Understanding Dependent Origination - The Enlightenment of Dharma

Dependent Origination is the least taught, most misunderstood but most important aspect of all of Buddhism. Dependent Origination is the natural law that the Buddha fully realised when he became enlightened. It is not magic, it is not mystical, it is to do with the grounding truths of all logically possible realities and how they affect the emergent realities we experience as sentient humans.

At first site Dependent Origination, to western analytic minds, seems so obvious, it even has exact analogies in classic logic and metaphysics that have propagated from the pre-Socratic philosophers to modern reason. But what the Buddha did was to not only see it as fundamental but he understood the subsequent effects Dependent Origination has in all aspects of reality and, importantly, the limits it puts on reality.

To understand impermanence, emptiness and negativity is to understand the Dharma but to understand why all systems are impermanent or why there can be no ego, the answer comes back to Dependent Origination.

"If you know Dharma, you know Dependent origination. If you know Dependent Origination, you know dharma." The Buddha

What Dependent Origination is Not.

If you ask a learned Buddhist what Dependent Origination is, or read in the vast majority of texts concerning it, you will most likely have described a complex wheel of causation. This wheel has twelve stages that encompass rebirth, suffering, ignorance and is termed The Twelve Niddyas.

Historically the Twelve Niddyas came at least four hundred years after the Buddha’s life yet they have become interpreted as being the actual concept of Dependent Origination rather than a mystical (pertaining to the supernatural) interpretation of Dependent Origination as applied to some notion of rebirth. This is a catastrophe to a widespread understanding of Dharma because it obscures the original and crucial meaning of the concept and thus excludes a deep and true understanding of Dharma.

An analogous case would be to say that a constructed, complex economic cycle that nobody but a PHD economist could understand was the law of "supply and demand" and then to expect budding economists to be able to move on in their studies from the confusing and inaccurate set of first principles.

Dependent Origination is a simple and rational principle, when properly understood its about as far from the mystical as one can get.

What Dependent origination Is.

Think for as long as you can about these four statements:

• If I knock at your door, I am on your doorstep.
• If I walk up to your door, I will be on your doorstep.
• If I am never on your doorstep, I will never be knocking on your door.
• If I stop being on your doorstep, I will stop knocking your door.

And then ask yourself these questions:

Are the statements all true in this world? Is there a possible world where the statements might not be true? Are the statements true together, that is, if one is true must they all be true? You can easily come up with trivial examples where they are not true, for example, standing off your doorstep and knocking with a big stick, but without adding any extra information to the statements, it seems that they are absolutely true in all cases.

If, like me, you are forced to conclude that the statements are true in all possible worlds in which they make sense, then you understand the foundational formulation of Dependent Origination. That is it! An anticlimax compared to the esotericism of the Twelve Niddyas, perhaps, but it is this conditionality that is Dependent Origination, nothing more.

In scriptural terms Dependent Origination is most simply expressed as:

• When there is this, that is.
• With the arising of this, that arises.
• When this is not, neither is that.
• With the cessation of this, that ceases.

1.

The first point we need to make about the above expression of Dependent Origination is that the this and that stated will be any this and any that. This is hugely important Dharmically because it referring to all possible things, all possible systems and events and representations. What the Buddha realised was that conditionality isn’t the domain of some isolated syllogism but that it applies to everything, necessarily (The Buddha had no idea about quantum randomness; I am not sure how this would fit in with Dependent Origination.)

When you take this and that as being any possible this and that then it can be seen that Dependent Origination bestows three properties on the causality of reality:

· Transitivity - Conditionality is transitive. If P then Q then R, if not P then not R

o Note that in the world there are countless ways for events to happen, eg, you may open the door for another reason than me knocking on it. But that would be a different event, even though "on paper" it’s the same event.

· Generality - Conditionally applies to any causally related events at any level of abstraction.

· Totality - Conditionality applies to all events/systems/things. There is nothing outside of the conditionality of all things.

Everything is a cause and everything is an effect and the effects of causes are never singular and the causes of effects are never singular. The Buddha realised how reality is the vast, consistent and complex web of change, that there are no distinct unchanging things that can possibly be connected with reality.

Why is Dependent Origination Dharma?

I outlined here about the Three Marks of Existence, Annica, Anataman and Dukka, and how all of Dharma flows from them. I belive when you understand Dependent origination it is possible to see how these Three Marks are necessarily the case. Even now after many years thinking about this it hurts my head to see it all as one body of truth. I think this is why Meditation is considered so important to Dharma practice, as it may offer a way to apprehend these conceptual structures outside of the rigid lingustic structures we are used to relying on. But here goes:

Annica – All things are impermanent

Because all conditioned things originate within this transitive web of causation it follows that there is nothing to remain a constant. There is no thing that is isolated from the changes that flow following the principle of Dependent Origination. This applies from the neurons in my brain that make my knuckles tap on your door to the sound wave you hear and everything that follows from that and leads up to that.

As soon as an event happens, as soon as a thing changes, it is gone and the next change is happening, the effect becomes a new cause. And so on. And so on.

All conditioned things are impermanent. Everything is change.

Anataman – There are no objects/egos/souls

Because all things (systems, events..) are conditioned things it follows that there can be no thing that is isolated from the web of causation and equally no thing that appears from nowhere within the web of causation (QM randomness aside?). If Dependent origination is true in all possible realities then all possible realities are consistent. Consistent interconnectedness and impermanence preclude the possibility of their being something that is excluded from interconnectedness (a distinct thing) or immune to impermanence (an eternal thing.)

Ontologically impermanence and interconnectedness manifest in the impossibility of anomalous things, like miracles and souls. Psychologically impermanence and interconnectedness preclude the possibility of a constant distinct self/ego. There are no distinct objects in mind our world, however the illusions of perspective may make things seem to the contrary.

Dukka –Negativity/Suffering/Decay is Inevitable

Consider a deck of cards arranged neatly in suits and imagine the order changing (shuffling) as all things do. Any change will be a change away from that order, and, in addition, the probability increasingly decreases the more the deck is shuffled that it will to the original neat order. The deck of cards has a finite possibility space and the vastest extent of that space is change away from order not towards

The same is true of all systems that constitute reality; change will take place in a finite possibility space. In physical terms this fact is captured by the Second Law of Thermodynamics. In economic terms by the Law of Diminishing Marginal Returns. In human terms by realisations such as “the more of Great Thing X you have, the less great X becomes.” Change reduces the possibility space and if that space is valued by some other agent (like you) then change tends towards the negative.

These kinds of realisations are the opposite of difficult, if dogs could think like us, they would think the same. It’s not just that all things change but that most change tends towards the negative. The Buddha realised that this fact was self-evident. Moreover, when the inevitable negative was apprehended by sentient beings with qualitative experiences (like you) the realisation, conscious or not, will be bound to create negative experiences in the being.

This is why we suffer, the Buddha thought; because we constantly crave for the inevitable negative to not be the case. Accepting our impermanence and the impermanence of our good experiences is one thing but clinging to the hope that that may not be the case is fundamentally going to only bear bitter fruit. It cannot be any other way.

Dukka applies to solar systems and ecosystems and air-conditioning systems, but where it solidifies into suffering and strain is when the inevitable negative is apprehended by sentient systems, just like me, just like you. The only way to lessen the negativity of the inevitable negative in ourselves is to end attachment to transient things and to remove ignorance about the ontological status of things (ego, object, others...) and see the world as it really is. The method he reasoned from these realisations was to follow the Noble Eightfold Path and embrace the transitive and the inevitable negative.

Conclusion

Dharma is science and reason, to think otherwise is to place the contaminating teachings of scholars and monks who came centuries after the Buddha’s teachings as being more authoritative than the original teachings. It seems this has happened with all religions, but with Buddhism are lucky. We still have the original, wonderful, rational, sceptical discoveries of The Buddha available to us, but in addition, we don’t need them. We could erase all of Buddha’s teachings and start again just from that first principle of Dependent Origination that enlightened the Buddha and arrive using nothing but reason and insight through the Three Marks of Existence, the Four Noble Truths to the practice of The Noble Eightfold Path.

Dharma is simple and rational, not mystical and obscure. It takes us from the core truths of reality to a personal and social morality and understanding where compassion and love are not assumptions but conclusions entailed all the way up from the first principles.

Dharma is truth, to prove it wrong one merely needs to disprove Dependent Origination.

What is Karma?

A twitter post compelled my to quickly try and get down on pixel paper my thoughts on what Karma is.

As with, I think all Dharmic concepts, Karma is best understood as pertaining to systems rather than objects/people etc. So before explaining how I see Karma I’ll outline what a Moral System is to me:

Moral systems have emergent moral properties.

A moral system is a system that can emerge moral properties. I am a moral system. You are. Society is. Religion is. Schools are... and so on. All of these moral systems share the possibility of having moral properties attributed to them. Properties such as right, wrong, fair, cruel and just.

Moral properties are internal, in that they refer to the system or they are external in that they refer to some other system.

In addition these moral systems have the potential of specific attitudes towards other moral properties; my dislike in your unfairness, your compassion for their suffering, a charity’s stance against world debt.

Moral systems have emergent evaluations of moral properties.

Moral systems are able to refer to their own moral systems and in these references they necessarily will value distinctions between moral properties. (I believe it’s these constant valuations that all moral systems have to make that add the core bivalence between right and wrong into our moralities.)

A value within a system is a propensity to pursue or avoid some future state to which the value pertains to. If I value cream-pies then I will pursue those. If I hate cucumbers, I will avoid those. The same is true of moral properties, as moral systems will behave in accordance as to how they value the moral properties they can pursue and avoid.

All of these evaluative properties we can boil down into two abstract notions, the positive and the negative. Loosely, the positive are the things I or you would prefer to be the case and the negative are the contrary.

Karma is the causal interconnectedness between all Moral Systems.

I think that Karma is simply the network of moral causes and effects that radiate from each of our actions out into the world and, importantly, into ourselves.

The moral effects of our actions may be external; you make someone happy, you annoy an entire country . or they may be internal; your pride at your kindness, your guilt at your selfishness. This is all Karma is. We are in a sea Karma. It is our lies and admissions and hopes and fears and all of these motivators that guide not only us as individuals but the institutions around us.

Often people mistake Karma as being a substance or energy or force, and you can see why because all morality is potentially interconnected it is has this substantive aspect but that is just an illusion. The only sense in which Karma can be accurately seen as a Force is by analaogy to physical causation.

The cue ball causes/forces the black ball to move. The bad deed causes/had the karmic effect that Bob was sad.

If you are a good person the chances of you having a good life are increased, not because of some supernatural reward system but because of the “karmic feedback” of your actions and thoughts, internally and externally.

If you are a bad person then your lies and violence and guilt etetcera will increase the chances of you having more negativity in so many ways. Not only the obvious, like punishment etc but also in terms of ones psychology. The Buddha realised this and now so many studies are confirming it.

I think most people, when you take away the “majic” decorations that millennia of Buddhist culture have added to the concept of Karma would see it as the simple and obvious fact: good moral causes have good moral effects.

Nothing is Important V2

Nothing is Important

Nothing is important, save time.
Nothing is important, save for happiness,
Yours, and theirs, and mine.

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This is the second attempt at this poem. The first is here.

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Kingmaker Prologue

My Novel is coming along nicely. I am about half of the way through and have just finished the first draft of the Prologue which I am putting up here. Comments very welcome, mat@salted.net


Kingmaker

Prologue: The thirty eighth abacination


Even though the cabin was chill and draughty, Fanza was sweltering as soon as he had the cuffs duct-taped onto his freshly shaved wrists and ankles. In the dim light of the vanity unit he inspected each cuff carefully, trimming the frayed threads of the tape with his knife’s scissors.

Back facing in the mirror Fanza took a new four-blade and started shaving from the bottom up. Even though his collarbone seemed smooth he shaved it again. All parts of his body were parts of the sequence, the routine.

Under the left jaw to under the right jaw and all the way down. Then ear to ear to ear across his chin and cheeks and lips. His eyes had bits in them from the exfoliant, he shaved around them and then he shaved his mottled brow. He shaved his temples and then he binned the blade in readiness to shave his skull which he wet and lathered some more.

Taking his time he took away the blonde stubble of two days, tracing the hairline and a centimetre outside. He shaved his supple shoulders and upper back then picked up the unwhite towel with the faded ferry logo to dried himself.

Fanza cut off two ten centimetre strips and used this to tape the inner lapel of the under-suit to his chest and shoulders. Then he cut a meter long strip of tape and with surgical slowness pressed this twice around his neck, the second an inch higher than the first.

Picking up the makeup mirror from the shelf Fanza twisted his head and checked in the second reflection that there were no holes, tufts or cuts.

“Done,” he said, taking a moment to relax

Fanza looked at his watch as an announcement came over the boat’s sound system, first in English and then Spanish. The Bay of Biscay would be docking in one hour. Fanza checked his watch and quickly cleared all of the items on the shelf beneath the mirror into their stuff-sacks.

He attached the travel shower to the cabin sink’s tap and then, like a magician setting up a trick he unfolded the pristine dust-sheet. It was his eighth remaining, the other seven carefully filling sack number five. The sheet was laid out on the floor between bed and wall underneath the tiny sink that for two days had had many purposes. He taped one edge under the sink and folded the remaining edges up and onto the bed to be laid flat and covered by his rucksack and its arranged contents.

The American stood inside the dust-sheet shower, took off his watch and dropped it to his feet and then he turned on the tap and started hosing the outside of the suit and his skin. When all was drenched he turned off the tap and took the reused hair conditioner bottle from the bed. The contents were a white paste that over the next ten minutes Fanza would carefully rub into every inch of the under-suit. It made his finger-tips sting.

Fanza squeezed out some paste into his left palm and started quickly coating his ankles and his feet. His hands and wrists were next. It was building up slow, the burning, caustic, chemical agony.

“Breath big. Breath big,” he commanded himself, when all but above his shoulders was done. He took stock of the pain and his expectations and tried to stay calm as he squeezed the final dollops into his palm.

He closed his eyes and slid his fingers over his face and ears and neck and brow as fast and meticulously as his could. Through the pain. Nostrils, lips and stone black eyelids. He counted quietly but with determination.

The escalation of the sensation was more than pain.

“Nine Mississippi,” he blindly clawed as a medusa of hurt was woken inside his head. Biting and spitting at his face and neck. All the agony in the world felt his alone. He drowned in the molasses of thirty Mississippis of pain. Breath out.

Fanza knew he could not scream. Every time he felt the paste he could swear in his thirty years it was beyond any pain he had had before.

He fumbled sightless for the tap and turned it on. More than parched, washing his mouth first. His lips were stinging so much. He washed his nose next then his eyes and the rest for rapid relief. Stepping out of the dust-sheet whilst rinsing one foot at a time then he reached down into the creamy water and picked out his wristwatch.

He was sweating. On edge, hot and hurried.

Fanza dabbed down his blotchy and blistering skin with kitchen paper and gave the last application of the preparation, a white thick coconut oil, scented with radiation.

He took his third of three suits out the rucksack. It was still in the dry cleaning bag which was tightly duct-taped inside a vacuumed bag. He scrubbed his boots in the sink with the conditioner and rinsed them. Then he lifted up the now sloshing dustsheet and managed to get most of the water down the sink.

“Lots of time. Lots of Time,” he said as he slipped in a new set of insoles and tied his boots tight half way up his shins and five inches over the under-suit. Then Fanza taped each boot to the under-suit and let his trousers fall back down to cover. Standing, coat on over jacket, rucksack on, hat on, nose plugs in, gloves on and lastly his spectacles were on, and on.

“Here goes.”

Fanza opened the door, turned off the light in the cabin and was walking slow, adjusting to the insoles before the cameras came. Left, along the corridor, his knees went out a fraction with each step. He passed some passengers on the stairs. Heart fast, Mind alert. People were looking at him in the busy junction of stairs, public toilets and the first deck. Up the stairs to the outside deck he sprung smiling and blistered. The wind was so cold, it felt so good, chilling him, soothing his face. He shivered in the air and inconspicuously dropped the binbag of his rubbish over the side of the ship.

Around to the starboard side, the land side, past freezing families waking up fast. The morning lights of Plymouth in winter filled the horizon. Fanza took his heavy ruck-sack off he waited for the ferry to clunk and bump of the ferry clunked and bumped into a standstill at the port. Dead on time. He waited ten minutes until the majority of foot passengers had disembarked.

“Into Babylon,” he muttered to the salty breeze as he walked the gangway down. His key-card binned, he felt prouder than he looked.

In customs he saw the cameras and thought just about his gait, that was the only thing he could change right there. They scanned his passport but not his eyes, they couldn’t sniff his genes.

Outside in the drizzle Fanza looked for the white van with the black man that was parked as expected to the left of the terminal. The headlights lights flashed once and then the walking Fanza could see the driver disappear into the back.


As he approached the van the side door opened and there was Matte smiling from inside. Without greeting, Fanza unslung the ruck-sack and handed it to his friend. The handsome Ethiopian stepped back into the front and reached over to open the passenger door as Fanza slid the side-door shut.

“Nice weather for it,” said Fanza, shutting his own door and smiling as they were reunited. They shook hands tight. When Fanza smiled his lips cracked and Matte got a look at the real face of his friend.

“Oh Allan Sir, it’s great to see you! I won’t say that you look well!” he laughed and winced at the same time.

Fanza laughed and his lips cracked more.

“Owwww...” he said, lifting his gloved fingers to his face, halting touching just in time. “This truck is safe?” he asked.

“Yes Sir, one hundred percent,” answered Matte. The certainty in his voice allowed Fanza to relax.

“You have no idea what that means to me Matte, no idea. Let’s get out of here buddy,” he said, tapping the dashboard.

As they drove they started chatting about how Matte was finding driving on the left. Then they talked about Matte’s first week in England and his incredulity at the cold but soon, before they had crossed the Tamar, they were in the meat of their matters. Unrestricted, without the need for salts and encryptions, washing in each other’s trust, they told each other how it had been.

“It’s been hard,” he started...



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Understanding The Georgia Guidestones

(This is a first and rough draft of a longer essay I am working on)

Introduction

In a Field in Northern Georgia USA there is a megalithic Monument as tall as Stonehenge and on eight of the sides of these stones are written Ten Precepts in Eight World languages.

The originator’s who came up with the idea for the stones and their message made sure they would never be discovered and so now we know more about the originators of Stonehenge than the Guidestones. Stonehenge is over four thousand years old, the Guidestones were erected in 1980.

If you Google the Guidestones you will find about their background and the mysterious middle men who lead to their creation but you will also see that they are considered deeply malign by many people. They have been vandalised. They have had their demolition petitioned. They are considered the "Ten Command Mends of Satan" or mocking proclamations of the Bavarian Illuminati. How could this be?

I read them once and I was blown away by them, and remain so. I saw in these Ten Precepts a mission statement, a method and a beautifully consistent structure that, as one, formed a guide towards a better civilization for the planet and humanity. In every sense I found them utterly benign and without compromise.

How could this be? How could I, with my fair to middling understanding of philosophy think these so pure, true and benign whereas others think them so evil that they get vandalised and their destruction called for?

This is the main aim of this essay is to show that these people are very mistaken in their understanding of the Guidestones. I will show how the Guidestones can only be benign, that if you simply follow the principles of reason, it can be no other way. It is only when reason isn’t used, when the interpretations are unreasonable, that the kind of malign accusations can be made.

This essay won’t try to answer the question "Who created The Guidestones?" Nor will I try to find any hidden messages in the alignments and structure of the Guidestones - in truth I don’t think there is anything cryptic about them. I simply want to try to understand and explain the message of the Ten Precepts.

I have been talking to people a lot about the Guidestones recently and I am often am asked, "Who do I think created them?". I have no idea. We can assume that it was ultimately important to the originators to hide their identity. We can assume that they had serious intentions about the Guidestones - Benign or Malign, they were not a joke or "art stunt."

What is important about the message is what everything focuses on, the text, the message, the capstone statement and the Ten precepts.

I think that when you understand the Ten Precepts then it becomes pretty much irrelevant whether the message was sent back by quantum entanglement from the year 20,000 AD, given as a gift by some alien intelligence or the product of a cartel of wealthy ex-hippies.

The Ten Precepts are carved into the granite eight times in eight languages: English, Spanish, Swahili, Hindi, Hebrew, Arabic, Chinese and Russian.

They Read:

1. Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.
2. Guide reproduction wisely - improving fitness and diversity.
3. Unite humanity with a living new language.
4. Rule passion - faith - tradition - and all things with tempered reason.
5. Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.
6. Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.
7. Avoid petty laws and useless officials.
8. Balance personal rights with social duties.
9. Prize truth - beauty - love - seeking harmony with the infinite.
10. Be not a cancer on the earth - Leave room for nature - Leave room for nature.

This essay is about The Ten Precepts of The Guidestones.

The Monument

In 1979 a stranger walked into a stonecutters in Northern Georgia and, after some debate and assurance, commissioned and paid for a large granite monolith to be made in secret.

A site was found nearby, the land was purchased and in 1980 the Georgia Guidestones were unveiled on this land.

The six meter high monument has a central pillar with four oblong monoliths aligned with the pillar’s corners. On each of the two large faces of the oblongs is written ten statements in these eight World languages. The central pillar and the oblongs are locked in place by a granite capstone, upon which is written a statement in four ancient languages, Egyptian, Babylonian, Sanskrit and Ancient Greek.

Slightly to the west of the pillars is an explanation stone inlaid in the turf that’s not part of the Monument itself.

The Capstone Statement

The Capstone that holds the pillars in place has on it is a statement written four times in four ancient languages: Babylonian, Ancient Greek, Egyptian Hieroglyphs and Sanskrit. Whatever the Capstone Statement says, we should assume that it is the prime statement of the monument due to its position and repetition. Translated to English the Capstone Statement reads:

"Let these be Guidestones to an Age of Reason."

This is the prime statement of the Guidestones in all senses. I spent a while trying to work out which of the various meanings of the Capstone Statement the originators had intended.

But then it struck me that it is all meanings are relevant, this is one of the principles that I think carries throughout the Monument: maximum ambiguity, all applicable meanings are relevant and intended.

The Capstone Statement tells us what the monument is for - It is a guide to a new age of reason. It’s not about any current age of reason, we can see this by the "to" operator in the statement as well as, as we shall see, from the content of the Ten Precepts. I think the Capstone Statement in terms of tense is about a future age of reason to which we are guided towards, but that once "there" the Capstone Statement still applies.

Understanding Reason

Reason is the means and methods we use to preserve consistency between the world and our ideas and statements. If I tell you that "the cat is on the mat", you instantly assume that that the mat is not on the cat. If I hand you a pot of red ink you know, just by looking, that I haven’t handed you a pot of blue ink. These simple reasoning’s and the more complex are at the core of all of our thoughts and interactions, however complex they may be. There is nothing exotic about reason.

If things are not reasonable they are not right.

The Capstone statement defines reason as the prime objective and the prime method of the Guidestones. The Guidestones must adhere to the principles of reason or else there would be, at some level, inconsistency.

The principles of reason are not a complete set of principles but an ever expanding system that encompasses maths, science, computation... However, there are some principles that are fundamental at all levels and which become essential in understating The Guidestones.

• Noncontradiction is the first principle of reason. It is simply saying that if a thing is one thing it is not another.
• Causality is the second. It is saying that all reasonable things have causes.
• Simplicity is the third principle of reason. It is saying that in understanding complex systems the simplest explanation is the most reasonable

If we look at the Monument purely as a granite structure and ask if it coheres to the above three principles we will see that it does, perfectly. Nothing is wasted, all is used. The Capstone is just big enough to hold the slabs in place and yet without it we imagine the monument would collapse - as without Reason the Ten Precepts collapse.

The astrological features are not frivolous additions, they pin the monument in space and time. The significance of the location, again, is a simple application of reason, it’s near America’s largest Granite quarrying area. That’s all there is to it. In the same was as the originators didn’t want us to be distracted by their identity, the location is irrelevant to the message.

If you are a conspiracy theorist who believes that The Precepts are malign, please, you don’t need me to tell you how wrong you are. Just use reason and you will have no choice but to agree, like me, they are utterly benign. How else could they be interpreted?

Understanding the Ten Precepts

I have grouped the Precepts into four categories, Humanity, Society and Individuals and Environment. This isn’t in any sense relevant to the precepts but its a handy way to divide them

The Humanity Precepts

I term the first three Precepts "The Humanity Precepts" and they are the most susceptible to misunderstanding. They are:

1. Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.

2. Guide reproduction wisely - improving fitness and diversity.

3. Unite humanity with a living new language.

1: Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.

Overpopulation is the world’s biggest problem, this has been known about for decades, and it’s getting worse, not better. The UN places the optimum population at about Three billion, we are currently pushing seven billion and by 2040 it could be as high as twelve. No pandemic, no war, no famine stands a chance of reducing this explosion.

It is truer now than in 1979 when the First Precept was cut that our population needs to be managed. This isn’t an evil thing to say, quite the opposite. One thing that is certain about overpopulation is that it effects the poorest and least developed the most. The WHO agrees that smaller families are healthier and happier families. Also and importantly the only viable solutions to the population problem invariably involve the education and empowerment of women, practices absolutely prescribed for by the Precepts.

The First Precept not only recognises the problem of the population explosion as globally paramount, it suggests, unequivocally, an ambitious population milestone of half a billion people. It doesn’t say reduce to this or ensure that this, it says maintain the population at this. The guide is to aim for the ideal and when there, maintain it. That is the core of the first precept.

I thought when I first read it that the sub-clause "in perpetual balance with nature" was just about the environment. It’s not, I believe. I think that it is referring to the actual process of maintaining the population rather than the effect of maintaining it.

The First precept doesn’t say how to maintain this balance in any specific sense. But we do know from the rest of the precepts the kind of solutions that would not be consistent with the Guidestones. For example, putting contraceptives in the municipal water supply wouldn’t allow by Precepts Five and Eight at least and nor would it be in balance with nature, whereas providing more contraceptive choice to all women of the could be.

Any suggestion that the First Precept is even "faintly eugenicist " simply misunderstands the precept and its place within the consistent whole of the Guidestones. Consider these two examples:

"The Georgia Guidestones, which call for the earth's population to be reduced to five hundred million..." Alex Jones, Prison Planet

And:

"Limiting the population of the earth to 500 million will require the extermination of nine-tenths of the world's people. " Mark Shaw, Radio Liberty

From the first mistaken reading and understanding of the First precept there is a snowballing of mistakes that promotes their hatred for the stones. If you don’t use reason to understand them, you can interpret them in any way. If you use reason, as intended, I argue, there is only one way, the benign and right way.

2: Guide reproduction wisely - improving fitness and diversity.

The second of the Humanity Precepts is telling us that in order to facilitate the First precept we will need to guide reproduction wisely. Wisely has to mean more than rationally here - it means we will also need to be insightful to the problems that we will face managing our reproduction in the future.

Precept Two also contains two additional conditions: that reproduction should be guided towards fitness and diversity.

"Fitness" here must mean in terms of any individuals health and fitness but also the macro fitness of Civilizations as a species to adapt to future strains and stresses. "Diversity" must mean in terms of Genetic diversity for individuals and species. There is no reason not to think that the terms in The Precepts have the maximum applicability (ambiguity), the whole think seems more robust and clear if we allow for this very justified assumption.

So rather than any malign eugenic project, I believe that Precept Two is saying that we should be wisely mixing up our genes and trying to make us fitter and more diverse on all levels, from the individual to the future civilization.

3: Unite humanity with a living new language.

The third precept has had its share of controversy but as with the Precepts One and Two, this controversy is unjustified. In order to discuss it I will split it into two components

Let’s look at the first clause first, is uniting humanity a good thing?

In and of its self, I think most people would say yes. We can see many benign ways in which uniting humanity would be good and I believe you would agree that it’s hard to see how uniting humanity in any sense could be bad.

The case for the benignity of Precept Three is further made by the fact that in order for "unity" to be consistent with the other precepts it must cohere with the principles like fairness and justice and truth explicitly stated in the latter precepts. The unity of humanity must cohere with the protection of individuals, their rights, their nations and it must prize truth and goodness. This unity, whatever it is, is clearly intended to be far from a bad thing.

The mechanism for achieving this is stated in the last clause of the Precept. Humanity should be united with "a living new language."

This phrase could mean a number of things.

It could mean simply a new kind of spoken and written language that can be used to unite humanity. This is what most people would think about this at first reading the Third Precept (Conspiracy theorists might care to add that this Slave Esperanto would be used to control and homogenise humanity.)

This is the only point where I think there is utility in going back to 1979 when the Third Precept was handed to the stone-cutters. There was no internet as we know it then, no mobiles, but there were networks, electronic mail, personal computers, program languages, file formats and so on.

If you were in 1979 trying to describe and prescribe this impossible-to-predict explosion of information and communication technology how would you have done it? That’s the question I have been asking myself when thinking about Precept Three.

Its tricky, I have tried. I think that in fact, the term "a living new language" isn’t referring to a living language as opposed to a dead one, its referring to a communication system that has the qualities of living things. Being adaptive and processing and improving

Equally the use of "new" here isn’t referring to a new degree of linguistic communication but an entire new kind of language altogether which its hard to argue isn’t emerging all around us now.

The Social Precepts

Precepts 4 to 8 deal with the foundational conditions of a Civilisation: Law, Rights, Duty and Governance.

They describe a system that recognises the importance of people, nations, tradition and beliefs but they provide a containing framework to allow these often incompatible aspects of humanity to coexist.

4. Rule passion - faith - tradition - and all things with tempered reason.

5. Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.

6. Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.

7. Avoid petty laws and useless officials.

8. Balance personal rights with social duties.

In contrast to the Humanity Precepts, the Social Precepts in the main bring together ancient concepts in a unified and demonstrably good way. When we say good in these kind of hyper abstract senses its important to see that there is no perfect when dealing with humanity, and good is better than not.

4: Rule passion - faith - tradition - and all things with tempered reason.

Passion, faith and Tradition are the three aspects of humanity that capture the essence of the human irrational.

We can reasonably imagine robots that could design the Eifle Tower, but we cannot reasonably imagine Robots that would destroy themselves by, of their own conclusion, jumping off it.

An Age of Reason without passion, faith and tradition would be an age of human robots. It cannot be the extreme reason of the perfect choice, because for most of our issues such choices don’t exist. The Fourth Precept acknowledges that there must be compromise between the human rational of uncluttered reason and the human irrational of passion, faith and tradition.

Reason would never lead to these kinds of decisions:

• I will run with bulls at Pamplona
• I will fast for lent
• I won’t say "Macbeth" in rehearsals
• I will pray for my brother.
• I will not mention "Praying for my sister" because I have one of those but don’t have a brother.

What is tempered reason? Tempering means to harden or soften something to make it more suitable for it’s purpose.

When a knife blade is tempered one aims for the optimum balance between sharpness and strength. It’s that compromise, the same compromise we see between human rational and irrational that the fourth precept accepts and accommodates.

The fourth Precept suggest a simple solution to the conflict between human rational and human irrational, it is this: Allow for all; but let reason rule.

This works well in that it accommodates the existence of irrational beliefs but clearly says they should be subordinate to tempered reason in our choices and systems.

I am convinced that The Guidestones have no atheist or theistic bias, they apply to all people and belief systems without dogma and prescription save for the single condition, "Let reason rule."

There is a Schism in the world between religion and reason, The Fourth Precept is a Guide as to how this can be bridged in a world more Civilized and reasonable than this world today.

5: Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.

This is the first Precept that I imagine will have close to global acceptance on the first reading. For thousands of years it has been understood that Justice and fairness should be the central political foundations for a good society.

I think Precept Five must apply to nations not just in the sense of country and state but in the more general sense of a group of people.

6: Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.

The Sixth Precept defines a simple delimiting principle of governance between distinct groups (nations).

7: Avoid petty laws and useless officials.

The seventh Precept asks us to "Avoid petty laws and useless officials." I think this is saying that though there needs to be the rule of law we should keep laws to the essential and the reasonable and the same with those who govern us.

So not only should Laws be Fair, protective and reasonable they should be significant and relevant, not petty.

In order to see what laws would be considered petty, I think its clear, they would be the Laws that do not promote the positive aspects of humanity, justice, fairness, truth, goodness.

We know that this Precept isn’t talking about irrational laws as they are ruled out by The Fourth Precept. I think that this precept is explicitly about laws that may be reasonable but in their wider context are unrequired, for example Prohibition and laws pertaining to personal behaviour.

8: Balance personal rights with social duties.

In a Civilization the compromises made between society and individual are both ways.

People have a duty to the society that protects and unifies them. There is no explicit mention of what these Duties might be but we can imagine from the Consistency of the Ten Precepts that the duties will be those that promote fairness, goodness, justice and unity.

The Individual Precept

9: Prize truth - beauty - love - seeking harmony with the infinite.

The Ninth precept I term "The Individual Precept" because, unlike the first eight, it applies directly to each of us as individuals.

In my understanding of the Ten precepts we see that as we move down through the them the scope changes from the wide abstract notion of Humanity, through its governing systems and principles to the individual notions that apply to us each directly and personally.

Goodness, Beauty and Truth have been the foundational ideas of "purposeful" lives for millennia. Like with all things, philosophically there are issues but in the vast majority of possible cases these three are very much accepted as cornerstones of a Good life.

The Guidestones keep with this tradition but I believe progress it, but first let’s see what it means to "prize" in the context of The Guidestones.

Value and Rational Action

A rational action is an action that in some relevant sense preserves a value. If I like Gateaux and I eat some Gateaux, then my valuing of Gateaux is preserved by the action. It’s rational for me to eat Gateaux. If I hate Gateaux and I eat some then, of itself, that value hasn’t been preserved. It’s been lost by the action and we would say it’s irrational.

People value many things and often those values conflict. You may Value Gateaux but you may also value your waistline or your low blood sugar, in such cases it may well be irrational to eat Gateaux.

Rational actions are actions that preserve the values of the person doing them. This by no means makes all rational actions "good actions", history and humanity is scarred by the rational actions of evil people.

If something’s is "prized" it is valued exceptionally high. It should be pursued and cultivated and it would be irrational were this not the case. The ninth precept is saying then, that we should highly value Truth, Beauty, Love and seeking Harmony with the infinite and thus live and act in the pursuit of these values.

Truth, Beauty and Love

Truth underpins everything we do. It gives our statements meaning and allows our beliefs to be knowledge. In some cases it is inescapable in others it’s inaccessible but it’s always there. There is always Truth and it is the pursuit of this that should be prised.

Beauty, unlike Truth, is never there, in the world. It is always in the experience of the individual, but still it should be prised, cultivated and experienced.

Love, unlike truth but like Beauty, does not exist in the world. But unlike Beauty, love does not exist just in the individual. Love is a thing that can only exists between individuals, and it should be prised.

Seeking Harmony with the Infinite

The last of the four things to be Prized is harder to fathom, "Seeking Harmony With the Infinite."

When I first started thinking on this ideal I came to the conclusion that this was some abstract new-age hippy sentiment straight out of those times. But that interpretation didn’t seem to fit with the clear and crystalline structure of the rest of the precepts. It would seem an incongruous part of the message if it was intended to be so pithy and "hippy".

It isn’t, the "harmony" clause of the Ninth precept values not the object of any kind of belief but the actual process- the "seeking" - of finding "harmony with the infinite."

This Harmony isn’t about the external to the individual, it cannot be, because harmony, by definition, is a relationship that requires the individual’s involvement with some other system. Whatever "Seeking harmony with the infinite" means, I know it must be about me and my relationship to something rather than something purely outside of me (like some truths are, by necessity).

What is the "infinite" to which we should seek harmony? Is it in space, time and computation? Is it peace with God? Is it harmony with the idea of Nothingness? Is it understanding one’s place in a godless rational universe? We cannot say because, as said, its about each of our relationship directly with these unknowns. These deeper, scientific, philosophical, spiritual or cultural aspects and questions about our place in reality.

It took me a while to see this clearly and now I think it’s wonderful. Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Jew, Buddhist, Atheist, Agnostic the one engine that drives all of these kinds of beliefs is the desire to understand and relate to that which is beyond us in all directions.

Can you think of a statement that could more unify the often violently incompatible beliefs shared by humanity? If you can please tell me.

The Environmental Precept

10: Be not a cancer on the earth - Leave room for nature - Leave room for nature.

The last Precept is not about humanity but the environment and our place in it. The cancer metaphor succinctly captures the human potential for environmental damage; the occupation of area, the damage to natural systems and the creation of toxins/pollution.

It's interesting to see how the tenth precept reconnects with the first precept, but whereas the first precept is about Humanity itself, the last is about the Environment humanity is contained in.

I have puzzled long about why "Leave room for nature" was repeated twice, and to me it’s now obvious. Simply, the repetition is emphasis in the sense of pleading to us all to leave room for nature.

Conclusion

I think I have shown that The Georgia Guidestones are an important and rare and original set of principles that stand up to scrutiny and challenge. They remain consistent but most importantly, the Ten Precepts seem intutivly, morally, rationally, to be so true and apt to all peoples of the planet.

To each of them we can ask, "Would humanity be better or worse where this Precept followed?" And the answer seems evident to me that "yes" is the provable answer.

The Ten precepts are not an instruction manual. They are not Ten Commandments or a list of dogmatic proclamations. They don’t ask us to believe anything whatsoever; they are simple and consistent Guidelines towards a better, fairer, more just, more efficient, less damaging, happier (more loving, truthful and beautiful..) Civilization.

These people, and they seem ever growing, even people I respect, that slander the Gudestones do them and us a great disservice. They simply have not followed the Capstone Statement and so they jump to unjustified conclusions and wholly ignore the demonstrably benign and consistent message.

If you think the Georgia Guidestones are bad, you simply haven’t thought about them enough.

If, like me, you think they are profound and good and true, then you understand them as the originators can only have intended.

Email mat@salted.net

The Ten Precepts from The Georgia Guidestones

Let these be Guidestones to an Age of Reason

1. Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.
2. Guide reproduction wisely - improving fitness and diversity.
3. Unite humanity with a living new language.
4. Rule passion - faith - tradition - and all things with tempered reason.
5. Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.
6. Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.
7. Avoid petty laws and useless officials.
8. Balance personal rights with social duties.
9. Prize truth - beauty - love - seeking harmony with the infinite.
10. Be not a cancer on the earth - Leave room for nature - Leave room for nature.

Please Boycott Google Mars until Google adds Cornwall’s Capitol City to it’s Weather Gadgets Now!

Today I was outraged by Google. I found that in it’s Weather Gadgets, Google lists ZERO locations in the Nation-state of Cornwall. These weather gadgets are used in the Google Homepage and in Google’s popular spying application, Google Desktop. This is injustice.

The Continent of Cornwall is used to such exploitation by search engine giants. Most residents of Kernow still refuse to use Yahoo search since it’s 1996 mistake of suggesting Cornwall was, in fact, a part of England. And indelibly etched on the expatiations of Cornish IT companies is the shortly lived askjethro.com; after pioneering multi-layered Cornish search heuristics in 2003 askjethro.com was obliterated by the legal canons of A very nameless corporation. I can’t even wrote that coperation’s name from within the Cornish internet without being sued or a getting mundane rendition to Abu Ghraib.

Tread carefully, said the badger.

Whether it is marauding mercenaries, mercenary missionaries or men from Microsoft, Cornwall is used to getting shafted. But until now (excluding the infamous “Grampound Line”), the proto-omniscient Googemon has remained on the side of the Kernotropolis.

We have always felt deeply at one with “The G”. When Cornish citizens needed to find out about things in other counties, and sometimes even other times, Google was there. When Cornwall petitioned for a modern progressive online democracy instead of disinterested Westmister-quangol scrag-ends, Google was there with the technology to facilitate and liberate... wouldn’t it be great.

So why... now... have they forsaken us?

The injustice that the closest weather information Das Googen can supply is Plymouth is a bitter injustice. And anyone who has ever been to both Plymouth and Cornwall will know how much better the weather always is in Cornwall. Plymouth isn’t Cornwall. They can’t even swim there.

Outrage at injustice often leads to action. I took action. I decided that I would Boycott all Google Services. I would give “The G” “The Bird”.

After less than a minute I realised that this would not be possible. On an Information and Communication Hunger Strike I made a shoddy Bobby Sands. Simply, the sacrifice of my protest wasn't worth the victory.

However, not one to give in totally, I "fine tuned" my anti-Google protest to the totally encompassing and lifelong new protest: The Boycott of Google Mars.

Whilst they mock and ridicule the people of the Empire of Kernow I shall not be looking at their Online map of The Red Planet. And in this I shall be steadfast - Unless, say, the kids are using it for their homework and they need my help?

It doesn’t matter if you live in Cornwall or not, this is an almost global issue. If you don’t believe me, simply imagine the slight annoyance you would feel if your Capital City wasn’t listed in the Weather Gadgets. I rest my case, and... with you, I pick up my war flag.

My clarion call that shall rattle down these digital ages shall also echo aeons across my small and badly lit office!

I am Lexographically Famous!!

I have always been interested in words, as a child I was even taught some.

Until yesterday I had only discovered three new words in my life. These being:

1. "Bumgollier" - A homophobic term for a homosexual ("gay") man.
2. "Architechtonics" - The art of creating deep/complex technical systems.
3. "Flangeina" - Like a "mangina" but on a female human.

An impressive trio, I am sure you will agree. But it gets better...

Yesterday I came up with a new term that in a matter of hours, powered by its own etymological etiology, became wrought into the semantic framework of an entire planet. Not bad for a boy from the wrong side of the Grampound Line.

You can see the word here: http://tinyurl.com/ctmgf8

Note: Although the Dictionary doesn’t state this, the term is also synonymous with "anticlimax"

Reminises: Taking Tramps for Dinner

When I was about twenty seven and a half I took two homeless men to dinner in Chinatown, London.

I met them in Leicester square one Friday evening. We were sharing the lawn and they started chatting to me, as tramps tend to.

I had just been paid and so a few "starter cans" of Stella in it was like "I'm hungry, do you guys want a Chinese". (I had recently finished reading Songlines where the narrator does the same, only in the Outback (In Australia not the Franchise Antipode bar))

They accepted. I remember one was called just "Billericay" and he was, you got it, Oirish.

I assume the cause of their acceptance was the sound of a free meal rather than any desperate need to spend more time with a lanky "student twat type" (My quotes) but nonetheless, as a trio, we did go.

Hing Loon’s was our destination, it’s still there and remains my fave - I was there last time in London. I had been going there for years with friends and family and, on that summer in the late 90s, two pissedup tramps. Both of whom, in the confines of a building it was revealed, stunk like they had been living on the streets for decades.

We sat on a big round table.

We sat under a drizzle of uncouthness that gradually, by the time the Won Ton's had arrived, increased to an embarrassing torrent of uncouthness.


I don’t think the tale needs the details.

It was a truly educational experience. One I was keen to end fast (I think we skipped the ice-cream with Lychees) and even more keen never to repeat.


Don’t ever take drunken tramps for dinner.

Reminiscences: Our Point of Lowest Parental Responsibility

Three years ago, as you do, I started checking out the legal products you can get on ebay to get you a little high or whathaveyou. Blue Lotus Flowers, Dagga, Wild Lettuce, Salvia, Kratom.... and on and on. There are loads of these things and, in the spirit of adventure, I have tried them all. Most were very low on the fun and effect, in fact, most shamanistic herbs you get on ebay are unable to shamanize you anymore than two Kalms and a cup of Coco.

But there was this one stuff that I bought a sample of, enough for two people called, and remember this name, Hawaiian baby Woodrose. Tiny seeds.

We put the kids, who were like, 3 and 1, in bed, it was a Saturday night. We had a movie to watch. Probably even popcorn. And so we ingested....

I remember sitting there on the sofa cuddling watching the film. All was well. 

Then suddenly my domestic assistant started feeling nauseas. Soon after I did to. Soon after that we were both very very very nausueaus.

It wasn't long before we were both sprawled on the kitchen floor puking for an age into a big yellow rubble bucket (I saw this same bucket last night and it reminded me about the occasion,and thus was catalyst for this post). We were looking at each other, helpless and hurling. If there was a fire we probably would have been screwed. If guests arrived at that point, I don't think they would have stayed long. Maybe just 2 mins to call the social services.

Eventually the puking stopped - but it gets worse. 

We made out way slowly to bed. But we were feeling down. So down. Down and distant from each other and everything. I was cognant and rational, not disorientated...its hard to explain. Imagine being in a black space surrounded by nothingness and believing there was nothing else. We were both like this, holding each other so tight but it was so pointless, loveless, cold. I just cannot explain quite how horrible this state of mind was. 

The next day we got up and were peachy perfect, but blown away by that most worsest of psycoactive experiences. I emailed the seller saying "Why on earth would anyone buy these things??!!!"

He replied back, "I dunno, but I get a lot of repeat orders."

It takes all sorts.

Another Problem with Pascal's Wager

Pascal's Wager is one of the last stands for even vaguely coherent faith based beliefs.

Pascal's Wager (wiki):

"Pascal's Wager (or Pascal's Gambit) is a suggestion posed by the French philosopher Blaise Pascal that even though the existence of Godcannot be determined through reason, a person should "wager" as though God exists, because so living has everything to gain, and nothing to lose. It was set out in note 233 of his Pensées, a posthumously published collection of notes made by Pascal in his last years as he worked on a treatise on Christian apologetics."

In other words, you should belive in God because if you are right, you are rewarded and if you are wrong you don't loose. You cannot be penalised by a possibly existing God if you belive in it absolutly.

There are a number of arguments against Pasca's Wager, here is mine (I think its mine?):

Argument

The wager doesnt take into accont the potentially signigant compromise in the truth, reason and quality of life that one must make if one believes in God. Lets call this the "Payload" of the belief in God. Its the potential to reduce a valued aspect of whatever system we are abstracting about (individual, society...)

The Personal Payload is things like guilt due to the belief or related ideas (eg religion itself), reduced possibilities due to indoctrinated morality or sexual repression.

The Social Payload of a belief in god and what has historically followed from that is the dominating masculin religious establishment globally, the damage this has casued is infinitly incalculable, both throughout history and currently.

I think there is also a Truth Payload as well, in that accepting the wager NOW isn't the same as in Pascal's time. We can stare into creation and life with blinding clarity. We don't know it all, but there is much less mystery than in Pascal's time, and this signifigantly skews the good money away from the stupid bet.

:)

What are Things?

Is the last book you read a thing? If it was a paperback, you would probably answer "yes" If your reading it as an ebook, it might not be so clear. It wouldn't exist like paper does, it would just be a "thing" of information on a memory chip. What about if it was an audiobook?

What are things?

Birds are things. Bird's beaks are things. Molecules are things. Chairs are things, as are galaxies and atoms and waves. I could list of an infinite list of potential candidates for being a thing and you could say for each, "Yes" or "No".

Its a thing. Or Not. Sometimes.... you may pause...

What about the number seven? Is that a thing? Or the number 7.34243 Or the square root of minus one? Or the meaning of the word "ironic" or twentieth King of France. Are they things? Its not so clear.

What do dictionaries say? Things like:

"A thing is an entity, an idea, or a quality perceived, known, or thought to have its own existence."

This dictionary definition points us in the right direction but it doesn't really capture the features of things, nor does it explain the features of non things and, it doesn't explain or contain any information about why what it contain is the case. For example, why are ideas things? Are experiences ideas? Are numbers ideas?

We use things lots in our conceptual framework, but most people, including me, haven't a clear answer of what things are.

An Elemental Definition specifies all statements that are true of the thing defined.

An Elemental Definition of "a thing" will be true of all things and there will be no elements of the definition that any given thing does not posses. Each element is necesaary but not sufficient for "thingdom".

"Thing":

1. A thing is contingent; it can only be, if certain other things are.
2. A thing is divisible; it contains elements that exist independent of the thing.
3. A thing is elemental; it can be an element in another distinct thing.
4. A thing is interconnected; it can exist in relationships with other things, as will its parts.
5. A thing is a reference; it can be represented.
6. A thing is countable.
7. A thing is possible.
8. A thing is imperminent; it can either be or not be.

So what things are thing, on this definition. All objects we interact with in he physical world are clearly things. Bank accounts are things. The experience of a tea ceremony in a Japanese tea-house is a thing. The penumbras of shadows are things.

That, is what I think things are:)

I can be followed on Twitter.com now

I'm not doing much blogging at the moment as I am doing lots of writing, but I am also sending in inande thoughts and actions toTwitter at matripley

I had a big breakthrough with Buddhism yesterday.

I have been a practicing Buddhist for about seven years, which is less time than I have spent studying and tutoring Western analytic philosophy at University. Unlike Buddhists without this background, I feel I have been able to come to an understanding of Dharma without the cultural and historical accoutrements of Buddhism that have augmented the Dharmic System system over the millennium, often in ways incongruous with the initial teachings of The Buddha.

In a very concise nutshell this is what I believe:

Foundational Dharmic Truths

• There is no God
• There is no soul
• There is no self
• There is no heaven
• All is impermanent
• Decay is inevitable
• Dukka: suffering and strain, are intrinsic to the human condition and experience
• There are definite reasons why this Dukka is the case (Thirst, Attachment, Ignorance..)
• The Noble Eightfold Path is the path away from Dukka and towards happiness and enlightenment.

This might not look very interesting or satisfactory as an account of Buddhism. But that's because people in the main come into Dharma from the top down, from the abstractions of Kama, mental formations and - in many schools of Buddhism - speculations about the endless cycles of rebirth what they entail for one's life.

But as I have written elsewhere, I have found it impossible to meaningfully link the core truths of Dharma with the idea of rebirth and its corollaries: that there is more after this life.

But today I had a revelation which for me at least removes the problem of rebirth and closes Dharma off to be specifically what the Buddha Intended, not how it has been variously interpreted.

The Problem with Rebirth

1) Rebirth doesn't fit architectonically with the Dharmic System.

2) Rebirth doesn't fit with the natural observable world whereas the core Dharma does perfectly.

3) Buddhists, even very leaned scholars, cannot answer the question of where Rebirth fits in with Dharma with the same clarity that the rest of Dharma fits together.

The Problem with Buddhist Enlightenment

1) We know that the Buddha was born a normal man who reached enlightenment in his thirties and lived for fifty more years as an enlightened being.

2) We know that whatever enlightenment is, it was a change of state in the Buddha's understanding.

3) We know that enlightenment, at the time, was communicable by the Buddha. Many people became enlightened just by spending a short amount of time talking to the Buddha.

4) In modern times, the idea of Enlightenment is shrouded in so many layers of mystery and profound inaccessibility that to even ask, "what could this state change (enlightenment) in the Buddha have been?" is met with something close to ridicule. This has always troubled me.

So I have been in this situation where I feel I deeply understand the Core Dharma from a ground-up perspective but have been unable to answer what enlightenment could possibly be or why the Buddha even mentions rebirth at all.

Until yesterday I was unable to answer the enlightenment question. My answer to the problem of Rebirth went something like this:

Rebirth has become entwined in Buddhism because the Buddha used it as a metaphor for the change in our lives as they pass by, with each moment a new life, a new birth. This kind of made historical sense because we know the Buddha used many metaphors and we know that all of the people of the time were familiar with the idea of Rebirth because of the Hindu/Brahmin culture.

And thus the metaphor of rebirth became entwined in Buddhism (in various ways and schools) until now people assume it's part of Core Dharma when in fact it seems totally incongruous. It kind of made sense, but I wasn't pleased with it.

The Penny Drops

But yesterday it clicked. It made sense. I had an epiphany. This is what I now think:

The Buddha wasn't using Rebirth as a metaphor, he was using it quite literally, he was referring directly to the doctrine of rebirth/reincarnation that had been the dominant cultural doctrine for over a thousand years before his birth. He was saying, this endless idea that there is more to life than this life is a fundamental part of the problem of Human Suffering.

He was saying, to be happy one must extinguish the Hindu idea of Rebirth because he realised by philosophy and meditation that it was false; in fact the idea itself constituted part of the problem.

The Buddha found the path to enlightenment. This path required the removal of attachment to many various and related notions, such as self, immutable things and discrete things. But also, the Buddha realised, that to be enlightened one must extinguish completely the idea that there is anything supernatural, anything beyond this single short life and world of ours.

You cannot be truly enlightened in this life if you place yourself within the possibility space of some life after this. There is none.

To extinguish that last flickering candle of hope, that there is something more than this life of Dukka, is to reach the final stage in extinguishing this Dukka.

I am a Buddhist. I am an Antitheist. This is my only life. There is no rebirth.

Salt tops historical award

http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/2403/17-molecules-altered-human-history-molecules-changed-wold

Bad Times, a Letter to Muji

To:Customer Services 
Muji Europe Holdings Limited 
8-12 Leeke Street 
London 
WC1X 9HT 

Dear Sirs/Hunnies,

I have long been a fan of Muji's functional minimalism. I believe your pencil cases are the stationary equivalent of a Zen Koan, and for this I thank you.

However, this festive season you failed me, and, in a deeper sense, you failed yourselves.

I received two Muji gifts from Santa, a pumice stone and an Egg Timer. The pumace stone was a well cut piece of solidified pyroclastic froth that will perform adequately upon corns and dry skin (which I currently dont posses). 

The egg timer leaves me with an incredulous sense of despair at your quality control. Both the package and the device specify it is a 3 minute egg timer but, after multiple tests, including the one on this youtube video, it saddens me to say the timer times a period of 2 minutes and 56 seconds.

I hope you will agree that a four second error is simply not acceptable when determining such relatively short metrics.

I like this egg timer, it looks good, and, before realising the temporal blasphemy this timer commits every time it times, I was going to carry it around with me to time things. This is no longer possible.

I am sure you will refund me whatever this item cost, but I don't want that. I want a either a three minute Muji egg timer that times for three minutes exactly, or twelve Muji egg timers with an error margin of no more than five seconds in either direction. This latter option provides the possibility that when needed I can use all twelve timers and average out the result. Thus, we would hope, achieving something like accuracy.

My address to send either one accurate, or twelve inaccurate, Muji egg timers is:

**********

********************

Once recvived I hope we can put this malign point in our supplier/consumer relationship behind us.

Warm regards,

Mat.....

To USB a Pirate

I found a USB Key

On a memorial bench, overlooking the sea.

Contents: Rolling Stone, 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

Who owns these? I found them, are they mine?

Why I am Pro-Illuminati

I have been researching the big conspiracies for my new novel, Kingmaker. One of the things that keeps coming to me as unavoidable is how Pro-Illuminati I am becoming. I guess it's much the same way that researching marine ecosystems would make you more pro-fish. I think that The Bavarian Illuminati may be seen in a bad light just because they are a shadowy secret government that's been influencing the Tides of Man since before the Euphratean slave camps discovered The Power of Few Over Many.

But I think if we could all get to understand the Illuminati better we would be able not only to serve them better but perhaps, in time, really have them open up to us. They are people too and though we only ever know about their generals, the Bildebergers, Masons and Churches, we must assume that they, in some sense, would rather feel loved than hated. Increase the Peace, even with your Hidden Overlord God Emperors.

So, rather than just saying that we should offer an olive branch to the Illuminati (clenched between trembling buttocks), I will outline why I think the Illuminati are A-OK.

Firstly, they are European, and although I am not nationalistic in any bigoted sense, I just feel happier that the world's secret overlords are, like, from my patch of The Illuminati Hegemony. If it was the Americans or the Russians or the Chinese who really had been running the show for three millennia it would just seem a bit, I dunno, retarded. America wasn't even around then!

Secondly, their principles of enslavement have evolved over the last three thousand years into something that is at least able to maintain a certain quality of life for the higher ranked prisoners as well as, relative to the ancient prisoners, much better chances of living into adulthood for the lower ranked prisoners. Every one is a winner with The Sons of Terah.

Thirdly, they are Smart and Smart is better than Dumb (Remember you can hate Bush and Brown and still be Pro-Illuminati). Because The Real Illuminati are a quasi-totally-secret-society (“the line between two shadows is stronger than the edge of sword” Analogs of Terah CIXIXIIX) most people never get to hear about how smart they really are. Which is a shame. Making a best selling fiction novel exactly about them to destroy the sniff of them that people had after WWII and during the Cold War was a work of genius. Putting your secret overlord “tags” all over the place, Awesome! As was smuggling the debt of existence into religious guilt to gain extra shackleless control. Who would have come up with that today? Nobody!!! These guys, throughout history, have again and again trumped the prisoners at every turn. That's why they are the masters and we are the slaves. Respect.

Fourthly, when the Illuminati Hegemony is ready to fully homogenize the world into a global unified socio-economic slave camp where punishment is the absence of false-liberty and reward is relative to subservience/genetics there will at least be easier travel. Many of the barriers to global travel in the past have been due to secret conflicts with maverick secret governments who have accidentally discovered The Power of Few Over Many. When we are finally totally enslaved, thes boundaries won't be possible, which means less queues and more time on the beach for all of us.

So, I hope like me you can see that Illuminati Hating and Baiting is just wasting their time – which is much more valuable than our time to the ultimate progress of humanity – and our own time, which you have very little of, and even less that isn't working to keep the prison running; satisfying its its multitude of requirements.

Don't hate them, just because they own you.

Come Back Mickey Rooney

Today I met Mickety Rooney in a lift,

He was smaller than the smallest man ever,

And so wrinkly; like a grumpy mad wallnut,

I asked if I could shake his hand,

And he told me "No, I can't 

I've just broken it."

Snap.

Good Docs Just Started Sucking Big Digital...

Way before Google Docs was Google Docs it was called Writely. If you search this blog you will finjd many prasiworthy refrences to it. I was Zelous about it then.

Last week a colleague lost his laptop harddrive and was having tremendous issues getting it all back, a year ago I said "use google docs" and this week I had the chance to say, "If you had been using..."

I' writing my novel, Kingmaker,  in Google Docs. Its going very well, I have a single document for the text and google Site for the notes, structure etc.  The fact whever I am I can edit a cetrl version with full history is just brilliant. Googl Docs rules! Until about ten mins ago when I was writing away and got this:

Pantaloons!!!!

Thats crazy, I am only at 25,000 words into Kingmaker and it say no!!!! 

I guess I'll just have to stop writing and play Fallout 3 instead, until Google can quit with their stupid file size limmit on this. Oh Calamity!

Review Proporta Silicon Soft Touch Ipod Touch Case

I recently was forcibly upgraded to the new second generation Ipod Touch and this time I was determined to keep it as shiny as new; the back is a magnet for scratches.

In order to do this I got myself a new case for it, from Proporta:

I have been using Proporta PDA cases for years, their innovation and customer support is beyond compare. So they were the first choice - I went and got myself  their new Ipod Touch dual skin case and a screen protector.

I had a Proporta  silicone cases for the first gen Touch, it was good, but wasnt double skinned like this new one. 

Its kinda weird- the double skin - you can see in the picture above how the white skin is beneath the outer black skin -  the of two-tone-tech-bone aesthetic actually increases the look of the Touch, a feat I never thought possible.

I could probably wax on pretentiously about this for a few more paragraphs, but suffice it to say, its the best case for the ipod Touch.

Check it out at Proporta.com

Is Nick Berry More than We Think?

Today, for reasons unassociated with this moment, I was deconstructing Nick Berry's groundbreaking song, "Every looser Wins," and in it  found a depth and poinancy I was genuinly not expecting.  Is this a Threnody for the Victims of The Hegemony?  I'll let you decide,

Every Looser Wins

We nearly made it 
We nearly found the perfect combination 
The road was right, we must have read the signs wrong 
And now it's all gone 

But if we'd made it 
Could we be sure that it was for the better 
Who could say we would have stayed together 
Nothing is certain, in a changing world 

Every loser wins, once the dream begins 
In time we'll see, fate holds the key 
And every loser knows, the light eternal shows 
Will shine on you, and all those who knew 
We nearly made it 

Suddenly we seemed to stop and lose our way 
But did it really matter anyway 
For that was yesterday 
And we must live for now 

Coz every loser wins, once the dream begins 
In time we'll see, fate holds the key 
And every loser knows, the light eternal shows 
Will shine on you, and all those who knew 
We nearly made it 

Stand up and count me 
I know you're on my side 
Shine down on me 
And those who believe 
That we can make it

Booootifully Stupid: let's Boycott Bernard Matthews Turkey products just because they must be stupid.

I have written three poems inspired by the new range of turkey products from Bernard Matthews. I have tried make each poem able to stand on its own thematically, whilst each offers the others stylistic support when they are read one after the other, as intended. I feel that "Drummers" should come first but I am sure a lot of the less buffy poetry slammers might want to try deconstructing it by flipping the order they are read, it's up to you. Incidentally, this paragraph is also a poem.

Turkey Twizzler

Aeons, Bernard Matthews, You have sold turkey eaters turkeys, for tea.

Today,  Bernard Matthews, A new range of turky stuff, You tried to sell me.

But, Bernard Matthews, the name of the range is insane, Are you thick?

What, Bernard matthews, could have led to the Big Green Tick?

Which part of the process of your corportate might

Missed the part about the Turkey's parasites?

The tick?

The tock.

The Penny Drops.

Turkey Drummer

Once I respected you, Though I am not sure why,

You reminded me of an uncle, Wholesome inside.

Bright red cheeks and kinda lame tweed,

Peddling your poultry on my 80's TV.

I wouldn't say I was a big fan, as turkey is kinda dry,

But as Corporate bosses go you seemed my kinda guy,

But you went too far, there is nowhere to go,

There is a big green tick next to big daft bozo.

Family Ipoddery

We have a new Ipod Touch 16 Gigs in the House. It is a thing again of beuty beyond compare. Those billions of you that read thesaltedsolution will know that I was one of the first prosumers to get the Ipod Touch in the UK and now, over a year down the line I still think its just so so so good and getting better.

However since getting a shiny new model and knowing how much it can loose its polish,  it is no longer known in the house as the "ipod" but as "mypod."

;-)

Dear Complainers to the BBC

You stupid humourless idiots,
Life is too short for your lameness
I think the pus of your festering pettiness,
Oozes from the fact you're not famous.

(In refrence to compaints against the BBC, Russel Brand and Jonathan Ross complaints)

Google Chrome's Bookmarks

I have been using the fantatsic Google Chrome brosr since it came out, if you havent tried it you really should give it a whirl (Download Chrome for Windows).

One thing that was a bit weird about itb was the Bookmarks handling but now a month or so in, I have to say, I love it.

It is kind of a tool bar/menu bar hybrid that can be set up in many different ways. The reult is that when I started off It as awkward to make sense of comapred to say, the Firefox or Ie systems. But as it tweeks and changes with one's use  entire  a sub-interface evolves for you.

I would like it to have integration with my cloudbased Google bookmarks, that will surley be in soon.

Try My New Ultra Mobile Game! For Free!

Over the years I have designed a number of computer games. MondoPondo is a multiplayer quiz game with adult Truths and Dares. In fact, MondoPondo Wilde was the World's first computer game for Lesbians. And thats a fact. Its now defunct but Lesbians are going strong. Though not at my parties. Alas.

I designed the vastly underplayed 22Kung (from the blurb:"Use your Monks and all your cunning to capture your opponent's Jade Fountain and become the master in a game that combines the tactical planning of Chess, the simplicity and gameplay of GO and the drama of Kung Fu.") which by now I was hoping to have been bigger than Sudoku and Online Poker combined. I think maybe the graphics could have been a bit better. 

And there there was Factland, which I designed a while ago, bought the domian, specced the game and then, stupidly, didn't repurchase. Lesson learnt.

But now I have a new multiplayer game that you can try for free. For reasons of public decency it is only playable by pairs of Male Humans where at least one of the pair is concenting to play. The game, that is causing a stirr, in at least the streets of my mind, is Eyebrow Tennis.

Eyebrow Tennis

How to Play: 

As you walk down the street and a man approaches you you must raise your eyebrows. This is your serve and the completion of the game. You must now decide who was victorious:

Winning and Lossing

• If the man replies with a Brow Raise, then you are both winners.
  
• If the man doesnt raise his eyebrows, then you are both losers.
  
• If, as you approach, he raises his Brows before you, then he has won.
  

You will find, as you get better, that there is much skill, subtlety and cunning in the game's tactics. 

Not only is this a great new game for all the men of the world to play so that there may be unity and a lasting peace, thus stopping, once and for all, masculine aggression's cancerous hurricane upon humanity and the planet; it is also a Paradox of soritian import.

  

War of Guns, A Great Little Flash Game

http://play.igamesfun.com/warofguns.html

Money ad Debt

My freind Luke pointed this out to me, its a great video where the content/information/enlightenment is inversly proportionarte to the production valued.

Palindrome

A palindrome is Never odd or even. 

This is a fact that's weird belivin'

Because when you read and both ways see,

That final period frames an anisotropy.

Scanus Horribilus?

Nobody cares enough to monitor me;

This, the nonproblem with surveillance society.

For really all they can really see,

The information that might protect me,

Or you, if you walk through,

The streets their cameras look onto.

This Public is not the place for privacy,

But in my home, that place is for me;

And this, my Brother, is a Sanctity.

The Money Myth Exploded, a great short read.

Watching Zeigtest Adendum got me interested in Banking again. I used to have a skepticism about banks after watching some youtubes on the Federal reserve. But then I listened to a Skeptoid podcast that put over a very convincining arguement for Banks: If it wasnt for banks people couldnt borrow money to do things they cant afford to do at a given time. 

I dont think that argument carries much weight now (eg Zopa ) and even if it did, banks are a scam, as this almost kids story really well explains. The prose isnt great but the clarity is fantastic.

http://www.michaeljournal.org/myth.htm

Please Watch Zeitgeist Addendum

Last year I watched, a couple of times, Zeitgeist: The Movie. The second time I wacthed it with my wife and we were both Blown Away and despressed buy what is a poorly produces but fantatsically informataive and thought provokiing movie. The opening sequence is perhaps the most harrowing opening sequence of any movie, escpially a documentary.

But its not just a documentary, its a call to arms in a sense, the director clearly and desperatly wants you to think about his content.

The second movie in the series has just been released, its called Zeitgeist Addendum, and it is Mind Blowing. It truely is. I think you should watch it.

You can watch it right here:

Or www.zeitgeistmovie.com

The Google Homepage and Google Chrome and our Privacy

If you haven't tried Chrome yet from Google, and you use Windows, you should give it a go. I have been using it since its launch - I was an avid Firefox 3 user, but Chrome is just simpler, faster, safer, smoother and, well... better. Its quite a revolution in browser architechonics, baby.

http://www.google.co.uk/chrome

The Google Homepage

And once you have Chrome installed you might like to see how its new Java Script engine handles your own perosnalised Google Homepage. This homepage comes over as a super-useful set of web  applciations and content sources that you can chop and change to your heart's content. Replete with huge amounts of integration into the other websites, it is, prima faciae, the perfect portable preferenceable personal portal to "The Cloud". However, this is not the case.

The Google Homepage is in fact a Hegemonic Honeytrap designed to analise and scrutinise and prioritrise (by their priorities, not yours) your life as a digital prisoner in the guilded penitentiary of the aforementioned Hegemony. Your entire psychometic and cognitive patternality  is constantly being syphoned off your online life, via your Google Homepage and past, through stegonoinformatic internet tunnels into The Dark Cloud (Yes, the same "Dark Cloud" as used by the CIA, ASDA, and Interpol)

If your kewl with that, it;s well worth using. 

Oh, and it works really well on the Iphone/Ipod Touch so that even when you're out and about everything about YOU is recorded in various senses, for YOUR protection from purchsing the wrong products.

I'm actually pleased that I am so DEEPLY suckered into this fuctional funfare of faux favors because I know that at some point in the future The Google will be able to "help" me. They haven't yet, and let's hope they don't (Or is it do?)  but soon they will realise the value TO US of the data they clandestinely have been sucking FROM US for over the last three decaces and they will realise they will be able to SELL US this information that they BORROWED WITHOUT TELLING US and, moreover,  we will be happy with this.

I really don;t mind running headlong into a total surveillance society so long as:

1. Never in our homes.
2. Never in our chats to questional "Dominatrixes" on an Internet Relay Chatroom called "The Castle of Sexual Disfunctionalism" in about June 1994. It was a Sunday morning.
3. Encryption is never illegal.
4. No bugging without a Judge's permission.

But, before The Google totally gets into massaging the flows of humanity and intelligence I wish they would allow you to add a Gadet get to your homepage for reading emails from an alternative Gmail account. Thanks in advance.

Amila's Wedding Photo's

I have so far been to two weddings in Sri Lanka, the last one was Amila and his beutiful wife Sandya. 

Here are the official  photos

:)