Mr. Sam Harris on happiness and spiritual experience.

Sam Harris speaking at AAI 2007 on human happiness, spiritual experience, and the "atheist" movement.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Sam
• Harris
• happiness
• spiritual
• experience
• meditation
• religion
• atheism
• atheist

[ilshockll]

why are there gaps in this presentation? what is being said between cuts?

[MrPhiloscience]

@ilshockll This was back before I could upload longer videos, so I cut out a few seconds here and there -- mostly long pauses, page turnings etc. The whole talk can easily be found, probably at the top of the suggested videos list.

[1blueshifted]

could sam be bridging the gap between spiritualists and atheists?

[EdwardsComment]

If are agreed that all human beings are set on the quest for happiness, and that it is easier to achieve our collective happiness when working together, it is logical that we ought base our goals not on subjective interpretations of mythology but on objective interpretations of reality.

[Guedingen]

@MrPhiloscience grateful for the upload as I deleted this accidentally. However I have to take issue with you that there are only long pauses, etc cut. Doesn't he also challenge the atheist notion that 'spiritual experience' lies in experiencing setting and rising suns but is something profounder i.e. as he says earlier, not contingent on anything.

[brunodemoura]

Love and curiosity is sufficient.

[Laughingblades]

^ This

[Laughingblades]

@ilshockll Back when he first started speaking Sam Harris had a habit of trailing off a bit (IE in the middle of a sentence throwing out additional details that interrupt the flow of what he was saying, like this) then snapping back exactly to where he left off, so a bit of editing was necessary to get under the 10 or 15 minute mark and get what he was saying out more succinctly.

Also, he had and still has a tendency to pause in his speech, so the pauses often get edited out.

[avedic]

I love Sam. Sums up my own viewpoint. I was a die-hard atheist for the longest time...mainly due to my unfailing interest and respect in science. Yet, recent mediation and psilocybin mushroom experiences..of which the psilocybin was the single most poignant, important, and meaningful experience of my entire life..have opened me up to the idea that there may be something very interesting and mysterious about consciousness that is worth looking in to. It needn't be about abandoning reason though

[JarethGT]

@AegeanKing Between Hitch, Dawkins and Harris they've sold about 4 million books. Rick Warren (Religious author) sells a million in a month and sells more total in a year. Bullcrap self help books wipe the floor with their sales too.

I never said they don't make money, they do make millions of dollars, but millions less than religious literature.

Acting like I do drugs just because I disagree with what you said?... How christ-like.

[AegeanKing]

@JarethGT Are you on drugs? Both Dawkins and Hitchens make millions of dollars off of their books. Bashing God is big business.

[JarethGT]

@AegeanKing Not really, all of the four horsemen combined sell less books than the average bullshit self-help books and religious books on philosophy.

[LegendSw0rd]

@AegeanKing Yes, but everything popular is wrong.