This is key

I just stumbled upon Donald D. Hoffman‘s work in The Atlantic Magazine. It was one of those exceedingly rare moments when a crucial new piece is added to the puzzle. He’s a cognitive scientist. He’s been studying the roots of perception and his research has led to his articulation of a key missing link if

Communication, driven by assumptions

We cannot connect or communicate intentionally without some assurance of common assumptions to buoy us through the effort. I find that through subtle hints – the sort of unintended communication that takes place whenever there is one organism perceiving another and “making sense” of what they see. Through these hints, if I feel the gap

Complicity, not conspiracy

The subject of the last post, questions around exploring our vulnerability and finding the sources of violence, leads to, implies, an examination of the questions of complicity in relation to conspiracy. As the objectivization of thought sends us following projections placing what we strive against outside us, we find it easy to see conspiracies everywhere.

Routine, Another Cost of Efficiency

The ripples keep expanding from Krishnamurti’s insight into the way knowledge, especially psychological knowledge, locks us into routine responses that, as he put it, atrophy the brain. In my penultimate post, I speculated on how this could be a way to speak directly about a significant aspect of what’s led us to where we find

The Nature of Conditioning

Without this insight there can be much confusion between any action we might contemplate or take and striving. This confusion can lead either to paralysis or frustration. By linking striving to the attempt to outrun conditionality connects the futility of an approach to life that sees only division and seeks to find answers to self generated problems with the deepest manifestation of that impulse in the desire to transcend our conditioned natures.

Not Individuals, Not Groups

One open question around the brain/mind formulation is what it does to our conception of individuals and groups. It seems easy to criticize a practice of attention that opens us to mind and sees the conditioning of the brain – thought in Bohm‘s characterization – as an impediment; either as swallowing up the individual into

“Movement” toward Dialogue

Along with other actions in which we allow a switch from striving-to-become to simply manifesting an experience of Being, this form of dialogue nurtures the conditions that help us get out of the illusions of Ego and the habits of our brains. Beyond that, it is a fulfillment of our interconnectedness and a refusal to treat the “other” as a commodity, or a means to an end.