[Jag skriver undantagsvis denna bloggtext på engelska, för att kunna länka till den i engelskspråkiga forum]
There are very many and very different approaches for facilitating the transition of an individual from an ordinary state of mind to some kind of spiritual awakening, whatever it is called (enlightenment, fundamental wellbeing, liberation, etc.). There is a large number of different schools of meditation, yoga, contemplation, etc., as well as more or less well-known spiritual teachers or gurus.
I have recently started to learn what can be done with ChatGPT 4, an AI system. I have set up at chatbot called “Program theory analyst”, with the function of describing change methods in diverse fields (chatbotar.thomasjordan.se). The variant of program theory I use comprises four components: Framing, Theories of change, Activities and Goals. The Framing component describes the problem formulation and basic assumptions, e.g. about causes of the identified problem or undesired present state, of the selected approach/method/school. The Theories of change component describes the assumed mechanisms that can be put to use in achieving the desired change. The Activities component describes the concrete practices, techniques or methodology of the approach. The Goals component, finally, describes how the aspired-for outcome is conceived in the approach. All these four components may vary considerably among a family of approaches that may seem to have similar purposes.
I have spent some hours asking the chatbot Program theory analyst to describe the program theories of no less than 40 pathways to spiritual awakening. It turns out that this chatbot, using ChatGPT 4, actually seems to generate very good descriptions of program theories. I write “seems”, because ChatGPT is known to sometimes “hallucinate”: if there is not enough factual information in ChatGPT’s knowledge base, it makes up responses that it “believes” are likely. So the descriptions here may include elements that don’t accurately represent the actual methods/pathways.
I find this very fascinating and helpful, in order to get a condensed description of particular methods or pathways, and also for more clearly seeing the considerable differences and also similarities among different pathways.
The library of descriptions of program theories of the 40 (and counting) pathways to awakening is available in a Dropbox folder at this link.
Below is a list of the 40 pathways described so far. If you want me to ask the chatbot about other approaches, please contact me (thomas.jordan@perspectus.se). However, the chatbot can only make good program theory descriptions of approaches for which there is appropriate information available on the internet.
A Course in Miracles
Actual Freedom
Adi Da
Adyashanti
Andrew Cohen
Bhakti Yoga
Centering prayer
Chögyam Trungpa
Culadasa
Daniel Ingram
David R. Hawkins
David Steindl-Rast
Diamond approach
Eckhart Tolle
Fred Davis
Gary Weber
Gateless Gatecrasher
Gina Lake
Goenka
Headless Way
Iyengar yoga
Jan Frazier
Judith Blackstone
Jun Po Roshi
Kundalini yoga
Mahamudra
Maharishi
Mother Meera
Osho
Ramaji
Rupert Spira
Sedona method
Shinzen Young
Sogyal Rinpoche
Sufi mystics
Surat Shabd Yoga
Taoism
Ten fetters
Thich Nhat Hahn
Vortex Healing