Hi Joan

You will find some of my criticism/evaluation in the essay "Problems of Consciousness...", and
in some of my emails to you.

"Searle is a relative beacon of light....."

Eastern philosophies, and western idealism in the graded idealism...

Western materialism, and the entire modern world view, in that - under the influence of what
may be called Cartesian or, perhaps more properly, local-adaptive dualism - it totally misconceives
and marginalizes the meaning and nature of the perceiving subject to an epiphenomenal
ephemerality - even those who pay homage to the need to turn away from dualism even you, even
I. The real nature of the perceiving subject includes hard surfaces and real things... I am
tempted to hedge but should not succumb

The modern community of consciousness/mind philosophers is not a hard entity. These are folks
from various theatres who, in their travels, spend some time in the castle - some sit for a
while upon thrones, others are overnight guests, some are fools, some tricksters, some
minstrels, some counselors...and there are the enforcers, and the dungeons.

Scientific materialism - I perceive this to be a trap; not essentially for one can always take
any viewpoint, and place it in hierarchies defined by levels of neutrality, levels of
generality, levels of magic and myth, levels characterized by the dimension whose poles
are the ice-mountain of logic in the hands of the magicians on the one hand and the full
plenitude, wonder and splendor of being on the other.

So I perceive this tendency for modern academia to remain on the lowest floor in a space of
minimal dimensionality; people become committed to views held in a moment of excitement in
their immaturity and die as old men with shiny heads and grey beards reciting their youthful
mantras on their death-beds.

In itself I see the modern approach as having elements of promise but executed in a sterile
vein; perhaps it is necessary to go through this living out of an inherited "karma"...but,
seen as a mature science, the modern science of mind presents as one giant step backward...

Some comments on criticism of others in the knowledge/being endeavor. One approach: the polite
give and take, there is an infinity of time and we leave the ultimate discovery to some future
generation or species. Another, in opposition to the first: Attila the Hun or perhaps a more
sophisticated version - Arjuna on the fields of Kurukshetra - Kurukshetra means "field of Kuru";
there is one reality; here-now is the time and place and I choose between the Sunday
afternoon picnic, the gentlemanly cricket match...and a sword into the thickets of confusion
and exposure of the real. There are other poles that provide us with a multidimensional space to
inhabit in our personal journeys; the purist, continuing the toilet training in to adult hood,
projecting cleanliness to the real, lives on the thin line of one of of the dimensions. But, there
is a wealth of places to live.

Details later...and, of course, the above will not appear in print or in my web page except
by possible implication.

Anil