TRY Blogging
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Friday, December 11, 2009
SEMINARS by Gregory David Roberts aka Shantaram
The Big Questions - Seminar Two, The Philosopher’s Toolkit
In this seminar, we're going to acquire the first in a set of intellectual tools that will help us in the search for truth, which is to say the search for the meaning and purpose of existence. The tools we'll discover here, and in the next few seminars, are not the only ones we'll acquire during this journey of discovery. Several times along the way I'll ask you to pause for a moment and familiarize yourselves with another new tool or intellectual method that will be helpful. For now, I'm going to give you the first and most essential tools we'll use, as we take new or old ideas apart and search for the truth in them.
Okay, here we go. The very first tool that I want to give you, in this seminar, has a long and seemingly confusing name: it's called
the dichotomously variable continuum.
Now, fearsome as this mouthful might seem, it's really a quite simple idea that we'll use many times in our minds' journeys. Let's see what the term means, and then let's break the term down to examine each of the words in the string.
Many of you will be familiar with the term "The Bell Curve", which comes from the field of statistics. The term is used to describe the graph form of a certain kind of distribution.
A simple example of the Bell Curve relates to the heights of all the people in a crowded room. If we put all the heights of all the people in a crowded room onto a graph, what we see is that:
a few people are clustered at the short end of the scale,
a few people are clustered at the tall end of the scale, and
a larger number of people are clustered around the average height.
So, what we get is a curve shape, that's a bit like a bell, with a low pointy bit at one end, a high round bit in the middle, and a low pointy bit at the other end. It also looks a bit like a hat, so it could have been called a Hat Curve, but the term that statisticians have all agreed to use is "The Bell Curve."
You can use the term yourselves, in your everyday language. For example, if you were talking about the popularity of a successful TV show, you could say that "It's pitched right at the centre of the Bell Curve."
If you were talking about a TV show (to stay with the TV example) that had a very small, specialized audience, you could say that "It's pitched at the shallow end of the Bell Curve."
Now, the philosophical term that describes this kind of statistical averaging of things, is our new friend:
the dichotomously variable continuum.
So, what does it mean? It means that most things (but not all, as we'll see) in life are to be found somewhere on a Bell Curve distribution. Most things fall somewhere between two opposites, and they lean towards one end of a spectrum, or they fall somewhere in the middle, or they lean towards the other end of the spectrum.
The reason for this is rooted in statistics itself: that is, in the nature of sample groups, and averages. If we take any one of trillions of examples - let's say, the automobile, in a modern, Western city - we can get the idea.
Cars can be examined from many points of view. We can, for example, talk about the relative pollution given off by a car. Now, some cars will be right down at the end of the Bell Curve where they give off almost no pollution at all. Some cars will be right down the other end of the Bell Curve, where they give off huge amounts of pollution. And most cars, in modern Western cities, will be somewhere in the middle of a fat or high Bell Curve.
The same kind of distribution curve applies to almost every aspect of the automobile (if we stay with cars for just a moment longer) that we care to examine. If we look at the relative cost of cars, we'll see that some cars are right down at the end of the spectrum, or the Bell Curve, where they are fabulously costly. Some cars will be right down the other end, where they're very cheap. And most cars will be filling out the fat, high curve in the middle range of prices. Now, let's take another look at the philosophical term for this understanding of things in terms of their averaging:
DICHOTOMOUSLY: a dichotomy (die-kott-o-mee) is a division into two. Often, the word dichotomy is used when people are referring to a sharp distinction between two very different and opposite things, such as the dichotomy between Good and Evil, or the dichotomy between Right and Wrong, or the dichotomy between Love and Hate. This division is also known as a "binary classification", which means that we're classifying things in terms of two polar opposites. We're going to encounter the word "dichotomy" several times during this journey. One of the most common errors in thinking, for example is the "unreasonable dichotomy" or the "false dichotomy", and we'll examine them in later seminars. For the moment, what we need to understand is that a dichotomy is a division into two, and usually of opposites,
VARIABLE: what we mean here, when we put the common word "variable" together with the uncommon word "dichotomy", is that there is a range of variation between two things, and usually between two opposites. The amount of Good or Evil in an act, for example, is variable between the dichotomy ( or division into two, remember) of Good and Evil. The amount of Love or Hate in a given emotional state, as another example, is variable between the dichotomy of Love and Hate.
CONTINUUM: a continuum is anything that is seen as having a continuous nature, rather than a separate and not continuing nature. The lives that we're living, for example, are part of a continuum, or can be said to form a continuum. We don't stop living for a few hours or days, and then start living again, speaking in the strictly biological sense. We're born, and we die, but the life between those points in the dichotomy (there you go, we've used the word) is continuous, and can be described as a continuum. We might say that a specific university education, for example, has a beginning and an end, and is thus "discrete" (which means separate). But the process of learning lessons in life, which is a much broader sense of education, goes on until the day we die, and can be described as a continuum. So, what have we got here? A dichotomously variable continuum, can be described in other words as "a continuous stream of things that varies between two opposites."
Let's take the example of Good and Evil, and begin to use the language we'll come to know well as we move further along the path of this journey. We can say that any one act, if we consider it from a moral perspective, will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Good and Evil.
We'll use exactly those words, many times, in the coming months, so I'll write them again, and in bold:
We can say that any one act, if we consider it from a moral perspective, will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Good and Evil.
We might've said that "any proposition will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Truth and Falsehood"; Or we might've said that "any event will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Inevitable and Impossible," and so on. But for our first example, we're using the terms Good and Evil (which we still haven't defined, but that's in a later seminar).
Okay, so the dichotomously variable continuum between Good and Evil can be seen as a line, drawn on a page, with Almost Perfectly Good at one end, and Almost Perfectly Bad at the other. And any act that we care to examine will fall somewhere (or will vary) on the line (or continuum) between the two opposites (or the dichotomy). Some acts will be so Evil that they'll be right down toward the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the spectrum. Some acts will be so Good that they'll be right down toward the Almost Perfectly Good end of the spectrum. And some acts, probably most acts, will be somewhere in the middle of the Bell Curve.
Now, there are a few points that we have to make here, in order to complete our understanding of this important tool, and of its application in our search for truth and meaning.
1) Nothing in the finite, physical universe is perfect. I won't go into the quantum proofs that support this assertion here, because it will put us off the track. I referred to this point in Seminar One, and I'll simply state it as a fact, here and now. We live in a finite, physical universe. Nothing in that universe, including the entirety of the universe itself, is perfect and absolute. And what this means for our dichotomously variable continuum is that the ends of the continuum - the opposites in the dichotomy itself - will never be perfect.
So, in the example we've used just recently, about the Good or Evil in any act, what we have to realize is that the ends of the spectrum - the extremes of the dichotomy - are never perfectly or absolutely Good or Evil. Nothing in the universe is perfect, so no act is perfectly Good or perfectly Evil. Therefore, the most we can ever say is that one end of the continuum or spectrum is Almost Perfectly Good and the other is Almost Perfectly Evil. And every act falls somewhere between those less-than-perfect or less-than-absolute extremes.
Now, this has huge ramifications for us, as we begin to grapple with big ideas about the meaning and purpose of life. One of them, right off the top, is that if no act is perfectly Good or perfectly Evil, then there must be at least a tiny little bit of Good in even the most Evil acts, and at least a little bit of Evil in even the most Good acts.
I have to say that when I've taught my cosmological model around the world some people - quite a few, in fact - have found this fact about the Good that's in every Evil act, and the Evil that's in every Good act, to be very disturbing. They're people who found a sense of assurance or reassurance in the belief that some things were completely Evil, and some things were completely Good.
If you happen to be one of those people who are disturbed by, or who resent, the idea that nothing in the finite, physical universe is perfect or absolute, and that therefore no act is perfectly Good or perfectly Evil, then please break off from these seminars now. I'm not trying to make converts here. I don't want anyone else to think like me. I'm not trying to convince anyone else, ever, to believe what I believe. Quite the contrary: my cosmological model insists that every single one of us has to engage in our own journey of discovery, using all the tools and methods that work for us, even if they don't seem to work for others. All that I'll ever do here, in these seminars, is tell you what I believe, and why I believe it. I don't ever want you to just swallow whole what I tell you, and accept it as your own. My only aim is to tell you what I believe, and why I believe it: what you choose to do with that information is your private, personal, and unalienable right.
Okay, so to conclude that first general point about the dichotomously variable continuum, we can see that the ends of the spectrum (no matter what the dichotomy that we choose to examine) will always be less than perfect or absolute, and that anything we look at in life will be composed of a mix between the two ends.
But don't be confused into thinking that if every act is a mix of Good and Evil, then every act is allowable or permitted. The fact is that some acts are so close to perfectly Evil - they're so far down towards the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the continuum - that it's impossible for a human mind to see the Good in them. Rationally, we know that the act can't be perfectly Evil, because nothing in the finite universe is perfect. But the little Good that must be in the act is so infinitesimally small that it's beyond our ability to detect it. Child molestation is an example that we might use to make this point. The act is so close to the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the continuum that we just can't see even the merest scintilla of Good in it. And for all practical purposes, there is no Good in it.
It would be ridiculous, and a profane misuse of the philosophical tool, if someone were to try to excuse child molestation on the grounds that nothing in the finite universe is perfect or absolute. Some things are so close to the Almost Perfectly Good end or the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the continuum that we can, for all practical purposes, describe them as Good or Evil acts.
The important acknowledgement that we're making here, as philosophers in the search for truth and meaning, is that with this tool of the dichotomously variable continuum, we can take just about any event, act, or phenomenon, and examine it in terms of where it falls on the continuum between the dichotomous extremes; and we can see that it will never be perfectly or absolutely one thing or the other.
The significance of this intellectual tool might not be immediately obvious, but it will become ever more useful as we move further along in this journey. In the meanwhile, you might want to try using the tool as you examine ideas and moral propositions from day to day. For example, someone tells you a lie. You can immediately see where that lie falls on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost Perfect Lie and Almost Perfect Truth - and recognize, at once, that because nothing is perfect in the finite, physical universe, then every lie has at least a little truth in it, and every truth has at least a little lie. Similarly, if someone betrays you, you can see where that betrayal falls on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost Perfect Betrayal and Almost Perfect Loyalty - while recognizing that no act is perfectly loyal or perfectly treacherous. And similarly, if someone does something generous for you or for a friend of yours, you can see where that generous act falls on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost Perfect Generosity and Almost Perfect Selfishness.
In future seminars, we'll see that there are exceptions to the Bell Curve distribution. One of those, for example, is the distribution of wealth between individuals in any given society. In every example that I've studied wealth isn't distributed as, say, height or weight or cooking talent are,; in a Bell Curve, with a few who are short or fat or have no talent at one end, a few who are tall, or thin, or have much cooking talent at the other end, and a large number clustered around the middle or the peak of the Bell Curve. Wealth distribution, in almost every case, follows a different set of laws. In almost every case, there is a small number of wealthy people, and a large number who aren't wealthy.
We'll look into those exceptions to the Bell Curve distribution in later seminars, but for the moment, we can safely assume that even when a phenomenon can't be put into a Bell Curve, it will still fall somewhere on a dichotomously variable continuum. Even when wealth distribution, for example, defies the Bell Curve, it still falls somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost perfectly Wealthy and Almost Perfectly Poor.
The important things to take away from this seminar, which introduces the first of the many intellectual and philosophical tools we'll use, are these:
Everything can be seen to fall somewhere on a dichotomously variable continuum.
Nothing in that spectrum, or at either end of it, will be perfect or absolute.
Everything in the finite, physical universe is a mix of opposites, within a given dichotomy.
In the next seminar, I'm going to introduce you to one of the philosopher's most useful tools, and the cornerstone of the sceptic's intellectual mansion.
Good luck, good thinking, and good wishes to you all.
Greg Roberts.
In this seminar, we're going to acquire the first in a set of intellectual tools that will help us in the search for truth, which is to say the search for the meaning and purpose of existence. The tools we'll discover here, and in the next few seminars, are not the only ones we'll acquire during this journey of discovery. Several times along the way I'll ask you to pause for a moment and familiarize yourselves with another new tool or intellectual method that will be helpful. For now, I'm going to give you the first and most essential tools we'll use, as we take new or old ideas apart and search for the truth in them.
Okay, here we go. The very first tool that I want to give you, in this seminar, has a long and seemingly confusing name: it's called
the dichotomously variable continuum.
Now, fearsome as this mouthful might seem, it's really a quite simple idea that we'll use many times in our minds' journeys. Let's see what the term means, and then let's break the term down to examine each of the words in the string.
Many of you will be familiar with the term "The Bell Curve", which comes from the field of statistics. The term is used to describe the graph form of a certain kind of distribution.
A simple example of the Bell Curve relates to the heights of all the people in a crowded room. If we put all the heights of all the people in a crowded room onto a graph, what we see is that:
a few people are clustered at the short end of the scale,
a few people are clustered at the tall end of the scale, and
a larger number of people are clustered around the average height.
So, what we get is a curve shape, that's a bit like a bell, with a low pointy bit at one end, a high round bit in the middle, and a low pointy bit at the other end. It also looks a bit like a hat, so it could have been called a Hat Curve, but the term that statisticians have all agreed to use is "The Bell Curve."
You can use the term yourselves, in your everyday language. For example, if you were talking about the popularity of a successful TV show, you could say that "It's pitched right at the centre of the Bell Curve."
If you were talking about a TV show (to stay with the TV example) that had a very small, specialized audience, you could say that "It's pitched at the shallow end of the Bell Curve."
Now, the philosophical term that describes this kind of statistical averaging of things, is our new friend:
the dichotomously variable continuum.
So, what does it mean? It means that most things (but not all, as we'll see) in life are to be found somewhere on a Bell Curve distribution. Most things fall somewhere between two opposites, and they lean towards one end of a spectrum, or they fall somewhere in the middle, or they lean towards the other end of the spectrum.
The reason for this is rooted in statistics itself: that is, in the nature of sample groups, and averages. If we take any one of trillions of examples - let's say, the automobile, in a modern, Western city - we can get the idea.
Cars can be examined from many points of view. We can, for example, talk about the relative pollution given off by a car. Now, some cars will be right down at the end of the Bell Curve where they give off almost no pollution at all. Some cars will be right down the other end of the Bell Curve, where they give off huge amounts of pollution. And most cars, in modern Western cities, will be somewhere in the middle of a fat or high Bell Curve.
The same kind of distribution curve applies to almost every aspect of the automobile (if we stay with cars for just a moment longer) that we care to examine. If we look at the relative cost of cars, we'll see that some cars are right down at the end of the spectrum, or the Bell Curve, where they are fabulously costly. Some cars will be right down the other end, where they're very cheap. And most cars will be filling out the fat, high curve in the middle range of prices. Now, let's take another look at the philosophical term for this understanding of things in terms of their averaging:
DICHOTOMOUSLY: a dichotomy (die-kott-o-mee) is a division into two. Often, the word dichotomy is used when people are referring to a sharp distinction between two very different and opposite things, such as the dichotomy between Good and Evil, or the dichotomy between Right and Wrong, or the dichotomy between Love and Hate. This division is also known as a "binary classification", which means that we're classifying things in terms of two polar opposites. We're going to encounter the word "dichotomy" several times during this journey. One of the most common errors in thinking, for example is the "unreasonable dichotomy" or the "false dichotomy", and we'll examine them in later seminars. For the moment, what we need to understand is that a dichotomy is a division into two, and usually of opposites,
VARIABLE: what we mean here, when we put the common word "variable" together with the uncommon word "dichotomy", is that there is a range of variation between two things, and usually between two opposites. The amount of Good or Evil in an act, for example, is variable between the dichotomy ( or division into two, remember) of Good and Evil. The amount of Love or Hate in a given emotional state, as another example, is variable between the dichotomy of Love and Hate.
CONTINUUM: a continuum is anything that is seen as having a continuous nature, rather than a separate and not continuing nature. The lives that we're living, for example, are part of a continuum, or can be said to form a continuum. We don't stop living for a few hours or days, and then start living again, speaking in the strictly biological sense. We're born, and we die, but the life between those points in the dichotomy (there you go, we've used the word) is continuous, and can be described as a continuum. We might say that a specific university education, for example, has a beginning and an end, and is thus "discrete" (which means separate). But the process of learning lessons in life, which is a much broader sense of education, goes on until the day we die, and can be described as a continuum. So, what have we got here? A dichotomously variable continuum, can be described in other words as "a continuous stream of things that varies between two opposites."
Let's take the example of Good and Evil, and begin to use the language we'll come to know well as we move further along the path of this journey. We can say that any one act, if we consider it from a moral perspective, will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Good and Evil.
We'll use exactly those words, many times, in the coming months, so I'll write them again, and in bold:
We can say that any one act, if we consider it from a moral perspective, will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Good and Evil.
We might've said that "any proposition will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Truth and Falsehood"; Or we might've said that "any event will fall somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Inevitable and Impossible," and so on. But for our first example, we're using the terms Good and Evil (which we still haven't defined, but that's in a later seminar).
Okay, so the dichotomously variable continuum between Good and Evil can be seen as a line, drawn on a page, with Almost Perfectly Good at one end, and Almost Perfectly Bad at the other. And any act that we care to examine will fall somewhere (or will vary) on the line (or continuum) between the two opposites (or the dichotomy). Some acts will be so Evil that they'll be right down toward the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the spectrum. Some acts will be so Good that they'll be right down toward the Almost Perfectly Good end of the spectrum. And some acts, probably most acts, will be somewhere in the middle of the Bell Curve.
Now, there are a few points that we have to make here, in order to complete our understanding of this important tool, and of its application in our search for truth and meaning.
1) Nothing in the finite, physical universe is perfect. I won't go into the quantum proofs that support this assertion here, because it will put us off the track. I referred to this point in Seminar One, and I'll simply state it as a fact, here and now. We live in a finite, physical universe. Nothing in that universe, including the entirety of the universe itself, is perfect and absolute. And what this means for our dichotomously variable continuum is that the ends of the continuum - the opposites in the dichotomy itself - will never be perfect.
So, in the example we've used just recently, about the Good or Evil in any act, what we have to realize is that the ends of the spectrum - the extremes of the dichotomy - are never perfectly or absolutely Good or Evil. Nothing in the universe is perfect, so no act is perfectly Good or perfectly Evil. Therefore, the most we can ever say is that one end of the continuum or spectrum is Almost Perfectly Good and the other is Almost Perfectly Evil. And every act falls somewhere between those less-than-perfect or less-than-absolute extremes.
Now, this has huge ramifications for us, as we begin to grapple with big ideas about the meaning and purpose of life. One of them, right off the top, is that if no act is perfectly Good or perfectly Evil, then there must be at least a tiny little bit of Good in even the most Evil acts, and at least a little bit of Evil in even the most Good acts.
I have to say that when I've taught my cosmological model around the world some people - quite a few, in fact - have found this fact about the Good that's in every Evil act, and the Evil that's in every Good act, to be very disturbing. They're people who found a sense of assurance or reassurance in the belief that some things were completely Evil, and some things were completely Good.
If you happen to be one of those people who are disturbed by, or who resent, the idea that nothing in the finite, physical universe is perfect or absolute, and that therefore no act is perfectly Good or perfectly Evil, then please break off from these seminars now. I'm not trying to make converts here. I don't want anyone else to think like me. I'm not trying to convince anyone else, ever, to believe what I believe. Quite the contrary: my cosmological model insists that every single one of us has to engage in our own journey of discovery, using all the tools and methods that work for us, even if they don't seem to work for others. All that I'll ever do here, in these seminars, is tell you what I believe, and why I believe it. I don't ever want you to just swallow whole what I tell you, and accept it as your own. My only aim is to tell you what I believe, and why I believe it: what you choose to do with that information is your private, personal, and unalienable right.
Okay, so to conclude that first general point about the dichotomously variable continuum, we can see that the ends of the spectrum (no matter what the dichotomy that we choose to examine) will always be less than perfect or absolute, and that anything we look at in life will be composed of a mix between the two ends.
But don't be confused into thinking that if every act is a mix of Good and Evil, then every act is allowable or permitted. The fact is that some acts are so close to perfectly Evil - they're so far down towards the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the continuum - that it's impossible for a human mind to see the Good in them. Rationally, we know that the act can't be perfectly Evil, because nothing in the finite universe is perfect. But the little Good that must be in the act is so infinitesimally small that it's beyond our ability to detect it. Child molestation is an example that we might use to make this point. The act is so close to the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the continuum that we just can't see even the merest scintilla of Good in it. And for all practical purposes, there is no Good in it.
It would be ridiculous, and a profane misuse of the philosophical tool, if someone were to try to excuse child molestation on the grounds that nothing in the finite universe is perfect or absolute. Some things are so close to the Almost Perfectly Good end or the Almost Perfectly Evil end of the continuum that we can, for all practical purposes, describe them as Good or Evil acts.
The important acknowledgement that we're making here, as philosophers in the search for truth and meaning, is that with this tool of the dichotomously variable continuum, we can take just about any event, act, or phenomenon, and examine it in terms of where it falls on the continuum between the dichotomous extremes; and we can see that it will never be perfectly or absolutely one thing or the other.
The significance of this intellectual tool might not be immediately obvious, but it will become ever more useful as we move further along in this journey. In the meanwhile, you might want to try using the tool as you examine ideas and moral propositions from day to day. For example, someone tells you a lie. You can immediately see where that lie falls on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost Perfect Lie and Almost Perfect Truth - and recognize, at once, that because nothing is perfect in the finite, physical universe, then every lie has at least a little truth in it, and every truth has at least a little lie. Similarly, if someone betrays you, you can see where that betrayal falls on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost Perfect Betrayal and Almost Perfect Loyalty - while recognizing that no act is perfectly loyal or perfectly treacherous. And similarly, if someone does something generous for you or for a friend of yours, you can see where that generous act falls on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost Perfect Generosity and Almost Perfect Selfishness.
In future seminars, we'll see that there are exceptions to the Bell Curve distribution. One of those, for example, is the distribution of wealth between individuals in any given society. In every example that I've studied wealth isn't distributed as, say, height or weight or cooking talent are,; in a Bell Curve, with a few who are short or fat or have no talent at one end, a few who are tall, or thin, or have much cooking talent at the other end, and a large number clustered around the middle or the peak of the Bell Curve. Wealth distribution, in almost every case, follows a different set of laws. In almost every case, there is a small number of wealthy people, and a large number who aren't wealthy.
We'll look into those exceptions to the Bell Curve distribution in later seminars, but for the moment, we can safely assume that even when a phenomenon can't be put into a Bell Curve, it will still fall somewhere on a dichotomously variable continuum. Even when wealth distribution, for example, defies the Bell Curve, it still falls somewhere on the dichotomously variable continuum between Almost perfectly Wealthy and Almost Perfectly Poor.
The important things to take away from this seminar, which introduces the first of the many intellectual and philosophical tools we'll use, are these:
Everything can be seen to fall somewhere on a dichotomously variable continuum.
Nothing in that spectrum, or at either end of it, will be perfect or absolute.
Everything in the finite, physical universe is a mix of opposites, within a given dichotomy.
In the next seminar, I'm going to introduce you to one of the philosopher's most useful tools, and the cornerstone of the sceptic's intellectual mansion.
Good luck, good thinking, and good wishes to you all.
Greg Roberts.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Mary Jane- Few Facts
What is marijuana?
Marijuana (grass, pot, weed) is the common name for a crude drug made from the plant Cannabis sativa. The main mind-altering (psychoactive) ingredient in marijuana is THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), but more than 400 other chemicals also are in the plant. A marijuana "joint" (cigarette) is made from the dried particles of the plant. The amount of THC in the marijuana determines how strong its effects will be. The type of plant, the weather, the soil, the time of harvest, and other factors determine the strength of marijuana. The strength of today's marijuana is as much as ten times greater than the marijuana used in the early 1970s. This more potent marijuana increases physical and mental effects and the possibility of health problems for the user. Hashish, or hash, is made by taking the resin from the leaves and flowers of the marijuana plant and pressing it into cakes or slabs. Hash is usually stronger than crude marijuana and may contain five to ten times as much THC. Pure THC is almost never available, except for research. Substances sold as THC on the street often turn out to be something else, such as PCP. What are some of the immediate effects of smoking marijuana?
Some immediate physical effects of marijuana include a faster heartbeat and pulse rate, bloodshot eyes, and a dry mouth and throat. No scientific evidence indicates that marijuana improves hearing, eyesight, and skin sensitivity. Studies of marijuana's mental effects show that the drug can impair or reduce short-term memory, alter sense of time, and reduce ability to do things which require concentration, swift reactions, and coordination, such as driving a car or operating machinery.
Are there any other adverse reactions to marijuana?
A common bad reaction to marijuana is the "acute panic anxiety reaction." People describe this reaction as an extreme fear of "losing control," which causes panic. The symptoms usually disappear in a few hours.
What about psychological dependence on marijuana?
Long-term regular users of marijuana may become psychologically dependent. They may have a hard time limiting their use, they may need more of the drug to get the same effect, and they may develop problems with their jobs and personal relationships. The drug can become the most important aspect of their lives.
SEMINARS by Gregory David Roberts aka Shantaram
Disclaimer
Here I am trying to put seminars I found on the official website of Gregory David Roberts author of wellknown novel Shantaram. I admire this writer, his life style and his creations a lot. He is love for search of truth and his love for humanity and human species is really very inspiring. In no ways I claim any of the follwing materials authorship or pronounce myself a legal channel to distribute follwoing texts. If it hurts or infringe any of the rights, feelings and emotions attached to any human, I apologize. If copyright owners or the author of this text find its illegally parked here just leave a note in comments section and text will be taken out from this blog.
The Big Questions - Seminar One, The Search for Truth
We are embarking on a journey of discovery.
My purpose is to attempt an answer to the three Big Questions:
Where did we come from? (What is the origin of existence and the universe?)
Why are we here? (What is the purpose of existence and what gives life meaning?)
Where are we going? (What is the future of the species, and of the individual soul?)
My method is to use my intellect to examine much that we know about how the universe works, and what our place in the universe is.
When I talk about what we know, or when I call some piece of data a fact, I’m proceeding from the point of view that nothing in the universe is absolutely true, and I’m then making a distinction between what is merely believed to be true (without some supporting data) or what simply might be true, on one hand, and what has a high order of probability of being true, on the other hand.
When I say that something has a high order of probability of being true, what I mean is that to the best of our understanding and knowledge, at this time, the statement of fact is more likely to be verified than contradicted, through observational tests and closely examined predictions of outcomes. An example of this kind of "fact" and its "high order of probability of being true" is the statement that all men are mortal. It may be that all men are not mortal, and that an immortal person will be born tomorrow, but based on all the data we have, the high order of probability is that each new human being born will be mortal. Thus, for the purposes of our discussion here, I would accept the statement "all men are mortal" to be a fact, which is to say that it has a high order of probability of being true.
Now, I know that there may always be people who won't or can't accept even this use of the word "fact", or the word "true". If you happen to be such a reader, and if you just can't get past this point, then I advise you to stop reading right now. It's not my intention to cause distress to anyone who might read this series of seminars, and it's not my practice to try to convince anyone of my point of view. If a reader finds that something in my method, or some conclusion I draw, is upsetting to her or his sensibilities, I advise that she or he should simply stop reading, and leave the seminar series with my best wishes.
I’m talking to the body of people – the very large number of people, in my estimate – who think it useful to proceed on the assumption that some pieces of data, on the basis of a high order of probability, should be considered facts. I’m not ruling out the possibility that new evidence might emerge that might show me that the piece of data wasn't a fact. On the contrary, my method demands that we must learn everything we can about the universe, and constantly subject what we've accepted as facts to the test of new evidence. One of life's greatest delights, it seems to me, is the emergence of some new research or insight that reveals a previously accepted "fact" to be quite wrong. While I don't accept everything in the analysis of Popper (more of Karl Popper in later seminars), I do share the delight he felt in seeing long-cherished scientific tenets overturned.
Okay, if you're still with me, then you've accepted that we can use the words "fact" and "true" in meaningful ways. Now, let's proceed with the elaboration of our method.
In this process of examining data and accepting high order of probability data as facts, and proceeding to draw reasonable conclusions on the basis of those facts, I employ the intellect.
This is not to say that intuitive approaches are invalid, or that meditative-introspective journeys are not fruitful. On the contrary, those approaches are often illuminating.
My purpose here, in this summary of much that is known about the universe and our place in it, is to apply the intellect to those facts and data that have a high order of probability of being true, so that my conclusions – about the answers to the Big Questions – are open to the widest possible audience, regardless of their personal beliefs. It's my hope that a rational and reasonable-minded Hindu would see and accept the essential sense in my method and my conclusions, just as a rational and reasonable-minded Christian, Jain, Bahai, Buddhist, Jew, Muslim, Parsee, Animist, Agnostic, or Atheist would.
It's my hope that in this search for meaning, we can build a community of the mind, which will allow us to open our hearts to one another with the love inspired by the discovery that we really are very special beings, in a universe that has the special function of bringing beings like us into existence.
To begin with, let’s take a closer look at that word truth.
As I said earlier, nothing, in the physical universe, is absolutely true.
We live in a finite, physical universe, and nothing in it is perfect or absolute.
Everything in the universe – and indeed, the whole universe itself – is involved in the flow of time, when looked at from our human perspective. Moreover, the latest discoveries from the research into sub-atomic particles, using particle accelerators and super-colliders, suggest that the sub-atomic particle called a Proton has a finite “life-span”. The fact of the proton’s demise, known as proton-decay, sets an upper limit, as it were, on the existence of matter. These two facts (remember, facts are things that have a high probability of being true, based on what we currently know) about the flow of time, and proton-decay - among many other facts that will be discussed later in this series of seminars – leads me to the overwhelming conclusion that the universe as we know it is physical and finite, rather than absolute and infinite. So, nothing is absolute and nothing is perfect. So, nothing is absolutely true.
I’ll discuss this theme again, later in the search, but for the moment, it can be stated as a fact that nothing is absolutely true, because nothing in the finite, physical universe is absolute, eternal, or perfect.
Now, the fact that nothing is absolutely true doesn't mean that all things are equally untrue – or that the search for truth has no meaning – because some things, quite clearly, are more true than others.
For example, in normal or average conditions and without special apparatus, people fall to the ground if they jump off tall buildings. Therefore, the statement “If I jump off this tall building, I will fall to the ground,” is more true than the statement “If I jump off this tall building, I will not fall to the ground.”
It is important to realize that the first statement – “If I jump off this tall building, I will fall to the ground,” is not absolutely true.
Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle (which we will discuss later) assures us that there is a rare but not impossible chance that we will not fall, if we jump off the building.
Nevertheless, the odds against such an event are so astronomically high – and the odds in favour of falling are so close to absolutely certain – that the only reasonable and rational assumption to draw, based on all the available evidence, is that we will fall if we jump off the tall building. It’s not absolutely true, but it’s so very close to being absolutely true that no sane person would risk her or his life on the chance that it is not true.
Now, let’s take a look at one of the most important tools we’ll employ in the search for meaning:
The Intellect
The function of intellect is, among other things, to:
1) Discriminate,
2) Compare,
3) Measure, and
4) Categorize
Each of these four major functions of the intellect is related to knowledge.
To discriminate, in this special sense of the intellect, means to discern that there is a difference between one thing and another, to focus on one thing rather than another, and to recognize the qualities and characteristics of one thing in relation to another thing.
To compare, means to contrast the qualities and characteristics of one thing against those of another (and against all known things), and to see how similar and how dissimilar the things are.
To measure, means to recognize the physical and energy-related limits of a thing, and to find the direct and indirect ways in which the thing relates to all other things.
To categorize, means to group the things we see into families of things, and to do our best to discover how the thing, and its family of things, interconnect with the purpose of existence.
Some readers will have noticed that the explanation of the word "categorize", as a function of intellect, involved the question of how the family of things in a given category interconnects with "the purpose of existence". Some of those readers who noticed this point may object that such a statement presupposes that there actually is a purpose of existence.
Let's be clear about that point right now. I hold that there's a purpose to existence, and that consequently there's a meaning and purpose to life. I believe that when we've examined all of the data we can accumulate about the nature of the universe, from Big Bang to the present, the only rational and reasonable conclusion to draw is that there's a meaning and purpose to life.
I feel sure that the data supports this view, and I feel confident that it's, in fact, the only rational and reasonable conclusion to draw, based on that data. However, I’m just starting out on this journey with you, the readers, so I’m happy to put the conclusion forward as a conjecture or an assumption, at this stage, and work our way towards it. If you're the kind of reader who's offended by the suggestion that there's a meaning and purpose to life, I advise you to stop reading right now. I don't want to upset anyone, under any circumstances, and there's no doubt about where we're going with this: there definitely is a meaning and purpose to life.
For the moment, for those who are still with us, please accept that when I use the term "meaning and purpose of life", I’m working from an assumption that will become an overwhelming conclusion.
Okay, I was talking about some of the functions of intellect, and I was intending to use the intellect as an important tool in the search for answers to the Big Questions.
The limits to intellect
There are limits to our intellect, just as there are limits to all things in the finite, physical universe. It's useful, here, for me to point out at least 3 of the important limits to intellect.
1) The Plethora of Knowledge
The sheer numerical immensity of data available to the human senses, the plethora of facts and figures and sense impressions that constitutes the family of things we call "knowledge", forces us to make approximations in our apprehension of the universe around us.
For example, with very large numbers of things – such as the number of leaves on all the trees in a visible section of forest – we can rarely (if ever) be very precise about exactly how many leaves there are in view.
What we human beings do, in fact, is approximate these large numbers or volumes or spaces. We are genetically hard wired to approximate, by using category groupings, such as many, and few, and abundant, and scarce, just as we are hard wired to guess the missing parts of a given image or picture (more about visual perception later).
It's important to note that this limit to intellect is actually critical to our survival as a species. If our brains were hard wired to discern and know exactly how many things exist in a given view, rather than approximately, we would be environmentally disadvantaged. Important decisions would be delayed interminably if we were required or forced to know every detail and every aspect of our environment.
So, approximation is a limit to intellect, because it sets an upper limit to what is knowable, but it is also essential to our survival.
2) The limits of Scientific Models and Theories
Every theory or model that hopes to explain phenomena or predict outcomes will have at least some limitations.
For example, Newton's inverse square law accurately predicts the positions of the planets in our solar system, based on the gravitational attraction between the planets, and between the planets as a whole and the Sun.
However, Newton's model does not consider very small gravitational interactions, such as the gravitational attraction between molecular dust particles and planetary bodies. The absence of these small but very real gravitational interactions constitutes a limit to the theory.
Furthermore, our reasonably accurate molecular theories and models do not take the forces of gravitational attraction between the particles within atoms, and between atoms within molecules, into account when calculating the velocities or positions of such large or small bodies. This is a limit to the accuracy of the model we use to study and describe sub-atomic systems.
And as a last example of the limits to our models and theories, let's not forget that Newton's gravitational theory – brilliant and marvellously predictive as it is – doesn't actually tell us what gravity is. We're closer to understanding what gravity is today, thanks to Einstein and the work done in particle accelerators, but we still don't know exactly what gravity is, or how it works.
In conclusion, every model and theory we put up, no matter how useful, is limited in some way. And that limitation imposes a limit upon our intellect. There are those who'll say that the limit to the intellect is what limits the models and theories. I don't agree. It seems to me that it's the models that are small, and that the intellect is capable of grasping and developing any new model that comes along.
In the early 1930's, a scientist colleague of Edwin Hubble said that there were probably only 2 or 3 hundred people in the world who understood Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Today, the theory is taught in high schools across the world, and there are hundreds of thousands of people who have some understanding of its implications. The intellect, we suggest, is limited by the models and theories we have available to us, and when newer and better models appear, the intellect will respond.
3) The Limits of Language
The very language we use to describe the world has limitations. These limits are exposed when we try to explain or describe apparently contradictory or enigmatic phenomena.
As an example of what we mean, let's look at what seems to be the dual nature of light.
a) Interference phenomena (quite literally, colliding beams of light against one another, just as we can collide waves against one another in a water tank) suggest that light is made up of waves, because successive bursts of light interfere with one another's progress in ways similar to the ways that waves in water interfere with one another's progress.
Also, when beams of light are shone through narrow slits in a piece of card, the light that penetrates the card does so in exactly the same ways that water will penetrate narrow slits in the form of wavelets.
So, on the basis of this evidence, light would appear to be made up of waves.
b) However, when we examine something called the photoelectric effect, we find something very strange. When we shine UV light on some metals, we "kick out" electrons from the surface of the metals, in much the same way that one billiard ball will "kick out" other billiard balls that are assembled in a mass. On the basis of this evidence, light would appear to be composed of particles.
However, particles are entities (hard objects) confined to a very small volume and waves are spread out over a large area of space.
But light appears to be both waves and particles: that is, light appears to be both a hard, small object and a thing that's spread out over a wide area. Obviously, that's a conflict.
How can we reconcile this conflict? Reason tells us that light can't be both a wave and a particle. Yet, light seems to be a wave in one experiment, and a particle in a different experiment. What we do, to find a way around this enigma, is to bend the language around the problem. We call the bits that make up light wavicles, which is a made-up word that scientists use to describe the dual nature of light.
Now, there's no such thing as a wavicle, but that doesn't stop us from using the word, and bending our language around the enigma. What we've encountered here (and it won't be the last time), is the limit of our language to describe what actually happens in the world.
Our languages are derived from a range of impressions of the world that we gain from our physical senses. Some of the things we discover in the world of sub-atomic particles, however, and in the world of interactions associated with photons of light (more later), are simply beyond the reach of our senses. The language we use every day isn't adequate to describe what we discover in the very small world of the atom – or in the very big world of the universal macrocosm, for that matter.
What we need, in order to deal with the things we discover in these strange worlds beyond our senses, is a new language, with a new set of paradigms. That new language, of course, is mathematics. But even there, in that multi-dimensional infinitude, we reach limits to what it's possible to describe or encompass within a given paradigm.
So, the very language that we use imposes a limit on the intellect.
The Conclusion
The intellect is a powerful tool in the search for answers to the Big Questions, but the intellect isn't perfect, and there are significant limits to the range and reach of the intellect.
What that means for us, at the beginning of our search, is that we must be vigilant, and we must be as open-minded as we possibly can. The answers are out there, and I’m sure that we'll arrive at some very satisfying conclusions, but we must remain vigilant against lazy or arrogant thinking, and open to every new piece of learning that comes to us.
Next Seminar
In my next seminar, I’ll look at some of the ways that we can shape our use of the intellect. I'll examine the ways in which profound thinkers have provided their little pieces of the logic-puzzle, and we'll discover a few simple tricks that will always serve us well in trying to keep our reasoning processes logical, fair, and reasonable-minded.
Good luck, good thinking, and good wishes to you all.
Greg Roberts.
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