Alan Wallace on "Contemplative Science and Objective Science"

To many people today, the "scientific method" appears to be the only successful means for acquiring consensual, accurate, and useful knowledge of the natural world; and science focuses solely on the objective, physical, quantifiable aspects of reality. That leads materialists to believe that reality consists solely of objective, physical, quantifiable phenomena, even though subjective experience fills none of those criteria. Since all mental processes and states of consciousness are undetectable with the methods of objective science, those methods cannot give us a complete understanding of nature as a whole. The radically empirical methods of contemplative inquiry found in Buddhism and other contemplative traditions can complement the third-person methods of modern science and lead to consensual, accurate, and useful knowledge of reality. Most importantly, such first-person methods have yielded profound insights into the nature and origins of consciousness and the role of mind in the natural world.
Suggested readings: The books: The Taboo of Subjectivity, Mind in the Balance, and Meditations of a Buddhist Sceptic
B. Alan Wallace began his studies of Tibetan Buddhism, language, and culture in 1970 at the University of Göttingen and then continued his studies over the next fourteen years in India, Switzerland, and the United States. After graduating summa cum laude from Amherst College, where he studied physics and the philosophy of science, he went on to earn his Ph.D. in religious studies at Stanford University. He then taught for four years in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara, and is now the founder and president of the Santa Barbara Institute for Consciousness Studies (sbinstitute.com). He is also Chairman of the Thanypura Mind Centre (piamc.com) in Phuket, Thailand, where he leads meditation retreats. He has edited, translated, authored, and contributed to more than forty books on Tibetan Buddhism, medicine, language, and culture, and the interface between science and Buddhism, including Hidden Dimensions: The Unification of Physics and Consciousness (2007), Mind in the Balance: Meditation in Science, Buddhism, and Christianity (2009), and Meditations of a Buddhist Skeptic: A Manifesto for the Mind Sciences and Contemplative Practice (2011). See http:/alanwallace.org/

[@JesseNickelltheFourth]

Thank you for sharing this teaching/lecture, and discussion, I found it insightful, and well worth my precious time.

[@joelweddington]

I'm inspired to find this channel, I found Dr. Velmans 2009 paper "How to Define Consciousness..." helpful in organizing a presentation I will give next month at SAND in Italy "Observerless limitless beingness as a scientific definition for consciousness."