"You're gonna want cause & effect"---GR

[Jed Kelestron]

It's about examining the examiner with intense focus and
concentration. Applying the scientific method to the psyche or ego of
the scientist so to speak. Western studies in cognitive science are
now using mindfulness meditation as part of their research. It has
zilch to do with superstition or metaphor. But putting it in words is
always problematic and leads to such trivializations of what is
actually a method of very deep inquiry into the nature of personal
identity. And it's not 'Buddhism,' although Buddhism is one arena that
utilizes such investigation. If you add two molecules of hydrogen and
one molecule of oxygen you get water. If you look deeply into the
nature of personal identity - you get nothing.

On Fri, Aug 19, 2011 at 12:53 PM, Ian Livingston
<igrlivingston at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ah, Buddhism. Yeah, it, too, is an interesting metaphor, though more
> explicitly founded in superstitious projection than some others. Maybe
> the explicit nature of the superstition makes it more palatable in
> some ways.
>
> On Fri, Aug 19, 2011 at 12:41 PM, Jed Kelestron <jedkelestron at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> I tend to incline toward a limited determinism: history
>>> compels us, but possibility opens infinitely.
>>
>> Both history and future possibility are fictions created by the illusory separate self which likes to believe it isn't determined but is a free and autonomous entity. Until that illusion is dispelled the big wheel just keeps on spinning.
>
>
>
> --
> "Less than any man have I  excuse for prejudice; and I feel for all
> creeds the warm sympathy of one who has come to learn that even the
> trust in reason is a precarious faith, and that we are all fragments
> of darkness groping for the sun. I know no more about the ultimates
> than the simplest urchin in the streets." -- Will Durant
>