Rachel,

  This is a good and deep question, and as Nik’s reply suggests, there is much to be mined here and reflected on and debated.

  For me, I am really just making three basic points that I think are pretty straight forward. The first is that we can separate out awareness from the way our self grips it. That is, we want to be able to just attend to what is present in us. One way to think about this is to have a look at this blog on the four levels of pain<https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/theory-knowledge/201210/the-four-levels-pain#:~:text=The%20four%20levels%20are%20as,emotional%20reaction%20to%20the%20pain.>. In it, it mentions the fact that some people can experience the sensation of pain without the affective aversive element. This is a rare and problematic condition because it renders the crucial function of pain mute. However, it shows conceptually the difference between perceptual awareness of sensation and affective charges in response to that. Although for most of us, pain will be part of the foundational experience of being, it nonetheless is the case that with training we can distance the process by which we fuse our awareness of being with the motives, needs, and perspectives of the self, ego, and persona.

  The second point is that differentiating the witnessing of awareness from the attachments of the self, ego, and persona is potentially very helpful. I think Rob Scott and his work on the Fundamental Shift makes this case especially well. However, it is also a central feature of Eastern meditation and thus there is a huge set of traditions and practices that take this meditative mindful approach to being in many valuable directions. Regardless of one’s specific angle or set of practices in this domain, the general second point then is that this separation of witnessing from gripping/needing/attaching is an important set of insights that can lead to wisdom.

  The third point is that awareness itself is an interesting philosophical phenomena. One way to characterize it is as follows: It is where the epistemic is the ontic. That is, awareness is an epistemic process of knowing. I am presented with a meaningful witnessing experience. That simply is. That is, if we do not think about it in terms of representing anything, but rather simply take it for itself as itself, we are presented with a kind of foundational knowing. It is the case that I am witnessing the world now and am experiencing myself in my office. Regardless of any external truths, the subjective experience of being is true in itself for itself and can’t not be true on its own terms. It is kind of like Descartes’ inability to doubt that he did not exist. But is more basic. It is an epistemic ontic reality that is true on its own terms and can’t not be true. This relates to the “isness” claim. I just want to leave it here for now, though.

There are many different ways people can go with these insights and exploring the interrelations between them is valuable. My goal, however, with UTOK, is less of a deep dive into a particular stream of thinking, and more about obtaining the optimal grip on the ontology of mental processes, human mental behavior, and the psyche such that we solve the problem of psychology, both its objective science-behavior side and subjective psyche side, and collectively bridge the Enlightenment Gap with a descriptive metaphysics and metatheoretical understanding that is coherent and up to the task, enabling us to revitalize the human soul and spirit in the 21st Century.

Best,
Gregg



From: theory of knowledge society discussion <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Rachel Hayden
Sent: Saturday, February 12, 2022 2:27 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: TOK Blog on ESP-A Model

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Gregg and all ~

Thank you for this interesting topic and framing.

Not to stick my unlearned nose in here, but the above contention around Isness is really interesting and makes me wonder: Is there a difference in epistemological status between unconscious awareness and aspectualized conscious awareness (qualia) that is relevant here and for wisdom cultivation? This conversation is reminding me of a tale (supposedly) about the Buddha, which I can only paraphrase loosely from memory:

An onlooker asked the Buddha: What is it that monastics do?
The Buddha replied: They sit, they stand, they eat, they lie down.
The onlooker was shocked at the banality of this, and said: Surely that's not all?! What makes them different from ordinary people then?
The Buddha said: When they sit, they know that they are sitting. When they stand, they know that they are standing...

In gratitude for these conversations,
Rachel


On Sat, Feb 12, 2022 at 11:39 AM Nicholas Lattanzio <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
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I dont believe that from most perspectives of pure awareness or Isness that it is an aspect of consciousness, it is not epistemogical in nature. Maybe from a natural scientific perspective this is how you could make it fit into your system but honestly to me this shows a flawed understanding of Isness. If I can put it that frankly without intending to be pejorative.

Isness as a way of being has been recorded as such for thousands of years, almost none of the originating schools of thought considered it secondary to anything, especially consciousness. I would hope that your take on it can be corrected so as to actually impart the learnings of wisdom traditions without appropriating them into an otherwise incongruous model.

The way you have it could certainly still be useful, but it is incomplete.

I also hate to say it because its just another word game and I dont mean for it to be personal but to attribute the term Isness to one person is perhaps the reason for its mischaracterization.


Regards,

Nicholas G. Lattanzio, Psy.D.

On Sat, Feb 12, 2022, 10:59 AM Henriques, Gregg - henriqgx <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
Hi Folks,
  Here is a blog I did which explicitly adds the “pure awareness” dimension/aspect of consciousness to the Updated Tripartite Model:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/theory-knowledge/202202/the-esp-map-human-consciousness<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.psychologytoday.com_us_blog_theory-2Dknowledge_202202_the-2Desp-2Dmap-2Dhuman-2Dconsciousness&d=DwMFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=Qf7MJ5_la3XWoM_z6HBeB8EU1Zs1rgelktN58lJlKB8&s=snuGOShStplENal71YAbaEJRMUU4Jr5tUTETkJztwUY&e=>

Welcome thoughts,
Gregg


___________________________________________
Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
President of the Society for the Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration (2022)
Professor
Department of Graduate Psychology
216 Johnston Hall
MSC 7401
James Madison University
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(540) 568-7857 (phone)
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Be that which enhances dignity and well-being with integrity.
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