2009.03.29 19:00 - "You'll be absolutely free, only if you want to be", Frank Zappa

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    The Guardian for this meeting was stevenaia Michinaga. The comments are by stevenaia Michinaga.

    Pila Mulligan greeted me with Trevor Berensohn rezzing in the distance

        

    Pila Mulligan: hi Steve
    Pila Mulligan: hi Trevor
    stevenaia Michinaga: hello
    Trevor Berensohn: I'm just waiting on the rezz =)
    stevenaia Michinaga: lots of emails
    stevenaia Michinaga: today
    stevenaia Michinaga: hello Mystic
    Trevor Berensohn: Two ppl here? Or will more rezz..
    stevenaia Michinaga: Trevoe, rather
    stevenaia Michinaga: hi pema
    Pila Mulligan: maybe more -- the chat starts at 7 SLT, but not regularly

    Pema Pera arrives

       

    Pila Mulligan: hi Pema
    Trevor Berensohn: Pema! Hello!
    Pema Pera: Hi TREVOR ! ! ! !
    Pema Pera: How nice to see you again -- been so long ! ! ! !
    Trevor Berensohn: If I knew how to animate myself I'd hug ya!
    Pema Pera: hehehe
    Pema Pera: well, we'll give a virtual virtual hug :-)
    Pema Pera: and hi Pila and Steve!
    stevenaia Michinaga: already did
    Trevor Berensohn: Thank you Steve
    stevenaia Michinaga: I'm packing hugs
    Trevor Berensohn: Hahah
    Pila Mulligan: licensed?
    Pema Pera: Would you like to join our guaridan guild again Trevor?
    Trevor Berensohn: Probably not at present, as I'm only on sporadically
    Pema Pera: okay, as you like, you of course have a standing invitation to return
    Pema Pera: Pila, Trevor is one of the very first guardians
    stevenaia Michinaga: thanks for setting up the Wiki for the new RL retreat info,
    Pema Pera: going back almost a year
    Pila Mulligan: hi Threedee
    Pema Pera: yw, Steve
    Pema Pera: hi Threedee!
    Trevor Berensohn: Oh thank you Pema. This is a wonderful group of ppl
    stevenaia Michinaga: hello Three
    Threedee Shepherd: ho folks
    Pema Pera: we now have close to sixty guardians, believe it or not
    Pila Mulligan: and a lion
    Threedee Shepherd: hio
    Trevor Berensohn: Wow amazing
    Pema Pera: we started with 8 or 9 or so
    Pema Pera: yes, we even have lions to extra guard :-)
    Threedee Shepherd: ^.^
    stevenaia Michinaga: and a bunny or two
    Pila Mulligan: and a tiger
    Pema Pera: and a teddy bear
    stevenaia Michinaga: oh my
    Pila Mulligan: :)
    Trevor Berensohn: Yes there were many creatures when last I visited
    Pema Pera: Moon, you know him, Trevor
    Pema Pera: a dragon
    Trevor Berensohn: whoops I lagged sorry

    Pila brings up a discussion from last night as a continued discussion for tonight
    http://playasbeing.wik.is/Chat_Logs/2009/03/2009.03.28_19%3a00_-_Agreements_in_our_Disagreements

    Pila Mulligan: maybe Pema and Threedee would like to continue the disucssion that was mentioned in Pems'a email
    Pema Pera: Threedee, I have a question about something you said a day ago:
    Pila Mulligan: :)
    Pema Pera: ah, yes, Pila, great minds think alike :)
    Pema Pera: Threedee Shepherd: Pema, it would seem that for someone in (1) the leap to (2) would have no disadvantages--at least logically. Yet, there is a clear feeling within me (at least now) that keeps the muscles from jumping. Not a wish, a sensed embodiment.
    Pila Mulligan: I wish
    Pema Pera: I recognize the feeling you expressed myself
    Pema Pera: and I find it odd myself, that kind of all too human reaction
    Threedee Shepherd: yes...
    Pema Pera: perhaps we can all say something about that, trying to figure it out
    Pema Pera: this afternoon I quoted the great American philosopher Frank Zappa:
    Pema Pera: "you'll be absolutely free, only if you want to be"
    Threedee Shepherd: well, I was thinking about that tonight as I was driving home from dinner out.
    Pila Mulligan: I thought Zappa was Dutch :)
    Pema Pera: wouldn't we wish!
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmmm
    stevenaia Michinaga: smiles
    Pila Mulligan: what were 1 and 2 again, please?
    Pema Pera: just a sec
    Pema Pera: Pema Pera: when we feel/sense moments of timelessness, we have a choice of interpretation -- even if there is no "belief" involved Pema Pera: let us say we have a choice of two hypotheses to follow Threedee Shepherd: ok Pema Pera:
    1) we exist in the world, and for whatever physiological/ psychological reasons, we have that kind of wonderful sensation 

    Pema Pera:
    2) those are moments that show cracks in the too limited belief in a world that exists in space and time, and something wider shines through "out of Plato's cave" so to speak, totally different Pema Pera: I sense that you follow hypothesis 1) and I follow hypothesis 2)

    Pema Pera: and then we talked about that for a few hours :-)
    Pila Mulligan: :)
    Trevor Berensohn: Can't we just choose to revisit the moments of timelessness?
    Pema Pera: so what is holding us back?
    Pila Mulligan: so are we to assume there is a discontinuity between 1 and 2 :)
    Pema Pera: yes, we can and we can walk right through that portal, Trevor, but we are afraid it seems
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmm yes I can relate to that too
    Threedee Shepherd: It seemed to me that the concrete road beneath the wheels of my car, the steering wheel I was grasping, the mountain in the distance, partly snow covered simply WERE, were as in real. Then I said to myself, that works, even with no words. I then wonder what else might BE, in any sense of the word BE.
    Pema Pera: Pila, the emphasis was on "exist"
    Pila Mulligan: how hih is the mountain, how deep is the snow (Pila sings)
    Pema Pera: :)
    Threedee Shepherd: I know that naming is categorizing, yet the experienced aspects required no words, only embodiment to interact with them
    Pema Pera: ah, but as long as thoughts continue, concepts continue, Three
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmmm I never find adequate words or concepts for that, um, experience myself
    Pila Mulligan: sensing a moment of existence that suggests something wider ...
    Pila Mulligan: wider than what seems a fair question
    Threedee Shepherd: Well, in my opinion Descartes got the first part right I thinkl (although I would restate that as "thinking is."
    Pema Pera: footnote: I was delighted that Three and I could find enough common ground to describe similarities and differences, but in no way would I want to suggest that others share the same definitions of 1) and 2), etc -- we probably need many translations, perhaps even for any pair of participants here.
    Threedee Shepherd: very likely true, Pema
    Pema Pera: PaB should have no formulas, definitions, other than talk about play and Being, I think
    stevenaia Michinaga: very
    Pema Pera: but for communication, we can build temporary floating devices :)
    Pila Mulligan: I think a distinction can be found simply in the quality of sensing
    Pema Pera: rafts
    Threedee Shepherd: Ok Pema, what assumptions are already hidden in the word "talk". I think that is important in understanding our varying views
    Pila Mulligan: one day the mountain is just the same old mountain
    Pila Mulligan: one day it is an epiphany
    Pila Mulligan: hi ELiza
    Pema Pera: Hi there Eliza!
    Threedee Shepherd: hi
    Trevor Berensohn: Ha much the same
    Trevor Berensohn: Hello Eliza
    Eliza Madrigal: Hello Pila, Pema, Steven, Three, Trevor :))
    stevenaia Michinaga: hello Eliza
    Pema Pera: yes, Pila, starting close to such phenomena would lead to a different dialogue than Three and I had yesterday
    Pema Pera: equally valid, different starting points
    Pila Mulligan: my first question was really how wouold you and two define the distinctions between 1 and 2, since you seem to have identiifed with thems separately for dialoug purposes
    Pema Pera: Three, do you want to describe those?
    Threedee Shepherd: I'll try
    Threedee Shepherd: (1) takes as an axiom--an accepted reality if you will--that there is a physical world of stuff and forces/energies/essences, whether Ihumans exist or not. more...
    Threedee Shepherd: Or as PHILIP k. DICK HAS WRITTEN: rEALITY IS THAT WHICH WHEN YOU STOP BELIEVING IN IT, DOESN'T GO AWAY.
    Threedee Shepherd: Caps not intended
    Pila Mulligan: :)
    Pema Pera: but great effect nonetheless :)
    Pila Mulligan: - 30 - ?
    Pila Mulligan: typographers reference :)
    Pila Mulligan: following more ...
    Pila Mulligan: means end?
    Threedee Shepherd: (2) subsumes (1) as just one of many possible ways experience is perceived, not as a "tangible" given. As I understand where Pema and I ended up, he suggests that starting with (1) as an axiom, limits my possible thinking of other than (1), because I already assert a standpoint
    Pila Mulligan: thnaks
    Pema Pera: As for me, I accept Three's definition of 1), and for 2) I could simply say: what the heart sutra says
    Pema Pera: since anything more specific than that dresses 2) up in the clothes of 1) and will likely lead to confusion
    Pema Pera: No ignorance, no end to ignorance; No old age and death, no cessation of old age and death; No suffering, no cause or end to suffering, no path, No wisdom and no gain.
    Pema Pera: and so on
    Threedee Shepherd: remind me of the simple heart sutra statement, please
    Pema Pera: let me get a URL
    Threedee Shepherd: No reality, no happening, I would say
    Pema Pera: just a sec
    Pila Mulligan: so a world wider than that existing in space and time would be Pema's Place, where Threedee dare not tread?
    Threedee Shepherd: no, I would go there FROM here, where HERE is a real instantiation within that wider realm
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmm but can the reality of it even be verified?

    Mangolope Whalen and Riddle Sideways join us

    stevenaia Michinaga: hello Mangalope
    Pila Mulligan: hi Mangolope
    Mangolope Whalen: Hi :))
    stevenaia Michinaga: have a seat
    Mangolope Whalen: thank you
    Pema Pera: I wouldn't say "wider", Pila
    Eliza Madrigal: Hello Mangolope, Riddle
    Pema Pera: nor would I say "going from or to"
    Riddle Sideways: sorry I so late
    Pema Pera: btw, the Heart Sutra is here: http://heartofus.wordpress.com/chants/hannya-shingyo/
    Pema Pera: my favorite translation
    Pema Pera: (there are many)
    Threedee Shepherd: Pila, no it cannot be verified. However, I accept the statement that everything that is verified is true, however, everything that is true cannot necessarily be verified.
    Pila Mulligan: hi Riddle
    Riddle Sideways: Hi Everybody
    Pema Pera: Hi Riddle!
    Trevor Berensohn: Hey newcomers =)
    Mangolope Whalen grins
    Pema Pera: Have you been here before, Mangolope?
    Threedee Shepherd: One way to restate the "form of the Heart Sutra seems to me to be: No X, no Non-X.
    Mangolope Whalen: Nope
    stevenaia Michinaga: I invited her this evening
    Pema Pera: ah, welcome
    Riddle Sideways: can there be false positives
    Mangolope Whalen: thank you
    Pema Pera: sukoshi nihongo mo hanashimasu ka?
    Threedee Shepherd: however I asert that there is some X that is the universe, even when I stop believing in it.
    Mangolope Whalen: nihongo o amari hanashimasen
    Pema Pera: and I would say: there is the presence of the appearance of something that we tend to interpret as the universe
    Pema Pera: :-)
    Threedee Shepherd: There cannot be false positives if the process that is implied by verified is adequately defined (and if there S reality)
    Pema Pera: but the whole logic of 2) is totally different from 1) . . . .
    Pema Pera: and the Heart Sutra is showing that by cutting through
    Threedee Shepherd: Not once, in all my life, has the ground beneath my feet or car wheels suddenly ceased to exist. I count on that (no earthquakes, please, that is shifting only)
    Pila Mulligan: :)
    Pila Mulligan: but beneath your airplane it did
    Pema Pera: what is more, Three, is never has existed, so it CANNOT cease to exist
    Pema Pera: it is always more radical than we *think*

    Eliza Madrigal and aurel Miles arrive...

    Eliza Madrigal: Hello Aurel :)
    Pema Pera: Hi Aurel!
    Threedee Shepherd: Yes, Pema. the logic of (2) is stated as "The Way that can be known is not the Way."
    Pila Mulligan: hi aurel
    aurel Miles: hello
    aurel Miles: Hi everyone
    Pema Pera: yes, Threedee
    aurel Miles: please don't let me interrupt
    Trevor Berensohn waves to aurel
    aurel Miles waves back
    Threedee Shepherd: I find such Koans "mind-expanding" and demanding that I look "sideways" to see MORE, not denials of the reality Philip K. Dick describes
    Riddle Sideways: just repeating "the known is not the way" makes the ground shake and go non-existant
    Pema Pera: the trick is to drop who seems to be doing the looking . . .
    Pema Pera: looking backwards :-)
    Trevor Berensohn: Erm how to do that, Pema
    Threedee Shepherd: I have dropped the "who , who seems to be doing the looking" I have not dropped "the looking is \"
    Riddle Sideways: the most interesting things happen in perphial (sp?) vision
    Pema Pera: we cannot do it, Trevor, no way :)
    Pema Pera: but we can open up for what already is
    Trevor Berensohn: haha well put Pema
    Pema Pera: there are so many levels in dropping that kind of self or I, Threedee: each time I think I have done it, a little later I find a more subtle form
    Pema Pera: there are many many many layers
    Pema Pera: each next one more interesting
    Pema Pera: take the "I" who has dropped the "who" for example
    Threedee Shepherd: *I* is a shorthand for a useful, real spatio-temporal locus in a potentially multidimensional universe, that is the source of doing
    Riddle Sideways: peeling the onion/lotus is sooo much fun
    Pema Pera: who/what is that?
    Pema Pera: that needs to be dropped, yes, Three.
    Trevor Berensohn: lol no such thing
    Pema Pera: the firm belief in such a world
    Pema Pera: or put on hold at least
    Pema Pera: up for grabs
    Threedee Shepherd: Pema is there anything?
    Riddle Sideways: many like keeping one foot on know soil
    Pema Pera: there is the presence of appearance
    Riddle Sideways: which inhibits moving on
    Pema Pera: and Being IS but Being's IS is very difference from our seeming "is" . .
    Threedee Shepherd: how do you know that?
    Threedee Shepherd: that there is a presence of appearance?
    Trevor Berensohn: Um, the experience of it
    Trevor Berensohn: Or wait, is experience & presence.. same thing?
    stevenaia Michinaga: lol
    Pema Pera: (sorry, I followed the 90 seconds silence)
    Threedee Shepherd: what is aware of that presence of experience?
    Trevor Berensohn: Whoops
    Pema Pera: (while the fountain becomes mysty)
    Riddle Sideways: that fountain is amazing
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmmm the awareness itself?
    Pema Pera: a new experiment: 9 sec dropping in RL, 90 sec in SL
    Threedee Shepherd: tautology
    Pema Pera: I don't know it, as much as that I take it as a hypothesis, Three
    Pema Pera: a working hypothesis
    Pema Pera: but all that I have intuited and experienced is in agreement
    Riddle Sideways: if you don't have the awareness, does it mean the presence is not there?
    Pila Mulligan contemplates Plato's Allegory of the Elephant
    Pema Pera: and it certainly makes life a lot easier and also more effective
    Threedee Shepherd: is in agreement with what?
    Pema Pera: in agrement with the working hypothesis that 2) is true
    Eliza Madrigal: So Pema, what we call water, you see as an aspect of being that has appeared as "water"...metaphor....though it seems/is tangible (enough to swim in and have our eyes sting from) from this (in-world) view...?
    Pema Pera: that would still be too concrete, Eliza; rather
    Threedee Shepherd: Nothing i have experienced denies (1) not undermines the possibility of (2) as long as I try to experience and not use words
    Pema Pera: each moment, you could say, Being expresses itself through the given-together-ness
    Threedee Shepherd: nor undermines
    Pema Pera: or all that appears in that moment, and what we interpret then as separate subjects
    Pema Pera: and objects and distances and all that
    Pema Pera: So, Eliza, the way you asked the question already buys into an acceptance of separation and distances
    Pema Pera: that itself has to be dropped
    Pema Pera: it is very very radical, and not easy to find at first how to do that
    Eliza Madrigal: Wouldn't Being have projected it?
    Pema Pera: that is still too much thnking in terms of 1)
    Pema Pera: Being IS in every single aspect of every appearance
    Threedee Shepherd: yes, Pema, a half-hour bus ride from here to there takes a half-hour. That is simply an experience, needing no concepts
    Pema Pera: no projecting, no separation, no distance, no coming, no going
    Pema Pera: not so simple, Threedee :)
    Pema Pera: lots of concepts in there already
    Riddle Sideways: yes, not so simeple
    Pema Pera: does that make sense, Eliza?
    Eliza Madrigal: :) It is....
    Eliza Madrigal: But as for articulating what I see in a wider view...not so easy
    Threedee Shepherd: Ok, I really would appreciate an example, Pema, of howNo projecting/separation/etc. , "certainly makes [Your} life a lot easier and also more effective
    Pema Pera: but good to try, Eliza, to find out "what gives way"
    Pema Pera: anything is an example, Threedee, any worry, need, problem

    Pema explains to clearify....

       

    Pema Pera: Let me try this:
    Pema Pera: we know about two ways to conquer a knot, like a Gordian knot, a knotty problem too
    Pema Pera: 1) slowly unravel
    Pema Pera: 2) cut through
    Threedee Shepherd: Is that because in 2-logic anything is no-thing
    Pema Pera: 3) see that the knot never existed in the first place
    Trevor Berensohn chuckles again
    Pema Pera: got ya!
    Pema Pera: hehe
    Pema Pera: so I'm talking about 3)
    Pema Pera: and that applies to anything
    Threedee Shepherd: yes, that is what I just asked.
    Pema Pera: a worry about illness
    Pema Pera: a worry about a deadline
    Pema Pera: a worry about mistakes I'm making
    Pema Pera: a remorse or guild
    Pema Pera: or feeling of inferiority
    Pema Pera: a need I perceive to have
    Pema Pera: a willingness to help but seeing my own limitations
    Pema Pera: all of those, Three, take on a completely liberated form in 2)
    Threedee Shepherd: So, if I stop worrying about, thinking about, believing in Type-II diabetes, I can tell my wife to stop nagging me to go to the gym?
    Eliza Madrigal: :)
    Pema Pera: no, that is the 1) logid
    Pema Pera: logic
    Pema Pera: okay, a single example:
    Pema Pera: in the middle ages in Japan there was a samurai handbook
    Pema Pera: telling the samurai: go into battle as if you have died already
    Pema Pera: so you don't have to worry about dying
    Pema Pera: and you can put all your energy in fighting
    Pema Pera: and in fact, surprise, you are more likely to survive
    Pema Pera: not wasting energy in worrying and overly protecting yourself
    Pema Pera: similarly here:
    Trevor Berensohn: O wow
    Threedee Shepherd: makes perfect sense, except that IF you had died already you would not be able to bgo into the battle
    Pema Pera: you can be nicer to your wife if you don't have to protect your own personal history
    Pema Pera: if you accept that that is all an illusion
    Pema Pera: that you can really finally completely freely express yourself
    Threedee Shepherd: If it is all an illusion, why do?
    Pema Pera: ah, that's the rub!
    Pema Pera: true love does, not because of rewards
    Threedee Shepherd: and express "myself' in what linguistic illusion
    Pema Pera: true compassion just is, without needing a belief in "existence" to function
    Pema Pera: a movie being an illusion doesn't mean it is not worth watching
    Pema Pera: a good movie is worth crying over
    Pema Pera: and learning from
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmm Three if you're still experiencing, then might as well go with it
    Trevor Berensohn: Whether it's real or not
    Pila Mulligan: I'd rather be lucky
    Threedee Shepherd: Trevor, Ithat is similar to William James talking about consciousness.
    Riddle Sideways: totally agree, some movies are worth watching
    Riddle Sideways: but know they are still movie life
    Threedee Shepherd: movies are not an illusion, they are a story told in words and pictures that represent some aspect of what the teller has perceived
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmmm guess I'm not familiar with Dick OR James
    Pema Pera: they are and they aren't, Three: the existence of a house in a movie is an illusion -- and a good one, in the story
    Threedee Shepherd: Dick is a SF writer. James was a late 1800s philosopher who laid foundations for pragmatism, among other things
    Trevor Berensohn: Ah
    Pema Pera: Three, this is where Pila may want to come in: if you start with appreciation of what is, the question whether it "exists" is not so relevant
    Pila Mulligan enters
    Pema Pera: and certainly does not act as a backstop or off-stage guarantee of the value of what is
    Eliza Madrigal: :)
    Pema Pera: :-)
    Threedee Shepherd: Pema, I think that is slipping into making this a semantic agrgument, which we have done well in avoiding for the most part, in our conversation
    Pema Pera: no intention whatsoever to make semantic arguments, Three
    Trevor Berensohn: Hmm? It sounds more like just describing apprecitation
    Pema Pera: I'm just trying to include other angles, like Pila, as well
    Pila Mulligan is reminded of Stim's dicussion about View or Approach
    Threedee Shepherd: I know, but it sounds like that, to me
    Pema Pera: how so?
    Pila Mulligan: Pema and Three have finely toned and tuned academic presentations to draw upon in the dialog
    Pila Mulligan: if I do ont misunderstand Stim's comments you each have a View or Approach to reality
    Pila Mulligan: but what about when it comes down to the moent when luck matters?
    Pila Mulligan: luck
    Threedee Shepherd: Pema, IF my "instantianted reality" version of (1) happened to be true, I do not see where it destroys your expanded hypothesis that is (2)
    Pema Pera: you see, Three, we can't get from 1) to 2) by arguing . . . really, that will never work. The best we can do is trying to sketch how different the hypoheses of 1) and 2) are, each in their own way
    Pema Pera: and yes, Pila, I would talk totally different about 2) with a Taoist, for sure!
    Pema Pera: we can do that some day, would love to.
    Pila Mulligan: but I think Threedee has sais that but for the words he sees 2 also
    Pila Mulligan: said*
    Pema Pera: yes, but that is not 2, that is the shadow of 2 projected into 1
    Threedee Shepherd: In answer to my own question, I might reply that accepting (1) is akin to staying I have to start somewhere, whereas (2) denies the meaning of both "start" and "somewhere" and simply ios appearance of perception with no preconditions,
    Pema Pera: in 2 it is not possible for 1 to be true the way Threedee intends it
    Pila Mulligan: why not, Pema
    Pema Pera: let's now go slow again, Three:
    Pema Pera: akin to staying I have to start somewhere
    Pema Pera: is what you said, but that already closes the doors of 2
    Pema Pera: before you start, you have already started by introducing an "I"
    Threedee Shepherd: yes, that was my answer to myself
    Pema Pera: so you are already on your way
    Pema Pera: within 1
    Pema Pera: ah, okay, sorry, now I was too fast :-)
    Pema Pera: hehe
    Trevor Berensohn: Oh dear, First Life calls.. Will hopefully sit in on this agina soon =)
    Pema Pera: so now then the question is what happens when you do not start with an "I"?
    Pila Mulligan: bye Trevor
    Pema Pera: bye Trevor!
    stevenaia Michinaga: I must go, see you soon
    Pema Pera: bye Steve!
    Trevor Berensohn: Pema, you are a gem!
    Pila Mulligan: bye Steve
    Pema Pera: great seeing you again, Trev!
    Eliza Madrigal: Bye Trevor, Bye Steven
    stevenaia Michinaga: bye all, thanks for coming Amngolope, c join us again
    Pema Pera: (2) denies the meaning of both "start" and "somewhere" and simply ios appearance of perception with no preconditions,
    Threedee Shepherd: Well, lets agree that in this discussion I/you/me is a shorthand not a necessary reality.
    Pema Pera: it looses everything, time and space and distance and identities
    Pema Pera: but the crux is there, Threedee
    Pema Pera: that is not a detail, that's the center
    Threedee Shepherd: doing happens
    Pema Pera: in 2 nothing happens
    Pema Pera: it really really is radical
    Threedee Shepherd: therefore nothing is, therefore there is no (2) ^.^
    Pema Pera: heart sutra again:
    Pema Pera: O Sariputra , all things are expressions of emptiness, Not born, not destroyed, not stained, not pure, Neither waxing nor waning. Thus emptiness is not form; Not sensation nor perception, Reaction nor consciousness;
    Pema Pera: nothing exists, and indeed 2) does not exists
    Threedee Shepherd: Not born, ...so where did these words come from, an ongoing being that is always everything, out of which they happen to coalesce?
    Pema Pera: Three, you can't get there from here -- you can't construct an object from its shadows
    Threedee Shepherd: It sounds like (2) has now jumped to (3), and in (3) "WHY?" is not meaningful as an utterance
    Pema Pera: indeed, any why requires a framework to ask the question in
    Pema Pera: there is no framework independent why
    Pema Pera: the Tao is not a framework
    Threedee Shepherd: of course.
    Pema Pera: nor is Buddhist emptiness
    Pema Pera: why questions in 1) don't reach 2)
    Threedee Shepherd: I make an assertion: No feral child could grow up to be Buddah.
    Pema Pera: there is no Buddha in 2) nor a child, of whatever type
    Mangolope Whalen bows in honor
    Mangolope Whalen: Thank you so much for being inviting and kind.
    Threedee Shepherd: But sometime in the next 24 hours it is likely I will have to find the toilet to take a shit
    Pila Mulligan: bye Managlope
    Eliza Madrigal: Mangolope, bye for now :)
    Threedee Shepherd: bye
    Pila Mulligan: a maybe useless idea from Pila: something that bridges the apparent distinction between Approach 1 and Approach 2 is luck
    Pema Pera: bye Mangolope!
    Mangolope Whalen: baibai :)
    Pema Pera: what kind of luck, Pila?
    Pila Mulligan: luck luck :)
    Threedee Shepherd: if luck=chance
    Pila Mulligan: not a joke :|
    Pila Mulligan: good luck bad luck
    Pila Mulligan: personal luck
    Threedee Shepherd: (2-3) The 2-3 that can be know is not the 2-3, in fact nothing can be known because it is already the case that ALL IS
    Pema Pera: so how does that bridge 1 and 2, Pila?
    Pila Mulligan: well, I think Threedee said he sees 2, but he does not buy the words
    Threedee Shepherd: Pema, is a mantra of (2): disbelieve
    Pema Pera: and Three, I know it is frustrating, but arguing against it doesn't help seeing it -- opening up and testing the hypothesis that it might be true is more effective to at least sense what the hypothesis is trying to say
    Pema Pera: so how does luck come in, Pila?
    Pila Mulligan: it defeats the premise that someting is more effective but affirms the premise of 2
    Pema Pera: and luck?
    Pila Mulligan: luck = it in the previous sentence
    Pila Mulligan: it Three is indeed accepting the concept of 2 but nt the words
    Pema Pera: you're beyond me, Pila
    Threedee Shepherd: No, I think it might better be stated as a varient of Avastu's "Everything arises perfectly" by saying "EVERTHING--now you try to live with it."
    Pema Pera: can't follow that so far
    Pema Pera: can we start again, in a simple way?
    Pila Mulligan: Three, didn'y you sayyou have an inkling of what Pema means by 2, wihtout the words?
    Riddle Sideways: Everything is what it is. And the only thing we can change is our attitude towards it
    Threedee Shepherd: yes, AND I say that I have already excluded some regions of potential, BEINGNESS space because of perception, imperfect as it is. Or.
    Pema Pera: can you try again to explain luck, Pila, I don't get it yet
    Threedee Shepherd: to put it another way (2) if (2) shows me that nothing is impossible, all I have is useless chaos because there is no signal and no noise
    Riddle Sideways: Good night all
    Pema Pera: do you, three?
    Eliza Madrigal: Bye Riddle :)
    Pila Mulligan: bye Riddle
    Pema Pera: nite Riddle?
    Pila Mulligan: but you have a sense of the idea of what Pema means in his description of 2?
    Threedee Shepherd: it is as if no-thing==every-thing, which does not tell me any-thing
    Pila Mulligan: I need to look back at the log, just a sec please
    Pila Mulligan: but the next question, Three, have oyu had expereinces of good luck and bad luck?
    Pila Mulligan: sorry, I cannot find the part of the log I was looking for
    Pila Mulligan: so skip to luck, please
    Pila Mulligan: is luck not an expereince in Approach 1?
    Threedee Shepherd: perhaps, Pila. I do accept that what I call effect apparently can arise de-novo without cause (or that such things are simply beyond my understanding, even thoug they are my apparent perception)
    Pila Mulligan: so we can proceed with luck as a viable idea. Three?
    Eliza Madrigal: So interesting, but I need to peel away.... Nite Aurel, Three, Pila, Pema :)
    Pila Mulligan: bye Eliza
    Threedee Shepherd: bye
    Threedee Shepherd: if we mean by luck, randomness
    Pila Mulligan: no, personal luck
    Pila Mulligan: like Jeez, Sam sure is lucky
    Threedee Shepherd: no, I do not accept that kind of luck, if I understand you. there is not a state variable=luck
    Pila Mulligan: okay, then I was mistaken, it doe sont work as a bridge :)
    Pila Mulligan: pardon the digression please :)
    Pema Pera: :-)
    Pema Pera: I probably should get some sleep
    Threedee Shepherd: no, not a digression, a clarification of a layer not there
    Pila Mulligan: :)
    Pema Pera: since I will be up again in four hours, for the next session :)
    Pila Mulligan: have a nice rest Pema
    Pema Pera: but we can continue, Three, we are just beginning to scratch the surface
    Threedee Shepherd: Pema, before you go
    Pema Pera: yes?
    Threedee Shepherd: From (2) no statement but (2) can be true. thus tautology, it seems
    Pema Pera: in 2) the role of statements is different than it is in 1)
    Pema Pera: so if you apply the 1) logic to 2), you wan
    Pema Pera: won't get anywhere
    Threedee Shepherd: OK, in (2) is there ANY meaning to the copmmon word, REALITY
    Pema Pera: I'm not trying to be difficult, that is just the nature of 2)
    Threedee Shepherd: I know you are not trying to be difficult
    Pema Pera: the problem is, once we both have glimpses of 2), we can compare the glimpses and from there on we can try to grope for words
    Pema Pera: and luck will help to get glimpses :-)
    Threedee Shepherd: hehe
    Pema Pera: but we need to start from the experiments to then try to describe whatever theory we would like to argue with
    Pema Pera: we can't produce reality by constructing a clever logical argument
    Pema Pera: in 1) the experience is everyday experience
    Pema Pera: in2) it is something different
    Pema Pera: and believe me, I know how frustrating it is
    Threedee Shepherd: I would say, every time I think I have had a glimpse that might be of (2) the words I grope for always bring me back to it being just another case of (1)
    Pema Pera: I found it frustrating too, and I used to argue just like you are doing now, I know where you are coming from
    Pema Pera: yes, words project it down into the shadows . . .
    Pema Pera: it's delicate
    Pema Pera: at first at least
    Threedee Shepherd: OK, in a sense one cannot get from (1) to (2) because they are orthoganol constructions,
    Pema Pera: You sked for examples, let me give a concrete example.
    Pema Pera: When I was 17, I started to study these things, that was in 1970.
    Pema Pera: Then in April 1994, I remember the day, I suddenly realized that I had reached a point in which all books from all religions made sense to me, recognizable sense
    Pema Pera: like reading a tourist guide of a place you had already visited
    Pema Pera: you might not know every street and building, of course, but you recognize the atmosphere and feel of the place
    Threedee Shepherd: ok
    Pema Pera: Before that, I had not reached that familiarity or depth of insight, whatever you want to call it
    Pema Pera: after that, the journey become so much easier
    Pema Pera: and at the same time, I could also say, at that point the journey was just beginning
    Pema Pera: until then I had been struggling, as if blind
    Pema Pera: I did have my intuitions
    Pema Pera: luck :-)
    Pema Pera: but after that I could proceed in a much more directly guided way
    Threedee Shepherd: the words journey and proceed imply movement
    Pema Pera: so end of story: a concrete phenomenological description of how I began to approach 2).
    Pema Pera: and yes, you are right, I am projecting the story into 1)
    Pema Pera: willingly
    Pema Pera: knowingly making errors to make it fit but ready to backtrack where needed
    Pema Pera: nothing random there
    Threedee Shepherd: ok, an observation, and then I will "let" you go to sleep...
    Pema Pera: so this is just to counter the "but then it would all be chaos" objection
    Pema Pera: yes?
    Threedee Shepherd: I "perceive/feel" at a deep level beyond any words I can use, that our discussion is not about semantics, which thus suggests to me that I must have some "knowing" of 2, or this would seems an empty discussion to me.
    Pema Pera: yes
    Pema Pera: if you didn't you would have left much earlier :-)
    Threedee Shepherd: heheh
    Pila Mulligan: that's what I heard you say earlier 3d but could nt find in the log :)
    Threedee Shepherd: Yes, but here I have said it in a much more useful way--at least useful to me
    Pema Pera: if I may make one last comparison?
    Threedee Shepherd: yes
    Pema Pera: between math and 2)
    Pila Mulligan: but I believe you also saind you were not buying the words Pema was using
    Pila Mulligan: excuse me Pema
    Threedee Shepherd: words are but a scaffold, in the end
    Pema Pera: np, Pila, you can also go first!
    Pila Mulligan: that was it :)
    Pema Pera: :-)

    Stories are always enlightening...

    Pema Pera: Let me tell it as a story
    Pema Pera: Here goes
    Threedee Shepherd nods
    Pema Pera: In 2030 a major crisis happens, and civilization breaks down completely
    Pema Pera: for five hundred years the few survivors keep alive as hunters and gatherers
    Threedee Shepherd: likely, even, though unfortuante in the short run
    Pema Pera: (perhaps fortunate for the planet, could be)
    Pema Pera: now in 2530 someone finds a mathematics book
    Pema Pera: with strange drawings
    Pema Pera: and even stranger sentences
    Pema Pera: with words that seem to have no meaning
    Pema Pera: and many pages of add arguments
    Threedee Shepherd: odd
    Pema Pera: and at the end "what was to be proven" a kind of "so there!"
    Pila Mulligan: maybe add :)
    Pema Pera: Now the kid who finds this book shows it to his friends and elders
    Pema Pera: and everyone concludes that it must be sheer nonsense
    Pema Pera: one of the reasons that the great complex civilization, only knonw through warped legends, came to a fall
    Pema Pera: but somehow the kid has "luck"
    Pema Pera: has this strange intuition, belief, hunch, idea
    Pema Pera: that, you know, there might actually be something to it
    Pema Pera: he has no idea what
    Threedee Shepherd: and woe if he finds out?
    Pema Pera: if he would have tried to argue what it could be, he could have never argued his way into it from scratch
    Pema Pera: instead, he just takes the book
    Pema Pera: and reads it every day
    Pema Pera: again and again
    Pema Pera: and each time it makes just a tiny little bit more sense
    Pema Pera: he begins to see patterns
    Pema Pera: how the words may correlate with the pictures
    Pema Pera: the same kind of sentences keep appearing
    Pema Pera: near the same kind of pictures
    Pema Pera: and slowly slowly over the years, the fog lifts
    Pema Pera: and buy golly. there is sense there
    Pema Pera: and by more golly, the sense is so totally different from anything he could have guessed
    Pema Pera: in the hunter gathere vocabulary counting was there
    Pema Pera: but not algegraic geometry, or topology
    Pila Mulligan: b* :)
    Pema Pera: well, by early April 1994 I felt like that kid
    Pema Pera: in utter amazement, even though I'd be playing with those ideas for 24 years
    Pema Pera: and thought I knew quite a bit already by then
    Pema Pera: end of tale
    Pema Pera: (thanks Pila:)
    Threedee Shepherd nods thoughtfully
    Pila Mulligan: are you going to the August retreat Threedee?
    Threedee Shepherd: I will not keep you from sleep. AND, I want to put on a list that I would like to discuss with you, the word/concept/idea/essence "PATTERNS"
    Threedee Shepherd: No, I am not.
    Pila Mulligan: thnak you :)
    Pema Pera: Ah, let me add one important footnote here
    Pema Pera: I do not claim that I have found the truth, by any means
    Threedee Shepherd: I know you do not
    Pema Pera: but I do claim that what all those books try to say makes internal sense
    Pema Pera: there is something there there, of which I have seen enough glimpses that I stopped trying to wonder whether it would be baseless wishful thinking
    Pema Pera: so no belief or claim, but insight in the worthiness of the hypothesis of 2, as worth pursuing, but potentially still false
    Pema Pera: (complete disclosure :-)
    aurel Miles: i have a lot to digest, and slept very little last night so I hope you'll excuse me - i am going to bow out here
    Pila Mulligan: bye aurel
    aurel Miles: it is always a pleasure
    Pema Pera: thanks for sitting through all this, Aurel :-)
    aurel Miles: goodnight
    Threedee Shepherd: "Suspend both belief and disbelief" and see what happens
    Pema Pera: yes
    Threedee Shepherd: goodnight
    Pema Pera: beyond belief (and disbelief) :-)
    Threedee Shepherd: beyond belief and disbelief, thaer is just IS
    Threedee Shepherd: or BEING to be Played with
    Pema Pera: btw, there is a second milestone for me, which happened eleven years later, in 2005, from which point on luck was no longer necessary to get glimpses of 2 -- that's an altogether different story for another day. From then on I began to find (more and more) ways to open up without waiting for glimpses . . . .
    Threedee Shepherd: another story for another time :)
    Pema Pera: yes, perhaps in four hours, hehehe
    Threedee Shepherd: I will gladly listen
    Pila Mulligan: well, I move we adjourn :)
    Pema Pera: good time for Hawaii perhaps?
    Pema Pera: yes, I second
    Pila Mulligan: any nays?
    Pema Pera: see you all later
    Pema Pera: hehehe
    Threedee Shepherd: done, goodnight, Friends
    Pema Pera: thank you both!
    Pila Mulligan: aloha Pema and Threedee
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