[MD] The Trouble With Wilber

[Krimel]

dmb says:
Of course biologists don't reduce things to quarks and nobody said they did.

We're talking about flatland, not tiny town. Think of Pirsig's discussions 
about objectivity in anthropology or the way behaviorism is considered 
scientific while psychoanalysis is merely an art. That is flatland 
reductionism. I've never heard of anybody wanting to break biology down into

quarks or anything like that. I really can't imagine where you got this 
impression.

[Krimel]
Wilber equates flatland with reductionism. If the land were truly flat
biology would have to be reduced to nothing but matter and energy, Quarks
and leptons. Clearly it does not reduce this way and is not flat. As I
mentioned before Pirsig is ranting about the anthropology of Boaz during the
Victorian era and the treatment of Dussenberry in the late '50s. Times have
changed. But by the way behaviorism was scientific and psychoanalysis isn't
even that great as art.

Reductionism is not the enemy. Breaking thing down into parts and examining
the relationship among those parts is a valuable tool for thinking in all
areas. This is after all in large part what holarchy is all about. Wholes
composed of parts that are wholes. The real problem is a determinism that
attempts to establish fixed causal relationships among both parts and
wholes. While relationships can be established, they are probabilistic. They
may often be regarded as causal if all other things are equal. But all
things are never equal. The network of causality is so complex that only
probability statements can be made. Probabilities that are resolved through
the process of becoming in the present then dissolve into a probabistic
past. If you want to postulate a whole new sense probability is a good
candidate. It is embedded in our language, mythology, popular culture and
economics. We assess the environment instantly and sense probable outcomes.
Value is the measure of weight we assign them. Quantum physics and
mathematics only confirm what we already sense in this regard. 

Old School determinism may indeed be thought of as flatland. Even I think of
it as such. But it works better as a relic of the past than as a strawman in
the present.

Krimel opined:
I have pointed out many times that Wilber's talk of expanded consciousness 
is nothing more than pandering to empty headed rich new agers.

dmb says:
You've dished up a lot of empty insults like this one. You say he panders to

empty headed new agers but his work is fairly well established in the 
academic world. I'm not denying that there might be an empty headed new ager

who read and enjoyed one of his books, but the idea that his ideas have no 
credibility among serioius people is factually incorrect. Its just plain 
wrong. By the way, I have no money.

[Krimel]
If you have a list of academic papers or dissertations on Wilber I would
love to check them out. I don't have access to a citations index but you
probably do. Show us what he's got.

Krimel said:
All this while virtually ignoring the emergence of real expanded awareness 
and consciousness that is booming around us in the form of cell phones, 
instant messaging, e-mail, Google Earth, GPS, webcams, Alternative 
Intelligences, the expansion of identical shared memory in the form of film
and voice recording and the sum total of human knowledge instantly available

at the touch of a button. All of this higher level consciousness emerges 
specifically from the direction of rational thinking suggested by Piaget 
whom Wilber butchers while you applaud.

dmb says:
These forms of technology reflect a higher form of consciousness and their 
use might very well lead to even higher forms in turn, but technology itself

is not conscious. At least, not cell phones. Not yet. You're not really 
saying anything that hair-brained. The post-Piagetian structures added by 
Wilber are also based on "the emergence of real expanded awareness and 
consciousness" too, but its not the sort that is "booming all around us" for

the simple reason that it is not that common. Unlike the early stages, which

are more or less universal, these higher structures are not something you 
can find in just anybody but they can be detected in the same way. Like I 
said, I don't think this is butchery. Its only addition and in the world of 
idea is it perfectly normal practice. In fact, I think your objections to 
this are quite meaningless.

[Krimel]
Actually one of the best criticisms of Piagetian stages I have heard is that
there are a great many adults who never achieve the formal operations stage.
Artists, plumbers, Buddhists, ministers and politicians may achieve high
levels of functioning that are not rational or spiritual. Various kinds of
intelligences have been proposed and this is a general problem for stage
theories. Wilber takes note of these multiple intelligences, but I thought
his treatment of them was superficial. Talking about integrating is not very
meaningful if you are fuzzy about what is being integrated. My biggest
problem is his emphasis on the spiritual as representing the highest level,
the level toward which integration leads.