A Quote by Shantideva

Whatever joy there is in this world
All comes from desiring others to be happy,
And whatever suffering there is in this world
All comes from desiring myself to be happy.

Autobigraphy in 5 chapters (Portia Nelson)

I came across the following poem, which struck a real chord with me, while reading The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche. (An amazing book, by the way.)


1) I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I fall in.
I am lost...I am hopeless.
It isn't my fault.
It takes me forever to find a way out.

2) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don't see it.
I fall in again.
I can't believe I'm in the same place.
But it isn't my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

3) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it there.
I still fall in...it's a habit.
My eyes are open.
I know where I am.
It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

4) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

5) I walk down another street.

Bad dream

Last night, for the first time in about 10 years, I had a nightmare which woke me up and left me terrified. I'm not really sure why the dream occurred when it did. I was in a room, there were some alien greys on the stairs and bunch of people in the room. I felt no threat from these aliens, and I asked "Are these 'visitors?'" and the response was "no," although someone mentioned that "Jesus was a visitor." I got the distinct impression that "visitors" were a subset of the alien greys, a particularly powerful and dangerous subset. Then I dreamed I was in my bed, and I was being pulled up. I continuously recited the Buddhist refuge prayer as an antidote: "I take refuge in the Buddha, dharma and Sangha. By the virtuous merit that I collect, may I be attain Buddhahood, to benefit all sentient beings." My legs were being pulled upward, but my torso was staying in place. Then I dreamt I woke up, and I saw a tiny figure fleeing down the hall. I felt like I had the upper hand now, and I chased it. Then it became a rather menacing alien head which fell down the stairs where I chased it. I kicked it, and then picked it up, feeling like it was dead and defeated. I went outside, where there were some people in the parking lot. I showed them the alien head, and one of the people put it on top of her head as a joke. I began to get worried that it still had power, so I suggested we destroy it. I suggested we cut it up with scissors, but then I realized it had them under its control now, because they attacked me, although not in a particularly violent way. Then I woke up, terrified. Lying in my bed, I felt scared to open my eyes in case there was an alien there. As I was lying there, I came to the conclusion that this alien was an actual creature, perhaps not corporeal, with whom I had some kind of karmic debt. Like a good bodhisattva, I made the aspiration that the suffering I was experiencing be sufficient for all sentient beings. But then I became so frightened at that prospect, I started arguing with myself and part of my mind said "I was just joking." Anyway, it's pretty anticlimactic from there. I did eventually fall asleep.

The alien grey was always a very disturbing image to me, and I've had some nightmares before involving them, though as I mentioned this was many years ago. When I was really young, I had a dream about a giant glowing skeleton which scared me in exactly the same way. I think this skeleton and the grey are the same archetype in my unconscious mind. As for the question of why? What does it mean? What does the grey represent? I don't really know. It's a very powerful symbol in my mind, and I have some guesses, but I don't really know. Before I went to bed, I had been thinking about this alien symbol (not frightened at all) and I was wondering why I had found it so disturbing in the past. I thought it was something I could ask Lama Norlha Rinpoche. Then, lo and behold, I had a dream about it. Makes you think.

Meditation methods

There are many, many types of meditation. One major distinction is between calm, abiding meditation ( shinay or shamatha), and analytic meditation ( vipassana or insight meditation). Once one practices shinay for a while, one's mind is clear and stable enough to engage in insight meditation. The root is shinay, and I'd like to describe a few basic shinay techniques for the possible benefit of my readers.

The first type is called shinay with a focus. First sit in meditation posture if you can, or sit in a chair with your back upright and straight otherwise. You can have your hands rest on your knees, or in your lap, often with the right hand cradled in the left. Choose an object of your focus. For example, it can be a candle flame or a sacred image. Now keep your attention loosely on that object. Whenever you find your mind has wandered, bring it gently back to the object. Although this seems easy, it's not, because the mind very easily wanders away. The meditation trains us to be mindful. Whenever we notice our focus has been lost, we give our mind something concrete to do: bring it back to the focus. Do this or some form of shinay for at least 20 minutes a day. If you just do it sporadically, it will help on the day you do it, but will have no lasting effect. It would be like attempting to boil water by turning the burner on for a few minutes every few days.

The second type of meditation is called shinay without a focus. Sit in meditation posture as before, the only difference being that your eyes are half-open (as opposed to fully open.) They can be closed if you want. Now the idea is to let your mind rest in emptiness without conceptualization. Whenever you notice that you are thinking, let go of the thoughts and bring the mind back to a state of emptiness. This meditation also trains the mind in minfdulness, it trains us to be aware of our thoughts. When we see that we have a thought, that's the important point. Then we let it go, don't follow after it, don't let it carry us away in a dense conceptual web. Just let it go and repeat. Although experienced meditators can let their minds rest without distraction in a natural state of empty awareness for hours and days, beginners like us will find that thought arise almost continuously. Over time the gaps between thoughts will lengthen, however.

The third type of meditation lies somewhere in between the first two. Here you focus on the breath. Whenever your attention wanders, and you notice it has wandered, you gently bring it back to the breath. You can count breaths, say up to 10, and keep repeating. You can also internally say the mantra OM AH HUNG synchronized with the breath, so that when you breathe in you think "OM", when you pause ever-so-slightly before breathing out you think "AH" and when you breathe out you think "HUNG." One of my favorite meditations is to combine this focus on the breath with a meditation on compassion (bodhicitta). When you breathe in, imagine that all the afflictions and suffering of sentient beings are drawn in to your nose in the form of black smoke. It collects at you heart center, where it is transformed into white light, which you then breathe out, purifying all sentient beings of their sufferings.

I am grateful to Lama Norlha Rinpoche for teaching me these methods, and giving me permission to teach them to others. If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask.

Codex Seraphinianus

I found out about this amazing book, Codex Seraphinianus, while reading a collection of articles by Douglas Hofstadter. It purports (or does it?) to be an encyclopedia of another civilization or world, written in another language that is indecipherable to us. Most of the images are delightful containing all sorts of playful modifications of form from what we're used. Hofstadter compares it to music. I've included some of my favorite pictures here although I would definitely recommend finding it and looking at it yourself. When one browses the internet, the standard refrain is that large university libraries have it, and indeed, that's where I got my copy.

The first image is from the "botany" chapter. Who says plants have to be connected, or only have one root? The second image is from the "physics" chapter indicating a contraption for some physical experiment that presumably makes sense in their physics. The third image is really funny is all I have to say, and so is the fourth, an entry on one of the various tribes that inhabit this other world.

More philosophy of mind

Beckett, in a comment below, asks: "What if it is true that our rational decision-making thought process is actually a fantasy ; a running commentary to justify decisions already made (a concept supported by some evidence, according to a NY Times article)."

I think this is probably largely true. The way I see it at the moment, the decision making process occurs largely unconsciously, as does the thought generating process. But, who is coming up with that running commentary, and more to the point in my mind, who is experiencing the running commentary? As far as I see, it is our awareness that experiences the results of our unconscious thought processes. However, I don't think that our actions are completely determined by our unconscious mind in this way. What would the point be of our awareness if it were powerless? I think that we can affect the way our unconscious mind works through our awareness, but it is subtle and it takes time.

Mount Timpanogos Photos Part 3

First photo: Emerald Lake, fed by a year-round snow field.
Second photo: Tibetan prayer flags someone had hung on the little structure at the peak. Very cool!
Third and Fourth Photos: A lone mountain goat that was wandering around very close to the summit.

Mount Timpanogos Photos Part 2

The first image captures some mountain goats high on a rock wall. The third photo is a view of the top.

Click on pics for more resolution.

Mount Timpanogos Photos Part 1

I hiked to the top of Mt. Timpanogos about an hour south of Salt Lake. It's definitely among the top hikes I've ever been on, if not the top one. It ranks among the hikes I've done in the high Sierra in California.

Be sure to click on the photos for a larger view.

Salt Lake City

I took a little (1.5 hour) hike from my hotel room up the side of an adjacent foothill this morning. It was hot, but the air is so dry that it didn't feel too bad, especially with a hat. The temperature is actually about the same (95 degrees) as back home, but it feels infinitely better here. I snapped this picture when I reached the highest point I could get to in time. I had a talk to present at 1pm, so I didn't have the luxury of climbing all day, even though it looked like I was about 20 minutes from the peak. Alas. The surrounding countryside is stunningly beautiful.

If you lived in Nebraska, you'd see this all the time!

On the road I'll be

I'll be leaving tomorrow for Salt Lake City, where I'm attending a conference. I've decided to drive because I love to see the countryside change as you move further west. It's about 1800 miles from here, which I plan on doing in two and a half days. The conference itself is three days long, so there'll be more driving than conferencing, but that's okay. While in Utah, I hope to get a bit of hiking done. I'm bringing my trusty camera with me so hopefully I'll get some good pictures. See y'all later!

Hofstadter versus Searle on the mind

I read I am a Strange Loop by Douglas Hofstadter several weeks ago, and it contains an extremely good explanation of something called Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem. This is a result in the foundations of mathematics that says, essentially, that there are true mathematical facts that cannot be proven. The heart of the proof is a method for reading a second encoded meaning into arithmetical statements, one which is consistent with the axioms of arithmetic, but which actually means something else to us. (Similar to the way a string of zeroes and ones underlies the entire operation of your computer, and yet you are reading a different meaning into it.) Hofstadter then points out that this is the way consciousness works. There's the laws of physics which underlie the operation of our brain (kind of like the zeroes and ones), but then there's our conscious experience which arises from symbols interacting at a higher level.

So far, I have to say "Right on!" However, here's where things get sticky. Hofstadter argues that once you have a set of symbols in whatever substrate, the human brain, a computer (not too hard to imagine) or anywhere else (hmm), which is sufficiently complicated then there lies consciousness. John Searle argues against that point of view. He says that computers will never be conscious, even if they act like it, because they won't understand what they're doing. He doesn't explain what makes humans different, though.

I personally believe that the truth lies somewhere in the middle. I don't see any reason why computers can't be conscious. Maybe they can, maybe they can't. There definitely seems to be something special about conscious awareness. But here's a question. Could I act like myself, going about my usual daily activities, in the same way I always do, with my conscious awareness shut off? When I phrase it that way, it seems more intuitive that I could not, and that actual conscious awareness is concomitant with behavior of a certain kind.

If a computer were made that acted conscious, would we ever be able to know that it is conscious? It seems unlikely that that could ever be settled scientifically.

And what about the Buddhist perspective? After all, in Buddhism we seek to understand the nature of mind. Well, I don't see any reason why, within the Buddhist framework, computers can't be conscious. There are all types of sentient beings, in all different types of states. (In fact, in one of the hell realms, mention is made of metallic beings.) But, just because I don't see a reason why not, doesn't mean I see a reason why. :)

And now, I must go eat lunch...

One last poem, for now, from the vault

A conversation between the ears of God


Stick your Euclidean prick
Where a conversational vortex
Glimmers and shines
Sparkles and whines
Stick your Euclidean prick where
"Dad's (famous) shorthand" system
Mirror of self
Lurks like a beast ready to spring
Lurks like a metaphor wrapped in cliché
Lurks like a recursion beyond order 2
(Hofstadter thinks like this.)
And that's why rhythm should be preserved
For if it breaks
It will lead to a pantheon of apathy (weak: antiphony)
Clutching a bottle I contemplate (...)
Hidden fear of alcoholism just like Daddy G.
Gee: it's great I meant to say grand
Poetry requires honesty, the "one true (garbled) thought."
Imagine zin is zang and yang is zid.
That was a self-quotation, almost.
Appending I must append, tinker and fix
Separate sentences are required
For each prisoner
of language
Beginning a line with prep
Oh. sition. What? That's pretty damn stupid
If you ask me.

Another poem from the vault

Hills in the desert
Staring at the plains
Cacti, ocotillos, sagebrush, creosote, pinyon, nolinas and juniper
Horned lizard, bighorn sheep, fox, lynx, coyote
In the end there is always a reference to sex
A pass, a lookout, a drop-off into a canyon
My family is with me
My mom is about to be diagnosed with MS
I am free in my own world
I am jubilant
I am crazy
I am struggling to connect with another
I see the clouds spilling and breaking over the mountains
and am awed by their beauty
I am composing songs in my head
I am composing elaborate constructions to show enough primes exist
I am getting impaled by cacti
I am a balloon losing contact with the earth, floating away free

A poem from the vault

I must have composed this when I was in grad school:


One must pay attention to form
words.
One must be alert to detect
subtlety.

Two lie together and share
a biological moment
and bask.

One, two
One, two
and through and through
the vorpal blade goes snicker-snack.

One must pay
attention!
To form words one must be
alert!
Two detect subtlety.

On a less serious note

I went to see the Simpsons Movie today. I got a free ticket when I purchased the season 8 DVDs. It was definitely worth it. Very funny. I also got to see some interesting trailers. (By the way, "trailers" seems like a misnomer since they don't trail behind the movie but actually precede it. Perhaps they should be called trawlers as they are trawling for viewers. But I digress.) One was for a movie in the Resident Evil series, which I know nothing about, but involved a virus that turns almost all of humanity into zombies. (It wasn't specified whether they were flesh-eating.) I'll bet I would hate the movie, but seeing the sketch in the trawler was definitely interesting. I'm not really into the horror/scifi genre. I am however a huge fan of intelligent scifi and fantasy. This is almost universally absent among movies, although there are exceptions, but I have read a large number of really good science fiction and fantasy books. (Disclaimer: I have never read, nor do I plan to read, Harry Potter.) I read the Lord of the Rings trilogy when I was younger and absolutely loved the books, but I actually never read the last 30 pages because, subconsciously I think, I didn't want the books to end. I later reread the series, including the last 30 pages, in time to see the Peter Jackson epics. This positioned me uniquely to nitpick every deviation from the book. Something that really bothered me, but apparently no-one else, was the scene in the first movie where the troupe is attempting to cross the mountains through a dangerous pass. They are forced to turn back because the evil wizard Saruman is creating a storm to block the pass. All very well and good, except that in the book, it is the mountain itself, Caradhas, that turns them back. Gandalf uses the incident to explicitly caution against the view that there is only one enemy. In an age when George Bush says "You're either with us or against us," giving voice to a simplistic view of the world where things are divided neatly into two categories, good and evil, I thought that this parable of Tolkien's was very apt. Things are more complicated. Even though the mountain spirit had no stake in the war, no alliance with Saruman, it was being independently belligerent. That's the way things go. I therefore was very unhappy to see Jackson bulldoze over that nuance and recast the incident more toward the George Bush worldview. But in any event, I digress yet again.

An explanation

Soon after posting the previous poem, I heard from a couple of concerned family members wondering what the heck was going on. Basically the poem is a combined lament, using artistic license, arising from two events in my life. Currently my wife is working in Cambridge, Mass, and has been for many weeks. She's coming back pretty soon but I nevertheless miss her. The other circumstance is that a good friend of mine, who was a sponsee of mine in the A.A. fellowship, has stopped coming to meetings and essentially broken off contact. All at once, the two people who I talked with the most, essentially my two best friends, have absented themselves. This gave rise to that poem, which I felt I needed to share. Still, I'm actually doing well, and I don't want anyone to worry about me. :)

A poem

She's gone.
It hurts.
No number of words will change that.
No amount of activity will remove that
From every thought.
I read in a stupid book that we grieve
Not for the ones lost
But for ourselves.
I read in a beautiful prayer
May all beings abide in equanimity
Free from attachment and aversion
That hold some close and others distant.
I held her close and now she's distant.
She's gone.
It hurts.

Life is like a dream

According to my understanding of Buddhist philosophy, appearances are like a dream. But, if appearances are like a dream, why can't I simply crash my car into a tree, since after all, I would only be dreaming it? I think the answer is that, although appearances are illusory, my mind would not be able to carry that awareness through a car crash. My body would be shocked, and my mind would quickly become attached to confused appearances of the world. Moreover, as it is attached to the appearances of this world, it will also be subject to its laws of physics and karma. So I would die, and my mind would be reborn in a lower realm, as that is where the wind of karma would probably blow me, even though that karmic wind is actually an illusion. On the other hand, an enlightened master, when he or she dies, will be able to maintain their awareness through the death process and remain unattached to appearances. Of course, I'll bet most of my readers regard this worldview skeptically. :) A less controversial example of the same phenomenon is sleep. Most of us cannot maintain our awareness when we sleep. However, some people can lucidly dream. In fact, my Buddhist practice has increased my skill in this regard, though it is still rudimentary. Other people can witness their own deep sleep. They experience states where they are aware and present, watching their mind in the deepest phases of sleep. I read about this, and someone I know actually does this sometimes. An realized master, on the other hand, can maintain his or her awareness throughout their sleep.