Is there mystical knowledge of Nirvana? (Brahman? God? the "higher self" of the Yogasutra?)

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Is mystical experience, like sense experience, a source of knowledge?

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A. The parallelism question

1. The cognitive value of sense experience: the "Theory of Appearing"

If S takes something a to appear to herself as F, then she has a prima facie ("defeasible") reason for believing that a is F (Fa).

2. Similarities between sense and mystical experience

a. experience is taken by the subject to reveal realities
b. compelling character
c. checks for differentiating veridical and non-veridical experiences

3. Dissimilarities

a. lack of universality (see C & D)
b. nature of the object(s) taken to be revealed

B. Testimony and the principle of credulity

1. 1st-person and 3rd-person perspectives
2. criteria of reliability

· character

· self-consistency

· nature of the claims (coherence with other things we know, e.g., evil or lifelessness of Mars)

· personal investment, objectivity

C. Objectivity and intersubjectivity

D. The problem of mystic diversity

Some philosophic answers:

1. William James's "piecemeal supernaturalism"
2. W. T. Stace's "core view"
3. Aurobindo's "logic of the Infinite"
4. irreconcilable diversity

E.  World views

1. Motivation
2. problems of coherence (e.g., God and evil)
3. spirituality without a world view
4. metaphysical minimalism

F. debunking views

1. Hume on miracles (naturalism)
2. psychological debunking (including brain chemistry)
3. sociological debunking