As I was walking recently with the monk who teaches me Buddhism, he characterized his undergraduate training in psychology as being Skinnerian psychology.

As I reflected on this later, it occurred to me that Skinner’s psychology of behaviorism was the ultimate extension of the principle of conditioning that the Buddha spoke about.

This post is a follow-on post to an earlier one that discussed the sense of the sacred.
I’ve finally figured out in my mind how to lay out a 7 cicruit Cretan labryrinth in my back yard with temporary materials that won’t kill grass as I try it out. These Christian meditational labyrinths are not a maze; once you enter, you will inevitably find your way to the center, though it may not be obvious, and you will seem to be going the wrong way sometimes.

A recent story about NBC pulling the plug on a Maddona video scene in which she mounts a cross triggered a bit of reflection on culture, freedom, and a sense of the sacred. It was similar in a way to cartoons about the Prophet Mohammed that stirred up violence in the Muslim world. In retaliation, one Muslim museum sponsored a cartoon contest on the Holocaust, which struck me as repugnant while the Prophet cartoons did not.

I’ve struggled with this quite a bit during my life. I have a scientific bent. Science has a stellar track record is demolishing sacred cows. It has systematically destroyed our myths about who we are, what our importance is, and our place in the universe. Now it threatens to define life itself as nothing more than DNA strips to be manipulated at will by those with its tools in hand.

In looking at mostly Buddhist blogs recently, I’ve noticed many of them bent toward politics. There is the usual decrying of Bush, the U.S. involvement in Iraq, the Republican scandals with the expected antidote of voting the Republicans out of office and replacing them with Democrats. Mind you, I’m sympathetic with everything they say, and at the same time I’m not too excited.

Only a relatively small portion of the American electorate can think. Those are reachable. Most others fit the category of the quote by A. E. Housman

Paul: It’s seems ridiculous to me to believe in a mere theory like evolution, when it contradicts the very word of God himself. Why would I choose to believe some theory which is always changing, and has holes in it, when the unchanging Truth of God is the alternative? It seems really silly to discard the weighty words of the Bible for ever-changing scientific theories.

They show up in a minivan. The ringleader descends, gives a few words of instruction, and sends them off in twos, Bible tucked under their arms, filled with literature to convert the wicked. The JWs start with a smile, and then launch a practiced introductory line.

JW: “Nice day for (whatever I’m doing at the moment). I bet you have some questions about the Bible, don’t you? Things that were never quite explained to you.”

“No, not really. I don’t read it anymore, or have any questions about it.”

JW:“Why don’t you read the Bible?,” and draws a deep breath.

“I didn’t find it helpful.”

JW: “Would you mind if I read a bit of the Bible and prayed with you,” nodding toward the door.

For a belief to survive, it does not have to be true or factual; it only has to be useful.

The above is a paraphrased thought culled from Stumbling on Happiness by Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert.

(It would be a mistake to read the following as anything other than a conversation between two beings, who, though separated by undeniable differences in theology, age, and space, remain friends of the heart.)

A few days ago …

“You can choose to believe God’s word,” the 83-year old voice from a 1000 miles distant insisted. “Belief is a choice.”

I think the title of this post is also a title of a book by J. Krishnamurti, but I didn’t get my topic from that. In fact, I got it from a book called Opening the Hand of Thought, by Kosho Uchiyama. And in one of those serendipitous ways, I recently read an unrelated book, Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert, a Harvard psychologist, that connected directly to the “thought in hand.”

A relevant excerpt from Opening the Hand of Thought is:

Usually people assume they are born onto a stage or into a world that already exists, that they dance around on stage for a while, and then leave when they die. Actually, though, when I am born, I give life to my world as well! I live together with that world; therefore, that world forms the contents of my self. Then when I die, I take the world with me; that is, my world dies with me.

Over the ledge or off the wall. What’s the difference?

Things that don’t make sense, the nonsensical, humor, or the far out fit in this category