The Buddha said to Ananda,
"Devas and humans in the land of Amitayus are each provided with
robes, food and drink, flowers, perfume, ornaments, silken canopies and banners,
and are surrounded by exquisite sounds. Their abodes, palaces, and pavilions
are exactly in accordance with the size of their bodies. One, two or even innumerable jewels appear before them,
as soon as they wish. ...In that Buddha-land there are innumerable jewelled nets,
all adorned with skeins of gold thread, pearls,
and a hundred thousand kinds of rare and marvelous treasures.
All around the nets hang jewelled bells of the utmost beauty, which shine brilliantly.
When a natural breeze of virtue arises and gently blows,
it is moderate in temperature, neither cold nor hot,
refreshing and soft to the senses, and moves neither too slowly nor too quickly.
When the breeze wafts over the nets and the various jewelled trees,
countless excellent sounds of the Dharma are heard,
and ten thousand kinds of delicate fragrances of virtue are diffused.
If one smells those fragrances,
one's impurities and passions spontaneously cease to arise.
"Devas and humans in the land of Amitayus are each provided with
robes, food and drink, flowers, perfume, ornaments, silken canopies and banners,
and are surrounded by exquisite sounds. Their abodes, palaces, and pavilions
are exactly in accordance with the size of their bodies. One, two or even innumerable jewels appear before them,
as soon as they wish. ...In that Buddha-land there are innumerable jewelled nets,
all adorned with skeins of gold thread, pearls,
and a hundred thousand kinds of rare and marvelous treasures.
All around the nets hang jewelled bells of the utmost beauty, which shine brilliantly.
When a natural breeze of virtue arises and gently blows,
it is moderate in temperature, neither cold nor hot,
refreshing and soft to the senses, and moves neither too slowly nor too quickly.
When the breeze wafts over the nets and the various jewelled trees,
countless excellent sounds of the Dharma are heard,
and ten thousand kinds of delicate fragrances of virtue are diffused.
If one smells those fragrances,
one's impurities and passions spontaneously cease to arise.
Hello Fellow Consumers of That Which Pleases You ... (hopefully all healthy choices, in moderation) ...
How do we persuade great numbers of us to change and select something good for us, instead of all the things harmful to health and life, while respecting freedom of choice, individual autonomy, freedom from compulsion, the honoring of human rights and the rules of the open marketplace? Once (hopefully) good and healthy technologies are developed, how are we to persuade folks to use them ... especially in a world which recently saw a simple vaccine rejected by so many?
I remind readers: My writings are based on the premise that certain medical, genetic and other technological developments ...
(1) are inevitable and coming anyway, cannot be halted, cannot be ignored;
(2) have a high chance of being misused by bad actors unless we use them in beneficial ways;
(3) can be shown to be effective and safe to use; and
(4) can be introduced in an ethical way respectful of individual free choice, civil and human rights ...
... and I ask, how should such technologies be best employed to heal some of what troubles this world??
My book suggests a way ...
~ ~ ~
Apart from judicially convicted heinous criminals (murderers, rapists, child molesters after full and fair trial) for purposes of preventing violent crime, nobody should be forced to undergo any pharmacological, hormonal, neural or other medical treatment, no change to their DNA, brain or anywhere in or upon their body, except by free choice in the marketplace, upon fully informed consent, the same as for any personal consumption or medical decision today. Dictatorships may wrongly force people to do so against their will, but our democratic faith in civil liberties and constitutional protections must work to prevent the same from happening in western free societies. It is vitally important that people have the right and power to choose, or refuse, any such treatment. In a society upholding civil rights, nothing should be imposed on ordinary citizens by force.
But here is something to keep in mind about changing peoples’ minds …
… a truth that Madison Avenue ‘ad men’ and common salesmen figured out long ago in regard to consumer choice and free will:
It is a simple truism that people can be induced to choose what’s fun, thrilling, titillating, tasty, relaxing, pleasing, sexually and/or spiritually satisfying or otherwise extremely pleasurable precisely because it is fun, thrilling, titillating, tasty, relaxing, pleasing, sexually or spiritually satisfying or otherwise extremely pleasurable ... something that makes folks feel so happy and fulfilled, sated and fortified that they choose it simply because it feels so gosh darn good.
Even today, consumers can be persuaded to do things (some beneficial, but even so many actions very bad for themselves) just because they get pleasure and feel good in doing so. The more pleasure or peace and satisfaction, the more good feeling, the more apt to be enticing. Even now, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, unsafe sex and excess eating drive people to kill themselves through their choices ... quite literally.
Thus, if techniques and pharmaceuticals are designed that will cause people to act better, to be more loving, kind and generous, to be healthier in body and mind, all while experiencing incredible, wild levels of pleasure, or profound and abiding well-being and self-satisfaction by undergoing the change—perhaps levels of pleasure and self-satisfaction that may be described as better than sex, ice cream and opium combined, or degrees of fulfillment and peace that can only be called truly heavenly—the treatments will be in wide demand, flying off the shelves and doctors’ prescription pads. Afterwards, following the orgasmic experience of pure pleasure, beyond the passing taste of divine bliss and tranquility, after the original excitement calms, users will be left with the same feelings of satiation, fulfillment, mellow ease and relaxation that follow sex and ice cream but, in this case, the treatment itself will have left them healthier, calmer, happier, stronger, kinder and generally better to boot. People (even rich and powerful people in society and its politics) will run for such incredible pleasures or feelings of inner peace and joy just as they now chase after 1,001 other physical and mental pleasures in life.
Thus, let us make these treatments as satisfying and self-fulfilling as 1,001 pleasures combined!
Imagine ... powerful pleasures that lead, in this case, to health and happiness among humanity, peace on battlefields, and an end to hunger and homelessness in the world!
Have not Buddhism and the other religions always promised heavens with harps, palaces, nectar and ambrosia, endless treats, joys, inner peace and satisfaction, bliss and delights as the reward for good and virtuous behavior? As well, the image of “nirvana” is of boundless peace and satisfaction, ease, joy and calm.
We will simply be delivering on the promised exchange a bit sooner, rather than waiting for the next world.
The intense period of initial pleasure or rapturous peace need not last long: Pleasures in more ordinary degree might continue even after the first rapturous dose, a different kind of pleasure than the original orgiastic waves, paradisal peace or sublime satisfaction. Thereafter, the body shall be sufficiently changed, and society will greatly change by simple math: When great joy and satisfaction arise whenever one does good for others, while guilt or self-disgust are strongly felt when doing or witnessing harm to another, good will increase in society and bad acts will be rarer.
From time immemorial, religious teachers and moralists have sought to motivate people to be good by persuading, pleading, beseeching, inspiring, or simply promising heaven and threatening hell. Our doing so has been only mildly successful. Much more effective will be inner heavens which are experienced within one’s emotions as the body is made to feel good by doing good, as well as inner hells escaped or avoided when the heart is repulsed by acts of uncaring or violent harm.
Just as people today are free to choose from the marketplace of available goods and services based on libertarian, free market respect for an individual’s right to pursue their own happiness as they darn well see fit -- to elect plastic surgery or a tattoo, to drink a beer, to watch pornography, to buy a cute puppy, or to smoke a joint because it makes one feel good -- people will choose these virtue improving treatments by their own free selection simply because they make the recipient feel incredibly good …
Incredibly, INCREDIBLY, INCREDIBLY GOOD!
Each dose will be designed specifically to cause maximally heightened levels of pleasure, relaxation, euphoria, bliss, or simple peace and a sense of well-being, as part of the initial treatment, combined with accompanying physical changes that will leave the recipient healthier, happier and living better. Soon, the pleasure level will return to more moderate strengths, but the person will remain much more happy and content than before, even if no longer swept with bliss or such levels of profound serenity. No gun to the head will be necessary, no taking of hostages, not any more than today we must force people by threat to eat ice cream, masturbate, take a vacation or do other pleasurable things. Should the plan work, wide swaths of the general population will line up by their own choice, of their own free will, as if offered chocolate, a long holiday, $1 million cash and a sexy night with their favorite movie star all rolled into one … but will then find themselves, on the morning after, as reborn people with kinder hearts and fewer bad habits, feeling mellow, relaxed, positive and content, healthier and more at home in their lives.
Many people today are willing to ingest all manner of questionable, exotic, unproven, often expensive herbs and minerals from the local health food store, or quack cures that are pushed on the internet, merely based on rumors of becoming happier, more peaceful, more loving, sexier, stronger, longer lived, smarter, and thinner. Might people just as voluntarily, fully within their own choice, agree to ingest similar substances if guaranteed to induce extremely positive and pleasant states of mind, while even more effective in realizing the same positive goals of being happier, more peaceful, more loving, sexier, stronger, longer lived, smarter, and thinner, all tested to be safe with minimal side-effects (unlike so many of those questionable internet herbs)?
I foresee capsules of “peace-oids” more pleasant than opioids, “anti-alcoholism ale” on tap designed to turn imbibers from their addictions, vicarious viagra, “fast mood” drive-thru’s dishing out nourishing and healthy McDelight, “generosity-hacks” as powerful to our charitable natures as crack! But unlike opioids, excess alcohol, unprotected sex, junk food and cocaine, this stuff will leave one measurably better, stronger, longer lived, smarter, kinder, and nicer.
Of course, all must be tested, and one-by-one clinically checked for possible side effects as with any new drug or treatment … but then get ‘em on the market! That is what capitalism is about, is it not?! Let's use capitalist methods to check capitalism's worst excesses and weaknesses. Give consumers what pleases them, what they desire. Let somebody realize that they can make a fortune selling peace, charity and the simple joys in life ‘that money can’t buy,’ and somebody will sell em’ for sure. There will be no compulsion, and only individual preference selection and consumption in the marketplace, with hoards of shoppers willingly rushing down the shop aisles to alter their behavior with "goods" that make one good. Becoming healthier in body and mind will be supplied because demanded. There will be no more coercion or arm twisting than current advertising and social media employ in convincing us to head to the mall, seeking happiness in lasik surgery, sexy lingerie, and a bottle of vodka with ginseng.
The provided pleasure will be so much greater than any store purchase of chocolate bon-bons, botox or booze, that is true, but the rewards will also be so much greater.
But is it wrong, or “un-Buddhist,” to use peoples’ vices and desires for pleasure in order to overcome their vices and excess attachments to pleasure?
I think it quite traditional:
Just as some Buddhists savor the extreme bliss which results from Jhana states in deep meditation, thereupon enabling the practitioner to better abide by the Precepts, the Jhanic bliss provided by these “Precepts by Rx Prescription” will enable better, more ethical behavior. I say quite seriously that, if we can make doing charitable deeds as pleasurable to the brain as sex, we will all become founders of soup kitchens and orphanages.
(to be continued next time)
Gassho, J
stlah
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