Mysticism in Philosophy - What is Mysticism? Are Mystical Experiences Beyond Human Comprehension?

What is Mysticism?
Mysticism and reported mystical experiences, like claims of becoming one with a God or absolute reality, are often dismissed today as interesting, but ultimately unimportant events fully explained by neurological processes in the brain.

However, mystical events, whether real or fictional, have significantly shaped the course of human history. All the world’s major religions have started from reported mystical experiences such as the angel Gaberial manifesting in front of the virgin mary or the Buddha experiencing initial nirvana under the Bodhi tree. Mystical experiences have been reported to radically alter the trajectory of experiencers’ lives, in many cultures and societies, including the non-religious.

Plus, if just naturalistic neural events in the brain fully explain all mystical experiences, this raises a philosophical question.

Does identifying neural correlates of mystical experiences prove they are mere naturalistic brain events or does it just identify the brain activity that occurred during a genuine mystical experience?

Regardless of epistemology, should we put more effort into understanding and experiencing these events to improve our well-being if they indeed, as reported, radically change the way we view our life?

This video will serve as a brief introduction to the philosophy and psychology of mysticism. In it, we’ll cover what mystical experiences are, explore their categories and attributes, examine how beneficial they are, and if they can serve as a doorway to something about reality beyond our comprehension we should seriously explore.

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0:00 Introduction
1:40 What is Mysticism?
2:00 'Wide Sense' of a Mystical Experience
3:03 'Narrow Sense' of a Mystical Experience
3:50 Examples of Mysticism
6:18 William James, 'Noetic', & 'Ineffable'
6:44 The Problem of Ineffability
8:13 Perennialism
9:56 Constructivism
11:02 Inherentism vs Attributionism
12:06 Epistemology of the Mystical
13:37 Naturalist Causes
15:50 Mystical Events for Healing
16:56 The Importance of the Mystical