. During stage 14 I had walked the Divine State from moment to moment from early April to early July 1962. I was at the monastery during that time. I have never forgotten those 3 months. In 2004 to 2006 I deeply recognized that the root was still there. It had not been undermined. Therefore, my religious life could rise again from that state, that root. The cutting down of my religious life of 40 years merely forced me to begin my religious life again, but this time from its very root. This root was profoundly experienced during mystical union. Please read on:
Therefore, the first crisis of my religious life was the 53 month crisis from 1957 to 1962, which culminated in mystical union. That crisis was detailed in Table I. When that crisis was over I began the first period of my religious life. That first period lasted 40 years, from 1962 to around 2002. It was dominated by stage 11 or purgation. The second crisis in my religious life occurred during the years from 1999 to 2006. That crisis is described in the above paragraph. Right now I am slowly and tentatively beginning the second period of my religious life. This transition is illustrating that, if there is going to be more growth in one's religious life, one must proceed from the first period to the second period. It is a transition from focus on the conditioning for the religious life obtained during the experience of purgation to focus on the ego ideals obtained during mystical union and the Divine State. The above paragraph illustrates that the first period - the 40 year period - of my religious life was over, whether I liked it or not. Now, like it or not, I had to go on, either to a deeper period in my religious life or to the abandonment of truth and integrity. There are certain people who could never abandon the quest for truth and integrity, because they feel such a quest is just too deeply embedded in them. In my case, I look back fondly on the struggles of those 40 years of the first period. It is hard for me to leave the first period. Eventually, time will tell what I do.
My thinking during 2005 to 2006 about this radical transition in my religious life was as follows: Perhaps, my mind could continue to try to penetrate to the very deepest core of my heart during this next period of my religious life (see the profound instructions given to me at the beginning of my religious life in Chapter 4). Penetrating toward the deepest core of my heart could lead to both stabilizing and deepening my mind and could begin this second period of my religious life. Indeed, the profound instructions given to me at the beginning of my religious life had allowed me to penetrate in this way during the first 40 years of my religious life. During the early part of this second period my analytical work began to indicate that this penetrating approach, which had held fairly well during the first 40 years, had a good chance of holding during the second period. So, this new and deeper second period looks promising. The root is still alive! It's true, though, that I am finding that readjustments are necessary. Nevertheless, this deeper and more penetrating period is already bringing more truth and integrity to my religious life: During this second period the evolutionary origins of religion and the primary purpose of religion have been revealed. In addition, this new period in my religious life is revealing that my analytical method, Feedback Phenomenology (FP), has been the missing factor in science during the past 300+ year period of the scientific revolution. FP is what is needed to open up the second half of the scientific revolution, because FP gives to scientists a formalized science for analyzing the dynamics of deep, first-person, consciousness phenomena. (See Section II of this Chapter which just follows this Section I, the Introductory Section. Section II gives the Summary of the main insights of the book. For example, the explanation of the evolutionary origin of religion and the primary purpose of religion is given in paragraph 15 of the Summary. The missing factor in science - the first person analysis of consciousness - is summarized in paragraph 21.)
Prayer still guides me. It has been with me during this transition to the second period. My heart remains, as always, the center of my religious life (see Chapter 4). The insights emerging from this adventure are leading toward an integration of science, philosophy, psychiatry, and religion. The second period of my religious life could be for my mind to go from doxa to episteme but, at the same time, to remain with my blessed heart, God willing. Stated another way: My evolving plan is tending toward deep knowledge, but also toward the integration of my mind and heart.
To summarize my religious life, as presented above, I consider myself a person who has been undergoing sacred psychotherapy (SP) since 1962. SP has been steadily deepening my religious life. My psychiatrist is the Lord.
In this book I will start my wide ranging study of PMU right from the very beginning of my religious life. That beginning was the 53 month religious crisis. This study is aimed at untangling the complexity underlying PMU. This first crisis began in December 1957 and culminating in 1962 with the experience of PMU. Table I, above, gives the sequence of 14 stages for my particular 53 month religious crisis that began in 1957. PMU is the combination of stages 11 and 12. Table I gives the names used by mystics from various cultures for many of the stages. This gives an indication of the universality of the first crisis and, as a result, begins this book by showing the possibility of a general theory of religion. Table I is partly based on the quotes in the References and Notes section of the narrative of the last 22 months of the first crisis. That narrative tells the story of what occurred during the period that extends from the middle of stage 2 to the first few minutes of stage 14 in Table I. I call that narrative, An Engineer's Story. It can be read at Chapter 1 of PART I. Later, in the Technical Section or PART III the idea of a general theory of religion is put on a formalized scientific basis by using Forrester's system dynamics (SD) and insights from Husserl's transcendental phenomenology.
At the end of stage 14 in early July 1962, I came down from the heavenly or Divine State of the first crisis. I was then faced with the problem of what to do next. With that question I began the Return or the Aftermath or the "working out of my salvation with diligence" (see Chapter 4). This was the beginning of the first period - the first 40 years - of my religious life. At the present time I have not yet determined or settled upon the substages of that first period of my religious life. I still need more time to develop the broad perspective required for such a determination. However, some of my thoughts and experiences related to the first period of my religious life are presented in the very important Chapter 4.
During the first 22 years of the first period, between 1962 and 1984, I began and then developed a prayer-based relationship between my mind and my blessed heart. This phase of the Return or first period is of great importance (see Chapter 4). My mind also explored the religious life by studying religions and searching libraries and bookstores. My preliminary explorations and studies began to indicate that PMU is an experience central to most religions (see, in particular, stages 11 and 12 of the West/English/Judeo-Christian column of Table I above). Therefore, I began the search for an analytical tool or method capable of analyzing consciousness during PMU. The search for the right analytical method is important to an analytical engineer seeking the truth. There was no doubt in my mind - then and now - that, for a man, PMU is the greatest and most sacred experience one could possibly have, although mothers have claimed that childbirth is the greatest experience. During the time between 1962 and 1984, despite the claims of mothers, I began to conjecture that the experience of PMU would be at the very essence or core of a general theory of religion (GTR). I conjectured or hypothesized that PMU is the key to the understanding of religion.
In 1974 I found the analytical tool or method I needed in order to analyze purgation. The method was brilliantly utilized by Forrester in one of the greatest books I have ever read. That book was being displayed at the Massachusetts Institution of Technology (MIT) bookstore. The analytical method was called system dynamics (SD). I could feel the unusual excitement at the bookstore among the students and professors milling around the book. Also, there were an unusual number of display tables. Millions of copies of this book were being sold throughout the world. I skimmed the book and saw how that analytical tool was used. I could see SD would not be too difficult to learn, although I could see that if I wanted to become an expert in SD it might take me a lot of time and study. The great book itself is called World Dynamics (Forrester 1973). However, my religious life was such that I was not ready to take up SD at that time. I was driving a cab then and my mind was still absorbed and focused on its growing relationship with my blessed heart (see Chapter 4). It took me 10 more years before my mind was ready to apply SD to analyze purgation.
You may be wondering why I was driving a cab. In order to explain I need to start by telling a little about myself and my world: I am one of the many independent scholars who live in Cambridge, close to the libraries at MIT and Harvard. There is good reason why I am an independent scholar. To succeed in my very important and highly controversial work on religion, I have found that I must avoid the subtle conditioning and political correctness that usually captures and enslaves the minds of professional scholars who are working in religion, social sciences, and the humanities. Such professors and scholars are hired and, as a result, enslaved by either secular universities, religious universities, or various other kinds of think tanks. Such universities, religions, and think tanks are all subtly attached to, and dependent on, a complex cultural system for support. That cultural system is the vast and highly influential Military/Industrial/University complex. (This intellectual enslavement usually does not apply to scholars who are working in science or engineering. Lying or prevaricating in science or engineering is relatively easy to track down and can ruin the lying person's career.)
As a result of these observations, I realized I must proceed in my search for the profound truths about religion in a much more serious way than it is done in academia. To accomplish this, I knew I could not be part of the academic world. Therefore, my career as an independent scholar was supported for the first 13 years, beginning in 1964, by work as a maverick in a variety of jobs: mainly as a carpenter's helper, vocational-technical school teacher, and cab driver. Also, those jobs did not require deep analytical concentration. I needed to reserve such concentration for my religious life. In addition those jobs tended to broaden my understanding of the world (see Chapter 4). Later, between 1977 to 1987, I used my maverick approach when I returned to engineering, working as a temporary engineer (called a contract engineer) or engineering consultant. By structuring my religious life as a maverick or as an independent scholar, I believe the pattern of my mind was set in such a way that no academic or social conditioning or political correctness was able to bar my way to truth.
Before this career as a maverick or an independent scholar, I had studied engineering at the University of Minnesota [MS (Mechanical Engineering) 1956] and had worked on and off as a high tech research and development engineer, mostly in Boston. My engineering career extended from 1957 to 1989, but I only spent 15 of those years working as an engineer.
Now, let us focus on my GTR project for analyzing purgation: In order to develop the hypothesis, given five paragraphs above, I finally began the SD-based scientific analysis of purgation in 1984. My analysis focused on recalling the dynamics of my core consciousness system, operating 22 years earlier in 1962 during the ten hour purgative stage of my experience of PMU. I conducted that analysis according to the scientific method. I proceeded as follows:
During the first period or step of that analytical process I began by recalling the data of core consciousness during the 1962 experience of PMU. This data of core consciousness was recalled from long term memory, using the causal loop diagraming technique [see (Richardson 1981 or Sterman 2000)]. The causal loop diagram technique is a simple exploratory technique, often used during the preliminary stage of any kind of system dynamics (SD) analysis. However, when this preliminary SD technique is used for exploring core consciousness during a deep experience like trauma or a religious experience, it fits into the category of a simple phenomenological methodology. I will be calling this simple phenomenological methodology, Causal Loop Feedback Phenomenology (CLFP). The CLFP methodology enabled me to unearth or recall from long term memory various dynamic aspects - or noemata - of core consciousness during purgation and then organize them into a feedback structured system. My use of CLFP began to reveal - in rough form - the structure or noema of core consciousness during purgation. It also revealed some of the main concepts Husserl referred to in his transcendental phenomenological methodology, such as the noema, the noemata, noesis, directedness of consciousness, intentionality, intentional inexistence, and the natural attitude (see Follesdal 1998). After a few years with the CLFP analysis I was able to probe fairly deeply into the contents of my long term memory where the 1962 experience of PMU resided. While I was making the CLFP analysis, I was opening up the memory of PMU that had laid dormant within me during the 22 years between 1962 and 1984. As a result, during this CLFP analytical phase my soul was on Fire. This was because my remembrance of PMU was opening up again, releasing pent up energy associated with those deep memories. During that firey period I wrote The Engineer's Story, given in Chapter 1.
Once the CLFP analysis of purgation was exhausted or was milked dry of preliminary insights, I was ready to begin the more subtle, second period or step in the analytical process. That step consisted of a much more powerful phenomenological analysis: A formalized, SD-based, mathematical kind of phenomenological analysis of consciousness. I eventually called that phenomenological analysis, Mathematical Feedback Phenomenology (MFP). Now, it is important to state here a fact psychologists are very familiar with: The dynamic data of core consciousness during deep experiences, like trauma or religious experiences, are very precisely and permanently retained in long term memory. Using that fact, which I had obtained from my experience with the CLFP step, the objective of my MFP analysis focused on constructing a formalized SD model (see Forrester 1961, Richardson 1981) that would use simulation to precisely describe my memory of the dynamics of my core consciousness during purgation. This key task was performed by mathematically modeling and then simulating - in a iterative way - a relatively simple set of aspects or variables of core consciousness during purgation, moment by moment, over each variable's or aspect's 10 hour duration This iteration process was performed until the actual dynamics of each aspect or noemata of my core consciousness during purgation had been precisely described (using moment by moment simulations) and purgation's two sector structure or flow diagram or noema had been carefully determined. There are, presently, 38 variables or noemata in that SD model of purgation, 23 of which are aspects of my core consciousness during purgation. The MFP analysis of purgation is given in Chapters 6, 7, and 8.
I was completely absorbed with the above two periods or steps of this analytical process. However, the analysis took a great deal of time to complete: The CLFP period took about two years, from December 1984 to some time in 1986 or 1987; the MFP period or step took about 8 years from 1986 or 1987 to December 1994. Metaphorically, the CLFP analysis could be thought of as like a model T Ford; the MFP analysis could be thought of as like taking the model T Ford and rebuilding it into a more precise Mercedes-type machine with vastly greater capabilities. Much was learned about purgation during the initial CLFP period or step, but the MFP step was a much more serious, rigorous, and subtle analytical process. The CLFP and MFP analytical tasks were not performed full time. I was working on other GTR project tasks at the same time. The completion of CLFP and MFP analyses are where my SD-based phenomenological analysis of purgation stands at the present time. The relatively simple 38 variable, two sector, MFP model will do for now, but it could be refined and expanded more and more as my insights grow deeper and clearer. Also, the number of variables or noemata I am using could be increased as the variables or noemata of the MFP analysis become more comprehensive and more refined. There is no limit to either the number of sectors of this MFP model or to the potential depth and fineness of detail of the analysis. However, one must be willing to give the time required for such an expanded and refined analysis. I am now 74. Time is running out. I must move on to other, more pressing tasks.
MFP is unique. It is a formalized, mathematically-based, SD analysis of the dynamics of core consciousness data during a deep experience. Such an analysis has never been done before. Its application to PMU is the first use of the MFP methodology. The MFP analysis of purgation reveals that the SD-based MFP methodology is the rigorous science of philosophy (RSP) toward which key phenomenological philosophers - like Brentano and Husserl - had quested, but had never attained. Note carefully: The CLFP and MFP analyses are SD-based analyses. SD is the underlying analytical tool of the first and second periods or steps of the comprehensive overall analytical methodology I am calling Feedback Phenomenological (FP).
It is important, now, to look at the SD methodology from a broad perspective for a moment. SD can be used to model and simulate the dynamics of any kind of system that is changing or moving. In this book I am focusing my SD analysis on the dynamics of my own core consciousness system during the 10 hour experience of purgation. However, the 4 to 7 second state of mystical union is a timeless state: There is no change in core consciousness during mystical union. SD cannot be used to model and simulate a core consciousness that does not change. That is, SD cannot model and simulate a changeless, and hence a timeless, state like mystical union. To analyze mystical union, I must find another analytical tool or method (see this link for a discussion of a possible scientific approach for analyzing consciousness during mystical union). As for the history of SD, it was conceived and developed by Jay W. Forrester (Forrester 1961). The analytical power, brilliance, and simplicity of the SD method is one of the great achievements of Forrester's legendary career at MIT. His career began when he arrived at MIT, fresh out of the University of Nebraska with an BSEE in 1939 or 1940, to work at the, now historically famous, Servo Lab during the desperate years just before and during World War II. Forrester's career has continued right up to the present day. I believe his SD methodology satisfies the requirements for being the logos, an all encompassing methodology for analyzing any kind of system that is changing or moving. The concept of the logos was first introduced by the ancient Greek philosopher, Heraclitus.
Now, the third period or step of the FP analysis of PMU will be introduced. My mind has been working on this third step since December 1994. The task of the third step is to materially ground or transcendentally ground the precisely simulated second step or MFP step of the FP methodology. For example, during the third analytical period or step of the FP methodology the simulated description of the opening of my heart, which is described in the natural attitude, is materially grounded or transcendentally grounded in the releasing of cramped or paralyzed heart muscles. That is, the third period or step of the FP analysis is a diagnosis: It takes the second step MFP dynamic description of purgation in the natural attitude and converts it to episteme in the form of its dynamic material correlates. That diagnosis is an example of the Transcendental Grounding Step of Feedback Phenomenology (TGFP). That third analytical period or step is finding out or diagnosing what was actually going on within my body physically or materially or neurophysiologically or behavioristically during purgation.
Here is a summary of the three periods or steps of the Feedback Phenomenological (FP) methodology for analyzing a deep experience like a trauma or a religious experience. This summary describes the FP analytical road from the dynamics of core consciousness "in the natural attitude" to core consciousness' transcendental grounding in the dynamics of material or neurophysiological objects within the experiencer's body.
Here are some of the material, neurophysiological, behavioristic, and conceptual results of that TGFP grounding of purgation:
Analogously, Forrester's conception and development of SD, together with my application of SD and FP in this book to formally analyze the data of my consciousness during purgation, is leading to a comprehensive understanding of purgation and the essence of religion. It also is leading to a number of breakthroughs. These breakthroughs are leading to the religious, scientific, phenomenological, philosophical, psychoanalytical, sociological, and anthropological culmination of this book: A science of consciousness, an integration of science and religion, a general theory of religion (GTR), a formalized scientific understanding of trauma, a solution to Chalmers hard problem, a rigorous science of philosophy, an understanding of the primary purpose of religion, an understanding of the evolutionary origin of religion, and, most importantly, a proposed scientific test for verifying my analysis.
Now, let us step back for a moment from this focus on the FP analysis of my religious experience, summarized in this introduction. There is something that is even more remarkable emerging from this book: It begins with an ontological statement made by the highly respected philosopher, G.E. Moore (1953). It goes something like this: "There are two kind of things in the universe: material objects and mental states." Therefore, the above two paragraphs reveal that Galileo and Newton began only one-half of the scientific revolution: The formalized science of the dynamics of third-person, material phenomena. The conception and development of SD by Forrester, together with the FP methodology for analyzing consciousness in the natural attitude, is leading to the other half of the scientific revolution: The formalized science of the dynamics of deep first-person, consciousness phenomena.
Therefore, the second half of the scientific revolution begins here with this book manuscript. We are now waiting for the scientific and religious communities to begin the second half of the scientific revolution! The first half has been going on for over 300 years. The second half of the scientific revolution is about to begin: The formalized science of core consciousness or the inner life will be played out during the second half. The game is not over yet.
Here is an outline of the events occurring during the above simulation:
