One day, you will find yourself outside this world which is like a mother's womb. You will leave this earth to enter, while you are yet in the body, a vast expanse, and know that the words, "God's earth is vast," name this region from which the saints have come.
--Jalal-ud-Din Rumi
Many of my fellow atheists consider all talk of "spirituality" or "mysticism" to be synonymous with mental illness, conscious fraud, or self-deception. I have argued elsewhere that this is a problem -- because millions of people have had experiences for which "spiritual" and "mystical" seem the only terms available.
Of course, many of the beliefs people form on the basis of these experiences are false. But the fact that most atheists will view a statement like Rumi's, above, as a sign of the man's gullibility or derangement, places a kernel of truth amid the rantings of even our most gullible and deranged opponents.
Consider Sayed Qutb, Osama bin Laden's favorite philosopher. Qutb spent most of 1949 in Greeley, Colorado, and found, to his horror and satisfaction, that his American hosts were squandering their lives on gossip, trivial entertainments, and lawn maintenance. From this Dark Night of Suburbia, he concluded that western civilization was so spiritually barren that it must be destroyed.
As is often the case with religious conservatives, whatever ignorance and "death denial" didn't explain about Qutb, sexual frustration did:
The American girl is well acquainted with her body's seductive capacity. She knows it lies in the face, and in expressive eyes, and thirsty lips. She knows seductiveness lies in the round breasts, the full buttocks, and in the shapely thighs, sleek legs--and she shows all this and does not hide it.
(Sayyid Qutb, The America I Have Seen: In the Scale of Human Values, 1951)
These are not words of a man who has discerned the limits of romantic attachment. Being terrified of women, and yet as concupiscent as bonobo, Qutb is widely believed to have died a virgin. We can feel his pain. Needless to say, his puritanical attachment to Islam allowed him to make a virtue of necessity: What a relief it must have been to know that the Creator of the universe intended these terrifying creatures to live as slaves to men.
But Qutb was not wrong about everything. There is something degraded and degrading about many of our habits of attention. Perhaps I should just speak for myself on this point: It seems to me that I spend much of my waking life in a neurotic trance. My experiences in meditation suggest that there is an alternative to this, however. It is possible to stand free of the juggernaut of self, if only for a moment.
But the fact that human consciousness allows for remarkable experiences does not make the worldview of Sayed Qutb, or of Islam, or of revealed religion generally, any less divisive or ridiculous. The intellectual and moral stains of the world's religions -- the misogyny, otherworldliness, narcissism, and illogic -- are so ugly and indelible as to render all religious language suspect. And I share the concern, expressed by many atheists, that terms like "spiritual" and "mystical" are often used to make claims, not merely about the quality of certain experiences, but about the nature of the cosmos. The fact that one can lose one's sense of self in an ocean of tranquility does not mean that one's consciousness is immaterial or that it presided over the birth of the universe. This is the spurious linkage between contemplative experience and metaphysics that pseudo-scientists like Deepak Chopra find irresistible.
But, as I argue in The Moral Landscape, a maturing science of the mind should help us to understand and access the heights of human well-being. To do this, however, we must first acknowledge that these heights exist.
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Steve McSwain: What I've Learned from the Spiritual Masters
Which state is the "real" pure consciousness state? Are they all equally "valid" spiritual states?
My take is that the pure consciousness found in TM is the "valid" one. It occurs spontaneously, without effort, and physiological research on the state shows that it is impossible to "hold on to" because by the time a subject notices that they are "in" the state, they are actually no longer showing the physiological signature of the state: they didn't notice the state itself, but only the transition out of the state, thereby sidestepping the question of how can you describe, or even do something like push a button, when you aren't thinking.
Continued...
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1600-0838.2009.01007.x/full
Higher psycho-physiological refinement in world-class Norwegian athletes: brain measures of performance capacity
http://www.tm.org/american-psychological-association
Abstract for the 2007 Conference of the American Psychological Association
Brain Integration Scale: Corroborating Language-based 
Instruments of Post-conventional Development
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12406612
Patterns of EEG coherence, power, and contingent negative variation characterize the integration of transcendental and waking states.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19862565
A self-referential default brain state: patterns of coherence, power, and eLORETA sources during eyes-closed rest and Transcendental Meditation practice.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10512549
Pure consciousness: distinct phenomenological and physiological correlates of "consciousness itself".
http://www.psychosomaticmedicine.org/content/46/3/267.long
Electrophysiologic Characteristics of Respiratory Suspension Periods Occurring During the Practice of the Transcendental Meditation Program
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7045911
Breath suspension during the transcendental meditation technique.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9009807
Autonomic patterns during respiratory suspensions: possible markers of Transcendental Consciousness.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10487785
Autonomic and EEG patterns during eyes-closed rest and transcendental meditation (TM) practice: the basis for a neural model of TM practice.
A classic example of a a Straw Man fallacy which is based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position in order to bolster the inherent weakness of one's view.
This is a vision of living within the means of our planet sustainably and of balancing body and mind. Our visions of survival of the fittist or random mutation or brain events being the same as mind or dna determining everything is a mechanistic vision of the industrial revolution not that of complex living systems...
alright, I'll admit it. There are probably a very large number of people who are already using that name. And it's not even clear that they can all demonstrate anything at all about the nature of sufism.
Look at uncle Albert for example. Who came up with such preposterous insights as:
Only two things are infinite. The Universe and human stupidity. Though I’m not sure about the Universe.
"many of the beliefs people form on the basis of these experiences are false"
But fortunately, I’m in the enviable position of infallibly knowing which is which.
"a sign of the man's gullibility or derangement"
Like, allegedly, the numbers that some perceive they see, floating in front of their normal vision. With which they can perform calculations. Quite preposterous, if you don’t happen to be one of them.
"so spiritually barren that it must be destroyed."
Before their quest for the fuel to power the machines to manicure those lawns, lead to the demise of all.
"Qutb was not wrong about everything."
For every way in which his rendition of reality matched mine, was strangely right?
"The Moral Landscape"
Or, View From A Unique Vantage Point?
Allowing for the possibility that "higher states" of well being exist doesn't require that one allows for particular answers how these states come about - not even whether they can be brought about or are in any sense repeatable.
The problem of finding the fine line that divides sound argument from arbitrariness exists for the seeker of meaning in the exact same manner as it exists for the scientist.
There ain't no free lunch - not even spiritually.
If a scientist wants to say that the possibility exists for something without investigating the how, and just sit with that and go no further, it has more to do with the readiness for the answer than anything else. Unless it's a true scientist with an open mind who is more excited about discovering new truth then protecting the ones they already believe in. For them, no rabbit hole is too scary to go down...
Meditation is presently both an art and a science. Perhaps in the future, as sciences of meditation and being biology evolve positively and spiritual awareness trait capability also improves, meditation (perhaps other words would be used in the future for spiritual/meditation) for spiritual awareness would gradually become a science. Meditation is one of the best invention by being species which not only have many benefits for practitioner but also huge potential. Presently, meditation techniques are more for well being rather than means to experience nature phenomena. Meditation can also be deceptive since it is not only a science but also an art of living. One should try different meditation techniques and living to have better understanding. Spiritual awareness requires extreme and sustainable efforts and diligence through practices and experience. It is also important to point out that since each being is biologically, genetically, physically and mentally different, spiritual awareness capability would also vary among people. If one has little interest, no interest or view spiritual awareness negatively or never really live such experience; would be difficult for one to even have idea nonetheless judging. Spiritual awareness, which is a fundamental characteristic of being and essence of nature, is not magic. And unlike magic, spiritual awareness is real. Furthermore, we can judge magic, it is either an illusion or a deception.
Nature phenomena or the natural world can be perceived differently among species. The phenomena could be hallucination, wrong perception or real. The world spiritual can have different meanings for different people or communities. A person experience nature phenomena does not mean that person practice spiritual or understand spiritual. Since spiritual awareness is a trait or capability which being species has just recently achieved in the past several millenniums through millions years of evolution and transformation of such as physical body, intelligence, consciousness and awareness; and therefore, the potential or possibility for spiritual awareness manifestation and ability is still very primitive. Furthermore, entities such as social and cultural norms could also hinder it development if spiritual awareness is not practiced or sustained. Therefore, more often then not, spiritual experience are spontaneous since spiritual awareness ability is still evolved and developed as a species. However, spiritual is not about experiencing natural phenomena. Rather, the real meaning of spiritual is the advancement in understanding and knowledge of meanings and purposes of life, existence and natural world through such as reasoning, contemplating, discernment, objectives and subjective sciences, including analysis of nature phenomena. Presently, spiritual practice is mainly a combination of art, philosophy and sciences. Perhaps, as being spiritual awareness genetic or epigenetic trait gradually evolves in the future, spiritual practice would be more and more scientific or more objective and less subjective.
carriage return and line feed.
five
words.
It's likely that consciousness is merely an electromagnetic phenomenon generated by the busy brains of the myriad creatures on this planet. I doubt that the universe will find this phenomenon to be indispensable as it goes about its business of combining various forms of matter and energy. Unfortunately, most humans are still at the level of primitive bipeds who need a tribal leader to tell them what to do and what to think -- and so religion will be very profitable for the foreseeable future.
I'm stealing that, but changing concupiscent to horny.
I like how gossip and lawn care is seen as shallow, even narcissistic, but meditating isn't?