'Folk theories' in Guru based spirituality...

I found the content of this post quite interesting, however, what fascinated me even more was the underlying assumption of how 'popular theologies' come into existence. You see what this poster illustrates in his post is that there is a belief that certain truths (such as scientific truths) have a different basis of validity from those that come to be accepted as truths through 'popular consensus'.

Of course this is complete nonsense! Empirical truths are also based on popular consensus! The easiest way to illustrate that is to ask how much 1 Kilogram weighs... Of course it weighs 1 Kilogram, but why does it weigh 1 Kilogram? Well, it weighs one Kilogram because a group of individuals agreed to set a 'standard' in place by taking a substance, measuring it's weight and then saying that from that time forward all other weighted items would be benchmarked by measuring them against the 'popular consensus' standard they had just invented.

The same goes for subtler (less physical) truths. Have you ever considered how the concept of law and justice works? The laws and regulations of any group are set by consensus and upheld by popular consensus (a person is deemed guilty or not guilty when there is consensus that he or she has transgressed, or not transgressed, the agreed upon standard set by the community)...

I could go on and on with such examples from religion, philosophy, science, mathematics, politics, sociology and a host of other disciplines...

So, truth is truth (not in spite of popular of folk consesus, but most frequently because of it!). Anyway, here's the post:

Folk theories are assumptions or "common sense" things that people generally believe to be true. Over at Guruphiliac, my pal Jody Radzik presents a list of folk theories that he's identified in guru-based spirituality and invites readers to contribute their own. It's fun to see how folk theories can be used to get people to "buy in" (often literally) to almost any bullshit. Here are a few tools Jody says are in any "flimflamming, big-time guru's" box:

• The folk theory of everything being connected
• The folk theory of ancient wisdom
• The folk theory of holiness
• The folk theory of sex being a loss to the spirit
• The folk theory of harmful technology
• The folk theory that only the heart knows what is true

Folk Theories Of Guru-Based Spirituality

Comments

[abraxas]

Science is nothing more than what is least argued about, ie popular consesus.
Ditto for law, medicine and road rules.