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cintune
climber
The Utility Muffin Research Kitchen
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Apr 24, 2015 - 05:31pm PT
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I feel the urge to go read a Dr. Bronner's bottle.
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Apr 24, 2015 - 07:46pm PT
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I’m not advocating woo, I’m just pointing out the reasonable assumption that mind (mind; structure;order) is the predicate to material existence
I don't think I would call it "mind", but the mathematical matrix of natural relationships or physical laws may have been there just shy of the emergence of matter. My guess would be both matter and physical law came into existence simultaneously. But at the point of origin of the universe (if it does indeed have an origin) time and space may have appeared but with the chronology strangely distorted and incomprehensible now. "Cause and effect" as we now observe it may have come about in this primordial mix, but may have been scrambled as well. Backward causation might have occurred and the "past" may have been subject to the "present."
To speculate about an all-encompassing "mind" regulating the universe is to speculate about some sort of god existing beyond time and space.
Matter as it is constituted is subjected to annihilation, but antimatter is completely free from all annihilation (Duck)
"Antimatter cannot be stored in a container made of ordinary matter because antimatter reacts with any matter it touches, annihilating itself and an equal amount of the container" (Wiki)
You are funny but . . . (I can't find a word to describe you)
;>\
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Apr 24, 2015 - 08:08pm PT
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^^^eternal?
;d
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WBraun
climber
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Apr 24, 2015 - 08:25pm PT
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antimatter reacts with any matter it touches, annihilating itself and an equal amount of the container
No
Antimatter can never be annihilated.
It is non material.
Your material body will be annihilated, but you will not.
Even Schrodinger confirmed that from the Mundaka Upanishad.
He knew and understood the soul (antimatter) can never be annihilated .....
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Apr 24, 2015 - 09:15pm PT
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I am left speechless in the presence of such an abundance of arcane knowledge.
Sullly, if you read this can you come up with a figure from literature who is comparable to Mr. Werner Duck?
;>0
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Apr 24, 2015 - 09:40pm PT
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To speculate about an all-encompassing "mind" regulating the universe is to speculate about some sort of god existing beyond time and space.
Wouldn't do that... but that logical matrix is intriguing. Not because it implies woo, but because it implies a curiously organized human mind in relationship to a curiously organized universe.
And it just leaves you wondering.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 24, 2015 - 09:49pm PT
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No-thing simply means that the qualities we normally attribute to a thing like form, mass and shape and so forth, are entirely absent, and that we come to know these non-things only by the effect they have the energy they contain. Well, by that definition one could certainly state that, when we meditate, one can pigeonhole what is experienced into thoughts, the "effects" of things including bodily sensations, and no-thing else. The challenge then remains the same sort of 'framing' question Paul is asking relative to order before the beginning of material existence: what is the experience / perception after shutting down discursive thought and just hanging out in that 'being' state?
Largo appears to continually and tangentially almost imply - with a certain in-the-know wink-and-a-nod innuendo - that there is a rumor which might lead one to infer that a very particular state of no-thingness is, by loose definition: rich and fertile territory. I on the other hand, beyond a certain point, consider it more a matter of lingering at an impenetrable event horizon of experience / consciousness which cannot be breached anymore than you can breach death. An interesting experience and practice for sure, but with regard to insight, for me, one with diminishing returns compared to moment-to-moment mindfulness. I liken it to LSD in that aspect - much to be gained in the beginning, less so over the stretch of time.
That's not to say meditating over a lifetime can't contribute to perceptions of self, life, mind and body, but rather that at a certain point the "exploration" hits a wall for me personally. Largo will say I'm framing this all wrong and ask from what experience I make these claims; but to that I say broad and deep experience with meditation and long-duration experiences in isolation tanks. To that he'll say I lacked a proper teacher and I went about it all wrong or that I lost my way. To that I say some of us desperately need 'a' way or method, for the path to be well-worn before we take our first steps, and require guides for the journey; others not. Each of our journeys, driving prerequisites and needs along the way are our own. He is welcome to judge me and my explorations however he pleases.
But personally I'd prefer it if he just came out and said what he means which is something he seems almost pathologically unwilling to do. Sure, meditation is a DIY deal by definition, but if it were as incommunicable as he makes it out to be there would be no need or use for Zen masters. The fact there are Zen masters and that Largo stresses their utility utterly belies his entire discourse on this thread as far as I'm concerned. If his Zen masters can find the words for the experience, journey and exploration then I can only assume it's either a matter of poor training or unwillingness that he cannot.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 24, 2015 - 10:00pm PT
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Sullly, if you read this can you come up with a figure from literature who is comparable to Mr. Werner Duck?
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Apr 24, 2015 - 11:46pm PT
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Hey that's interesting... that science folks think Groucho Marx is a literary character.
I nominate Huck Finn or Holden Caulfield... didn't he say literary figure?
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Apr 25, 2015 - 07:27am PT
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the mind evolved the capacity to grok symbology (language) because it improved survivability. that talent has been recently repurposed to create the modern world.
bidness as usual, evolutionarily speaking.
Largo, you gettin kinky on me?
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 25, 2015 - 11:01am PT
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Hey that's interesting... that science folks think Groucho Marx is a literary character.
For the purposes of this thread he is as half the audience can't distinguish fiction from non-fiction or imagination from reality, falling back to TV seemed a credible option.
And, for Werner as a long-time Yosar member, every day is a veritable "You bet your life" show. And we don't even need to go into his duck popping off here all the time.
But, if you must be literal, then I would have to say Oskar of Gunter Grass' Tin Drum.
Oskar: There was once a credulous people... who believed in Santa Claus.
That, and the fact Oskar and Werner choose to keep to similar confines (though Werner beats a Kanjira).
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Apr 25, 2015 - 11:53am PT
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Werner could easily fit into any Oscar Wilde play as well.
No doubt he's Earnest.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Apr 25, 2015 - 01:13pm PT
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grouchoz right on - a clown often depicted as a duck.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Apr 25, 2015 - 01:56pm PT
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my Children.
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 25, 2015 - 02:08pm PT
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Sez Dingus: No werner you have not been paying attention. This whole discussion was started by Largo making grand pronouncements about the fundamental nature of physics.
Not remotely so. The whole discussion originally came from realizing that the objective and subjective realms required specific modes of inquiry that were mutualy exclusive but which had some overlap - though no body is quite sure where and how much and so forth. Fundamentalists from both camps have often claimed that knowing belings tho ther camp alone - the quantifiers, and the transcendentalists. I have advocated what the Suffis call the middle-way, appreciating full well the limititations of both measuring and open focus empirical study.
Of course you are going to run into the Dingus' who can't really grasp what is being said and try and "pork the football," so to speak, and this always involves conflating many thing into a kind of knuckleheaded pie we can all get hold of with our sense organs. But what is Dingus holding onto so fiercely?
The belief that stuff and every phenomonon has a physical extgent or exists as a physical thing. When we point out that which has no mass or physical extent he simply shifts to the effects without pausing to ask WHAT it is that is rendering the measurable effect. That is, if for a moment we removed the physical efect, WHAT is there that has no mass?
Of course there are those like John G. who claim that asking such qustions (for reasons only he can answer are by his definition "religiously inspired") are not useful because they do not lead to an understanding of what a phenomenon DOES. This is to be entirely beholded to the DO school, and rightly so since science is rarely about asking what reality IS, but what are the mechanical aspects that we can measure. When we move ino the subjecive, the human "being" or pure experiential part is quite naturally not served by measuring so a fundamentalst measurer will simply yell to quick looking and to get back to calculating, or will write off the whole experiential realm as fruitless for the lack of numbers forthcoming.
Meanwhile Dingus will keep shouting that phenomnon with no mass and no material and no "body" is in fact a "thing" just as a football is a thing because we can derive measurements - but from WHAT, exactly, do such measurements arise? What IS it?
JL
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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 25, 2015 - 02:21pm PT
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Healyje said:
Well, by that definition one could certainly state that, when we meditate, one can pigeonhole what is experienced into thoughts, the "effects" of things including bodily sensations, and no-thing else. The challenge then remains the same sort of 'framing' question Paul is asking relative to order before the beginning of material existence: what is the experience / perception after shutting down discursive thought and just hanging out in that 'being' state?
--
Where I would have you focus is on the "WHAT (content) is experienced" part that you refer to in the above graph. While you present an elegant explanation on why one should "cowboy" your experiential path, and that other following the normal mode of study involving teachers, experts, empirically tested techniques and so forth are by nature "folowers" too fearful to go it alone, your "what is experienced" betrays that you are still focused on content, as opposed to probing into the fundamental narture of that which experiences.
This is the hardest thing to penetrate and get past for someone still fixated on the "what," the stuff, the content, the experience/perception of some mysterious, inpenetrable stuff or mysterious event horizon "out there" that we can't ever get at cha cha cha.
But you're still missing the mark there, Healje. As mentioned before, I'm not sayhing you are doing it "wrong," rather you and not doing it at all. That is not to say you are doing nothing worthwhile and gratifying with your isolation tanks and cowboy meditations, but it is not what I am driving at whatsoever.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Apr 25, 2015 - 02:53pm PT
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Where I would have you focus is on the "WHAT (content) is experienced" part that you refer to in the above graph. Your injection of 'content', while ably setting the stage for your strawman to follow, is entirely wrong.
While you present an elegant explanation on why one should "cowboy" your experiential path, and that other following the normal mode of study involving teachers, experts, empirically tested techniques and so forth are by nature "folowers" too fearful to go it alone, your "what is experienced" betrays that you are still focused on content, as opposed to probing into the fundamental narture of that which experiences. Fear is certainly one reason, other possible reasons are a socialization where a person feels the institutional approach is for them, and yet another is a 'buying into' the all the cultural trappings and appearances of the form.
This is the hardest thing to penetrate and get past for someone still fixated on the "what," the stuff, the content, the experience/perception of some mysterious, inpenetrable stuff or mysterious event horizon "out there" that we can't ever get at cha cha cha. Again, the "what" is your fixation and strawman, not mine.
But you're still missing the mark there, Healje. As mentioned before, I'm not sayhing you are doing it "wrong," rather you are not doing it at all. That is not to say you are doing nothing worthwhile and gratifying with your isolation tanks and cowboy meditations, but it is not what I am driving at whatsoever. Amusing, but again, entirely mistaken. You seem incapable of getting past tilting at your own strawmen which have no real applicability here. And really, when you say:
...normal mode of study involving teachers, experts, empirically tested techniques...
It implies there exist words which teach, inform, and provide insight - how is that possible when you yourself are so unable to provide any here? How is it a Zen tradition survives at all?
...open focus empirical study... Now there is an idea - but let me guess, you can't state any thing or no-thing about said study what with there being no communicable syllabus or agenda and nothing to "report back" (even though Amazon Books will sell you endless words about Open Focus and Zen meditations).
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
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Apr 25, 2015 - 04:19pm PT
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healeyje-
I'm curious about your experience in the deprivation tanks. I've read that almost everyone begins "halucinating" a few hours after being introduced to one. Of course one person's hallucination is another one's unconscious imagry. I'm wondering if you or anyone you knew ever got past the imagry, and if so what was the next stage?
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Trad climber
Will know soon
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Apr 25, 2015 - 06:29pm PT
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I've read a bit of this thread off and on, can't believe how many posts it has. I guess that makes it worthy. But as to points of knowledge and learning, a few have made me really think about the posters ideas, but overall I'm going with William Shakespeare "much ado about nothing" or at least not much. Jess sayin'. :)
Edit: But I could be considered shallow, who knows? Only the shadow.....
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