Animal instinct-Classic or Dud?

John Holmes is now a zen buddhist? Man alive!

It's a very good question anyway, and one I wrestle with every day. I'll get back to you.

Sorry - misread. I now see that you are not trying to be a zen buddhist.

I have a feeling it would be the death of art, or at least art as we know it. Whether that's a price worth paying for all the decreased suffering is the eternal question.

JOn Holmes is not buddhits

I fart like a buzz-bunny

fuck no. buddhism's stupid. i mean, the very pursuit of this knowlege of bliss is one of those animal instincts it's trying to eradicate. sleeping, eating and fucking case basic chemical reactions of varying pleasurability. i support them.

What Robert Pirsig would call 'Physical Quality'. (Lyla/Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenence) Farting eating sleeping belching Fucking Fucking and Fucking. Physical quality rules. I am Proud to be and happy to be a human, most of the time, although sometimes ashamed. I wouldn't trade it for anything. Arf! Arf! Meow!

Sometimes you gotta like it Ruff!

If there was one thing I could change about the human body, it'd be the ability to program sleep time like a video recorder.

http://users.uniserve.com/~sbarclay/negpoet.htm

more fingers more fingers!! base 12 now!!

To not have the need for food or sleep is my idea of the perfect existence. I actually managed it for a time, with the help of large amounts of crystal meth. Unfortunately, you can't keep that up indefinitely.

No desire to reproduce? Are you crazy?

Tart

I'd gladly lose all my animal instincts if it meant I could become a ROBOT but not to become a buddhist.

May the wrath of the socio-biologists be upon me, but I'd want to look pretty sceptically at the idea that "xenophobia, tribalism, pack-forming" etc are (biological)'instincts'.

And on art: does this assume that art is generated from the tension between our 'biological/animal' instincts and our socialised selves (id/ego or something?)? Not pickin', just clarifyin'.

Yeah Ellie - I guess that's more or less what I meant. It would also mean the death of love, which is perhaps even harder to take.

A friend of mine likes to say that Buddhism (and similar things), particularly in their Americanized new-agey form, are about "the denial of aggression".

Meaning: you take people who -- being human beings as we all are -- have a lot of problems expressing rage, hostility, and the like, and rather than get them to work through said problems (whether through psychoanalysis, self-reflection, true love, or whatever) and become fully-functioning, emotionally/psychologically healthy, and engaged human beings, you encourage them to surrender, to give up hope, to disengage, and to deny all their desires. However, since they're human, the desires remain -- they're just repressed -- and Buddhism's oblivion-is-the-answer outlook really amounts to a massive, passive-aggressive morass by which these people (who on some unconscious level are still in the throes of an inchoate rage they can't articulate and that terrifies them) can respond to anything positive or joyful, anything that might reawaken their life force/libido/whatever you want to call it and in so doing acknowledge their unresolved conflicts, by saying "Oh, but nothing really matters" -- which despite its seemingly mild trappings, really means "Fuck you: no matter what you say, no matter what you love, I can turn it around and turn it into something meaningless." It becomes a lens for infantile narcissistic rage and undifferentiated contempt, masquerading as ingenuous harmless Eastern mysticism.

It may seem over the top, but I think that there's a lot of truth to this notion of his. Buddhism has brought a lot of wonderful things into the world, and nurtured many other wonderful things; I don't like attacking it, but the full implications of that nasty little bit at the core about life = suffering and all that are really pretty icky in many ways. Giving into death is a lot easier (read: is chickenshit) than acknowledging the finitude (and thus essentially tragic nature) of life but striving nonetheless.

I would reject all my biological intincts if I could. They just aren't nessasary. I am constantly torn between what makes sense and what I want just cause I'm an animal. One might say that I can't enjoy the "real" things in life (true love, art, music, friendship) without juxtaposing them against the "fake" stuff (lust, trying to gain social status in the "pack", ect.) And I'm not saying it's bad to like the way it feels. It's good to harness and control the postive feed back ones gets from achieving in animal practices. Thats what porn is all about. But to let it control you is bad life.

I mean, what the hell? I know sex feels good, why does my body make me want it on top of that? I hate m

This is not at all my understanding of Buddhism. To me it seems that the accept biological instincts as unchangeable and try to get rid of reactions due to emotional changes. It's emotional, not physical, reality they are trying to suppress. I don't have any desire to be a Buddhist, but reading a lot about it unfortunately destroyed most of my melodramatic romantic personality and I'm much calmer than I used to be. Things aren't as strongly "good" and "bad."

Zen Buddhists are just like Christians, it's just a bogus framework of tradition which is smeared over a variety of responses. I read in the Hite Report a woman saying that she was afraid masturbating was a sin, but in confession she told her very old, conservative priest that she masturbated and he said 'don't worry about it, what they say in the bible is wrong.' Do you see what I mean? That compassion sort of slides around inside how you interpret your culture. I like people who aren't revolutionary, but wilfully reinterpret their culture in compassionate terms. Anyone who strives for a 'new culture' is in pursuit of the impossible. So give up your dreams of a disembodied paradise. Instead, reinterpret what's available to you. That's my advice since you asked. PS I do not know what I'm talking about.

Um, no, Zen Buddhists are nothing like Christians. A buddhist is not trying to be enlightened. A buddhist is being enlightened. The more you want to be, strive to be, the further away from being enlightened you actually are. Weird concept until you actually do reading on it. A Christian has rules he must obey, but a buddhist acts in a certain way because he sees correctly. A buddhist does not fear consequence from god. In fact, a buddhist fears nothing, including death. Giving into death is not chickenshit at all. It is seeing correctly. It's impossible to convert anyone to buddhism, especially within one paragraph. But, suffice to say, almost everything above is a completely fucked up understanding of the buddhadarma. There is not "right" and "wrong". There is only control of self, by not giving into desire and not trying to label a thing in order to understand it. In this, there is more freedom than in any other way of thinking. When a person says, "I'm going to do it MY way" he thinks he's exerting great control over his life, when, in fact, he is giving into desire, ego, all his incorrect assumtions of "how things are" and he is not free to do anything. Rather, he is a slave to his desire.

All I know is, I spent 3 hours last night dancing with and talking to girls who I'll never see again, when if not for reproductive instinct, I would have stayed home and drawn pictures or talked to friends. The buhddist mind rejects ambition towards such things as "dating" and "stuff". It's effortless for them, but only after years of effort. Christians just have a bunch of rules, like backgamon does. Plus, christianity has fused it's mythology and it's ethics and it's philosophy. When buhddist, you can still be confusionist, or shinto, or hindi, or believe in medusa and what have you.

I guess I just want to have

want to have what dammit! Buddhists seek to remove their ego from the desires of the physical world. This means both sensual and social pleasures, which are short term, impermenant, and subject to opposites of pain and pleasure. They seek instead to focus of spiritual, intellectual pleasures. They are saying "fuck it", but they are not hateful or vindictive because that itself is rooted in the desire to feel socially superior and loved. Only when we DESTROY OUR DESIRE can our mind come afire.

isn't there a difference between pleasure and survival? when you say "buddhists do not seek sensual pleasure from their biological impulses" that is one thing; when you say "buddhists seek to make biological impulses completely unheeded [and therefore end up dying of starvation or thirst]" it is much different. and i do not think that the latter is what buddhists do. you need to be more clear in your terms because i can't tell what you are saying.

The thing is there are all sorts of people and groups that identify themselves as "buddhist" and zen buddhism is one aspect of buddhism. I have a book by an ordained buddhist "minister" and he doesn't even consider himself a "buddhist". He points out that when people smile at him and say, "I'm a buddhist, too!" his reaction is, "So what?" Buddhism is just another label after all.

Ya see, what we got here is an example of people seeing the attitude of another person (an enlightened person) and they are impressed by what they see and they try to put into words that seem appropriate: "Oh the buddhist rejects this and does that". The truth is no piece of buddhist literature contains anything other than thoughts to help you see things as they really are for yourself. No words are truth and no words can cause you to be enlightened.

True, certain monks deny themselves all kinds of things and there are all kinds of buddhist teachers who go about educating in different ways. People often deny themselves pleasure in an effort to become enlightened, when, in fact, the only thing necessary for enlightenment is self-awareness at all times and being, rather than doing, and correctly seeing rather than interpreting. A buddhist can have sex, but it is typical of people who persue mental ecstacy (kundalini yoga, as well) that they lose interest in more "simple ecstacies" such as sex. This isn't just me talking out of my ass, it's well documented. Sex is the first ecstasy/ base chakra center.

Any one interested should pick up a very thin book that pretty much tells you all you need to know about practicing buddhism without all the zen koans and mysterious shit. It's called "Buddhism, Plain and Simple" and it really demystifies a lot of the horseshit associated with buddhism.

I am a scientist anyways, not a buddhist

ooooh, scientist. What kind of scientist? Or just "scientist", as in, "I'm less ridiculous than anyone else" but not really a scientist?

Sorry, that was rude. What I meant was, "are you really a scientist?" I really didn't mean that to sound offensive. Poor wording.

I've just ran into a lot of people who take the attitude that scientific "fact" beats all, when in reality, they know little about the difference between fact and speculation... or even science at all. They're just copping out to a popular opinion and patting themselves on the back for their own ignorance.

Scientific research has concluded that buddhist monks use an entirely different portion of the brain (and a larger portion at that) during meditation (the entire back and top of brain as opposed to the tiny bit of frontal lobes). A cool but cursory article on God in the brain is found at ye olde and I found some crap about brains in generalhere and here's something from 5 months ago about scientists working with the Dalai Lama to "vigorously pursue research on contemplative practice because [they] believe it can be beneficial" ....

Dalai says something cool:

Known 

to have a life-long curiosity about science and technology, the Dalai Lama has 

expressed keen interest in this sophisticated new technology that can be 

used non-invasively to examine the effects of meditation. "Wonderful," he 

said repeatedly at seeing it. With characteristic humor, he added that he 

would like to get his hands on tools he saw in the laboratory machine room, 

where parts for the scanners are made. 



The Dalai Lama says he has shunned the warnings of others who fear that 

science is the killer of religion. Going his own way, as the Buddha advised, His 

Holiness says he sees many benefits in science. 



"I have great respect for science, " he says. "But scientists, on their own, 

cannot prove nirvana. Science shows us that there are practices that can 

make a difference between a happy life and a miserable life. A real 

understanding of the true nature of the mind can only be gained through 

meditation."

... But I can't find the one article all about studies already done on the brains of monks in meditative state. Bummer. I thought it was cnn or scientific american, but can't find it. It was really detailed and interesting, with scans of a "normal brain" sleeping and awake and scans of a "meditative brain". I'm sure if you do your own searches on "science buddhist brain meditation" or something you'll find enough to know that there's a lot to be found inside your head that isn't easy to see or prove at this point (depending on what it is you're trying to prove), except with a PETscan or by observing the actions and attitudes of those with these different ideas going on in their heads.

Sorry, that was rude. What I meant was, "are you really a scientist?" I really didn't mean that to sound offensive. Poor wording.

I've just ran into a lot of people who take the attitude that scientific "fact" beats all, when in reality, they know little about the difference between fact and speculation... or even science at all. They're just copping out to a popular opinion and patting themselves on the back for their own ignorance.

Scientific research has concluded that buddhist monks use an entirely different portion of the brain (and a larger portion at that) during meditation (the entire back and top of brain as opposed to the tiny bit of frontal lobes). A cool but cursory article on God in the brain is found at ye olde msnbc.com. and I found some crap about brains in generalhere and here's something from 5 months ago about scientists working with the Dalai Lama to "vigorously pursue research on contemplative practice because [they] believe it can be beneficial" ....

Dalai says something cool:

Known 

to have a life-long curiosity about science and technology, the Dalai Lama has 

expressed keen interest in this sophisticated new technology that can be 

used non-invasively to examine the effects of meditation. "Wonderful," he 

said repeatedly at seeing it. With characteristic humor, he added that he 

would like to get his hands on tools he saw in the laboratory machine room, 

where parts for the scanners are made. 



The Dalai Lama says he has shunned the warnings of others who fear that 

science is the killer of religion. Going his own way, as the Buddha advised, His 

Holiness says he sees many benefits in science. 



"I have great respect for science, " he says. "But scientists, on their own, 

cannot prove nirvana. Science shows us that there are practices that can 

make a difference between a happy life and a miserable life. A real 

understanding of the true nature of the mind can only be gained through 

meditation."

... But I can't find the one article all about studies already done on the brains of monks in meditative state. Bummer. I thought it was cnn or scientific american, but can't find it. It was really detailed and interesting, with scans of a "normal brain" sleeping and awake and scans of a "meditative brain". I'm sure if you do your own searches on "science buddhist brain meditation" or something you'll find enough to know that there's a lot to be found inside your head that isn't easy to see or prove at this point (depending on what it is you're trying to prove), except with a PETscan or by observing the actions and attitudes of those with these different ideas going on in their heads.

Holy shit. Would someone delete the first huge post? I didn't realize the first one went through... and I was surprised to see how long it is. Geez.

I was at the library yesterday and found by accident that organizing shelves of books is the most effective meditation I've ever done.