Karma is not supernatural or mysterious

There is nothing mysterious about karma.

Doing harm to others is like gambling; you may "win" short run, but in the long run you always lose.  The world is just simply built that way.

What happened to National Geographic?

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC ON TV

A comment about the "reality" show where venomous snakes were shown (more like exploited) being handled by religious believers.

When I was a kid we subscribed to the National Geographic, and I remember learning a lot about geography and more important about the different people around the world.  It was presented in a slick first person way that a high schooler could enjoy, and emphasized, at least as far as I could tell, the truth in a non-commercial clearly written way with lots of informative pictures and maps.

I gave up on it in college.  Maybe I outgrew it.

Recently (since I don't now live in the states we can get it on satellite), I checked out its TV channel a few times.  They have gone cheap and crass aiming for a low-class audience based on people watching, hoping someone will get killed and they can see it.  I guess that is what draws the TV audience they want -- idiots that can be easily influenced by advertising.

Sad, such an old institution has gone that way. 

America's schools and gross ignorance

AMERICA'S SCHOOLS

I saw a headline in several web pages today that said that a quarter of Americans don't know that the earth circles the sun and that half don't believe in evolution.  The second part of that does not surprise me, considering the religious primitivism (i.e., snake handlers dying of snake bites -- also in today's news) found throughout the States.

That first part though kinda astounded me.

Thinking about it I guess that's probably about right.  I think back on my high school class and about a quarter of them were more than functionally illiterate but flat-out illiterate, after spending most of their waking hours in schoolrooms since they were six.

The thing about primary and secondary education in the states is that it serves to educate the elite and to baby-sit the others, so the parents can have jobs.  Teachers naturally gravitate to the smarter harder working students and try to ignore the others, or at least keep the disturbances they cause to a minimum, and think, rightly, that trying to get them to learn something is so contrary to the anti-intellectual culture of not just their peers but their families and neighborhoods, that there is no point.

So America produces the best doctors and engineers and lawyers and artists and designers and architects and even educators, in the meantime leaving a huge chunk uneducated and perfectly happy with themselves being that way.

The only thing that gets me is that in a democracy those people are encouraged to vote, and where a political machine is in place, in a close election, they do vote.

Impeaching U.S. Presidents

IMPEACHING U.S. PRESIDENTS

Thinking about the past attempts to impeach a U.S. President and I conclude that this clause in the U.S. Constitution is not just outdated and bad and a source of trouble but never was any good.

What are "high crimes and misdemeanors."  I presume way back a couple centuries ago that meant something, but I doubt, since no President has ever actually been convicted (Nixon resigned, admirably I think so that the government could function even though he might not have been convicted and it is hard to see where the charges fit the Constitution anyway).  So the definition has never had a proper court test to my knowledge and is almost meaningless.

Presidents who have the opposition party in control of the House constantly have to deal with impeachment any more, something intolerable, with someone calling for hearings all the time.  American partisan politics is getting worse and worse and already just stinks.

To have effective government you must have a President who can do things "on the edge."

Flappy Bird takedown

FLAPPY BIRD TAKEDOWN

I see the new official line now is that the owner took Flappy Bird down because it is "too addictive."  To be sure it is but that is the first time I've seen that as a reason for taking down a game (something so easy to learn should not, we think, be so hard to win -- hence the addiction as it hurts our egos).

My first reaction was that the Vietnamese authorities advised him to take it down out of their concern for the welfare of the human race.

By the way, I always thought he should have been called "Floppy Bird," since it is obvious he can't fly.

Hillary Clinton and her husband's sexual offenses

HILLARY CLINTON AND HER HUSBAND'S SEXUAL OFFENSES

I see that a prominent Republican has said the party should avoid bringing up Clinton's sex scandal should Hillary be the Democrat's nominee for President.  That would be good advice.

Let me first say that, while I would agree that a man or woman's sexual behavior has little to do with their ability to serve effectively in public office, and while I thought the impeachment effort was just politics, I nevertheless was very much offended by Clinton's behavior.  It was just a gross ego trip by a man in power demeaning an ambitious but silly girl unable to keep her mouth shut (in more ways than one).

Follow that by the public, carefully coached, lie on TV, "I did not have sex with that woman" accompanied by emphatic gestures.  Then when it became clear that this was a lie the hypocritical effort to say that what happened was not really "sex."  Disgusting performance -- so much so that no matter how great a President Clinton may in history be judged, he will never be seen as a great man.

Now we have his wife a likely nominee for President.  Her performance during the episode seems to me to have been acceptable, whether or not she was aware of his womanizing.  Women, especially those married to public figures, need to be seen to be loyal and to support him, and to keep their problems private.

There are other things in her career that are fair targets, but not this one. 

Adam and Eve

Adam and Eve

 
Adam and Eve have always puzzled me a little.

1. They were perfect.

2. It was only through the eating of the forbidden fruit and the subsequent curse that they came under sin – that is, became imperfect.

3. Perfect beings do not do imperfect things.

4. In short, if they really were perfect, they could not have been tempted to eat the forbidden fruit until after they had eaten it.

All the talk about free will does nothing to help this illogical story. Perfect beings don't do imperfect things. They are not even tempted to.

McDonalds Coming to Vietnam

I see McDonald's is opening a "restaurant" in Ho Chi Minh City.  I do hope they leave the clown behind.

One of the things I like about Vietnam is of course the food (this is what everyone says about Vietnamese food because it is true), and one of the features of Vietnamese food is that it uses meat sparingly and more as a condiment and not as an unhealthy plop of meat and fat.

Of course one can get excellent hamburgers in Vietnam.  They aren't cheap, but not outrageous either unless from one of the snob hotels.  They are prepared as one asks, (not mass done with frozen patties) with toasted bun and sliced onion and really good fresh tomatoes and "salad" (the Vietnamese word for lettuce), and you can add ketchup, hot sauce, mustard and mayo and relish to taste (as well as a few more Asian things).  It doesn't come buried in that stuff they call "dressing" that seems designed to hide the absence of reality.

As you can probably can tell from what I have to say about the McDonald's fare I have had in the states (not often, fortunately), I will probably not be a regular customer.

It bothers me that so often science and politics or science and religion, or even all three get mixed up.  This is, in fact, a major weakness of modern elected-official republics.  People try to get their way about issues through politics rather than what works best, expressing biases and ideologies and prejudices through the elective process.  Government is not the place to enforce morals and should be interested not in ideology but in what makes for the best outcomes for the population as a whole.

An example is the environment, and especially the global warming issue.  The environmental extremist ("tree hugger") would shut down modern commerce and industry to preserve some air headed idea of nature, when in fact nature left alone is no utopia.  On the other side of the political fence the political right engages in denial that the environment must be protected and in particular that mankind is causing a steady global warming, of which there is really no scientific doubt, that at best is going to cost billions and displace as many and at worse could lead to runaway warming converting our planet into another Venus (not that that seems likely but it is a possibility so severe that even though the chances are remote it must not be ignored).

Another issue of this sort is abortion.  Many religions, including my own, feel that any taking of life, including that of a fetus, is wrong -- and late in term seriously wrong.  However, the use of the political apparatus to interfere with such personal decisions leads to even worse wrongs.  It is fine to encourage having the baby and to set the right personal example in these things, it is not fine to use the criminal process on what is essentially a political issue.  I find the inability or unwillingness some express to see the point here that it is necessary to criminalize murder but not necessary to criminalize abortion makes all the difference unfortunate.

One final example of how modern political republics so often fail because of their structure -- the constant political interference in the curriculum of secondary and even tertiary education.  Science (especially evolutionary theory but also accurate and not grandiose histories or things like religious myths taught as history) leads to a misinformed and prejudiced public and is in the end harmful to such a culture.

This is one general area, then, among many, where single party states and even autocracies are better.

1984

In the novel “1984,” the lead character O'Brien stubbornly holds onto his perception and his personal "memories" as objective reality in spite of the opposition of those who control him. He ultimately fails, as I guess would happen if brainwashing is persistent enough and has the technology needed.

O'Brien thinks there is an objective reality "out there." Big Brother asserts that what is in O'Brien's head as objective reality is an illusion -- and, indeed, a counter-revolutionary and therefore intolerable illusion. We cannot be allowed to remember as history what we experienced but only what the authorities have decided what history was.

Maybe the authorities are right; that there is no objective reality. Memories can be manipulated: we cannot trues even the evidence of our senses to not be fooled by some illusion or trick. Of course to function we assume there really is an objective reality, and I think there probably is one, but as physics pushes on we come to realize that whatever it is it is a lot further away from our personal existence than we even begin to imagine.

All illusions necessarily have something under them that generates the illusion. When someone asserts something is an illusion, one excellent refutation is to ask for the underlying reality. It may be that the reality is itself just a deeper illusion, one wonders how far that might go.

There are several things that I wonder maybe are illusions, as I can see underlying things that could underly them as causes. Causation is one, another of course is space and time. Then there is mind and there is free will: the modern mechanistic materialist is I think forced to assert that these too are illusions, but what could be the underlying reality? Brain neurons firing away do not demonstrate any way to generate such an illusion.

Vietnam's government

Since this blog intended at first to be mostly about Vietnam, and since there has been precious little about Vietnam in it, I think I will try to correct that a little now.

Vietnam is a free independent republic that tries and generally has good relations with everyone.  There aren't too many countries around like that.  It is mainly socialist, but with an active private market and has shown remarkable growth and prosperity over the last few years, so that living standards and other standards, such as education, health, transport, and so on, have improved markedly.

The biggest difference between Vietnam and most Western states is that it is a single-party state, with only one political party.  Over time this has evolved more and more into a meritocracy, where party membership goes to the educated and those who served well in the military, as well as those willing to do the extra work required.

I personally think this is the closest one can reasonably get to Plato's concept of the ideal state, although the selection is not made in childhood but from among adults.  Government decisions then follow, largely through consensus building.

A bit about Buddhism to a Muslim

I did not start this Blog to promote Buddhism, and make a poor Buddhist anyway. However, I have had some inquiries and I am happy to answer questions as best I can, with the proviso that there are lots of more qualified sources available.

Buddhism is an ancient religion, more ancient than Islam or Christianity. The Buddha coincides in time with Zoroaster and precedes Confucius and Socrates.

Buddhist "scripture" exists. Buddhists are not, however, superstitious. We do not see scripture as magic books that give us magic solutions to all of our questions, nor do we think the invention of humans (language) could possibly be adequate to divine words. We see our scripture as the writings of wise and good men to be respected..

As with any religion, it is impossible to summarize Buddhism, especially with all of its varieties, in a few sentences, although the Four Noble Truths and the Eight-Fold Noble Path are sometimes used that way, the idea gives me cold shivers. They can at least serve as a start.

Jainism

Westerners are not the only ones to have discovered atheism. Here is another case, Jainism, traditionally founded by Vardhaman Mahavira (about the same time as Buddhism was traditionally founded, although in both cases the tradition may be older).

I try here to provide a few of its teachings, with comparisons to Buddhism, but please be kind and forgive errors and important things I am not aware of – to be in a position to be accurate and complete in such things requires lifetimes of study.

1. The universe is neither created nor sustained by a supernatural being. It is without beginning or end and operates in accordance with natural law (Buddhism posits an uncaused and unknowable beginning to the universe, but agrees that all operates under natural law). I have been taught this and I suppose it is true, but one has to wonder in both cases if these traditions, until recently, had any firm idea of what natural law might be, or at least if they had a Baconian or similar sense of it.

2. Existence has two categories, mind and non-mind (some Buddhism tends to the idea that non-mind is a sub-category of mind).

3. The law of karma is a law of automatic cause and effect. Karma comes by non-violence (Buddhism also posits a law of karma, but sees it as both negative and positive; also, Buddhism sees all cause and effect as examples of karma – that is to say that often Buddhists see the cause and effect of classical physics as an example of karma too).

4. Karma leaves when there is violence, detachment, anger, pride, infatuation, greed, hatred, or craving (Buddhists see such behavior leading to the accumulation of negative karma, except for detachment, which is seen as desirable). It may be that there is a difference in the meaning of words here, with one group defining detachment as absence of compassion. Buddhists emphasize compassion but applied in a detached way

5. Attachment to material objects is the main cause of bondage and leads to greed and jealousy (Jains identify the problem as bondage, Buddhists as one of suffering).

6. There is no need for the rituals of the Vedas (Hinduism tends to insist that the world will fall apart if the rituals are not sustained).

7. There is no God or gods (Buddhists make no such assertions, seeing such matters as speculative).

8. The goal of life is liberation. (Buddhists call it enlightenment).

9. Vegetarianism is necessary. (Buddhists encourage vegetarianism).

It is likely that both Buddhism and Jainism and other subcontinent traditions come from the same extremely ancient root. This may be as far back as the ancient Indus Valley (Harrappa) cultures. While both traditions may have specific beginnings with particular founders, the very physical existence of these individuals cannot be proven and I am not willing to go so far as to say their existence is likely or unlikely (many scholars will say the existence of an important religious figure is “likely,” I tend to suspect to be friendly and maybe retain access). If these “founders” were real people they may also have been kernels of myth clusters around which the actual traditions later developed, or they shaped and modified existing tradition ― if would be difficult to say they founded them, since main ideas had already been around a long time.

Hinduism shares characteristics with Indo-European religions (especially pantheons of deities specializing in different aspects of existence) and seems to be therefore derived more from the Aryan invaders. Hinduism, however, does also share with the other two traditions the ideas of karma and rebirth, so we can discern that the Hindu tradition picked them up over the ages in India.

Even more on free will

A comment if I may about mites making choices.  For that matter elevators make choices.  You push button three and it goes to the third floor.  These things are called reflexes and natural selection programs them as well as do engineers.

Evidence that we are loaded with such reflexes, some of them amazingly complex in the range of behaviors available, is not valid that we don't have free will.

We are also sentient beings, meaning that we experience much of our existence, through senses and emotions, and natural selection has also used these phenomena to arrange for possible subtleties of choice beyond what is possible with programming that nevertheless are by no means free will.  The sudden powerful anger of a parent when their child is harmed is built into us by natural selection and serves us, or at least the progeny.  Behavior in such a state is not free will either, but a demonstration of that fact would not constitute proof that free will does not exist.

Our minds are not "things" (as the Buddhist points out) but process flows and they can make choices.  They are usually determined by things like past experience and personality and habit, but not always.  I think it takes someone with a little training in mindfulness (mind being aware of mind) to see that it is indeed possible to deliberately and willfully do things of our free will, even whim, if you will.

Atheist Buddhism

I go to Temple (Buddhist) and participate in the rituals and contribute to their charities.  As George Washington (a non-Christian deist) said, "attending church is something a gentleman does."  One nice thing about Temple as opposed to Church is you don't have to listen to sermons and you can do the various rituals or not as you please (some do require physical abilities beyond me at my age and weight).

Lots of atheists feel Buddhism is in the end a good thing so long as it doesn't take too many young men and turn them into navel starers (there are some who are better off in monasteries, at least for awhile).  I don't buy most of the Buddha stories but I do think we are reborn and that there is a non-materialist aspect to existence, and I think the philosophy about the root nature of our unhappiness and unease is close to the mark. 

Debunkers, skeptics, cynics, and believers

A "debunker" is someone who doubts some hairy story and actually goes to the effort of checking the assertions to see if they are factual or not.  Usually of course they are not.  I can see why believers don't like them and would censor them if they could.

A "skeptic" is just someone who doesn't accept unusual or exotic claims without damn good evidence.  They tend to be of a lazier sort than the debunkers and are prone to make logical arguments but leave it at that.  I think that tends to be where I am most of the time.  The religious types who have been indoctrinated, generally as children, don't like these at all, as they like their comfortable beliefs and don't want them doubted.

A "cynic" is a step beyond the skeptic and is in fact in some ways closer to the believer, especially when it comes to "official" versions of things, and as a result is prone to accept conspiracy theories that fit with their political views.

And then there are the legions of "believers" who rely on faith rather than evidence and reason.  A skeptic only has opinions, the others believe, and when cornered inevitably depend on their right to believe whatever, or on the tremendous virtue of having faith in the face of plain sense.

Unending free will debate

Well of course there is no soul; I keep forgetting that this is what Westerners think when you assert mind and body.  Out of body arises mind, but it has its own being, not as a thing but as a process -- the proverbial "chain of consciousness."  When we sit quietly (this is in fact a popular form of meditation) and "watch" ourselves (that can be misleading because what you are looking at is very recent short-term memories), we can see how the process flows.

Where or how free will arises I don't know, but I tend to take it as an assumption necessary for almost any philosophical knowledge and for any assumption of values.  Plus I am quite sure I can ascertain when I am mindfully exercising it and when, as is most of the time done for efficiency, I am just going with the flow.


I don't disagree with how what I say "sounds," especially to a materialist ear.  It is all inferential; I am persuaded I have the ability to exercise genuine choices, but of course it is impossible to prove that what I think has been an actual mindful choice on my part is not in reality just another aspect of my personalty that I don't notice, no matter how careful I am.  I really, truly find that too much of a stretch, that I am more aware of myself than that, but it remains a possibility.

Here is the rub: if we deny free will and assume some sort of determinism either by a deity or by mechanical processes, or maybe some sort of random choice at the quantum level (which would no more be free will than a classical deterministic process), then we enter a pointless universe and there is no point in even talking about it.  It's similar to the solipsist: there is no point having a discussion with such a person since only he or she exists and is in effect talking to itself.

Three take-aways:  first, I and most people think they have free will and we construct our society and most of our philosophy on that assumption, second, it is not hard to carry out introspective tests to convince oneself the mindful use of actual choice is possible, and, third, without free will as an operating assumption we only talk in circles.

Dream coincidence

Last night outside other dream time -- quite by itself, I dreamed the face of someone I hadn't seen in maybe a year or so saying, "Hi, Frank."  I said, "Hi, Dan" and he faded out.

Now this morning greeting me is a nice email saying he had discovered my blog and liking it and all that.  I know, coincidences we wouldn't believe happen all the time.  This is one I wouldn't believe.

Alternative medicine for the dying

I think someone who is dying and loves life will try all sorts of things the seem to have some sense to them.  Approved medicine tends to come first, followed by religion (prayer, going to temple, etc.) followed by the traditional medicines of the culture followed by practically anything people suggest or they themselves think up.

Cost and false hope and the potential of the treatments doing additional harm are the objections to these efforts, but sheesh just the western treatments which only defer death can bankrupt a family, and I see nothing wrong with hope -- even false hopes help in other ways, and surely we don't insist that regular accepted medical treatments don't also often do their own harm via side effects.

A bit more on free will and conscious choice

We often have discernible choices, but we must be mindful to be aware of them; otherwise we act out of habit or our desires.  Therefore free will is rarely utilized and more often than not our subconscious has already decided before we act.  I can deliberately and freely make my toe move, but if instead I think to my big toe, sometime shortly, move, then my subconscious actually does it.

The conscious we think of as a thing is really a self-perpetuating process not unlike a wave, although a good deal more complicated and with more inputs than just the energy of the rock thrown in the lake.

Scientific ignorance

Usually when someone dismisses some foundational or important scientific knowledge, it merely indicates ignorance, but that is not always so.  I think a close reading of the disagreement is needed, or maybe follow up questions, before the ignorance label is appropriate.

I have several times been falsely accused of ignorance on things I knew better than the accuser: of course it was not because I expressed disagreement but because the accuser was a little ignorant.  Those cases call for even more caution.

What is right and good

We each have to decide for ourselves what is right and good.  No one else can do it for us.  That doesn't mean there aren't standards we can apply, and we need to train ourselves in non-judgmentalism, mindfulness, compassion, awareness and understanding of the needs and delusions and compulsions of others, being aware but not judging them and of course first off is compassion and personal moral rectitude.

Free will

I have no problem with free will and think it is a necessary thing if there is to be judgment, responsibility and even purpose in life.

I don't have an omniscient deity in my thinking creating paradoxes, and I don't have a mechanistic universe winding itself down with inevitability either.

I doubt we exercise our ability to make free will choices most of the time; doing so requires mindful choice, and most people never even heard of the idea.  They just do what they do in accordance with their nature, but that does not mean it doesn't exist.

Psychic reading

A good "reader" can identify things about you that it is good for you to know.  I don't think it's magic, but just a skill some people have, sometimes learned, sometimes intuitive.  Once they have your main issues, their advice can be great.

The ability unfortunately includes the ability to be a fraud, pulling cons on people who will later say, "He [or she] must be genuine -- he knew things he couldn't possibly have known."

Of course they often make guesses, and certain guesses, like a recent loss, are very likely to be correct.  Then they assess how serious the loss was to you before proceeding.  Then, again, a wrong guess can also be covered in a myriad of ways, with something like, "What I mean is. . .."

Jesus' Sacrifice

I have to say that is one of the weirdest ideas invented by people -- that one "worships" a deity with sacrifices -- by killing something, but it is so widespread an idea in so many religions, but at the same time is so illogical and, if I may say, just plain dumb, that one really wonders what in our evolution might have led to such a way of thinking.

Christianity of course took the idea to perhaps its ultimate irrationality by deciding through some mysterious magical way the death of a piece of God himself was needed, although of course it was a something of a sham since the death was not real and the particular piece of God (the Son) was very quickly brought back to life.  Something like someone giving you a gift and then taking it back three days later -- not really a gift.