Darwin, Purpose, & Electric Gold. . .
A friend recently said to me that the only good reason to ever write, is because you have to.
I have not had to write in awhile. So other then a few notes, quotes, and memos, I have not sat down to put much out. A lot has happened within the last several Months. And those experiences have floated about in memory for a bit, until I realized I had to write. So here it is, and on a positive note, I also view it as a kind of safety mechanism. It helps ensure a sense of authenticity. I am not a good enough writer to ever fake that.
To begin with I had the chance a few weeks ago to attend a live video conference with the movie Director David Lynch. What interested me was not just the fact that it was David Lynch, who is brilliant, but also the title of the video conference. . . .consciousness and unity as related to the creative process.
Talk about a title.
He began by talking about recent revelations that have occurred to him, and how this relates to the unicity of mind, universe, and self. But I was hooked at unicity. He spent a lot of time talking about meditation, and tapping into that dynamic source of mind for creative breakthroughs in Art, and meaning. He talked about the importance of Authenticity, and he had an obvious faith based on past observation, that if you truly were following your bliss, then all else would follow. He expressed that the variety of Artistic mediums he used was directly related to the need he has to stay creative. And I am really sure he expressed all of it much better then I am writing above. I didn’t take notes, and I didn’t try and memorize his exact use of metaphor. But he used a lot.
He then fielded a whole lot of questions. A lot of these were related to movie making, which was interesting to me in the sense of anyone who is great at their craft being interesting when they share the discoveries that have come as a result of that. And he also answered a few about movie stars I can’t remember.
But two questions in particular really captured my attention.
The first was a question asked by a clearly uber cool, way too hip, angst ridden, I am a dangerous artist type. He questioned Lynch on the ‘edge’ that might be lost when an artist takes on that optimistic, evolution of consciousness, there is only one, type of realization. How that may lead to a more soft and fluffy type of message. . .to the loss of that crucial hint of darkness, the loss of that artistic edge.
Lynch, without pausing even a breath for thought, ripped open the questioner immediately by saying. . . .yes, I used to be that person myself. I used to think that playing that dark, moody, artist role would get me laid more. And it did. And I identified with that, and so I thought I needed it for that quality. But then I realized that was just an act. It was bullshit. And it left me. . . . . . . . . the questioner sat down.
The second question was about the process of revelation. The movement of real transformation, which seems to also at times lend itself to severe emotional lows. The highs of authentic introspective realizations can often mark just how low the daily operating level of consciousness we each display can be. Which when measured against such an extreme high, or chased after, becomes a low which can feel seriously debilitating at times. It was a process that every authentic artist, craftsman, thinker, lover, or joker, knows all too well.
Everyone nodded at the problem presented.
So when dipping as far into that dynamic well as you are proposing Mr Lynch, how can we prevent those lows?
Again, without any pause, Lynch started asking the questioner to close his eyes and visualize something in the mind. He said:
“Imagine that mind is like the empire state building. And it has thousands and thousands of rooms. And many of those rooms remained unused, are dark, dusty, and have not been opened in years.
And then imagine that the Empire State building produced this amazing energy. And this energy was beautiful, like ‘electric gold’. . . .but sometimes this energy gets stuck, sometimes it doesn’t come out of the building as it should. So you have to get inside the building and clean it out.
So you have hundreds of these robots. And these automatic robots go through the building, room by room. They enter all the old rooms which had not been cleaned in decades. And they clean each room. . .step by step, through the entire building”
Now the small crowd at the video conference is looking around nervously? What is he saying?
And then he said. . .”And you have to imagine that those robots tend to kick up a lot of old dust, a lot of old stuff, and its going to float in the air for a bit, and make things murky. . . .he paused. . . . .But the thing is, the electric gold just keeps flowing through.
I might have just massacred David Lynch’s metaphor here. But trust me, I had an honest moment of. . .”Oh”. He is a great speaker, and you can’t possibly plan what he brings in the moment.
Man is the only animal that blushes, or needs to.
-Mark Twain
I watched an interview with two of Americans top scientists in the fields of biology, and evolution. James Watson, and E.O.Wilson talked about Darwin, evolution, and DNA. It was one of the most fascinating interviews I have seen in a long time.
What struck me were their answers to questions related to modern day evolution. Does what we know of evolution, DNA, and conditioning leave room for “evil”, for that sort of ‘choice’?
No, and the realization of that can lead to a different take on crime and punishment, and civilizations as a whole.
Does mankind still evolve?. . .absolutely.
Then the natural question. . . . . is man evolving for the ‘better’?
And the answer was that the preponderance of evidence suggests that we are evolving to be nicer human beings.
When asked how that relates to the incredible extremes of violence we now seem to have, Wilson’s answer was. . .”Just imagine what it was like 20,000 Years ago.”
He had a point.
“It is remarkable how much trust we have in each other as human beings now. All things considered.”
I want to sit in a room with those guys and ask them a hundred questions.
I’ll share the one minor point I had with how they presented their ideas. They rejected flat out the process of revelation, as a tool. That would be fine, except they then went on to articulate the fact that Darwin was perhaps the most important man who ever lived. Also ok. But this belief was based on the fact that for whatever reason, Darwin was able to, by simply looking around at his surroundings and thinking, realize to a large degree where we all came from.
It was similar to how I have heard Scientists, who are really familiar with the history and theories of Albert Einstein, describe the process he used when realizing his world changing revelations. A paradigm shift so vast, that only an incredibly creative, intuitive pull of energy, can bring it into focus.
It is the kind of thing that comes through to us. . . . .if I wanted to go out on a limb I could even describe it as God reaching out and making contact with itself.
So at that level of realization, what similarities would a Darwin or Einstein share with say a Shakespeare, or Mozart? Speaking only for my own idea on the subject, I think that thing they share sometimes gets undervalued by experts that come from fields that measure nature. And I think that is probably just fine.
I think that is what poetry is for.
It is you who will define which I you think of, when you say I.
-Ram Dass
A Bodhisattva set off on a journey to meet the Buddha. As he walked he ran into a man on the road sitting in the lotus posture meditating. Only this man had not bothered to find a shady spot in the road, so his skin had become rough. When the Bodhisattva asked the man what he was hoping to achieve, the man said he believed absolutely in the force of will. That if he just had the strength, the power, the discipline, then he would be able to achieve freedom. And then he said. . . . . “when you see the Buddha ask him long it will be until I become enlightened”. . . and the Bodhisattva agreed.
A few days later the Bodhisattva came to a different man who was camped by the side of the road. This man was dancing, laughing, and singing. There were children playing about, and women dancing and laughing, food, and wine, and a festive, joyful mood. And then the man stopped dancing for a brief moment, and he asked the Bodhisattva . . . .”when you see the Buddha ask him how long it will be until I become enlightened.”. . . .and the Bodhisattva agreed.
He then went on and had his meeting with the Buddha.
On the way back he ran across the man he had met first on his journey . . . .by this time the man was almost dead. He had worked himself ceaselessly during the day, and had maintained an austere meditation practice in the evening. . . almost dead, absolutely miserable, the man asked the Bodhisattva. . . .”when did the Buddha say I would attain enlightenment?!”. . . .”The Buddha said, 6 more lifetimes". . . . . .”oh that’s horrible, I can’t stand it!”, yelled the man. And he began weeping.
A few days later the Bodhisattva ran into the second man he had seen on the road. When the man saw the Bodhisattva approaching, he stopped dancing and ran over to greet him. . . . .”when did the Buddha say I would attain enlightenment?!”. . . . . . “You see that large tree over there, the one with all those leaves? The Buddha said that every leaf on that tree represents a hundred more lifetimes”. . . . . . . . . .. . . .”Is that all?!” said the man, and he began dancing and singing, even more joyfully, exuberantly then he had before.
And at that moment he became free.
”I'm curious to know where J.Krishnamurti states there's free will.”
"From a scientific point of view, the question either is not raised, because free will appears only as a subjective feeling and never as a verifiable fact; or should be answered in favour of determinism, because there is no verifiable evidence that any personal decision is not a reaction to prevailing circumstances, an automatic response to biochemical reactions in the brain.
For all materialists, who consider the mind to be a function of the brain, there can be no free will. Only if the minds or the souls are independent entities is it possible to assert their freedom, whereas if they are mere processes or functions of the body no such freedom is possible.
The decisive question, thus, is whether the soul is a separate, independent entity. For a dualist philosopher, it is. But then he has to face the problem of how to explain the interaction between body and soul: if the soul is a separate substance, an entity which does not depend on the body, then how is one to account for the remarkable effects of physical conditions on the soul's reactions, or inversely how is one to explain the supposed control of the soul over the body?
For a nondualist, who sustains that everything appears in Consciousness, and that there is only that One Consciousness, there is no such thing as free will, because all individual body-minds are not real entities, but mere appearances without substance. Where there is no real doer, there cannot be a free will.
What regards Consciousness Itself, being the only and ultimate subject, It is not an object. It is thus free of attributes or qualities. It is free of action, free of decisions, free of choices, free of will. It is pure Freedom."
Miguel-Angel Carrasco
I think the problem that some very rational people have with the idea that we as human beings are evolving, and that this evolution is for the better, is that it seems to posit a kind of “purpose”. And that raises a lot of flags for a lot of really bright people.
But my take on it is this, the above stated distaste for the concept is based entirely on a simple confusion between consciousness, and time.
All biological and organic things have a sense of time. That is, they are temporary. They are governed by a set of guidelines we call chemistry and physics, and like all things that can be measured, are transitory. And I think that is an important thing to remember, especially when it comes to happiness.
Evolution, or the reality of it, is a fact. In the sense that the Sun, or stars are a fact. The idea that humans are evolving to become "nicer" is simply the preponderance of evidence, as agreed upon by people who have the greatest expertise in their specific fields of measurement.
The idea that this is a "purpose" is a linkage we make in our own minds, but not actuality itself. They can be independent, that is things can be evolving for the better, while at the same time lacking a purpose. It is only desire that creates a purpose. That does not mean that 'purpose' is an actual thing. Purpose is subjective, except as related to measurable phenomena.
But even here a better term might be likelihood. . . .it is likely, that when throwing a ball into the air, it will fall back down. We call that gravity. This does not therefore mean that gravity is the purpose of that phenomena.
They have asked people who were in the last stages of a terminal illness, what things do they most regret, or wished they had done in their lifetime.
Nobody said they wished they had made more money, or worked harder.
The two most common answers were these. . . I wish I had spent more time with those I love.
And I wish I had traveled more, and related more to this planet, this home we share.
“If at first an idea is not absurd, there is no hope for it.”
-Einstein
***
I have not had to write in awhile. So other then a few notes, quotes, and memos, I have not sat down to put much out. A lot has happened within the last several Months. And those experiences have floated about in memory for a bit, until I realized I had to write. So here it is, and on a positive note, I also view it as a kind of safety mechanism. It helps ensure a sense of authenticity. I am not a good enough writer to ever fake that.
To begin with I had the chance a few weeks ago to attend a live video conference with the movie Director David Lynch. What interested me was not just the fact that it was David Lynch, who is brilliant, but also the title of the video conference. . . .consciousness and unity as related to the creative process.
Talk about a title.
He began by talking about recent revelations that have occurred to him, and how this relates to the unicity of mind, universe, and self. But I was hooked at unicity. He spent a lot of time talking about meditation, and tapping into that dynamic source of mind for creative breakthroughs in Art, and meaning. He talked about the importance of Authenticity, and he had an obvious faith based on past observation, that if you truly were following your bliss, then all else would follow. He expressed that the variety of Artistic mediums he used was directly related to the need he has to stay creative. And I am really sure he expressed all of it much better then I am writing above. I didn’t take notes, and I didn’t try and memorize his exact use of metaphor. But he used a lot.
He then fielded a whole lot of questions. A lot of these were related to movie making, which was interesting to me in the sense of anyone who is great at their craft being interesting when they share the discoveries that have come as a result of that. And he also answered a few about movie stars I can’t remember.
But two questions in particular really captured my attention.
The first was a question asked by a clearly uber cool, way too hip, angst ridden, I am a dangerous artist type. He questioned Lynch on the ‘edge’ that might be lost when an artist takes on that optimistic, evolution of consciousness, there is only one, type of realization. How that may lead to a more soft and fluffy type of message. . .to the loss of that crucial hint of darkness, the loss of that artistic edge.
Lynch, without pausing even a breath for thought, ripped open the questioner immediately by saying. . . .yes, I used to be that person myself. I used to think that playing that dark, moody, artist role would get me laid more. And it did. And I identified with that, and so I thought I needed it for that quality. But then I realized that was just an act. It was bullshit. And it left me. . . . . . . . . the questioner sat down.
The second question was about the process of revelation. The movement of real transformation, which seems to also at times lend itself to severe emotional lows. The highs of authentic introspective realizations can often mark just how low the daily operating level of consciousness we each display can be. Which when measured against such an extreme high, or chased after, becomes a low which can feel seriously debilitating at times. It was a process that every authentic artist, craftsman, thinker, lover, or joker, knows all too well.
Everyone nodded at the problem presented.
So when dipping as far into that dynamic well as you are proposing Mr Lynch, how can we prevent those lows?
Again, without any pause, Lynch started asking the questioner to close his eyes and visualize something in the mind. He said:
“Imagine that mind is like the empire state building. And it has thousands and thousands of rooms. And many of those rooms remained unused, are dark, dusty, and have not been opened in years.
And then imagine that the Empire State building produced this amazing energy. And this energy was beautiful, like ‘electric gold’. . . .but sometimes this energy gets stuck, sometimes it doesn’t come out of the building as it should. So you have to get inside the building and clean it out.
So you have hundreds of these robots. And these automatic robots go through the building, room by room. They enter all the old rooms which had not been cleaned in decades. And they clean each room. . .step by step, through the entire building”
Now the small crowd at the video conference is looking around nervously? What is he saying?
And then he said. . .”And you have to imagine that those robots tend to kick up a lot of old dust, a lot of old stuff, and its going to float in the air for a bit, and make things murky. . . .he paused. . . . .But the thing is, the electric gold just keeps flowing through.
I might have just massacred David Lynch’s metaphor here. But trust me, I had an honest moment of. . .”Oh”. He is a great speaker, and you can’t possibly plan what he brings in the moment.
Man is the only animal that blushes, or needs to.
-Mark Twain
I watched an interview with two of Americans top scientists in the fields of biology, and evolution. James Watson, and E.O.Wilson talked about Darwin, evolution, and DNA. It was one of the most fascinating interviews I have seen in a long time.
What struck me were their answers to questions related to modern day evolution. Does what we know of evolution, DNA, and conditioning leave room for “evil”, for that sort of ‘choice’?
No, and the realization of that can lead to a different take on crime and punishment, and civilizations as a whole.
Does mankind still evolve?. . .absolutely.
Then the natural question. . . . . is man evolving for the ‘better’?
And the answer was that the preponderance of evidence suggests that we are evolving to be nicer human beings.
When asked how that relates to the incredible extremes of violence we now seem to have, Wilson’s answer was. . .”Just imagine what it was like 20,000 Years ago.”
He had a point.
“It is remarkable how much trust we have in each other as human beings now. All things considered.”
I want to sit in a room with those guys and ask them a hundred questions.
I’ll share the one minor point I had with how they presented their ideas. They rejected flat out the process of revelation, as a tool. That would be fine, except they then went on to articulate the fact that Darwin was perhaps the most important man who ever lived. Also ok. But this belief was based on the fact that for whatever reason, Darwin was able to, by simply looking around at his surroundings and thinking, realize to a large degree where we all came from.
It was similar to how I have heard Scientists, who are really familiar with the history and theories of Albert Einstein, describe the process he used when realizing his world changing revelations. A paradigm shift so vast, that only an incredibly creative, intuitive pull of energy, can bring it into focus.
It is the kind of thing that comes through to us. . . . .if I wanted to go out on a limb I could even describe it as God reaching out and making contact with itself.
So at that level of realization, what similarities would a Darwin or Einstein share with say a Shakespeare, or Mozart? Speaking only for my own idea on the subject, I think that thing they share sometimes gets undervalued by experts that come from fields that measure nature. And I think that is probably just fine.
I think that is what poetry is for.
It is you who will define which I you think of, when you say I.
-Ram Dass
A Bodhisattva set off on a journey to meet the Buddha. As he walked he ran into a man on the road sitting in the lotus posture meditating. Only this man had not bothered to find a shady spot in the road, so his skin had become rough. When the Bodhisattva asked the man what he was hoping to achieve, the man said he believed absolutely in the force of will. That if he just had the strength, the power, the discipline, then he would be able to achieve freedom. And then he said. . . . . “when you see the Buddha ask him long it will be until I become enlightened”. . . and the Bodhisattva agreed.
A few days later the Bodhisattva came to a different man who was camped by the side of the road. This man was dancing, laughing, and singing. There were children playing about, and women dancing and laughing, food, and wine, and a festive, joyful mood. And then the man stopped dancing for a brief moment, and he asked the Bodhisattva . . . .”when you see the Buddha ask him how long it will be until I become enlightened.”. . . .and the Bodhisattva agreed.
He then went on and had his meeting with the Buddha.
On the way back he ran across the man he had met first on his journey . . . .by this time the man was almost dead. He had worked himself ceaselessly during the day, and had maintained an austere meditation practice in the evening. . . almost dead, absolutely miserable, the man asked the Bodhisattva. . . .”when did the Buddha say I would attain enlightenment?!”. . . .”The Buddha said, 6 more lifetimes". . . . . .”oh that’s horrible, I can’t stand it!”, yelled the man. And he began weeping.
A few days later the Bodhisattva ran into the second man he had seen on the road. When the man saw the Bodhisattva approaching, he stopped dancing and ran over to greet him. . . . .”when did the Buddha say I would attain enlightenment?!”. . . . . . “You see that large tree over there, the one with all those leaves? The Buddha said that every leaf on that tree represents a hundred more lifetimes”. . . . . . . . . .. . . .”Is that all?!” said the man, and he began dancing and singing, even more joyfully, exuberantly then he had before.
And at that moment he became free.
”I'm curious to know where J.Krishnamurti states there's free will.”
"From a scientific point of view, the question either is not raised, because free will appears only as a subjective feeling and never as a verifiable fact; or should be answered in favour of determinism, because there is no verifiable evidence that any personal decision is not a reaction to prevailing circumstances, an automatic response to biochemical reactions in the brain.
For all materialists, who consider the mind to be a function of the brain, there can be no free will. Only if the minds or the souls are independent entities is it possible to assert their freedom, whereas if they are mere processes or functions of the body no such freedom is possible.
The decisive question, thus, is whether the soul is a separate, independent entity. For a dualist philosopher, it is. But then he has to face the problem of how to explain the interaction between body and soul: if the soul is a separate substance, an entity which does not depend on the body, then how is one to account for the remarkable effects of physical conditions on the soul's reactions, or inversely how is one to explain the supposed control of the soul over the body?
For a nondualist, who sustains that everything appears in Consciousness, and that there is only that One Consciousness, there is no such thing as free will, because all individual body-minds are not real entities, but mere appearances without substance. Where there is no real doer, there cannot be a free will.
What regards Consciousness Itself, being the only and ultimate subject, It is not an object. It is thus free of attributes or qualities. It is free of action, free of decisions, free of choices, free of will. It is pure Freedom."
Miguel-Angel Carrasco
I think the problem that some very rational people have with the idea that we as human beings are evolving, and that this evolution is for the better, is that it seems to posit a kind of “purpose”. And that raises a lot of flags for a lot of really bright people.
But my take on it is this, the above stated distaste for the concept is based entirely on a simple confusion between consciousness, and time.
All biological and organic things have a sense of time. That is, they are temporary. They are governed by a set of guidelines we call chemistry and physics, and like all things that can be measured, are transitory. And I think that is an important thing to remember, especially when it comes to happiness.
Evolution, or the reality of it, is a fact. In the sense that the Sun, or stars are a fact. The idea that humans are evolving to become "nicer" is simply the preponderance of evidence, as agreed upon by people who have the greatest expertise in their specific fields of measurement.
The idea that this is a "purpose" is a linkage we make in our own minds, but not actuality itself. They can be independent, that is things can be evolving for the better, while at the same time lacking a purpose. It is only desire that creates a purpose. That does not mean that 'purpose' is an actual thing. Purpose is subjective, except as related to measurable phenomena.
But even here a better term might be likelihood. . . .it is likely, that when throwing a ball into the air, it will fall back down. We call that gravity. This does not therefore mean that gravity is the purpose of that phenomena.
They have asked people who were in the last stages of a terminal illness, what things do they most regret, or wished they had done in their lifetime.
Nobody said they wished they had made more money, or worked harder.
The two most common answers were these. . . I wish I had spent more time with those I love.
And I wish I had traveled more, and related more to this planet, this home we share.
“If at first an idea is not absurd, there is no hope for it.”
-Einstein
***
