| consciousness and spirituality | Pim van Lommel's book 'Endless consciousness' (for a review see 'spirituality') woke me up to filosofical questions long forgotten. What is the essence of consciousness? How does one's self awareness relate to the world around us? Every child will sooner or later come across the question, where people are when they are not in its vicinity when they are "invisible" for the child itself. The movie "The Truman Show" by Peter Weir (1998) revolves around this idea: the whole world around the main character Truman is ficticious, a TV-set, and all the people around him are actors. For myself, I at some point came to the conclusion, that the reality I perceive is in itself consistent. The reality I perceive is governed by consistent and coherent rules, which form an unbreakable system. It is not possible to walk through walls one moment and the next you can't. In theory it might be perceivable that one would be able to walk through walls, but not within this reality. So maybe this could be done in another reality, but one would have to leave the reality one exists in at the present time to get into a different or parallel reality in which this would be possible. The concept of parallel worlds is not new ofcourse and several SF-novels are based on this idea. Van Lommel poses the question, if our perception of the world around us, our consciousness, is necessarily connected with the matter we consist of, or not. This in fact is a question that concerns spirituality. His book has made me doubt my conviction that consciousness and our spirit are indeed unconditionally bound with the matter we exist of, and has prompted me to explore this question deeper. This doubt is triggered by two things. One is the scientific method he uses for his analysis if matter and mind are neccesarily linked, or if the mind could also exist without matter. I could not tell for sure if this scientific basis is sound. But it has aroused my curiosity. The other approach of Van Lommel however is to point out that as long as mankind exists, similar experiences are told once and again, throughout all times and cultures. The pattern in these tales is completely consistent and does not change. This pattern is so persistent, that for that reason alone it is barely possible to deny the truth of these stories. However the question should be asked, what exactly is the nucleus of truth in these lores of all times and all places. Ofcourse there is also a lot of 'mumbo jumbo' in these stories, and that does not help us to come to the real truth of the matter. This has put me on my spiritual quest, which is an inquiry if matter and spirit are inevitably one and cannot exist apart, or if that cannot be upheld. This also brings about an inquiry into the essence of consciousness and perception, because any enquiry into the essence of the human mind is an inquiry into the nature of consciousness. So now I am (simultaneously) reading several books in order to find out more. A standard philosophy handbook about "Existential fenomenology" a book titled "Descartes in 90 minutes", two books by the Dalai Lama, books by Jan Willem van de Wetering, two books about the Roman philosopher Seneca et cetera. I would like to tell you about my progress through this website (insofar as I can find the time to do so). And if I can find the time to make this website more interactive, I would also like to have other people contribute to this enquiry and discussion, or if you will this search into philosophy. [MdV 5 november 2008] |
| boeddhism | The
most surprising discovery about boeddhism I made, is that boeddhism
basicly boils down to a very practical exercise in filosofy and the art of
life. Boeddhism is not a religion in the most common sense of the word.
There are temples and religious ceremonies, they have monks and so on. And
then there is ofcourse the believe in reincarnation. I have always felt
boeddhism is a very sympathetic "religion" because in my
impression it is the most tolerant. But I never realised that dat
boeddhism is very much a filosofical way of life. In the book by Jan Willem van de Wetering
about zen boeddhism (which describes the daily practice of Zen boeddhism
and the people practising it with a sound bit of irony) it becomes clear
that zen meditation is mostly about solving a sort of riddles, meant to
sharpen ones mind and meant to lead to the conclusion, that (to put it
somewhat bluntly) nothing really matters and everything is "void". The book "The art of happiness", which has been written by an American psychiatrist in cooperation with the Dalai Lama, shows that boeddhism especially focuses on reaching a state of mental calmness through practice of the mind. One should reach mental and emotional harmony by "letting go". But this is not "letting go" alltogether without caring what happens around you! One should reach happiness by practising compassion for other people. This practice of the mind leads to greater happiness for other people and through that also for yourself. A classical example of these exercises for the mind is a story about a mother, who searches a medicine for her dead child. Boeddha orders her to look for the ingredients of this medicine, but with the provision that these ingredients could only come from a house where nobody had died. In her search she finds out, that there isn't such a house, and that everyone is confronted with death in their families. This revelation does not take away the pain, but it does make it more bearable. Thus her search became an exercise in filosofy and the art of life, a way of forming oneself. Thus the "only" religoius or spiritual aspect of boeddhism is the conviction, that the mind lives on after death of the physical body and returns in another form after death through reincarnation. And this leads us back to the question above: how does boeddhism know that? Is it possible that mind and matter exist seperately? [MdV 5 november 2008] |