[FutureBuddha: Hunches] Coin flip

[Matt Johnson]

Hi Matt

Yes, I agree, Jundo sort of set the Future Buddha as an aside from the rest of the sangha threads so that people could shoot his ideas down, or challenge them at least, but I much prefer the idea of clarifying what each other understands rather than making it about what that person believes per se. Well since you ask about what I think....

Isn't our understanding these days, of how matter and antimatter operates in quantum laws, where two opposing principles can be both present and both absent simultaneously, or something like that anyway. It seems to me that randomness does indeed exist, but it is random within a certain range of possibilities according to the laws of physics. Even where we relate this to our own bodies and minds, there are infinite possibilities, but much of what we are and think exists within a specific set of possibilities. I do not personally believe in determinism but whether a God or just 'how things have unfolded', the universe does indeed appear to develop along 'intelligent' lines. Of course, what is good and bad is simply a matter of preference, even while we strive for the good. A star exploding and consuming its surrounding planets might seem disastrous if it wipes out all known life, but in the great cosmic dance of the ebb and flow of life (and death), it is simply a matter of the universe being impermanent and subject to conditions. We do not want the sun to expand and consume us (one day) but it is not inherently bad if it does, possibly not deliberately designed to occur, but quite likely inevitable if the parts of the universe follow some basic rules that allow for seemingly random events, such as a star reaching a critical threshold for expansion which appears random to an observer, but has arisen unexpectedly because of fluctuations that have that random appearance, but cannot truly be random because the constituent parts can only behave or interact in certain ways. Man I'm getting far off reservation for me, I hope no particle physicists are reading this!

To me, Karma is a similar issue. We experience conditions in our life based on how we interact with the world, so I understand Karma in this way. If I am aggressive towards others no doubt I will end up being beaten up in a fight. This isn't determinist, it is a consequence of natural laws, but then again it could be deterministic, if my Karma from a previous life predisposes me to be aggressive. I am a 'one trip on earth' person, so I see things more in terms of cause and effect, of action and consequence, but I do not 'know.' What I do know is that through my Zen practice I see the wonder of the universe, the intricacy of the people and world around me, and how we can see the moon in a drop of water on a blade of grass, and know the peace of practice where all boundaries and explanations fall away.

Thanks again, gassho, Tokan (satlah)

(Better get back to my day job, nursing notes to write!)

You remind me of someone who lacks logical consistency. How can it be in one breath you say you believe in the scientific story of the universe, seeing it as governed by natural laws and cause and effect, but you also allow for concepts like justice and morality, suggesting some underlying intelligence or order at work. An intelligence that was uncaused and appeared from nowhere.

Respectfully,

_/\_
sat/ah
matt

[Tokan]

You remind me of someone who lacks logical consistency. How can it be in one breath you say you believe in the scientific story of the universe, seeing it as governed by natural laws and cause and effect, but you also allow for concepts like justice and morality, suggesting some underlying intelligence or order at work. An intelligence that was uncaused and appeared from nowhere.

Respectfully,

_/\_
sat/ah
matt

Hi Matt

Do you not think that when life emerges, concepts that govern behaviour also emerge, whether based on natural laws or consciousness. I do not believe you need an intelligent designer for the consequences of your actions to be experienced by you. I did not introduce the concepts of justice and morality, I offered a simple example of how cause and effect works, but in reality bad people get good things and good people get bad things, bad people get bad things, good people get good things - we judge the effects because we have created the concepts of morality and fairness. The universe creates and destroys, we do not know why.

You remind me of someone who lacks logical consistency.

- Thank you for the compliment

Gassho, Tokan

satlah

[Ryumon]

If something can be either a particle or a wave, then I think it’s fair to say that traditional ideas of anything aren’t written in stone as we instinctively think they are. There is no logical consistency in wave-particle duality, so I think we can eschew standard ideas in these discussions.

Gassho,
Ryūmon (Kirk)
Sat Lah

[Jundo]

You remind me of someone who lacks logical consistency. How can it be in one breath you say you believe in the scientific story of the universe, seeing it as governed by natural laws and cause and effect, but you also allow for concepts like justice and morality, suggesting some underlying intelligence or order at work. An intelligence that was uncaused and appeared from nowhere.

If I may jump in, I can prove with 100% certainly that the universe has natural, in-built notions and scales of "justice" and "morality" to it.

That is because we (and all our fellow sentient beings) are 100% just the universe doing its natural thing, so our senses of justice and morality are 100% natural forces of the universe. When we act in a just or ethical way, it is 100% the universe doing so. That does not mean that the universe must have a single sense or measure of justice and morality, and it appears that there are so many, just as there so many individuals who are us. But each of our views and actions are the views and actions of the whole universe 100%, much like each flavor of ice cream in the ice cream store is 100% ice cream and 100% the store doing its ice cream business!

Sadly, our greed, violence and other ignorance are also so. It is one thing that makes me have a "hunch" that the universe tries (whether intentionally or just as an organic process) all these differences out ... with varied and different life forms, different versions of justice and morality or their opposites ... to see which life form sticks and which is destructive. I suspect that, outside the jungle, the more peaceful, tolerant and cooperative forms of life will have a better chance of survival for the long term without destroying themselves in some final war or the like.

Gassho, J
stlah

[Matt Johnson]

At one point you were looking for analogies... I think of what it means to be an alive universe... I just thought this was a cute way of getting there...

https://youtube.com/shorts/4sG9FhwCBTo?si=0tkAh7xfTic154TU

_/\_
sat/ah
matt

[Jundo]

https://youtube.com/shorts/4sG9FhwCB...kAh7xfTic154TU

_/\_
sat/ah
matt

What is your point? I don't see the connection.

By the way, I will move this to the other thread to keep it together.

Gassho, Jundo
stlah

[Jundo]

What is your point? I don't see the connection.

By the way, I will move this to the other thread to keep it together.

Gassho, Jundo
stlah

I will say this: The film correctly shows that a flame needs 4 things to burn ... heat, fuel, oxygen, and their chemical reaction.

My book is why a particular train of flames ... passed flame to flame through 13.8 billion years ... is now burning particularly as the reader's hot flame when, one might imagine, the trail of flames could have wandered off to burn in any other direction and places amid all possibility, that it could have headed elsewhere amid the vast field of possibilities that is universal, solar and planetary development, the meandering course of evolution, human and personal family history.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_cez4AX_Gjs

Gassho, J
stlah

[Jundo]

By the way, I am reading a book right now by a respected mathematician who (very rightly) criticizes anti-evolution folks who use false mathematical arguments to assert that Darwin's evolution could not work to explain complex life bodies because "random" events could wander off in wild directions, most of which are deadly to life. He shows, quite correctly, that the anti-evolutionists are wrong because there is a mechanism (natural selection) which makes the process less than totally random. Namely, "winning" elements which aid survival tend to be kept, passed on to next generations, with "losing" elements discarded and not passed on because their carriers do not survive and mate. This serves to guide the direction of body design toward incremental improvements. With sufficiently large populations (lots of babies) and time, winning mutations can appear and be winnowed out from the mass of losing mutations. Thus, there is a selection mechanism which makes the process not completely random. For this reason, creationists are wrong when they argue that a random process could not reach complexity, and particular bodily organs, especially in limited time.

https://skepticalinquirer.org/2022/05/the-failures-of-mathematical-anti-evolutionism/

My book seeks to argue that there must be a similar, yet to be understood mechanism of nature that causes our appearance amid all possibilities of time and space (in a particularly body and self-aware experience of the self) to be less random than it seems on the surface. I offer a variety of possible solutions to the puzzle proposed by respected scientists and mathematicians, Zen masters, theologians, computer designers and such.

Gassho, J
stlah