let's become eco-romantics!

i've written a socio-political manifesto for my eastern philosophy class. you are more than welcome to read it and even discuss it.

teachings of vivekananda

here ia a selection of the teachings of vivekananda, disciple of ramakrishna.

My ideal, indeed, can be put into a few words, and that is: to preach unto mankind their divinity, and how to make it manifest in every movement of life.

Education is the manifestation of the perfection already in man.

We want that education by which character is formed, strength of mind is increased, the intellect is expanded, and by which one can stand on one's own feet.

So long as the millions live in hunger and ignorance, I hold every man a traitor who, having been educated at their expense, pays not the least heed to them.

Whatever you think, that you will be. If you think yourselves weak, weak you will be; if you think yourselves strong, strong you will be.

If you have faith in all the three hundred and thirty millions of your mythological gods, … and still have no faith in yourselves, there is no salvation for you. Have faith in yourselves, and stand up on that faith and be strong; that is what we need.

Strength, strength it is that we want so much in this life, for what we call sin and sorrow have all one cause, and that is our weakness. With weakness comes ignorance, and with ignorance comes misery.

Purity, patience, and perseverance are the three essentials to success, and above all, love.

Teach yourselves, teach everyone his real nature, call upon the sleeping soul and see how it awakes. Power will come, glory will come, goodness will come, purity will come, and everything that is excellent will come when this sleeping soul is roused to self-conscious activity.

Religion is the manifestation of the Divinity already in man.

They alone live who live for others, the rest are more dead than alive.

This is the gist of all worship – to be pure and to do good to others.

It is love and love alone that I preach, and I base my teaching on the great Vedantic truth of the sameness and omnipresence of the Soul of the Universe.

the gospel of sri ramakrishna

find here the gospel of sri ramakrishna.

MWF 11am

MWF 9am

TR 9:50am

T 5:40pm

the philosophy club blog

this is the philosophy club blog.

"as president of our country, and commander in chief of our military, I accept that people are going to call me awful things every day, and I will defend their right to do so”

here is a video of obama addressing the UN today. good speech of conciliation and freedom of speech!

phi 2070 class: comments to posts are part of the final grade. check my syllabus!

why ahimsa

i'd like to go over some of the ideas we've discussed last class.

let's start here: ahimsa pressuposes the ability to strike. 

gandhi seems to imply that once one makes ahimsa a ruling principle, the possibility of self-defense, or striking for the sake of justice becomes automatically justified. on the other hand, himsa is not only violence, it implies a sense of lack of identification with life (jiva), a lack of understanding. himsa is basically avidya or ignorance.

this takes care of some of the points made in class about what to do in cases when one is faced with arbitrary injustice (such as the question of ahimsa under totalitarianism or slavery, etc). ahimsa is not an amorphous anomic attitude of inaction towards injustice. FAR FROM IT. it's an active principle of understanding the economy of the strike. truth never himsa a cause that is just.

 so we have: 1- everything is brahman, 2- if we're all brahman, my "other" = "me." 1 & 2 sort of imply 3- non-harming is more evolved than harming simply because it takes more of understanding and self-control. the easy distortion is to make "we're all brahman" look like a new-age fad while missing the subtlety of the lemma. am i ready to see other humans, non-human animals, non-animal life & non-living nature as i see myself?    

let's not ignore that himsa can easily get inscribed in a vicious economy of injustice. this is the well-known ancient semitic eye-for-an-eye, and nemo me impune lacessit, etc. a satyagrahi is never vindictive. he believes not in destruction but in conversion. ahimsa (as gandhi demonstrated) has important political and social consequences. in war, for example, with the so called jus ad bellum norms, in penology, in sociology, etc. no wonder martin luther king made ahimsa a central tenet of his struggle for civil rights in america in the 1960's. 

so, understanding is crucial.

let's entertain for a second the reincarnation metaphor of the jaina: within the cycle of rebirth, one's mother may be reborn as a stray dog. if, then, one is followed by a stray dog, one might ask oneself, "why me? why this particular dog? who might it have been in a previous life?" since time is beginningless, it is said that all beings have been reborn numberless times as the mothers of all other living beings. jainism understand -literally- that all beings are then our "mothers."  so, if a being tries to harm us today, at some time in the past it has nurtured us as our mother. this is why we should repay its kindness by seeking its welfare now.

here comes the turtle. it's quite easy to assume an anthropomorphic blind-sided attitude. the i'm-a-human-and-that's-it attitude. which doesn't go deep enough. what is human?

it's then that understanding the turtle becomes crucial. we living things ARE ALL JIVA! "humans" don't come from a different, special, pre-destined arrangement.

so long as one retains one's sword, one has not attain complete fearlessness.

blaming islamic culture dismisses the muslim majorities who are not enraged

in following our previous discussion, this interesting article in the new york times. 

earth, air, sea and plastic bags

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The plastic bag is a thing of this world. A derivative of petroleum or natural gas, the plastic bag is a close relative of other esteemed domestic household objects: the salad bowl, the cheap kitchen clock, the asthma inhaler-device, the computer chassis, the CD we listen to. It figures as a part of our Teflon coated pans, the acrylic paint on our walls; as alloy to wind-resistant windows, even corn starch.

Every day millions of plastic bags are carried out of our malls and supermarkets. They wind up everywhere, peppering park's greenery, polluting the streets. A dense layer of flotsam (choking marine life) and jetsam (drifting to shore) dirtying our beaches.

Innocuous container or recalcitrant matter?

In his essay "Plastic Materialities," Gary Hawkins explores how things have the power to capture us in new relations. His idea is to show a less obvious perspective of the thing. In American Beauty, Ricky, the aspiring film maker and pot-head, is obsessed with beauty. He videotapes a plastic bag as it floats, to-and-fro, at the mercy of the wind. Ricky's video shows the thing-power, a "depth from which objects rise up towards our superficial knowledge."* Here's Ricky's narration:

It's one of those days when it's a minute away from snowing. And there is electricity in the air, you can almost hear it right? And this bag was just... dancing with me. Like a little kid begging me to play with it. For fifteen minutes. That's the day I realized there was this entire life behind things, and this incredible benevolent force that wanted me to know there was no reason to be afraid. Ever... video's a poor excuse. I know. But it helps me remember. (PM,  p. 135)

One can think of other examples, such as this, where plastic bag becomes a "plastic-bag chair."

Ryan Frank, Plastic Bag Chair, 2008.

Frank re-presents the material, but the plastic bag's form becomes aestheticized, subsumed, concealed.    

Shipwrecked: My Life for a Bag, 2010.

British artist Claudia Borgna, above, presents the plastic bag as an organized society of ready-mades. The bags stick together as a kind of ghostly soul-buddies. Is this a real accumulation of thing-power?

What is thing-power? 

Thing power is a kind of agency, it is the property of an assemblage. Thing-power materialism is a (necessarily speculative) onto-theory that presumes matter has an inclination to make connections and form networks with varying degrees of stability. Here, then, is an affinity between thing-power materialism and ecological thinking: both advocate and the cultivation of an enhanced sense of the extent to which all things are spun together in a dense web, and both warn of the self-destructive character of human actions that are reckless with regard to other nodes of the web.(PM, p. 135)

I'd like to read Bennet's thing-power with Shvetashvatara's holistic glasses. The old Hindu sage would agree that all things "are spun together in a dense web". But "the self-destructive character of human actions" is as much part of the web as the rest. If the living and the non-living are connected, then creation and destruction become connective possibilities.

Shvetashvatara is not afraid to talk thing-power from the bottom up:

You are a woman, you are a man, you are a boy; also a girl. As an old man you totter along with a walking stick. As you are born you turn your face in every direction. You are the dark blue bird, the green one with red eyes, the rain-cloud, the seasons, and the oceans. (...) You live as one without a beginning because of your pervasiveness, you, whom all beings have been born. (Shvetashvatara Upanishads, 4.2-4.4)

In a perverse geological sense, we are walking plastic bags!

If ecology is going to address living and non-living, then clouds, air, trees, earth, sand, proteins, viruses, humans, plastic bags are all part of the whole. What's the point of differentiating when everything is (a part of) Brahman?**

We cannot think outside the whole. There is a democracy of creation and destruction everywhere. If we destroy ourselves that's inside the whole. Nothing and everything is it. Only by facing this predicament can we understand how to deal with our mounting ecological problems.

On the other hand, this sea turtle is out of the loop.*** Though part of a network that includes sun, sand, sea, predators, plastic bags, etc, it cannot fathom the subtleties and contradictions of thing-power. Think about it, the turtle is jiva amidst the all-absorbing power and extent of ajiva. We have to find new ways to deal with our living/non living dichotomy.

Is it really about them or about us? Or is it both?

___________
* Jane Bennet, Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things, (Duke University, 2010) p. 2. **Brahman doesn't have to be our anthropomorphic God. Just the totality of all things put together. *** Plastic bags are among the 12 items of debris found most often in coastal cleanups, according to the nonprofit Center for Marine Conservation. Marine mammals, seabirds, and sea turtles can become entangled in the bags, and sea turtles can mistake them for food such as jellyfish, then die from starvation resulting from intestinal blockage.

secularism or theocracy?

here is the post i mentioned in class today (you are welcome to post your opinion here if you want).

T 5:40pm

TR 9:50am

MWF 11am

MWF 9am

for an open minded secularism

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we know the story: 1- a mediocre film (laughable, a comedy?), financed by an individual, who happens to be a coptic christian, get its way through You Tube. the film vilifies, distorts sacred tenets of the muslim faith. this is a fact.   2- caveat: if a desecrator knows he can get you, that's exactly what he/she'll do over and over (this french satirical magazine just published cartoons mocking the prophet mohammed). 3- the film achieves its goal of enraging believers throughout the Muslim world.

predictably, one expect fallacious charges of guilt-by-association. so, coptic christians have become targets. in pakistan, violent protests have left 23 dead and hundreds injured, a christian church burned; even a minister put a bounty on the film director's head! on the other hand, muslims  now are presented by the western media as violent, intransigent and dogmatic. we must be careful how to characterize these manifestations of condemnation. not all protesters have the same goals and motivations. not all protesters are fundamentalists. 

is this newsweek cover stereotypical?

these events happen at a moment of perceived denigrations of muslims and their faith by the US's military, which are detailed extensively in the arab news media: the invasion of iraq on a discredited pretext, the images of abuse from the abu ghraib prison, the burning or desecrations of the koran by troops in afghanistan and a pastor in Florida; detentions without trial at guantánamo, the deaths of muslim civilians as collateral damage in drone strikes, etc, etc. which brings a comment like this:

“We want these countries to understand that they need to take into consideration the people, and not just the governments,” said Ismail Mohamed, 42, a religious scholar who once was an imam in Germany. “We don’t think that depictions of the prophets are freedom of expression. We think it is an offense against our rights,” he said, adding, “The West has to understand the ideology of the people.”

granted. but killing people on the grounds that the film is blasphemous -or that it was made in america- becomes as obtuse as the film itself. the counterargument to this is "we fundamentalists could care less about your arguments."  another response is "is there a middle point?" (more of this later).

blasphemy is as old as human civilization. when will we learn to live with it?

writer salman rushdie

 theocrats differ: in iran the bounty for salman rushdie's head rose to $3.3 million (though rushdie has nothing to do with the film). this is the statement from the ayatollah hassan saneii:

As long as the exalted Imam Khomeini's historical fatwa against apostate Rushdie is not carried out, it won't be the last insult. If the fatwa had been carried out, later insults in the form of caricature, articles and films that have continued would have not happened.

in case you're interested, here is rushdie's answer.  what sort of religious argument that is not self-defeating would condemn rushdie to death (again?) over a film produced by someone with no connection with the writer. rushdie and his books have already been a target of bombings. this is before 9/11, before the word "terrorism" was coined. he survived an attack on his life when a bomb exploded prematurely, killing the perpetrator (this site identifies a mostafah mazeh &amp justifies his action).

this dogmatic side of religion is nothing new: we've been through it already!

blasphemy (theological anxieties aside) has been used as a weapon of coercion by the religious status quo for centuries: christianity has a dark history of religious persecutions (catholics as well as protestants). islam under the great al-mahdi had its history of inquisitorial policies. blasphemy laws are still part of the state laws in many muslim countries.

blasphemy, the act of insult, is related to heresy (any belief "outside" the authorized limits, since blasphemy is already "outside") which clearly expresses the force of religious dogma (those untouchable, unalterable, core truths). but historically, dogmas are constantly challenged, provoking big religious schisms: mahayana vs. vajrayana (in buddhism), catholics vs. protestants (in christianity), sunnis vs. shia (in islam).

for a neutral observer outside of the fray, how could a self-avowed christian -or muslim- be a "heretic" for another christian -or muslim- unless someone is setting narrow & indisputable theological limits?  time and again these factions end up persecuting and killing each other. the sad state of sunni/shia relations in countries like iraq & pakistan reminds one of europe's thirty years' war, though one shouldn't rule out other factors besides religion. as marx would point out, such as class struggle, political equality, etc. even as they seem antipodes, the lesson is that religion (against the received view) has never been far removed from people's political aspirations.

the possibility of an alliance between powers that be is always forthcoming, which makes the more difficult to know whether religion -as it describes and defends "the nation" as a whole- is a freestanding and well integrated body of belief and practice, or merely a rhetorical dimension of the polity. it's hard to know whether one is dealing with the religious aspects of the political system or the political aspects of the religious system. 

an open minded secularism

let's propose this lemma: once a principle becomes sacred, "enforceable by law," it opens up the  possibility of its desecration. this is a metaphysical dynamic: the absolute sacred would not have to be incontestable unless there was a possibility of challenging it. looked at it this way, desecration is immanent to the absolute sacred.  

being that the multiple tensions between different religions over matters of doctrine and blasphemy, desecration, etc, are ideologically and metaphysically unavoidable. any limit beyond which nothing is permissible becomes automatically up for transgression.  is it that bad?

take the case of new york artist andrés serrano's alleged desecration of christian symbols with his piss christ (late 1980's). incidentally, i'm glad i can see the image & glad serrano is still alive. one even could make the broader point that his desecration helped us to have an important discussion about the limits of freedom of expression vs. institutionalized religion. indeed, the tension is ongoing, which is a good sign.

secularism asserts the right of people to be free from religious rule and interference, and the right to freedom from governmental imposition of religion upon the people within a state that is neutral on matters of belief.  having said that, to construe religion and secularism as opposites, is to be blind to the very metaphysical tenets that i have already suggested. is there a more interesting way of being religious or secular? let's think of religion and secularism as an economy, an ongoing process of exchange. 

so, how do you deal with this loony by the name of terry jones who has attracted some attention by burning korans? of course, i disagree with his bigoted views, but that's far from saying that he deserves to die. is this the view of a "westerner," a non-muslim "philosopher"? i can see many pro-secular muslims agreeing with me. in fact they exist.  imagine now a muslim imam burning bibles at the entrance of a mosque in the US. would the imam be granted the same leeway?

if terry jones got killed by an avenging muslim fundamentalist, his killer would be as bad a bigot, plus a murderer: it's that simple. one cannot claim to have a right he/she denies the other. we must protect others' rights to ensure that mine -and yours- have a space. obviously, we'd have to protect the right of the imam to burn bibles as much as we protect jones' right to burn korans. my point is that as rificulous as it seems, this tit-for-tat needs to happen (wait and see). it's this uneasy trial and error that accommodates our differences.

here some have a different opinion. can so-called freedom of speech be changed a little? erich bleik writes in al-jazeera:

Freedom of speech is a core liberal democratic value. It must be upheld even when words cause offense. And no amount of violence should intimidate the United States into changing its laws. But it is vital to recognize that America is a dramatic outlier when it comes to the freedom to express inflammatory, hate-mongering, racist speech. In this regard, we are different from virtually every other liberal democracy; we are different from what we used to be; and we are different from what many Americans want us to be.

the problem here is that tweaking free speech is already suppression of speech.

this is the proof. who would think the ACLU would defend the KKK? (even if the KKK stands for ideas that most of us find repulsive). in a secular atmosphere, even an enemy may deserve the same space he used to denied to others, which paradoxically guarantees the symmetry of an always perfectible justice. 

what's your take? go on!

(i will close this post next monday at 11pm)

we have a philosophy club

leave your name and the position you want: president, vicepresident, treasurer, secretary. if you are not pursuing a position, leave your name anyway, or any questions you may have.

kafka, prometheus & the inexplicable

"There are four legends concerning Prometheus:

According to the first he was clamped to a rock in the Caucasus for betraying the secrets of the gods to men, and the gods sent eagles to feed on his liver, which was perpetually renewed.

According to the second Prometheus, goaded by the pain of the tearing beaks, pressed himself deeper and deeper into the rock until he became one with it.

According to the third his treachery was forgotten in the course of thousands of years, forgotten by the gods, the eagles, forgotten by himself.

According to the fourth everyone grew weary of the meaningless affair. The gods grew weary, the eagles grew weary, the wound closed wearily.

There remains the inexplicable mass of rock. The legend tries to explain the inexplicable. As it comes out of the substratum of truth it has in turn to end in the inexplicable."

Sri Aurobindo or why you cannot escape (as much as you want) philosophy

By Sri Aurobindo Ghosh 

Aurobindo (1870-1950), perhaps India's foremost "modern" philosopher, wrote profusely on a multitude of topics and themes. His idea of integral nondualism is very attractive and controversial:

Aurobindo holds that reality in its inmost essence is non-dual, non-verbal, and non-conceptual. That is to say, indeterminable and logically indefinable, yet reality is accessible to direct experience on the non-verbal level, to the penetrative insight of spiritual intuition born of the integration of human personality.  Non-dual reality is beyond the scope of categories including that of number (?). Strictly speaking, monism, unitarianism, trinitarianism, pluralism, etc., are just different human ways of intellectual comprehension of the various aspects of reality. Caveat: Is Aurobindo's own nondual integral philosophy not just another way?

For Aurobindo, even monism (which utters a profound truth in proclaiming the fundamental unity of existence) commits the rationalistic fallacy of identifying reality with a conceptually formulated principle or intellectual scheme. Monism interprets the essence of reality in terms of the concept of the One, a determinate logical or dialectical structure, or a sum of well-defined powers and qualities.

Nondualism is opposed to such identification of reality with a determinate principle of unity. Either the conceptually formulated One as "infinite substance" of Spinoza  (scroll down for the definition), or the absolute idea of Hegel, represents only a particular metaphysical standpoint, a specific rationalistic way --one among many ways-- of comprehending the nature of reality. According to nondualism (advaita), reality is beyond one and many, beyond substance and quality, beyond cause and effect, and beyond any rigidly conceived thought structure. So, reality is not to be equated with any conceptual formulation or logical construction, or system of words and symbols.

The problem is how do you avoid categorization? Aurobindo seems not to see that identification or miss-identification is a necessary condition of any  worldmaking. What do you think?

are you fluent in evolutionary theory?

 
check out this interesting site: evolution 101 from berkley. at the top you have the following themes: patterns, mechanisms, micro-evolution, speciation, macro-evolution and big issues. each theme has sub-themes. you can always move to the next topic at the right bottom. we'll be talking more about evolution during the semester.

getting "it," recycling thoughts, hermeneutic cycle, my bad & salvation as illusion

remember i'm closing the post on m.bourbaki friday at 11pm. 

excellent class discussion. thanks. more voices, more yin, more plurality, more minds working in unison at the same yielding better results.

some points worth remembering:

* the more you get "it" the less you "get" it (this is only a cautionary metaphor).
* micro/macro should be handled carefully. when micro implodes into its opposite the metaphor ends up cannibalizing itself.
* listening is important.
* own the moment. you know.
* let's recycle more (both metaphysically and ecologically)  

about the importance of texts, don't worry too much for the original language. philosophy is more than hermeneutics.  too much to hermeneutics is a potentially vicious cycle: is the interpreter not -just- another interpretation? and what makes this one better than the other since there's nothing but interpretations to appeal to?

is there a way out? yes. a slap in the face. true philosophy is a speculative discipline. mental gymnastics. thought experiments. possible worlds. let go, but remember: PROBLEMATIZE!

a point about my use of moksha in my post on hinduism brought to me by jonathan at the end of the class. the meaning of moksha, literally, is salvation, not confusion (as the link in the post obviously indicates). i used it loosely making a leap which i didn't justify in detail. you see: i believe that salvation presupposes a fundamental illusion. why? 

first, a theological problem: maya, the deity of illusion: divine mother constantly weaving a phenomenal veil of "as ifs," right before our eyes. is the deity's intention to deceive? well, she does, she has to (each has to do what he/she does).

secondly, an ontological problem: salvation presupposes a safe-conduct, earned tit-for-tat. to win salvation one must work at it. he/she who is saved has something to show for. why is one saved? one wants it more than anything. wanting salvation is a desire for salvation. and yet, that desire (as you'll see very soon) is detached. remember our conversation about yajna (sacrifice). if one gives to receive, is there sacrifice?  salvation means working at it, becoming better, i.e., feeling better. feeling is part of the journey. but behold, feeling is problematic because it means attachment: the very thing that salvation rids one of. so, in a sense, there is no salvation -eternal life, bliss, one-ness, call it what you like- that would not preclude the possibility of attachment (selfishness) re-appearing. this is the point of this important passage in the patanjali sutras:  

III, 50: When the presiding-deities invite, there should be no attachment and no smile of satisfaction, contact with undesirable being again possible. Comment: This is the moment when everything can be lost or everything gained; it is the moment when the superior powers are themselves to be rejected, even as the visions and ecstatic experiences of the saints are to be rejected since they are manifestations of the divine but do not themselves constitute the divine experience. To rest in these accomplishments is ultimately no better and possibly worse than the activities he or she came from initially. 

how is it possible that there shouldn't be any attraction (attachment) to the invitation of the deities right at the moment of salvation? it seems to contradict the very idea of the gift of salvation, isn't it? unless the hope for salvation is ego-driven. isn't the place of mortals to be with mortals? will not "the saved" come back always again in the endless wheel of samsara?  

salvation, thus, precludes a state of "confusion," in the sense that true salvation is not (cannot) be exempt from the possibility of contamination, i.e., the very idea of being saved as something completely other than what needs salvation. which brings me to this question:

is maya a global state of things? is it a lack we all suffer? if maya a necessity, i.e, god  playing games with us when she asks me to be self-vigilant. but wait, even atman (i.e., my access to self) can be illusory! how do i know that the self i think i've found is not a travesty? (which is why we need to get to a subtler state of mind by leaving the "thinking" mind behind).

of course, this discussion of the confusion of salvation needs more time.

i wanted to thank jonathan for the observation. true, moksha means salvation, but the desire for salvation always presupposes avidya, another meaning for the confusion of illusion (i should have made the observation and i didn't).

if you want to tackle this discussion is fine with me. i left the comment box open.

NIYAMSARA (or THE PERFECT LAW)

CHAPTER ONE: JIVA

9. Soul, Matter, Medium of motion, Medium of rest, space, (substances) having dimensions, and Time, together with their various attributes and modifications are said to be the principles (Tattvartha).
10. Soul is characterized by Upayoga. Upayoga is towards Darsana of Jnana- Upayoga is of two kinds, Swabhava Jnana or Vibhava Jnana.
11-12. Natural knowledge (is) perfect, unassisted by sense and independent. Non-natural knowledge is of two kinds. Right knowledge of four kinds :- Sensitive knowledge (Mati Jnâna) Scripture knowledge (Shruta Jnâna) Visual knowledge (Avadhi Jnâna) and Mental knowledge (Mana-paryaya Jnâna), and Wrong knowledge of three kinds, beginning with sensitive knowledge.
13. And conation attentiveness (is) of two kinds (i. e.,) natural (Svabhâva Darshana), and the opposite of its kind, non-natural (Vibhâva Darshana). That which is perfect, unassisted by senses and independent, is called Natural.
14. Non-natural conation is said to be of three kinds : Ocular (Chakshu Darshana). Non-ocular (Achakshu Darshana) and visual (Avadhi Darshana). Modification (is) or two kinds, irrelative (natural, Svabhâva Paryâya) and relative to itself and others (i. e., Non-natural, Vibhâva paryâya).
15. Human, Hellish, Sub-human and Celestial conditions are said to be Non-natural conditions free from miseries arising from the effect of Karmas are termed Natural.
 16-17. Human souls are of two ; born in Work region or in Enjoyment region. Hellish souls should be known to be of seven kinds, because of the regions. Sub-human souls are said to be of fourteen kinds. Celestial souls (are) of four kinds. Their detailed account should be known from (the scripture) Loka-Vibhâga.
18. From the practical point of view, a mundane soul causes material Karmas and experiences; but from the (impure) real point of view the soul creates (and) experiences thought- activites arising through the Karmas.
19. From the substance point of view (all) souls are free from the modifications mentioned before; but from the modification point of view souls are possessed of both ( the Natural and Non- Natural).

CHAPTER TWO: NON-SOUL AJIVA

20. The substance matter is of two kinds; in the form of an atom (Parmanu) and in the form of molecules (Skandha). And the molecules are of six kinds and atom (is) of two kinds.
21-24. Gross-gross, gross, gross-fine, fine-gross, fine, and fine-fine are the six kinds. Solids like earth, stone, consist of gross- gross molecules (Liquids) like ghee, water, oil are gross. Shade, sunshine, etc., consist of gross-fine molecules. Objects of the four senses (of touch, taste, smell and hearing) are of fine- gross molecules. Karmic molecules, in the condition of being bound up with soul are fine. Those which are unlike these are of fine-fine molecules.
25. That which is the cause of the four root matters (earth, water, fire and air) should be known as cause-atom. (Karana Parmanu). The Smallest possible part of a molecule should be known as effect as,
26. That substance which (is) the beginning, the middle and the end by itself, inapprehensible by the senses, and (is) indivisible, should be known as an atom.
 27. That which possesses one taste, color, and smell, and two touches is of natural attributes. Those tangible to all (Senses) are in Jain Philosophy said to be of non-natural attributes.
 28. The modification which is independent of other objects is the natural modification (Svabhava Pryaya); and modification in the molecular form is the non-natural modification, (Vibhava Pryaya).
 29. From the real point of view an atom is said to be "Matter substance"; but from the other (i.e., practical point of view) the "Matter substance" has been applied to a molecule.
30. The auxiliary causes of motion and rest to soul and matter (are called) the medium of motion, and medium of rest (respectively). (That which is the auxiliary cause of) filing space to all the substances, soul, etc. (is) space.
31. Practical time is either of two kinds, instant and wink (avali); or of three kinds (past, present and future). Past (time is) equal to the number (of the liberated souls) who have destroyed their bodily forms, multiplied by numerable winks.(Om (Karya Parmanu) deification).
32. The instants of the practical time are infinite times (of the number of) atoms, which again are infinite times (of the number of) souls. (Time-points) which are packed full in the universe, are (called) the real "Time".
 33. That by the help of which, all substances, soul, etc., are altered in their own modification, is "Time." The four substance; the medium of motion, (the medium of rest, space and time) have (only) their own natural attributes and modifications.
34. Excepting Time, (the other five) of these six substances, (are known) as "Extensive substances," (Astikaya). Extensive substances occupy many spatial units, as mentioned in Jaina scriptures.
35-36. The atoms of matter are numerable, innumerable and infinite. Verily there are innumerable points of space in "medium of motion," “medium of rest" and in each individual soul. The same (innumerable number of spatial units are) in the universe; and in the other, i.e., (non-universe) (there are) infinite (number of spatial units). There is no extensiveness in Time; therefore, it has one spatial unit (only).
 37. The matter substance (is) material; all the rest are immaterial. Soul (has) consciousness as its nature, all the rest are devoid of the attribute of consciousness. 

CHAPTER THREE (PURE THOUGHT)

38. The external principles, soul, etc., should be renounced. One's own soul, absolutely free from all the attributes and modifications, caused by the impurity of Karmas should be realized.
 39. (From the real point of view), there are in the soul, no stages of (impure) thought-activities Vibhava Svabhava Sthan, neither there are there degrees of regard and disregard, nor grades of feelings of pleasure, nor degrees of the feelings of pain.
40. In soul, there are no stages of duration bondage, (Sthiti Bandha Sthana); neither (there are) the stages of Karmic nature (Prakriti Sthana); nor (are) the degrees of the molecular bondage (Pradesha Sthana) nor are the grades of fruition (bondage) (Anubhaga Sthana), nor are the degrees of operation of Karmas (Udaya Sthana).
41. (In soul there are) neither the stages of destructive thought-activities, (Kshayaka Bhava), nor the degree of destructive subsidential thought-activities (Kshaya-Opashamic Bhava), nor the grades of operative thought activities (Audayika Bhava), nor the degrees of subsidential thought activities (Aupashaika Bhava).
42. In soul (there is) neither wandering in the four conditions of life (gati), nor (are there) birth, old age, death, disease, and sorrow, nor are there the stages of bodily materials is (Kula), nuclei (yoni), soul-classes (Jiva Samasa) and soul quests (Margana).
43. Soul (is) turmoil less, bodiless, fearless, independent and faultless; without attachment, free from the activities (of mind, body and speech), devoid of delusion and free from ignorance.
 44. Soul (is) possession less, free from attachment, blemish less, devoid of all defects, desire less, anger less, pride less (and) without lust.
45. Colour, taste, smell, touch, conditions of, female, male, and common-sex inclinations, etc., (six kinds of bodily), figures, (and six kinds of) skeletons; all these are not found in the soul.
46. Know the soul to be, devoid of taste, colour and smell, not cognizable (by the senses), possessed of the attribute of consciousness soundless, incomprehensible by any outward sign and one having no describable form.
47. Just as liberated souls (are) free from oldness, death and birth, and are crowned with the eight attributes; so (are) mundane souls (from the pure real point of view.)
48. Just as liberated souls, residing at the top-most of the universe are bodiless, indestructible, independent of senses, free from (karmic) filth, and pure, so the mundane souls (also) should be considered (from the pure real point of view.)
49. From the practical point of view, all mundane souls have been described as possessing all the aforesaid conditions; but from the pure, real point of view, they also (are) of the same nature as liberated soul.
50. All the aforesaid conditions relate to either foreign substance or foreign modifications; hence (they) should be renounced. Internal principle is one's own substance, i, e., and soul. (It only) should be realised.
51. Conviction (in things ascertained as they are) alone without (any) perverse motive (is) right belief, (Samyaka Darshana). (Knowledge) free from doubt, (Samshaya), perversity (Vimoha) and vacillation (vibhrama) is right knowledge (Samyak Jnana).
52. Conviction, from wavering, impurity (Mala), and non-steadfastness (Agarha) alone (is) right belief. Correct understanding (Adhigama) of what principles are worth renouncing and what are worth realizing, (is) right knowledge.
 53. The external causes of right belief are the Jain scriptures and the persons, who know them; while the destruction, etc., of right-belief-deluding Karma are said to be the internal causes.
54. Listen, (Just as) Right Belief and Right knowledge are the (causes of) liberation, (so) is Right Conduct. Therefore, I shall describe Right Conduct from (both) the real and the practical points of view. 55. Right conduct from the practical point of view, is to practice austerities from the practical stand-point, while Right Conduct from the real point of view is to observe austerities from the real stand-point.

CHAPTER FOUR (PRACTICAL RIGHT CONDUCT)

56. Thought-activity free from (all) undertakings (injurious to any of) the mundane souls (which are) known as existing in (any of the various) physiques, nuclei, soul-classes, soul-quests, etc., is the first vow (non-injury), Ahimsa.
57. A saint, who renounces thought-activity leading to telling falsehood, on account of delusion, attachment and aversion is (said) to observe always the second vow, (truth), Satya.
58. He, who renounces the thought-activity of picking up articles belonging to another, lying in a village, a town or a forest, (is said) to observe the third vow (non-stealing), Achaurya.
59. He, who having seen the beauty of a woman, is not moved by a desire for her; or whose thought-activity is free from sex-animate feeling, (is said to observe) the fourth vow (chastity), Brahmacharya. 
60. The carrier of the load of (right) conduct, i.e., a saint, who having first formed the idea of being unconcerned with all worldly attachments, renounces them is said to observe the fifth vow of possessional, (Parigraha Tyaga.)
61. A saint, who walks upon a trodden path, free from living beings, in day time, after seeing (carefully) a distance of four arms length (two yards), (is said) to observe carefulness in walking (Irya Samiti).
62. He, who renounced backbiting, ridiculing, talking ill of others, self-praising and harsh words, speaks what.
63. He, who calmly takes food  which is free from living-beings, and given by another (with devotion), is said to have carefulness in eating (Eshana Samiti).
64. (A saint who has) acted with care in picking up, and putting down, books, and jug (Kamandala), etc., is said to have carefulness in lifting and laying down, (Adana-nik shepana Samiti).
65. (A saint who) discharges his waste, etc., in a place which is secret, and free from all living beings, and where is no obstruction on behalf of any body, (is said) to have carefulness in wasting (pratishtha-pana Samiti). 
66. Renunciation of delusion, animate-feeling, attachment and aversion, and other impure thought activities, is from the practical point of view, called control of mind (Mano-gupti).
 67. Renunciation of censurable gossip relating to people, state, theft, food, etc., which cause the bondage of evil Karmas, or refraining from telling falsehoods, etc., (is called) control of speech, (Vachan-gupti).
68. Renunciation of bodily movements, such as binding, piercing, beating, contracting, expanding, etc., is called control of body (Kaya-gupti).
 69. (From the real point of view) know, that abstaining from attachment, etc., is control of mind; and freedom from falsehood, etc., or silence is control of speech. is good for himself as well as for others (is said) to have carefulness in speech (Bhasha Samiti).
 70. (From the real point of view) refraining from bodily movements, non-attachment to the body, restraint of body or renunciation of causing injury, etc., is called control of body.
71. Worshipful Lords (Arhats) are those who are entirely free from all the (four) destructive Karmas, and are possessed of the highest attributes, omniscience, etc., and are crowned with the thirty-four extraordinary glories, (Atishaya).
72. Those (souls), who have destroyed the bondage of the eight Karmas, are possessed of the eight great attributes, abide at the topmost of the universe and are the most exalted and indestructible, are Perfect Souls (Siddhas.)
73. Those (saints), who are possessed of five kinds of conduct, who have trampled down the fury of the elephant of five senses, who are firm in their determination, and who are profound in virtue are (called) Heads of the order of Saints, (Acharya).
74. Those (saints), who are brave, possessed of the three jewels, are preachers of the categories enunciated by the Conqueror (Jina), and are endowed with the thought activity of desirelessness, are (known) as the Preceptors (Upadhyaya).
75. Those that are free from all (worldly) occupations, are always deeply absorbed in four kinds of contemplation (Aradhana) and are possession less and delusion less are (said) to be the Saints (Sadhus).
76. From the practical point of view, (all the previously mentioned) meditations constitute Right conduct; that (which is known) as Right conduct from the real point of view will be described further on.

CHAPTER FIVE (REPENTANCE)

77. I am neither in any of the Soul-quests, nor I am in any of the Spiritual stages, nor do I belong to any of the soul classes. I am neither the doer, nor do I make others do, nor am I the approver of the doers.
78. I am neither hellish, nor sub-human, nor human, nor am I in the celestial condition. I am neither the doer, nor do I make others do, nor am I the approver of the doers.
79. I am neither a child, nor young, nor old, nor the cause of any of them. I am neither the doer, nor do I make others do, nor am I the approver of the doers.
80. I am neither attachment, nor aversion, nor delusion, nor the cause of any of them. I am neither the doer, nor do I make others do, nor am I the approver of the doers. 81. I am neither anger, nor pride, nor deceit, nor greed. I am neither the doer, nor do I make others do, nor am I the approver of the doers.
82. By practicing self-analysis, (a soul) becomes equations and thus (gains) Right Conduct. In order to fortify this (conduct) I shall speak of repentance, etc.
83. He, who leaving aside (all) forms of speech, and getting rid of (impure) thought-activities, such as attachment, etc., meditates upon his own soul (is said from the real point of view) to have repentance (Pratikramana).
84. He, who avoiding (all sorts of) transgressions particularly, is observed in self-contemplation is said to have repentance; because he himself is the embodiment of repentance.
 85. He, who avoiding (all sorts of) disinclination towards conduct, is absorbed in self-conduct, is said to have repentance, because he himself is the embodiment of repentance.
 86. He, who avoiding the wrong path, firmly walks in the right path of the Conquerors (Jainas) is said to have repentance because he himself is the embodiment of repentance.
87. A saint, who avoiding all thorny thought-activities enjoys the modifications of only an unblemished thought-activity, is said to have repentance; because he himself is the embodiment of repentance.
88. A saint, who avoiding uncontrolled thought-activities is absorbed in the three-fold (of mind, body and spirit.
89. He, who avoids (both) the thoughts of pain and ill-will, and entertains righteous and pure thoughts, is said to have repentance in the aphorism delivered by the Conquerors (Jinas).
90. (Impure) thought-activities, (such as) wrong belief, etc., have been experienced before since eternity, by a mundane soul, (but) pure thought-activities such as right belief, etc., have never been experienced by this soul.
91. He, who having completely renounced Wrong Belief, Wrong Knowledge and Wrong Conduct, mediates upon Right Belief, Right Knowledge and Right Conduct (is said to have) repentance.
92. Soul is a supreme category, Saints absorbed in it destroy the Karmas; therefore self- concentration only is the repentance of the highest order.
93. A saint absorbed in self-concentration, renounces all defects. Therefore self-concentration only constitutes the repentance of all transgressions.
94. He, who having understood the modes of repentance, as related in the scriptures known by the name of "Pratikramana Sutra" meditates upon it, is then said to have repentance (from the practical point of view). Each is said to have repentance; because he himself is the embodiment of repentance.

Post for comment: MWF 11am

Post for comment: MWF 9am

Post for comment: T 5:40pm

Post for comment: TR 9:50am

Cheap food? High price

Lately we've talked a lot about food in class. Food is a fundamental necessity. We can't live without it. In America, more and more people eat fast food. Here is where the McDonalds symptom: Burgers! Fries! Soda! We love them! But how come they are so cheap? Meat is, after all, at the top of the food production pyramid. How can we afford a burger with fries and soda @ McDonalds and refuse to buy vegetables at Publix? Why are so addicted to fast food? Why is America -in general- so obese?
There's a way of problematizing what we eat while learning better habits. Let's call it nutri/conomics, that is to say, how much nutrition habits are interrelated with net profits by the food industry.

Check out this revealing article in TIME MAGAZINE about the kind of food we eat. It boils down to a thought experiment: Is it worth spending so many resources to raise animals for food, when doing so is more detrimental in the long run?

Somewhere in Iowa, a pig is being raised in a confined pen, packed in so tightly with other swine that their curly tails have been chopped off so they won't bite one another. To prevent him from getting sick in such close quarters, he is dosed with antibiotics. The waste produced by the pig and his thousands of pen mates on the factory farm where they live goes into manure lagoons that blanket neighboring communities with air pollution and a stomach-churning stench. He's fed on American corn that was grown with the help of government subsidies and millions of tons of chemical fertilizer. When the pig is slaughtered, at about 5 months of age, he'll become sausage or bacon that will sell cheap, feeding an American addiction to meat that has contributed to an obesity epidemic currently afflicting more than two-thirds of the population. And when the rains come, the excess fertilizer that coaxed so much corn from the ground will be washed into the Mississippi River and down into the Gulf of Mexico, where it will help kill fish for miles and miles around. That's the state of your bacon — circa 2009.

I recently talked about this problem insofar it applies to our relationship with animals. But this is a different matter altogether.  Animals, that is to say, the ethical issues related with our present treatment of animals is a problem we need to confromt and I'll do it during the semester.

The question here is one of environmental depletion and (ultimately, since we live on this earth with animals) of human self-destruction.

What do we do about it? Through advertising, the BIG COMPANIES brainwash our appetite into consuming cheap food (by cheap I mean BAD).

Can we do something about it? Of course we can. Modifying eating habits, improving our diets, making choices as to what and what not to eat, teaching our children and friends that a hamburger at McDonalds cannot be our lunch staple.

I'll close this post this Sunday at 11pm.

a world without elephants is a poorer world

dramatic news from the new york times regarding the slaughter of elephants in africa:

 The demand for ivory has surged to the point that the tusks of a single adult elephant can be worth more than 10 times the average annual income in many African countries. In Tanzania, impoverished villagers are poisoning pumpkins and rolling them into the road for elephants to eat. In Gabon, subsistence hunters deep in the rain forest are being enlisted to kill elephants and hand over the tusks, sometimes for as little as a sack of salt. Last year, poaching levels in Africa were at their highest since international monitors began keeping detailed records in 2002. And 2011 broke the record for the amount of illegal ivory seized worldwide, at 38.8 tons (equaling the tusks from more than 4,000 dead elephants). Law enforcement officials say the sharp increase in large seizures is a clear sign that organized crime has slipped into the ivory underworld, because only a well-oiled criminal machine — with the help of corrupt officials — could move hundreds of pounds of tusks thousands of miles across the globe, often using specially made shipping containers with secret compartments.

it's clear: governments seem unable to stop the extermination of this beautiful animal.  

brahman? everywhere, but then

remember our discussion of duck/rabbit?

brahman is nature,

nature is everything there is

man is nature and brahman.

but man destroys nature

so, man  destroys himself

did man learned from brahman?

for IT being nature destroys nature and man

thus, brahman destroys itself

what's the riddle?

we cannot lie to ourselves pretending that we live in this safety isle outside the relationship of brahman/atman, pakriti/purusha.

a more honest relationship between man & nature means recognizing that we are -also- nature. but, what nature? do we even know how to look around? do we really see nature or do we see ourselves outside?

i propose environing as learning to weave one-with-another. let's begin with understanding what's difficult. in aesthetics, there is this category of "ugliness",

the so called unpleasant & unsightly in nature. the different, the awkward, unattractive, the queer. people are definitely afraid of the ugly duck. or the frightful (the putrid smell of the marshes, abandoned animal carcasses in the country site, sulfide vapors coming up from the earth's bowels).

and death?

lord byron (who is not precisely afraid of death) has this to say:

The world was void,

The populous and the powerful was a lump,

Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless,

A lump of death, a chaos of hard clay.

The rivers, lakes, and ocean stood still,

And nothing stirred within their silent depths;

Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea,

And their masts fell down piecemeal; as they dropp'd

They slept on the abyss without a surge

The waves were dead; the tides were in their grave,

The moon their mistress had expired before;

The winds were withered in the stagnant air,

And the clouds perish'd; Darkness had no need

Of aid from them. She was the universe.

or baudelaire, in fleurs du mal:

Je veux dormir! dormir plutôt que vivre!
Dans un sommeil aussi doux que la mort,
J' établerai mes baisers sans remords
Sur ton beau corps poli comme le cuivre.

I wish to sleep! to sleep rather than live!
In death as sweet as sleep,
I shall remorselessly cover with my kisses
Your lovely body polished like copper.

fearing less, loving more. that's one way to find one's place within nature. mind you the love i'm talking about is awe before the beauty of nature. it's beauty you wish to keep because it's there in its perfection (in hindu "everything that is is perfect").

how about insects (our misunderstood enemies? the spider is a famous character in the upanishads). ants, one of the smartest and most sociable insect. how about roaches? i found this on a website of people inquiring about miami as a place to live:

I've been hearing a lot about these large flying roaches and it's starting to scare me from relocating here. Are they in all homes? Do they bite? I think I could handle seeing them once in a while outside, but if I saw one of these things flying around my house I think I would want to pack my bags and leave!

what should we stop with insects? let's take atman/brahman down to plants. trees (forgotten shade-giving, trunk-bearing, leafy beings). do they talk? do we talk to trees? they say trees like being talked to. talking to a tree is a sign of acute sensibility. suggested homework 4 all of us: let's embrace and kiss a tree. there goes karma back to the universe!   

You're poor you are unprepared, it's a fact

Fresh from the New York Times. The gap between the haves and have-nots is widening:

One reason for the growing gap in achievement, researchers say, could be that wealthy parents invest more time and money than ever before in their children (in weekend sports, ballet, music lessons, math tutors, and in overall involvement in their children’s schools), while lower-income families, which are now more likely than ever to be headed by a single parent, are increasingly stretched for time and resources. This has been particularly true as more parents try to position their children for college, which has become ever more essential for success in today’s economy.

Also in college:

The University of Michigan study, by Susan M. Dynarski and Martha J. Bailey, looked at two generations of students, those born from 1961 to 1964 and those born from 1979 to 1982. By 1989, about one-third of the high-income students in the first generation had finished college; by 2007, more than half of the second generation had done so. By contrast, only 9 percent of the low-income students in the second generation had completed college by 2007, up only slightly from a 5 percent college completion rate by the first generation in 1989.

What I think this shows is how hard it is for many of you to make it. The more reasons to do it! And it can be done.

post for comment

hi class. thanks for the interesting discussion on thursday.

as promised, this my post @ m.bourbaki. leave your comment there.