Hey Ebud,

Hope all is well...Wilber has been throwing around that "reseach shows" states to stages for years now but I wish he would say what research. Yes it may make sense intuitively and fit his model but I want to read about how this happens and where all the research is that delves deeper into it besides just "states to stages".

The closest I've come to finding anything is by digging through Wilber's endnotes in Integral Psychology where he discusses the roles of the self - one of which is metabolism or a process of the conversion of states to stages (or the self "metabolizes experience to build structure". He listed a reference (see his endnote #8 for Chapter 3 which sends you to endnote #4 for Chapter 10) to Blanck and Blanck's work on self psychology and says they "have summarized a century of psychoanalytic theory and research on the development of the self by saying that the self metabolizes experience to build structure." Ok how about something more substantive and some studies to back it up in his books that constantly reinforce his states to stages mantra.

I think we need to look into Blanck and Blanck's work and see if it holds up and if their research is supportive of Wilber's assertions. In that endnote, Wilber takes a leap to assert that he believes the process that Blanck and Blanck summarize for early development also holds true for the conversion of temporary peak experiences and altered states to enduring structures/stages of consciousness beyond the actual levels researched in mainstream developmental psychology? Is that a fair leap and can he use their research to back up his statement of using Holosync, meditation, and other consciousness altering methods to induce these states which will, according to Wilber, speed up our development to higher and higher stages?

-shawn

Hey Shawn,

Just saw your comment now - thanks! I believe I will have time to comment on yours later as well. Super-busy right now.

I don't know if you have been stopping by Open Integral, but you might enjoy it. A lot of emphasis on checking Wilber.

Also, Vince has been pointing out when Ken's generalizations don't fit into the facts as well.

In regards to your questioning the leap, I would say that you can't leap, without the data to back you up - at least, you can't state authoritatively, but only labeling the leap as "theorizing", such as "we theorize that..." x is y is related to z.

Then of course, you can say mostly what you want...