Posted inBuddhism Humor

Buddhism shows its extremist side: threatening tranquility

Damn those Buddhists! I knew they were up to no good. Had to be some malevolent plotting going on behind those serene smiles.  The Onion has revealed the truth in "Buddhist Extremist Cell Vows to Unleash Tranquility on West."  WASHINGTON—In a 45-minute video posted on Tibetan websites Thursday, Tsuglag Rinpoche, leader of the Buddhist extremist group Kammaṭṭhāna, threatened to soon inflict a wave of peace and tranquility on the West. Speaking in front of a nondescript altar surrounded by candles, burning sticks of incense, and a small golden statue of the Buddha, Rinpoche did not specify when or where an…
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Posted inBuddhism Science

Unbiased thought or pure perception is impossible: Neuroscience 101

Like I said before, now it's really tough for me to read books that reflect pre-scientific understanding of the human mind. Or to seriously consider any form of spirituality/meditation/philosophy that doesn't address what Robert Burton, M.D. says in the opening pages of his "A Skeptic's Guide to the Mind: What Neuroscience Can and Cannot Tell Us About Ourselves." Our brains possess involuntary mechanisms that make unbiased thought impossible yet create the illusion that we are rational creatures capable of fully understanding the mind created by those same mechanisms. Our brains have evolved piecemeal; contradictions, inconsistency, and paradox are hardwired into…
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Posted inBuddhism Science

Buddhism is too serious and unscientific for me

I must really be entering the churchless deep end. Which is great! I enjoy diving into the depths of reality, rather than swimming around in the shallows of religious and philosophical concepts. For a long time I've enjoyed reading Buddhist books, so long as they aren't overly traditional. But now even edgy writings like "Rebel Buddha" seem too dogmatic to me. How can this quote be justified? Is mind the brain or a by-product of the brain? Is it chemicals and neurotransmitters lighting up pathways in the brain that spark sensation, thought, and feeling, and lead up to the brilliance…
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Posted inBuddhism Reality

One sip of coffee is more real than a thousand thoughts of God

I've drunk a lot of coffee in my life. Also, thought a lot about God. What I've concluded after all these years (65, to be exact) is that a single sip of coffee brings me hugely closer to reality than a thousand God-thoughts. I could have said "a million," because the gap is so wide between (1) something that actually exists in the world beyond the human brain, and (2) something that exists only as an abstract human conception. In no way do I call myself a Buddhist. But there are many aspects of Buddhism that I find appealing, along…
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Posted inBuddhism

Now is the simplest place and time to be

Here's how I've come to look upon now: its the best place to live out my life, because it is the simplest and least complex residence my psyche can reside in. Also, my inescapable home. So I might as well embrace what is impossible to be separate from. During my waking hours, I always have to deal in one way or another with what is happening now. Even if I'm lying down doing nothing, that doing nothing is something. Question is, how much extra do I add to the inescapable now? Dealing with now is an irreducible minimum experience; adding…
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Posted inBuddhism

Dalai Lama is a celebrity who doesn’t have much to say

My wife is an avid reader of Psychology Today. She pointed out an interesting article in the September/ October issue, "Holy Celebrity," by Joachim Kreuger, a social psychologist. It's about the Dalai Lama. Basic theme is that if you're a celebrity, spiritual or some other variety, your vacuous statements take on an aura of meaningfulness that people wouldn't ascribe to those words if a non-celebrity said the same thing. All religions assume that certain individuals have special access to divine, esoteric, or transcendental knowledge, although they tend to be mute on just how this knowledge is transmitted. This view does…
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Posted inBuddhism Reality

Not only the devil, but also reality, is in the detail

Didn't know this: Wikipedia tells me that the familiar "the devil is in the detail" saying was preceded by "god is in the detail."  OK. So it looks like detail is really important whether we aim at hell or heaven. This is the intriguing premise of "Things Fall Apart" by Philip Kitcher, a philosophy professor at Columbia University.  In his Queries to the “Opticks,” Newton looked forward to a vision of the cosmos in which everything would be explained on the basis of a small number of physical principles. That Newtonian vision remains highly popular with many scientists who turn…
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Posted inBuddhism Taoism/Tai Chi

Wei Wu Wei (Terence Gray) on non-duality

Wei Wu Wei's "Open Secret" is a fascinating book. I took a stab at talking about this attempt to describe the indescribable here and here.  I've been re-reading the first few chapters. Though sometimes I get irritated by Wei Wu Wei's (pen name of Terence Gray) often-obscure way of writing, he draws me in with a feeling of There's something he's trying to say that is really interesting and important, but the truth of it is beyond the saying. Every time I pick up "Open Secret," I get a different sort of glimpse of what that might be -- because…
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Posted inBuddhism Taoism/Tai Chi

A New Age’y slogan that doesn’t make much sense

Browsing through my Facebook feed today, I came across this post that someone had passed on: If you are depressed you are living in the past...If you are anxious you are living in the future...If you are at peace you are living in the present...       ~Lao Tzu~ At first read, I liked it. Made sense. But I was pretty sure that Lao Tzu never said such a thing. For one thing, Lao Tzu may not have ever existed. And even if a person by that name actually was the source of the Tao Te Ching (or Dao De Jing),…
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Posted inBuddhism

Jet-setting money-hungry fugitive Thailand monk

It's good to see that Buddhist monks are getting into the scandal business. For too long they've pretty much gotten a pass on the can you believe they did this?! front. Way behind Catholic priests, for sure. But thanks to someone who emailed me a link to this story, I'm now aware of a Thailand monk who breaks the traditional Buddhist mold. He's known as Thailand's jet-setting fugitive monk, and his story has riveted the country with daily headlines of lavish excess, promiscuity and alleged crimes ranging from statutory rape to manslaughter. Until a month ago, 33-year old Wirapol Sukphol…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

Good article on mindfulness meditation

As sort of a counterpoint to a recent post, Buddhists are wrong about a "witnessing mind," check out How Meditation Works. This story in The Atlantic is a good overview of mindfulness meditation from a secular scientific perspective. I still wonder what it means to watch thoughts arise or be aware of emotions blossoming. Hard to believe that our consciousness is outside of the brain where all of this stuff is going on. Thus it sure seems like being "mindful" of what the mind is doing is another activity of the mind that we can be mindful of. And, of…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

Buddhists are wrong about a “witnessing mind”

OK, admitted: my previous post about a Speculative Non-Buddhism essay was pretty damn intellectually intense for summer reading.  I thought of writing about something lighter today, but decided to make another attempt at conveying what I like about what little I know about what those guys at Speculative Non-Buddhism seem to be up to. (Hope that last sentence conveys my uncertainty about what their goal is; these are the most articulate, deep, philosophically-sophisticated Buddhists-who-aren't-really- Buddhists I've ever come across; hard to fathom them after just a little reading.) First, a note about my own split personality toward Buddhism. Part of me…
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Posted inBuddhism

Interesting take on how Shin Buddhism supports social activism

I don't claim to fully understand Tom Pepper's "The Radical Potential of Shin Buddhism." But then, I don't claim to fully understand anything.  The vestiges of other-worldly mysticism remaining in my mind have found Pure Land Buddhism both utterly unbelievable and also strangely compelling. After all, what's not to like about reciting Namu Amida Butsu and earning a ticket to Nirvana Land? Sure beats other forms of Buddhism that require you to engage in all sorts of arduous practices, including back-breaking, mind-numbing meditation for ever and ever (almost).  But Pepper presents a view of Shin/Shinran Buddhism that tosses out its unbelievable…
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Posted inBuddhism Taoism/Tai Chi

Don’t tame your wild horse nature. Let it run wild.

It's simplistic to divide spiritually-inclined people into two types. But I love to do it! So I will! There, I embraced my wild horse nature. I thought of a rule that seemed to make sense. I considered throttling my inclination to do something. Then... Screw it. I'll do what I feel like doing.  I don't want to be a well-trained horse. That's a familiar image in some spiritual, religious, meditation, and philosophical circles. The horse is our untamed sensous, craving, lustful, thought-obsessed self. The trainer or the rider is... Well, that's a good question. If the wild horse is one…
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Posted inBuddhism Taoism/Tai Chi

Why Taoism beats Zen on being non-religious

I can understand why someone who isn't religious wouldn't feel any need at all to embrace a philosophy that has some churchy aspects -- such as Zen Buddhism and Taoism.  However, I enjoy reading books in both genres, and am heavy into Tai Chi, which expresses Taoist principles in movment. It seems to me, along with others much more knowledgeable about Eastern philosophy than I am, that Zen minus Buddhism equals Taoism.  (More or less, at least. We're not talking mathematical precision here.) Buddhism adds in a bunch of religiosity to Zen, which would be more closely related to Taoism…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

Compassion starts with yourself: be kind to your own crap

Last night I watched part of a video that Netflix suggested I'd like to stream to my TV -- "Louis C.K.: Live at the Beacon Theater." I enjoyed his style of ironic/cynical comedy. Often he reminded me of me. Like when Louis C.K. said that he believes in being kind to people. He gets pleasure out of knowing that he believes this. Doesn't mean that he actually does kind things, compassionate things, caring things. He just enjoys the feeling of believing that these would be good things to do, were he ever to do them. I can relate to this.…
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Posted inBuddhism Science

The illusory self loves to make up stories

Who are we? Is there both an "I" and a "me" inside my head? Where do my stories about myself come from? Is it possible to live without a coherent life story? Great questions. So it didn't take me long to reply to this email with a "Sure, Alex, I'll put up a post about the video." Hi Brian,I'm writing from the Institute of Art and Ideas, where we organise a philosophy and ideas festival called HowTheLightGetsIn in May every year. All the debates at the festival are filmed and released over the course of the following year and I thought a…
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Posted inBuddhism Science Taoism/Tai Chi

The self: a trick your mind plays on not-you

Here's some good news, and some even better news, from the current special issue of New Scientist: "The Great Illusion of the Self." You're being tricked by an expert! And who doesn't like amazing tricks? Even better, the trickster is your own mind! You're your own magician.  Well, you would be if you existed. But almost certainly you don't. At least, not in any way close to how you feel that you do. In 10 pages, several New Scientist stories -- "Who Are You?," What Are You?," "When Are You?," "Where Are You?," "Why Are You?" -- persuasively present evidence that an…
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Posted inBuddhism Radha Soami Satsang Beas Spiritual practice/meditation

Eyes shut spiritual escapism: the trap of “going within”

For many years, decades actually, I practiced a form of meditation aimed at "going within." Meaning, within some supposed realms of consciousness distinct, and higher than, the physical world. This practice was part of a Sant Mat teaching. As Wikipedia says: The basic teaching of contemporary Sant Mat, as described by its Masters, is that everything lies inside us and that God is within. The outside world is only an image or a reflection of the inner reality. So, in pithier terms, what's outside of us is worthless crap; what's inside of us is precious divinity. This world-denying notion is…
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Posted inBuddhism

How to challenge ghosts who seem real

I came across a great story in one of my non-holy inspirational books, "Complete Idiot's Guide to Zen Living."  Here's a simple way to prove whether a seemingly supernatural vision, thought, presence, or whatever really is other-worldly, or just an emanation of your own mind.  Adapt the proof as desired. There's lots of ways to do what this Zen master advised. An old Zen story tells of a man whose wife, on her deathbed, begged him never to go to another woman. A few months after her death, the man fell in love and became engaged. Immediately, he was haunted…
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