Reclusland

Just found out about this guy.  Amazing.

He did engravings for the Divine Comedy, The Bible, The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner, and a bunch of other stuff.  The best site I could find on him is here.  Wikipedia here…

Go here to watch the whole thing.

(You’ve got a few hours, right?)

I’ve tried to get out of the habit of stating in advance what’s going to be posted here, since my expectations usually end up diverging pretty widely from reality (in a way that almost seems intentional…). Best laid plans and all that.  But I have to admit, it’s been quiet lately in Reclusland, and, seeing as it’s a holiday weekend, this is a good chance to get some stuff together to put up.

I also recently realized that my latest art post was, sadly, in last June, and that’s something that needs to be remedied as well..  I haven’t stopped making it, I’ve just been lazy about posting it.  So my plan for the weekend was to get those up as scheduled posts throughout the week.

However, as part of a large parcel of (for) Valentine’s Day gifts, I helped my girlfriend setup a blog for her artwork (check it out, it’s awesome).  Doing so inspired me to not only post the abstract art and photography I usually post, but also a few of the other artistic type projects I’ve documented over the years.  Some involve black masking tape, some are oil pastels, and some are ink-pen-bored-at-the-office type affairs.  But they’re all awesome, and you’ll enjoy them.

It’s an “It’s art week here at Reclusland!” kind of thing.

Stay tuned…

Found via a link (again on tumblr) to one of my old posts…

Just finished reading an amazing article on Virgina Woolf, where it mentioned a book called “The Illusion of Conscious Will” by Daniel M. Wegner.  It intrigued my enough that I ordered a used copy right away, but while doing a little research, I found this short summary (PDF) of the book that includes this:

Wegner sometimes describes this as the thesis that the will is epiphenomenal; but that it misleading since on his account acts of will can have causal consequences. The central point is rather that they never directly cause actions, but can do so only indirectly, via other effects on the agent. He compares them to a compass. The compass doesn’t directly steer the ship. Instead it indicates the direction that the ship is taking, and may thus indirectly affect its direction via its effects on the pilot.

This excites me.  Plus the idea that it’s not so easy to consciously choose to do something fits in with my Gurdjieff studies as well.

Just thought this was awesome.

Drawing of a magnetic field by René Descartes, from his Principia Philosophiae, 1644.
This was one of the first drawings of the concept of a magnetic field.

Now, perhaps his definition of “meditation” is not all that exact (WTF Bill Gates?), but it’s his take on Zazen that I like here: the mind quiets down and we come into contact with reality as it is.

There’s some humbling news from the chemical world for anyone who has ever found themselves lost in a garden maze. A simple droplet of organic solvent can find its way through a complicated labyrinth with nothing more to go on than a slight pH difference.

Makes we wonder how much of our decision making is really just a more advanced form of chemistry and logic…

“The highest that a man can attain is to be able to do.” - Gurdjieff

Been in California visiting family for the long weekend, didn’t have time to think, let alone get any writing done.  But I did find this video, which is awesome.  It’s done mostly (if not entirely) by hand.  Enjoy:

PRESS + from benjamin ducroz on Vimeo.

by Mr. J. H. Marshall

From here.

Found this today.  It’s good enough that I’m going to just cut and paste the whole thing.  Original is from Allspirit, to whom I owe many thanks.  If anyone is offended by my having this up, let me know and I’ll take it down immediately.

The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences.
When love and hate are both absent everything becomes clear and undisguised.
Make the smallest distinction, however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

If you wish to see the truth then hold no opinions for or against anything.
To set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind.

When the deep meaning of things is not understood the mind’s essential peace is disturbed to no avail.

The Way is perfect like vast space when nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess.

Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject that we do not see the true nature of things.

Live neither in the entanglements of outer things nor in inner feelings of emptiness.

Be serene in the oneness of things and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.

When you try to stop activity to achieve passivity your very effort fills you with activity.

As long as you remain in one extreme or the other you will never know Oneness.

Those who do not live in the single Way fail in both activity and passivity, assertion and denial.

To deny the reality of things is to miss their reality; to assert the emptiness of things is to miss their reality.

The more you talk and think about it, the further astray you wander from the truth.

Stop talking and thinking, and there is nothing you will not be able to know.

To return to the root is to find the meaning, but to pursue appearances is to miss the source.

At the moment of inner enlightenment there is a going beyond appearance and emptiness.

The changes that appear to occur in the empty world we call real only because of our ignorance.

Do not search for the truth; only cease to cherish opinions.

Do not remain in the dualistic state — avoid such pursuits carefully.

If there is even a trace of this and that, of right and wrong, the Mind-essence will be lost in confusion.

Although all dualities come from the One, do not be attached even to this One.

When the mind exists undisturbed in the Way, nothing in the world can offend,
and when such a thing can no longer offend, it ceases to exist in the old way.

When no discriminating thoughts arise, the old mind ceases to exist.

When thought objects vanish, the thinking-subject vanishes, as when the mind vanishes, objects vanish.

Things are objects because of the subject (mind); the mind (subject) is such because of things (object).

Understand the relativity of these two and the basic reality: the unity of emptiness.

In this emptiness the two are indistinguishable and each contains in itself the whole world.

If you do not discriminate between coarse and fine you will not be tempted to prejudice and opinion.

To live in the Great Way is neither easy nor difficult, but those with limited views are fearful and irresolute;
the faster they hurry, the slower they go, and clinging (attachment) cannot be limited;
even to be attached to the idea of enlightenment is to go astray.

Just let things be in their own way and there will be neither coming nor going.

Obey the nature of things (your own nature), and you will walk freely and undisturbed.

When thought is in bondage the truth is hidden, for everything is murky and unclear,
and the burdensome practice of judging brings annoyance and weariness.

What benefits can be derived from distinctions and separations?

If you wish to move in the One Way do not dislike even the world of senses and ideas.

Indeed, to accept them fully is identical with true Enlightenment.

The wise man strives to no goals but the foolish man fetters himself.

There is one Dharma, not many; distinctions arise from the clinging needs of the ignorant.

To seek Mind with the (discriminating) mind is the greatest of all mistakes.

Rest and unrest derive from illusion; with enlightenment there is no liking and disliking.

All dualities come from ignorant inference. They are like dreams or flowers in air: foolish to try to grasp them.

Gain and loss, right and wrong: such thoughts must finally be abolished at once.

If the eye never sleeps, all dreams will naturally cease.

If the mind makes no discriminations, the ten thousand things are as they are, of single essence.

To understand the mystery of this One-essence is to be released from all entanglements.

When all things are seen equally the timeless Self-essence is reached.

No comparisons or analogies are possible in this causeless, relationless state.

Consider movement stationary and the stationary in motion, both movement and rest disappear.

When such dualities cease to exist Oneness itself cannot exist.

To this ultimate finality no law or description applies.

For the unified mind in accord with the Way all self-centered striving ceases.

Doubts and irresolutions vanish and life in true faith is possible.

With a single stroke we are freed from bondage; nothing clings to us and we hold to nothing.

All is empty, clear, self-illuminating, with no exertion of the mind’s power.

Here thought, feeling, knowledge, and imagination are of no value.

In this world of suchness there is neither self nor other-than-self.

To come directly into harmony with this reality just simply say when doubt arises, ‘Not two.’

In this ‘not two’ nothing is separate, nothing is excluded.

No matter when or where, enlightenment means entering this truth.

And this truth is beyond extension or diminution in time or space;
in it a single thought is ten thousand years.

Emptiness here, Emptiness there, but the infinite universe stands always before your eyes.

Infinitely large and infinitely small;
no difference, for definitions have vanished and no boundaries are seen.

So too with Being and Non-Being.

Don’t waste time with doubts and arguments that have nothing to do with this.

One thing, all things: move among and intermingle, without distinction.

To live in this realization is to be without anxiety about non-perfection.

To live in this faith is the road to non-duality,
because the non-dual is one with trusting mind.

Words!

The Way is beyond language, for in it there is no yesterday, no tomorrow, no today.

Wind stirs water by penetrating it. Thus the superior man, when obliged to judge the mistakes of men, tries to penetrate their minds with understanding, in order to gain a sympathetic appreciation of the circumstances. In ancient China, the entire administration of justice was guided by this principle. A deep understanding that knows how to pardon was considered the highest form of justice. This system was not without success, for its aim was to make so strong a moral impression that there was no reason to fear abuse of such mildness. For it sprang not from weakness but from a superior clarity.

should escape dishonor. That recoil had at last urged him to make preparations for quitting Middlemarch. If evil truth must be reported of him, he would then be at a less scorching distance from the contempt of his old neighbors; and in a new scene, where his life would not have gathered the same wide sensibility, the tormentor, if he pursued him, would be less formidable. To leave the place finally would, he knew, be extremely painful to his wife, and on other grounds he would have preferred to stay where he had struck root. Hence he made his preparations at first in a conditional way, wishing to leave on all sides an opening for his return after brief absence, if any favorable intervention of Providence should

(via facade)

Sorry it’s been so quiet here. The move is finally done, the new place is great, and I finally got my internet set up last night.  No house is a home until you’re plugged back into the noosphere.

Today I’m off to the monastery for 4 solid days of silent meditation, which I am certainly looking forward to. My nerves are feeling a bit raw and worn out after all the stress of moving and needing to rearrange my lifestyle to fit the new environment. A quick dip into the I AM is just what I need right now.

Or, in other words, I am in the midst of moving to a new apartment, and so posts here will probably be at a slightly slower rate until I get settled in.

The new place is in a much nicer neighborhood (Prospect Heights, for all you NYCers out there), which means places to go to and things to do that don’t require waiting for a subway or a bus.  Plus the space is larger than my current place, and there’s an actual common area IN ADDITION TO a kitchen. Very exciting.

The applications going through tonight, so please keep your fingers crossed for me.

This is really exciting, seems to line up a lot of my thoughts on space, magnetism, and the heliosphere (check here, here, and the pictures here for a vague sort of explanation)

• In a discovery that took astronomers by surprise, the first full-sky map of the solar system’s edge—more than 9 billion miles (15 billion kilometers) away—has revealed a bright “ribbon” of atoms called ENAs.

• The solar system is surrounded by a protective “bubble” called the heliosphere. The narrow ribbon snakes along this bubble’s inner wall

• Astronomers aren’t yet sure how the ribbon formed, but it’s possible that the ribbon could be a result of pressure exerted on the heliosphere by our home galaxy’s magnetic field.

• ENAs are created at the outer edges of the heliosphere, which is formed by solar wind—charged particles streaming rapidly outward in all directions from the sun. Some gases from outside the heliosphere are constantly leaking in, and when the fast-moving solar wind meets these slow-moving gases, ENAs are born.

• The ENA ribbon’s existence suggests the atoms are produced in higher densities in some parts of the outer heliosphere than others, McComas said, although scientists aren’t yet sure why that would be the case.  One idea is that, wherever the Milky Way’s magnetic field presses on the heliosphere, more ENAs are created.  “Exactly where the [galaxy's] magnetic field is most wrapped around the outer boundary of the heliosphere, that’s where the ribbon runs,” McComas said.  “That could be an unbelievably remarkable coincidence, or it could be a fabulous clue that somehow this external magnetic field is actually imprinting onto our heliosphere through some process that we don’t yet understand.”

From an article sent by a friend.  Says it all better than I have been able to:

• Jung had “spirit guides”, one of whom was named “Philemon”. Jung observed that “Philemon and other figures of my fantasies brought home to me the crucial insight that there are things in the psyche which I do not produce, but which produce themselves and have their own life. Philemon represented a force that was not myself. In my fantasies I held conversations with him, and he said things which I had not consciously thought. […] Psychologically, Philemon represented superior insight.” To anyone else, Philemon might be a figment of Jung’s imagination, or evidence of his madness. But Jung felt that Philemon was real – yet somehow dead, and somehow “talking” to Jung – to Jung’s mind.

• He had a life-long fascination with Nietzsche, but he realized the need to distance himself from Nietzsche for fear that he might be like him and therefore suffer the same fate: Nietzsche (1844-1900) became hopelessly insane. But more than 15 years later, Jung spoke to a “highly cultivated elderly Indian”, who told Jung that his experience was identical to many mystics. In his case, his “spirit guide” or guru had been a commentator on the Vedas who had died centuries ago. Rather than be mad, Jung felt that he had stepped into the same shoes as the ancient priests and others thought have experienced the divine.

• The text (the 7 Sermons to the Dead) is intriguing for several reasons. For one, he uses the name Abraxas to describe the Supreme Being that had first generated mind (nous) and then the other mental powers. Still, Jung did not teach the return of human essence to the Gnostic pleroma, where individuality was lost, but instead adhered to individuation, which maintained the fullness of human individuality. Most metaphysics today argue that both possibilities can be encountered – and are encountered in many religions: that the soul at its final stage can chose to melt with the One (the pleroma) or maintain its separate identity inside the One (individuation). The easiest parallel is with the hologram, in which each “replica” is unique, yet also the whole. If any “replica” was aware, and would at one point have to ask what it wanted, some would ask to surrender into the greater hologram, whereas other “replicas” would ask to retain their individual memories – even though they are part of the whole.

• As early as August, 1912, Jung had intimated in a letter to Freud that he had an intuition that the essentially feminine-toned archaic wisdom of the Gnostics, symbolically called Sophia, was destined to re-enter modern Western culture by way of depth-psychology. Of primary sources, the remarkable Pistis Sophia was one of very few available to Jung in translation, and his appreciation of this work was so great that he made a special effort to seek out the translator in London, the then aged and impecunious George R. S. Mead, to convey to him his great gratitude.
  Subsequently, he stated to Barbara Hannah that when he discovered the writings of the ancient Gnostics, “I felt as if I had at last found a circle of friends who understood me.”

• Jung believed that the cosmos contained the divine light or life, but this essence was enmeshed in a mechanical trap, presided over by a demiurge: Lucifer, the Bringer of the Light. He contained the light inside this reality, until a time when it would be set free. The first operation of alchemy therefore addressed itself to the dismemberment of this confining structure and reducing it to a condition of creative chaos. From this, in the process of transformation, the true, creative binaries emerge and begin their interaction designed to bring about the alchemical union. In this ultimate union, says Jung, the previously confined light is redeemed and brought to the point of its ultimate and redemptive fulfilment.

• In The Psychology of the Transference, Jung stated that in love, as in psychological growth, the key to success is the ability to endure the tension of the opposites without abandoning the process, even if the process and its result appear to have been brought to naught. In essence, it is the “stress” that allows one to grow – to transform.
  The union of opposites, the focus of the alchemist, was for Jung also the focus of the Gnostics, whom he felt had been incorrectly labelled as radical dualists, i.e. believing in the battle between good and evil – without any apparent union possible between the two. For Jung, dualism and monism were not mutually contradictory and exclusive, but complimentary aspects of reality. As such, there was no good or wrong, no order or chaos, just two opposites, who constantly created grey, and demanded of mankind to be united, transformed.

So, before departing on the spiritual path, we remain in the so-called “impure” state of samsara, which is, in appearance, governed by ignorance. When we commit ourselves to that path, we cross a state where ignorance and wisdom are mixed. At the end, at the moment of Enlightenment, only pure wisdom exists. But all the way along this spiritual journey, although there is an appearance of transformation, the nature of the mind has never changed: it was not corrupted on entry onto the path, and it was not improved at the time of realization.

The navigator who lands on an island made entirely of fine gold, will not find a single nugget, no matter how hard he searches.

From here (by way of clothedinsky)

Daido Roshi, founder and abbot of the Zen Mountain Monastery, speaks on the reasons to become (or not to become) a member of a monastic order.  From PBS’s program The Congregation.

is silence, sort of.

Anyway, sorry for the quietude here, been busy with work, travel, and real world joys/woes, although there has been some interesting discussions on the Grail legend, quest(ion)ing, and suffering in the comments, if you find yourself inclined to read those.  Lots of good stuff there (with thanks, as always, to speedbird).

I do have plans for some new material, but I’ve also joined the Zen temple’s Fall Training Intensive (traditionally known as Ango) which is going to keep me pretty busy.  I hope to be able to share more on that as my engagement with it evolves, but there’s nothing much at this point  (it just started today).

In the meantime though, I wanted to share something else, briefly.  From time to time, I’ll check this site’s stats for the search terms that have drawn people here.  Today though, I found something a little different (and kind of cool, if you’re into the western mystery traditions at all…):

Since when do search engines index sites by “of” or “the”?  Weird…

Not that I take it all too seriously, but there’s this site where you can get daily tarot, i ching, and other divinatory readings, based on your name and birthday.   I check it daily, because:
1) why the hell not?
2) I’ve occasionally found them to be useful as a sort of foil for my thoughts.
3) my computer at work is usually really slow, so it’s generally good to have something quick and easy to read open in the background, as I wait for the “print” box to open…

Every once in a while though, they can be really good.  My stitchomancy “reading” for today is a particularly poetic excerpt, so I thought I’d share it here.  Stitchomancy, for those unfamiliar with it, is the divinitory act of closing your eyes, randomly opening a book, and pointing to a passage, which you then open your eyes and read.  Anyway, they’ve got a digitized version that picks from a bunch of classic novels and other texts (once I got something from the Bible, for example).

Today’s is from Tales of Unrest by Joseph Conrad:

God!”

A shriek inhuman, vibrating and sudden, pierced like a sharp dart the white shroud of that land of sorrow. Three short, impatient screeches followed, and then, for a time, the fog-wreaths rolled on, undisturbed, through a formidable silence. Then many more shrieks, rapid and piercing, like the yells of some exasperated and ruthless creature, rent the air. Progress was calling to Kayerts from the river. Progress and civilization and all the virtues. Society was calling to its accomplished child to come, to be taken care of, to be instructed, to be judged, to be condemned; it called him to return to that rubbish heap from which he had wandered away, so that justice

Really wanted to get this one together, but the bastard just kept collecting links.  So instead, here’s a little packet of idea-seed-links for you all…

One of the book’s central concepts is that as the human brain has grown, it has built upon earlier, more primitive brain structures, and that these are the “ghost in the machine” of the title. Koestler’s theory is that at times these structures can overpower higher logical functions, and are responsible for hate, anger and other such destructive impulses.

It is here that the computer tries to speak to him directly, although it is not certain how, revealing the nature of AM, specifically why it has so much contempt for humanity, that it wants nothing more than to torture Ted and his four companions. AM itself has, since its awakening, been suffering immeasurably because even though it is a sentient being which longs for free will and creativity, it is still bound by some of the laws of logic that it was originally programmed with, and thus feels that it can never be truly free. It places the blame solely on humanity.

So far the best prediction I’ve read along the lines of technologically based human immortality was bad news for the concept. Is was from a Luciferian remote viewer who said that he saw the downloading of minds/spirits into computers beginning in Japan. He says this became a great tragedy because as soon as the download was complete the people began begging for the robot, or whatever, to be turned off. He never said what was so unbearable or if they could be turned off.

only three things are necessary for it to be a big deal — 1) that you believe a brain could be incrementally replaced with functionally identical implants and retain its fundamental characteristics and identity, 2) that the computational capacity of the human brain is a reasonable number, very unlikely to be more than 10^19 ops/sec, and 3) that at some point in the future we’ll have computers that fast. Not so far-fetched. Many people consider these three points plausible, but just aren’t aware of their implications.

What Will Replace the Internet?  First it will become wireless and ubiquitous, crawling into the woodwork and perhaps even under our skin. Eventually, it will disappear…

Scientists have already hooked brains directly to computers by means of metal electrodes, in the hope of both measuring what goes on inside the brain and eventually healing conditions such as blindness or epilepsy. In the future, the interface between brain and artificial system might be based on nerve cells grown for that purpose.

Scientists are well on the way to creating the first artificial nerve cell that can communicate specifically with nerve cells in the body using neurotransmitters.

A team of computer scientists investigating the political, social and economic struggle between individual self-interest and the need to build a consensus have learned that, depending solely on the ability of individuals to interact in a network, as well as the number of connections they have to other participants and other structural properties, there are networks that generate the global adoption of minority viewpoints.

Penrose presents the argument that human consciousness is non-algorithmic, and thus is not capable of being modeled by a conventional Turing machine-type of digital computer. Penrose hypothesizes that quantum mechanics plays an essential role in the understanding of human consciousness. The collapse of the quantum wavefunction is seen as playing an important role in brain function. (Other potential possibilities hover around us in time-space, like quantum-super-position states, other pathways for our consciousness to travel down through time-space. Computers harbor little potential!  It’s a long possability-less slide through along a single, digital time-line, 1, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0….)

The technique, called targeted muscle reinnervation, involves taking the nerves that remain after an arm is amputated and connecting them to another muscle in the body, often in the chest. Electrodes are placed over the chest muscles, acting as antennae. When the person wants to move the arm, the brain sends signals that first contract the chest muscles, which send an electrical signal to the prosthetic arm, instructing it to move. The process requires no more conscious effort than it would for a person who has a natural arm.

Researchers in Italy and Switzerland have found carbon nanotubes to be bio-compatible and that the can be attached to neurons to boost the natural signal-processing capabilities of those neurons. (see also: carbon nanotubes may cause cancer…)

The value of a network explodes as its membership increases, and then the value explosion sucks in yet more members, compounding the result. (see also, the magnetic nature of “mind”).