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Thread: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV (Random Universe?)

  1. #1

    Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV (Random Universe?)

    A couple more 'BIG' questions ...

    [The] thought that the universe might be random and unintended makes me sad. I feel that if this were the case it would have implications for life, implications that I don’t feel I can ignore. Two areas that I feel would be affected by this are the nature of suffering, and the foundation of ethics, but I do not wish to open that Pandora’s Box here...
    Oh, I will open that Pandora's Box.

    Even if reality were random and unintended and utterly 'pointless' (I am not saying it is, by the way ... more about that in a second), there's still a firm foundation for ethical conduct. Namely, whatever the case, we still need to all live together on this planet, and in society, and that means we should act well toward each other. God or no, societies needs rules and laws, whereby peace and safety, kindness and compassion are to be preferred for all our mutual sake.

    Further to that, our Buddhist practice allows us to see that we are all connected, and are truly one. Doing violence to another being is much like your left hand punishing your right hand. It is no other than 'you' doing violence to 'you'.

    As well, people who do violence, steal, abuse themselves or others are not at peace. A murderer, terrorist, rapist, gambler or jewel thief must lack within, and be suffering within. A person who knows inner peace and contentment simply will not act in such fashion. In this way, I certainly believe that human beings make "hells" for themselves, at least in this world, and in their own lives, through their harmful conduct. Questions of an afterlife aside, people certainly can create "heavens" and "hells" for themselves, and for other people around them, by their actions in this life. Thus, God or not, people should choose the course that reduces their own suffering.

    I am not an atheist, but I happened to recently read a review of this book ...

    Title: Atheism, Morality, and Meaning, by Michael Martin.

    A professor emeritus of philosophy at Boston University, Martin [seeks to show] that morality is possible absent any assumption of the existence of any gods, to show that human life can have meaning and purpose absent those same assumptions, and to show moreover that traditional theistic beliefs don’t do a good job at grounding morality, meaning, or purpose — just what believers claim to be true about atheism.
    http://atheism.about.com/od/bookreviews ... rality.htm
    Now, on the question of 'random' 'unintended' and 'pointless', this was noted ...

    So it’s not so such much that I’m demanding that the universe be other than what an atheist might say it is. It’s that the thought that it might be leaves me feeling kind of empty and futile... and not empty in the positive Buddhist sense...
    Far from being "empty" and "futile", living life for the sake of living life, right in this moment, is the very essence of "full" and fulfilling".

    To borrow a mountain climbing example, nothing is more ridiculous than crawling up a great hunk of rock. Or running a marathon in cirles. Or making art or writing poetry that few will see. Yet most people would consider such activities far from "empty" or "futile", and instead, living life fully. Each step by step up that mountain is complete unto itself.

    When viewed as such, living life moment by moment is complete unto itself. One does so "because it is there", not because of any true destination.

    You wrote:

    So yeah, I kind of thought that Zazen might lead to knowing that the universe is ‘divine’ directly. Or rather, I thought Zen might help you to realise what the universe is NOT i.e. not random and not unintended! But perhaps it is true that these kind of questions simply have no answers, or that the answers given are just pretty stories, and that I have to give up this egotistical need for 'answers'. Perhaps the universe is really beyond all descriptions. Beyond the labels ‘intended’ and ‘unintended’, ‘divine’, or ‘random’. After all, if emptiness is anything, it’s surely empty of attributes. Or perhaps I’m really missing the point! I think that’s highly likely, and I thank you for your patience.
    Let me say again for the record, that I do not think our being born as sentient beings, on a strange spinning ball in the middle of time and space, was something "random" and "unintended". Too much seems to have been required for that to occur, an incredible string of a priori events ... and it simply seems to me very much more likely that we should not have been born at all if the universe were truly random (I am writing a book on the subject, the incredible chain of events over the billions of years that led to our being alive to read these words now). My deep sense is that we are serving as an organ for something that requires our services.

    To get back to the rowboat on the river ... I feel it is a wonder that I have awoken, alive, sitting in a rowboat in the middle of this river, oar in hand. The boat, the water and air and trees, the wood of the oar ... all seems too well matched to be mere happenstance. In a random world, I feel that I should not be sitting in this boat. In fact, I feel that I am supposed to be sitting in this boat because, quite frankly, I think that there being a boat and a river is too much a lovely outcome.

    I believe the River Tao has a direction, and that this boat is meant to be sailing upon ... and is not apart from ... the river.

    But when Suzuki Roshi or any religious figure of any creed says something like the following, well, they are either guessing or going on faith ... (In fact, the following from Suzuki Roshi is a very general statement, and he doesn't try to fill in the details. The Buddha also refused to fill in most of the details. Almost all religions start to go wrong when they try to fill in the details, usually based on human imagination alone):

    Here is a quote by Shunryu Suzuki from Zen Mind, Beginners Mind:
    ‘So it is absolutely necessary for everyone to believe in nothing. But I do not mean voidness. There is something, but that something is something that is always prepared for taking some particular form, and it has some rules, or theory, or truth in its activity. This is called Buddha nature, or Buddha himself.’

    I remember Suzuki saying in the same book that whatever is manifesting now is manifesting for some reason, though I can’t find the page right now...
    Suzuki Roshi is making a very nebulous statement, open to wide possibilities for what the driving force may be ... And that's how Zen folks like it: open and nebulous with all life's possibilities!

    Please understand my conclusion:

    I think Suzuki Roshi was right, but Suzuki Roshi would also teach you that he does not need to be right ... In other words, whether we were placed in the boat with an oar, or just happened to pop up there, no matter ... get on with the trip!

    I think that, since I have an oar in my hand, I was meant to row. If you were to press me, I would say that it is no accident, not in the least, that I am in a boat, alive, self-aware, with an oar in hand. In other words, since we are alive, I think that we were placed here to live, we were meant to live. I feel that in my heart. So, I row and row.

    But, if it is all random and meaningless ... still, I row and row. No difference. Each stroke of the oar, like a step up the mountain, is reason enough. Beautiful enough, all on its own. So, I row and row, complete and fulfilled. Thus:

    A - If there is a God, and if she had wanted us to know the details, she could have told us much more clearly (but she did not) ... so, I row row row.
    B - If there is a God, but the details are too hard for a human mind to grasp ... I row row row.
    C- If there is a God, and he did tell us the details (in the Koran, Bible, Upanishads or other old book), but I am just too closed minded to see it ... still, I row row row ... trying to live as best I can.
    D - If there is no "God", but some other mechanism at work that uses us for purposes all its own ... I row row row
    E - If there is no God or mechanism, and no details ... I row row row.
    F - Whatever ... I row row row

    Everything is "manifesting for a reason" (to borrow what you think Suzuki Roshi said) ... whether or not there is a "reason" apart from the manifesting itself.

    If you were asking me to tell you what I think I sense, it is something like A,B or D ... not C or E. But, also I sense that it just does not matter, and I do not care.

    In each case, all is fulfilled and complete.

    Am I saying too much?

    Gassho, Jundo

    PS - You asked ...

    It seems to me that what is manifesting now is manifesting for some reason. And this question has occurred to me: How could Karma exist in an unintended / random universe?
    More about Karma maybe next time.

  2. #2

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Hi.

    What happened to G- we're all god? :twisted:

    May the force be with you
    Tb

  3. #3

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Thanks, Jundo. What a lovely open response

    Mmm... much to ponder.. but it's gone two in the morning and I need my beauty sleep. :wink:

    Looking forward to continuing this chinwag soon!

    Gassho,
    David

  4. #4

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Quote Originally Posted by Jundo
    But when Suzuki Roshi or any religious figure of any creed says something like the following, well, they are either guessing or going on faith ...
    This is the key point that I have been wondering about all along. As you are aware, one of the reasons I started practising Zazen is that I have always had a sense that the universe has some kind of pattern or principle, and I believed that I could deepen that sense and become directly aware of it through Zazen. Perhaps misguided to use Zazen as a means to an end...

    Quote Originally Posted by Jundo
    I think that, since I have an oar in my hand, I was meant to row. If you were to press me, I would say that it is no accident, not in the least, that I am in a boat, alive, self-aware, with an oar in hand. In other words, since we are alive, I think that we were placed here to live, we were meant to live. I feel that in my heart. So, I row and row.
    Would you say that Zen practice has nurtured that feeling in your heart/that sense?

    In any case, the practise of Zazen just seems to be a wonderful thing. Whether or not it answers questions, one of things I've noticed is that it gives one a greater sense of freedom and strength to just express one's self (or lack thereof) in the moment and be more authentic. That's joyful

    Some of the people I've spoken to about these 'big' questions have expressed the idea that I should ask myself. One person told me that I should ask my 'higher self'... What is the 'higher self' and how do you ask it? I suppose it could be what's left when you drop away body and mind... the ego... The person told me that my 'higher self' already knows... Another couple of people have said that as we are all unique each of us has a different purpose, and so again you have to ask yourself... You already know it. Hmm, I don't know about all that, but I do have a growing sense that ultimately there may be no objective answers to any of these type of questions and that I will have to take the responsibility to find my own answers.

    I realise that what I should do is stop speculating about what's left when body and mind are dropped, and actually drop them and find out! If we are not our minds and thoughts we must be the reality beyond thought and mind. Some talk of the the 'silent watcher' of the mind... the 'transcendent witness'. This could be unmanifested Buddha Nature, pure consciousness itself... pure presence, pure awareness. Perhaps this pure awareness is the eternal ground of existence of everything that exists... As you can see, I'm way beyond speculation :lol:

    The thing about Karma is this: I don't really see how the Buddhist belief in Karma is compatible with the possibility that the universe is random and unintended. Karma for me means that there are no 'coincidences' and nothing happens just 'by chance'. We find ourselves where we find ourselves and with certain people for a reason. Karmic relationships and patterns are at work, and maybe we even get exactly what we need... As such, if Karma is true then it would be a kind of proof against the idea that the universe is random and unintended. You can't believe in Karma AND consider the possibility that this is all random and unintended. This is to assume of course, that the Buddhist notion of Karma refers to more that mere materialistic determinism or mechanistic cause and effect: a cause yielding an inevitable effect which in turn acts as the cause of another inevitable effect and so on... But as far as I'm aware, this idea is usually supported by those who believe that there is only matter, and nothing else, and I would never have associated Buddhism with that sort of thing. And Karma always seemed to have more to it than that...

    Gassho,
    David

  5. #5

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Quote Originally Posted by Borsuk
    Quote Originally Posted by Jundo
    But when Suzuki Roshi or any religious figure of any creed says something like the following, well, they are either guessing or going on faith ...
    This is the key point that I have been wondering about all along. As you are aware, one of the reasons I started practising Zazen is that I have always had a sense that the universe has some kind of pattern or principle, and I believed that I could deepen that sense and become directly aware of it through Zazen. Perhaps misguided to use Zazen as a means to an end... [emphasis added]
    But Zazen DOES allow us to taste that the universe has some profound pattern or principle, and allows us to deepen that sense and become directly aware of it.

    That pattern or principle is the way things are, how things go, how we go too ('cause its all just us and us all).

    Moon rises at night, because that is what the moon does. The sun each morning from the east ... the world spins and the wind blows ... because that is what sun, world and wind do. Human beings live human lives, because that is what humans do. And all is connected.

    Both Suzuki Roshi and I (and all Zen folks I can recall through history) believe that (to quote Suzuki Roshi), "There is something ... always prepared for taking some particular form, and it has some rules, or theory, or truth in its activity.This is called Buddha nature, or Buddha himself.. There is an order to this universe, it seems to me, and that order somehow cooked up the moon and stars, burning sun, this world in its orbit, the wind and rain and you and me (no simple recipe). I truly believe this, and think it most unlikely that I should be alive now to have this lovely conversation with you were it a truly chaotic universe (and even though it can often be messy). Quite the contrary, much groundwork was required. Something seemingly went to a lot of trouble to allow us life and all needed to support our lives.

    But, David, for most Zen folks I know, the question thus becomes "if I have this life, as rare and precious as that seems, what am I to do with it"? And the answer to that question becomes "live it, and live it artfully". If something went to all the trouble to place you in a rowboat, oar in hand ... I guess you are supposed to row row row, sometimes drift drift drift.

    AND (and this is the part that seems to confuse you) --if-- we are wrong, and our spider senses are wrong, and if there is no "pattern or principle" and only chaos ... THEN what should we do? Well. "live life, and live it artfully" .... row row row, drift drift drift.

    (But if you ask me what I taste ... I taste that we were placed in this darn rowboat, oar in hand, by something that wants us to do the following: row row row, drift drift drift. If there is a "purpose" to life, oar in hand, that's the purpose. So, that is what I do).


    Now, I think what also confuses you is that we do not spell out all the details of what is going on ... god's name, his favorite color, his mother's name, her favorite flower (those are the parts that most religions, some forms of Buddhism included, start to make up ... and where it all gets rather fanciful). Well, let me ask you this: If you go to the theatre and enjoy a play, do you need to know the name of the lighting director, the actors' birthdays, the material that the curtains are made of ... even the name of the author? No, you just enjoy the play!

    We know there is a play, sense it was written with us in mind as spectators. That's enough to know. So, ENJOY THE SHOW!

    Quote Originally Posted by Jundo
    I think that, since I have an oar in my hand, I was meant to row. If you were to press me, I would say that it is no accident, not in the least, that I am in a boat, alive, self-aware, with an oar in hand. In other words, since we are alive, I think that we were placed here to live, we were meant to live. I feel that in my heart. So, I row and row.
    Would you say that Zen practice has nurtured that feeling in your heart/that sense?
    Yes

    Quote Originally Posted by Borsuk
    ... I should ask my 'higher self'... we are all unique each of us has a different purpose ... If we are not our minds and thoughts we must be the reality beyond thought and mind. Some talk of the the 'silent watcher' of the mind... the 'transcendent witness'. This could be unmanifested Buddha Nature, pure consciousness itself... pure presence, pure awareness. Perhaps this pure awareness is the eternal ground of existence of everything that exists...
    Our Zen perspective may be rather unique among so-called 'Eastern Philosophies'. That's because, while we think David needs to see the reality "beyond thought" ... we think David should soon get back to being David. David is "David's Higher Self", just this ordinary mind and life. In other words, taste and experience that you are the river ... but don't drown in it. Instead, get back to rowing.

    If there is a "Transcendant Witness, Pure Awareness", then probably 'That' wants you to get on with the trip you have been sent upon.


    The thing about Karma is this:
    I promise to get to the subject of Karma shortly. Now, there's a Pandora's Box!



    Gassho, Jundo
    Last edited by Jundo; 08-18-2020 at 07:30 AM.

  6. #6

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Thanks for an interesting article, Jundo. Would it be possible to collect all these 'big questions' posts together in one place for reference?


    Quote Originally Posted by Jundo

    Let me say again for the rcord, that I do not think our being born as sentient beings, on a strange spinning ball in the middle of time and space, was something "random" and "unintended". Too much seems to have been required for that to occur, an incredible string of a priori events ... and it simply seems to me very much more likely that we should not have been born at all if the universe were truly random (I am writing a book on the subject, the incredible chain of events over the billions of years that led to our being alive to read these words now). My deep sense is that we are serving as an organ for something that requires our services.
    Just one thing - I'm a bit surprised that you could suscribe to the 'teleological argument' in any shape or form?
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleologic ... rarguments
    I would have thought, rather, that you would have said 'how can we puny humans dare to presume that we are so important that the universe has been organised to produce us'! There has also been an incredible chain of events that led to the evoution of the cockroach - and they will probably outsurvive us,

    Gassho,
    John

  7. #7

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Hi John,

    I will get back to your question, a question that I am writing about in my book even today and that is so important to me ...

    But, for now, let's leave it with these wonderful lyrics from the 10,000 Maniacs ... they say it all ...

    Give a listen hear

    http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl= ... =N&tab=wv#

    Everybody's wondering what and where they all came from

    Everybody's worrying 'bout where they're gonna go

    When the whole thing's done

    Nobody knows for certain,

    And so it's all the same to me

    I Think I'll just let the mystery be



    Some say once gone, you're gone forever

    Some say you're gonna come back

    Some say you rest in the arms of the Savior

    if in sinful ways you lack

    Some say that they're comin' back in a garden

    Bunch of carrots and little sweet peas

    I Think I'll just let the mystery be



    Some say they're going to place called Glory

    And I ain't sayin' it ain't a fact

    But I've heard that I'm on the road to purgatory

    And I don't like the sound of that

    I believe in love and I live my life accordingly

    But I choose to let the mystery be



    Everybody's wondering what and where they all came from

    Everybody's worrying 'bout where they're gonna go

    When the whole thing's done

    Nobody knows for certain,

    And so it's all the same to me

    I Think I'll just let the mystery be

  8. #8

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Nice video. The question isn't all that important to me, Jundo. You triggered something from my old philosophical background and I still find my myself getting interested in such questions. I'll go and wash my bowl

    Gassho,
    John

  9. #9
    Member Martin's Avatar
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    Wherever the next mediation is. Every now and then I make it back to Norfolk, England.

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    My first degree was English Literature. Lots of us used to approach the subject as being a "search for meaning". Each book had a "meaning" to be interpreted, found, argued over etc. King Lear was about parents and children being nicer to each other. Or, about shedding the trappings of authority and power. Or whatever.

    It was good fun, too, arguing over the different "meanings". But in the end, I wondered if each "interpretation" was, by definition, reductionist. It reduced the play, or whatever, to a code to be decoded. And then what? This kind of "interpretation" was a way of being in control. And was actually deeply disrespectful to the author and to the work in question. If Shakespeare had meant to say "Parents and children should be nice to each other" he could have said just that, he needn't have written King Lear. If the "moral" of Lear were "unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor bare forked animal as thou art", why, Shakespeare could have stopped writing at that point in the text.

    T S Eliot was once asked "What does the line "Lady, three white leopards sat under a juniper tree" mean?". He replied, "It means, "Lady, three white leopards sat under a juniper tree". Eventually I decided that most literature isn't a code for something else. It's just what it is. It's "meaning is just what it is. Reading any other meanings in was fun, but they were always less than the whole. At which point I decided I'd better study something else.

    I don't know anything but I wonder if the same isn't true of our search for the "meaning" or purpose of life. Every "purpose" I've ever seen put forward is reductionist, less than the sum of life's parts. If life is a code to be cracked, then once it's cracked, what then? I dimly perceive that the only "meaning" of life is the whole thing, every last bit, and therefore can never be reduced to a few lines. I wouldn't want it to be reduced to a few lines, actually. The universe "means" what it is. Which doesn't mean it "means" nothing, but at that point my head starts to hurt. And perhaps I'm no better at The Meaning of Life than I was at the Meaning of King Lear.

    Gassho

    Martin

  10. #10

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Hi Martin,

    I would like to keep this particular post in the archives, and repost it from time to time when the question comes up.

    Ah, life is a good book ... which we and the world co-author! Comedy and tears.

    Gassho, Jundo

  11. #11

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    If Shakespeare had meant to say "Parents and children should be nice to each other" he could have said just that, he needn't have written King Lear. If the "moral" of Lear were "unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor bare forked animal as thou art", why, Shakespeare could have stopped writing at that point in the text.
    I like to tell my students that Shakespeare is to be read with the Heart and not only the mind (to use their own experience to relate to the text). His job was basically to express human emotions and what not, using the vocabulary that was available to him. A summary, paper or thesis can't quite get it. To describe the emotions that he was portraying by talking about metaphors and themes, misses the point. Music is the same.

    Gassho

    Will

  12. #12

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Hi
    Was on the road yesterday and missed the sit along with Jundo. Just picked it up tonight. What a wonderful song, Let the Mystery Be! At least the question of where did I come from and where am I going never seemed to be much of an issue in my mind. Guess just getting by some of life’s left curves seemed to always be and still is the challenge for me.
    That is why understanding the Heart Sutra is so important to me. Jundo keeps trying to point me in the right direction, …… guess I just keep sitting and some day…..?

    Anyway, if nothing more that song sure took me back to some fun years. Starting college in 1958 led to many nights at the Ash Grove and the Purple Onion listening to some very wise tunes, glad they are still around…

    Jim

  13. #13

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Quote Originally Posted by Martin

    I don't know anything but I wonder if the same isn't true of our search for the "meaning" or purpose of life. Every "purpose" I've ever seen put forward is reductionist, less than the sum of life's parts. If life is a code to be cracked, then once it's cracked, what then? I dimly perceive that the only "meaning" of life is the whole thing, every last bit, and therefore can never be reduced to a few lines. I wouldn't want it to be reduced to a few lines, actually. The universe "means" what it is. Which doesn't mean it "means" nothing, but at that point my head starts to hurt. And perhaps I'm no better at The Meaning of Life than I was at the Meaning of King Lear.
    Interesting question. The only problem is, we humans just can't seem to stop ourselves wondering and analysing, even if it means we often over-analyse and then cling to the concepts that we generate. But couldn't it also be argued that analysing pieces of literature, music or art actually increases our enjoyment of them. It seems to me that the possession of good, comprehensively detailed background knowledge should increase, add to, deepen and enrich our appreciation and enjoyment of any given piece of art, so long as we don't lose sight of the original work in a welter of complications. I remember attending an Open University Arts Summer School a few years ago. The music tutor for the course had done a Ph.D. dissertation on a song called "Ghost Town" by The Specials. He started telling us about the Moorish influences etc in the song! Well, ok, but maybe that was going a bit too far for me!

    I was listening to an interesting series of talks on the radio this week about a book written by an American missionary who worked with an Amazonian tribe for years trying to convert them to Christianity. But these Piraha Indians just could not see the sense of having to believe in a story from the distant past. They lived totally and pragmatically in the present. The guy eventually lost his own faith!

    http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dont-Sleep-Ther ... 832&sr=1-1

    Maybe some of us are just more prone to ask deep questions than others and we probably need those types of people around, as well as those who just incuriously get on with life. Otherwise we ourselves just might have remained at the same level of civilisation as those Piraha Indians, which might be okay I guess?

    Anyway, if we didn't keep analysing things we wouldn't have much to say here. would we? We are actually analysing the process of analysis at the moment

    Gassho,
    John

  14. #14

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    But couldn't it also be argued that analysing pieces of literature, music or art actually increases our enjoyment of them.
    This topic popped up this morning. There is benefit in analyzing literature and what not because it gives one the ability to think critically, so it is beneficial when one is training or studying. It's another tool of development. Of course, for literature, one should have some information about the period, language and culture. However, to understand the deeper meaning and perhaps beauty, you should drop that and let the poetry or novel speak for itself.

    Gassho

    Will

  15. #15

    Re: Jundo Tackles the 'BIG' Questions - IV

    Quote Originally Posted by Martin
    I dimly perceive that the only "meaning" of life is the whole thing, every last bit, and therefore can never be reduced to a few lines.
    Sure it can Martin my friend...

    "thus" (immediately followed by my best Barker's Beauties impression)

    My thought is that analysis is like whiskey; too much of it and all you get is a headache. It might sound a little anti-intellectual (it might actually be anti-intellectual), but we always have to be on guard that we do not transform ourselves into hungry ghosts with the desire to know the answers to some of these "big" questions.

  16. #16
    I dimly perceive that the only "meaning" of life is the whole thing, every last bit, and therefore can never be reduced to a few lines. I wouldn't want it to be reduced to a few lines, actually. The universe "means" what it is.
    I think that, since I have an oar in my hand, I was meant to row.


    Gassho
    Lisa
    sat today

  17. #17
    Millions of people play and only one wins the lottery. This person might feel special, but he was probably just lucky. Maybe it is the same with our lives. Out of the infinite number of planets, galaxies, and maybe universes, we won a lottery ticket. Doesn't make me feel special, but I do feel lucky and grateful. Regardless of what is true, I row row row. Thanks!

    Gassho,
    Sat

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by Tomás Sard View Post
    Millions of people play and only one wins the lottery. This person might feel special, but he was probably just lucky. Maybe it is the same with our lives. Out of the infinite number of planets, galaxies, and maybe universes, we won a lottery ticket. Doesn't make me feel special, but I do feel lucky and grateful. Regardless of what is true, I row row row. Thanks!

    Gassho,
    Sat
    My new book talks about this a bit, and I argue against it with this example: Yes, what you say is true for someone to win one lottery, or even three times.

    https://turnto10.com/news/local/mass...mes-in-5-years

    But we might be have said to have won 13.7 billion years of lotteries without a miss, in perfect sequence. At what point does one begin to consider that, just perhaps, there is a fix in with a corrupt official or a loaded computer at the State lottery office?

    I won't bore you with all of this, and it is still a rough draft ...

    Seemingly, for you and I to be here now, subjectively considering the outcome, we have been the winners ... not of a single lottery where some seemingly unlikely happening happened because something had to happen (although it is not clear why anything had to happen, and why there had to be a lottery in the first place) ... but of a string of back to back lotteries, stretching 14 Billion years to the first expansion of this universe. One might consider the string of events as a new roll of the wheel in every second and fraction of a second within which any one (1) single factor of physics, chemistry, stellar, solar or planetary development, biology, evolution and history had to hit a certain finite number, all to continue to roll our way in order for us to be here now pondering the string of events. No exceptions, not one, can be tolerated, as shown by the fact that we are here to look back and ponder all the a priori steps and stage necessary to our being here to ponder.

    One left turn of a space rock whose right turn would have put our planet out of the game, one needed atom out of place, one star the was not quite hot enough, our world a little too close to our sun, one microbial, piscine or mammalian forefather who fell prey to a predator before having had time to breed, a drought, flood or infection that wiped out an ancestral village, any two grandparents who never met or never loved on just the right night, one sperm that missed its egg, and seemingly ... according to how science now seems to consider cause and effect ... we would have been out of luck. Just one.

    Oh, there might have been more than one chain of events that could have wound around to our front door (the dinosaurs would have been just as wiped out by a different meteor hitting in that moment in place of the one that did, thus clearing the way for the age of us mammals), but it seems in hindsight that the chains leading away from our door are so very very many more.

    Imagine the universe as a mysterious casino. We are not sure of the origins of this casino, but here it is, complete with a very special roulette wheel, That wheel is a matter of life and death. Anyone spinning, truly, is playing with their life because, apparently, only a relative handful of slots will leave the spinner breathing, while a vastly greater number of outcomes result in instant death. The ball is rolled, the player remains alive, signifying that she has been very, very lucky … but that is just how the ball rolls. Good for her.

    But imagine further that the game is changed such that, instead of one roll, her life depends on successfully hitting a handful of slots, again and again without fail, in an incredibly long series of spins stretching back through time. Minute by minute, second by second, continuing on for billions of years, the wheel is spun and the ball rolls with her life in the balance. One single miss, one single fall anywhere amid the greater sweep of deadly outcomes, and game over. Each roll, in each instant through the eons, is a crossroad between being and not. Nonetheless, low and behold, in spin following spin without fail, we have a winner. No matter where she places her bet on the table, it is that number which is called.

    Now, again, if someone goes into a casino, spins the roulette wheel and hits the jackpot 10, 1000 or 10,000 times in a row, well, it could be dumb luck. No less, if someone hits their number 100 times a minute for 14 Billion years, it could be dumb luck too ... although billions of trillions of times more luck. That is just how the wheel turns. But at what point would someone in an actual casino begin to entertain doubts, think about a rat, call the gaming commission, consider that things are not what they seem, that there may be magnets in the wheel and a shady character named “Rocko” with his foot on a pedal? Perhaps the table is weighted, or slants, or the ball is somehow loaded? Perhaps there is some as yet unknown fix or cheat that is in. In fact, to common sense, such a rigging of the table seems much more plausible by Occam’s razor, especially given how seedy this casino is.

    Something is very strange about our being here, and I will bet that there is something more going on than meets the eye. Science just does not know what that “something” is yet, because science is always one generation away from realizing how wrong it has been all along. Oh, I don’t mean that our present understanding of how the world works is totally wrong, because it is not and I have great faith in scientists and the scientific method to overturn centuries of supposition and ignorance. I simply mean that our understanding is bound to be incomplete, just as scientists of the past though that time is constant until Einstein showed them it is not, or until Quantum Mechanics demonstrated the Newtonian physics may only be true above the subatomic world. I will place a wager that what we know about the history of the universe, including the seeming randomness of evolution, is true ... yet not complete ... as a description of what is actually going on.

    Before I go any further with this topic, I just want to note my protest regarding how folks from that other religion use similar arguments to stuff their Jehovah or Creationism into the cracks of this mystery. That is not what I am talking about at all. It could be that there is some “intelligent designer” who has rigged a game or simulation of some sort, with amazing technology or power, by which it only appears in the game that there is random evolution, but actually there are hidden parameters in the programming that limit or channel outcomes. That would not be unlike the multi-player fantasy quest game my teenage plays which depicts a world of seemingly endless variety, with choices, surprises and doorways to pass through all along, yet the outcomes are actually finite and the world far from as free as it seems. That is a possibility. Some respected scientists and philosophers today believe that the odds of our world (including your reading this book right now) actually being part of a simulation you are experiencing being run by some advanced species could be 50% in their eyes. Certainly, the graphics on my son’s newest fantasy game are so realistic that I sometimes feel that I am looking at wizards standing right outside my window rather than on a screen. The latest virtual reality equipment adds movement, dimension and actual physical sensation to the experience. A physicist friend of mind tells me that it might not actually take that much computing power to create the experience of being in a whole universe if we merely create at any one time the room or horizons and sky that we can see at any one time (in other words, no reason to animate the world beyond a door or over horizon until we wish to go there, whereupon the world we leave behind can be easily erased). It is a possibility.

    Or, there may just be some principle, force to other factor that is perfectly natural, with no intent or intelligence behind it at all, but which shapes outcomes. How miraculous it must have seemed to our ancestors that “magic” acorns always produce oak trees, and not apple trees, until they had some early understanding of genetics. How strange that cannon balls fall to earth, and do not continue on indefinitely unless shot into space, until we had some basic understanding of gravity. Are they pushed down by some god’s invisible hands? How mysterious the chromosome, until we understood the double helix. In other words, our knowledge now is not wrong, but there are likely additional forces and principles at work that await discovery. It is the best explanation for our being here to think about it all: I think, therefore I wonder.
    Gassho, J

    STLah
    Last edited by Jundo; 08-18-2020 at 07:56 AM.
    ALL OF LIFE IS OUR TEMPLE

  19. #19
    Thank you for sharing Jundo. It is interesting to compare your modern outlook with that of the historical Buddha, that for better or for worse, we are stuck in a cycle of Samsara. Funny enough, despite the suffering, I am grateful for this life. Looking forward to reading your book!

    Gassho,
    Sat

  20. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by Tomás Sard View Post
    Thank you for sharing Jundo. It is interesting to compare your modern outlook with that of the historical Buddha, that for better or for worse, we are stuck in a cycle of Samsara. Funny enough, despite the suffering, I am grateful for this life. Looking forward to reading your book!

    Gassho,
    Sat
    The passage actually appears in a section of the book in which I am trying to "resuscitate" (pun intended) rebirth in modern terms.

    Gassho, J

    STLah
    ALL OF LIFE IS OUR TEMPLE

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