The simple way of Hun-Tzu

I'm going to take 4 points by Hun-Tzu:

1- Nature = T'ien, constant, regular, exact.

Here T'ien is not the people. Is an ideal. A sort of "thing in itself" that makes itself visible and yet, remains hidden. Let T'ien speak. Listen to its inner rhythm.

T'ien follows PSR, what happens is the best possible world. How does T'ien operate?

T'ien (T) acts without effort. It just emerges from things to show us the way. How? Poetically.

"To accomplish without any action, to obtain without any effort."

2- Rectification of names: "Names don't have correctness on their own. Their meaning depends from convention."

"Rules have a place, but they don't unveil the truth."

3- "The nature of man is evil. His goodness is the result of his activities." Men are animals (no pun intended).

4- Realization: "Any man in the street can become chun-tzu, but it doesn't follow that everyman is able to do so."

Hsün Tzu on evil

Hsün Tzu: The nature of man is evil.

Faces of evil

Evidence of ethnic cleansing in Rwuanda right after the mass murder of Tutsis, (1994).

After our discussions about determinism and/or freedom, it's too easy to report that "this is the way we are" (obvious & uninformative) or that evil cannot exist without good (axiomatic & lazy), or Facundo's interesting point about the evil's "gray areas, " i.e., the uneasy cohabitation of good and evil.

Here are my ten cents:

What is evil? This is. And this, and this  and this.

Wait... it's too easy! Those above are limit cases. We are not that. Instead, let's look for the average kind of evil, the sapping everyday evil that becomes almost invisible, the sort who-me? evil that lurks and surprises, in other words, our shocking daily companion.

I will propose a very simple idea. Evil consists of "merely" treating people as a means to an end. See that the common factor present in both limit cases and average cases is precisely that.

The world is a jungle. Sometimes we find ourselves in situations when we have to choose¹ to treat a person as a means to an end. It becomes unavoidable. What to do then? This is dharma, as momentous as it comes. We cannot become an ostrich and sink our head in the sand. so, we face the situation and try our best to practice ahimsa, i.e., we'd act in such a way that it minimizes treating a person "merely" as means to an end. This is what does violence. 

Is it evil? Maybe, but then it will make a difference between necessary ² and unnecessary evil. We have made the right choice. We can feel the instant as we own it, flowing through our veins.
  
The second interesting point is, where is this evil coming from?

Let's dispel the myth: It's not that we're intrinsically evil -or good for that matter. That's too melodramatic. We just EXIST. And to exist means to deal with our history: past, present, and future. There is past (our embeddedness), present (our surprise) and future (in the form of de-liberation).

Embeddedness is the world we inherit (not necessarily our choosing). Surprise, because this boring world, which seemed so uneventful up to this moment has suddenly become dangerous. Now we're scared shitless. Deliberation³, because this is our now-or-never moment. We'll define ourselves in the act of choosing NOW.

And who chooses? Was there really a solid "me" -valiantly defined, self-assured- before this moment?  Bollocks. This now is always anew. This door is for me!

By the way, this is not my post #3, which I'll post later today.
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¹Sartre's fundamental existential motto: l'homme, par ses choix, définit lui-même le sens de sa vie (our choice defines the meaning of our life). The idea is that not choosing is not an option because by not choosing we automatically choose. ²Obviously, necessary evil is that which can prevent further evil, or bring forth good. Unnecessary evil is simply unredeemed. ³Look what a rich word this is. De-liberation. It comes from lat. deliberatus:de- libra (scale), it also brings forth liberatus, akin to liberty.

Your turn #2: Nothing is sacred

 Ryan Riss, Life Cycles, via Juxtapoz

Thanks for a nice reading! It's time for post #2. And there is plenty to talk about. Pick any of the themes treated this week (Jainism and Buddhism) and build your own idea. Go ahead.
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Apropos of Facundo's, Jose's, Chris', Monique's, Emily's, Rosa's, et. al., cold showers in class, here is a sequent, friendly, witty, thought -on laughter- by he who endlessly wait, Samuel Beckett:

The bitter laugh laughs at that which is not good, it is the ethical laugh. The hollow laugh laughs at that which is not true, it is the intellectual laugh. Not good! Not true! Well well. But the mirthless laugh is the dianoetic laugh, down the snout—Haw!—so. It is the laugh of laughs, the risus purus, the laugh laughing at the laugh, the beholding, the saluting of the highest joke, in a word the laugh that laughs—silence please—at that which is unhappy.

I like cold showers and what comes out of them. One leaves fresh, unpretentious, light headed and yes, ready for more (I close this post next Wednesday @ 11pm).
 
The duty of the sacred? Nothing is sacred!  

Plants are not Dasein

Last night we went for a barbecue at Amida's. It was a nice Memorial Day party, with a laid-back group of Anglos, Africans and Latinos. Imagine an exuberant subtropical garden with dashes of reddish lights coming from behind the vegetation. Uttered words linger in Babelian, fused with the beats of late-60's rock music. There is a curated selection of imported beers with vegetarian hamburgers and other tidbits. The main attraction? Ami's garden.

Ami was kind to give us a "mini-tour". Flashlight in hand, he walked us through the winding straights of his garden -more like an urban forest amidst Miami's Little Havana, as it appears from the outside. At each stop of the way he would nimbly lean over and show the given specimen. He'd explain its Latin root and go over provenance, care, growth process, local climate conditions, aesthetic preference, etc. Meanwhile he compared the banal, the exotic and the endangered. You could tell that he knew his plants. Suddenly the garden had become a wonderful, rich-in-detail, reservoir of pure "in-itself" beingness.

What's first, plants or Dasein?

Emergence: A star is born

Here is my sketch of the emergence* of a star from t1 ---> t4. At each step of the way, the star gets bigger and brighter. Emergence becomes obvious at t4, when a new process (nucleosynthesis) gives rise to new elements not present before (after t3, the star would by itself get smaller and brighter). Why does this happen? The approximate picture we have is based on quantum mechanics and relativity.
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*I've been trying to present a sketchy picture of emergence, to get out of the reductionist physicalist model that talking about consciousness is just talking about brains. If you want to understand the problem of freedom vis-a-vis predeterminism, you have to look no further than this problem. I suggested to you that the mind can be seen as irreducible to physical processes. Under this picture, the mind is still caused by the brain, but exhibits properties that are non-reductive, such as intentionality.

Midterm Exam

Our midterm has 2 parts: Identification of terms (just writing down the meaning of the term) and one brief essay question. For the essay question, pick a theme or subtheme amongst all that we've studied in class. Prepare it. For the test, be prepared to write down a brief mini-essay (sort of one page) in which you will bring the facts of the matter + your personal opinion.

For the terms: here is the list for the Midterm Exam.

If you have any questions, post them here.

Dhyana's mystery

Rethinking our last class: pris de conscience!

 Elizabeth Magill, Lower Lough, 2006.

There are a few things I want to come back to. One is Rosa's question of the value of samadhi and the questions on what meditation is good for (if I recall correctly). First, keep in mind that Yoga is a methodology, a HOW TO manual for spirituality. This is not a set of formulas one debates trying to find apriori reasons. It's more knowing-as-doing, doing-as-feeling.

To find out about Yoga's validity one has to try it.*

There are at least two ways of looking at this: You don't accept a whole model but take some of its parts, or you reinterpret the parts. I propose the latter. Let me address some of these concepts as I see them:

 Elizabeth Magill, Parlous Land, 2006.

1. Reincarnation is repetition. Is repetition the same throughout? The idea is that (R)eality is a ground of reverberating intensity. If that ground is difference (perpetual differentiation) then repetition cannot be of the same, but only of the different, i.e, the renewal of the different.

2. Purification is pris de conscience! (i.e., taking charge). As in quantum physics where the observation alters the result of the experiment, purification takes one's disturbing one's -ongoing- movie. 

 Jeff Wall, After Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, 1999.

We live at a par of our unfolding. So, as the moving-picture plays, there is a possibility to see it -AS IF- we were outside it. This position of "being-outside" as "being-inside" means that you can interact with yourself. This is what the yogis call niyama.

You have two options: (a) like so many people, you live inside the movie and just let the movie play (doing nothing), or (b) you choose to possibly change aspects of your own story as it unfolds.  

3. Attachment is as difficult as it is obvious. We are amidst a raja vortex of forces. We're matter, only in a high state of complexity. And matter craves matter. Yet, MIND being an emergent property of matter, can sort of detach itself from matter. This is the difference between sattvas and tamas.

Elizabeth Magill, Oncoming, 2006. 

4. Attainments. Now comes the big one: What is samadhi? Riding with the wind.

Finding oneself (being-one-with- ______). Of course, that is too general to make sense. What's key is that this finding of oneself needs to have a goal. Pursuing the goal is a way to do it. **

We must not forget Patanjali's caveat about samadhi which is a point he shares with Nietzsche's own idea of rapture: "... the path to one's own heaven always leads through the voluptuousness of one's own hell."

This is why Patanjali is so careful about attachments. If the voyage into the horizon of the infinite fills us with a "thrill," this is because something is glimpsed in samadhi which is in excess of the human, something that is "too much." A voyage into the eye of the maelstrom: Nobody can do it for you.

5. Dhyana asks: Why not thinking about non-thinking?

See you tomorrow with more nonsense.
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*Only then, as the French say, en connaissance de cause one can say it's not good. But, is chess (as good as it is) good for everybody? **In keeping with Buddhism's central teaching of pluralism that there are many ways to heaven, we can say that Yoga is another way.

Is pseudo-talk worse than bad-talk?

A propos of clean & dirty:

Art-writing is loaded with so much shit that it takes over political babbling. What is it? Tropes of banality are displayed along with descriptive bits to conflate fact and fiction. Soon rhetorical inflation grows to the point of fatuous, pathological farce. 

More @ Miami Bourbaki.

What's the matter? Evidence doesn't matter

@ Miami Bourbaki: 

The time has come and the chosen families get ready for the moment of ecstasy: What do I wear to the Olympus? Are there naked people in heaven? To whom I leave the house and the beamer? Should I take my cell phone just in case I can make one last call to my stubbornly sinful girlfriend on earth?

Patanjali sutras (excerpts and comments)

Chapter 1: SAMADHI

I,8: Unreal cognition is the knowing of the unreal, possessing a form not its own.
Comment: Removal of wrong impressions. Egoism, attachment, aversion and love of life are afflictions.Nescience (adidya) affects the purusha. Mind is not identified with purusha, but with its opposing principle: pakriti. The purusha is not mind, but pure absolute consciousness.

I,30: Disease, languor, indecision, carelessness, sloth, sensuality, mistaken notion, missing the point, instability, these causing distractions are obstacles.
Comment: Disease is the disturbance of the equilibrium of the humors. Languor is the indisposition of the mind to work. Indecision is the notion touching both sides of the question. Carelessness is want of resort to the means of trance. Sloth is inertia of the mind and body upon heaviness. Sensuality is the desire upon objects. The self is confused with the activity of its instrument (buddhi) and the other operative psychic faculties. This is the cause of pain, confusion and the frustration of life. Yoga seeks to provide disciplines and techniques of inner control whereby liberation of this spiritual reality from its confinement can be brought about.

I,33: By cultivating habits of friendliness, compassion, complacency and detachment towards happiness, misery virtue and vice, the mind becomes pure.

I,34: Optionally, by the expulsion and retention of breath. Retention is Pranayama, the lengthening of the duration of the stay of the air inside the lungs.

I,36: Or by meditating according to one’s predilection.

Comment: When the mind becomes free from memories or verbal convention, of trance-consciousness, devoid of the options of inferential and verbal cognition, the object makes its appearance in the mind in its own nature. The transformation is called “Distinct” (nirvitarka).

3: Distinctive (wordless) thought transformation is that in which the mind shines as the object alone, (with the cessation of memory), and is as it were devoid of its own nature.

Chapter 2: ON THE PRACTICE OF YOGA

II,1: Purificatory action, study and making God the motive of action, IS the Yoga of action.
Comment: Yoga is a practice in the sphere of living creatures. It cannot be attained by one not be willing to change (purificatory action).

II,3: The afflictions are Nescience, Egoism, Attachment, Aversion and Love of Life.
Comment: Nescience is unrreal cognition (i.e., taking the unreal for the real). That is to say, confusing the root of the problem and its solution.

II,7: Attachment is the sequential attraction to pleasure.
Comment: Yama (or restraint) is a curb or bridle; a way of indicating spiritual control which the self needs to cure the aimless wandering about in the meaningless world of change. We as humans are diverted by a variety of stimuli in every direction. If one abandones inner control, if one cannot resist the variety of attractions and repulsions one feels daily, one is driven back-and-forth between opposites. There is a need for restraint amidst a world of idle distraction: The desire to possess, the thirst for pleasures and its means, preceded by a remembrance of the pleasures in one who has enjoyed it

II,28: The means of the destruction of ignorance is by continued practice of discriminating judgment.
Comment: This means to divide. One must learn to isolate the primordial principles, primal nature and spirit from one another, so that the spirit can exist in its own radiance.

II,52: The consequence of this regulation of breathing is stated: Then the covering that veils the light is destroyed.

II, 53: The mind is now ready for inner concentration.
Comment: After posture and breathing comes the third and last of the specifically Yogic processes by which the entire man is prepared for the development of a higher mental consciousness leading to the liberation experience.

II,54: Withdrawal is the alienation of the senses from their proper objects and their consequent functioning according to the activities of the mind.
Comment: This process entails a cutting off of the distractions of the mind from the dispersion of the senses.

CHAPTER 3: ON ATTAINMENTS

III,1: Concentration is the steadfastness of the mind.
Comment: Dharana, the mind and a total fixation on a single object. In this phase the person is brought to an absolute unity. The focus of attention can be the space between the eyebrows, the tip of the nose, or the tongue, the lotus of the heart, the navel, or some other object. This forces the mind to be fixed, seated as it were in total stillness.It means becoming fast in the navel, the lotus of the heart, the light in the brain, the fore-part of the nose, the fore-part of the tongue or by means of the modifications only in any other object only.

III,19: Of the notions, the knowledge of other minds.

III,24: The knowledge of the subtle, the veiled, the remote, by directing light of higher sense-activity toward them.

III,30: By mastering of Samana comes effulgence.

III,45. The perfection of the body consists in beauty, grace, strenght and adamantine hardness.

III,47. Thence comes quickness as of mind, un-instrumental perception and mastery over pradhana.
Comment: Meaning power to control over all the modifications of the pakriti.

III,49. The seed of bondage having been destroyed by desirelessness even for that, comes absolute independence.

III,50. When the presiding-deities invite, there should be no attachment and no smile of satisfaction, contact with undesirable being again possible.
Comment: This is the moment when everything can be lost or everything gained; it is the moment when the superior powers are themselves to be rejected, even as the visions and ecstatic experiences of the saints are to be rejected since they are manifestations of the divine but do not themselves constitute the divine experience. To rest in these accomplishments is ultimately no better and possibly worse than the activities he or she came from initially.

Raja Yoga

Photo: (Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa)

1- Raja Yoga is concerned with the mind, its modifications and its control. There are five states of the mind - Kshipta, Mudha, Vikshipta, Ekagra and Niruddha.

The mind is always running in various directions; its rays are scattered. This is the Kshipta state. Sometimes it is self-forgetful, it is full of foolishness (Mudha). When one tries to practice concentration, the mind seems to get concentrated but gets distracted often. This is Vikshipta. But with prolonged and repeated practice of concentration again and again, and repeating Lord's Name, it becomes one-pointed. This is called the Ekagra state. Later on, it is fully controlled (Niruddha).

It is ready to be dissolved in the Supreme Purusha, when one gets into Samadhi. 2- Raja Yoga is an exact science. It aims at controlling all thought-waves or mental modifications. 3- The 8 limbs are: Yama: Self-restraint, Niyama: Commitments to practice, such as study and devotion, Āsana: The integration of mind and body through physical activity, Pranayama: Regulation of breath leading to integration of mind and body, Pratyahara: Abstraction of the senses, withdrawal of the senses of perception from their objects, Dharana: Concentration, one-pointedness of mind and Dhayana: Meditation (quiet activity leading to samadhi), Samadhi: The quiet state of blissful awareness, superconscious state.

The aporia of gain: A footnote to yesterday's class

Good class! Hard questions coming from all over. One would like to be as smart to answer all questions satisfactorily at the snap of one's fingers. But as a French rapper would say: N'est pas possible, sommes faillibles.

1- We didn't have time to address meditation and what is good for. We'll catch up.

2- To Emily's great question: What is "gain" good for? There is good and bad gain. Then, there's epiphenomenal gain. Madoff's is bad gain. Why? It cashes in by objectifying people (that was his intention all along). Now, how do we play "gain"? Better yet, when do we "gain"? Let's problematize: Gain, in itself, is empty (for it to be gain it has to be "in relation to" and "for someone").

Do I always gain when -I think- I gain? Certainly not. I can gain in the economic exchange and loose in the long run. Example: Wall Street's idea of financial capitalism, which seemed to destroy the very idea of what a good investment is in Classical Economy (i.e., bankers playing against the solvency of their own banks).

So, when do I "really" gain?

It's here that yajna comes in as sovereignty (which points to just a different exchange; only a virtuous one). The best gain is to give it up. This is when studying for a test and yet failing comes in (or meaning well with an action and yet, being misunderstood). Failing is loosing (a form of un-gain), but only if we see it from the POV of exchange economy. Studying for the test is what one should do to responsibly pass it. Now the duty is fulfilled. Yet, there is no gain = 0. According to Janinism the fulfillment of duty and un-gain are incompatible. One must go behind avidya (illusions).

3- To Facundo's questionable "friend." Parfois, for the sake of time and energy you have to call a spade a spade. I'll approach it from ahimsa's perspective. There is right and wrong: It's axiomatic. You bet that causing unnecessary suffering is wrong. Why? The best you can muster is that it violates ahimsa, which can be seen as symmetry (Golden Rule)

4- A bit on Realism and Anti realism, Materialism, etc.

(a) Realism: There are entities independent of our minds.

(b)Anti realism denies (a).

(c) Irrealism: Entities exist but not as in (a) but as ways to describe the world. This view is also known as conceptualism.

(d) Materialism: There is only matter (even consciousness is matter, i.e, neurons). There is close kin to materialism:

Metaphysical Naturalism (e) There is nothing but natural things, forces, and causes of the kind studied by the natural sciences. So, there are no supernatural thing, force or cause, such as they are described in various religions, as well as any form of teleology (purpose).

5- I wanted to stress the three most important philosophical schools within the Vedanta tradition. Advaita, Dvaita and Vishishtadvaita.

(a) Advaita Vedanta: Teaches that the manifest creation, the soul and God are identical, which is form of monism. This is how Shankara presents it: Just as particles in physics consists of continually moving fields of energy, so the sages of Vedanta recognized energy in the form of consciousness. We perceive the universe by means of gross senses, because of our limited ego-limited body. What is really real and unchanging is the ever-changing manifest world of names and shapes. Shankara's best example is the piece of rope that in the dark is taken for a snake: Anxiety, repugnance are induced by the snake that exists only in one's mind. Once the rope is recognized as a rope it cannot be turned back into a snake. The initial error involves not only ignorance  but superimposition (vikshepa) of a notion that has nothing to do with "what is." That is, we live with this idea of the snake (manifest world) on the rope (Brahman). Shankara puts it this way: "May this one sentence proclaim the essence of a thousand books: Brahman alone is real. The world is appearance, the Self is nothing but Brahman."   

(b) Dvaita: (in Sanskrit it means duality). The human body is separate from the creator god.  Although Madhva's Dualism acknowledges two principles, it holds that the sentient is rigorously and eternally dependent on the other (Vishnu/God). Interesting that for Madhva there is a hell

(c) Vishistadvaita: Defended by Ramanuja: A non-dualistic ontology (things appear "distinct" but are not really separate). Therefore, Brahman alone exists, but is characterised by multiplicity.

6- For our discussion of ahimsa and our treatment of animals.

Did I forget something? Say it if you want.

The Cup

This is your cup -- the cup assigned
to you from the beginning.
Nay, My child, I know how much
of that dark drink is your own brew
Of fault and passion, ages long ago,
In the deep years of yesterday, I know.

This is your road -- a painful road and drear.
I made the stones that never give you rest.
I set your friend in plesant ways and clear,
And he shall come like you, unto My breast.
But you, My child, must travel here.

This is your task. It has no joy nor grace,
But it is not meant for any other hand,
And in My universe hath measured place,
Take it. I do not bid you understand.
I bid you close your eyes to see My face.-- Swami Vivekananda.

Lost and found

 Rob Hornstra's photo for the book cover of 101 Billionaires (2008)

Thanks to Xian, for reminding me of the photo above. We lost it (along with other posts) during the blogger's weekend blackout. If it works as a cipher, go ahead!

If you're interested in the photography of Hornstra, click here.

Sorry for the delay

Hi, kids. Something happened to Blogger (the blog platform). It was off the air all day yesterday. We lost the last two posts, including my linked Bourbaki page (on Duchamp's Fountain). They say they are working on it.

I'm waiting until later today (Friday) to post the homework for comments.

When did this urinal become a work of art?

Good first class, kids. Thanks for the company!

I just finished a post on Bourbaki a topic that relates to our conversation yesterday. The topic here is Marcel Duchamp's Fountain. It is related because, in general, to talk about something in general is to talk about what that something is in particular. So, what is the difference between a urinal and a work of art? Believe it or not, the questions takes us to the very act of creation, whether it's God or Beethoven or Beyonce.

Take the topic and spin it if you want. You're more than welcome to leave comments on Bourbaki.
:)

Confucius' Analects (Excerpts)

On Filial Piety

Mang asked what filial piety is. The Master said, "It is being obedient." Soon after, as Fan Chi was driving him, the Master told him "Mang asked me what filial piety is, and I answer him 'being obedient.'" Fan Chi asked, "What exactly did you mean?" The Master replied, "That parents, when alive, should be served according to ritual; that, when dead, they should be buried according to ritual; and that they should be sacrificed to according to ritual." (Note: "ritual" here is "Li" the idea being of developing meaningful practices that can be seen as embodying what is right. For Confucius there must be a blueprint to be followed).  

Ziyou asked what filial piety is. The Master said, "The filial piety of now-a-days means providing nourishment for one's parents. But dogs and horses likewise are able to do something along that line for their own kind. Without reverence, what is there to distinguish the one support given from the other?"

On Goodness

The Master said, "A youth, when at home, should behave well toward his parents, and when abroad, respectfully to his elders. He should be earnest and truthful. He should overflow in love to all, and cultivate the friendship of the good."

The Master said, "With coarse rice to eat, with water to drink, and my bended arm for a pillow, I still have joy in the midst of these things. Riches and honors acquired by unrighteousness are a floating cloud."

Zhong gong asked about perfect virtue. The Master said, "When abroad, behave to everyone as if you were receiving an important guest; treat people as if you were assisting at a great sacrifice; do not do to others as you would not wish done to yourself. Thereby you will let no murmuring rise against in public, and none in private. . . ."

On the Chuang Tzu

The Master said, "Riches and honors are what men desire; but if they cannot be obtained in the proper way, they should be let go. Poverty and meanness are what men dislike; but if they cannot be avoided in the proper way, they should not be avoided. If a gentleman abandons virtue, how can he fulfill the requirements of his title? A gentleman not, even for the space of a single meal, act contrary to virtue. Even in moments of haste, and in times of danger, he clings to virtue."

The Master said, "A gentleman, well studied in literature, and abiding by the rules of ritual, will not go very wrong."

"When gentlemen perform well all their duties to their relations, the people are inspired to virtue. When they remain true to their old friends, the people are preserved from irresponsible behavior."

The Master said, "A gentleman points out the admirable qualities of men and does not point out their bad qualities. A petty man does just the opposite."

The Master said, "A gentleman is distressed by his lack of ability, but he is not distressed by men not knowing him."

The Master said, "What the gentleman demands is something of himself. What the petty man demands is something of others."

A gentleman does not wear a deep purple or a puce color, nor in his at-home clothes does he wear red. In warm weather, he wears a single-layered garment, either of coarse or fine texture, but when going out he wears it over another garment. He wears lambskin with a garment of black, fawn with white, and fox with yellow. His fur dressing gown should be long, but with the right sleeve short. His night clothes must be half again as long as his body. When staying at home, he wears thick furs of the fox or the badger. So long as he is not in mourning, he wears all the trimmings of his girdle. . . . He does not wear lamb's fur or a black cap when making a visit of condolence. And on the first day of the month he must put on his court robes and present himself at court.

On Ritual and Music

The Master said, "If a man lacks the human virtues, what has he to do with ritual? If a man lacks the human virtues, what has he to do with music?"

The Master said, "Respectfulness, without the rules of ritual becomes laborious bustle; carefulness, without the rules, becomes timidity; boldness becomes insubordination; straightforwardness becomes rudeness.

The Master said, "It is by the Odes that a man's mind is aroused, by the rules of ritual that his character is established, and by music that he is perfected [finished]. . . ."

Education is, of course, important to Confucius, as one needs to learn the traditions and profit from the wisdom of the past. Government can then be carried on by "moral force," as opposed to requiring military or legal force. As to religion, Confucius does not challenge it, but he doesn't put his hope in it either. His stress is always on living well, which means living properly, here and now and by our own actions.

Which is more important for an orderly state: food, weapons, or a government that one can trust.

On Education

The Master said, "Anyone learning without thought is lost; anyone thinking but not learning is in peril."

The Master said, "Yu, shall I teach you what knowledge is? When you know a thing, to realize that you know it; and when you do not know a thing, to allow that you do not know it: this is knowledge." The Master said, [I have been] "a transmitter and not a maker, believing in and loving the ancients. . ."

When the Master went to Wei, Ran Yu acted as driver of his carriage. The Master observed, "How numerous the people are!" Ran Yu asked, "When they are more numerous, what more shall be done for them ?" "Enrich them," was the reply. "And when they have been enriched, what more shall be done?" The Master said, "Instruct them."

On Government

The Master said, "To rule a country of a thousand chariots requires reverent attention to business, sincerity, economy in expenditures, and love for men, as well as the employment of the people only in the right seasons."

The Master said, "If the people are governed by laws and punishment is used to maintain order, they will try to avoid the punishment but have no sense of shame. If they are governed by virtue and rules of propriety [ritual] are used to maintain order, they will have a sense of shame and will become good as well."

Ji Kang Zi asked Confucius about government, saying, "What do you say to killing those who are unprincipled [i.e., the immoral] for the good of those who are principled?" Confucius replied, "Sir, in carrying on your government, why should you use killing at all? Let your obvious desires be for what is good, and the people will be good. The relation between superiors and inferiors is like that between the wind and the grass: the grass is bound to bend when the wind blows across it."

Zigong asked about government. The Master said, "The requisites of government are that there be sufficient food, sufficient military equipment, and the confidence of the people in their ruler." Zigong said, "If one had to dispense with one of those three, which should be given up first?" "The military equipment, " said the Master. Zigong again asked, "If on had to dispense with one of the two remaining, which should be given up?" The Master answered, "Give up the food. From of old, death has always been the lot of men; but if the people have no faith in their rulers, they cannot stand."

On Religion

Someone asked the meaning of the great sacrifice. The Master said, "I do not know. Anyone who knew its meaning would find it as easy to govern the kingdom as to look on this," and he pointed to the palm of his hand.

Zilu asked about serving the ghosts of the dead. The Master said, "Until you are able to serve men, how can you serve their ghosts?" When Zilu ventured to ask about death, the answer was: "While you do not know life, how can you [hope to] know about death?"

A Yoga (Socio-Political) Manifesto

aTrifF 

Nature should have priority.¹ It's here first and sustains everything.

The guiding principle is ahimsa. Non-violence translated into deep & skeptic ecology, i.e, the interdependence of human and non-human life in a world out of joint. We cannot understand ourselves if we estrange ourselves from nature, but we're already estranged!   

Socio-political starts bottom-up not top-down.² We don't need to wait for the top to change. As real actors, close to the local/regional nodes of action, we can acquire the know-how to build connections and mobilize public opinion to challenge institutional and social alienation.

* From the bottom ---> up: The initial transformation is individual but it doesn't stop there. We are ONE: There is no true path without dharma/activism.³

* The aporia of human anthropocentric emancipation: We need to see non-human life under a different optic. The Greeks of ancient times didn't realize that non-Greeks were persons. American plantation owners in the late-18th Century didn't realize that blacks were not inferior brutes. The majority of Americans don't realize that non-human animals are more than just foodstuff. We have an obligation to treat animals with dignity⁴ (animal farming in America needs to be transformed from intensive farming ----> extensive farming).

* The aporia of pollution vs. development: Blaming corporations in order to feel safely excluded from the pollution cycle while feeding the very thing we try to prevent. We are the world's worst polluters! ⁵

* Though it may be a little late, the move towards eco-conservation is a social imperative. Let's fight to stop deforestation, to protect sea life from extinction (due to overfishing), ensuring ecological diversity for future generations. Yes, it seems daunting, but it begins by understanding, doing & telling others.

* The aporia of technology vs. emancipation: What makes us human is a result of our cultural evolution: language, rituals, arts and technology. Yet, our anthropocentric-based culture is leading us to a dead end. Let's move from an anthropocentric to a bio-centric culture!⁶

We must learn to curb and manage our waste: Reuse, donate, recycle! The present corporate-driven/production-intensive food paradigm needs to be turned upside down, from fast food ----> slow food. ⁷ Let's switch our eating habits and bring back food sacralization. Let's turn environmental degradation and human exploitation into eco-erotics!⁸

* The aporia of development vs. under-development⁹: Our post-Capitalist global society is craft-deprived. Globalization has outsourced our manufacturing and trade/skills base. Let's get back to cooking, arts and crafts, organic horticulture,¹⁰ etc. We should balance our individualism with communitarianism!

Let's change our cities by fighting urban decay with environmental sustainability, changing ugliness into beauty.

Let's become eco-Romantics!¹¹ engaging in heritage conservation, infrastructure efficiency,  mass transit, regional integration, human scale, and institutional integrity.

Let's transform our neighborhoods by building sustainable structures, limiting urban sprawl, reducing car dependence, promoting pedestrian friendly urbanism.¹²

What to do? 

 anti-advertising, 

protest, 

social graffiti,
urban farming,

disvestment, 

Zenarchy, 

nonviolence, 

anarcho-syndicalism, 

building consensus,

civil disobedience,

E-democracy,

potlatch

ACT NOW!

____________

¹ Aristotle's naturalism can be seen as a forerunner of eco-thics, as expressed by his dictum that Nature "does nothing in vain." John Clearly, Aristotle and the Many Senses of Priority, (Southern Illinois University Press, 1988) p. 60. ² We don't have to choose between markets (Welfare Capitalism) or governments, as instruments of emancipation (Communism, planned-economy Socialism). Nor is there need to eliminate markets, trade, private ownership, the welfare state, or the institution of the corporation. What we need to do is bring about new practices for each of these institutions appropriate to a balance between prosperity and conservation. This task belongs neither to corporations nor to states: They are incapable of questioning the legitimacy on which their present institutional form is based. Citizens, not big-money interests, have to set the terms of the economic and political agenda. This is the force of emergence: Millions of people joining voluntary movements, discovering that the good life is more fulfilling than the endless cycle of accumulation and consumption. Professor Steven Buechler makes a similar (hopeful) point: "Movements can be crucial switching stations in the direction of history (...)  vital free spaces that promote democratization and restore a meaningful public sphere." See Steven M. Buechler, Social Movements in Advanced Capitalism: The Political Economy and Cultural Construction of Social Activism (Oxford University Press: 2000) p. 214.  Enacting Niyama at the social level can bring about a life of material sufficiency with cultural, intellectual, and spiritual abundance in balance with the environment. By osmosis, the social level can bring about needed changes in the political sphere. ³ One's embeddedness in a particular context: job, household/family, or community can lead one to recognize a problem, learn about community needs, and find a way to make life better through new -or reconfigured- social linkages.  ⁴According to philosopher Tom Regan, animals have "inherent value" as subjects-of-a-life, and cannot be regarded as a means to an end. See, Tom Regan, The Case for Animal Rights, (University of California Berkeley, 2005) p. 245. ⁵The United States has 4.2% of the world's population and produces 24% of the world's C0₂ emissions. ⁶One must be careful not to write off culture, as if humans have fallen from paradise straight into some artificial exile of civilization. This is where the ancient Greeks can help. They understood that us humans are not completely "natural" but rather the site of a collision of nature and culture, which uniquely defines us. See Bruce Thornton, Plagues of the Mind: The New Epidemic of False Knowledge (ISI Books, 1999) p. 96.  ⁷ "Slow food" goes against the received notion that cheap food = good food. Carlo Petrini, the man behind this movement defends the "unpolitical" idea that cheap food is really expensive, bad food, when compared with good, clean, carefully harvested food. He is right. In his book, Petrini advocates the idea of "gusto" (taste) and diversity. There is a correlation between slow food and health, which makes slow food more enjoyable. The locus for this revolucion is la osteria, a place where one can find "traditional cuisine run as a family business with simple service, welcoming atmosphere, good wine and moderate prices." See Carlo Petrini, Slow Food, the Case for Taste (Columbia University Press, 2003) p. 51-58. "Cheap food" is a Capitalist ploy to misrepresent real capital allocation and profit in the name of "abundance," hiding government subsidies for monoculture and intensive production which end up as profit for Big Business in food and energy. Take for instance American corn policies: We subsidize corn while (protect Monsanto's right to sell it to farmers as genetically modified seed). Coincidentally, corn is the foodstuff staple for raising cattle in the US (funded by whom?) and an energy commodity. Wonder why such a labor-intensive commodity such as meat is so cheap? Corn is heavily fertilized — both with chemicals like nitrogen and with subsidies from Washington. Over the past decade, the Federal Government has poured more than $50 billion into the corn industry, keeping prices for the crop — at least until corn ethanol skewed the market — artificially low. That's your Big Mac @ McDonald's, a $5 meal bargain, with 1,400 calories (more than half the daily recommended requirement for adults). ⁸ I thank my friend Gene Ray from Scurvy Tunes, for his suggestion. I'd like to spin his idea of eco/erotics as an embodied striving for well-being that connects us with the animal and non-animal other (life). The opposite of eco/erotics is eros gone astray, a perversion of Nishkam Karma. A desire in the form of a will-to-control that aims to secure itself by mastering all around it. Ridden with anxiety, this eros reduces other to self. In fact, there are examples of such versions in modern times: Certain "peak" historic moments, when factors motivating nations and individuals, such as the desires for profit, security, and hegemony got transformed militaristic erotics. ⁹ It turns out that the mantra of "emancipated" Communist development in Eastern Europe, Africa, and the Caribbean throughout the 1960's-1980's consisted in mimicking the Capitalist "anthropocentric development" model: 1- constant growth, 2- domination of nature, 3- industrialization and technologization of production and society at the expense of environmental degradation, abandonment of agriculture (land reform in this case meant very little, since arbitrary and exploitative prices were set by the bureaucrats, not by the farmers), massive migration to the cities, urban unemployment and loss of crafts skills. The deterioration of nature brought by these mistaken policies, was invoked by the communist  bureaucracies as a step in the right direction for the attainment of development. ¹⁰ Who would think of pursuing horticultural studies in Miami, now, when the expected move of disenfranchised farmers is from the rural areas to the city? Precisely! This overall migration has to do with the switch from farmer-produced to corporate-produced agriculture. How can one reverse it? By encouraging simple living. Diversifying instead of homogenizing food consumption; by making good, simple food (not gourmet food) a desired commodity, so that corporations are forced to alter their mode of production. Surely, one must be watchful of corporation's good intentions! It's all about awareness: As we become more educated in our food habits, there is gradual a move from agriculture into crafted horticulture. Are people ready for it? After the subprime mortgage crisis, the Upper Big Branch Mine disaster, and BP's gulf disaster, the answer is yes. ¹¹ The new eco-Romantic is committed to ecological flourishing, but she is neither anti-technology, nor naive in her political expectations about Messianic utopias. The traditional Romantic lived in a paradox he was blind to. (H)e deprecated technology from his studio in the industrial-brought comfort of the pre-Modern city. We must see the good and bad in technology. The Industrial Revolution cannot be simply undone (the remedy would be worst than the disease). It needs to be transformed. Technology can serve us in using the ecosystem resources more efficiently. On the other hand, there is a strong historical relationship between growth in economic output and growing human demands on the earth's finite ecosystem. We've pushed since 1950's the human burden on the planet's regenerative systems, its soils, air, water, fisheries, and forestry systems beyond what the planet can sustain. Anthropocentric "development" is not the answer. Pushing for economic growth beyond the planet's sustainable limits accelerates the rate of breakdown of the whole. It also intensifies the competition between rich and poor for the earth's remaining output of life-sustaining resources. ¹² See my  "Miami's Urban Mess."