Theos-Talk Archives (February 2002 Message tt00298)

Steve: The implication is that Blavatsky was lying when she says she 
> saw pages of books in the "astral light." However, suppose that
> she was one of those rare people who has the gift of eidetic 
imagery 
> and photographic memory. Suppose furthermore that having read those 
> 100 books she had no conscious recollection of much of their 
content. 
> Suppose also that her unconscious mind stored photographic images 
of 
> much of this material and was able to present it to consciousness 
in 
> the form of "visions" in the "astral light." In that case, it is
> reasonable to assume that she was describing her experience 
> accurately and that the experience could be better explained in 
> psychological terms than in terms of miracles. According to the law 
> of parsimony, that would seemingly be more reasonable than the fraud
> hypothesis of her enemies, or the "astral light" hypothesis of her 
> worshippers, This explanation allows Blavatsky to be right inasmuch 
> as her description of her experience goes, and ditto with
> Coleman, since what he said can be easily checked and found to be 
> true. It would be "paranormal" in the sense that not just anyone 
can 
> do it, but it would not be "paranormal" in the sense that Daniel 
> Caldwell uses the word, to describe something which is miraculous
> and outside the range of human potential.
> 
> The polarity here is the same as with the Ootan Liatto story. Some 
> insist that we have to find some "miraculous" explanation for it, 
and 
> others insist that Olcott was lying. A better approach seems to me
> to be to totally accept the statements of these people regarding 
what 
> they experienced, and ask what it means. We allow ourselves in this 
> case to question their INTERPRETATION of what they experienced, but 
we
> do not question their truthfulness. We therefore eliminate one 
> hypothesis (i.e., that they are lying in certain cases when it 
serves 
> our purpose to say they were lying and not in other cases) and the 
> argument becomes more parsimonious.
> 
> As for the recent comment someone posted that the truth is likely 
to 
> turn newcomers away, I think that is not a problem. There are at 
most 
> a few thousand Theosophists in a world with some five or six billion
> people in it, so there is no army of newcomers to turn away. 
Besides, 
> if Theosophy can only be promoted by concealing the truth, it is 
not 
> worth saving."
> 
Brigitte: I think Sufilight might think different of that, he is 
thinking in 
> lightyears, and he is a firm believer in Indries Shah, the one who 
> was able to con poor J.G. Bennet.
> Bri.