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Evolution=Samsara?
betaboy
Veteran
Evolution through natural selection is beautiful - complex forms coming out of simpler ones, infinite variety. But evolution is also a painful process, a struggle where we compete for limited resources and space - basically dukkha.
So is nibbana all about getting out of this evolutionary trap, which the ancients might have called samsara?
So is nibbana all about getting out of this evolutionary trap, which the ancients might have called samsara?
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Buddhism doesn`t deny that species evolve, or that within that process it can be pleasant or painful experiences. But samsara doesnt neccesarily is synonymous of evolution.
Take care.
http://newbuddhist.com/discussion/19015/evolution-samsara#
Pain, suffering, rape, murder, torture, disease, hatred, anger, lust etc etc...
DEATH = nirvana or heaven or PEACE
Whatever you want to call it!
Death is the ultimate peace of mind because you will have.... No mind!!!
No mind - no desire - no suffering - no pain, no this , no that ....
Life - hell
Death - heaven
That "making of it" is mind. "No mind" is the absence of any "making of it"-- in other words, non-attachment to the concept that life a "good" or "evil" (to which we either cling to or seek to run away from). That clinging or resisting is dukkha itself.
Dukkha then is not to be confused with life itself. If you confuse it with life itself, that's just more dukkha.
The second Noble Truth states that the problem lies not in life but with clinging to things within life. This is a very important distinction.
Non-attachment it is not a flight from life, but rather something to be cultivated in the midst of life.
Sheng Yen has a book on "no mind" that is very clear which I recommend: Song of Mind
Preceded by mind
are phenomena,
led by mind,
formed by mind.
If with mind polluted
one speaks or acts,
the pain follows,
as a wheel follows
the draft ox's foot.
Preceded by mind
are phenomena,
led by mind,
formed by mind.
If with mind pure
one speaks or acts,
then ease follows,
as an ever-present shadow.
~ Dhammapada, chapter 1
Although the Ego hates this idea, you are just karma's taxi cab. When you can no longer drive, the passenger moves on and you cease to exist.
This is true regardless of whatever name we paint on the cab door.
That passenger may take some of the inertia of the ride along when they leave but that still isn't really you.
Suffering exists just as it's opposite does.
This, both cab & passenger can share.
Suffering of suffering. This is like arthritus and it also means that just because you have flu doesn't mean something else bad won't happen like a conflict with a friend.
Suffering of change. Holding onto that which is dear.
Suffering of composite things. The most subtle of all but we have bodies that are composed of parts. I'm not too clear on this one.
I think scarcity of resources could be one or more of these.
Turning the wheel of dharma is part of the evolution. As we connect and share we learn to skillfully work the causes we can affect, and accept those which are an inherent part of being in bodies. Everybody poops, but regretting it is optional.
It might be fruitful to examine the causes which push/force a mind to see a terrible world. If the Buddha could sit in a joyful connection to the world full of suffering, how could suffering be inherently ugly, a trap, or a hell? It is more likely there is a fetter arising which clouds the simplistic beauty of rain falling, sun shining, flowers opening.
With warmth,
Matt
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn15/sn15.014.than.html
Timsa Sutta: Thirty http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn15/sn15.013.than.html
Assu Sutta: Tears
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn15/sn15.003.than.html
But biologists have a problem explaining why organisms become more complex. There is a price to pay. Greater fragility, for example. So the big question is, what drives this increase in complexity? The reason has to be very deep. Buddhism would say the reason is desire. So in this case Buddhism offers an answer (right or wrong) to a valid scientific question.
Btw I found the quote I was thinking of, from a guru of complexity.
"There’s a price to pay in becoming more complex; the system is more likely to break, for instance. We need a reason why biological systems become more complex through time. It must be very simple and it must be very deep."
Stuart Kauffman
(in Complexity, Roger Lewin)
What drives life to become more complex, that's more complicated. It's not a progression, the most successful life forms on Earth are still the most simple, single celled organisms. In the distant past some cells must have found it advantageous to clump together (like modern sponges), if it had been disadvantageous to become multi-cellular then those cells would have died out, so there must have been some kind of selective advantage to it.
When you live in a colony of more than one cell, then you can start to specialise, some cells can specialise in protecting the colony, maybe by producing a hard protein or a layer of slime on the surface. Others can specialise in sieving food particles from the water etc etc. There is no thought process going on though that determines which cells do what, it all happens gradually through mutation of their genes and then natural selection. There are a lot of evolutionary dead ends along the way though, mutations that are either immediately fatal to the colony, or cause a disadvantage at some future point.
That was a bit long-winded, but basically life wouldn't become more complex if it wasn't in the best interest of the organism, the population it lives within and future generations. I hope that makes sense, there's a good reason I'm not a writer.
I can see how eyes would evolve from simple light sensitive cells to tell where to go in the water.
But like how did cows suddenly develop four stomachs? It couldn't happen all in one mutation. Why would there be so many mutations all going in the same direction? I couldn't think of a better example. How did humming birds get so specialized? I can't think of my examples I thought of on occasion, but sometimes some ability requires such specialized body that it's hard to see how it went from one ancestral form to another. It would seem that the intermediary steps (not one mutation) would not be able to permit natural selection because the first mutations wouldn't arrive at a benefit. Oh here is one. How did squids evolve to produce ink? If you had a half baked ink ability it wouldn't provide any advantage and only in further developments does it become a complete specialized organ and behaviour.
It is difficult to imagine the intermediary steps, I agree. But that's partly because there were no real "intermediary" steps, the forms of animals and plants we see now aren't the perfected end product, there was no goal to produce a cow with four stomachs or a squid with an ink sac with gradual steps along the way - each species in the ancestral line of these animals would have had organs that helped it survive in the environment of it's time. Perhaps the ancestors of cattle got along fine with two stomachs until the nature of their food became tougher, the evolution of extra stomachs would only only have occurred due to pressure from their surroundings. And the ancestors of squid must have found their pre-ink organs very handy for escaping predators, otherwise they would not have survived to pass them on to their offspring.
Also, most animals have some "half-baked" organs, humans for example can get long fine without a gall bladder, spleen, appendix or with only one kidney. If something were to happen to our environment and diet we might see evolutionary changes to those organs, the gall bladder to expand to cope with extra fat for example, or the appendix may evolve to become a second stomach - these processes would occur over a very long time scale and involve the deaths of millions who lacked the beneficial genes for larger gall bladders or bigger appendixes, but at the end of the process our descendants would look back and ask themselves "why did they have those half-baked gall bladders and only one true stomach, what use were they?"
I'm a fan of Schrodingers 'faux-Lamarkism' as an explanation of much that happens. He is also very interesting on the mechanics of genetic mutations. He calculates that mutations occur on such small scales that the laws of physics, which are statistical, do not apply. His 'What is Life?;' is a wonderful essay. So is his 'What is Mind?' .
With respect, Schrodinger was a physicist, and while a great physicist he didn't have a complete understanding of evolutionary biology. For example, when he talks of mutation he's discussing point mutations which are rare, usually have no consequences and are more often then not repaired. The most significant biological mutations involve portions of genes, whole genes and even whole chromosomes of genetic information, no-one in their right mind would argue that those are statistically insignificant.
Also his concept of "use it or lose it" is fundamentally flawed, it is not the individual who determines whether or not his genes are multiplied within the population, it is external influences, it is the reactions of predators or prey to his mutation, it is the reaction of potential mates as well. An organism will use all of its abilities to survive, for some those abilities will be an advantage, for others a detriment, animals don't decide to make best use of a beneficial mutation, they just use it.
But I can only agree with his 'use it or lose it' proposition. It seems inevitably or even trivially true to me. No mutation can be useful to us unless we use it, this is what we mean by 'useful', and if we do not use then it can never become a special trait. We have legs only because our ancestors wanted to walk. No?
In simple terms, our ancestors were fish. Fish can't move about too well on land (check out mudskippers for an example), but some fish would have had more rigid fins than others, this would have given them an advantage over their floppy finned cousins and so they would have reached food more quickly and easily. More food means a better chance of survival and propagation of their genes.
Natural selection tends to exaggerate traits, so eventually our rigid finned fish ancestors, after many hundreds of thousands of generations would have fins suited to walking on land and swimming, much like the modern newt, from amphibians we get reptiles and from reptiles we get mammals. Not one of these creatures ever thought that growing legs would be a good idea, it's something that gradually developed in response to the greater survival of those creatures who could access food more easily, those more suited to the environment they found themselves in, which is the definition of survival of the fittest.
No, no, no, no, no.
You sound like Marlin Perkins, the old guy who hosted Mutual Of Omaha's Wild Kingdom. He'd launch into an insurance commercial by saying something like, "The eagle wants to fly to that highest tree, so he begins to train his wings from a very young age. Just as you should begin thinking about your insurance needs just as you get out of college." No, the eagle doesn't think, "Oh I want to fly to that highest tree top". He starts flying by instinct. I didn't think, oh I want to live, so I will make my heart pump blood to the rest of my organs.
I also note it's not even to scale ... If it was, our human appearance would be even less significant on the scale of time ... and more alarming considering the impact we are having on the planet.
I wonder what our species next evolution will be?
Lol. It's okay. I'm not that naive.
Also, I really cannot believe that even quite simple creatures feel no desire to survive. At any rate, there's no proof that they do not. Why did those fish bother eating at all? Why does anyone? What about Chuang-Tsu's happy fish?
Darwin's finches evolved different beaks because they wanted to eat different food. Are you saying that they have no idea what they're eating, or even that they're eating?
But maybe I made a mistake above. The finches were on different islands and so were forced to eat differently, rather than having a choice. The problem remains though. How do we explain why animals eat unless we assume that they want to eat? I don't think we can.
In the same way, how can we explain the usefulness of legs except by supposing that the ancestors of their owners wanted to walk and so found them useful. Perhaps for our distant ancestors the girls preferred males who did so upright. That would be enough to expain our walking abilities. So it makes sense to me that our behaviour decides which mutations become adaptions. If we choose not to make use of a mutatation then even if it proliferates in the species it would be what Dennett calls a 'spandrel'. A useless appendage or whatever.
This is why I object to the idea that consciousness is irrelevant to evolution, and prefer the idea that it is the fuel the drives the whole process and that decides it's course.
Here is an example of increasing complexity without consciousness. I don't know that I'm right, just some food for thought.
So I would question your final sentence. You have no idea whether this is evolution is with or without consciousness, and nor do I.
@Chrysalid - I expect I did want to breathe when I was born, yes, but I don't know this. It may have been just an automatic physical function. I wouldn't deny that are such automatic functions. But babies are usually thought tio become conscious in the womb, and Freud even suggests that at some level we continue to remember this experience.
My proposition is only that consciousness, and thus wants and desires, plays an important role in detirmining the course of biological evolution. Darwin was clear about this, and speaks of the similar behaviour of widely separated groups of apes as being caused by their similar wants and desires. This behaviour will often detirmine which mutations will disappear and which will become traits. Were these apes not conscious there would be no way to explain their behaviour, similar or not.
It is not Darwin who insisted that we banish consciousness from evolutionary science, but the neo-Darwinists who followed him. With the death of Behaviourism their view would seem to have become untenable.
I can see though that you hold an opinion I don't share, that consciousness exists independently of the brain as an integral part of the universe, so I can understand why you might hold the beliefs that you do.