The Sunday Rabbit Whole
A Bit of a Scientist gets more data...
Happiest of Sunday mornings to you!
Before diving down the Rabbit Whole, I need to thank you for the click, the read, the listen, like, subscription…gifts.
These are translations of attention - energy - into form that matters.
Maybe our present-day use of the word “currency” speaks to the flow of this energy connecting us all, symbolized by paper, pixelated digits in an “account”, or thumbs-up emoji.
The Sunday Rabbit Whole is a gift I give myself, in letting my attention scramble through disparate lands in anticipation of the chills and “aha!s” I get when a bigger picture emerges. SRW is a gift I share with you, as a paid subscriber - mainly a choice I made when this substack started, to limit access to sometimes deeply personal experiences and mind-workings.
To those who are paid subscribers, thank you for supporting the bast’s music and musings and joining The Living Room community. Your gifts have meaning beyond label… ;) ❤️
Today’s post is free to subscribers, and all who come across the trail, to celebrate the gifts of fellow deep-divers, and share my gratitude for the work they, and so many, are doing to bring clarity to a world of confusion.
Last week’s Sunday Rabbit Whole, A Bit of A Scientist, was my exploration of “science”…not as a “thing” so much, but more questioning our relationship to science. The entire post is included below.
In diving down The Sunday Rabbit Whole, I have found that paradoxically, by adding perspectives I travel through a cloud of complexity to reach a refined vision of reality - there are simple shared truths, I think, underlying the wild workings of our worlds.
This week I saw echoes of A Bit of A Scientist in my world, from Vinay Prasad’s Observations and Thoughts post “Universities fall in love with money, forget debate”, to the deep wisdom Bryce Haymond shares in Thy Mind, O Human, a project exploring human consciousness and “what has traditionally been called ‘God’”.
Maybe these echoes emanate from the waves of perennial philosophy, the ancient-ageless wisdom at the root of all words and symbols of idea-energies, and nothing is ever new under the sun. Just endless variations on the themes of “life”.
Intending to repost A Bit of A Scientist, this morning I searched for an Einstein quote, recalling the revered scientist’s words on human consciousness. I thought the singularly phenomenal physicist’s perspective on separation and Oneness a fitting addition to last week’s post.
“A human being is a part of the whole, called by us “Universe”, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest — a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
- Albert Einstein
Funny thing is, I have this quote on my frig…I just forgot to grab in before heading up to my studio to write this morning…and the simple duck-duck-go search led me down the rabbit hole to Bryce, his translations, and his stories of life-search for perennial wisdom.
In the post I found, Bryce explored the layers of meaning and misquote in the above famously cited ideas of Einstein, finding the source letter written in German, and arriving at this more accurate English translation:
“A human being is a spatially and temporally limited piece of the whole, what we call the “Universe.” He experiences himself and his feelings as separate from the rest, an optical illusion of his consciousness. The quest for liberation from this bondage [or illusion] is the only object of true religion. Not nurturing the illusion but only overcoming it gives us the attainable measure of inner peace.”
— Albert Einstein, translation from German by Bryce Haymond
Thank you, Bryce! And thank you for relating your journey in the brilliant “Einstein’s Misquote on the Illusion of Feeling Separate from the Whole”, detailing the search for source material and meaning. I love your Welcome page…artist Alex Grey is a mystic-phenomenon! (and a Burner;)
Your work is astounding!
Read, subscribed, gifted…currency flows in the stream of gratitude.
Where the threads really started to weave into tapestry, however, was when I heard the following in a podcast last night:
“Why would we believe in science as atheists, when we don’t believe in God?”
— Walter Wartenweiler, The Atheist’s Guide to Spiritual Awakening
Dude! So simple, and profound! And easier for me to see after my pondering our relationship to science, instead of the absolute value of what “science” is. I think that loosening the hold on science as sacred reveals it to be less a foundational support for truth, than a belief system frought with superstition similar to religions that support other named “Gods”.
In his podcast, Walter describes the cognitive dissonance as a non-God-believer navigating a lifetime fascination with spirituality.
Definitely worth checking out, giving a listen. So happy, after months of gratitude for your perspective and sharing on Twitter, I found your podcast, Walter!
Liked, subscribed, followed…gratitude flows.
Another quote from Bryce’s post echoes the above,
“Every religion and spiritual tradition on Earth has their own set of symbols, and this includes science.”
—Bryce Haymond
I find that in approaching our relationship with science, in stepping back and looking at our collective creation, there is an appreciation of “natural law”, “foundational physics and math”…leading to ideas of source and concepts labeled “God”.
That is a huge rabbit hole, God. Or maybe the common gathering place we hang out together at the end destination of all the rabbit holes.
No wonder reliance on science flourishes, as confounding as the communal attempts to conceptualize and translate what may only be approached by exploring mystery.
So in the stories of these two humans, from my perspective as a third, the post last week has more complexity, and more wholeness.
Bryce, an American with most of his living in a mind-framework of an American-born Christian Morman-now-mystic shares a very different story than Walter, a Swiss-national avowed atheist.
Both have abandoned certainty to engage with the mystery of our shared reality. And what appears on the surface to be two humans on opposite ends of a spectrum, shows in their stories different views of the same…and can be seen in this fullness as existential proof of our Oneness.
Even if it’s not scientific.
A Bit of A Scientist
but first, a human...
This Sunday Rabbit Whole is a dive into what it means to be a “scientist”…really more foundational I think is the question “what is science?”
As always, seeking the functional aspects in the underlying movement of forces in our collective of human lives.
Surely, there is some meaning we can ascribe to the chaotic arguments flying like flaming frisbees in a gunpowder factory? I think many of us are fearful the whole place is gonna blow any second, while ducking yet desperately trying to comprehend the decisively hurled statements. Bazooka blasts of argument - “right” bolstered by “facts” in a hierarchy of power - with “science” set as the heavyweight in our Western cultures…is leaving us all war-torn.
“Trust the science”.
Ok….
What is “the science”?
Before I go further today, I feel compelled to remind that The Sunday Rabbit Whole is explicated musings, loose connections in hopes of widening the net of conscious thought, and engaging others to add story-threads of their own ponderings.
Here you will not find expertly dissected and displayed logical analysis…more like a channeling from the Flying Spaghetti Monster. No disrespect to followers of the pasta deity, of course.
As since this area of living - “science” - has captivated me, motivated me, and most recently confounded me, maybe sharing a bit of my science story and ruminations on my worldview through ever-changing science-prescription lenses will prompt you to reconsider a few taken-for-granted aspects of this being human.
To start, I could review the etymology of the word science, our current connotations, the history of the concept for humanity, and projected utility of “science” for future times.
Seems a logical analysis to answer the questions, “what is ‘science’?”… and “what is ‘The Science’?”.
That attention would imply that there is a “right” definition, or use of “science”, and by finding or agreeing on such we would solve problems.
I don’t want to attempt an answer.
Instead, I would like to start a discussion independent of characters, roles, and perceived experience with individuals, and focus on the scripts we read, written from the wells of our collective understanding of the thing we call “life on Earth”.
I want to zoom in on our use of the entire construct of science as a tool, which I have explored in bits earlier in “None of These Paradigms Fit, Can I have a Parachute Instead?”
Such a large part of our collective framework of understanding, “science” may be like the entire Eurasian land mass relative to the globe of human ideologies. Whatever a human believes “science” means, or how it fits into their particular philosophy of life, the where is guaranteed: I think every human participating in industrialized societies includes “science” in the bandwidth of waking daily thought.
I ponder here if the spectrum of merit given to “science” is wide - opposite ends with one point scoffing at the entire “trick” of science and the other holding science as the anchor point for all valid experience. All points on that line relating in reference to “science”.
How do you interact with “science”?
Like a Russian nesting doll, since COVID hit, the nuanced utility of science has been uncovered in layers:
“Trust the science”.
“Evidence-based medicine”.
“Peer-reviewed article”.
“Randomized, controlled, double-blind study”.
And at the core, finding no source of information without conflict…discovering the institutions producing research now to have no funding without ties to special interests. That is a blanket statement, sure to have holes… and while I have found sources that appear to be relatively conflict-free, those are so few as to be statistically insignificant - swamped by the deluge of information designed in some way to influence.
And, regarding “statistics”, here’s a mind- and paradigm-blowing reveal - check out Robert F. Graboyes’ post below in support of the claim that “mathematical statistics was created largely to support eugenics”….
I remember when I started college, entering as a Biochemistry major in 1989, initially considering the MD/PhD track. Over the first years, I worked in labs beside graduate students and professors, “benchtop research” the term for the nitty-gritty of answering “science” questions in a “scientific” way, and living as a “scientist”.
Rodent histone genes, sea urchin mRNA expression, visual neuron pathways in albino cats, dopamine receptors in Alzheimer’s model rat brains…it was pretty cool stuff to teen me.
What shocked me, though, was to work beside some of the most accomplished researchers - intellectually deep and precise, rigorously disciplined in approach, lifetimes of published projects evidencing their stature - and hear their distress with “the system”.
No academic I met then was satisfied with the state of “science” in the early 1990’s - and that was three decades ago.
All recognized that their job security, and ability to continue doing the work they loved, relied on special interests. Whether they stayed in the ivory tower, or left the political grind of an academic tenure-track for private industry or a “not-for-profit” institution, all paths were paved with funding from outside sources making “politics” a necessary traveling companion.
Back then, most slept at night by choosing the lesser of the evils, using their control over the work done in their labs to produce findings that were as pure, as conflict-free, as possible.
Since the funnel for funding was the university, there were factors in layers well beyond the primary researchers that were unknown, undisclosed, and most certainly not unbiased.
I decided instead to finish my Biochemistry degree and devote my career energy to practicing medicine, leaving the world of academics - teaching and research - to those scientists more equipped to navigate what I saw as the insecurity, pandering, and ethics-bending of university politics.
That statement isn’t flattering, and in truth the idealist (entirely-too-opinionated) early-20’s me did not realize I was jumping from the frying pan into the fire.
What started in my med school training as “evidence-based medicine”, with courses in epidemiology - applied statistics to populations for outcomes analysis - and study groups for “article review”, became “clinical guidelines”.
Let me explain:
What if a doctor has research data about a certain treatment in a specific population of people and the outcomes with or without that treatment? As opposed to learned ways of practice from apprenticeship and anecdotal experience, this “evidence-based” medicine seems practical and more grounded in “science”, right?
From that assumption follows a necessity for a physician to cull the relevant valid “evidence” from mountains of outpouring research data, to fit into the framework of their “practice”.
In medical school and residency, my colleagues and I pored over articles, learned the most recent advances in many fields, analyzed why the endpoints in one study were invalid and another study had perfect data but an incorrect conclusion, for example.
But after graduation, in “practice”, this theoretical gold standard of evidence-based medicine was onerous, and beyond any one individual to shoulder… enter “clinical guidelines”.
What if a group of physicians and scientists reviewed the relevant research data and arrived at conclusions for best practice of “evidence-based medicine”, then shared those with physicians at large to improve outcomes for patients, and make medical care more consistently current, and standardized?
Whoa! Now we’re getting somewhere - physicians get the security of “knowing” they are “doing the right thing” for patients, without having to take brain-power and time away from patient care to thoughtfully read and analyze research articles!
One example is the United States Preventative Health Task Force, created in 1984, which for US primary care docs was the ultimate resource in clinical guidelines developed from evidence-based medicine.
Through the 90’s and early 2000’s I practiced medicine using the USPHTF publication as a bible. It felt good. Knowing I was telling my patients the “right” information, based on the best research, and when research wasn’t available, a consensus of “expert authority” opinion.
I outsourced my expertise.
The fact that now, decades later, we have discovered that few of the preventative measures espoused by these guidelines are consistently effective in reducing disease or death is shocking. More gut-wrenching is the number of people who underwent costly invasive procedures, sometimes suffering life-changing or life-ending consequences, under the direction of physicians (including me) using these “clinical guidelines”.
More relevant to this post, and the head-scratching so many physicians and scientists can’t stop in today’s Twilight Zone, is that the above bombshell is not common knowledge. Not for patients, not for physicians - unless one was in the path of the information rivulet that carried the news [shoutout to Sensible Medicine, among others]. This decades-long-sought data, evidencing for patients a woefully negative return on investment, was a speck in the swarm of mainstream media health, wellness, and medicine reporting.
[Another nod to Professor Graboyes, and Bastiat’s parable of the broken window, and the necessity of evaluating both the seen and the unseen: for many industries, including the physicians who received payment for “preventative” measures promoted by the USPHTF, a handsome profit was seen. I argue that our human collective suffered irreparable loss, and that the overall destructive impact of shifting decision-making away from individual caregivers and their personal relationships with patients is devastating.]
Those USPHTF guidelines still guide medical practice today.
photo credit: coloncancercoatition.org
Back to way back then, though, when as a physician in Emergency Medicine, I started out with a focus on “quality assurance” using these guidelines….
If every over 40 male with chest pain and shortness of breath gets an EKG to look for heart strain and damage, we won’t send home someone with an undiagnosed heart attack, right? Check the box: over 40 - check. male - check. chest pain - check….
These measures, while seemingly sound in original intent, moved the point of control in decision-making from physician to health system.
In short time, if a doc practiced outside of “clinical guidelines”, that guy was increasingly seen as a liability. “If the correct treatment for disease X is Y, then why did you not treat with Y?”. Nuance, individual patient characteristics, and flexibility to use alternative modes of care to help people moved into the land of “unscientific”, “unprovable”, and therefore “unsupported”.
Insurance companies used such clinical guidelines to stratify reimbursement, often denying payment for care outside of their own framework of “standard”…then the “pre-approval” process began - unless the correct diagnosis code was entered for a particular evaluation or treatment, the insurance company would not cover the cost…and often regardless of who paid, the patient was refused the option for care.
Enter the era of cookbook medicine.
Agency shifted from the doctor in front of you to the corporate-owned healthcare facilities, insurance companies, and large-lobbyist legislation favoring big bankrollers…what had become of “the science”?
Autonomy and ownership for health decisions shifted from individual patients to whoever and whatever became their authority - increasingly puppet-stringed doctor, “best institutions” like the Mayo Clinic, government “experts” like the CDC, FDA, NIH.
What physicians and patients shared in this transition was the giving up, the surrendering of responsibility for the process of health decision-making to “higher level” authorities.
Not without ambivalence, but largely without a sense of control to change the “system”.
So what does all of that have to do with “The Science”?
Exploring the relationship we as humans have developed with that science, has at its core a parallel in our relationship with ourselves, maybe.
I think the personal responsibility to understand our human bodies, and respond to the needs that arise in a lifetime, has been eroded by the shifting of power to large corporate interests. This shift began as carefully structured funding for research (pharmaceutical, medical devices, etc.), and more distanced money for medical training schools, but morphed into a mess.
The level of influence, through financial incentive, afforded large corporations has deeply infected all aspects of healthcare. This is across the board, from the curricula for medical schools - literally training docs what to look for and how to treat - to the content of exams for licensure and board certification, the standards of practice espoused by specialty organizations (American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Cardiology, for example), and the political lobbying for legislation by the largest medical society in the US - the American Medical Association - itself inappropriately influenced by corporate interests.
So what is “The Science”?
I don’t think we should think of science the same way anymore, really.
At least not relate to science in the same way.
If a horribly conflicted source of data is the “science” supporting an argument, yet an individual citizen has neither the training nor experience examining data sources for validity, a debate based on “The Science” becomes nonsense.
Here’s an example of nonsense:
I have no opinion about the individual represented above - I’m not informed enough to make conclusions on the matter. The media above is included to demonstrate the mind-boggling state of communications I see around me in today’s world. And I’m curious what you’re seeing….
Those words…maybe I can make sense and find meaning? Maybe the individual speaking meant that the “climate crisis” is complex? And, we all know that any human is capable of word-salad in the moment, so again, I’m aware this is a snapshot and I’m not criticizing the human depicted.
I’m wondering if what is offered as “The Science”, and how we as individuals use that information for decision-making and belief-building in our lives…is often thinly veiled nonsense?
[Spoiler Alert: if you haven’t seen at least into Season 3 of The Good Place, and intend to watch, skip ahead to the ✨😉]
In the Netflix series The Good Place, deep in to the storyline, the plot turns to the futility of humans’ striving for enough points to enter heaven - no one has made it in to “The Good Place” in over 500 years.
Humans on the 21st century Earth, (aka “Us, now”), doing their “best”, are plagued by unintended consequences, like choosing a tomato (healthy choice: 100 points) but not realizing it was grown in a hothouse using Earth-killing chemicals (bad choice: -500 points). No one makes the Good Place anymore.
✨ok…safe to go back in
In my mind, I see this vast expanse of cloudy data between the core of me, my inherent values…and the ultimate consequences of my actions in the world.
Does it matter that in my early days as a doc my intent was to advocate fully for patients, if my allegiance to my (incomplete and corporate-influenced) medical training shaped my decision-making, and the warped guidance caused harm?
Or when I enlarged my toolbox to accommodate a functional medicine hammer, herbal wrench set, and trauma-informed screwdriver…but still practiced within a system that demands statins and COVID vaccines for all? (human - check, pulse - check…)
Does it matter that my relationship with “The Science” has matured from a teen crush “you are PERFECT!” to a wiser, more patient and accepting matron? “Yeah, you make a good point, and I love you so much, I’m just trying to hear what you really want me to understand”….
In our relationship to “The Science”, what matters? How are we served?
How are WE served?
For those of you new to The Sunday Rabbit Whole, this is the “buckle your seatbelt” hairpin turn…
The early days of “alternative medicine” cliff-diving for me included this paradigm-shattering read:
“In order to understand how healing happens, in the twenty-first century we shall look not only at our atoms and molecules but at consciousness as well. In so doing, we shall reinvent medicine, adding ancient wisdom to modern science. The result will be fabulously more successful-and fulfilling-than science alone.” – Larry Dossey, M.D.
Chock full of studies detailing totally woo outcomes in “healing” the human body, including research from NASA, NSA, and major academic centers (for what it’s worth…“science” 🤓)…this book changed my approach to healing by opening my mind.
What was “consciousness”? What control did we as individual humans have over this inherent aspect of our being? What made the connection I shared with patients healing? For them? And for me?
“Open mind” meant considering my ideas of reality were flawed, and at the very least limited. Thus began the confrontation with the previously held-in-cement ideas of “the way things work” in a human body. The way things worked in me.
But I knew open doors to other layers of shared reality might lead to opening Pandora’s box…releasing chaotic changes, maybe even apparent destruction.
Too late. Box open.
That book by Dr. Dossey may have well been made out of magic mushroom paper that I ground up in to tea, for the changes it brought to my medical-perception.
photo credit: trippy tea
After that, there were herbal conferences, Reiki attunements, and HeartMath conferences.
Returning to the hospital halls with an expanded perspective each time I dipped outside conventional medicine, the process of integrating woo/science into what would truly serve my patients - serve Us - was impossibly “unscientific”. Yet, the real observable improvement in health in the human asking me for help was undeniable. The shift in power, even in tiny increments, back in to the heart and mind of each patient is what kept me going back to “doctoring” again and again, despite the betrayal I felt from “modern medicine”.
That working through leading me to my own earlier abdication of personal responsibility, acknowledging the “knowledge” I consumed without questioning.
Determined to find “truths”, I sourced primary research, early texts of homeopathy, naturopathy, even shamanic medicine, looking for the shared threads - finding differing language describing common processes. I wanted to be “scientific” about my new educational journey, after all.
One of the more profound, astoundingly “scientific” mind-openers was a book by Dr. Jenny Wade detailing her doctoral thesis in human development. “Changes of Mind: A Holonomic Theory of the Evolution of Consciousness” questions how “scientific” an approach to developmental psychology could be, when it excludes all data that does not conform to reductionist models of significance determination…suggesting such an application of “science” is more akin to superstition.
That trash-basket of superstition is filled with what scientists consider to be “based on fear or ignorance and considered incompatible with truth or reason”…except who decides what is “truth” or “reason”, and how a finding is “incompatible”?
Is “science” another belief system, a paradoxically faith-based program that shuns “non-believers”? The humans who insist that valid experiences of mere mortals be accepted as such, even when they do not fall within the catechism of our current Newtonian/materialistic models of reality? Are the leaders of the cult of “science” the arbiters of “reality”?
The patients I saw with lived stories of distress and disease which fell outside of the conventional medicine rubric of diagnosis and treatment were largely dismissed by the establishment - often after years of consults, tests, and opinions by physicians that what the patient lived through daily was “all in their head”.
How does that serve Us?
For those patients, my validation of their symptoms, signs, and searching served to unblock their own ability to take control and find answers and meaning in their struggles - empowering them.
But the physicians and “healthcare” system as a whole?
Even after I learned the NIH with the National Institute of Complementary and Alternative Medicine - now the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health - had years of well-organized data like that detailed in Dr. Dossey’s book, any discussion with colleagues outside of what was “acceptable practice” caused disruption. Nobody wanted to chat about “healing touch” or herbal remedies, let alone “consciousness”.
For example, I remember the excitement I shared with fellow primary care docs when I read an American Academy of Pediatrics study finding that for acute otitis media (ear infection), an herbal garlic/mullein eardrop appeared to relieve pain and provide an alternative to oral antibiotic, solving a frontline doc problem - the overuse of antibiotics. A “valid”, “legitimate”, “authority” and a well-designed and executed study! So COOL!!!
Let’s just say, it was during this time I earned the nickname “Spacey Staci”.
[This beautiful description of mesmerism/hypnosis is a snapshot into the world of medical-establishment mind.
Interestingly, in my spelunking of Eastern spiritual traditions, I came across Vedic texts from thousands of years ago describing specific places on the body that one could impress the nervous system and achieve changes in a human’s consciousness allowing painless surgery. These “marma points”, I later discovered, were the origin of Chinese Medicine’s system of acupuncture.]
In those early years of woo, after the sting of rejection began to wane, and confusion surrounding my colleagues’ deaf ears allowed to percolate, I realized just how frightening the steps into openness and uncertainty appear to many. For me at that time, having already discarded a few bedrock life structures and forced to explore the nature of my own sanity, I had already seen the vastness of my own ignorance. Just plain dumb misinterpretation, miscommunication, mistakes. Repeatedly.
Ashamedly, I had been word-salading myself for some time….
I humbly wanted better for me, my patients, and colleagues…and I was willing to be stupid to do it.
“What is the first talk of one who pursues philosophy? Tho throw away self-conceit. for it is impossible for a man to begin to learn that which he thinks he already knows.”
-Epictetus, Discourses, Book II Chapter 17
What do we “know”? For sure? What does it mean when we say “proven”? Especially when we throw that word as an adjective onto “scientifically”?
This is where the trip to the desert gave me a gypsum dust-impregnated context for the new.
photo credit: JustABunchOfBits
Burning Man 2019 was my first “Big Burn”. Strangely in my 30’s when I learned of “Burns”, I felt drawn to go - I think back in my ER/disaster management/wilderness medicine days it seemed like a fantastic challenge to provide medical support for whatever the heck was going on with those fire-throwing hippies.
What I found in researching the whole phenomena before travel was even planned, was the 10 Principles. Reading about Radical Self-Reliance, Civic Responsibility, and Immediacy did little to prepare me for the truth of lived experience with over 80,000 humans in a self-constructed Black Rock City in the flat nowhere-sands of Nevada.
The LED lit city designed around a center “camp” serving coffee and ice - the only “commodities” on the affectionately named “Playa” - was organized as concentric semicircles, with the missing wedge known as “Deep Playa”. There lived the massive art installations, many were mechanical and only functional with participation of more than one human…and the Man. The effigy made of wood, towering above the meager tented camps, the shiny RV “plug and play” lodging for the likes of Elon and Paris, and the pyramid-massive glass and metal rave houses built for 24hr DJs and their disciples.
The global travelers in their perfect “burner” attire, the shoeless bearded nomads, the bikini-clad bike-riding folks of all ages…
We built that city, we brought that art, we gave and received, and then we took what we built and burned it, or tore it down, packed it out completely, and left the Earth as we found it. In a matter of days.
Radical Self-Reliance…
“Burning Man encourages the individual to discover, exercise and rely on their inner resources.”
What “inner resources” are necessary for one to survive in the widely varying weather conditions of the desert Southwest, cut off from “civilization”, amongst ?strangers (yikes! maybe real weirdos!) for 7 days? I thought the “outer resources” like water, shelter, the perfect snacks, were what my packing list needed to include…?
Civic Responsibility….
“We value civil society. Community members who organize events should assume responsibility for public welfare and endeavor to communicate civic responsibilities to participants. They must also assume responsibility for conducting events in accordance with local, state and federal laws.”
I wish I could translate in words how it feels to live and breathe just one week working beside other humans to accomplish mundane chores (kitchen cleaning or trash pickup) to magical leaps (singing “Autumn Leaves” in a M.A.S.H. meets Casablanca “Playa Jazz” tent, slinging moonshine at the entrance to Rootpile’s dance hall then hustling on stage in Daisy Dukes to play ukulele with the bluegrass band)…and realize with awe I witnessed the truth of humanity. Consent, respect, kindness, generosity, hard work by all. (Ok, there were a few sparkle ponies who def did not pull their weight in the hard work department, but still….)
Immediacy…
“Immediate experience is, in many ways, the most important touchstone of value in our culture. We seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner selves, the reality of those around us, participation in society, and contact with a natural world exceeding human powers. No idea can substitute for this experience.”
Yes. No idea can substitute for this experience.
No idea, or abstract framework…no statistical analysis, or double-blinded randomized controlled trial can come close to communicating what direct felt experience of being human, in a collective of well-intentioned humans, working and playing in the real natural world means.
What the eyes see, yet the limited number of senses we are taught to believe we possess as humans can’t possible take in…what in essence is an evidencing that we, as humans, are indefinably more than what we know - both as individual humans, and as ever-enlarging sized groups of humans.
The Playa held humans from so many different walks of life. Accountants, lawyers, tattoo artists, mathematicians, mechanics, truck drivers, homemakers, physicists, musicians…all artists. All artists. Giving and receiving everything as art, from the welded scaffolding of a trapeze display to the talks delivered by esteemed ethnobotonists in overflowing “academic halls”.
Remember the craziest imaginings of your childhood? These adult humans built it. Painted it. Made it fly, and sparkle, and delight.
Using “science”, and more than science. What I saw was more than anything I’ve ever seen humans accomplish before, and at the same time was more wholely human in expression than I had experienced. What a relief!
“You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.”
-Mark Twain
photo credit: backtalk: a medium place
What if our dependence on our eyes, and our steadfast belief in the value of science-as-proof-for belief is totally wonky? (yes, that is the accurate scientific term for what I am trying to communicate ;)
What if the immeasurable aspects of our human living are the truth? The scent of a new baby’s soft downy hair, the way the sunrise splays colors we can’t recreate with a box of crayolas, the deep knowing that, even without comprehending the “why”, we are here, now, with each other…alive?
You are reading these squiggly lines that symbolize thought forms, themselves some ethereal energy rudely mapped to a part of the squishy stuff inside my skull, requiring something much more than science explains to participate in this dialogue.
In truth, making real a connection that already exists as our common human being-thread… celebrating, really, our shared aliveness.
What if there is lots of “science” that is true, but it is not the truth?
Years ago, during the more rocky seas of woo-navigation, a simple exercise helped me regard my doings in this world. Stripped down as far back as I could consciously take an action, I considered whether the particular choice would support truth as I knew it. Then, as now, “truth” to me, at its core, was the connectedness - the unity.
The deeper this process developed, the more I discovered the parallel micro workings in my individual identity - was I being true with myself? Connected to the whole of me? Living the unity that I am?
Exploring what relationship I have with other humans, what authority I give away, what expertise I outsource, what responsibility I deny, what excuses I make for not living fully?
Was I using “science” as a weapon? A shield? A gateway? A sandbox?
I found it incredibly destabilizing to release information from the scaffolding supporting my belief systems, even more ridiculous to let the underlying scaffolding fall. But what choice did I have when I experienced the immediacy - the present moment truth? That there is very little…almost nothing…that I know.
My beliefs, I came to see, were stories. Some, really compelling, intensely dramatic tales. But not truth. At least not the whole truth.
Maybe this was a semi-conscious Aristotelian First Principles exercise of sorts that I was unaware had a model.
Ironically, that is so First Principles - not following a model, but stripping down to “knowable” elements within my own sliver of reality. [Insert sideways cracking up laughing emoji HERE].
In Playing the Changes, I storialize my epiphanies with jazz-as-process, rather than jazz-as-content…and maybe “science” is the same.
“Science is a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge.”
-Carl Sagan
If we as humans are so much more than thinkers, than even a shift from science-as-content to science-as-process leaves us with a science that is only part of our truth.
And, if as First Principles philosophers advise we endeavor to uncover the root elements at the foundation of our thinking process, we are still missing fundamental aspects of our workings as humans that are more than “thinking”.
What if our current connection with THE SCIENCE is teetering at the top of a leaning tower of stories over generations far removed from the original cognitive processes that “made sense”?
(I love that we English-speaking people use this phrase “make sense” to connote something “rational”, when the words are literally describing the process of creating a felt reality….)
And, what if back then in that origin-ish era, we had a different relationship to “science”, understanding it as a part of the whole of human information processing? What proportion of today’s scientist practice “science” as a part of a larger working?
More curious, what if like in First Principles’ approach to “problems/goals”, and the tearing down to fundamental truths, there is a parallel infinitely larger truth set?
That by allowing larger bodies of complexity to aggregate until we can comprehend again the distilled higher level dynamics, we see an infinitely networked big picture.
We are one, as humans, in our similarity of essential atoms…we are one, as humans, in our similarity as entire body of humanity as species.
Is that not true if we lack the replicable scientific proof?
I think we are in unprecedented times, confronted with paradox - apparently opposing “truths” impossible to reconcile without expanding our perspective…our consciousness.
If we labor to use science as a tool to uphold what is “true” - at least true for us as individuals mired in story-swamps for the most part, I think we are ignoring and dismissing in many cases what is real.
This is the dilemma I see many astoundingly intelligent, articulate, well-intentioned scientists - humans - struggling with today. And maybe, it is a functional conflict pushing us as a collective towards our next frontier of “human being”.
“You cannot solve a problem from the same consciousness that created it. you must learn to see the world anew.”
- Albert Einstein
What if it is time to acknowledge our relationship with science has some serious internal conflict? What if we need to break up with science? Or at least have a heart to heart about what’s really troubling the coupling…try to start anew, from the core of what we love about science?
We may find that humanity and “science” have matured, and science doesn’t fulfill humanity like it used to. Maybe humankind - for its own sake - is ready to check out what’s behind door number 2. Start something new.
Here’s something I know:
What we are doing isn’t working. At least “working” defined as moving people towards a future where basic human dignity is a given, all people have abundant food, water, shelter, and opportunity for creative living - and all are safe, free from indiscriminate or targeted violation. Agency, sovereignty, and the ability to administer one’s own wealth are enjoyed by all.
Children are nurtured, protected, guided to grow into autonomous independent parts of the whole. And that whole includes not only the collective humans as a species, but the entirety of life on planet Earth.
Maybe the reason we dismiss that future vision as a “dream” is because our collective consciousness sees no way to build a bridge to “there” from “here”. [I delve into my claim that “building bridges” is a fallacy in “Take It To The Bridge”.]
I think to “see the world anew”, is to allow the relationships we have with what we “know”, including science, to wobble. Maybe even detonate a (metaphorical!) bomb or two and see what part of the structures remain standing.
So… “The Science”. Hmmm…..
When a framework of what is we see as “real”, what is considered “valid”, is built on a flawed foundation, then the house of cards we call “science” is a delusional theme park of deceit.
In the COVID debate, for instance, foundational “knowns” - immune system health is the battlefield where any “war” with virus will be won or lost; the approach to viral infection of “winning or losing” is flawed, since all alter our genetic code irreversibly (perhaps functionally?) ; the basis for immune health is relationship health (more on that in a future SRW)…these were set aside like pyramid building blocks ignored in favor of styrofoam shells.
How did that serve Us?
The basis for COVID public health policy globally appears to be a fear-based expectation that any exposure to SARS-CoV-2 might result in life-altering infection, and that the virulence was so great that such infection may wipe out large swaths of populations. The focus was on blocking this supposedly super-lethal invader…instead of strengthening the life force and community spirit of the species being challenged.
Goal: divide the virus from the humans, instead of goal: unite the humans to approach the virus with the best of humanity.
From the early stage, set with rows of vaccine artillery and mask/sanitizer/lockdown forts for poor hapless citizens to “shelter in place”…the war on COVID began. All following tactics from the West Point commander-filled strategy boardroom were successive layers of flimsy cards building a house that has now become a hall of mirrors.
So many humans have been lost in that maze. Literally, the loss of life, of function, of dignity, of livelihood, of relationships, community, of joy and peace, is beyond comprehension.
Did the CEO of Pfizer knowingly market a product that was not only ineffective, but harmful? Was Fauci right to head the charge, “mandate the vaccine!”…were lives saved?
How will using science to answer these questions serve Us? Are there prima fascia truths we can use to tear away the nonsense?
How was science used to tell stories, and lead away from our humanity?
What I see now is massive disparity in the reactive evidence-based posturing…with few leaving the amusement park built in early 2020. Like a never-ending spinning teacup ride, there is constant movement and no destination.
An exercise of mine now is to think past my “right” answers, with scientific proof of their rightness of course, to the unseen…the stones we built our beliefs upon, the ways in which we each covered our humanity with stories that led us all astray.
Will the science we use bring us closer to the truth of our togetherness, or farther apart? If the answer is the latter, then I think we become a self-righteous cancer to the body of man, believing the cells that are in our band of truth must overcome those with ignorant, lesser viewpoints…unaware we feed for our life force off the ones we deem “wrong”.
What does it mean to source our own truth? How do we explore “life force energy” and consciousness itself?
What if instead of relying on external authorities and the battles for “right” or “wrong”, we stand solidly in the treasures of our individual selves we have excavated from the rubble of these times, voicing those knowings not for or against an ideal, but for their statement of who we are choosing to be in any moment? Commit to our own internal journey through the unseen, to examine- scientifically and otherwise - our own aliveness?
When the truths discovered carry the substance of our unity, and they remain unspoken, I think that too is a lie.
And since the whole truth can not possibly be heard without all voices speaking, the way forward out of the destruction of these times is to listen for the unheard, and look for the unseen.
The secrets we keep from ourselves may be what creates the splitting internally that blocks free flow of energy in our human system, and manifests in the double-speak that seems crazy-making.
The secrets of the powerful, shielded often in “science”, are coming to light now - maybe a functional process to see what we together turned blindly against, to stay in community in the cave of past centuries.
How does this unveiling - “apocalypse” - serve Us?
What can our collective consciousness attend to, and bring into our sight, in the future we are creating together?
Have we razed enough of the nonsense walls to clearly see a firm foundation for the life we intend to build?
I think the real foundation of our planet is a harmonious flow of life force energy exchange within and between all species, all surrounding organic matter, and all visible forms. Probably invisible forms, too, which is dependent on the vision of the individual, but that’s a topic for another post. Or not. Probably too woo.
To me, the vision limitations for humanity in 2023 are blindingly clear.
From the earliest understandings of ourselves as humans, we have “understood” our “understanding” is limited…like a video game of Plato’s cave with infinite levels of finding the “true light”.
Why would our human existence in this time and place be any different? What is the misunderstanding Big Boss we have to defeat to reach the next level of awareness? To grow and expand our comprehension of ourselves and our place in the universe?
I think that what we collectively agree to throw into the container of “science” will vary, and like discovering new depth in previously accepted “truths”, will never be absolute.
How much more significant to the daily walk of life for humans is our relationship with what we consider to be science?
How we choose to be informed by science, to alter our goals, to override our innate sense of what may be right for us as individuals and communities?
Is our power of recall so poor we can not instantly bring to awareness horrid examples of soul-violating atrocities done because…science said so?
Are we not impacted by the schism created when our hearts’ longing for physical touch from our closest loved ones crashes into our minds’ recitation of the latest evidence-based distancing rule?
Those of us still standing in this mirrored funhouse get to consider whether the searing Twitter rants or 28th lockdown initiatives are somehow not staring US back in the face.
Lest I make it through an entire Sunday Rabbit Whole without loopy-diving into my fave - etymology, here’s what I found on the origins of our word “science”:
What we accept as meaning now, is science as the “state or fact of knowing; what is known, knowledge (of something) acquired by study; information;" also "assurance of knowledge, certitude, certainty." This comes from the Latin scientia "knowledge, a knowing; expertness," which is from sciens, "intelligent, skilled.”
This form is the present participle of scire "to know." And that grammatical formulation constructs a noun from a verb. A thing from an action. A content from a process.
Here’s where is gets interesting to me:
“The original notion in the Latin verb probably is ‘to separate one thing from another, to distinguish,’ or else ‘to incise.’ This is related to scindere "to cut, divide" (from PIE root *skei- "to cut, split;" source also of Greek skhizein "to split, rend, cleave," Gothic skaidan, Old English sceadan "to divide, separate").
Holy schizophrenia!
Years ago, during the more rocky seas of woo-navigation, a simple exercise helped me regard my doings in this world. Stripped down as far back as I could consciously take an action, I considered whether the particular choice would support truth as I knew it. Then, as now, “truth” to me, at its core, was the connectedness - the unity.
The deeper this process developed, the more I discovered the parallel micro workings in my individual identity - was I being true with myself? Connected to the whole of me? Living the unity that I am?
If the immediacy of our most tender moments as humans teaches us that the underlying connections we share are real - truth - then science as we created it, and relate to it now as content or process, will always lie.
Science will show us division, how there is “separate”. But that is not the entire truth.
Without a consciousness that can hold the whole of separateness within unity, relating to science as a method of fact-finding is incomplete at best.
I am a scientist and a doctor and a mom and a musician and a burner and…really no label can completely describe me. Most arguably because I am not a “thing”, I am a process of life, without stasis.
Who I am to you depends on your relationship to me, and what level the house of cards nonsense we sustain between us has reached.
Digging down to the foundation of these relationships may send the playing cards flying, and change the game…but the flimsy paper scraps are coming down now or later. And that bedrock fluid truth of our aliveness here now, in these fleeting moments will remain as what mattered.
Both the content of what we consider “science”, and the process considered “science” are less immediately relevant, I think, than the relationship with the ideas and how we let those ideas shape our individual and collective lives.
With what we know, and the knowledge that much of what we know is a distorted fractal of the truth of our shared reality…can we allow ourselves to see more in what is “science”? See the vast more than science?
Can we learn to incrementally see more of the unseen, rather than denying all but what our current scientific methods demonstrate to our eyes?
See more in others, more in ourselves? Even if it is (gasp!) utterly and ridiculously unscientific?
As Einstein instructed, “see the world anew”?
And to see the more…to see Us as we more truly are…
maybe it’s time to take off the randomized controlled double-blinders.
Ok, friend…if you made it to this point, color me rainbow-amazed, with light-up glitter bursts of grateful you chose to share this ride.
Here is your Easter Egg 😘 🎉
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Well said!
Oh my dear....I'm doing well rn to occasionally update my Tumblr. And...I'll try.