~~Stewart Kiritz, September 24, 2022
In many ways Bruce anticipated ideas and methods that are gaining wide acceptance and bearing fruit today. Although some of these notions were already “in the air,” Bruce saw how important they were and promoted them in his writings and presentations. His senior thesis at UC Santa Cruz, written in 1987 and accepted by psychologist Frank Barron, himself an expert on creativity, as sufficient to grant him a BA in psychology, contains language and thinking that are quite contemporary in flavor. Below are passages from this work written 35 years ago. For example:
On holistic and analogic expression, or right brain vs. left brain process:
“I sometimes think that the diagrammatic, or visual-spatial approach to conceptual representation is superior to the ‘linear symbol stream’ approach of formulaic or language- based description because a diagram is inherently holistic; it represents many aspects and relationships at once, and to those who think intuitively, this can be a highly convenient way to package complexity.”
On the value of online interchange through the medium of the internet:
“…I believe that the day is coming when most significant intellectual debate now transacted in writing will be conducted on an international scale through the online medium.”
On what is now called “big data” and its application to scientific research:
“…[E]xtremely sophisticated forms of idea processing will be defined in the relatively near future, and… through these sorts of methods the coordination of massive amounts of otherwise independent data will become a standard objective of ambitious research designs, thus providing means for science to approach the establishment of certainties in areas where humanity has so long been forced to depend on guesswork. … [T]hese new research techniques are beginning to afford approaches to extremely complex and ambitious projects, which undertake the kind of massive data organization which would have been dismissed as hopelessly utopian only a generation ago. “
Some of Bruce’s ideas have not yet been realized, but point us in intriguing directions, as in the following:
“I believe that the proper conceptual keys for the development of interactive communal research networks will eventually emerge, that common high level teleconferencing languages will be defined, and that some individuals ‘specializing in generality’ will work closely with teams of specialists who far outstrip them in specific technical areas, defining unifying and broadly inclusive concepts and frameworks within which this teamwork can most productively be coordinated.”
Bruce’s intellectual and spiritual journey began in his early college years. It’s possible he may have been drawn to these topics previously, but we have no data to answer this question. What we do know, from letters and articles, is that he was interested in the symbolism of the mandala, an archetype of wholeness, quite early. This led Bruce to read enormous amounts of literature in the areas of psychology, philosophy, cybernetics, and religion, especially Eastern religious beliefs and practices. Looking at Bruce’s many articles and posts, mostly seen on online journals and collectives of persons interested in spirituality, we see that Bruce was on his own quest. This had several aims:
1. To find a way of uniting science, psychology, and spirituality into one unified structure of some kind.
2. To persuade others to pursue spiritual goals and to connect with others in an effort towards affiliation in the service of these goals.
3. To come up with a way to unify political action and spiritual belief so that society could move in a positive, ethical, and spiritually enlightened direction.
Bruce life’s work consisted of his writings, his work designing and implementing websites, and his involvement with groups sharing his goals. In one measure he seems to have succeeded quite well. Re goal #2: the comments in the appreciation section of this website speak volumes about the number of people he influenced. Many were already similarly minded. But he clearly mobilized their energies. We know that for each person who took the time to write an appreciation there are most likely dozens or hundreds who were impacted but have not commented. So yes, Bruce achieved one of his signature goals – to influence others in a positive direction and support their own efforts towards spiritual growth and mutual connection in the service of this quest.