Mysticism and logic

By Massimo Pigliucci

Recently I started a new hobby: collecting relatively rare philosophy books. I figured that there would be some sense of poetry in having an apartment where there are absolutely no books (they all reside on my iPad) except for a few copies of my own and selected philosophical classics smelling of old paper. (I’m not talking about really expensive editions, obviously, not on my public university professor salary anyway.)

The first entry in my collection is a first edition (1918) of Bertrand Russell’s Mysticism and Logic, which is appropriate considering both the influence that Russell has had on me since I was in high school (when I read Why I Am Not a Christian) and because of the topic itself — the difference between rational argument and mystical intuitions.

I want to focus on Russell’s analysis of four characteristics of mystical “insights,” which I think still today provide a fine analysis of the phenomenon — and yes, the irony of logically analyzing an inherently non-logical process has not escaped me. Here is an extensive quotation from Russell, to which I will then add my own thoughts:

“The first and most direct outcome of the moment of illumination [the mystical insight] is belief in the possibility of a way of knowledge which may be called revelation or insight or intuition, as contrasted with sense, reason, and analysis, which are regarded as blind guides leading to the morass of illusion... The second characteristic of mysticism is its belief in unity, and its refusal to admit opposition or division anywhere ... A third mark of almost all mystical metaphysics is the denial of the reality of time. This is an outcome of the denial of division ... The last of the doctrines of mysticism which we have to consider is its belief that all evil is mere appearance, an illusion produced by the divisions and oppositions of the analytic intellect.”

Russell of course is not maintaining that all mystical systems share these four properties, but that very often these or some variations thereof constitute core aspects of the mystical belief, which strikes me as about right. There are two ways of reconstructing what a mystical experience is, one charitable and — I will argue — incorrect, the other one, well...

In one sense, we can think of mystical insights as a form of intuition. Notice that Russell himself uses that word, together with “insight” and “revelation.” The three, however, are clearly not synonymous. As it turns out modern cognitive science has been investigating how intuition works, and we have learned that there doesn’t seem to be a general faculty of intuition (as in “women’s intuition,” to use a loaded and politically charged example). Rather, intuition is a domain-specific type of (subconscious) information processing by the brain, processing that yields insights that are both fallible and limited to that domain.

The best studied case, though by no means the only one, is that of intuitions about the game of chess (for other examples, see the chapter on expertise in Nonsense on Stilts). Expert players, unlike novices (and many chess playing computer programs), do not actually explicitly work out all the possible ramifications of a given move because they have intuitions — rooted in their experience — about which moves are going to work out better given a particular configuration on the board. Chess masters’ intuitions are even better than expert players’, and in fact cognitive scientists have figured out how many thousands of hours of play are required to move from novice to expert to master (assuming one has the aptitude, of course, just playing doesn’t do it). Turns out that to become an expert in a particular field takes a number of hours that is roughly equivalent to those required to obtain a PhD in an academic field.

Of course, even though an expert’s intuitions about a particular domain are far more reliable than a non-expert’s considered opinion, they are not infallible. Which is why in academic fields from science to philosophy, experts’ insights are then carefully scrutinized by means of analytical dissection and comparison with the empirical evidence, where the latter plays a useful role. In other words, even in the case of reliable intuitions, the best course of action is to filter the resulting insights through rational, explicit analysis (if one has the time and resources).

But none of this can possibly account for mystical experiences. Not only do mystics steadfastly refuse to acknowledge any useful role for logical analysis (indeed, they tend to disdain the very idea), mystical insights simply cannot be a type of intuition because they refer to domains of (alleged) knowledge of which nobody actually has any cumulative experience. Since what generates increasingly reliable intuitions is precisely a long history of cumulative experience in a given field, mystics must be resorting to something else for their insights.

That something else is captured by the remaining word used by Russell to characterize the difference between mysticism and logic: revelation. Indeed, mystics would have us believe that they (and only they) have access to a deeper level of reality, a type of access that is not available to most of us (though in some mystical traditions one can acquire it through practices such as certain types of meditation).

But that being the case, what is this special access based on? Where does the revelation come from? Here again there are basically two possibilities: either the revelation comes from a supernatural being (that is the meaning of revelation in religious traditions) or it is made possible by the existence of a special sense that mystics have and the rest of us don’t (or that mystics have learned to use and the rest of us haven’t).

The first possibility (divine revelation) of course begs the question of the existence of divinities to begin with, and readers of this blog know exactly what I think of supernaturalism. The second possibility begs the question in a different way: since there is no externally verifiable evidence of either a mystical realm or of mystical insight, how do we know that these people aren’t either frauds or — more likely — simply deluded? Unlike intuition, mystical revelation cannot be subjected to the scrutiny of logical analysis and empirical investigation; and unlike the case of intuition as studied in cognitive science, we have no reason to believe that there even is anything like mystical revelation as a way of knowing things.

I will not carry the argument as far as concluding that there is no mystical realm, because proving that sort of negative is outside the scope of rational discourse. But this isn’t a shortcoming of rational discourse, it is a shortcoming of mystical discourse (if it is a type of discourse at all). It always amazes me how many people, when faced with extraordinary claims about “quantum mysticism” (a la Deepak Chopra), parallel realities, underlying unity of the cosmos, and so on, fail to ask the simple question: “This is very interesting, but how do you know?”

It can be answered that asking for evidence or reasons backing up mystical insights is missing the point entirely. Perhaps, but then what is the point? If self-professed mystics are allowed to make whatever claims they wish, without constraints imposed by reason or evidence, then why on earth would anyone believe them? The answer, of course, is because it makes some people feel good to think they “understand” a reality beyond the mundane, so much the better if they can stick it to self-important rational intellectuals such as yours truly. But here is Russell on feeling sure about things for which there is no reason or evidence: “The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt.” Amen.