From a Letter to Mom

You asked about curanderos. They are not just faith healers. It is more about cleansing...removing negative energies both internal and external. Sometimes it's about removing curses. And it's combined with herbal remedies and rituals.

Luis Alberto Urrea was interviewed about the research he did for his book "The Hummingbird's Daughter," about his ancester Teresa Urrea, the Santa de Cabora. He went to Mexico to learn about curanderos. A curandera told him: "You people say we do magic, but it is science."

Reading that made it so clear to me, so easy to understand.

Modern science begins with assumptions. It is:
1) An examination of matter as if spirit does not exist.
2) Observation of matter as if there is no connection between the observer and the observed. The observer is to be as detached and as impartial as possible, almost as if he does not exist. No room for human emotion. Science cannot describe a smile.
3) An observation of a part, while losing sight of the whole.

Indigneous science begins with a different set of asssumptions. It allows for spirit and matter to exist simulaneously and recognizes a link, however subtle, between observer and observed, allowing for the essential humanity and integrity of the person, as well as recognizing the relationship between the parts and the whole. So it is a whole scientific tradition based on another set of assumptions.

Goethe reacted against Newton's color theory because it was replacing a magical, poetic, spiritual worldview. See my article here.

Modern science creates modern technology, based on science's assumptions, so the technologies carry us further and further away from direct perception of reality, and the thing snowballs.

Here in Mexico, at least, the indigenous worldview still exists and still pervades some aspects of the culture, so unusual things can still happen and be noticed here. John Paul II called it the most Catholic country in the world, the last bastion of the faith. It isn't yet overrun by the belief that science is the only truth.

It isn't that modern science is wrong. It is partial due to its partial premises.

A good friend of mine calls her country "surrealistic Mexico!"