NEWS: Analysis & Commentary Page 2 CASSIRER, ON THE EXPRESSIVE FORM OF MYTHOPOEIC THOUGHT: A FOUNDATION FOR Buchanan's Concept of Ambiance by Bill Stroud, Ph.D. Cassirer is not easy reading, even for the person who has some background in philosophical studies. If I have gleaned from his philosophy of symbolic forms a true representation of his ideas concerning a progression in forms of thought (from myth to language to scientific thought), I feel justified in proposing that certain dynamics of mythopoeic thought processes have parallels to what is commonly called "being in the remote viewing mode." For instance, except for one "notorious" remote viewer who claims to guarantee 99% accuracy for his teams of remote viewers, all the veterans of this discipline agree that hitting a target ordinarily does not produce results similar to a photographic-like image of the target. In fact, upon completion of a written summary, it seems to be an extreme exception for a remote viewer to be able to actually name the target (Eiffel Tower, etc.), although he or she might acquire extensive data integral to the target situation. Also, often the raw data, from which a summary is initiated, has more to do with images that overlap in some fashion than with abstract concepts. Images produced in a remote viewing session are often as diverse visually as the faces of mythical gods. However, as students of mythology are apt to tell you, in mythopoeic thought a storm god can be cited as present in war and a war god can be cited as present in a storm, because, on the experiential level, devastation is common to both.11 Maybe the mode of remote viewing, as it is often called, is replete with an atavistic element, a regression to a mode of experiential symbolism vis-à-vis a conceptual symbolism of representation. Maybe this former mode of "knowing" is rooted in descriptions of emotions more than descriptions of things, one which communicates with images which do not function as representative pictures any more than a broken heart refers to a organ's demise. Maybe Right Brain processes (whatever such a spatial metaphor means--in light of its reversal in some people!) is a factor.12 As most of us have learned, we seldom get pictures on the model of photographs, unless we are talking about very fuzzy ones that are radically out of focus. We may be moving a little closer to an explanation of what constitutes the mode of remote viewing by seeing Buchanan's ambiance notion as being a pre-conceptual appropriation of information, an appropriation which is rooted more in an expression of an emotive formulation than a conceptual one. But alas! We still face the question of how that got here from there or how we got there from here. Maybe we just don't know how to ask a question that would deny both a here and a there! 1 Citing as exception the claim of mystical experience as direct appropriation of "knowledge" offers no explanatory value and becomes tantamount to extending the word "knowledge" until it has no cash value in the philosophical market. 2 For a survey of the contemporary theory of non-locality, see Robert Nadeau and Menas Kafatos, The Non-local Universe: The New Physics and Matters of the Mind. Oxford University Press, 1999. 3 For a concise summary of the impact of John Bell's theorem, see Evan Harris Walker, The Physics of Consciousness: Quantum Minds and the Meaning of Life. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Perseus Books, 2000, pp. 115 ff. 4 For a concise and very readable introduction to the positivist's approach, see A. J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic. Gollanca, London, 1936. 5 Ernst Cassirer, Vol. III: "The Phenomenology of Knowledge," in The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957, p. 68. 6 See my article, Making a Stray Cat Prolific: Thesaural Imaging and Remote Viewing (Hawaiian Remote Viewers Guild's On Target Newsletter (August/September Issue), in which I propose a tool for "deconstructing" multiple images recorded in a session: http://www.hrvg.org (Click on the On Target link and scroll down to title listings). 7 This dynamic should not be confused with logical implication. The intuitive experience here cited is more like a hunch, a conclusion reached on the feeling level, not on the cognitive level. For a treatment of this existential aspect of appropriating meaning from experience as if one is "getting messages," see Chapter I, "Transactional Being" in the authors monograph, I Feel Like Me When I'm With You: The Experience of Intimacy. Memphis, Tennessee: Creative Life Publications, 1979, pp. 11-17. 8 Ernst Cassirer, Language and Myth. New York: Dover Publications, Inc., p. 13. 9 Cassirer, Vol. III: "The Phenomenology of Knowledge," in The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms, p. 68. 10 For an excellent treatment of this particular theme, see Mircia Eliade, Cosmos and History: The Myth of the Eternal Return, translated by W. Trask. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1954. 11 For a discussion of this phenomenon, see Eric Voegelin, Order and History. Volume one: Israel and Revelation. Louisiana State University Press, 1956, p. 7. 12 For an examination of Right Brain dynamics in relation to Stray Cats, see the author's article, "When a Stray Cat Is Really an Angel: Target Data vs. Imagination in CRV," published on his personal website (http://www.drbillstroud.com/id18_writings.htm). Copyright by Bill Stroud, January, 2002 Bill Stroud, of Clearwater, Florida, has an extensive background in three areas: theology, philosophy and psychology (B.D, Th.D., Ph.D). Although semi-retired, he is active as a speaker, freelance writer and a workshop presenter for educational and service agencies. He is currently in training in the theory and methodology of remote viewing under the tutelage of Lyn Buchanan of Alamogordo, NM. www.crviewer.com. Address comments to drstroud@tampabay.rr.com. [Bill Stroud has completed advanced training with Lyn Buchanan. For other writings, visit his website at: drbillstroud.com]   PRINT THIS ARTICLE Privacy Statement Copyright © 2002, H.R.V.G. All rights reserved.

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