The Fugue State

Zen is a concept.

Picture this. You’re a University Student. Like me, when I took Macroeconomics, you’re taking a summer course, with online tests through WebCT. After a long walk home, you sit in your computer chair, and go through your books one last time; you have a quiz tonight.

You log in to your computer, and log on to the class website to do an online quiz for your class. You nod to your webcam; the webcam that was put there by your professor. The professor isn’t necessarily watching you, but your webcam tracks your every movement, so that when the quiz begins, you’re not caught looking at your textbook across the room, getting up to go the bathroom(and hence, obviously cheating, much like if you got up to go to the bathroom during a regular exam). There’s a microphone on your computer that’s listening to everything you say, and every rustle of paper. If it picks up any sound, it alerts your professor to pay attention to you—to make sure again that you’re not cheating.

But since this is mandatory, and since every class has this setup, there’s more—You accidentally think back to what lays across the room and remember you have a copy of 2600(a dissident magazine, the possession of which is liable to get you convicted on TERRORISM charges) laying in the open. You panic…you had gotten stoned last night and hung out with your secret hacker friends and had forgotten to put it away. You can’t look at it…the camera tracks your eye movement—you have to stay focused on the screen, focused on the test.

The camera detects something funny about your body movement, and the professor is alerted. She notices the magazine, and calls the cops. Before the test is done, the SWAT team kicks down your door, shooting your dog, and before you know what happened you’re unconscious in a black bag heading for a secret prison in cuba.

Sounds far fetched? Not really.

Check This out (at 18:15). It’s an Off the Hook episode which deals with a company selling the 1984-esque Mandatory Webcams. This is something you’ll probably have to see for yourself.

I have taken WebCT class, and I could probably have cheated, but didn’t. There was no point–WebCT tests are far easier than their paper counterparts, at least the ones I took. Actually in retrospect, it now makes more sense why the class average was so high.

I’ve got a webcam that I voluntarily put on my desk. It doesn’t work half the time, but still—-I’m probably on the ‘privacy is dead/useless’ side of most things, but even so, here in this case I don’t think it should be mandatory in order to go to university to subject yourself to this massive breach of privacy. Pretty much everything else in the above story has happened to someone, somewhere, there are no missing pieces of the puzzle anymore — if this system becomes commonly used(or worse, made mandatory by the government), it really will be the end of free society.

Something struck me deeply this week. It may not sound like much, but there’s a lot of things involved here, let’s see if I can ecludiate(word?) them.

I have been listening to the zencast podcast since a little before I worked at SaskTel. It helped keep a sense of perspective, and helped me to keep calm while dealing with irate customers on the phone. The kinds of things that it discussed I found new, and insightful. Christianity deals with some of the things, but only in passing, and only in a ‘read this passage’ way, where the passage says ‘don’t be afraid, for god is with you’, ’suffer, because god loves you’ or something like that–nice in principle, perhaps, but doesn’t actually *help*. The point being, the kinds of things that Christianity usually tries in order to help people’s lives have tended to be

1. Appeal to Authority
2. Appeal to the Afterlife

A better mind, a clearer perception of the world, these things are not what Christianity is about. To (especially early) christianity, the world is not understandable, and it’s best not to ask too many questions. Everything that you need to know is in the bible, which is read to you because you shouldn’t know how to read. Sure, there are exceptions, but they tend to be later-christianity hacks to make the faith seem less absurd in light of more secular opposition (before science could stand on its own feet, it really didn’t make much more sense than christianity. By the 19th century, there was little doubt, but before that time there was still work to be done, and both science and christianity proper benefitted from this era of competition).

Buddhism, on the other hand, deals entirely with the material world, kind of. All that is required is the belief in the existance of suffering(which is really a psychological/objective fact, at root). Buddhism then looks into the nature and causes(and effects) of this suffering, (and in doing so, the nature, causes and effects of pleasure). It’s a little pseudoscientific. However, it’s only so because it’s utterly personal, subjective but based on objective truths. Even if the ancients who hashed this stuff out couldn’t know it at the time. The whole idea is trying to make the human experience bearable, livable, to improve life itself, right now, starting with things we can do today. And it’s not like you can’t question their tactics, either. I’m pretty sure you can — sure a lot of buddhism is based around the teachings of the buddha, but I don’t think it’s actually necessary–it’s the quest that’s important, it’s the goal, it’s the intent. Once you accept that(really, the 4 noble truths) you are compelled to accept the rest by logic, science and the bayesian method. And if there is an error in the interpretation of buddhism, well, get on the wiki/publish-or-perish deathmarch/corporate gravy-train and improve our understanding of that, right?

I meditated. I learned some things about myself that I might have known earlier, but realistically did not take seriously(unless there was intense pain involved–for example my heart needs kindness and care. I know for a fact that it does because of the pain it has given me, but I could have known that by just paying attention to the way my heart feels when I treat it poorly, instead of ignoring it). It sounds simple, but these kinds of things are downplayed if given any time at all in modern economic and pragmatic worldviews, even those associated with judeo-christianity(and I suspect, Islam). One of the books I read(I think it was ‘patterns of educational philosophy, brameld(?), Uhawaii, 50s) right before I started university suggested that the peak of american thought up until him was Zen buddhism, Deweyan Pragmatism and I think existentialism. He may have been on to something; amid the repetition, the redundancy, the secretness(non-american buddhists have a heirarchy of secrecy to their discredit, and like a modern university or scientology-like cult, there is a whole staircase of levels to go through in order to become enlightened, definitely more than necessary), I think in the western understanding of the world, there is something missing. When taking Econ296(ecological economics) I read a paper(I think it was “buddhist economics” by E F Schumacher) on a suggested buddhist economics. He wasn’t very explicit–but later on in the course, the entire economic system was simplified into 3 things–the achievement of pleasure, the ridding the self of suffering and I think the third thing was related to identity/society (can’t remember that, either). Really, the course was, in it’s entirety, about simplifying ecological economics into ecology/systems theory/biology, non-ecological modern economics and buddhism. Again, the point here is that economics and buddhism are two pieces of a single puzzle, two ways of looking at a single problem, and although they deal with somewhat different things I think that they should both be learned, or neither.

One way this could manifest, I think, is that it would do *incredible* good for vipassana(sp?) to be taught in late elementary school through early highschool… far better than Channel 1, probably just as good as ritalin. Easy to understand, calming, and something to guide you as you live. Who wouldn’t want kids to be calmer, more perceptive and happier? Granted, I only have a part in that question as a former child, as a former peer, but I encourage those of you who do and will have children to take a serious look at this question, and the question of what you want society to do with children in general(is education merely passive? to get jobs? to become a citizen/human being? etc)

Where the shock came in, is when Gil(name?), on Zencast, suggested a per-class donation. It wasn’t required, just suggested, for simple things, building maintenance, bandwidth, whathaveyou. I tallied up my listens, and tried to figure out what it was that Zencast had suggested as far as payment and, well, I won’t tell you what the number is but it is big enough to be worth taking a second look at the whole situation.

Hypothesizing away my own poverty for one moment, from preachers on TV asking for money to spread the faith to SKTFM who suggested that “corporations and churches both want to steal your money and rob you of your soul”, giving money to churches is in my mind something of a verbotten activity. It’s just not done, because they can and will rob you blind.

And yet, in a sustainable society, we would have both economics and buddhism(and if you’re into that sort of thing, a (monotheistic) religion (like christianity)). We would have an understanding of ourselves, the world, and an idea how to make ourselves and the world better. So it is not really unreasonable for the Zencast monestary to ask for a pittance so that they can maintain their temple, while the property values around them hit the roof(nearby houses, outside of the slum which they sound like they are in, easily top 1$M). Now let’s assume that I was willing to give them something, through Ripple, even.

First of all, it’d mean more work. But what does work entail? Usually, causing suffering. Both in myself, possibly the customers, and the ‘external’ of the externalities inherent in both capitalist and really, when it comes down to it, communist/similar production. It would mean not paying attention to myself, the suffering both in myself and elsewhere in the world, and exiting the buddhist arena, and going into the economic arena, to toil for awhile. Much like going to work to afford school, I suppose. Would it be enough to just try my best to work rightly? To consume rightly? To bear responsibility of society, and to act always towards the optimal, most efficient path? The golden mean?

This is something that there has to be a balance of, but in my mind in part this undermines part of what Buddhism(and in doing so, I guess economics, and in part, the (meaningfulness?(word?)) I’ve found that both economics/science and buddhism give theis approach to life) is doing—I can’t even try to be happy more, that it makes more sense to suffer, and to be purpesfully unable to deal with suffering, so that others may have a chance at not-suffering?

I guess when written down like that it sounds whiny/simple. Sometimes you can be happy, sometimes you can’t, and the stoic/buddhist path is well defined in either case.

A related problem to all this is the biopolitical definition of a citizen. Who deserves to be a citizen? Is it right for me to squish the bugs in my house (for failure to pay rent)? What about to eat meat? To kill bacteria/viruses/fungi who threaten me? What about other human beings, even monsterous ones who we might otherwise kill/jail/exile? What the hell do we *do* with other people who clearly violate the law/cause harm on others in a serious way/cause mass suffering? Who choose not to be part of the (deme/socially acceptable group/society/future)? I think it is a related problem. I think it’s a problem that is in essence a political sub-problem of sustainability in general.

So, to sum up

Is Zen Buddhism/Vipassana(sp?) really something that is not just reasonable but which gets at something fundamental in life, something that actually makes human life better in a serious and effective way? If so what kind of church/educational structure should Zen Buddhism (the kind which we ought to support) be/be taught from? Is it ok to give existing structures your material support/help them change into different kinds of structures that might be better, in case the first question is answered as something different than what they currently have?

Is such an institution part of a sustainable society(with our without religions(christianity, islam, judaiism, atheism, etc to go with it)?

Another example; it is clear to me that I should not drink coffee, or at least, not treat it like I usually have in the past. Yet, if I do so I might be able to get short-term productivity gains that would enable me to give material support to the institution in question, allowing it to sustain itself. But then, what is that but exploitation, even if willful? Is that kind of thing part of a sustainable System of the World? An ethical one?

America, Chinese Government, and the Bank of Canada; a loop is formed
(more…)

Of course the most important way for me to be successful(and I suspect you too), is to close this browser tab, and actually get doing what it is that needs doing.

But it is hard. Sometimes, the hardest thing to do, even, is just to pull yourself away from the shallow mindless link propegation and the big glowing tangled mess of connectionist meaning and just go project your influence somewhere.