6) Transcendence: Is It Culturally Shaped or Is "Their Something" Universal?

Abstract "Nature Observation as a Field Technique: The Relevancy of the Ecological Self for Anthropologists" Ryan Hurd , MA in Consciousness Studies from John F. Kennedy University, BA in Anthropology from the University of Georgia. His work in lucid dreaming research and cognitive archeology can be followed online at http://dreamstudies.org For more information on this conference see http://www.sacaaa.org

This paper will present the practice of nature observation as a field technique for anthropologists. A blend of the work of naturalist John Young, archeologist Paul Devereux, and psychologist Eugene Genlin, this field technique helps researchers heighten awareness, emotional intelligence, and the sense modalities that are usually suppressed by the default techno-rationalist worldview of Western culture.

Ecopshchologists discuss nature observation as crucial to the development of the ecological self, naturalists call it arriving at baseline consciousness. As a second-person (or intersubjective) data collection technique, nature observation can highlight the role of psychological projection in perception, as well as offer research potential for novel observations, inter-species communication, and perhaps a little experiential gnosis of the interface between mind and body, self and other, and spirit and matter. And, besides all that, it just feels good.