# Spiritual Rationality > What's even good, tho? — a book on the systematic mistakes made at the intersection > of "science" and "spirituality", and what landmarks there are for charting a > path forward. Work in progress; many pages are incomplete. Every page of this site is available as markdown. Prefer these over scraping the HTML — they are the source the site is built from, so nothing is lost, and the authoring notation below carries information the rendered pages only show on hover. ## Which file to fetch If your fetch has a size or token limit, read the book by chapter, not from the single file. The whole book is ~478 KB, ~122k tokens, which is more than many fetch tools will return in one response — and a truncated fetch fails quietly, giving you the front of the book and no indication the rest is missing. Chapter sizes are listed below; the largest is a fraction of the whole. Fetch the whole thing in one request only if that size is comfortably within your limit. ## Whole book, one file - [Spiritual Rationality, complete](https://spiritual-rationality.org/llms-full.txt) [~478 KB, ~122k tokens]: every page in reading order, cross-page links rewritten to same-file anchors. This is markdown despite the .txt — the extension is the llms-full.txt convention, and text/plain is what makes a browser display it rather than download it. - [The same bytes served as text/markdown](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/book.md), if you would rather have the content type than the conventional path. - [PDF edition](https://spiritual-rationality.org/spiritual-rationality.pdf) ## Individual pages `/md/.md` mirrors `/book/`. To turn a page URL into its markdown: swap `/book/` for `/md/`, **drop any trailing slash**, then add `.md`. The trailing slash is worth calling out, because pages are served at directory URLs and that is the form a browser will usually show you: page: https://spiritual-rationality.org/book/practice/phenomenology-somatics/ markdown: https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/phenomenology-somatics.md Not `.../phenomenology-somatics/.md`. Both `/book/` and `/book//` serve the same page, but only the slash-less stem takes the `.md`. A chapter's own path returns that whole chapter — its index page plus every page beneath it — as one file, e.g. https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice.md. - [Introduction](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/introduction.md): Mystical and contemplative spirituality has in the West come in, out, in again, out once more, and (no really) back into fashion again. This time around it's… - [Metaphysics](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics.md) [~122 KB, ~31k tokens]: Meta-metaphysics, in principle, as groundwork for talking about spirituality and moral philosophy - [What, and Why, Metaphysics?](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/what-why-metaphysics.md): This isn’t abstract, because this affects the whole texture of your sense of existence. The whole sense of meaningfulness in your life, the whole vision and… - [Ways of Seeing](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/ways-of-seeing.md): A way of seeing is an orientation or a pattern of relating (whether to a physical object, a person, a symbol, etc.), which gives rise to some cluster of… - [Reification](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/reification.md): transitive. To make (something abstract) more concrete or real; to regard or treat (an idea, concept, etc.) as if having material existence. - [Eternalism, Nihilism, and Nebulosity](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/eternalism-nihilism.md): Eternalism and nihilsm are two poles of a tendency in relationship to either domains of meaning or systems of meaning. Eternalism seeks to stabilize and reify… - [Good, Right, & Wrong](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/rightness-ontology.md): There's no way to jump into meta-metaphysics without assuming some kind of metaphysics! I argue later that we mostly don't have frameworks for resolving… - [(Mis)use of Language and Rhetoric, re Rightness](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/rhetoric-rightness.md): There's a common kind of rhetorical trick, in which someone sneaks an evaluative claim in, like "a wolf in sheep's clothes," as though it were certain and… - ["Real"](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/real.md): Quite a lot of jousting goes back and forth about what is "real." I will claim that the determination of some phenomenon as "real" is often a stand-in for… - [Metaphysical Disagreement and Determination](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/metaphysics/metaphysical-disagreement.md): There's quite a lot of disagreement about metaphysics in general, if not explicitly by that name, and about subjects downstream of metaphysics. I've perhaps… - [Culture, Trauma, and Memetics](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/culture-trauma-memetics.md) [~87 KB, ~22k tokens]: Contextualizing culture and trauma, in preparation for discussing spiritual practice - [Trauma](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/culture-trauma-memetics/trauma.md): Models and reports of "trauma" - [The Structure of Trauma](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/culture-trauma-memetics/structure-trauma.md): The image that one might get about trauma based only on the criteria for PTSD is that it's mainly about symptoms of emotional dysregulation. I think this is… - [Trauma Smells](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/culture-trauma-memetics/trauma-smells.md): I'll use the word "trauma smell" to refer to a big cluster of things which, well, kinda smell like trauma. The term is a (shallow) riff on a concept from… - [Memetics](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/culture-trauma-memetics/memetics.md): Transmission and diffusion of pieces of human culture - [Culture, Taboo, and Trauma](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/culture-trauma-memetics/culture.md): Human cultures in general transmit memetic packets to their members, including patterns which might be called traumatic, or which at least smell like trauma. - [Burdens of Meaning](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/culture-trauma-memetics/burdens-of-meaning.md): Transmitting meanings can cause various harms - [Spirituality, Phenomenology, and Practice](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice.md) [~216 KB, ~55k tokens]: Careful descriptive accounts of spiritual practice and phenomenology - [Spiritual Practice](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/spiritual-practice.md): I broadly speaking agree with the take that "religion," "spirituality," and "spiritual practice" are not really natural kinds anthropologically or… - [Somatic Phenomenology](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/phenomenology-somatics.md): Are you feeling it now, Mr. Krabs? - [Misc. Features of Spiritual Practices](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/practices.md): The below isn't even remotely trying to be comprehensive, but this is I think an important angle on some common features both in spiritual traditions and in… - [Meditation](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/meditation.md): What the fuck is "meditation"? Geeze, what a mess. - [Introspection (and some "Transformative Practice")](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/introspection.md): Describing reports and models of introspection - [Content, Healing, and Integration](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/healing.md) [~34 KB, ~9k tokens]: Reports and models of healing and "integration" from spiritual practitioners - [Criticizing Somatics-and-Trauma Models](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/healing/criticizing-trauma.md): Discussing problems and caveats with the previous section on healing - [Other Models of Healing](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/healing/other-models.md): Contextualizing other models with respect to my stance here - [Mysticism and Awakening](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/mysticism-awakening.md): I'll use the term mysticism to refer primarily to traditions and practices of transcendence and gnosis, and secondarily to contact with the supernatural… - [Paths and "The Path"](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/paths.md): Discussion conceptions and reports of "the spiritual path" - [Transformative Practice](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/practice/transformative-practice.md): Everybody's into transformative practice - [Global Wayfinding](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/wayfinding.md) [~40 KB, ~10k tokens]: Rare and based takes on transformative practice - [Contextualizing Global Wayfinding](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/wayfinding/introduction.md): Introduction to the least legible meditation system - [The Global Wayfinding Model](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/wayfinding/wayfinding-model.md): Laying out the basic claims and models of wayfinding - [The Depths of Insanity](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/wayfinding/the-depths-of-insanity.md): Don't go looking for shit, you might just find it. - [Disruptions in Life and Practice](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/wayfinding/wayfinding-disruptions-nonmonotonicities.md): 😠😠😠???!? cmon mark, are you just trying to be illegible here - [My Takes on Wayfinding](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/wayfinding/my-takes.md): Where I agree and disagree with Mark - [Spiritual Truth](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth.md) [~6 KB, ~1k tokens]: Trying to understand what claims are made by different traditions, in what sense they could be true, and what we should want out of such claims - [Metaphysics re Phenomenology and Spiritual Practice](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth/metaphysics-phenomenology-spirituality.md): Varying ways of understanding what phenomenology is, and how that shapes the contents of phenomenology - [Lopsided Masters](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth/lopsided-masters.md): How thorough and robust is awakening, and what's wrong with so many teachers? - [Schools, Teachers, and Transmission](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth/schools-teachers-transmission.md): Spiritual lineages try to maintain institutions to transmit insight -- does this work, and how well? - [Gnosis, Inference, Deference, & Confabulation](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth/gnosis-confabulation.md): What's the difference between true spiritual insight, and something less reliable? - [Wrong Practice](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth/wrong-practice.md): Is there a notion of "incorrect" practice? - [Spiritual Truth](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth/truth.md): Na hi verena verāni, sammantīdha kudācanaṁ; Averena ca sammanti, esa dhammo sanantano. - [Rationality](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/spiritual-truth/rationality.md): Models of epistemic and instrumental rationality - [Goodness](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/goodness.md) [~3 KB, ~1k tokens]: What's actually good, tho? - [What is Axiology?](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/goodness/what-is-axiology.md): What axiology is, and why it comes first in talking about goodness - [Metaphysics and Axiology](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/goodness/metaphysics-axiology.md): How does "goodness" relate to our conception of truth, reality, etc.? - [Harm](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/goodness/harm.md): What does "harm" mean, and how do spiritual systems understand it? - [Metaphysical Harms](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/goodness/metaphysical-harms.md): Harms which arise from confused or distortive metaphysicses - [Sex](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/goodness/sex.md): Deep in the loins. Spiritually speaking. - [Conclusion](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/conclusion.md) [~3 KB, ~1k tokens]: This chapter reiterates and elaborates on the main thesis of the book. - [Spiritual Rationality](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/conclusion/spiritual-rationality.md): Spiritual rationality, in my view, is composed of three main considerations. I want a spirituality which satisfies all of them, and I believe you should too… - [Appendix](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/appendix.md) [~5 KB, ~1k tokens]: Supplementary essays and discussions on specific topics - [Empiricism re Therapy Efficacy](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/appendix/therapy-efficacy.md): Plausibly some empiricism - [The Garden Of Eden](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/appendix/garden-of-eden.md): There are a variety of theories, stories, and fantasies which I'll refer to as stories of the Garden of Eden. These stories revolve around a reconstructed… - [Specific Claims from Specific Traditions](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/appendix/specific-claims.md): Details of specific models from specific traditions - [Whose Buddha?](https://spiritual-rationality.org/md/appendix/whose-buddha-historiography.md): The intersection of devotion, myth, and modern historical scholarship ## Notation Source notation, not standard markdown: - `::gloss[…]` — definition of the heading above it. Invisible on the site; it is the hover card for links to that heading. Read as a definition. - `::gloss[…]{#id}` — defines a term holding its own anchor. `#id` is the link target; the block below is what it annotates. - `::nogloss` — heading deliberately has no definition. - `:::note[…]` / `:::info[…]` — callouts (MyST/Docusaurus admonitions). Footnotes are GFM. Heading anchors are GitHub-style slugs, written out as `{#id}` in the combined files. ## Anchors On individual pages, anchors are what they are on the site: heading slugs, `{#id}` gloss anchors, and `fn-