Category Archives: spirituality

Moral Constructivism

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I’ve been reading, recently, something that has me thinking about how morality might be most effectively approached these days. The book, which I would categorize as apocalyptic Sci Fi, tells a story of societal breakdown in the not too distant future. Those who can live in gated enclaves as a means of protection against gangs of homeless riffraff without moral qualms of any sort intent on theft, murder and mayhem. As the situation deteriorates and the enclave is over run, our protagonist, a teen age girl of significant capability, is forced to flee.

Our heroine is no ordinary teenager. She has, over her few short years, compiled a book of verse, a spiritual system, defining god in terms of the realities she faces as civilization collapses. Her notion that ‘God is change’ addresses the primary needs of the people who face disruption and displacement in this dark future world. Survival, she understands, will require flexibility.

As the story moves toward resolution, a small group has banded together and seems to have arrived at a moral understanding based on mutual needs and respect. Coexistence demands an ongoing exchange regarding moral priorities; change is the rule and openness to change must always be on the table: God is change.

The reader is left uncertain as to what the future holds for our small group, but, as I think about it, it seems to me their thinking about morality gives them a much better chance of survival than had they latched onto either a moral absolute or a relativist position.

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Neuroses and Evolutionary Survival

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It has occurred to me lately to wonder how we, being survivors of countless generations of evolutionary perfection, having obtained the genetic wherewithal to be alive at this point in time, can be so prone to suffering from various psychological malfunctioning.

I wonder this because it has come to my attention that a significant number of us suffer from a neurotic emptiness attributable to inadequate nurture. That, while physically healthy, more or less, psychologically many experience a profound emptiness (which, I suspect, may explain, to some extent, the prevalence of religious involvement.)

Anyway, there’s a concept the German’s call sehnsucht, defined as the inconsolable longing in the human heart for we know not what, which seems apropos to consideration of a malady which is likely to again lead to religious involvement, and seeing as how we evolutionary survivors have a predilection to belief in the supernatural anyway, it’s pretty hard to deny some sort of spiritual investment.

My particular inclination is to cultivate a deeper engagement with nature. There’s nothing as spiritually uplifting, for me, as a contemplative walk in the woods.

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Taking Advantage

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I’ve been wondering how natural it is for those who are able to take advantage of others. Beside the moral imperative to do to others what one would have done to one’s self and the often stated acknowledgment of the appropriateness of equal rights there seems to be a strong impetus for factions to separate along ideological lines and when those ideologies gain sufficient support, to find in others’ actions and beliefs a corruption deep enough to find those others undeserving of any respect for their contrary views.

So, the factions struggle for political dominance in order to impose their particular values in a way which will be, pretty clearly, disadvantages to the opposition. And, since it’s also pretty clear there will never be full consensus about much of anything, someone will suffer at the hands of the other, which makes me think the potential for discontent and even violence is in the nature of our society. And, the vulnerable minority or passive majority may find their very being twisted and tortured in most inhumane ways.  A benevolent overseer, Plato’s philosopher king maybe, might deal fairly with the most egregious of impositions of one on the other but it seems, ultimately, human nature will prevail; the strong imposing it’s values and beliefs on the weak.

Maybe a good solution, a means of avoiding the discomforts associated with factionalism, would be to remain apolitical, avoid the news of the day, and even, if necessary, maintain one’s being outside of the social milieu.   It’s not an unprecedented move after all; Buddha did it and by all accounts ended up in quite a favorable situation.

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haiku mantras

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So, I’ve been thinking, as I continue to pursue my meditation practices, that perhaps, in addition to mandalas as primary visual focus, haikus could be used sort of like mantras as additional mental foci:

Generally, a haiku might emphasize one’s meditative intent:

Be undistracted
Clear, open, alert, focused,
Perfectly present

Or:

Past is no longer
Future remains to be seen
Now is eternal

Or, possibly:

I must be conscious
Enveloped in thought, knowing
What it’s like to be

Sometimes, though, I get caught up in irritations that interfere with my goal of achieving some sort of enlightenment. Perhaps an appropriate haiku might ease or erase the problem:

Cultivate mindful
Compassionate responses
To those you despise

Or:

Inhale deeply, breathe
Expose the fallacies of
Acquired dogmas

Although, I’m not sure if this tact might not exacerbate the problem:

Mean words, hurt feelings
Hypersensitivity
Empowers the weak

Well, you get the idea. I’ll try these out; see which ones help me get nearer my goals. Actually just writing these haikus is quite enlightening.

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Beyond the Grave

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I see by the calendar All Soul’s Day and with it The Day of the Dead is here. Death isn’t something most of us want to think about very much but at this time of the year, with nature racing toward dormancy, the topic tends to come to mind.

In medieval times death was on everyone’s mind daily. The Black Plague invited Death to be a regular visitor if not a live-in house guest. She became so well-known she starred in a regularly performed play called the Danse Macabre. In the play the black Angel would appear and, along with her spirit helpers the psychopomps, invite victims to accompany them beyond the grave; the beyond being, I guess, a promised land of paradise.

Throughout history (and even earlier than that I bet) people have sensed an existence beyond the grave: The ancient Egyptians conceived of a Ka or immaterial double that would live on after the demise of the physical body so the deceased would be able to keep doing the same fun things they had always done when alive.

The philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer was inclined to believe that, upon death, an individual’s will or essence of being would be reunited with its Cosmic origins from which it originated, which is a pretty cool idea of togetherness even though one wouldn’t really be aware of it because one’s memory and ego would cease to exist.

The Hindu people understand the universe to be eternal and that rebirth will continue to happen until enlightenment of the soul propels a leap into the infinite, which, I guess must be a bit like Arthur’s cosmic origins.

Contemporary Trans-humanists anticipate a situation in which one’s brain activity is downloaded to a computer and since the brain is where one’s being resides one can expect to live on forever provided someone is around to keep the batteries charged.

I’m sure I’m like everyone else in hoping the Black Angel stays away for a while but when it does come time for me to leave the realm of the physical, wherever I end up, I can always look forward to new experiences.  Or, perhaps, oblivion.

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Contemplation

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I read the other day about a study done recently that found that a lot of people have a really hard time being alone with their thoughts.

Apparently, researchers had asked volunteers to sit alone in a room for fifteen minutes. The room contained nothing but a table and chair and a machine that would produce mild electrical shocks if one chose to use it. The study found that a fairly large number of the research subjects chose to administer shocks to themselves rather than be alone with their thoughts for even fifteen minutes.

Letting one’s mind wander to past occurrences or future possibilities seems to me pretty natural so I guess I don’t understand what the problem was. Focusing on the eternity of now, I must admit isn’t always easy but my mind is pretty good at wandering.  In fact, I was just thinking about the movie, Altered States, in which the protagonist, William Hurt, submerses himself in a sensory deprivation chamber, which is essentially a tank of warm water in a totally darkened cubicle, for hours on end, day after day. His idea was that by doing this he could get in touch with his primal inner self. I guess he succeeded because he ends up developing simian characteristics.

So, I’m wondering if the reason most people are unable or unwilling to be alone with their thoughts is that they fear glimpsing their innate animal natures. If this is the case it sure explains our inclination to constantly be distracting ourselves.

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Mindfulness

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I’ve been engaged for the last eight minutes or so maintaining awareness of the reality before me; not focusing on anything in particular, just contemplating the here and now. Thoughts occasionally enter, generally from the left, and pretty much pass right through and out to the right. Sometimes a thought gets stuck on its passage through so I have to give it a nudge so as to bring myself back to the here and now.

Traveling, as I am, down the road right now, the here and now is changing by the second; probably not an ideal situation for meditation; kind of distracting, really. And, having traveled this road numerous times before familiar objects come suddenly into view that bring thoughts to mine; thoughts that need to be ushered out stage right, lest I be drawn into thoughts of past circumstances and lose the here and now. Even as I concentrate on the here and now ‘veneers’ of association supervene adding layers of meaning that I gently, lightly erase without disturbing the here and now.

I’m up to about ten minutes now and my concentration is kind of fading in and out. With effort I know I can bring it back, aware, as I am, of the enormous benefits of mindfulness.

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The Singularity

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I’ve been reading lately about the technological singularity. As I understand it, the TS is that point in time when artificial intelligence becomes self-generating, independent of human manipulation and progresses to an understanding of the nature of reality beyond anything now imaginable.

The idea is, as far as I can tell, that AI, in the not too distant future, will evolve to the point of being capable of superseding the limitations of human intelligence to such a degree that it will provide nearly limitless knowledge. Many of the presently undecipherable mysteries of our lives and universe will be understood.

One might even think of this super-intelligence from a religious perspective: a lifting upwards out of the abysmal darkness of ignorance into the shining light of revealed truth.  Sort of a scientific Rapture, I guess.

Assuming humankind will be integrated into this new super-knowledge, I wonder how people will react? Those of a religious nature, I imagine, will be busy re-interpreting their doctrinal sources and those of a more scientistic bent will probably be in rapturous awe. The dilemmas and anxieties humankind faces these days will be eliminated, easily solved, or reduced to triviality. Before long Newoman with her god-like immortality will be hard pressed to remember what the hubbub and to-do was all about.

Still, one has to wonder what new and unimaginable dilemmas will replace current concerns. Knowing the nature of humankind, it’s hard to believe there won’t be something significant to worry about.

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Lost in the Wilderness (Traveling Day)

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It’s been raining for three hours and I’m lost again; or should I say still lost. Every once in a while I get this idea that I may know where I am in relation to my map.  And, of course, if where I am in reality is this corresponding spot on the map then maybe I’m not lost. It’s just that I’m not sure and there’s no one around to ask for directions, which, of course, stands to reason.

I haven’t seen anyone for quite some time, which does have its definite upside. There are no distractions to the purity of my being-here; no psychic interference or need to perform. Not that there’s anything wrong with friendly exchanges with total strangers but even those are intrusions of a sort.

I think being lost in the wilderness, as long as fear isn’t too much of a factor provides the means to eliminate identity, ego, that pesky Self that tends to get in the way of attaining a deeper consciousness and developing a profound peace within.

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Lost in the Wilderness (Animal Rights)

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Being in the wilderness has me thinking about animal rights. The animals here are all so friendly and self-reliant. They come by my camp and pay their respects but don’t beg; they’re not looking for a handout. They appear to feel pretty safe around their anthropomorphic visitors.

They’re happy, I think, in part because they’re free to pursue their romantic relationships, form bonds of friendship, and, for the most part, live a full life to a ripe old age. Which, of course, is very unlike domesticated food animals who may in the best of circumstances be given the opportunity to live happy lives, albeit short ones, in green pastures, but may find themselves on factory farms where their short lives can only be pretty miserable, which makes me think about the ethics of eating meat.

According to Jane Goodall, animals are much more sensitive than we ever imagined. I take it Simians were some of her best friends so I guess she’s not anthropomorphizing the issue. Perhaps from an ethical standpoint we should all be vegetarians at least.

There is a rationalization for meat eating, though, that I find reasonable. The conjecture that, when pre-historic man harnessed fire, cooked food, heavy in protein ignited an intellectual growth that raised humankind, for better or worse, to the imaginative, inventive being she is today. I suppose this allows one to surmise that continued meat eating, done responsibly and in moderation is condonable.

But, as I sit here enjoying my animal friends I’m not inclined to see any of them as potential dinner.

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