Evolution, Science & Religion (Evolution)

by romansh , Saturday, June 30, 2012, 16:15 (4311 days ago) @ xeno6696

The common notion in western thought, a myth in fact, is that we're free to do as we please. This is the notion of free will that Buddhism rejects.-> Consider someone with an IQ of 80. How likely is it, that this person is going to be a famous physicist? She might want to be, but no amount of will is going to make you push beyond a handicap like that. 
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Plainly Tabula Rasa is false or at least only partially true. No arguments here Matt.
 
> It accepts free will, but not, as I said above, in the western sense. A small quote from Nietzsche: "A thought comes when IT wills!"
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> Buddhist training teaches you to become an observer of your own mind. It trains your volition.
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> Free will is a muscle in Buddhism, meditation is how you learn to exercise it. 
This rings of dissonance again for me. No self versus free will however partial. My will is dependent on its environment (I would include my body in this sense as environment). -> I'm using ego in a more technical sense. I think the ego in Buddhism more closely maps to Freud's "id." At any rate, as I said above, when I learned exactly how little of what I did was volitional, when I learned how much I was ruled by my passions, it was THAT that I found scary. I felt less in control of myself. I'm still not, but I'm getting better. -I understand Matt, I find it's not just passions but everyday events that control me. I'm not saying there is no feedback to the environment, but any line I draw between my 'self' and its environment is purely arbitrary.
 
> Obviously I share your interest, but the only thing I can probably relate to you is that meditation feels like waking yourself up while in a dream within a dream. You become aware that you're dreaming, try to wake up, but perhaps barely realize that you're still not awake. There's techniques though to help mitigate this inevitability, and supposedly there was a man who accomplished it 2500 years ago...-This reminds me of the much maligned Blackmore and her first of the Ten Zen Questions, Am I conscious now? After much meditating on her part the conclusion she came to was the answer is No.-Even without any meditating, just simply interrogating my experience, I can see why she would say this.-> I started reading "The hero with 1000 faces," and had to set it down. It is a DENSE read. I needed to learn more mythology. 
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Yep, I got to about page 30, and decided this was something I didn't need. Read the last page though, albeit somewhat later.
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> I own the "Power of Myth". Maybe I should tackle that before "1000 faces."
I found it a great book. I have read it three times now and dip into it as the occasion arises. Each time I have read it I have found something new that touched me. It's much easier than "Hero". Let me know what you think.