Truth vs Falsehood (2 page)
The overall mission was guided by Socrates’ dictum that all human error or wrongdoing is involuntary for man can only choose what he believes at the time to be a good that will bring happiness. His only error is that he cannot discern the real good from the illusory good. This work is devoted to clarifying what is the ‘real’ and how it can be identified.
To preclude undue emotional upset, the publication of the book was delayed until information that had been discovered by prior research was revealed to the public. It was therefore decided to wait until after the 2004 elections, the Iraqi war, the United Nations scandal, Islamic terrorist training in the United States, double agents in U. S. intelligence operations, clergy pedophilia, MS-13 gang infiltration, Iran’s nuclear plans, etc., had occurred. All these events were identifiable back in 2003-2004, long before they became public news. Similarly, more could be said about events yet to surface.
Of greater importance is to describe the methodology and basic concepts that make such discoveries available to investigation, for this rather comprehensive study demonstrates that there are no longer any secrets, and truth can be instantly discovered by any integrous researcher.
Whether to reveal all that is discovered is problematic and requires reflection. The premise that occasioned the above decisions was that wisdom is the better part of valor.
The ensuing presentation of material is unique in that it views the totality of the human experience and the evolution of life via a new and relatively recently discovered means of research. It includes new observations and understanding of not only the ordinary, supposedly objective world (nature), but also uniquely, for the first time in any research, simultaneously correlates the observations with the very means of observation itself (subjectivity). Thus, it bypasses and transcends the ages-old major source of error (duality) by means of the unity of nonduality, a rather transformational process in and of itself.
The calibrations of levels of truth were frequently startling, and, like the discovery of the x-ray, microscope, and telescope, they opened up staggeringly huge areas for investigation that had never before been accessible by any means. The dimensions of suitable subject matter expanded at an overwhelming rate, and eventually there was the realization that it could be applied to
everything
. While it could be assumed that a seminal discovery would be satisfying, in this instance, on the contrary, it was overwhelming and took years of reorientation and decision-making. Could the understanding be explained? If so, how; and, finally, should it be?
The origination of the work was the consequence of cataclysmic, subjective changes of consciousness that occurred spontaneously, beginning in early life, and then, in 1965, revealed a whole new mode of knowingness that recontextualized the very core of experiencing. The shift was basically from content to context as the central focus of awareness from which all meaning then became transformed. (See “About the Author” at the end of the book.)
The research technique also revealed itself spontaneously in that witnessing and comprehension were now from the viewpoint of totality (field) instead of a personal or limited locus of ‘personal self’. The basic instrument of experiential information processing, and even of experiencing itself, had shifted from the linear particular and limited to the nonlinear, nonpersonal quality of autonomous awareness and consciousness.
The shift and its inferred possibilities necessitated leaving a huge psychiatric practice and spending twenty years of contemplation, out of which arose the basic research reported in
Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis and Calibration of the Levels of Human Consciousness
, which was the forerunner to the publication of
Power vs. Force
in 1995. This subsequently set what could only be aptly described as a whole new culture of interest, investigation, and inspiration that led to the spontaneous emergence of numerous independent study groups worldwide.
The collection and mass of material became widespread in the public domain where tens of thousands of people experimented with the new technique of calibrating the levels of consciousness of anything and everything. A widespread network of confirmation and feedback developed that was accelerated by dissemination of the information publicly by means of numerous formal lectures and workshops with public attendance and formal, recorded participant discussion and traditional question-and-answer sessions.
All the public presentations of the work have been recorded and videotaped throughout the United States as well as in the Orient (Korea) and Europe (Oxford Union). Thus, the information has been peer reviewed by many thousands of participant observers as well as by sophisticated, ongoing discussion groups.
While some of the raw data may not coincide with personal expectations, that is the anticipated response. The discovery of any new information of real significance has always provoked query and doubt and is to be expected. Data that are in conflict with personal beliefs are best handled by viewing such information as a ‘possible alternative’ rather than as ‘make wrong’, which automatically summons up ego protest or even indignation. Oddly, protest is often confirmation that a nail has been hit on the head.
Although the human mind likes to believe that it is ‘of course’ dedicated to truth, in reality, what it really seeks is confirmation of what it already believes. The ego is innately prideful and does not welcome the revelation that much of its beliefs are merely perceptual illusions. By research analysis, actually only 35 percent of the public is really interested in truth for its own sake.
The discoveries and the work itself do not spring from a personal source but are a consequence of the advancement of human consciousness, i.e., the overall climate.
In general, the calibrated numbers are rounded off to the nearest integer of 5, for example, 63 is reported as 65, 242 is reported as 240, etc. The real significance is to locate a level of consciousness relative to the overall Scale of Consciousness. More specific numbers are significant only when doing detailed research.
Some variation in numerical specifics is to be expected among different investigators and groups, but they are inherently consistent, and the variation is due to personal differences of technique (described in Appendix C). It is comparable to adjusting a barometer to different altitudes. The primary thrust of the overall approach is to know how to tell truth from falsehood, i.e., the absence of truth. Reliability depends primarily on the integrity of the questioner and the intention for asking the question. Dedication to truth itself is the rapid road to its discovery.
The first doubt block to be overcome is the startling discovery that the truth about anything whatsoever is readily available in a few seconds, just for the asking. The normal response to this discovery is disbelief, followed by paradigm shock, but then curiosity prevails. The whole universe awaits discovery on a new level of understanding, out of which arise compassion and wisdom.
The purpose of the work is long term, and the information is best assimilated by reflection, which summons forth comprehension. The numerous doubts and questions that arise have already been extensively examined, sorted, discussed, and resolved by virtue of collective intention, because if mankind really did not want to know truth, the means to its discovery would not have arisen and revealed itself on the radar screen of human discovery.
An all-pervasive crisis of credibility and integrity is currently shredding the very fabric of all levels of society. The institutions and historic bulwarks of integrity and reliability upon which society has relied over great expanses of time are under political attack, and others have fallen into disgrace and scandal on an almost daily basis. These include not only governments and world leaders but also entire dominant political ideologies, monolithic religious institutions, government agencies, federal authorities, universities, school systems, corporate giants, banking institutions, major newspapers, news channels, and the media in general.
Even the court system has become a contentious political circus, and jurists legislate from the bench while juries award huge fortunes in order to ‘make a statement’. Institutions that were founded to protect civil rights are now seen as their worst enemy and are seemingly intent upon destroying freedom as it has been known in the past.
In the criminal courts, carefully selected juries are purposely misled by fallacious argument and manipulated by histrionics and irrelevant fictions. Although distortions of truth historically have been part and parcel of the political arena, politics has degenerated from rational discussion and debate to personal vilification, overt fallacies, gross frauds, and prevarication.
Prior to our recent and current society, the fate of whole civilizations, as well as nations and cultures, was decided primarily by conquering enemies who relied solely on brute force. The same reliance on force was even adopted by religious institutions (as is currently the case in certain parts of the world), and often the conquered were given the choice of either becoming converts or being summarily executed. Force was then the predominant and ruling principle which dominated societies, and religions as theocracies perpetuated the reliance upon coercion and force, backed up by dire threats.
Because of current terrorism and zealously promoted threats to world peace, religion itself has surfaced as a focus of current public attention and discourse. The highly visible and volatile devotees of militant world religions have openly and formally declared war on the rest of the world and seek to exterminate all nonadherents to their restrictive belief systems. The egocentricity and megalomania of such extremist positions are now primary threats to the possibility of a peaceful world. The sophistry of such violent ideologies has even provoked the appearance in the Western world of naïve apologists and sympathizers who are unaware that they too are seen merely as infidels (“mushrikun”), fools, and ‘useful idiots’ (Lenin’s term) who equally deserve extermination as idolaters (Forsyth, 2004; Charen, 2003).
The bewilderment of current human society is evidenced by the lack of clarity or comprehension of the fundamental issues, which require identification and elucidation as well as validation of their credibility and authenticity. The primary defect now is, as it always has been, that the design of the human mind renders it intrinsically incapable of being able to tell truth from falsehood. This single, most crucial of all inherited defects lies at the root of all human distress and calamity.
Operationally, the mind is dualistic and thus sets up separatist mentations based on arbitrary, hypothetical positionalities that have no intrinsic reality. Thus, by design, the mind has the basic defect, as pointed out by Descartes, that it cannot differentiate
res cogitans
(also
cognitans
) from
res externa
(i.e., mentalizations about the seeming appearance of the world versus the world as it actually is). The mind thus confuses its own projections and mistakenly assumes that they have an external, independent existence, whereas, in reality, no such condition exists.
The design of the human mind is also comparable to that of a computer in which the brain is the hardware that is capable of playing any software programs fed into it. The hardware is, by design, incapable of protecting itself from false information; therefore, the mind will believe any software program with which society has programmed it, for it is innocently without any safeguard or protection. The same declaration has been made by all the greatest spiritual leaders of history who unanimously state that the basic defect of humanity is its relatively invincible ignorance, the recovery from which is operationally impossible without the help of a spiritual teacher.
The human mind, therefore, by virtue of its innate structure, is naïve, blind to its limitations, and innocently gullible. Everyone is the victim of the ignorance and limitation of the human ego. Not only is the majority of the content of the average mind fallacious (e.g., fifty percent of the information on the Worldwide Web tests as ‘false’), but it is also programmed to attack itself with self-hatred, depression, guilt, low self-esteem, envy, greed, conflict, and endless misery. These defects are then projected onto the world as hate, war, violence, and genocide. The ego defends its own limitations with prideful denial, thus becoming its own victim.
That the human mind, without help, is unable to tell truth from falsehood due to its own innate structure and design is so staggering a discovery that it is roughly comparable to the discovery by Copernicus that caused cultural shock in the sixteenth century. Because this single fact alone is confrontational to the average mind, it will probably not be welcomed or warmly greeted by those who profit from sophistry and its illusions.
In today’s world, it is not just the seeker of spiritual truth who is focused as never before on discovering how to tell truth from falsehood. The general public is in a semi-paralysis state due to the quandary of doubt and futility of hoping for any kind of dependable authenticity in the current public discourse. Public interest is riveted on testimony before investigative panels. Mobs in Madrid chant, “We want the truth.” Juries strain to sift through evidence, and protest groups vociferously challenge every aspect of society.
At this time, there is no common agreement on even the most basic, simple, and obvious questions: What to do? What to do when an avowed enemy slaughters thousands of innocent civilians? Should we ‘lock up’ criminals or just see them as victims of society and let them run the streets as compulsive predators? Is it simple, common-sense police work to scrutinize obvious terrorist-group suspects, or is that to be forbidden by civil rights? It is not even clear who is the perpetrator and who is the victim. Who or what is to blame?