Enlightenment

What is this fabled state of being he wondered. After many years of contemplation, he thought perhaps he might know.

Under the Bodhi Tree

A descent into silence and meditation. A search for the soul.

On Good and Bad

Will we make a better world for all, a different universe. Or will the wheel of samsara never be broken.

To be Free

Release from the shackles of a mind made prison, sought for so many years and yet so recently achieved.

Make Believe

While there may be no god and no objective morality, we may act as if there were. Some of us find that we must.

Ancient and Modern

While mesmerized by the beauty of nature and the past, naive Luddism is not a philosophy I espouse or admire.

The Past is a Foreign Country

They do things differently there. Or do they? Man’s real fear is of the unknowable future.

Faith and Doubt

Most of us have developed a worldview but I wonder how many of us let doubt destroy it?

Is Consciousness an Illusion?

Many now hold that consciousness is a trick, wrought upon an illusory “us” by physics and you may therefore wish to contemplate whether you exist at all.

Mysticism – Experience over Intellect

Countless words have been written about mysticism but only direct experience will ever be able to convey what it is “like”. 

Hearing the Logos

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth

Figuratively speaking I suspect the meek are indeed blessed and that in a sense they shall inherit, if not the earth, then at least a life of peace.

Economic Growth Sucks

Do we need economic growth? I find myself answering “no”.

Cynicism and LinkedIn

What makes a cynic? Reason and experience in life or the cold hand of genetic inheritance? Are cynics just born? … More

The Limits of Reasoning

“What Am I” is the most important question I can ask and yet the answer may have to be discovered not by reasoning but by experience. 

Original thinking or garbled trope?

Too often writers feel obliged to offer up a digest or synthesis of what they have read rather than contributing anything new or original.

Does Evil Exist?

In the absence of conscious beings with free will, morality can not exist.  Picture a universe of infinite violence such as our own with no sentient life.

Love is……

Love is a primary and immutable moral imperative and is not subjective or relative to any particular age or society.

The Limited Use of Self Awareness

“The unexamined life is not worth living” said Socrates and few would doubt the wisdom of his belief. But is self awareness enough? 

Is there an objective morality?

Is there an objective morality? If so, how can we learn about it?  Or is the whole idea of a universal morality misguided?

To every thing there is a season.

There is a season for learning and a season to realize you know enough.

This too shall pass

The world is full of annoyance and “noise” in the statistical sense.  Meaningless “stuff”, which in the bigger picture it is best to ignore. To shrug,walk away from.

Philosophy – Would we need it if we were happy?

Would we spend so much time in hand wringing existential anxiety if we discovered the genetic code of the pain … More

Why I doubt my Existence

I believe that I am merely a “program” and that similar programs run every animal and living thing on earth.

Isness

Happiness is only attainable once you recognize that everything just “is”.

How to be Human in an indifferent Universe

How damaging we are to each other. How grim the human condition can become, and it does not take war … More

Wittgenstein’s ladder: to climb or not to climb?

The happiest are those who have never heard of Wittgenstein’s Ladder.  If asked, they probably assume its something you buy in Homebase.

I know that my Redeemer Liveth

Success in seeking the Absolute may simply be a matter of altering our minds chemically. 

Discarding the Irrelevant

In recent years I have found it increasingly beneficial to narrow my focus. 

“I” do not exist

I have felt with increasing certainty recently that the Buddhists are right. We have no separate existence, no soul, no fixed place in the universe.

“Objective truth” is an illusion.

Unqualified objective truth can not exist.  Heavily qualified objective truth probably does.

Was the Noble Savage a Happy Bunny?

It is pleasant to imagine that there was a day in the distant past where people did not live in Grenfell Tower and didn’t have to look at Trump’s haircut in the media.

Class Prejudice

Is it right to feel distaste for your fellow man?

The Arab Israeli conflict is very, very Simple

The Arab Israeli conflict arose from vibrating energy “strings” – it really is that simple in a sense.

Carpe Diem

There is nothing quite like a funeral to concentrate the mind; “carpe diem” seems such an apt phrase at such a time.

Why are we forgetting the deaths of 100 million in the Spanish Flu outbreak?

Is it odd that 100 million deaths in the Spanish Flu outbreak of 1918 has received comparatively little attention?

Is it all gloom?

Is everything bad? Is the world a bad place? Are we humans damned and doomed? Is there any good news?

Corrosive, Obsessive Hatred

How can people not see what their untrammelled hatred does to themselves and those around them?

To defeat hatred

Hatred is a difficult emotion to combat connected as it is with so many other qualia. 

Catharsis in Writing

The act of self expression in writing seems to provide relief from strong or long repressed emotions – a catharsis.

Hypocrisy

Are we all hypocrites or is there the odd saintly exception?

With Hindsight….

What possible use is hindsight when the past is behind us and unchangeable?

The Existence of Evil

Evil cannot exist without consciousness and free will.