Posted inFree will Science Universe

Free will is a wonderful thing to lose

Most of us are afraid of losing our freedom. We like being able to say what we want, go where we want, do what we want. Within limits, of course. Absolute freedom is impossible. Constraints are part of the human condition. This helps explain the almost universal belief in free will, and the desire to exercise free will to the fullest. Even if we're constrained by outer circumstances, such as not being able to drive 200 miles an hour because our car won't go that fast, most people have the feeling that what they are capable of choosing to do…
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Posted inScience Spiritual practice/meditation

In spiritual science, discussing and debating beats blind faith

I'm amused at the advice I frequently get in comments on blog posts and emails: "Stop thinking so much, Brian. Believe in God. Have faith in your guru. Meditate and experience the truth that has eluded you." These people don't understand that I view spirituality and mysticism as a science. Always have. Likely always will. If I wanted a religion, I had one in my brief career as a Catholic. I was attracted to the Sant Mat teachings, Radha Soami Satsang Beas version, because they were billed as a "science of the soul." Cool. Spirituality and science wrapped up in…
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Posted inScience

Phi, integrated information, the fountain of phenomena

I've read a lot of neuroscience/neurophilosophy books. But none like "Phi: A Voyage from the Brain to the Soul," by psychiatrist Giulio Tononi. It's amazingly creative, filled with literary, historical, artistic, philosophical, and scientific allusions that made me feel like a Neanderthal. How the heck does Tononi know all this stuff? Guess I spend way more time watching The Daily Show and Survivor than he does. In the lavishly illustrated book, a blend of theory, fact and fiction, Galileo meets Francis Crick, Alan Turing, Charles Darwin, and other great thinkers. It's pleasingly entertaining, yet left me feeling like I'd eaten…
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Posted inGod

Do you believe that God exists? 100%? Absolutely? No doubts?

Usually on this blog I say what I think, and other people comment. Tonight I'm going to do something different.  I want to ask you, whoever you are, whoever might read this post, whether you are absolutely confident that God exists.  Meaning, you don't just believe, hope, suspect, hypothesize, have faith that God exists. You're sure. And not just pretty sure. You're 100% sure. You've got no doubts about the reality of God. If that describes you, leave a comment on this post. Explain the reasons for your absolute surety about God's existence. And while you're at it, tell us…
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Posted inGod

If rape and life is God’s will, why isn’t everything?

In addition to increasing the chance that Democrats will maintain control of the United States Senate by winning an open seat in Indiana, Republican senatorial candidate Richard Mourdock opened up an interesting line of theological questioning with his instantly infamous rape comment. In a Senate debate Tuesday night, Richard Mourdock, the Indiana state treasurer, tried to distinguish himself from two opponents who also oppose abortion, explaining why he does not accept an exception for pregnancies conceived by rape. “I’ve struggled with it myself for a long time, but I came to realize that life is that gift from God,” Mr. Mourdock said. “And…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

Why mindfulness is better than concentration

After more than thirty years of focusing on concentration in my meditation practice, I've become a believer of broadening into mindfulness. That is, being aware of whatever is there -- the point of my previous post about my can't-miss meditation approach.  Repeating a mantra is a common concentrative technique. So is following the sensation of one's breathing. Nothing wrong with this. Concentration is good. It's how I'm able to focus on writing this blog post on my laptop while distracting sights and sounds abound in our kitchen as my wife putters around. But here's the thing: I know what I need…
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Posted inScience

Oxytocin and the soul

This probably is my one and only chance for a blog post with the title above. Can't pass up the opportunity. As I was going through my pile of undone/unread stuff, I came across this letter in the October 6, 2012 issue of New Scientist that struck me as interesting. From Felix DuxNo doubt some will feel uncomfortable, as your reviewer Kayt Sukel suggests, at Larry Young and Brian Alexander's idea that the release of oxytocin during sex "tricks" women into nurturing their partners (22 September, p 46). Unless you believe in a non-physical soul - which I'm sure Young and…
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Posted inSpiritual practice/meditation

My can’t-miss meditation approach: “Whatever…”

So what do you do when you're scientifically minded, deeply skeptical about religiosity, and mistrustful of holy books, gurus, and other pretenders who unbelievably claim to know all about ultimate divine truth, yet are open to the possibility that reality may consist of more than is evident to our everyday perceptions? Well, here's what I do. Works for me. Your results may differ.  Before I meditate every morning, I utter my unsacred mantra. I'm open to: Whatever...Whoever...Wherever...Whenever...However....  It's my can't-miss meditation system. I've got all the options covered. No matter what ultimate reality consists of, I've opened the door to…
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Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas Religions

Indian cultural attitudes help explain guru devotion

"Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet." Well, back in 1892 Rudyard Kipling might have been right about the relationship between Britain and India, but obviously since then the world has become, in Thomas Friedman's jargon, a lot flatter. Meaning, a lot more interconnected, alike, accessible. Yet there still is a cultural gulf between East and West. A question I got from an Indian in an email today reminded me of this. I was a member of an India-based spiritual organization (Radha Soami Satsang Beas, or RSSB) for over thirty-five years. I've been…
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Posted inSpiritual practice/meditation

Spirituality is experienced, not proven

What does it mean to be "spiritual"? Is there any way to prove that spirituality is true? How should someone look upon his or her spiritual experiences? Great questions. Glad I asked them of myself. The answers I'm about to give won't surprise those who are regular readers of this blog. But maybe I can say what I've said before in a fresh fashion. Let's start with an experience that I'd call "spiritual" which I had during a dog walk not long ago. Passing by the shore of Spring Lake, I was stopped in my tracks by a crescent moon,…
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Posted inChristianity/Jesus Death/Rebirth

Brain damage can convince you of Christian bullshit

Recently someone emailed me about my "Heaven is NOT real, no matter what Eben Alexander says" post. She wondered why I thought his heaven seemed so Christian. To her, Alexander's account of the afterlife sounded more Hindu. Well, I'm no expert on Hinduism, but that assertion seems dubious to me. A quick check-in with the Great God Google taught me some things about Hindu notions of the afterlife. A Wikipedia article on the subject emphasizes Hindu belief in karma and reincarnation. We keep coming back to life on Earth, not an eternal life in "heaven." Heaven and hell are temporary…
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Posted inReality Religions

Have faith in reality, not religion

I feel a sermon coming on... can't help myself... spirit is moving me... reality must be praised... glory be! I'm happy to be your not-so-humble servant, Almighty Reality. --------------------------------------- Fellow humans, stand strong for what is real. Believe this: a single grain of sand is more worthy of your worship than any holy book, any religious theology, any supernatural theorizing. You can feel that grain of sand, taste it, see it.  Where's God? Where's soul? Where's spirit? Where's angels, heaven, reincarnation, Buddha nature, enlightenment, or any other abstraction lacking concrete this-ness and that-ness? Nowhere, reality worshipping brothers and sisters. Nowhere. …
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Posted inChristianity/Jesus Death/Rebirth Science

Heaven is NOT real, no matter what Eben Alexander says

I'm impressed with myself. (And not for the first time, nor the last.) Noted religious skeptic and neuroscientist Sam Harris has much the same reaction as I did, albeit more fully and cogently stated, to Eben Alexander's ridiculous claim that while in a coma, when his cortex supposedly was "completely shut down," he had an experience of heaven that must have been separate from brain activity. Hence, a soul travel of some sort to God's realm. Here's what I said about the guy's story three days ago, in response to a comment on this post. Rain, I'm not much impressed with…
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Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas Spiritual practice/meditation

Dude, where’s my soul? Can’t find it anywhere.

I've been looking for my soul everywhere I can think it might be. No sign of it. I've gone through the drawer where I put stuff that I figure I might need someday, but don't want to throw away. Nope. No soul. Our garage is filled with places it might be, lots of boxes filled with long-forgotten crap. But I don't remember putting my soul into storage there.  So I'm left with talking to myself. Or to whoever might be listening who could help me out. Dude, where's my soul? (If this allusion doesn't make sense to you, your taste in…
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Posted inBuddhism Reality Science

Happy birthday to me. But is there really a “me”?

Geez, I'm so philosophically minded, I can't even enjoy a birthday without questioning whether "I" am having one. Over on my other blog I mused yesterday about the Beatles' When I'm 64 and the positive side of craziness. Hopefully this will shut up the folks who, after reading my thoughtful ponderings about religion/spirituality, accuse me of being a left-brained rationalist who only lives in my big fat intellectual cranium.  Fire up your skateboard, accustory dudes, and join me on a four mile longboarding jaunt up and down (mild) hills here in Salem's Minto Brown Island Park. Then you'll see another…
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Posted inPersonal/Stories

Give up on making life itself a project

I enjoy projects. Meaning, I like to try something new, something I've never done before, which entails finding out what the thing is all about, how it works, what's necessary to do it, and then learning from my doing. I might find that I don't enjoy this new activity as much as I thought I would. Or, that it's even more satisfying than I expected. For example, early in the summer I decided to try longboarding, skateboarding without the tricks, basically. My longboarding has been the subject of various posts in a "skateboarding" section of my other blog.) I really…
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Posted inBuddhism Reality Science

Reality is a circle: nothing is fundamental

Ooh, ooh! It came, it came! I felt like a kid who'd just gotten a long-awaited toy in the mail when I opened our mailbox and saw the New Scientist cover: What is Reality? A User's Guide to the Ultimate Question of Existence. Finally. I'd know. What reality is all about. I stretched out the suspense by waiting until evening to read the cover story. In the bathtub, immersed in relaxingly hot water, a glass of red wine and highlighter in hand (not at the same time). I wasn't disappointed. Right away I liked the concise focus of the "Defining Reality"…
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Posted inBuddhism Spiritual practice/meditation

“No-self” isn’t a spiritual goal — it’s what we already are

Many religions and spiritual traditions venerate selflessness, ego-loss, transcending individuality. Here's the problem with that notion, according to both Buddhist philosophy and neuroscientific evidence: There's no such thing as a "self." So getting rid of one not only is impossible, but the belief that we have such a thing that needs to be done away with, or markedly reduced, perpetuates the delusion -- in much the same way that an obsessive attempt to rid one's garden of fairies feeds this fantasy by all the attention given to it. Another aspect to this problem is the widespread belief in an enduring…
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Posted inBuddhism Personal/Stories

Have I ever had a meaningful, valuable meditation experience?

Yesterday Jesse left a comment on this post which asked me: May I ask if you ever had a subjective experience in meditation that you found to be meaningful or that revealed something of value to you, personally? Not necessarily a RS [Radha Soami Satsang Beas] meditation or any specific lights or sounds but just something that left you in a state of deeper self reverence or lasting tranquility. Good question. Not an easy question to answer. It's a question that got me thinking more about the question than a possible answer.  Meaning, after pondering for a bit how I…
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Posted inBuddhism

How do we know someone is enlightened?

Enlightenment. It's an appealing notion. There I am, clueless, ignorant, unsatisfied, then bingo!, an enlightenment switch is flipped. Now I know what life is all about. I go around with a Buddha-smile for the rest of my days, blissed out because I'm no longer floundering blindly in cold cosmic darkness, but rather am basking on the always-sunny beach of enlightenment. Only problem is...some questions.  Does enlightenment exist? Could I tell if I've got it? Is it possible to know whether someone else is enlightened? Are there various types of enlightenment?  Short answer: nobody knows. Opinions abound. Demonstrable evidence is lacking.…
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