Lawson, thanks for the really thorough explanation. I especially like the example of the kittens raised in a unidirectional striped environment then not being able to see the missing direction.
Along with that, I'd say that "shining ones" is simply another reference to how essential to human development is both light and the sense of sight. I also liked your explanation about Dr. Nader's insight about the Ramayana in human physiology. I'll try to find what Ganesh stand for. I think someone asked about that. Maybe just joking but anyway... On Wednesday, March 26, 2014 9:21 AM, "lengli...@cox.net" <lengli...@cox.net> wrote: I would say that devas are labels given to fundamental behaviors and connections that enlightened sages perceived as existing within themselves and perceived as external to themselves as well. Of course, most neuroscientists are pretty confident that the only way we can interpret reality is based on how our brain works, so the fact that devas are internal and external at teh same time is an inescapable consequence of having a nervous system connected to physical sense-organs. The world is as we are simply because we can't even conceive of it being differently, and if an alien species with a sufficiently radically different nervous system and sense organs showed up, there wold literally be no ways to communicate about certain things. Just as kittens who have lost the ability to perceive horizontal bars will bump into horizontal bars no matter what, we (and the aliens) would find certain concepts common to the other species, completely incomprehensible. So devas aren't just about "physical laws," but social interactions, intuitions, and any/all other aspects of human existence and human perception. My belief is that they are "shining ones" because they are so fundamental to how enlightened sages perceive things that their existence as the commonality behind various related "things" like love, or destruction or creation or whatever leaps out at the sage even before the sage can label the thing that they are looking at/thinking about. L
