Failing to See Reality

brownestrabbit · 2012-05-27T21:57:04.302034+00:00

Sometimes I go out for walks and I stop to look at the sky, especially when it's a cloudless day. I stare into the blue, and try to concentrate as little as possible. And after a little while, it hits me like vertigo: a short grasp of the scale of infinity, the impossible to grasp, the significance and insignificance of it.

And then I remember that the sky is always there, constantly, right on top of our heads, and yet we rarely notice, and some never notice at all, like ants who don't realize the complexity of a computer chip they are walking on.

You can get the same feeling by staring at a wall or at moving branches, but I find it much easier to do it with the sky, either during the day or the night.

doc_daneeka · 2012-05-27T21:48:56.411706+00:00

I have a scrapbook of pictures of the Queen throughout her life in the form of Canadian coins. I have mixed feelings about that.

klmd · 2012-05-27T21:46:57.163257+00:00

IAMA bank. AMA.

heimsins_konungr · 2012-05-27T21:46:05.658676+00:00

Everyone who comes up to you will be 'dying' in a broad way of speaking. Some are in a condition which makes them fade out faster than others, but we are still in the same situation one way or another. Some people make this realization seem much more present and immediate, but we can't let this realization make us divide between 'people who are at risk of dying shortly' and 'people who are going to live relatively longer'.

That's not to say cancer is not difficult, and people going through it can certainly make use of an extra dose of compassion, so hopefully my comment doesn't sound mean. So in the end, after the emotion has taken over for a while, it's good to take some distance from the situation and see it from another perspective.

Everyone you meet is dying, meaning that everyone you meet is living. You may chose to focus on either side of the medal (or no side...).

herminione · 2012-05-27T21:38:13.441616+00:00

This is why economists are creating such a mess with the world: they think they can organize the lives of millions of people by creating variables and graphs that will solve everything, and completely fail to recognize the infinite complexity of real world conditions that contribute to the actual 'economy'.

Oh, yes, this is not really a complex situation, look, two lines, it explains it all perfectly. It's like left vs. right politics... come on guys, economics doesn't have to be this crude and cold!

SubtleVelociraptor · 2012-05-27T19:59:42.097810+00:00

If you really want to know, you're going to have to spend a lot of time reading about the topic. It's worth it, but it takes some effort. Start with the sidebar on this subreddit.

Wikipedia has an entire series/portal on Buddhism; you may start with this since it's a slow introduction to the topic, written for secular, uninitiated readers, without getting into specifics right away. There you will find Buddhist principles neatly organized in lists so you can get your bearings.

Wiki Buddhism Portal

Four Noble Truths

This is about where existential suffering comes from, how to see where it is coming from, and how to cease that suffering.

Noble Eightfold Path

These are the things that must be done in order to reach an to suffering: right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration.

Three marks of existence

These can be tricky to understand, you need to put your philosopher hat on, but they're very interesting to think about: impermanence, suffering, non-self.

Dependent arising

This explains, roughly, the origins of existence. Grossly speaking, it's the equivalent to biology's theory of evolution, except it actually includes evolution, as well as much more.

Samsara)

This is continuous movement, how the only constant is change, everything is always moving, changing, dying and being born; the wheel of life we are 'trapped' within.

Nirvana)

Liberation from suffering, stillness of mind, enlightenment... another very tricky one to wrap your head around, but worth the effort.

Skandha

Form, sensation, perception, mental formations, consciousness. Another one for your inner philosopher. You cannot 'get' these things by reading about it in Wikipedia, but slowly, you will start thinking about them, meditating about them, seeing them in your daily life, and you may come to understand what they are about. You can spend your whole life studying these things without ever being 'done'.

Karma

Cause and effect in the sphere of human actions.

Rebirth)

Not to be confused with reincarnation! Yet another subtle topic.

This website has tons of free ebooks on Buddhism and meditation.

[This one])http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/index.html) is a treasure trove of texts and essays about the topic, with a more 'Buddhist' flavour.

scousethrowaway · 2012-05-27T19:38:17.711946+00:00

You'd think it'd be somewhat difficult to ruin a 2,000 year old tradition, but nope.

The-Stranger · 2012-05-27T18:02:49.160058+00:00

Not everyone prays the same way. Selfish people would tend to pray in a selfish way, but people who may be more compassionate would pray so that others get better in some way. No, asking god to cure that person from cancer won't help the cancer to go away, so in that aspect, it's useless.

But when an individual takes the time to think about others during a short period of time, it trains that person to be less selfish and more compassionate. It makes them think about the well being of other people, and not just themselves. That in turns helps to shape them to be more compassionate in their daily lives.

I think we both agree that meditation can be very useful. I think we can also agree that there is some overlap between prayer and meditation (the part that's about asking god for stuff is not the overlap). So clearly, some aspects of prayer is useful.

You could argue that a sort of secular prayer that looks more like introspection or training one's compassion towards others, or trying to eliminate the influence of the ego, would be more useful than the typical Christian prayer, and if you were to argue that way you'd be preaching to the choir (hahaha, PUNS!).

Still, to dismiss prayer as being completely, inherently useless, is a mistake. Because using the same criteria I could make the argument that everything is useless unless it is entirely, fully, inherently good and useful: democracy, anarchism, socialism, technology... all of them have aspects that are complete wastes of time, and yet they should not be rejected since they do offer something constructive.

People generally use it as a "pseudo-act-of-goodness" and then go on without acting, because they think they've done their part (because of the illusion of an effect).

If you track down people who pray for others to get better, you'll most probably find out that they are actively involved in their community and don't limit themselves to prayer. Some might, but they're the same ones who pray to get a better job or to win a free car.

MySonIsFuckingStupid · 2012-05-27T17:19:46.674445+00:00

You can get a credit card limit of $15K without prior credit history?!? No wonder everyone's in debt.

MySonIsFuckingStupid · 2012-05-27T16:31:18.778390+00:00

Well I guess you learned a lesson too! Who gives his kid a credit card with a $15K limit?!?!?

The-Stranger · 2012-05-27T16:29:26.845626+00:00

If you live in the US, you probably might want to vote independent, otherwise your vote is meaningless. Yes, you're "throwing away your vote", but at least you're supporting an alternative in a small way, rather than keeping the red vs. blue puppet show going.

I'm Canadian as well. We have more choices and they are somewhat more significant, but they are still so extremely limited. People think they have the choice between orange juice, pineapple juice, apple juice, strawberry juice... wow! So many choices! But no one seems to understand that they could also have milk, water, wine, vegetable juice, etc. The spectrum of politics you're allowed to consider is extremely limited, about as limited as the visual light spectrum is compared to the entire EM spectrum.

Just look at Quebec, where I'm from (I live in Ontario now). Jean Charest is a 'Liberal'. But I had to look it up to verify, because he certainly doesn't act like anyone who could be a liberal. He's clearly a 'Conservative'. But what's conservative supposed to mean? Conservative about what? Family values, honesty, compassion? I want to conserve those values, certainly. But conservative about how we progress as a civilization? No thanks, I'd like to evolve already. And 'Liberal'... what does that mean? Of course no one bothers to talk about these things, they just say "We want to create jobs, we want a better economy, we want people to be happy", which every single party does. There is little to no difference, otherwise people would be talking about history, anthropology, society, heterarchy... most people don't know what heterarchy means. If you're in politics, if you're a leader, and you don't talk about heterarchy, you might as well be from the Medieval era.

Last time I voted, I voted NDP. That was in Ontario, and the Tories won it all. I will probably not vote anymore, not until they give me an issue to vote on. Do you want to legalize this, yes or no? Ok, I'll vote. But do you want to be ruled by this guy or that one? Why should I care, if he's going to make decisions based on what the public sector wants anyway? When you're voting, you're giving your consent to being ruled, you're giving your power of decision away; you're doing it legally, and in principle, the latter being of more concern to me. You 'did you job', and any further discussion about politics is 'optional'. You are now a passive agent, you can sit back and watch TV to see what your vote has been put towards.

I spent a lot of time trying to wake people up to this kind of reality. A lot of young people see the mess we're in now, and the prospects seem dark. So the next generation will be a lot more motivated and concerned about politics, rather than my parents' generation which are content to just sit down and let the cruise control do all the work.

So to answer your question: "Do you think that no one should ever vote in federal elections?" Ideally, I'd like people to realize that voting one way or another doesn't do anything, since the real sway is held by private interest. And once they realize this, they might decide not to vote anymore, and to keep their own power to make decisions. They should talk about politics in a way that is not framed by how the TV frames it. Most of my older relatives, when we have a debate about politics, regurgitate all the things they heard on TV, and are completely unable to carry the debate further. They are machines, more or less. People need to start thinking for themselves more.

That might never happen. Society usually has 1 to 5% leaders and thinkers, and 95% followers, the herd. Apparently, we can't all be thinking at once. I don't know. Anyways, long post, sorry :P

The-Stranger · 2012-05-27T16:14:54.555669+00:00

I'm Canadian, I've been in the US, and I follow US politics to a point. In Canada we have four or five main parties, which is a lot better than two in the US.

Anyway, speaking about the US, the Democrats and the Republicans are very similar in practice. In theory they keep fighting each other because, well, what else are they going to do? They're certainly not going to sit down and talk like adults, or actually debate about issues in a productive way. Dems vs. Reps. is a left puppet vs. right puppet game, and the puppets are fighting each other, but they are held by the same person, namely private interest (as opposed to public interest).

Their rhetoric is slightly different, but their actions are very similar. Obama has continued most Bush traditions, or made them worse. He makes it look as though he makes it better, but, I hate to phrase it that way, it's just a cover to keep business as usual. Guantanamo hasn't closed down, the wars are still going on, the people who crashed the markets are Obama's financial consultants, the banks have not been prosecuted, and on and on.

So a lot of people come up with the argument that "while Democrats are not very good, they're still better than Republicans, so I'll vote for them". Which is about as smart as saying "this guy has been beating me up for two hours, so I'll give him money so he punches me in the legs rather than in the face." It blinds people from seeing and addressing the real issue. It makes them think they're helping, while they're contributing to the problem.

Both parties understand that, and they use each other, like a puppet show, to misdirect the public. The GOP needs the Democrats, and vice versa. They would not work separately. It really is that bad.

eeka · 2012-05-27T16:08:00.935134+00:00

It's not as simple as "We live in a democracy", "We don't live in a democracy", "We live in a dictatorship", or "We don't live in a dictatorship".

We are a bunch of individuals and we live near each other. We have set up some institutions to manage our business. These institutions have traits that can be called democratic: we vote, we have a popular opinion, and those things, to a limited extent, affect the decisions of our leaders, or representatives, whatever you want to call them. But the same institutions also have traits that are more from a dictatorship: they (leaders/politicians/representatives/lobbyists/us) give us orders and many of us blindly follow them, they have power to enact laws without necessarily having the majority consent, or without consulting us, they do things that are against the public good or the common interest, etc.

These same institutions have socialistic traits (free health care in Canada, welfare in one form or another in Canada, US, and Europe).

In a dictatorship, the dictator has ultimate power to do whatever they want.

Their power is still limited. They have a lot of power, and people then to listen to whatever the dictator tells them, but their power is not unlimited. They can't do 'whatever they want'; they still have to be realistic. Otherwise dictatorships would last forever and every single dictator would be the unique ruler of the Earth.

In a democracy, they can't do whatever they want until they write it down on a piece of paper and call it a law.

If you want to do something, it's not that much of a hassle to write it on a piece of paper right before you go ahead and do it. All you have to do is to frame your actions in specific terms that sound more or less democratic, and you're free to do 'whatever you want', though again, you're limited because some things are not realistic, and you're further limited by what the democratic framework allows you to do.

I'm sure you can think of many examples of things North American governments have done lately that goes against laws, popular opinion, common sense, and the democratic framework itself. As though they were a dictatorship.

The-Stranger · 2012-05-27T15:59:24.928063+00:00

Compassion about others doesn't change anything

It changes everything. It determines how you act towards that person. And since civilization is based on what people chose to do with others or to others, then compassion is a crucial variable.

judgementalfish · 2012-05-27T02:01:24.413511+00:00

You're not likely to get any answers here, as this is an area that lies at the fringe of what science is allowed to research and talk about. It has many tools, but none of them can be used on things like 'What happens after death', 'What happens in my mind when I dream' (as opposed to what happens in the brain), 'What lies before, after, or beyond time or space', etc. It's like asking a blind man about what colours look like... an analogy in poor taste, but still.

In simple terms, death lies beyond the reach of science, and near death experiences are right on the edge, so science can only give you a partial answer. If you really want to answer this question, you're going to have to step outside of science and investigate other sources. This, unfortunately, is the most 'scientific' answer anyone should be able to give you. Any 'scientific' answer which claims to have studied what happens in the mind during or after death, would not be scientific.

phileconomicus · 2012-05-27T01:46:38.289164+00:00

I reconcile free will and determinism by saying that they are two aspects of the same thing, like positive and negative are two poles of a magnet, cold and hot are two directions on a thermometer, chaos and order are two extremes in the organization of systems, etc.

Our will and our choices are partially determined, and partially free. There is no contradiction here, and by trying to argue that one side is entirely true and the other is entirely false, you're bound to make mistakes and attract criticism.

Horgan makes a good point: ultimately, our choices come from the mind; our will is shaped by mental ideas, concepts, thoughts, which have no basis in the material world, or in the brain. If you reduce them to the physical level, they do not exist anymore. A personality only exists at a level above the physical human body; it is the whole, and if you take the whole apart, you are no longer talking about the personality, or the "parts that make the personality". The personality is no longer, until you rise above that level again, and at that point you have no direct access to the material.

My choices are determined to a large extent by my environment, genes, previous choices, etc. but they are also free in the extent that I can manipulate predictions in my mind. Those manipulations use neurons in the brain for their own purposes; it is not the neurons that are using thoughts for their own purposes.

Yes, there is an assumption here, that it is mind over body, and not body over mind. The assumption that the wholes control the parts, and not the other way around. The individual controls the limbs, the limbs do not control the individual. The molecule moves the elementary particles about, not the other way around. That which is below is subservient to what is above, even though they are necessary to act as vehicle for what is above. This is why you cannot simply reduce will and thought to its physical basis, and assume that the physical controls the mental.

So again, just like every system is partly chaotic and partly ordered, partly hot and partly cold, every choice is partly determined and partly free. A human mind is richer and more complex than the mind of a dog, so it is more free, and its deterministic aspect is not as influential. A rock has no 'free' component that I can think of; it has no 'whole', other than a lingually defined one, which depends on us. Otherwise, it is only a bunch of parts, and can be reduced to simply physical matter. A rock is fully deterministic, a human mind only partly so.

switchbadger · 2012-05-27T01:11:35.073781+00:00

I thought god(s), by definition, are things we cannot fully understand, and therefore trying to describe or assign any quality to them is a mistake? We probably have different ideas of what god(s) is/are...

The-Stranger · 2012-05-27T01:08:59.961838+00:00

Oh hi! Devil's advocate here.

Praying can be useful if it leads to compassion about others, similar to meditation. It depends on the context and how it is used.

Voting can be quite useful if you have the chance to vote on issues, in a context where your voice will actually be heard. Obviously, by 'context' I mean 'not for the government'. I'm talking about popular assemblies, direct democracies, or just voting to see which movie a group of friends are going to see.

So praying and voting are no inherently a waste of time, and since you don't know how dumb or smart the person in the car is, it's hard to say.

That being said, yes, if you're dealing with a moron who asks god if he could win the lottery, and votes Democrat because they're "not as bad as Republicans", then yeah, it's a huge waste of time.

eeka · 1 day

Not necessarily. Morally speaking you're right, but the law is what's written on pieces of paper; it's not worth much, and it doesn't care what the majority thinks :P

eeka · 1 day

It's so right and so illegal, I love it.

johnleemk · 2 days

A better question would be: "Should Stocks Trade?"

If you realize that trading tiny fractions of pennies isn't a good idea, then why would it be a good idea to trade thousands of fractions of pennies at a time, as in, dollars?

I'm not an economist so I'm sure someone will come up with really fancy words to prove me wrong, but by principle alone...

Muscles_McGeee · 2 days

Before the Big Bang, there was no time or space.

That's quite an assumption. How do you know the Big Bang is the beginning of the Universe, or the Metaverse? How do you know there was a beginning at all? Can't the Big Bang be the end of one Universe and the beginning of another?

Time and space began to exist at the moment of the Big Bang.

Time and space began to exist when someone decided there was such a thing as time and space. Hours began to exist when someone started to split the day in 24 equal parts. Everything always changes and always will; otherwise you're begging for an initial uncaused cause, and that's metaphysics, which is of course very interesting but it takes a while to talk about. Though as an aside, a Buddhist might point out that the Universe is filled with such emptiness, or empty with such fullness. Ordered with such chaos, or chaotic with such order.

If there was no matter before the Big Bang, a year and an eternity would both be meaningless.

What's this matter you speak off? You mean condensed energy? Energy has a rhythm, it oscillates, and if you take a single moment, then you have no oscillating, you have nothing at all, it's only by observing energy in its pure or gross form through subsequent moments that we can define them and assign properties to them. You are not alive within a single moment, you are alive because your existence is not confined to a single moment.

As the universe expands, it creates space

What does it expand into? Non-space? These things are much more subtle.

there just isn't anything occupying it so it is meaningless

It's hard to say, we have never observed non-space. We are limited by our observable Universe, which is finite, while the Universe itself, and space, is infinite, has always been, and will always be. Even if the Universe stops existing for some reason, then there won't be any 'time' into which the Universe can be said not to exist anymore. The only way to stop the Universe from existing (in the past, or future), is to put an end to existence itself. And non-existence is something, so it exists, so you didn't really put an end to existence after all. Duality and non-duality is hard to understand, but start thinking about how something can be both cold and hot at the same time, ordered and chaotic, ugly and beautiful, empty and full, existent but non existent...

If there was no matter before the Big Bang, a year and an eternity would both be meaningless.

If the Big Bang really was the beginning, then there couldn't have been a 'before' in which to have no matter. You can't even assign negative qualities to something that can't exist. And again, I suggest you consider that there was no beginning or end to anything, just like there is another wave behind the one you see, even though you can't see the other one. And there is another wave behind that one too, and it goes on forever. It may sound silly, but it's not as silly as "the Universe was caused by no cause".

So if I took my spaceship so far from the universe that I entered previously untouched space, I would be expanding space simply by existing out there.

The space has to exist before you enter into it, otherwise you're entering into nothingness.

Similarly, if I traveled back in time to before the Big Bang, I would be expanding time backwards just by existing at that point.

Again, you want to travel in a time that never existed, a time before time. It's like downgrading Windows to a version before Windows existed. It doesn't even start being possible in any way imaginable.

Do these statements make sense and if not, why?

No man. You need to think way, way beyond the limited boundaries of conventional wisdom. I suggest you check out Buddhism or Hermeticism, it's going to blow your mind. These guys have been doing physics, without the math, for over 3,000 years.

nicholasfukuoka · 2 days

You don't prevent them from doing anything, especially trade and barter, which you will not be able to eliminate, since it's another form of sharing.

What you can do is set up better alternatives that people will move towards, and those alternatives will replace the current financial system. Note the huge difference between currency and finance. Currency in itself does not allow debt or interest. It's the financial system that does.

Coops, crowd sourcing, 'buy this guy a coffee' and other new types of currency sharing are gaining popularity all over the place, so the transition is already happening. Maybe more people need to be foreclosed on before they finally realize that the current economic paradigm is unfair and unsustainable.

buddhists_throwaway · 2 days

I don't have any advice to help you force yourself to sit down for a long time, as I find it difficult myself. But you have to remain flexible. I go for walks, and I set my intent towards a meditative state even as I walk. I've had deeper insights while walking normally than by sitting still.

Sitting with your eyes closed does help because it blocks the visual stimuli, but if the result of that is to create pain stimuli (feet hurt, back hurts), and impatient thoughts, then maybe you need a different type of meditation, as a complement to regular sitting meditation. Find some place you like, walk for 20 minutes, then sit and meditate for 10, and walk again for 20. Train yourself to reach other states of mind without having to sit with your eyes closed. I've found this to be an especially good way to carry over my meditation into my daily life, since during my daily life I tend to have my eyes open and not be sitting all the time ;)

lvl_5_laser_lotus · 2 days

If you think you found a truth, you're probably hiding other truths by holding something as true. If you study your known truths you might find that they are somewhat false and that other truths lie beneath them.

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