Experientialism

 EXPERIENTIALSM

Psychology / Philosophy

I first began to use the term Experimentalism in the late 1980s early 1990s to explain the same use of the term as this blog explains. 

In the late 1990s I attended philosophy lectures at Cheltenham University with Alan Ford. I spoke with him about the phrase which he did not primarily recognise and directed me to the nearest equivalent. There was nothing published on the topic at that time. 

In the decades since then the phrase has been used to describe and regurgitate either the same basic or a different, vague theory of psychology and philosophy which is not the same as the one I present here. The evidence sourced and cited for it is flimsy. There remains scant little which I have been able to find to expand upon it. 

What I mean by Experientialism is as follows. 

The philosophy of basing everything you know exclusively on what you have first-hand direct experience of to the exclusion of what you do not. 

There are three forms of experientialism. 

The primary form is the simple thesis. Projecting probability based on what the individual knows from experience, to ascertain whether there is any truth in what is not known from experience but can rely on as a working thesis. 

Technically this includes the sum total of all human knowledge including polarised extremes of hard science to delusion. 

Some proclaim Experientialism to be cynical while others understand it as obvious. 

Certainly it posits the individual at the centre of the universe. This position is contrasted against any acknowledgement of collective consciousness as being superior to the individual. Thus, experimentalism is isolationism. 

The second form of Existentialism is to deny any plausibility to anything outside of the individuals own unique experience of reality and method of interpreting reality. It is to say Reality is subjective exclusive to the individuals own dogma. This opens into Lacan. In medical-psychological terms this is currently described as disbelief syndrome. 

The third form is when first-hand lived experience takes an individual outside of the commonly accepted normal reality, for illustrative example; experiences of the supernatural, which then become foundational in the individuals comprehension of macro cosmic reality even where it puts them at odds with the mainstream collective. The judgement call is that simply because you have never seen fairies yourself does not mean they do not exist and therefore it is possible others might see them. The argument of probability here is plausible and persuasive on the basis that simply because you have never been to Antarctica yourself does not mean it does exist. More people claim to have seen fairies than claim to have been to Antarctica so the numbers game is a win for supernature. Scientific validation has nothing to do with this simply because by its very character supernature takes us outside of the realms of clinically provable science. 

What differentiates second and third forms is objectively differentiating between delusion and potential. 

Experimentalism logically progresses toward Experimentalism.