Highly recommend Sonu Shamdasani’s Jung and the Making of Modern Psychology: Dream of a science as probably the best introduction to Jung out there, which does a great job situating the work in its context and includes the intellectual influences that Jung synthesizes but doesn’t necessarily name. Tons of unpublished sources as well, so quite a holistic approach to a subject many project onto
I just joined your list, and found this very interesting article on "Panpsychism", which for me evokes a kind of comparative analysis between Gustav Theodor Fechner from Europe, and Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Transcendentalism" from America. In 2008, on my extant group at the time, we looked into the parallels between European Panpsychism and its American equivalent in Transcendentalism. H.W. Longfellow played a very significant part, if my memory serves me.
I knew somebody at the time from Florida who raved about you and Becca Tarnas, and that is why the name Matt Segall has been floating around in my brain. This person said that you two guys were great together. She was from Gainesville, and had a lot of good things to say. I see a lot of strong continuation since then, Matt, and like minds will always gravitate toward each other. Max Leyf is a hero to me. He got me writing again. Kind regards, Steve
I remember Idaho in January 2017. Trump territory. How did you do? My friend from Gainesville seemed to indicate that you and Becca were still working the atlantic side. Now, you are back to Oakland from Sebastopol. All I know is that I see a small world in the making. Now, you find yourself touting Steiner's Outline of Occult Science. I just don't see the enthusiasm for it. It is not what you really want to be doing. Am I right? Your glory has Whitehead written all over it. Yet, A.N. Whitehead made it official in 1898 that he would be an agnostic, and threw out all his religious books. His wife was relieved, and hoped he would start paying attention to her.
Now, let us contrast this with Steiner, who went from Weimar to Berlin in 1898, and suffered all the same cosmopolitan issues that made Goethe sick in Leipzig in 1768. Yet, Steiner by this time, also knew that when he was a boy and living in Neudorfl, Hungary, c. 1871, that if he had remained a student in the village school there, run by the Cistercian monks, that he would have become a monk himself. This becomes our fundamental contrast with Whitehead. Steiner would have entered the spiritual life, while Whitehead chose agnosticism as the path as the easy solution. That is the difference, and why I challenge you to stick Whitehead's book in everybody's face in OOS, segment 12. See the difference if you care to.
Becca and I separated 4 years ago but remain friends and colleagues.
Steiner's work is important for me but I do not find it necessary to treat him as a infallible avatar. He's a Rosicrucian philosopher with unique abilities who has made an important contribution to integrating science and spirit. I find those who are overly enthusiastic about him to do a disservice to his contributions. He was definitely not trying to start a new religion.
Whitehead like most people continued to develop his perspective over the course of a long life. He was an agnostic for a time, yes. His later work rests on a profound and innovative theology that, as I've suggested elsewhere, is consonant with Steiner's evolutionary view.
I've been studying spiritual science for 37 years, and I can tell you that Steiner was not infallible like the pope :) He did come to bear a highly developed clairvoyant faculty with regard to macrocosmic considerations, which you find in Outline of Occult Science. My focus of development concerns the faculty of thinking, and how it leads to increasing powers of intuition and inspiration, which impinge on the microcosm, and the more detailed considerations of life. I'm not trying to get you to defend Whitehead, and apologize if it looks that way. I have simply gone down a different path. Cheers.
So, I like what you write from a certain standpoint, but it still embraces the materialistic viewpoint. Whitehead and Russell will never escape purporting materialism in the modern frame of reference. Yet, Steiner always sought what materialism meant as a higher resolve. This is the substance of OOS, which you even show as the ultimate alternative. Next week will prove a lot.
Whitehead and Russell wrote Principia Mathematica together, but Whitehead’s later “Philosophy of Organism” is certainly not materialism. He argues at length in several books that a thoroughgoing evolutionary cosmology is entirely inconsistent with what we calls “scientific materialism.” His later work presents one of the strongest criticisms of materialism available (though he also recognizes its historical appropriateness).
Highly recommend Sonu Shamdasani’s Jung and the Making of Modern Psychology: Dream of a science as probably the best introduction to Jung out there, which does a great job situating the work in its context and includes the intellectual influences that Jung synthesizes but doesn’t necessarily name. Tons of unpublished sources as well, so quite a holistic approach to a subject many project onto
Would also love to know how Augustine would change his critique of astrology based on Jung/jungian approaches :)
Thanks for this text - a fresh attack on What my current soul can comprehend.
Hi Matt,
I just joined your list, and found this very interesting article on "Panpsychism", which for me evokes a kind of comparative analysis between Gustav Theodor Fechner from Europe, and Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Transcendentalism" from America. In 2008, on my extant group at the time, we looked into the parallels between European Panpsychism and its American equivalent in Transcendentalism. H.W. Longfellow played a very significant part, if my memory serves me.
I knew somebody at the time from Florida who raved about you and Becca Tarnas, and that is why the name Matt Segall has been floating around in my brain. This person said that you two guys were great together. She was from Gainesville, and had a lot of good things to say. I see a lot of strong continuation since then, Matt, and like minds will always gravitate toward each other. Max Leyf is a hero to me. He got me writing again. Kind regards, Steve
I remember Idaho in January 2017. Trump territory. How did you do? My friend from Gainesville seemed to indicate that you and Becca were still working the atlantic side. Now, you are back to Oakland from Sebastopol. All I know is that I see a small world in the making. Now, you find yourself touting Steiner's Outline of Occult Science. I just don't see the enthusiasm for it. It is not what you really want to be doing. Am I right? Your glory has Whitehead written all over it. Yet, A.N. Whitehead made it official in 1898 that he would be an agnostic, and threw out all his religious books. His wife was relieved, and hoped he would start paying attention to her.
Now, let us contrast this with Steiner, who went from Weimar to Berlin in 1898, and suffered all the same cosmopolitan issues that made Goethe sick in Leipzig in 1768. Yet, Steiner by this time, also knew that when he was a boy and living in Neudorfl, Hungary, c. 1871, that if he had remained a student in the village school there, run by the Cistercian monks, that he would have become a monk himself. This becomes our fundamental contrast with Whitehead. Steiner would have entered the spiritual life, while Whitehead chose agnosticism as the path as the easy solution. That is the difference, and why I challenge you to stick Whitehead's book in everybody's face in OOS, segment 12. See the difference if you care to.
A few corrections:
Becca and I separated 4 years ago but remain friends and colleagues.
Steiner's work is important for me but I do not find it necessary to treat him as a infallible avatar. He's a Rosicrucian philosopher with unique abilities who has made an important contribution to integrating science and spirit. I find those who are overly enthusiastic about him to do a disservice to his contributions. He was definitely not trying to start a new religion.
Whitehead like most people continued to develop his perspective over the course of a long life. He was an agnostic for a time, yes. His later work rests on a profound and innovative theology that, as I've suggested elsewhere, is consonant with Steiner's evolutionary view.
I've been studying spiritual science for 37 years, and I can tell you that Steiner was not infallible like the pope :) He did come to bear a highly developed clairvoyant faculty with regard to macrocosmic considerations, which you find in Outline of Occult Science. My focus of development concerns the faculty of thinking, and how it leads to increasing powers of intuition and inspiration, which impinge on the microcosm, and the more detailed considerations of life. I'm not trying to get you to defend Whitehead, and apologize if it looks that way. I have simply gone down a different path. Cheers.
So, I like what you write from a certain standpoint, but it still embraces the materialistic viewpoint. Whitehead and Russell will never escape purporting materialism in the modern frame of reference. Yet, Steiner always sought what materialism meant as a higher resolve. This is the substance of OOS, which you even show as the ultimate alternative. Next week will prove a lot.
Whitehead and Russell wrote Principia Mathematica together, but Whitehead’s later “Philosophy of Organism” is certainly not materialism. He argues at length in several books that a thoroughgoing evolutionary cosmology is entirely inconsistent with what we calls “scientific materialism.” His later work presents one of the strongest criticisms of materialism available (though he also recognizes its historical appropriateness).
I found your reference to St. Augustine as the first depth psychologist intriguing.
To address your Question: At what point does psychology spill over into ontology?
I thought you might find these lectures by Rudolf Steiner to medical doctors & Priests interesting.
https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA318/English/AP1987/PasMed_index.html