Direct access to Reality in kennilingus and BOTA

In an IPS thread on generative (en)closures in this post Balder asks Joe this question:

"I do not question the reality of these states of consciousness, having experienced at least some of them in my own contemplative exploration, but one traditional belief which we have been questioning here is whether these states give us 'privileged access' to reality or to the center of being(s).  Such is the teaching of many mystical schools, including some in which I have practiced, but the concept of direct access to the entirety of reality itself is what has been criticized more recently as the 'philosophy of consciousness' or the 'metaphysics of presence.'"


You can see Joe's response following that post, which for me doesn't answer the question. Basically he said he cannot answer from personal experience, not having experienced the highest states. But he maintains that his BOTA tradition does "indicate that at the highest levels of consciousness we experience the ground of being."

From the BOTA introductory propaganda pamphlet, The Open Door:

"That you may understand what is meant by 'a higher state of consciousness,' consider the various kingdoms of nature. Each has a progressively wider range of awareness. These different ranges of awareness are clearly defined, from the apparent unconsciousness of minerals through the subconscious life processes of plants to the first glimmerings of self-consciousness in higher animals. Self-consciousness reaches its fullness in man, and he is able to reason, to formulate speech, to use tools, and to modify his environment deliberately. HIGHER consciousness goes even beyond self-consciousness. It has been called the consciousness beyond thought — the level of intuition. It is through this level of consciousness that direct knowledge of the answers to Life's questions are realized and one's path — past, present and future — is clearly seen."

It is much akin to kennilingus descriptions and incorporation of 'the perennial philosophy,' replete with direct access to Reality through mystical states of consciousness. Which, by the way, Kennilingam still promotes as we've seen in his most recent statements on critical realism. E.g., from this post, quoting the Lingam:

“Only ultimate knowledge—given by prajna or nondual awareness, and not vijnana or dualistic awareness—can disclose ultimate reality (Spirit or Emptiness). That reality is real; it is ultimate; it is unqualifiable (including that claim); but it can be 'known' in a certain sense via Enlightenment or Awakening, i.e., satori, sahaja, metanoia, gnosis, wu, moksha—which Integral Theory puts at the center of its framework.”