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De-evolution
Joshua
Veteran
I believe Buddhism endorses de-evolution of humans?
If so, are there any good supporting arguments?
If so, are there any good supporting arguments?
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Buddhist cosmology speaks of lower and higher realms, as well as the human realm, that constitute different states of existence per each rebirth. So, if one believes that, you could have been a deva (god) in a former life but through your karma are a human today.
I've never read or heard anything about humans de-evolving in Buddhist teachings though. I have read parts that correlate to what we now call "evolution" though.
Buddhist practice does try to tone down the importance we place on that part of the brain.
...."definitely remember reading something" isn't all that helpful...
There is the cosmology of the Agganna Sutta; see, the section beginning with [10].
12. 'Then some being of a greedy nature said: "I say, what can this be?" and tasted the savoury earth on its finger. In so doing, it became taken with the flavour, and craving arose in it. Then other beings, taking their cue from that one, also tasted the stuff with their fingers. They too were taken with the flavour, and craving arose in them. So they set to with their hands, breaking off pieces of the stuff in order to eat it. And the result of this was that their self-luminance disappeared. And as a result of the disappearance of their self-luminance, the moon and the sun appeared, night and day were distinguished, months and fortnights appeared, and the year and its seasons. To that extent the world re-evolved.
Anyway, should we interpret this all in a materialist reductionist way? Or should we interpret the Agganna as describing desire as the cause of suffering?
I do hope that there are formless realms though, and that somebirth I will be formless and mind-made.
Here's another scriptural source speaking of a "fall" from higher, purer states to those states lower and more coarse; see ch. II from the Brahmajala Sutta; most of these examples give a limited (mis)knowledge of previous existences as the cause of harboring certain wrong views of reality.
This isnt unique to Tibetan Buddhism but is a part of Buddhist cosmology.
Its not necessarily de-evolution but rather the conditions of different eons.
Right now, according to Buddhist cosmological time structure we are in the so called kaliyuga or degenerate age. The times are said to be very bad but authentic practice yields extraordinary results.
I question this science personally. I ask if it is not possible that a calf is perfectly evolved, and just born in a slum with slum traditions poised to defeat it.
"The child has the Buddha Mind."
Evolution is about adaptation, not a progressive march toward perfection.
I often feel Darwinian evolution doesn't paint the whole picture, but I find it difficult to find suitable alternatives or the next step in the ladder. Does anyone else know?
They tell us that
We lost our tails
Evolving up
From little snails
I say it's all
Just wind in sails
Are we not men?
We are DEVO!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCpxSzacbyc
If all beings are "evolving" toward buddhahood, then perhaps the next step on the ladder is a humanoid with webbed fingers and toes, taught calf muscles like an antelope, arms so long that they can reach their knees without any bending, and sheathed sexual organs with fragrant smegma.
Man, that's a silly picture!
I agree..though "survival of the fittest/strongest" is the phrase most often-used (at least, in terms of describing the accompanying mechanism of natural selection), "survival of the most adaptable" would be better.
Hrm. A/S/L? Kidding! Kidding...
I think you are curious why there are defilements? Why aren't we just start out enlightened?
Well why do you think? I think that one is hard to answer..
How about a picture?
Here's me practicing my banananana* meditation.
* Nanny Ogg knew how to start spelling 'banana', but didn't know how you stopped. — Terry Pratchett (Witches Abroad)
I dont remember giving you permission to post pictures of me.
Are you open to reevaluating that? What is a social skill? The ability to transcend conflict when others are not like you. And evolution is more and more things not like each other. And the cosmos is an astronomical extrapolation of that, and obviously its parts do ultimately meet.
First you assume that man is the tip of evolution? The pinnacle? If you go from there you are just twirling your thumbs. There is nothing dummer on Earth than man. Only man can be talked into being dummer than a cow or a pig, or even a crosseyed apartment cat.
But that's a long lecture. Maybe next time meditation will come forth with a nutshell version, though this lecture usually takes over an hour. Yes, the short version sounds more like an incantation than an invitation to understand how far man has fallen below the evolved norm.
Buddha sat beneath the tree waiting to become as beautiful as the tree, not waiting for the tree to call him a god.
Self is an illusion of life preparing an illusion of life for others by thinking up one.
I suppose I failed to grasp the concept, no less in a thread of de-evolution from higher beings. I guess I'm dumber than you.
When we renounce learning we have no troubles.
The (ready) 'yes,' and (flattering) 'yea;'
Small is the difference they display.
But mark their issues, good and ill;
What space the {gulf between} shall fill?
..but who talks them into that? Another sapient human. So there's still some notable intelligence going on there.
Tsoanra, just out of curiosity, whose work on evolutionary theory do you like to read? Dawkins, or another?
If so it isn't because you were born any dummer than evolution made life on Earth, and how beautiful that is! If we see the height from which we have been driven by conditioning we will not be taking it as lightly as you are doing.
What is an infant? A noisy, smelly, ingrate? Or an alien being in chains stuffed with offensive garbage? and not afraid to comment on it?
Clearly conditioning in the guise of self talks to them. Have you ever read any meditation works?
Evolution is just theft from works three-thousand years old, as is instinct. And as yet the modern effort hasn't caught up with the original. Because there is no meditation behind the modern.
Buddhist intellect? Gawdhelpus!
It sounds like you have your mind pre-emptively made up. And yes, I have read teachings on meditation. I don't see any opposition or dichotomy between the two.
I'm stating a fact. The conditioning destroys the child's mind; the child becomes conditioned, an authority, and destroys the next generation's minds. What do you want to discuss; what's your opening leading to? You seem to be posting in a terrible rush. Are you fishing for a discussion of the karma of being born into such a terrible predicament, or do you really think it's nice to do this to children? Maybe deep conversation is what you ought to be avoiding, not inviting.
The conditioning can just as easily provide the child the tools to cast off the conditioned ignorance inherent in its birth. If you are to fault conditioning, you ought not to do so from your now conditioned perspective that conditioning is bad.
If you believe, "the child becomes conditioned, an authority, and destroys the next generation's minds," you must appreciate that, unless you're one of the countless people passing by to assert their enlightenment, you yourself are guilty of this each time you interact in any way with anyone, always.
Based on what?
We're moving swiftly into off-topic, non-sequitur land.
Based on your last few comments, it seems you believe you are in a position to preach/lecture/witness to the poor, benighted souls here. You aren't the first to try this.
Belittling others and encouraging them to avoid 'deep conversation' hardly seems productive. Or kind.
In common parlance, "devolution" is the evolution of a species into more "primitive" forms. From a doctrinaire perspective, devolution does not exist. Lay people may see evolution as "progress", reflecting the ideas of Lamarckism and orthogenesis, but evolutionists assert that evolution by natural selection is directionless, and so "devolution" is still allegedly evolution.
Misconceptions about evolution
* Species evolve because they need to in order to adapt to environmental changes.
Biologists refer to this misconception as teleology, the idea of intrinsic finality that things are "supposed" to be and behave a certain way, and naturally tend to act that way to pursue their own good. As the fossil record demonstrates that more than ninety nine percent of all species that ever lived are now extinct it is clear that most species do not evolve despite radical environmental changes. From a biological viewpoint, when species evolve it is not a reaction to necessity, but rather that the population contains variations with traits that favour their natural selection.
* Evolution means progress to more advanced organisms.
This presumes that there is somehow a preferred hierarchy of structure and function, for example that "feet are better than hooves" or "lungs are better than gills", and can lead to the idea that change to "less advanced" structure can be called "devolution". To biologists this is an aspect of teleology, the supposition that there is purpose or directive principle in the works and processes of nature. A biologist sees all such changes as evolution, since for the organisms possessing the changed structures, each is a useful adaptation to their circumstances. For example, hooves have advantages for running quickly on plains as horses do, and feet have advantages in climbing trees as the ancestors of humans did.
either evolve or become extinct, same dharma for all species.
open the third eye, get 8 chakras total, enter the path (at least srotapanna)... and what Yuga you are will not matter.
So you are at a forum called 'advanced' and you have spit at all the 'charlatans' who had something deep and unconditioned and original to say, because even though you are conditioned you always know who else is. Sounds like democracy, not buddhism.
Everything you say tells us you are not aware what Buddha means, and so how do you conclude that he means anything you don't mean, that you are not just as enlightened as he was? Buddha is just a name and Buddhism is most often just a habit of dropping that name.
Humility and urgency.
When does one need humility? When something is very urgent.
And when is something very urgent? When the eyes looking at the world are not conditioned to see the polite images of people, but the people themselves.
Where does your insolence originate? In having all the answers? You have hashish, right, and you're listning to pop music, maybe you have some porn on the telly, some single malt and esperesso next to the bong. These are answers. Buddha didn't have a telly, so he had to become enlightened, but you sure don't. Insolence. Conditioned to consume.
And you think we can be conditioned to consume enlightenment teachings?
What I should do, I expect, is ignore that you post to this forum. We go to a new place and learn who is there, and when it is all words it takes a little longer.
It is counterproductive to invite yourself where you don't belong.
If devolution is also evolution, then the cow has evolved to let the bear kill its young, while the buffalo has not, so that where there are bears it is best to raise buffalo. The people who make this switch to boost profits say the cow has lost its instinct, which is what meditation is about: getting the animal mind back on track, getting good karma instead of bad, bad meaning devoting everyone to hurting each other.
As I was saying in an earlier posting here, evolutuon is not a progress of the best we have ever been, but of the largest set of differences. Intelligence grows as the distances it can cross, social distances. Long ones and many. Just because it isn't at wikipedia doesn't mean you have to ignore it. Does it make perfect sense or no?
Extinction is death. Does death kill? Does a giraffe look like a rodent to you? That's its father, right, by the text-book? But it doesn't worry about how it looks. It is still a leaf-eater spending its time in the treetops. The niche has reincarnated.
Reincarnation is a gift not given to self, like these words are not meant for self, so where is the caring about it? In the other species there is not such a great distance that self is a mortal thing, nor in the child. But in the life of self reincarnation is academic.
So meditation is to find the life that cares, to disqualify self as the person.
yes, the big picture
It's a forum...
Everyone belongs and everyone's invited. Private messaging is for private discussions.
He's not 'spitting' at you, he's making some valid observations. It seems that you expect others here to question everyone and everything <i>except</i> what you say.
How, exactly? Or is this yet another gratuitous insult?
Strawmanning...completely baseless assumptions.
Did he say that?
Actually, when going to a new place, it's generally polite to introduce oneself (in the appropriate thread if there is one, and yes there is one) and to be respectful of the new community, rather than make a handful of demeaning and vague admonitions to others because they are somehow not being 'correct' or 'proper' Buddhists in your estimation.
People claim domesticated cows have lost their instinct?
Again, an unwarranted assumption.
An ancestor, possibly. They don't need to look like each other.
So far Tsoanra, I see you following a pattern that has been treaded before:
A new person comes in, belittling and dismissing people with vague and often contradictory posts implying that they--the newbie--are possessed of some superior or secret knowledge which we poor plebes could only hope to comprehend. They make large amounts of <i>ad hominem</i> attacks and do a lot of strawmanning, always finding a reason or way to argue that someone challenging you is ignorant, benighted, and especially (once they really start challenging or questioning your claims) that they aren't worthy of your time.
I can't imagine many people here taking you seriously or as anything other than an annoyance with this attitude. If your attempt to spread or discuss the dharma is earnest (though I am really finding it hard not to suspect deliberate trolling at this point), you should be aware that people generally will be much more likely to dismiss and ignore you than to attach any credibility to your posts. You are doing your cause more harm than good.
nirvAna. nothing is lighted, there is no lamp. like where? in the meditators head?!
ah... needs to do some annotations to Buddhist Cosmology (after tri-translating to/from italian and spanish).
in samsAra?
Why provide a place for every taste, and then ignore your taste when you select a place? Surely if you know you want to heckle you can go where it is welcome, and if you go where it is not you can stop heckling?
You are the marvel of a person who actually listens and reads, then? You are undistracted? You are not dividing your attention between the written and what goes on in your head? Between this and music, stimulants, the weapons of superiority?
Accept us, you say. Meaning accept you. There is no meditation of self-acceptance. I don't go anywhere to idolize what you are. Get over yourself, and THEN others may have good cause to get over themselves.
Gangbanging, right? Now you're popular!
You're starting to sound like the Sphinx from <i>Mystery Men</i>.
Heckling by definition is generally unwelcome.
It's only a marvel to you because you're seemingly so caught up in the notion of your own superiority. I'm nothing special on that score; just someone who is fortunate enough to be well-educated, and motivated enough to make use of that. There are many others who actually listen and read too, as you will discover if you actually take the time to read posts here.
No more so than anyone else...and of course, I need to pay attention to what goes on in my head if I wish to communicate properly, <i>n'est ce-pas</i>?
Also, I don't know what you mean by 'weapons of superiority', and certainly don't consider music, stimulants, or anything else to be (it's not possible to determine from your statement whether music and stimulants <i>are</i> the aforementioned weapons in your view, or if you were simply including the weapons as part of your list). In any case, I have no use for weapons <i>or</i> 'superiority'.
Meaning to accept me, and everyone else on here. You don't have to agree with or even like everyone on here, just show some basic respect and courtesy. And humility.
Follow your own advice. Also, I'm not the newbie barging into a forum and gratuitously insulting others.
Another non sequitur? At least, I'd like to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it is, rather than that you are actually being so crass as to stoop to the level of casting aspersions upon other's sexual practices as yet another form of <i>ad hominem</i> attack.