Anyone Can Write!

The day's gotten away from me and there's something important I want to write about that I'm gnawing on but don't have the energy it deserves today. Check in Friday.

In the meantime, you can vote for which of the following pieces plumbs new depths of journalistic mediocrity, this arrogant smear or this depthless space filler.

Comments

[Steve Ford]

“Without English you can’t live, he said. “Without English, you are nothing.”

I am somebody. Give me some depthless space filler over uninformed infantile sneering any day of the week.

Good to see you are back and filling this space with your in depth musings again.

Steve

[Christian]

I didn't find the Slate article so bad. Theses critics are acceptable, I think. Of course, I don't know the real motivations behind these critics, so I would be cautious in public, but privately I find some critics interesting.

I know almost nothing in neurosciences, but I can easily believe that if one practices bicycle five hours a day everyday ,some part of the brain may change somehow in an observable way, if we know how and where to look. So that meditation impacts the brain comes as no news, in this context.

Does mediation makes people happier? Well, one study shows no difference, but this statement cannot be easily assessed. It does not mean that _personally_ I do not know if I am happier due to my practice of meditation, but I think it is not possible to determine for someone else. It is said that ordinary people do not know if someone is a Buddha or not. (We find this idea in ancient Greece a propos Gods.)

Does Buddhism promotes a method which is the same or similar to the scientific method? At first sight, yes, because both rely on experience to settle a question about reality. But, as quoted in the paper, if a meditator student reports a putative discovery, the master can reject the validity of such experience. Would this happen in science? Yes and no. Yes, because scientists are humans, and as such have a complex psychology that leads them to a priori thinking. (There is a huge folklore about scientists among non-scientists which is a problem here. For example, many outsiders think that in science a fact can automatically disprove a theory, but history of sciences and epistemology show that this is not so simple or even true in practice.) And, no, a PhD adviser _should_ not disprove immediately the validity of the experiment reported by his student, because the professor is not supposed to know everything. In case of buddhism, of course, masters never pretend to know everything, but they (ought) have a strong familiarity, to say the least, with their buddha-nature (tathagarbha), and therefore they know *the* path well. I mean, it is not a matter of intellectual knowledge as in science, (despite theoretical study is important) it is more a matter of deep and intuitive insight. For example, when I used to report to my master my meditation experiences, he didn't really listen to my words but somehow to the echo of my words on his own insight, looking for syntonisation or dissonance. There is also something else I sense but cannot explain: he knows better than I what I say. Period. That's why it is always an unpredictable event to talk to a buddhist master, one feels he has no clothes... It is not a pleasant experience for the go (poetic licence for "me":-). This definitely does not happen in science (I hold a PhD in theoretical computer science).

One other aspect of the critics of the Dalai lama at this neuroscience conference was about his apparently escaping answers to true difficult questions about ethics etc. (What about forcing someone to have part of his/her brain removed etc.) The same applies, in my opinion, to the Dalai lama discourses on politics. I mean, this is the way he is. He is a buddhist master, and as such, he is very pragmatic (especially, Tibetan buddhism inherited from Indian buddhism the taste for variety, to be contrasted to modern Korean and Japanese buddhisms). So, at one point in time, he would say "Yes, but..." and at another time, "No, but..." --- something alike. I read different Dalai lama's statements about abortion that were of this kind. This could look like hypocrisy. In politics, especially, this extreme pragmatism could be interpreted as demagoguery or lack of personal ideas or ideals. I personally think that ideology, i.e. an a priori take on reality, must be part of politics, and that the confrontation between ideals (not just ideas) and reality brings some knowledge (and hopefully some progress). Just as in science (don't believe that scientist have no prejudice or ideology!). [Another way is to declare that we do not need ideology anymore, accused it of some past or, preferably, present wars, then declare that the Market is inseparable of democracy and hide that this abstract entity is the true non-democratic ruler of the world and that capitalism is just another ideology.]

A buddhist master as the Dalai lama has no ideology. He could say "Yes." to someone and "No." to someone else with the same question. This is buddhist teaching: be helpful above all, and if the truth cannot be told, well, say what is most appropriate in the present situation -- or remain silent or hit the person or.

All this does not fit in the frame of sound scientific discussions.

I read also in the paper critics of the fact that the Dalai lama keeps repeating "compassion" all the time, whatever the question is. From a cynical point of view, this looks like fishing for compliments. "Of course, everybody should be kind and nice. My mother started telling me this whan I was three, I did not wait so many years to hear that." But there is a misunderstanding about what is compassion here and I don't think this misunderstanding can be unravelled in the middle of a conference about something else than buddhism. This compassion is not the outer bodhicitta but the inner bodhicitta, buddhahood itself. It is not a matter of social convention or some kind of strategy.

[Mongol dude]

"So that meditation impacts the brain comes as no news”. Well, maybe not news for you, but for a lot of neuroscientists it WAS, who believed until very recently that brain circuitry was fixed early in life and remained fixed into adulthood. The concept of "neuroplasticity" is very recent indeed.

Re the question of whether meditation makes you happier, you say “…I think it is not possible to determine for someone else”. According to Richard Davidson of University of Wisconsin, 1) the activity in the left prefrontal cortex is associated with happiness and positive thoughts and 2) his tests using electroencephalograph and MRI sensors showed abnormally high level of activity in this area in monks vs the control group. I am not sure we can say that it is entirely not possible, as we are talking about DETECTABLE electrical activity here. Obviously, we are not sure if mental and brain activities mirror each other, but still.

“Meditator can reject such an experience” Hmmm, maybe put in a different context, but reject? I am not sure rejection of someone else’s experience is feasible and practiced for that matter. And I don’t think it is the same as the a priori prejudice of a scientist.

“apparently escaping answers to true difficult questions” – don’t forget that these questions were designed to bait him and make him say truly religious, as is mentioned in the article by the way. Is it a constructive approach? For you to judge.

Personally I would take a pragmatism that can be interpreted as hypocrisy over unfounded idealism bordering on fundamentalism any day of the week. In Russian, we have a saying “istina rojdayetsya v spore” roughly meaning “the truth is to be found in debate”. I couldn’t agree more, but here I think it has very little relevance. Show me one politician who is an idealist, and I’ll show you a dangerous lunatic.

“All this does not fit in the frame of sound scientific discussions.” Look, I don’t mean to sound harsh, but I think you are mixing things here – politics, epistemology, etc. I am not sure what you meant by “all this”, moreover I am not sure what science has anything to do with the said “all this”.

Totally agree with your point on misunderstanding of compassion.

[Christian]

Hi Mongol dude,

I believe you when you say that the concept of neuroplasticity is recent. The critical paper assumes that this concept is indeed valid and logically pushes it forward: if some prolonged activity can have some observable effect on the brain connectivity or electrical activity, the fact that meditation also has observable effects comes as no surprise and only confirms the neuroplasticity theory but proves little about meditation itself.

That is why the second part of the attack is focused on happiness, the supposed positive effect. I don't want to look down on medical or biological studies, but I am sure that you are aware, if you read every day this kind of news, that around 30% of the published studies are contradicted or impossible to reproduce (I read the "30%" figure in... a study!:-). So I would wait that this electrical assessment of happiness is confirmed by independent people. My posture here may be due to a personal prejudice, I agree, but it is not incompatible with standard cautious scientific protocols. So is the paper posture.

About rejecting meditative experiences, I meant "putative discoveries" from part of the student. These indeed can be rejected _as invalid_ by the master. I did not mean that the teacher denies the experience indeed happen, but the interpretation or the reaction towards it may be incorrect. Like attachement to visions or bliss experience, or believing that mental quietness is buddhahood etc. I believe now that my teacher even lied to me once because he probably felt that confirming some meditative experience of mine would have a negative effect on my further practice. This NEVER happens in science.

I agree with you on the true motivations of many borderline questions adressed to the Dalai lama... One should not complain about escapism then.

The politics aspect of my comments was to defend idealism in politics, indeed. I precisely do not believe in the kind of manichean situation you propose: to chose between pragmatism and idealism+fundamentalism. Ideology does not mean complete blindness. "Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite" is a typical example of what ideology is. "Travail, Famille, Patrie" also. Can be good, can be bad: that is why the confrontation with reality is necessary. [The British obviously do not understand that French ideology, especially in those recent times of riots in France, but this is another story.]

Why did I mix politics with science here? Because in science too, there is ideology, principles. There are prejudices. This is because people make science, this is why epistemology comes into play. This is why a fact does not automatically disproves a theory, despite it should... in theory. I almost remember the story of the Geology society which Darwin belonged to, which decided, at its foundation, to not accept contributions that were guided by an a priori take on nature. A collegue of Darwin said that it was thus like examining all the stones one can find until a theory pops up in our mind.... This is not science but a fantasy (on the all-mighty induction, in this case).

I hope I made myself clear... It's difficult for me. If not, please feel free to criticise me.

[Mongol dude]

Hi Christian,

“…that around 30% of the published studies are contradicted or impossible to reproduce”. Well here is the link to the publication http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/101/46/16369. As you can see in the Methods section of the paper, the researchers have rounded up eight Nyingma and Kagyu masters with 10K – 50K hours of meditation under the belt over 15-40 years (mean age 49 ± 15 years) vs the control group of healthy volunteer students. The paper is recent – 2004, that may explain why it has not been contradicted yet, however I must disagree with the “impossible to reproduce” statement. Your point is valid in general but could it be that this particular study falls into the other 70%?

“So I would wait that this electrical assessment of happiness is confirmed by independent people” - you truly lost me on this one. I really can’t see what makes you question the independence and objectivity of a study of this nature. “…so is the paper posture” – if anyone suffers from a a priori stance here, it is this paper. Throw in some cheap shots too, including the title.

Re the “putative discoveries”, the vast and increasing body of scientific knowledge did not drop in from the sky. You wouldn’t argue that, somewhere along the way, a supposed discovery could have occurred that needed to be qualified or even rejected later in light of new evidence. Personally, I suspect that the number of these occurrences might be rather large, in fact perhaps even larger than that of let’s say “definitive discoveries”. Remember the scientific method and the principle of “falsifiability”.

You seem to contradict yourself here, where idealism in science from a priori point of view is taken to be a human weakness while at the same time accusing the pragmatism of a Buddhist practitioner as being a drawback. Please correct me if I have misinterpreted something here. Also, I’m not sure we can add much to the centuries-old questions of idealism vs realism, rationalism vs empiricism, etc. These subjects have been beaten to death as you are no doubt aware.

Sure, idealism is present in both politics and science. It is present in cooking, tying shoelaces and watching movies too. I fail to see the relevance. Also, I do not know HH personally, but according to the vast majority of second-hand sources, his “lack of personal ideas or ideals” as you put it does not seem to be a topic of urgent concern.

On a side note – PhD in theoretical computer science? Wow, must be a truly fascinating subject. I have worked with people with PhDs in computer science in building some of our quant models (mine’s in economics, softie – I know!), but never heard of theoretical CS.

[Christian]

Hi Mongol dude,

I did not subscribe to PNAS, I probably should:-(

Actually, I do not question this study in particular (since I have not read it), but I tend to be very cautious with this _kind_ (biology, medical) studies, so I think other people as well. I mean, there are plenty of examples of such studies which are not confirmed later or contradicted. One noticeable example is about the Sudden Death Syndrome of babies. For years, studies showed that it was good to make the babies sleep on their stomach until it was "discovered" that this, in fact, increases or triggers the infamous syndrome. Or consider the studies about taking aspirine (it's good for this one day, good for that another day, bad for this another day: a complete mess). Or coffee, or wine (Americans love this kind of studies). Or studies on the validity of acupuncture (not yet scientifically proven but widely accepted even my physicians).

That is why I am cautious here. More studies should come, especially involving skeptics about meditation or Buddhism, which would give to the results more importance if positive.

"Remember the scientific method and the principle of “falsifiability”. Yes, of course, I follow you on that too. I wanted to underline that the relationship between student and master in Tibetan Buddhism is of a different nature of a student and a professor in science. Therefore it is not enough, or not completely faithful, to say that in Buddhism experience is the ultimate proof. Experience is important but it needs to be confirmed by the master, *who is supposed to already know the path*. In scientific investigation, the professor (a good PhD advisor) is supposed to know a fruitful direction of research, but he is not sure, the real pathfinder is the student. Therefore the approach is not the same on a critical point (validation), even if Buddhism uses intellectual analysis, experiments.

Maybe the problem is not well founded. For Westerners, some field should be classified in Science, Philosophy or Religion. Sometimes, Buddhism is promoted as akin to philosophy, sometimes to science, to social liberation (in India), even now to ecology (in Korea)! (Asians themselves now often use Western concepts to classify their own cultural or religious inheritage).

"You seem to contradict yourself here, where idealism in science from a priori point of view is taken to be a human weakness while at the same time accusing the pragmatism of a Buddhist practitioner as being a drawback." Mea culpa for bad explanation. I think that prejudices, projections, cannot be avoided. And you say it is obvious too. So (for me) they are neither good nor bad, they are part of the necessary humane condition. These projections can be bad or good whence confronted to reality (which is supposed to be free from concepts and independent of the subject -- well, who really knows...). I probably said something too obvious here... Sorry.

I think that the pragmatism of a Buddhist master, like the Dalai lama, *may appear* as a drawback in politics or even secular ethics (both are linked), not in buddhism, of course. Politics is about general rules, principles (thus ideology, even if the word sounds ugly nowadays), not with a sum of peculiar cases. You cannot rule a country by taking the personal case of everbody into account. That is why democracy, laws etc. Of course, sometimes, leaders disconnect too much from the people and some rebalancing is necessary.

(More generally, I think that the mixing of buddhism and politics has done much harm to Tibet in the last centuries, and Christianity with politics as well in the West.)

My posture here is that I try to understand the critics of this Slate paper, because even if I dislike the overall approach of it, the tone, the picture, a critics is like a symptom in medicine: you cannot argue with a patient about the existence of his symptom, but maybe with the interpretation of it. I mean, not all critics of the Dalai lama are ad hominem...

“[HH] `lack of personal ideas or ideals'” as you put it does not seem to be a topic of urgent concern." -- I agree on that, sure. I was refering to what some people expect from a political leader and since the Dalai lama put himself in this situation sometimes (*or is put*), maybe it is the source of the critics. Just wondering.

Economics is not for little girls either! I never understood economics, micro, macro or whatever kind. I am truly fascinated by economy (the theory). Theoretical CS is about formal logics, theory of programming (my stuff), models of computation, and applying this fields sometimes (actually, I mostly apply theory rather than enrich existing theories). It's fascinating indeed but you should tell this to my students :-)

[Christian]

I wrote: "not all critics of the Dalai lama are ad hominem..."

That one was good. Obviously read "ad nominem".

[Mongol dude]

Skeptics are welcome, since, as you say, overcoming challenges gives more weight to the end result. Your caution is entirely appropriate here. But, so is the enthusiasm on the part of researchers, IMHO.

The difference in methodology that you highlight is probably not the only one. I think that no one tried to equate them, the point merely being that there are noteworthy similarities and parallels between the two.

I don’t feel qualified to comment on internal Tibetan politics. Theoretically, the mixing of politics and religion could make one susceptible to conflicts of interest. But when you say “I think that the mixing of buddhism and politics has done much harm to Tibet in the last centuries”, it sounds slightly extremist to me. Wasn’t the political environment conducive to study and practice? How about the level of civil liberties and the general standard of living? I don’t know precisely how it faired relatively and absolutely on these points, perhaps you can shed some light?

And don’t worry about economics – dismal science it is, I can attest to that.

[Christian]

"there are noteworthy similarities and parallels between the two." Yes, we always come back to that. This topic would need more investigation.

About Tibetan politics, I am a bit ashamed that I never read books on Tibet history... I will put that on my Christmas list. I based my (too:-) extreme statement on many books on Tibetan buddhism (including the dictionary of Philippe Cornu that I fully read) which offer some accounts of what life was at the time of the n-th Dalai lama or given masters. Also my master made once a comment about that (but he his young, he never lived in Tibet), in the lines: "We [Tibetans] should have left politics to politicians and religion to monks, so the country would have been more prepared to modernize." According to the little I heard, it was very easy for the Chinese to claim that the Tibetan society was backward... I also read that death penalty was never abolished, even if from time to time hunting and fishing was. I also remember movies like Kundun, were the condition of prisoners in the Potala prison is depicted. I also read a clear statement of Trungpa Rinpoche (the predecessor of the current one) in one of his teachings like: "The study of the dharma in Tibet at the moment of the Chinese invasion was a joke." Also, as a member of the Nyingma school, I heard several times comments about how hard life was hard for Nyingma abbots in Tibet because of the close relationship between the Gelug school and the power.

But I never study seriously the topics, so I should not make such strong statements in the meantime.

I do know a little about the situation in Bhoutan, not from first hand but from a past report of the CIA about civil liberties and human rights there, and the news. According to this report (few years ago, there were available on the net), the governement oppressed the Hindu minority with all possible means, including intimidation, beatings, arbitratry arrests etc. The goal, apparently, was to avoid further immigration from Nepal and India, and possibly to lead to the departure of the maximum of these Hindus in Bhoutan (many of them were living there for a long time, others entered the country in the last decades, often illegally).

There is also the case of Sri Lanka and Thailand, which, despite officially respecting freedom of cult, often see unhealthy mixing of politics and religion. Recently, a Sri Lanka party made exclusively of monks sent some representatives to the chamber on the elections. The main figure of this movement recently declared (see The Buddhist Channel) that it was a mistake to mix politics and Buddhism.

Also, I read the scholarly study "Zen at War" [Le Zen en guerre] by Brian Victoria, revealing how the Japanses Buddhist schools supported actively the Imperial policy and sent many monks to fight. I would write longer on this topics if you like, since I have been practicising zazen at the Dojo Zen de Paris for years, and I am also expecting to read soon the follow up "Zen War stories".

I cannot talk in detail of social status of women in Bouddhist countries either, but it is not so good as in France (in Bhoutan, women seem not being oppressed, according to a documentary I saw). I am expecting some books on these topics, by Bernard Faure, but focusing more on historical China and Japan.

I should look for books on TIbet...

About economy, even if it is dismal science, it is so important to understand the world we live in. Each time I think I understand what makes the value of things I found a counter-example. I really do not understand how it works, even micro-economy. Even the nano-economy of my street.

[Mongol dude]

As much as loyalty to your lineage is vital, non-sectarianism should be upholded at all times, right? Did I detect a slight bias there?

Chinese calling Tibet backward? Well, that would depend on your definition of progress, right? I think there was a nice post by Gonchig lam several months ago dealing with this topic.

My view is that politics is a necessary evil. Just like cleaning toilets, someone’s got to do it. Would a secular rule have produced a better outcome for all (in Tibet that is)? I don’t know, I have yet to see some convincing evidence to this effect. Would a secular rule have prevented a Chinese takeover? Make it harder? These kinds of speculations are pretty useless I think, sort of “if my grandma had balls, she would have been my grandpa”.

The experiences of other countries that you site are definitely something to ponder and learn from.

[Christian]

You are right when you say that rewriting history is pretty pointless. But it is still interesting to look at it and find something that could explain something else, even if we shall have never the means to really be sure.

My two cents about the Tibet invasion is that nothing would have stopped it. Nothing. As the Dalai lama once said, smiling: "Chinese: 1 billion, Tibetans: 6 millions."

Lineage bias? Hmmm... I don't think so. But it is true that I heard that stories (of difficulties for Nyingma monasteries) from people who may be biased. I personally have not studied the topics, so I really don't know. But I appreciate you ask me about a possible bias here.

I like your image of politics as cleaning the toilets! It's a very important job, yet not clean, by definition. Perhaps Buddhism should stay out of politics in order to stay cleaner. On the other hands, in Korea, during the 80's, at the times the students and some courageous people were fighting against the dictatorship, it was reproched to the buddhist monks to stay silently in their montains instead of saying something. There was an interesting film (I don't remember its title now, but I could check). In the end, the prominent liberal political figures (and some conservatives) nowadays in Korea were opponents at that time, and they are all Protestant Christian. And this is not a coincidence. In Europe, during WWII, the Vatican has remained silent too, and only recently (because the archives are not fully disclosed) critics hasve emerged from historians.

It's a difficult problem, with many misunderstandings. There are so many things to understand in this world... Not enough time!