Roy Posner, presidente y fundador de www.growthonline.org, un website dedicado a la aplicación el desarrollo en sus muchas variedades inspiró por las enseñanzas de Sri Aurobindo, enviadas me un papel llamado " respuesta a la teoría integral de Ken Wilber del sentido. " Su autor, Garry Jacobs, es un contribuidor a ese website, y un estudiante de largo plazo de la filosofía de Aurobindo de la vida. Su ensayo procura cubrir las diferencias teóricas principales entre Wilber y Sri Aurobindo, y pues tal sigue siendo una contribución agradable a un campo del estudio en su infancia: Wilberiana, o el estudio comparativo de Wilber y de las muchas fuentes que él ha utilizado. Sri Aurobindo es de hecho uno de los pilares principales del edificio Wilber ha construido -- aunque hay muchos, muchos más -- y por esa razón solamente un ensayo escrito por alguien versed en el sistema Aurobindo es al parecer muy bien oportuno. La mayoría de los ensayos críticos escritos sobre Wilber sufren del hecho de que sus autores no han tomado la época de estudiar el trabajo de Wilber en él son alcance completo. Veamos si Garry Jacobs maneja evitar esa trampa.

El papel de Jacobs no tiene una sola referencia a los trabajos de Wilber, ni la iguala nosotros encuentra cotizaciones literales, que hace difícil para que el programa de lectura considere adonde el autor está transportando exactamente las puntas de Wilber, y donde él está dando sus propios resúmenes e interpretaciones. Las palabras de Aurobindo no se presentan en el artículo tampoco, tan por lo menos Jacobs dan a ambos autores el mismo tratamiento. Desde como autor de Ken Wilber: Pensado como pasión , estoy completamente en el país en el universo de Wilber, quizás estoy en pie igual con Jacobs también, nosotros dos que son el intérprete para un autor que pensamos tenemos mucho a decir al mundo.

Sri Aurobindo escribió la síntesis del yoga , iniciando su acercamiento integral a ese campo, y Haridas Chaudhuri, uno de sus estudiantes, escribió yoga integral ; él también fundó al instituto californiano (antes) de estudios del este integrales. Por varios años, Wilber ha utilizado el término " integral " para su acercamiento también, como es evidenciado por uno de sus libros más recientes, psicología integral (2000), y del instituto integral que él fundó en el mismo año. Del término " integral ' integral ' " está por supuesto nadie característica, pero cuando Jacobs indica " aunque él llama su del acercamiento un teoría, aparece más como una adición o en el mejor de los casos una síntesis, más bien que una integración única ", esto parece como " más integral que una actitud del thou ". Por otra parte, Wilber ha dado, en sexo, ecología, Spirituality , un metasystem ontological y epistemological de gran alcance original que, debido a su lo completo y coherencia, puede integrar muchos diversos sistemas, incluyendo Aurobindo -- el acercamiento de Wilber es así una integración genuina y altamente original, no una síntesis mera.

Como tienen muchos críticos de Wilber, Jacobs lo acredita para crear una unificación magnífica de todo el conocimiento humano, en la cual se honra la dimensión científica y espiritual. Sin embargo, en el final de su Jacobs de papel da el aire a su sensación de la decepción: " aunque él incorpora planos espirituales más altos en su modelo y se parece hacer alcohol la base verdadera, el modelo sí mismo es terminantemente una formulación mental ". Tal juicio hace que su mente va espacio en blanco: cómo podía un modelo teórico de la mente humana ser otro entonces una formulación mental? Wilber no está escribiendo poesía, aunque él tiene sus momentos líricos, solamente alguien que intenta discutir en una manera académica para un worldview espiritual en un clima cultural moderno y postmodern que sea hostil o aún indiferente a tales materias. Como él dijo en una entrevista con el diario del yoga en 1987: " el empuje del conjunto de mi trabajo es hacer práctica espiritual legítima, para darle poner a tierra académico así que la gente pensará dos veces antes de que despidan la meditación como cierta clase de retiro narcissistic o de regresión oceánica. Ése es todo. "

Ése no es igual que reduciendo spirituality a la racionalidad, pues Jacobs se parece sugerir a través de su artículo, como si él esté esperando que Wilber proveiera de nosotros una filosofía espiritual de la vida que contesta a todos nuestros problemas. El objeto de valor tan que puede estar en sí mismo, negocio de Wilber se puede caracterizar como la cosa más segunda en calidad. Él intenta dar una comprensión científico sana del spirituality, incluso si ése implica el cambiar de nuestra misma opinión de la ciencia sí mismo. Pues Wilber ha indicado en muchas ocasiones, él es " un pandit, no gurú ", y éste de una manera la dice toda. Contar con más de la presentación de Wilber será un obstáculo importante a cualquier discusión " terminantemente mental ". Wilber mismo contornea otra vez su posición en su reciente " en la naturaleza de un Post-Metaphysical Spirituality: Respuesta a Habermas y a Weis " [ fijados en este sitio ].

Jacobs discute las aplicaciones el sentido, holons y la jerarquía, cuadrantes, tipos de ciencia, el ego y la evolución, la universalidad de la vida y de la mente, el transcendence y la transformación, el desarrollo social y un gravamen total. Los tomaremos uno por uno.

Sentido
Según Jacobs -- y mí debe parafrasear las muchas declaraciones que él hace en este respeto -- para el sentido de Wilber está la adición de todos los cambios de desarrollo en los cuatro cuadrantes y las totalmente dependientes en qué entra encendido en estos cuatro cuadrantes. Wilber no define qué sentido está en sí mismo, ni él refleja en la fuente de este sentido, que es también la causa de toda la evolución. Esta causa está, según Sri Aurobindo, el proceso de la involución. Cada etapa necesaria de nuestro progreso evolutivo, Jacobs escribe, ha sido anticipada y prevista por la involución anterior.

Al parecer, Jacobs no ha leído el proyecto de Atman , el capítulo final de el cual se dedica al concepto de la involución. Leímos: la " involución, o el enfolding del más bajo, es la condición previa de la evolución, o el unfolding de los estados más altos del más bajo " (p. 160-161). Mientras que es Wilber verdadero no ha escrito extensivamente a propósito de la involución desde entonces, sigue siendo una piedra angular de su sistema. Sin ella, la evolución sería un refinamiento mero de la materia, sin ningún crecimiento verdadero en subjetividad. Wilber tensiona otra vez la importancia de la involución en la introducción al volumen 2 de sus trabajos recogidos , pero él precisa porqué un poste-metaphysical, acercamiento de post-Aurobindoian ahora se exige (mientras que él explica completamente en " en la naturaleza de un Post-Metaphysical Spirituality: Respuesta a Habermas y a Weis " [ fijados en este sitio ]).

En cuanto a la definición del sentido, aquí está uno: " qué la mayoría de los panpsychists significan por el sentido o la mente no es lo que significo por el sentido, que es profundidad. Porque el sentido es profundidad, es sí mismo literalmente unqualifiable . Es profundidad, no ningún nivel determinado, qualifiable de profundidad (tal como sensación o impulso u opinión o intención) -- ésos es todas las formas del sentido, no sentido como tal " ( sexo, ecología, Spirituality , p. 538).

[ la carta franca exactamente correcta; También he precisado que, porque el sentido es en última instancia unqualifiable, es sinónimo con Emptiness (véase varios endnotes en SES en este tema). Eso también significa que, en el reino convencional o manifesto, el sentido aparece como cuatro cuadrantes, pero en el reino más unmanifest, el sentido es formlessness puro -- y en última instancia Emptiness y la forma son " not-two " o nondual. Como tal, el sentido último o nondual se sabe, no no conceptual o mentalmente, pero solamente supramentally con satori o la realización. Esta es la razón por la cual el sentido no puede ser definido en última instancia, sólo está realizado directamente -- KW ]

Qué respuestas la primera objeción levantó por Jacobs. En la opinión de Wilber el sentido no es totalmente dependiente en los cuatro cuadrantes para su existencia, sino que los utiliza para expresarse. Éste es exactamente los campeones de Jacobs de la visión: " los cuatro cuadrantes son simplemente los campos creados por el sentido para su uno mismo-expresión. " En una entrevista tenía con Wilber en 1997 que él me dijo: " cuál es la que intenta hacer es conseguir a través de la noción que el alcohol sea inclusivo. Y eso tenemos que tomar los cuatro cuadrantes en cuenta, porque los cuatro son manifestaciones del alcohol.... La dimensión material sí mismo es una manifestación del alcohol. "

Para un cierto desconocido de la razón a mí, muchos críticos han tomado este acercamiento: primero niegue a Wilber cierto punto de vista (que él en hecho abrace), critiqúelo para esta omisión, y en seguida presente muy la misma visión con la cual algo original usted ha venido para arriba, aunque Wilber habría convenido con esa punta determinada del comienzo.

Holons y jerarquía
La tentativa de Wilber de contradecir reductionism con su filosofía holonic da sensaciones mezcladas Jacobs. Mientras que es holarchy describe exactamente el mundo material y el proceso de la evolución, él se siente que es menos aplicable al mundo interno. Jacobs escribe: " hay cualquier sentido en el cual poder decir que las sensaciones son parte de pensamiento o los pensamientos son wholes más grandes que incluyen... sensaciones e impulsos? "

[ realmente, sí, que es donde los resultados importantes de la psicología de desarrollo moderna vienen en el juego -- resultados inasequibles a Aurobindo, una limitación que hobbles sus y sistema de Jacobs. En el desarrollo cognoscitivo, por ejemplo, tenemos una serie de desarrollo que incluya la sensación, la opinión, imágenes, símbolos, conceptos, las reglas (conop), y las meta-reglas (formop), entre otros. Cada uno de ésos es un entero complejo que incluye como piezas los wholes anteriores. Así, una imagen es una representación ilustrada de una opinión -- e.g., la imagen mental de mi perro Fido mira más o menos como el Fido verdadero. **time-out** a medida que desarrollo continuar, verbal símbolo emerger, y símbolo ser imagen MÁS uno nonpictorial capacidad -- e.g., símbolo o verbal palabra " F-i-d-o " ser uno imagen que no sí mismo mirar como verdadero Fido -- este símbolo capacidad ser así cognitively duro para lograr que mero imagen, pero él incluir imagen en su alto maquillaje -- es decir, uno símbolo superar y incluir imagen. Yendo más lejos, un concep *** TRANSLATION ENDS HERE ***t is a symbol that can represent not just a single object (the symbol Fido represents a single object), but a class of objects--e.g., the word "dog" represents not just Fido but all dogs--a higher capacity yet. So a concept is a symbol PLUS the capacity to connote--it transcends and includes symbols. Further yet, a rule is a mental operation that can operate on concepts--it transcends and includes concepts. And formop operates on conop--it transcends and includes rules. Thus, in each case, the whole of one level becomes a part of the whole of the next. This is not obvious to mere phenomenology, which is why it is missed by so many systems. But it is a good example of how and why holons are the fundamental entities of the manifest realm, in all four quadrants.--KW]

Without giving quotes, Jacobs then describes to Wilber a view in which human consciousness is split into different levels, somehow suggesting that "the person who lives in the thought mind ceases to have sensations, impulses and feelings or that a brilliant thinker or even a realized sage cannot have uncontrollable vital urges." [This is absolutely incorrect, as the above example should make clear--to transcend and include means that all the previous holons are still available as subholons. What Jacobs describes is pathological development--KW. Frank gives another reason, that of levels and lines:]

Anyone even remotely familiar with Wilber's works would know that this is precisely the point he has tried to make since the early eighties, a period in his intellectual career he has described as Wilber-3. As only one example, a quote from The Eye of Spirit : "Wilber-3 explicitly distinguishes the different developmental lines that unfold through those seventeen levels. These different developmental lines include affective, cognitive, moral, interpersonal, object-relations, self-identity, and so on, each of which develops in a quasi-independent fashion through the general levels or basic structures of consciousness. There is no single, monolithic line that governs all of these developments" (p. 212-213). Levels and lines, or waves and streams, for the texture of psychological reality, and this leaves every room for individual differences in development.

Quadrants
Passing to the four-quadrant model, which is central to Wilber's thinking since he first wrote about it in Sex, Ecology, Spirituality (1995), Jacobs object to the fact that his mentor Sri Aurobindo is confined to the Upper-Left quadrant (for example, in A Brief History of Everything , p. 86), thus ignoring the role Aurobindo has played as a politically involved social theorist (or, one might add, as a philosopher speculating on the degree to which Spirit could influence bodily matter, cf. his ideas about physical immortality). Although assigning theorists to quadrants is obviously crude but acceptable for didactical purposes, Wilber sufficiently motivates his choice in his recent book Integral Psychology (2000): "Aurobindo was most concerned with the transformations of consciousness (Upper Left) and the correlative changes in the material body (Upper Right). Although he had many important insights on the social and political system, he did not seem to grasp the actual interrelations of cultural, social, intentional and behavioral, nor did his analysis at any point proceed on the level of intersubjectivity (Lower Left) and interobjectivity (Lower Right). He did not, that is, fully assimilate the differentiations of modernity. But the levels and modes that Aurobindo did cover make his formulations indispensable for any truly integral model" (p. 84).

[What I particularly meant when I said that Aurobindo did not fully assimilate the differentiations of moderntiy is that he wasn't aware of all of the research into the various quadrants that recent modern scientific advances have made, such as the role of neurotransmitters, the massive revolution in cognitive science, the far-reaching breakthroughs in brain chemistry, molecular biology, systems anthropology, and so on--as well as the breakthroughs in postmodern scholarship on the nature of cultural backgrounds and contexts--and the great need to move from metaphysics, as exemplefied by much of Aurobindo's work, to post-metaphysical research (see "On the Nature of a Post-Metaphysical Spirituality: Response to Habermas and Weis," posted on this site).  Of course Aurobindo was aware of the differentiations of modernity (the good, the true, and the beautiful)--even the Greeks were aware of them.  But he didn't have advantage of the research into them that modern science brought.  Therefore, as it is, his system is massively out of touch with modern cognitive science, among other things.  It would be wonderful were he alive to see what he would have done with modern brain research--almost certainly he would have adopted something like the quadrants which would allow him to correlate cognitive science (Upper Right) with his own system of consciousness development (Upper Left).  As it is, since his system does not do this, his system is no longer truly integral.

Not to mention the modern and postmodern research into the Lower Left and Lower Right, which his sytem also lacks.... My respect and deep admiration for Aurobindo is well known; he was a genius of the first magnitude and, along with Plotinus, Shankara, St. Augustine, Abinavagupta, Tsongkapa, and a few others, one of the greatest philosopher-sages of all time. But time moves on.... I don't mind playing Jacobs' game of "more integral than thou," because both of our systems--mine and Aurobindo's--will simply be small footnotes to the many integral systems of tomorrow.--KW]

Another feature of the four-quadrant model that worries Jacobs is the equal treatment Wilber seems to give all of the four quadrants, presumably under the pressure political correctness: "Wilber treats them all as equals. This may be an advance from most theoretical perspectives and it is fully in keeping with our postmodern romance with equality. Inequality, like hierarchy, has become a dirty word." Has Jacobs read anything from Wilber's recent works, one starts to wonder? The sole motive for going to the laborious process of writing Sex, Ecology, Spirituality in the early nineties was exactly that all of the core concepts of the perennial philosophy -- depth, hierarchy, stages, judgment -- had become taboo in the postmodern climate that wants to see everything as relative except itself, or that deems surfaces the only thing in the world worth studying. Jacobs is again stating Wilber's own conclusion as if it were his.

Jacobs then questions the degree in which Wilber's 4Q model really integrates objective and subjective, individual and collective perspectives on reality: "Wilber's approach appears more additive than integrative. He does not explain the precise relationship between the quadrants or the process by which they mutually interact and develop in parallel with one another. For example, in discussing the rise of modernity he does not specifically correlate it with an evolutionary stage in individual consciousness or biology. He indicates correlations at some points, but not causal relationships." However, already in Up from Eden (1981) we can read: "It's incredible when you start to think about it, but sometime during the second and first millennia B.C. the exclusively egoic structure of consciousness began to emerge from the ground unconscious (Ursprung) and crystallize out in awareness. And it is just this incredible crystallization that we must now examine, the last major stage -- to date -- in the collective historical evolution of the spectrum of consciousness (individuals can carry it further, in their own case, by meditation into superconsciousness). It was that transformation which set the modern world" (p. 179). Clearly, a causal relationship if ever there was one...

[Yes, here Jacobs appears not to have read my fairly extensive writings on the differentiations, dissociations, and integrations of modernity, and the specific relationship to the quadrants: modernity was a tetra-evolution of the orange meme, or egoic-rationality, with profound causal connections in all four quadrants, most especially the Lower Left of worldcentric intersubjectivity--a tremendous collective advance--and the Lower Right of industrialization, a complex I often call "industrial rationality," with all its promise and peril, or dignity and disaster.--KW]

However, Wilber resists the simple explanation of the objective by the subjective -- as Jacobs seems to prefer -- where instead he pleads for a multi-causal analysis (or "all-quadrant, all-level"). As we can read in The Eye of Spirit : "We can now, for example, correlate states of meditative awareness with types of brainwave patterns (without attempting to reduce one to the other). We can monitor psychological shifts that occur with spiritual experience. We can follow the levels of neurotransmitters during psychotherapeutic interventions. We can follow the effects of psychoactive drugs on blood distribution patters in the brain. We can trace the social modes of production and see the corresponding changes in cultural worldviews. We can follow the historical unfolding of cultural worldviews and plot the status of men and women in each period. We can trace the modes of self that correlate with different modes of techno-economic infrastructure. And so on around the quadrants: not simply 'all-level', but 'all-level, all-quadrant'. Thus, modern-day integral studies can do something about which the great traditions rather badly failed: they can trace the spectrum of consciousness not just in its intentional but also in its behavioral, social and cultural manifestations, thus highlighting the importance of a multidimensional approach for a truly comprehensive overview of human consciousness and behavior" (p. 34-35). [See the "simul-tracking" and "tetra-evolution" sections in, for example, "An Integral Theory of Consciousness," V7 of the CW.]

Jacobs saves his strongest objection to the 4Q model for the end of this paragraph: "But the greatest limitation of Wilber's four quadrants is the danger that we may mistake them for something real! The reality he is categorizing and pigeonholing into four quadrants is a single, indivisible whole. Mind's attempt to capture it in clear abstract terms gives us a sense of security and satisfaction, but not real knowledge. Thought and language require the use of concepts and opposites for their self-expression. But whereas Sri Aurobindo constantly reminds us that any such division of reality is only perceptual (being is indivisible), Wilber seems to really believe in the separate existence of these four." Listen to what Wilber writes in the preface of One Taste (1999), a volume that sings of the Oneness of existence from cover to cover: "If there is a theme to this journal it is that body, mind, and soul are not mutually exclusive. The desires of the flesh, the ideas of the mind, and the luminosities of the soul -- all are perfect expressions of the radiant Spirit that alone inhabits the universe, sublime gestures of that Great Perfection that alone outshines the world. There is only One Taste in the entire Kosmos, and that taste is Divine, whether it appears in the flesh, in the mind, in the soul" (p. viii). Pretty intellectual, huh?

Reality tests
Jacobs applauds Wilber's attempt to expand our notion of science, so that it includes also the field of spirituality and inner subjective experiences. "This is precisely Sri Aurobindo's view that spiritual experience can be systematically repeated and scientifically validated, but only by subjective rather than objective methods." What Jacobs does not mention or seem to notice, is that Wilber can argue for the validity of "spiritual science" by correlating the various types of science with the four quadrants AND the levels of science with the three main levels of human existence: body, mind and spirit, offering the first truly integral approach to science and spirituality. In that fashion, he argues for spiritual science after he has made the case for a typical mental science -- a beautiful tactical maneuver which goes to the heart of the postmodern infatuation with interpretation.

[That is, each quadrant has a different type of science--UR: behavioral sciences; LR: systems sciences; UL: phenomenological sciences; LL: cultural sciences. (I often simplify those four types into two major types: narrow sciences, which deal with the exteriors or the Right-Hand sciences; and broad or deep sciences, which deal with the interiors, or the Left-Hand sciences.) Each of those four types has at least three major levels: sensory, mental, spiritual.--KW]

Body-science, as we may call it for short, acknowledges only what the eye of the flesh can see (and the relationships the mind can find it what it has seen). This is of course the realm of physics, biology, chemistry. Mind-science acknowledges a different world: that of thoughts, ideas, meaning and interpretation. The "mental science" of hermeneutics -- so often ridiculed by the hard-nosed, flatland scientists for the fact that it does not deal with the relatively simple laws of gravity, but tries to fathom the laws of meaning -- deals with different objects, but it follows the same three general steps that all good science uses: (1) injunction, (2) observation and (3) confirmation/rejection. Its results may not be as unambiguous as the results of body-science, but then, thoughts are not rocks. This is a very original attempt to heal the split between the hard sciences of matter and life, and the human sciences of meaning. Only after establishing the ontological ground for a veritable mental science of hermeneutics, Wilber seductively argues for a third level of science: spiritual science -- again with its own domain, its own degree of certainty, but still following the same general steps the other two sciences use. For his own elaboration of both the types and the levels of science (as well as the levels of art and morals), see his recent "On the Nature of a Post-Metaphysical Spirituality: Response to Habermas and Weis" [posted on this site].

Ego and evolution
Wilber's description of human development as going through the general stages of physiocentric, biocentric, egocentric, ethnocentric and worldcentric, valid and useful as it may be in itself, Jacobs views as "naive and simplistic," for it equates consciousness with cognition, and "fails to perceive the depths and complexity of human personality." [The equation of cognition and consciousness is not my position at all; see Integral Psychology , where I explain at length why consciousness and cognition cannot be equated.--KW]

Jacobs assertion that "Wilber's view equates consciousness with cognition" is simply embarrassing, given the many paragraphs Wilber has devoted to precisely this confusion. To give a handful of examples: in Integral Psychology he notes under "Cognitive Development and the Great Nest of Being": "You can certainly think of the Great Nest as being, in part, a great spectrum of consciousness, which it is. One of the dictionary definitions of 'cognitive' is 'relating to consciousness'. Therefore, in dictionary terms anyway, you could think of the development of the Great Nest (which in individuals involves the unfolding of higher and more encompassing levels of consciousness) as being generally quite similar to cognitive development, as long as we understand that 'cognition' and 'consciousness' runs from subconscious to self-conscious to superconscious, and that it includes interior modes of awareness just as much as exterior modes. The problem, as I was saying, is that 'cognition' in Western psychology came to have a very narrow meaning that excluded most of the above" (p. 19-20).

Jacobs then proceeds to sketch Sri Aurobindo's personality theory, almost identical to what Wilber explains throughout his works -- why do I get the feeling I have seen this movie before? Many passages from The Eye of Spirit go deeper into Sri Aurobindo's intricate view of human consciousness (p. 39, 140, 180, 206-7, 327-28n. 18 and 340n. 16). Interestingly, he identifies the Wilber-II phase of this work as the "Tibetan/Aurobindo/Wilber-II view" (p. 207) -- a perfect starting point for Jacobs for a true Wilber/Aurobindo comparison.

Universal Life and Mind
Moving towards more metaphysical subjects Jacobs complains that Wilber treats life (prana) and mind as individual entities, that cannot be separated from the body-mind, while acknowledging the universal nature of the transmental levels. Contrary to this, Sri Aurobindo did acknowledge the universal nature of the vital and mental worlds, which among other things enabled him to the phenomenon of "life response", according to Jacobs, "which all great literature and spirituality affirms, that our inner consciousness corresponds to and evokes responses from the wider life around us."

[In fact, my writing makes it clear that all of the basic levels of being and consciousness are universal--at least sixteen major levels, stretching from matter to body to mind to soul to spirit.--KW]

It is interesting to speculate about the value of the four-quadrant view, when we take the possibility of life after death on higher planes into account. Jacobs states that "consciousness is essentially independent of forms such as the brain in the upper-right quadrant of his model." While that may be true in the ultimate analysis, esoteric traditions don't hold that embodiment disappears on the higher planes. Consciousness might function in an astral body on the astral plane -- and four quadrant analysis would hold true even there! (So at least we CAN take something with us!)

[Yes, Frank is again correct. The standard 4Q diagram that I usually give is true for this gross manifest realm. But even in the dream realm, there are four quadrants. Moreover, the great traditions of Vedanta and Vajrayana maintain two important points: mind or consciousness is never independent of some sort of body or energy component, but there are the gross bodymind, the subtle bodymind, and the causal bodymind, and those can be indepedent of each other in certain circumstances, e.g., in the bardo realm. I acknowledge this view clearly in several places, including most recently in "A Summary of My Psychological Model" posted on this site. I will reprint the relevant sections from that essay here:

In many of the wisdom traditions, the three great normal states (of waking, dreaming, and deep sleep) are said to correspond to the three great bodies or realms of being (gross, subtle, and causal). In both Vedanta and Vajrayana, for example, the bodies are said to be the energy support of the corresponding mind or state of consciousness (i.e., every mental mode has a bodily mode, thus preserving a bodymind union at all levels). The gross body is the body in which we experience the waking state; the subtle body is the body in which we experience the dream state (and also certain meditative states, such as savikalpa samadhi, and the bardo state, or the dream-like state which is said to exist in between rebirths); and the causal body is the body in which we experience the deep dreamless state (and nirvikalpa samadhi and the formless state)( Deutsche, 1969; Gyatso, 1986). The point is that, according to these traditions, each state of consciousness has a corresponding body which is "made" of various types of gross, subtle, and very subtle energy (or "wind"), and these bodies or energies "support" the corresponding mind or consciousness states. In a sense, we can speak of the gross bodymind, the subtle bodymind, and the causal bodymind (using "mind" in the very broadest sense as "awareness" or "consciousness").

In my own system, the "body/energy" component is the Upper-Right quadrant, and the "mind/consciousness" component is the Upper-Left quadrant. The integral model I am suggesting therefore explicitly includes a corresponding subtle energy at every level of consciousness across the entire spectrum (gross to subtle to causal, or matter to body to mind to soul to spirit). Critics have often missed this aspect of my model because the typical four-quadrant diagram shows only the gross body in the Upper-Right quadrant, but that is only a simplified summary of the full model presented in my work.

In the traditions, it is often said that these subtle energy fields exist in concentric spheres of increasing embrace. For example, the etheric field is said to extend a few inches from the physical body, surrounding and enveloping it; the astral energy field surrounds and envelops the etheric field and extends a foot or so; the thought field (or subtle body energy field) surrounds and envelops the astral and extends even further; and the causal energy field extends to formless infinity. Thus, each of these subtle energy fields is a holon (a whole that is part of a larger whole), and the entire holonic energy spectrum can be easily represented in the Upper-Right quadrant as a standard series of increasingly finer and wider concentric spheres (with each subtler energy field transcending and including its junior fields). Each subtle energy holon is the exterior or the Right-Hand component of the corresponding interior or Left-Hand consciousness. In short, all holons have four quadrants across the entire spectrum, gross to subtle to causal, and this includes both a "mind/consciousness" and a "body/energy" component. For a discussion of body/realms--e.g., gross body (Nirmanakaya), subtle body (Sambhogakaya), causal body (Dharmakaya)--as the energetic support or "body" of each of the consciousness levels and states, see SES, note 1 for chap. 14. I often use the words "body," "realm," and "sphere" interchangeably; see Integral Psychology .

The important point is simply that each state of consciousness is supported by a corresponding body , so that consciousness is never merely disembodied. Even though it is said by, e.g., the Tibetan tradition, that subtle consciousness/energy or the subtle mind/body can detach from the gross mind/body, as in the chonyid bardo realm following death; and the causal mind/body can detach from both the subtle and gross mind/body, as in the chikhai bardo or the clear-light emptiness post-death experience (Deutsch, 1969; Gyatso, 1986). This conception allows consciousness to extend beyond the physical body (and survive physical death) but never to be merely disembodied (since there are subtle and causal bodies). In my opinion, this is a profound body/mind (or matter/consciousness) nonduality at every level, a conception I have incorporated into my own system.--KW]

Transcendence and Transformation
Under this heading Jacobs examines Wilber's view of transcendence as a gradual ascent of consciousness, transcending and including what went before. While he notices Wilber's concept of inclusion and Descent, he judges "descent for him is only to accept the world as a manifestation of Spirit in a spirit of Compassion, not to transform it. Wilber equates Descent with the materialist's affirmation of the physical world." [That is the opposite of my view. I said that the materialist accepts only those aspects of Spirit that are merely descended. The goal of the path of Descent is not matter, but Spirit reaching down and enlivening matter which is, after all, merely the outer garment of its own Being.--KW]

In a way, Wilber's Path of Descent is equally a Path of Ascent, the difference being that it does not focus on the Light beyond Form, but on every Form that is visible because of the very same Light. Growing along the Path of Descent means widening the circle of concern and compassion, from oneself to one's family, to humanity as a who, to all living beings... what else can this be than a gradual rising through the planes, so that the higher we rise, the more we can see, and the more we can embrace?

Social Development
Jacobs notes a close similarity between Wilber's and Aurobindo's ideas about social development, as it passes through the egocentric, etnocentric and worldcentric phases, so let's pass on to the next paragraph quickly. "The main difference is our emphasis on the vitally dynamic and expansive nature of society during the middle phase." Elsewhere in his paper, Jacobs ascribes to Aurobindo the view that "nations have souls just as individuals do."

[To equate collective holons and individual holons, as Jacobs does, can lead directly to fascism, as Fred Kofman points out in "Holons, Artifacts, and Heaps," posted on the website maintained by Frank Visser-- www.worldofkenwilber.com. This is one of the real dangers of such a philosophy. I have described the similarities--and the important differences--between individual and social holons in a 3-Part Interview posted on this site ("On Critics, Integral Institute, My Recent Writings, and Other Matters of Little Consequence").--KW]

Much lively debate about this aspect of the holon-theory can be found in the Reading Room of www.worldofkenwilber.com.

Overall Assessment
In the last paragraph of his paper, Jacobs tries to come to an overall assessment of the value of Wilber's work, in relation to the philosophy Sri Aurobindo has expounded: "Wilber has done an impressive job of mentally synthesizing many different strands of current thought within a coherent intellectual framework. He places different perspectives in a wider context in which each assumes its rightful place and significance as a valid perspective of a greater whole. His model is clear and logical. Where Wilber is particularly disappointing is in his efforts to apply the same mental formula to subjective life and spiritual phenomena that he applies to matter and social systems... What is lacking in Wilber's approach is not clarity or rationality. It is life, power and spirituality... Wilber's discussion of spirituality is pure mental abstraction -- colorless, odorless and lifeless -- as flat and hollow as the flatland he seeks to escape. It is conceptual, not spiritual." That Jacobs does not mention Wilber's key concept of vision-logic even once , is telling. He should also read One Taste , where Wilber describes his own spiritual experiences in powerful, compelling, and often beautiful terms.

[I personally appreciate very much the care and effort Jacobs has put into his study of Aurobindo, and his genuine concern to communicate the wonderful importance of Aurobindo for the modern and postmodern world--an importance I definitely and wholeheartedly share. I also appreciate Jacobs's attempt to compare and contrast Aurobindo's view and mine, although I feel that had Jacobs studied my work with the same diligence as Aurobindo's he would not have reached some of the conclusions expressed in his paper. Still, such dialogue can only help carry the cause of integral studies forward, and I am grateful for all of these ongoing contributions.--KW]

Had Jacobs taken the trouble to really study Wilber, he would have found that even for Wilber, spirituality is in the final analysis, more valuable then all his Collected Works taken together. In an autobiographical article in The Quest , published in 1995, Wilber explains: "The point of my books is not to get people involved in intellectual head trips. That is exactly what my books are attempting to stop, as those who have read them will readily acknowledge." "So I have attempted to engage these [academic] people in their own game, and to play it very fast and hard, simply to get to this conclusion: at some point, you and I must stop this intellectual head-tripping, and begin actual spiritual practice. We must begin contemplation, or yoga, or satsang, or zazen, or vision quest, or any number of other genuine contemplative practices (there are hundreds of practices, I am mentioning only a few). But we must actually do this as a practice -- not talking religion, not chit-chat, but engaged, concerned, passionate, intense practice.

"And in that practice, all your books, all your thoughts, and all your ideas will fail you miserably. You will burn in the fire of your own primordial awareness, and from the ashes of the smoking ruins of the shattered ego there will spontaneously arise a new destiny in the stream of consciousness itself, and you will be taken, transformed, ravished and transfigured in the glory of the Divine, and you will speak with the tongues of angels and see with the eyes of saints, and glories upon glories will enwrap and uplift your soul, and the lost and found Beloved will whisper in your ear, and the Divine will sparkle so intensely in every sight and sound, the wind will hum the hallowed names of the radiant Divine, while the clouds will crawl across the sky just to call your name, and your very Self will resurrect as the entire Kosmos itself, the haunting sound of one hand clapping in each and every direction, and it all will be undone in that extraordinary hymn -- the hymn of spiritual practice."

Now does that leave you breathless, or what?