Implications and Consequences of Post-Modern Philosophy for Contemporary Transpersonal Studies III. Deleuze and Some Related Phenomenologies of Felt Meaning: Psychosis and Mysticism as Inherent “Structures of Thought”
International Journal of Transpersonal Studies July 1, 2014 DOI: 10.24972/ijts.2014.33.2.16 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Mysticism Philosophy of mind |
| Citations | 2 |
| Key points | Argues that Deleuze, Bion, and Gendlin independently converge on a view of immediate understanding as a felt sense of shifting coherence and incoherence grounded in tacit metaphoric, figural, or synesthetic processes. On this account, psychotic thought disorder exaggerates the incoherence potential inherent in all felt meaning, while mystical states arise from enhancing its coherence aspect. The author proposes that Krishnamurti's ordinary-language descriptions of enlightenment confirm Deleuze's and Bion's claim that numinous states are latent within all felt meaning. |
Abstract
There is a surprising confluence in the philosopher Deleuze, the psychoanalyst Bion, and phenomenological psychologist Gendlin on what Deleuze terms the immediate "sense" of understanding and Gendlin calls "felt meaning."Beneath its more differentiated propositional articulations, all three understand this phenomenon as a felt sense of constantly shifting coherence and incoherence, and based in often tacit metaphoric, figural, and/or synesthetic processes.For Deleuze and Bion, in particular, psychotic thought disorder is understood as the exaggeration of this incoherence potential within all felt meaning.Correspondingly, the expansion or enhancement of the felt coherence aspect of ordinary thought becomes the basis for the mystical states of consciousness that become a major concern of the later Bion and Deleuze.The Indian spiritual teacher Krishnamurti, known for his use of an ordinary language of deceptive simplicity to describe spiritual enlightenment, offers a striking confirmation of Deleuze and Bion on numinous states as latent within all felt meaning.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on mysticism, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| The mystical mind: probing the biology of religious experience | 2000 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Religious and Mystical Experiences as Artifacts of Temporal Lobe Function: A General Hypothesis | 1983 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| The Problem of Pure Consciousness: Mysticism and Philosophy | 1993 | Edited collection of essays | |
| Irreducible Mind: Toward a Psychology for the 21st Century | 2020 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Mysticism and schizophrenia: A phenomenological exploration of the structure of consciousness in the schizophrenia spectrum disorders. | 2016 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
Citations in the library
Cited by 2
- Intimations of a Spiritual New Age: II. Wilhelm Reich as Transpersonal Psychologist. Part I: Context, Development, and Crisis in Reich’s Bio-energetic Spiritual Psychology International Journal of Transpersonal Studies September 1, 2018
- Intimations of a Spiritual New Age: II. Wilhelm Reich as Transpersonal Psychologist. Part 2: The Futural Promise of Reich’s Naturalistic Bio-Energetic Spirituality International Journal of Transpersonal Studies September 1, 2018
Cites 4
- “Dark Nights of the Soul”: Phenomenology and Neurocognition of Spiritual Suffering in Mysticism and Psychosis Review of General Psychology September 1, 2007
- Implications and Consequences of Post-Modern Philosophy for Contemporary Transpersonal Studies II. Georges Bataille’s Post-Nietzschean Secular Mysticism, Phenomenology of Ecstatic States, and Original Transpersonal Sociology International Journal of Transpersonal Studies July 1, 2013
- Creativity, Schizotypicality, and Mystical Experience: An Empirical Study July 1, 2013
- A Cognitive Psychology of Mystical and Altered-State Experience Perceptual and Motor Skills April 1, 1984