Having followed the latest incarnation of the Illumination debate with interest I would like to pitch in a few of my thoughts with regard to real-life examples. Pam Carlson gave some good ideas. I agree that in real life some of the real geniuses in their academic fields qualify as illuminates. NOT becase they can stand on a hot rail of an electric train but because they have come to an understanding of how the real world works that they understand and very few others can comprehend without a whole lot of study and bending of their world-view. From my field of physics the best examples are Relativity and Schroedingers Wave Equation.
After I had studied those two concepts for six months I understood them and could use them. But both tend to be counter-intuitive and hand them to an average physicist and they will get it wrong 99% of the time (if they don't do the study). I have since forgotten how to use them (since they are not my chosen fields) and perhaps that is the problem with the Lunar College method. Only constant study keeps you illuminated. Sure after a couple of years you get illuminated and go slightly insane but after you graduate and leave the school for a few years you lose the illumination mind-set but keep the dangerous powers and insanities (or go even more insane). Reminds me of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World actually.
Examples of Illuminating questions in my experience (when given to non-adepts/average people in the streets):
Does science exist to prove or disprove theories? (disprove)
Are chemicals bad for you? (NO, but your average newspaper will tell you a chemical spill is evil, although spilling some flour on your floor is a chemical spill because everything is made up of chemicals, only some are bad for you)
Can you actually prove anything? (Yes if we live in a finite universe, no if we live in an infinite universe and since we don't know the boundaries of the universe we can't assume we are in a finite universe)
Now ask the first and last question in any universities science faculty meeting and you will be cleaning the blood off the floor for months. I have given my answers as correct but maybe the converse is true and I belong to one of the tainted/wrong set of illuminate beliefs and should expect a visit from the Arkati anytime now. I can certainly find plenty of people who would disagree violently with me.
The point of the above is that the vast majority of society will never ask themselves the above questions or ponder their possible answers. It took a four year undergrad degree and most of a PhD to come to my answers which may not be correct still. Most people are happy to use a mobile phone without worrying about the complicated physics that needs to be understood to build one.
That is why illumination is such a shock. Over a long period of time and thinking in a screwy(non-common) manner you come to a fundamental understanding of how the universe works. An understanding that very few other people share and that allows you to do things that most people can't. I can build a mobile phone/computer chip. In Glorantha I could ignore a spirit of reprisal because I see nothing wrong about being a darkness worshipper and using Sunspear in the same breath (they are all part of the eternal balance of the elements and chaos that makes Glorantha what it is today). Mind you the Dara Hapans would still declare me morally insane and bury me alive with poison just to make sure.
[In real life I think all the above applies to every field. Except the vile economists who definitely dabble in dark arts they do not understand and should be the first against the wall when the revolution comes. Before the lawyers who have at least the decency to admit that they are constructing an artificial system to exploit you to their own gain. :-) I have just given physics examples because they are something from my own field. My girlfriend went to a lecture on "Deconstructionism of gender in writing" which I suspect is an English Departments way of going about gaining their own illumination. I think it sounds like a load of wanky droppings but Barbara assured me I would of enjoyed it and the above thought is probably an example of the limits of my world-view than an accurate assessment of the talks worth].
Cheers, Andrew
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