The Dalai Lama is trying to bring science and religion together by especially working with brain researchers as described in "The Destructive Emotions". So are some other theologians. We should take notice.
Science and religion seem to be at war the same way the Democrats and Republicans are at war. A whole new approach is needed to our search for truth. An approach that does not have power or profit as a motive, and that doesn't suffer from mutual disdain. A Buddhist monk may just be a good leader in this endeavor.
Science describes everything it sees, then formulates laws which it tests through predictions and verifiable experiments. Since all those laws are bound to hit "horizons" where they no longer apply, science then looks for more insight in the far, far away in time and space all the way back to the big bang, both in the macro and micro cosmos. Thus science is endlessly fascinating. But not as much as meditation, and much slower and more expensive.
Experiments typically try to split matter into tinier and tinier units, using stronger and stronger colliders. You don't need to be a physicist to realize that no matter how often you split matter you will never get to nothing or zero. We are trying to find the Ur-Particle, presently called the Higgs Boson - a no-mass, no-spin "particle".
Here is how Brian Greene, professor of math and physics at Columbia, puts it this morning in the New York Times:
"Perhaps space is pervaded by a field...that acts like invisible molasses. When we push something to make it move faster, the Higgs molasses would exert a drag force - and it's this resistance, as the Higgs theory goes - that we commonly call the object's mass."
Meditators - and that is where we need the brain scientists to join the party - would call this hypothetical molasses field "thought". Everything we know comes out of nothing and returns to nothing by the mystery of thought. Meditators know both the most subtle levels of thought, and - if they have experimented long enough - the realm of no thought, where there simply is no physical phenomena or mass of any kind. Thought, not as words but as subtle movements of mind, creates the resistance needed for matter to appear in time and space. We also know of supersymetry were every such movement has its exact opposite - together they can annihilate the universe.
The physicists have baptized the Higgs Boson the God Particle. Are physicists prepared to be in the presence of a God particle? I can't wait to see this - it will be amusing.
The fact that physicists may know nothing of meditation, may not understand thought and its origin, or how it creates and destroys the universe, is of some concern when they go to great length at smashing particles in an effort to discover the secret of the universe. Hopefully they aren't even close to the "answer" or ancient history might repeat itself where curiosity killed the cat. The fact that religious people have, and are still stoning people, has made us overlook some of the warnings in religious texts about trying to discover "the secret of the universe" and acquiring "God power". One aspect of God's infinite power is his infinite powerlessness. Are we prepared for such powerlessness?
A meditator knows that the secret of the universe is revealed in its annihilation - and we are wondering how this will turn out in the physics lab. To a meditator, the physicist is someone who is standing in front of a mirror studying every movement, color, shape etc., with ever more precision and complicated math, making predictions and designing experiments to test his theories - without ever realizing he is looking in a mirror. He needs to wake up to this fact or his more and more intense efforts are going to shatter the mirror. Which may be one way - and hopefully a harmless way - to this discovery,a s well.
Physicist look down on people who don't understand their elusive math and their sophisticated machines, while we look down on their attachment to the mind and its infinite illusions. They think we are fooled by our stupidity, we think they are fooled more dangerously by their intelligence. If we don't come together we may indeed destroy our world. The wisdom of smashing two tiny particles together at a velocity or violence level of twice the speed of light is at first thought, frightening. It seems that only the speed of light, is the level of violence natural in this present universe. Then again - doubling it would be a natural next step for universe dwellers to try out. Hopefully it is built into the universe's plan for us. That would indeed be very exciting.
Meditators would be well prepared for infinite and eternal existence outside of time and space, and to them it would be pure bliss - while to physicists the same realm would be eternal and infinite boredom, because there is no thought. Physicists are very attached to thinking but don't know what it is, because they have never stopped it long enough.
Hopefully the experiments in Switzerland will not mean the end of the material world. Here is a video of Brian Greene explaining things, which makes it easy to jump on the excitement wagon. We are still hoping for logic in a final, elegant, unified theory. The final truth can only be expressed in a paradox, so it will be a while before we'll get there, if at all, in physics. Jesus said:"You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free." We all long for this truth and freedom. For a scientist this freedom means no more questions. What scientist may not know is that the final answer will be a question that dissolves into omniscient not-knowing.
In this video, notice the physicist who studied swimming by reading a book - those are the folks who tell us we won't sink - even though we are swimming in the water waiting for them to jump in. Hopefully they won't drain the pool. Physicists and meditators have one thing in common - they love experiments and danger, and are willing to risk all - for truth.
Science and religion seem to be at war the same way the Democrats and Republicans are at war. A whole new approach is needed to our search for truth. An approach that does not have power or profit as a motive, and that doesn't suffer from mutual disdain. A Buddhist monk may just be a good leader in this endeavor.
Science describes everything it sees, then formulates laws which it tests through predictions and verifiable experiments. Since all those laws are bound to hit "horizons" where they no longer apply, science then looks for more insight in the far, far away in time and space all the way back to the big bang, both in the macro and micro cosmos. Thus science is endlessly fascinating. But not as much as meditation, and much slower and more expensive.
Experiments typically try to split matter into tinier and tinier units, using stronger and stronger colliders. You don't need to be a physicist to realize that no matter how often you split matter you will never get to nothing or zero. We are trying to find the Ur-Particle, presently called the Higgs Boson - a no-mass, no-spin "particle".
Here is how Brian Greene, professor of math and physics at Columbia, puts it this morning in the New York Times:
"Perhaps space is pervaded by a field...that acts like invisible molasses. When we push something to make it move faster, the Higgs molasses would exert a drag force - and it's this resistance, as the Higgs theory goes - that we commonly call the object's mass."
Meditators - and that is where we need the brain scientists to join the party - would call this hypothetical molasses field "thought". Everything we know comes out of nothing and returns to nothing by the mystery of thought. Meditators know both the most subtle levels of thought, and - if they have experimented long enough - the realm of no thought, where there simply is no physical phenomena or mass of any kind. Thought, not as words but as subtle movements of mind, creates the resistance needed for matter to appear in time and space. We also know of supersymetry were every such movement has its exact opposite - together they can annihilate the universe.
The physicists have baptized the Higgs Boson the God Particle. Are physicists prepared to be in the presence of a God particle? I can't wait to see this - it will be amusing.
The fact that physicists may know nothing of meditation, may not understand thought and its origin, or how it creates and destroys the universe, is of some concern when they go to great length at smashing particles in an effort to discover the secret of the universe. Hopefully they aren't even close to the "answer" or ancient history might repeat itself where curiosity killed the cat. The fact that religious people have, and are still stoning people, has made us overlook some of the warnings in religious texts about trying to discover "the secret of the universe" and acquiring "God power". One aspect of God's infinite power is his infinite powerlessness. Are we prepared for such powerlessness?
A meditator knows that the secret of the universe is revealed in its annihilation - and we are wondering how this will turn out in the physics lab. To a meditator, the physicist is someone who is standing in front of a mirror studying every movement, color, shape etc., with ever more precision and complicated math, making predictions and designing experiments to test his theories - without ever realizing he is looking in a mirror. He needs to wake up to this fact or his more and more intense efforts are going to shatter the mirror. Which may be one way - and hopefully a harmless way - to this discovery,a s well.
Physicist look down on people who don't understand their elusive math and their sophisticated machines, while we look down on their attachment to the mind and its infinite illusions. They think we are fooled by our stupidity, we think they are fooled more dangerously by their intelligence. If we don't come together we may indeed destroy our world. The wisdom of smashing two tiny particles together at a velocity or violence level of twice the speed of light is at first thought, frightening. It seems that only the speed of light, is the level of violence natural in this present universe. Then again - doubling it would be a natural next step for universe dwellers to try out. Hopefully it is built into the universe's plan for us. That would indeed be very exciting.
Meditators would be well prepared for infinite and eternal existence outside of time and space, and to them it would be pure bliss - while to physicists the same realm would be eternal and infinite boredom, because there is no thought. Physicists are very attached to thinking but don't know what it is, because they have never stopped it long enough.
Hopefully the experiments in Switzerland will not mean the end of the material world. Here is a video of Brian Greene explaining things, which makes it easy to jump on the excitement wagon. We are still hoping for logic in a final, elegant, unified theory. The final truth can only be expressed in a paradox, so it will be a while before we'll get there, if at all, in physics. Jesus said:"You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free." We all long for this truth and freedom. For a scientist this freedom means no more questions. What scientist may not know is that the final answer will be a question that dissolves into omniscient not-knowing.
In this video, notice the physicist who studied swimming by reading a book - those are the folks who tell us we won't sink - even though we are swimming in the water waiting for them to jump in. Hopefully they won't drain the pool. Physicists and meditators have one thing in common - they love experiments and danger, and are willing to risk all - for truth.
While some scientists are still worried about the experiments scheduled at the LHC in Switzerland, most scientists are as excited as this guy - Brian Greene, mentioned above. We live in interesting times...
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