Category: Buddhism

Humans as networks

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

The advantage of seeing humans as networks is we can say interesting things about them parsimoniously.

A network is an organization of parts that are all connected.

Humans are networks of language. It is quite easy to see that language is a kind of network. Words connect in many ways and any word can be added to an existing network without difficulty. One word is defined by other words and we understand how it is used by how it functions among other words.

Humans are networks of semiotics. Semiotics function and are networked much like words, though a single semiotic may require many words to describe.

Meaning or what things mean is another network that is a fundamental part of being human. Meaning can be expressed in words, it can be apprehended through semiotic analyses, and it very often has a strong emotional component.

Emotions are another network that is fundamental to humanness. Emotions are often not as easily analyzed as the other networks since they can be vague, changeable, and based on complexities that are difficult to see while the emotion is happening. I am pretty sure that most, if not all, complex emotions are socially determined. Since semiotics are by definition communicative, the emotional aspect of all semiotics is a major aspect of both the semiotic and emotional networks. For this reason, emotions are often best analyzed through their accompanying semiotics.

Humans also have biological networks, perceptual networks, chemical and electrical networks.

All of these networks are hooked up with each other and all of them send signals internally and to the other networks.

If we conceive of a single human being as being a vast network that includes all of the above mentioned networks and others that have not been mentioned (aesthetic, gustatory, sexual, etc.), we can see that that vast network that is all of the other networks must have a basic need to be unified.

The biology must cohere and be healthy and the mind and feelings that exist together with that biology must be unconfused enough to guide the biology toward what it needs to maintain itself.

The cognitive networks (language, semiotics, feeling, reason, etc.) must have a strong tendency to forming basic conclusions about the world around them.

For example, all humans live in fundamentally uncertain circumstances. We don’t know when we will die, what happens after we die, how stable our social lives are, our economics, our biology, and so forth. To function, our cognitive network(s) must have a basic answer to the question of uncertainty. Here are some ways that people answer or respond to the fundamentally uncertain nature of human existence:

  • Many just declare that this is how it is. People like this might say, “Life is tough and you gotta do what you gotta do ’cause that’s how it is.” Or, “I growed up poor so I gots to be rich now and that just how it is.”Answers of this sort, while not complex, can be very motivating. I am sure that many conventionally “successful” people deal with uncertainty on terms like these.
  • For many, religion, science, or philosophy answers this question. “God said so.” “Science has shown that.” “Do as thou wilt.”
  • Another common response is “No one has ever been able to answer that question, so I am going to ignore it and get all I can because you only live once.”
  • In my limited experience (wish it were more limited), a good many alcoholics love the feeling of being sure or of knowing how things are. Booze activates an easy confidence of this sort and can even be charming in an occasional drunk. By the time booze is an addiction, though, this form of confidence becomes a bad habit, declining in charm as the cognitive functions are eroded by the alcohol.
  • In cultures that have a belief in rebirth, the question of uncertainty is often answered by what happened in the past or resolved by what might happen in the next life.
  • Some people deal with this question by focusing entirely on one thing—their career, their children, their nation, their business, etc.
  • Some deal with it by facing it and finding that nearly everything produces a sense of wonder because hardly anything is known for sure. Others feel anxiety by facing it. Others anger or frustration.

I am sure that readers can add many more examples of how humans deal with fundamental existential uncertainty. What I find most interesting in thinking in this way is you don’t need to imagine a person’s ego or wonder too much about how or why their emotions developed as they did. You really just need to ask them how they deal with uncertainty and they will tell you.

The vast cognitive and biological networks of individual humans often can be understood as being based on a simple answer to a simple question like that.

Since psychological explanations are the coin of the realm today, many people will confuse themselves and others by further adding long stories about the development of their personality or how their parents treated them. These factors can be interesting and are real, to a point, but it is much simpler and more profitable to focus directly at the answer/response to the basic question of life’s uncertainty. A major bias or unifying principle of the human network can be found in a straightforward answer to that question.

Beyond this basic question discussed above, there are many other questions we can ask about a particular human network. Is the network closed or is it open? Is it complex or simple? Is it independent of social definitions/constraints or dependent on them? How well does it see itself, understand itself? Does it perceive other networks or does it see other people as two-dimensional aspects of its own network? Is it willing to interface with other human networks in complex ways or only in simple conventional or established ways? Is it secretive? Does it see the vastness of the networks outside and beyond itself? Does it see how it is connected to them?

The advantage of analyzing humans as networks is it avoids many of the ambiguities of psychological analysis. Rather than focus on such dubious concepts as personality, ego, the subconscious, or self, a network analysis simply asks how is the network functioning. From a network point of view, a personality or self is little more than a focal point, a unifying principle that provides an illusion of certainty where there need not be one and cannot really be one. A human can function perfectly well without an ego, self, or well-defined personality. Indeed, there is greater stability in seeing yourself as a complex network that is always open to analysis and always willing to add or remove parts as they show themselves to be either good or bad.

 After basic network questions have been asked and answered, I think the best starting point for a more detailed analysis is  an examination of semiotics and how they are functioning in the individual’s life, and especially in their communications with others. This is best done through FIML practice.

In this context, as in so many, it is important to remember that humans are entry-level conscious semiotic animals. As such, we are prone to processing semiotics with the abrupt and often violent instincts of animals. A network approach provides specificity (what semiotic are we talking about), malleability (oh, I didn’t mean that), an appreciation for the functionality of network nodes, what they are doing and how or why. Since FIML partners have a prior agreement to do analyses of this sort, it is fairly easy for them to segue from ordinary conversation to analysis of that conversation and then back to the ordinary conversation.

knowing

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

viewed from many angles, everything is unknown

viewed from one angle, a small area of self-knowing exists, is known

taken together, these two yield a singular insight

…a Dark City you cannot leave

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

Absurd and dangerous laws like this illustrate the extremely strong bonds humans have with default vocabularies, default cognitive tautologies, default authoritarian control, default conformity. These default bonds are the core of why mind-control works and how it works. Goose any of these bonds and droves will follow. We are right now living inside a multifaceted totalitarian panopticon—a Dark City you cannot leave. Is penultimate reality that we are controlled by Satan or mired in the First & Second Noble Truths of Buddhism? ABN

New York Times Guide to Fall Vaccine Shots Is ‘Disinformation’

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

Nirav Shah, M.D., J.D., principal deputy director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told The New York Times children 6 months and older should get the COVID-19 vaccine this fall, adding, “Do you want to see your grandpa … [and] grandma? Are you really sure you’re not going to give COVID to them?”

source

This anti-science vax ‘reasoning’ is based on what I call default tautologies or default linguistic tautologies or default language bundles. These tautologies are all but hard-wired assumptions about reality and language that are being obscenely misused in these vax ‘arguments.’ Default psycholinguistic bundles can also be entirely unique to persons. As such they comprise the stuff of the Buddhist ‘small self’ which we are counseled not to cling to. Clinging or attachment in Buddhism means clinging to these tautological bundles of self or of the culture around us or entities within that culture such as the NYT or CDC. Delusion in Buddhism means clinging to error, wrong views, wrong thoughts, wrong speech. One good thing about covid anti-science is it helped many people see how pervasive and pernicious delusion is, how it arises in the self as well as in culture. How it is used by powerful groups to trick people into wars, bad health decisions, etc. ABN

The timeline for full deployment of the modern United States internet control system, is likely around late fall and early winter this year, in advance of the 2024 U.S. election cycle

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

I share this information with you so that you understand what is being constructed and what is about to be deployed on a large scale throughout the U.S. internet operating system.  The U.S. internet will be different.  The social media restrictions became more prevalent and noticeable in the past several years; now it is time for DHS to expand that process to the entire U.S. internet.

The timeline for full deployment of the modern United States internet control system, is likely around late fall and early winter this year, in advance of the 2024 U.S. election cycle.

Everything will change.  Every route of online traffic including Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) to filters and rerouting on Domain Name Systems (DNS), to the Internet Protocol (IP) itself will be subject to change in the form of background shadow banning.  If the DHS partnership is successful, you will not initially notice – much like a shadow banned platform user doesn’t notice their new defined status.  The shift will become more obvious over time.

One odd outcome will be a regional targeting system.  Depending on where you are in the USA, your online experience will be different. There will also be enhancements to your internet travel based on your profile.  Good thinking users will have benefits that enhance the experience of the user and supports the interests of the national security guardians.

♦ Deployment of a Virtual Private Network (VPN) is irrelevant in this construct.  A VPN is like you renting a car without a license plate.  You travel past all the Automatic License Plate Readers, arrive at your destination, leave the keys in the ignition and just abandon the car.  Your personal travel was essentially invisible to the APLR system.  However, when the internet roads are controlled by the national security state, and there is no longer an offramp to the destination, your VPN use is irrelevant – you cannot reach your destination.  That’s part of the shift.

You will notice I use the term “definition” quite often.  That is because the root of every control mechanism is grounded upon defining things.  When you accept the terms ‘disinformation’, ‘misinformation’, and/or ‘malinformation’, you are buying into the process that permits definitions to determine your travel. Those who define both you and your destination, ultimately control your online experience.

source

If you provide content online, you probably already have noticed this happening to you. Total information control by advanced AI is a modern iteration of the First & Second Noble Truths—that we suffer because we cling to delusion. Escaping our delusional group karma will require paying wise attention to the truths of our own unique mind-streams and experiences. That has always been the case in the human realm. The good side of this is it has become so obvious today (if you look) how delusions are made and propagated. Fully understanding the First & Second Noble Truths = Enlightenment. In this context, FIML has more value than ever. ABN

I’ve studied thousands of near-death experiences and have become convinced there’s an afterlife

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

…Through his decades of research, Dr Long has concluded that about 45 percent of near-death experiences include a sense of being out-of-body, in which people’s consciousness is separated from their physical being.

About three-quarters of those who experience this reported wanting to stay in the afterlife because of the immense love and joy that overtook them. More than half report seeing a ‘heavenly’ realm and around a quarter of them are enveloped in light or mist.

This also means, he added, that nearly 100 percent of those who have a brush with death no longer fear it.

His research has permanently altered the way that Dr Long cares for his patients. Previously, he would not mention his research into this particular field, but if his patients want to talk about it, he does not hold back.

Dr Long said: ‘I tell them that based on my research, I’m very confident that there’s a wonderful afterlife for all of us and that we will be reunited with our deceased loved ones. And that’s profoundly reassuring to them. To me it’s a blessing to be able to share that with them.’

source

The Shadowbanning of the United States Internet

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

There really is no other phrase that seems to adequately describe the future for online life in the United States than to describe it through the prism of the previously discussed shadow banning that takes place on the X-platform for specifically wrong-thinking users.

It is important to begin with the end in mind.  Perhaps some people are unaware that internet services, meaning the actual experience of using the internet for communication and commerce, are not the same in every nation.  In fact, it is quite a different experience depending on where on the globe you are located.  The differences are driven by internal controls, the intranet of the regional internet per se.

The internet in China is not the same as the internet in Europe, which is not the same as the internet in Australia, which is not the same as the internet in North America, which is not the same -at all- as the internet that now exists within Russia.  Even in some continents, the internet traffic flows are controlled at different levels within each nation. The “world wide web” is a format, but when you get down to the national level, things change.

This baseline helps to understand that internet freedom is defined by access to information and commerce.

To the extent the information or commerce is defined as against the interests of the authority structure, or potentially a threat to the national security interest of the government therein, the internet content is filtered, modified, censored, removed or just simply blocked from view.  This is one layer in the information control system.

Another layer is the flow of commerce that floats atop the flow of information.  This is where advertising, product sales, purchasing and general e-commerce takes place. This layer represents another option for control; therefore, this e-commerce layer should be considered running in parallel to the information, albeit perhaps indirectly attached.

Continue reading “The Shadowbanning of the United States Internet” →

What limits speech? In a word: Fear

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

If we consider speech with only one listener and look firstly at the micro level, we find it is fear of wrong word choice, wrong gesture, expression, demeanor, or tone of voice that limits our speech because a misstep with any one of these may transgress interpersonal limits.

At the meso level, it is either fear of offending or embarrassing (our understanding of) the “personality” of our listener or the fear of an actual flareup from our listener.

At the macro level, it is the fear of introducing a largish idea with sociological or career implications that might disturb, embarrass, or anger our one listener.

With two or more listeners, the analysis is much the same though the numbers of people make it more complex, until we get to so many people we are speaking to an audience. Then it becomes simpler in some ways because the micro and meso levels will be less prominent due to distance between speaker and audience and there being no clear single target of our tone of voice or phraseology.

On the other hand, an audience’s response can be more complex and problematic because more than one person can become angry at us.

Human beings thus are stuck in a game that is controlled by how most of us listen most of the time.

Stated differently, human beings have magnificent speech and communicative capabilities, but rarely get to use them to their full, best effect because one or more of the many speech limits outlined above will cause us either to hold our tongues or else risk creating a disruption in the mind(s) of our listeners.

This seems like a Big Problem to me. I do not want to spend my life constrained by those rules. FIML can help us overcome this problem but even FIML cannot do it all.

We must also recognize that our very comprehension of meaning itself is grounded in fear.

first posted SEPTEMBER 23, 2019

UPDATE: This is a main area where I have some disagreement with traditional Buddhist practice which tends to put the onus of right speech entirely on the speaker. This makes sense in many contexts but in many other contexts it can cause speakers to withhold or be timid when they should not. Or it can cause listeners to believe that speakers must always keep in mind their weaknesses and that they (listeners) are being entirely proper when they misinterpret or mis-react to someone’s speech. This kind of thinking too often leads to overly emotional responses, a greatly reduced scope of discussable topics, and an overall pettiness that constrains everyone. Placing the onus for right speech always on the speaker and never requiring right mindfulness of the listener leads to a kind of hierarchy of speech or a totalitarian view of what is right and wrong to say. In the world today, we can clearly see how speech is constrained in this way through censorship, shadow-banning, muting, shaming, deplatforming, cancelling and more with almost no good purpose ever being served except elitist control of the masses. At interpersonal levels, our speech is too often limited by the narcissistic sensibilities of listeners or what we fear those sensibilities might be. None of this is optimal good speech. In Buddhism we want to optimize speech, thought, mindfulness, and listening. It is good to be mindful of what we say, when we say it, and to whom. But it is not good to always tread in fear every time you open your mouth. ABN

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

The basic Buddhist take on sexual misconduct is you shouldn’t harm anyone or let yourself be harmed by sexual behavior. Less basic is sexual thought and behavior should not be excessive. ‘Identifying’ your ‘self’ with your ‘sexuality’ is almost anti-Buddhist because Buddhism is all about overcoming the self, which is an illusion, a delusion. Additionally, sexuality is not the most important part of humans. For these reasons seducing children (or adults) into delusive identities based on sexuality is not right conduct. It is sexual and psychological misconduct. It is foisting your own delusions on others, leading others to make the same mistakes you have. ABN

Your mindfulness can beneficially affect other people

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

…Until relatively recently, mindfulness was studied in the context of the individual’s own well-being as a stress-reducing psychological mechanism. Researchers now are coming to recognize that some people are better at being mindful, and that those who are have not only less stress but better relationships.  According to the theory behind a new study by Auburn University’s Julianne McGill and Francesca Adler-Baeder (2019), it may very well be this ability to focus on the present moment that leads you to set stress aside and be more loving with your partner.  Indeed, the authors make the observation that such “positive relationship behaviors are associated with higher relationship quality and in fact, may be one of the most potent predictors of relationship functioning determined by individual studies and meta-analytic procedures” (p. 1).

Study is behind a paywall. The above quote comes from an article about the study: This Personality Trait May Improve Your Relationships.

UN expert argues religious beliefs must change to accommodate LGBT ideology

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

Last week, the U.N.’s Independent Expert on sexual orientation and gender identity, Victor Madrigal-Borloz, presented a report to the 53rd Session of the U.N. Human Rights Council arguing that religious freedom is “not incompatible with equality for LGBT persons.” However, by reading Madrigal-Borloz’s report, it appears that his understanding of “compatibility” means that long-held religious beliefs and traditions must be subservient to the LGBT ideology.

…In an obvious attack on religious freedom, the report openly takes aim at religious exemptions. For example, it notes that in some countries, “including the United States and Australia, government-funded foster care and adoption agencies can reject prospective families based on sexual orientation, gender identity and faith.” The report rejects the idea that religious institutions should have any autonomy regarding their internal policies, arguing that this could hinder “diversity-oriented education, comprehensive sexuality education, and gender equality.”

The report cites unspecified “obligations” under international human rights law to “ensure that LGBT consumers are not discriminated against.” It quoted the U.N. Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, who said, “[I]t is not permissible for individuals or groups to invoke ‘religious liberty’ to perpetuate discrimination against … lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex persons, when it comes to the provision of goods or services in the public sphere.” The report specifically alludes to incidents in the U.S. where wedding vendors were asked to create a unique product for same-sex marriages, which went against their religious conviction.

source

Wise compassion

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

The highest virtue in Buddhism is wisdom, not compassion.

Unwise compassion—that is compassion that brings harm rather than good—is bad.

I think the Pope’s talk as described in the following article is an example of unwise compassion.

Francis reprimands European leaders, forcefully asking continent: ‘What has happened to you?’

The Pope tried to highlight Europe’s “strengths” with his lofty rhetoric, but I think he revealed some of its deepest weaknesses.

Identifying a temptation to “yield to our own selfish interests” by “putting up fences here and there” to stop the flow of migrants into Europe, the pontiff said: “I dream of a Europe where being a migrant is not a crime but a summons to greater commitment on behalf of the dignity of every human being.”

I probably shouldn’t say any of what I have said and what I am going to say next: Each of the major Abrahamic religions suffers from the flaw of holding some word or law or ideal above human wisdom.

first posted MAY 6, 2016

Short-term memory is key to psychological understanding

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

Short-term memory is where the rubber of human psychology meets the road.

It is the active part of human psychology as it functions in real-time.

New research indicates that the thalamus, which relays almost all sensory information, is central to the operation of short-term memory. Without the thalamus, short-term memory does not occur.

See Maintenance of persistent activity in a frontal thalamocortical loop and New research: short-term memory depends on the thalamus for background.

Short-term memory is a changeable “program” that deals with and responds to the world quickly. It is the main determinant of how “you” are in the moment.

Short-term memory maintains persistent activity (in the brain/body) by relaying its components through the thalamus in response to real-time conditions.

If we discover a mistake in our short-term memory, it is typically very easy to change. For example, if you realize you forgot to set your clocks ahead, your short-term memory will quickly adjust. You might feel a little dumb for a moment, but usually it is no big deal.

This example shows how our short-term memory is connected to long-term memories, to planning, expectation, and our general sense of the world around us and what we are doing in it.

FIML is an effective form of psychotherapy largely because it focuses on the short-term memory.

By targeting short-term memory loads, FIML helps partners discover how their psychologies are actually functioning in real-time during real-world situations.

Correcting mistakes in short-term memory immediately changes how we function.

Changing the same mistake several times very often removes it entirely from the long-term memory, from the overall functioning of the individual.

first posted MAY 22, 2017

Buddhist mindfulness practice focuses a lot on short-term memory. In this respect, FIML is a kind of shared mindfulness between two people, both keeping themselves and each other honest and on the same page. FIML may feel intense for beginners because this kind of focus with this kind of intention has probably never been engaged in before. With practice, FIML becomes relaxed and pleasant, creating an in-the-zone feeling like you are playing a fun game or doing something important and interesting together. When done regularly, FIML generates a very sturdy kind of mutual self-respect. ABN

Compelling evidence suggests that many insects are sentient and feel pain

~ ABN ~ Leave a comment

…The ethical implications of these and other data on sentience are obvious because of how insects and countless other animals are used and abused in research and conservation projects because some people think it’s impossible that they are sentient beings or they casually write them off as so-called “pests.” Nonetheless, detailed data show they feel morally relevant pain.

Knowing that animals are sentient should—and must—make a difference in how we view, represent, and treat them. The details—the breadth and depth—of the Birch et al. and Gibbons et al. research set an excellent example for future comparative research on many other animals. I look forward to seeing what these studies yield about the biodiversity of sentience and I’m sure that more “surprises” will be uncovered. Who’d have thought that small-brained flies, mosquitoes, cockroaches, and termites would show strong evidence of pain? In fact, they do.

source