The Celestine Prophecy

I have been reading this book called The Celestine Prophecy that I received for my birthday, and I must say that it appeared rather coincidentally with my first philosophy course on ethics and modern culture. I am only a few chapters into this very spiritually oriented book and I must say that it gives me a very sour taste due to its references to science.

The work is supposed to be fiction, so I can tolerate the authors ignorance at what he is trying to describe, but at the same time I have a feeling that he is actually trying to make some kind of significant spiritual point in the book. I fear that whatever point he is attempting to make through this story might actually hinge on his discussions about history, and science.

I tried looking inside the back cover to see if he even has a degree in a field of study. I would assume that any educated individual who is publishing a work, where their work has some relevance to a field of study, would mention that they have a PHD or MD in this or that. But to my dismay I found no such verification.

What I have read so far has convinced me of one thing at least: That he is not a philosopher of any kind, and that his knowledge of history and science is limited to a high school level. Now, I do not want to seem as if I'm bashing no him for this, its just unnerving to see something that you understand very well be delivered by someone who knows very little and in a way that is entirely false.

What I find fascinating though is that my reading this book also coincides with my study of another book written by a philosopher by the name of Charles Taylor on the "Ethics of Authenticity". I bring this up because it seems that "The Celestine Prophecy" is a part of that self-help movement that has taken shape in modern western culture as Taylor would consider it.

Taylor's book is about the development of modern moral philosophy in our society. From Taylor's view there is a movement toward what he calls "subjectivation" that began sprouting in the Romantic Age. This movement concerns a shift in moral ideals toward a very subjective format where the individual acts as the source of definition of their beliefs, morals, and identity through their choices. He discusses how we can easily observe this stance in our societies youth, but I will not go into that here. What I find most important is his argument strongly against the position of sujectivation and the self-help ideas that have sprung fourth from it.

I will not go through the details of the argument (it would extend this writing further than I would like) but the general idea is that soft relativism, which is the trend toward complete subjectivity, is inherently self-contradicting. The determination of ones own identity by choosing ones own beliefs, morals, and world view to the end of "self-fulfillment" is Entirely impossible by looking into oneself for understanding and "enlightenment". He notes that a common thread in self-help is the "looking into oneself" concept of self-fulfillment.

Matter lies in what is significant in our lives. Taylor argues that significance, and those things that are significant, can not be chosen by ourselves through some internal dialogue. Hence our identity can not be determined through an internal dialogue with ourselves. An external reference frame is required, a so-called "horizon of significance". Without this horizon there can be no significance in our lives. Self-fulfillment becomes impossible because all things that are significant are chosen arbitrarily. And because they are chosen in this way they are not significant, since everything is brought to the same level. Significance requires a relation to something less significant, so meaning is lost altogether.

The result of subjectivity and complete freedom in self-determination is a loss of meaning and significance. As Taylor puts it, my choice of cereal in the morning is no greater than my choice of sexual preference. A reference frame is required beyond the self, and that is found in the "horizons of significance" that background of our individual existence.

In short, looking into the self for the answers will produce no end whatsoever for a person that belongs to a species which is primarily dialogical; where the definition of self comes not from internal understanding, but from an external dialogue with the people around you. Thus, self-help becomes worthless, since it must embrace that the core things that allow self-fulfillment can not be choosen or defined by the self, but are instead defined by the "bigger picture".

This takes the "power" of finding self-fulfillment and our identity out of our immediate hands. It does not mean that you can not achieve self-fulfillment, only that isolating your self from the world is not that way that it can be done. Self-fulfillment requires interaction with the world outside to determine your identity. If a person is left to themselves to determine what their identity is, they distort the picture they have of who they are, and only through interactions with others does it become obvious that who you think your are, and who you really are diverge.

This was in essence Taylors argument, with a lot left wanting from his actual argument, but I think I have managed to get the general idea across. I bring this up mainly because I have been immersed in a number of conflicting philosophies, many of them that bare a close resemblance to "self-help", and others that get lost in either subjectivation, or the complete opposite. Taylor's position is quite refreshing from the narrowed pictures other ideals present, mainly in that it is more of a meta picture about the ideals and how they fit into our modern society, and where they came from.

Of course I take what he rights with caution, as I do most things, but I think his ideas are worth a thought when considering the larger framework of things.