Enlightenment: Most Comprehensive Explanation/ What? Why? How?

53:57
Transcript
hello the following is all personal
opinion there are a lot of aspects of
Buddhism that are hard to understand the
advice to move away from one's ego the
idea that the emotions of desire and
aversion are the cause of all human
suffering I mean none of that really
makes sense given that we've evolved to
operate through an ego which seems to
work very well we've got the emotions of
desire and aversion for a reason why
would a religion asked us to go against
the way that nature's made us well in
short it's because our tendency towards
desire and aversion exists in a modern
form that's actually not natural the way
we used to perceive reality the way we
would do certain things and avoid
certain other things was very different
before we reprogrammed our minds with
things like language and other
technologies Buddhism is an early
science conducted through experience
rather than theoretical calculation that
reduces human suffering and it's nothing
more than that there are many different
schools of Buddhism that have different
ideas about reality but the original
point of Buddhism was just the science
of human suffering and as it turns out
to get rid of suffering one has to also
understand the nature of the universe
why because human suffering is caused by
the pain of being ignorant to the nature
of reality it's caused by us losing our
felt sense of what actually exists so if
you hear anyone talking about Buddhist
teachings in a moralistic way like oh
you just should be mindful you just
should do that because it's the right
way of seeing things that's not quite
right we've lost our felt sense of what
exists due to our biology and things
that have happened to us Buddhism
prescribes ways of getting back to it
that aren't intellectual they're
experiential they reprogram your mind
over time and now modern science shows
looking at brain scans that people who
for example meditate do restructure
their brain over time so people find
when they engage in mindfulness
meditation which is very much tuning
into reality it's trying to apply your
attend
to your surroundings quite aggressively
people find when they do that they
improve their sense of well-being so
there's that connection between knowing
what exists and feeling better and I
think what's happening is if you apply
your brain to the physical world you're
not giving it as much of its processing
power over to rumination but much of the
way we think every moment of the day is
sort of caught up in abstract thought
thoughts about things that aren't
immediately palpable so things that are
in the past things that you project into
the future and this really robs our
ability to plug into physical reality I
mean we have to think this way that's
the way we operate but I'm suggesting
that we didn't always have to think
quite the same and the result is that
it's a bit uncomfortable language which
makes up a lot of this abstract thought
is man-made we have a language center in
the brain so there are linguistic areas
of the brain but these evolved to cover
instinctive language you know laughter
crying screaming the signals we give to
others that don't ever need to be taught
and and possibly singing you know we've
got this three octave vocal range we
understand harmony Darwin thought we
sung before we spoke but words we have
to teach each generation anew so this is
a man-made technology as you know and in
learning to think and see the world
through this veil of symbolism we are in
effect running a software program on the
hardware that is our natural brain and
that muddies the ability of the brain to
do what it evolved to do which was not
speak in words but simply plug perfectly
into reality
exactly so to exactly fit its perception
of the environment with what the
environment was actually like so if you
do something that's slightly different
with the brain it impairs its capacity
to do what it did in its original state
when I say language I don't just mean
the words that we speak I'm talking
about the process of thinking
symbolically so you look at an item in
the environment and you consciously say
to yourself that's a tree
encountering this before and it's like
that and you know I was taught it's this
kind of tree and you make a map and you
hang it on a mental hook and your map of
reality is based on your very limited
experience of what exists out there and
it's up to you to store all that
information consciously in a format made
of language and symbols somewhere in the
brain and this way of mapping the world
is totally artificial none of the other
animals have to do it like that they can
feel into their environment as though
it's an extension of them because they
live in an a demyx state they live in a
state of symbiosis with nature they
don't also have a technological
component to their lifestyle so there's
nothing unfamiliar to their DNA and
they're not operating an artificial way
of thinking so all the problem-solving
of how they should interact with the
world beyond them has been taken care of
by the process of evolution it's all
built into their bodies how they need to
interact with the world they don't need
to think they're just doing stuff on
instinct
evolution is trial and error made flesh
it's a problem-solving technology it
presents ideas to the environment and
the environment says yes that works or
no it doesn't so animals physical form
their natural behavior their instinctive
perception of what each thing in their
environment means to them is literally
written into their ancestors DNA and
their DNA by extension and it's written
by the environment so you know the ones
that got the wrong code in their DNA and
had the wrong behavior died out so what
you've got if you're an animal is a very
accurate picture of what the environment
is like because the behavior of the
items in the environment has been
written into your DNA over millions of
years
now granted you only know the nature of
those things in terms of which aspects
of these things are relevant to you so
you still don't fully know the nature of
things on their own terms but you do
know how they've behaved over millions
of years instinctively so in in many
ways you're very much plugged into the
matrix of being you're plugged into a
matrix of knowledge referred forward
over
period of time this is a key component
of human ignorance when we approach the
world through problem-solving
we're incapable of seeing things on
their own terms but also of seeing even
the relevant edges of things very
clearly because these haven't been
programmed into our DNA over a long
period of time we evolved in the
rainforest
so anything outside the rainforest is
unlikely to be written into us and what
we're doing is guessing through our
limited experience of what these things
are like the other problem is a lot of
our world now is artificial so the ink
stinks can't inform us about artificial
stuff our DNA can't be updated in real
time you know about what this new
behavior in society means to us and how
we should navigate it
so we're forced to stick with our way of
mapping our physical surroundings
through looking at it hanging it on a
hook of meaning and just hoping that our
version of the territory is accurate
enough to help us get by this way of
thinking started when we moved from the
rainforest to the savanna our instincts
evolved in the rainforest and we could
live in accordance with what felt good
and bad on the savanna though these
instincts were suddenly out of dates
they didn't correspond to what that
environment was like so in the trees it
felt good to chill out eat mangoes have
sex on the savanna you suddenly had to
be engaged in a way of life that was
constant work you had to make fire and
tools and weapons it was your
responsibility to stay alive the
environment wasn't doing that for you
anymore
so you had to negotiate with it and we
can see that our move to this van was
quick because the body didn't have time
to adapt physical traits that would
allow us to remain as the other animals
do in this identic state we didn't
evolve claws and teeth to fight
predators and catch prey we didn't
evolve night vision or a speed so it was
up to us to bridge the gap between what
the environment required of us
physically and what we were capable of
physically with and there's a huge gap
between those two by making tools you
know we can't get
away from predators on foot but we can
create fire to scare them off we can't
digest raw meat because it's got
pathogens in it it's dangerous if we eat
it raw but we can cook it and make it
edible and so on the need for language
came from a similar gap between what our
environment required us to instinctively
perceive about it and what we could
instinctively perceive about it and
there's a huge gap there in the trees we
could just know what was dangerous by
feeling it in our DNA and know what was
pleasurable and good by feeling that you
know if you see a spider in the trees
you know that shape eight legs means
jump back whereas if you see something
of twenty legs it's not very frightening
this has been written into us because
the people who didn't fear the
eight-legged thing probably died out
much more on the savanna though there's
loads of things your instincts can't
read I mean you should jump back from a
poisonous plant but your body doesn't
recognize it as dangerous and if
instinct was the way that we previously
read our environment and I'm suggesting
it really was it was a very different
way of interacting it was a seamless way
of interacting with the world beyond
yourself the world felt like an
extension of you if that's how we read
our environment primarily when we were
in the rainforest then we went to a
place where objects are not
corresponding to our primary sensory
perception of them it would be like
modern man moving to a place now where
there are objects that we're banging
into but they don't correspond to our
eyes because we do a lot of the decoding
visually now and that it would be like
having all these invisible things we
can't see but they are affecting us so
what would we do in that situation I
think we may cast veils of material
across these objects so that we could
add and break those edges of the objects
that were relevant to us to stop us from
banging into them this would tell us
nothing of the objects themselves we may
learn that over many years or over many
generations but we could just pick out
the edges that we think we need to know
about and that's exactly what we did
with words we could apply concepts and
corresponding novel mouth noises or
two different objects that were novel to
our sensory perception and then hold a
man-made map that we hoped was accurate
of what the environment looked like in
our heads and we could use these words
to communicate our Maps amongst
ourselves and collaboratively catalog
all the items of environmental novelty
that we needed to know about to survive
this was also key in thinking
strategically in manually accessing the
past and manually projecting into the
future in it I say manually because
we're operating the brain in a very
conscious willed way animals have a
capacity to do that but they don't do it
habitually to the extent we did I mean
you see animals making tools when
there's environmental failure you know
crow can make it kind of makeshift tool
and chimps of course can but they don't
operate that way because actually the
key problem solving of staying alive in
an optimal state has been done by the
effect of the environment on their body
they exactly fit it why would they need
to improve upon perfection the start of
our perception of everything being
separate instead of all part of the same
system started at this moment where the
environment could no longer be treated
as a contiguous extension of ourselves
something we could know through our
feelings something that was written into
our biology but instead the environment
was now something that had to be
negotiated with as though a stranger
something with an unknown personality
that had to be decoded and then appeased
and this estrangement the sudden not
knowingness we were plunged into when
for all of our history up until then
there was no unfamiliarity to our
experience you know the world was like a
familiar family environment you know we
were the mirror image of it most if not
all of the things we ever encountered
were recognizable to our biology
so this estrangement caused a profound
hunger to return to that state of grace
and understanding that much later the
Buddhists would say we've actually found
a way of getting back to we found a way
of lifting the veil and the veil is the
conceptual content in
film of meaning through which we have to
strive for the external world now we do
have to kind of put up a meniscus
between us and reality because we have
to label everything as an almost
instinctive way of being but it's false
really it feels like we decode the
environment very easily without
conscious thought but it's a mechanism
that we've kind of made ourselves so
that we can keep ourselves slightly
separate from what's going on and not
feel the wrong feelings about things
that we see but rather know
intellectually that could be deceptive
that could be something else now the
brain didn't evolve to deal with this
level of innovation if you stopped
operating on instinct and work in a
problem-solving way very quickly it's an
act of neurological cannibalization we
are an auto forest species we're eating
our own bodily resources to stay alive
because if you're forced into this way
of being suddenly you don't have time to
evolve a section of brain that deals
with making tools as a way of life like
I say animals can make tools but what
I'm talking about is seeing reality
through the tool of symbolic mapping for
example you know this is very ingrained
into how we have to live and we didn't
have time to evolve sections of brain
that would just be dedicated to doing
this you know if you look at animals who
are technologists who make nests for
example they do have a section of brain
given over to making a nest so they
don't need to be taught they know it
instinctively well we don't have that so
we've got to take a piece of brain that
evolved to something else and repurpose
it and therefore as we repurpose it to
make tools we lose its original function
and in this way we're risking perceptual
holes appearing where the sections of
brain that evolved to do something else
can't do that thing anymore so we know
this from mindfulness that we're losing
our grip on reality in a way because
when you tune back into it you know
something as prosaic as the physical
world the ground beneath you you
suddenly feel better it's because the
degree of rumination is not quite right
it's not quite
it's not sort of conducive to comfort in
any case so what is the hidden nature of
reality that we're no longer perceiving
and here we get into what almost sounds
like a telepathic aspect of
enlightenment the idea in Nirvana as
well that you connected to all things
and it's all euphoric and you feel like
you have a felt intelligence of what
exists around you some people who take
psychedelics report that they feel a
wave of compassion going outwards and a
wave of feedback from the environment
coming inwards in the form of grief and
you know love and all sorts of things
that's what I'd call the functioning
nervous system albeit one that extends
beyond one's own body but morality
operates like that we've got mirror
neurons in our head so that we view
another human as though they're
ourselves you know if we hurt somebody
else we feel that pain almost like it's
in our own body and there's a section of
brain for that but the section of brain
that perhaps once extended out to the
environment that seems to have dwindled
somewhat but that intelligence would be
damn handy because if you thought that
the environment is as it is alive and
you felt it as an extension of yourself
you'd feel averse to degrading it in the
way we do and that's simply intelligence
because if you do degrade it it'll come
back to bite you in the ass so how did
this intelligence get coded into our DNA
and you know since then it seems to have
been lost somewhat and something that
needs to be activated through meditation
and so on but how did it get coded in
now before I say anything here I just
want to reiterate this is not esoteric
this is mundane and mechanical there's a
holographic nature to the universe every
fragment of the system has the signature
of everything else within that system
imprinted on it somehow because all the
things that happen to it
made it the fragment it is it's been
subject to the oceanic forces of
everything else that exists seeing as
everything's connected so even the
distant corners of that system had an
impact on the fragment if a rock is
subject to a force that splits it in
two pieces you can look at one piece and
in make inferences about the piece you
don't have the other half has written
its signature on to the piece you do
have and even our level of science can
unravel some of the threads of incident
that cause the fragment you have to
behave and look the way it does now the
ontological signature resident in
everything material is far more advanced
than our science could unscramble but
it's there nonetheless and this is
reflected in physics and also more
reflected probably in philosophy you
know the universe is resident within a
grain of sand and all that and in a way
it's very clear in terms of the material
universe that's just how it works
everything is subject to the laws of
physics if you have one thing occupying
a space another physical thing can't
occupy the same space and in that way
everything fits together as though it's
a giant puzzle and all the pieces may be
fragmenting into a more complex puzzle
but things still perfectly fit together
because they're behaving at the behest
of local physics when biology comes
along we see something that looks like
the introduction of another factor into
the equation which is agency biology
seems to want to do things that will
change this paradigm of everything
simply being influenced by physics so of
course biology has to adhere to the laws
of physics too but it it does more than
fit it does other things with the
addition of agency if you look at planet
Earth it should be losing mass as it
travels through space you know if it had
no biome no ozone layer the friction of
traveling would cause it to lose some
mass but with biology that is acting as
a net that traps leaking light energy
and solidifies it with carbon dioxide
and water and makes it solid and then
eventually stores it in the topsoil it's
carbohydrate through plant matter and
animal matter in turn and it's almost
like every piece of biology is living in
service to this endeavor of fossil
isaacsohn as a biologist told me that
because I thought I'd made all this up
but he said no they learned at
university that's what all biological
life is it's trying to fossilize
son so whether it's mitigating mass loss
or not the point is biology is an effect
dynamic matter and it's dynamic matter
that responds to environmental laws in
ways that alter the consequence of
physics alone on a supposedly dead
universe it alters the consequence in
physics that would normally confine
cause and effect to narrower if not
definite outcomes what's interesting
about biology is the way it operates is
through negotiation with the material
environment it's like intelligence that
puts forward a proposition and it waits
to hear the answer from the universe as
to whether that proposition fits into
the puzzle piece of the material
universe it asks if it can do something
and anything that biology proposes that
doesn't fit into the puzzle piece of the
bigger picture simply dies out the
environment says no to it this may well
be an unconscious and Darwinian process
as far as we know I'm not seeing life
knows it's doing this but it's the
process that works and therefore allows
biology to endure the ability to read
the information in DNA for example and
respond in accordance with the DNA's
suggestions of what feels good and what
feels bad is our consciousness we are
readers and responders the thing to
remember is that if you influence one
thing in your environment you are
affecting the status of the universe as
a whole so there's no small action
within the universe everything is
connected to everything else which is
possibly why a very extended nervous
system a very good sense of what was
going on far beyond your own body would
actually be useful so that you could
feel your actions in a way that would
reflect the potential butterfly effect
of your actions on far corners of the
world if not beyond the world and into
the rest of the universe and this is why
when you are in a natural condition when
your brain is working as it should when
the edges of your puzzle piece are flush
with the edges of the hole that houses
your puzzle piece I think you can
actually look down what feels like the
doors of infinity and apprehend things
that seem quite remote so the headline
for biology is that it has to be dynamic
if it's going to survive the changing
picture of reality you can't have the
same model of animal surviving forever
because the environment that houses it
will place different demands on it and
it has to update its picture of what
reality looks like and it does this by
asking questions through mutations in
our DNA and each mutation is in effect a
question about the changing environment
status it's asking do you look like this
do you look more like this if the
proposition it puts forward does make it
more in sync with the environment than
the other animals that confers an
adaptive advantage and informs the next
change in that species of animal over
time if this works on the level of
consciousness - if I have a truly
accurate felt sense of what reality is
like then I'll behave in accordance with
the way things are and again this would
mean not trespassing upon certain parts
of the environment that would come back
to harm us in the long term how might we
register the nature of reality
if we did perceive what was going on I
think it would be the way people
describe enlightenment we would feel
connected to everything and it would
register to us as though it was made out
of love because you always feel the
things that you treasure as though
they're made out of love so this
euphoric connection to everything would
again be damn handy you know it would
stop us from doing the things that we
don't feel an aversion to doing but we
know will kill us in the long term now
here I want to clarify why religions
conflate the two concepts of morality
all the time and enlightenment morality
and intelligence is because they are the
same thing morality is intelligence of
what's happening outside your own
experience ignorance and sin are
conflated in religion because they are
the same thing if you don't know what's
happening outside your intelligence
you're an unwitting sinner because you
call this harm where you didn't mean to
you just couldn't realize what you were
doing and a natural innate sense of
morality that was not made out of
intellectual concepts the way we have to
make our morality now an instinct of
morality that informed you about the
nature of things could once have existed
if you think of reality is a glass sheet
and it's been shattered into loads and
loads of puzzle pieces that make it up
then so long as your age is exactly
concur with those of the hole that
you're in you'll be able to feel into
that space that's beyond you because
it's the nodes
it's the nodes of connection as they say
in Hinduism or the what do they say the
the places where things connect in
Buddhism that contains your perception
of everything that exists I think that's
what they're getting at that if
something vibrates the corner of the
glass sheet and you're exactly fitting
into the puzzle piece the vibrations
will be very accurately transmitted
through your edge to you so that you
feel like you are the glass sheet itself
the vibrations that are sent to you will
affect your body as though you're
exactly fitting the entire universe but
you are still that fragment it's just a
case of exactly fitting the hole that
you're supposed to be in now we have
moved away from our original puzzle
piece fitting exactly into the puzzle
the edges that would allow information
to be transmitted to us about the
environment in a way that corresponds
with our DNA they're not in the right
place because we have unplugged parts of
our brain from what they were originally
doing in order to deal with the amount
of artifice that we require to stay
alive in an unfamiliar territory so
we've lost touch with how to perceive
and the mechanism that wrote the
intelligence of what existed into our
bodies purely by natural selection the
ones that didn't have the right picture
of the universe were died out because
they couldn't see down the corridors of
consequence but they were killed by the
consequence long-term so you end up
having an accurate picture of what
exists written into your DNA you could
say by chance almost humans currently
don't religion as I was saying in my
last video is very similar to tools and
language tools remember
the gap between what the environment
demands of us physically and what our
bodies are capable of physically
language bridges the gap between the
knowledge and understanding the
environment demands of us and what our
brains understand and know instinctively
again there's a huge gap because our
brains got their instincts from the rain
forest so they don't know anything much
about the savanna and religion bridges
the gap between how the environment
needs us to behave if we're going to
survive and how we feel like behaving
because again we evolved feelings in
another environment so there's a big gap
between our tendencies to hang around
like eating biscuits and having sex
because originally we just you know ate
mangoes and procreated and we were up
high away from predators we were playful
and you know we chilled out a lot you
can't do that post Savannah you got to
go away from what you feel like doing
and we have constructed morality as an
intellectual bridge to bridge what you
should feel like doing and what you do
feel like doing and because the body
hasn't had time to have this written
into it its DNA so that's another bloody
thing we've got to hold in our head the
head is already being taken up with a
lot of artifice that stops it from
plugging into reality morality is yet
another thing I mean for God's sake
when's all the apprehension of what
exists gonna happen you know no wonder
we can't tell what's going on from our
limited perspective we think that
morality is charity it doesn't benefit
us but we do feel good about giving and
there's a remnant of our picture of the
system beyond us when you feel good
about something it tells you that's the
nature of how your species needs to
operate and those actions should be
followed not for the dopamine hit but
because the dopamine hit is a reflection
of what is now the problem of course
that I was looking at the last video is
that technology interrupts the
conversation between person and
environment the body can't evolve in
sync with an environment that's
artificial partly because it's changing
way too quickly none of this has time to
be written into your DNA over many
generations that are necessary to give
you a true impression of what that piece
of technology
means we may get superficial aspects of
technology written into us but they'll
only be a short-term impression of how
this tool behaves we won't see the
long-term consequences of it
so feeling into the environment that is
constantly being reshaped and reshaped
again means your instincts fall woefully
short you can't perceive the nature of
things in a way therefore what choice do
we have we have to create these
workarounds they may be expensive in
terms of brainpower they may be causing
more of the problem that they're
actually designed to mitigate against
but we can't survive without them we
need our tools and language and religion
so what do we do and religion takes
different approaches to this you know
Buddhism says become the enlightened
figure you can become Buddha you know
we've got a handbook for doing this it
just takes a hell of a long time and
you've got to kind of get away from all
the artifice that actually is required
to survive I think it's quite cruel and
way because it's like you just should be
mindful idiot when the reality is we are
biologically disabled we can't be
mindful if you follow what Buddhism
actually prescribes it says do these
exercises and they D program the the
stuff that's clouding your perception
they don't blame you for being an idiot
you know we are the victim of
circumstance to an extent it's trying to
work out what to do that's the kind of
quest we need to go on I think and
there's not a clear answer because
Buddhism says become the enlightened
person Christianity and all the
religions that mirror Christianity there
were several before it that had the same
story of a protagonist the enlightened
man called Horus or Jesus or hey Seuss
that was sacrificed and then resurrected
in a more distant form as a sky God or
something but it's not here anymore and
it's the story of us sort of accepting
enlightenment and society I can't do
everything you know I'm going to make a
living and the two are completely odds
with each other so I'm gonna choose to
sacrifice enlightenment
and just bloody move forward in a state
of sin you know well that's what
happened to us like we're moving forward
in a state of sin and ignorance and
Christianity says look this what we did
but you've got to keep the phone line
going to the enlightened being that's
the best chance you have of surviving
follow these absolute rules that pertain
to morality that pertain to what reality
is like even if you don't feel like
following them and you should be okay so
really we got to remember the cost of
the sacrifice that we are ignorant and
ignorance is sin that's a price of
technology we had to engage in
technology we're forced out of the
rainforest there was no other way but
this is the price one of the key
recommendations Buddhism offers is to
meditate and that is a very clear tool
that attempts to undo the repurposing
that language in particular does this
way of symbolically mapping the
environment so if you use a mantra for
example you are jamming the linguistic
activity in your head you're repeating a
phrase over and over which occupies the
linguistic areas but because you're
repeating it it gets shorn of all
conceptual content so you're occupying
the areas with nothing it's very clever
and as you do that and language is
deactivated meditators will tell you
that something else Wells up in its
stead some other kind of awareness
that's much more natural that seems more
in tune with reality starts to rise up
and that can happen over minutes for
some people who just like bloody good at
meditators I mean over months or years
for me it took months to get any
glimpses of this altered state and what
it looks like when you remove concepts
is it's like you remove the veil that
that's meniscus of conceptual
calculation we have to have that
separates us from reality and when that
veil is gone it is like a veil that goes
and everything that only words represent
that can't actually be reached the past
and the future for example which I do
think of them as real but when
words disappear you realize no there
were just things that I symbolized with
words to make a model of what reality is
like but it's not like that seemingly
because the past and future simply
vanish and it's like a latching point
where all your consciousness that used
to be diluted across these three times
the past present future it's suddenly
all applied to the reality of the
present moment and because there's so
much more of it applied to reality now
you increase your apprehension of what
exists the veil of language gets lifted
and there is a shocking sense of what is
it's very different to what you thought
it was and I mean as far as I know this
is the first rung on the ladder of
improving your consciousness and that's
the only rung I've ever got to but I
think Eckhart Tolle describes this as
the itness of things it's a realization
that things have aspects to them that
your perception does not inform you
about and it almost registers as though
everything is sentient it's like you're
waking up from a dream where you thought
everything that existed was made up by
you and now you're realizing it isn't
and that might seem strange because we
know it isn't but what you're waking up
to is everything as I perceived it was
my construction it actually isn't like
that at all and the area where it's a
parent agency it's apparent otherworldly
personality and mind meets is utterly
frictionless there's absolutely no
connection between the two and yet we're
the same thing so when language is
lifted off and you have no conative if
that's a word projections onto anything
holy it's an extraordinary
revelation that our way of seeing is
artificial
so before having these small glimpses of
the altered states that seem more real
than normal reality does I just didn't
believe in enlightenment at all I
thought it's made up because if I know
people they'll say anything to get
attention but once I realized the
Buddhists definitely know what they're
doing I've started to believe in it like
I say I'm not pursuing it for some
reason I should be but I'm not
before we get into what Buddhism
prescribes to get back to the state of
enlightenment there is another major
factor this is probably more influential
than what I've been talking about in our
sort of degradation of our ability to
perceive reality so far we've discussed
behavioral traits ways of seeing the
world that repurposes the brain
cannibalizes neurological resources so
that they can't do what they originally
evolved to do and clouds your lens of
perception so that's one factor in us
having to work our way consciously back
to the brain operating so that it can
see things as they are another major
issue is that the brain has been
shrinking for thousands of years this is
reflected in the fossil record
Tony rate has an explanation of what
this shrinkage is about I mean science
currently says the brains was getting
more efficient which contradicts the
scientific view that when our brains
expanded we got more intelligent oh and
it's shrinking it doesn't have a
correlation with intelligence so if the
brain is in a process of deactivating
certain sections and then eventually
losing them physically what's the reason
for this well Tony rates as the brain
was originally built on our high fruit
diet in the rainforests it's reflected
in our Anatomy sweetness is the main
thing we taste we're strongly drawn to
that the brain and muscles run on
glucose and if we ate more fruit by
weight than any other species which we
seem to have you know chimps eat a high
fruit diet and they are more intelligent
than gorillas who eat a high greens diet
you know it's it's reflected across
different species in fruit bats and
better vampire bats as well it seems to
be connected to having a bigger brain
eating a high fruit diet and we seem to
eat the highest fruit diet around fruit
is the womb of a plant and it's sort of
like a mammals uterus and that is very
juvenile environment that has a bunch of
chemicals that are designed to trigger
hormonal switches and affect the way
that DNA is read so if we were flooding
our bloodstream with sex chemicals of
other species albeit a plant species
that had the capacity to affect the way
our DNA was being realized in the same
way that when you take sex change
hormones your DNA is still the same but
it's triggering hormonal switches to
make you change sex so with fruit the
effect seemed to be that we were a
younger version we were juvenile aged so
there was a longer time before puberty
that allowed the brain to proliferate
mass for longer so we see in the fossil
record the brain exploding in size a
tripling of its volume and the
appearance of the modern neocortex which
is the executive layer through which we
see reality so since we moved to the
savanna we can't eat that high fruit
diet it's not available in the same
quantities all year round as it was in
the rainforests so we can't maintain the
brains operations and functions also a
lot of our diet is cooked on the savanna
there's confusion because we seem to be
getting better and better and more and
more smart as we go along we're getting
better at fighting the environment we're
getting smarter at technology language
conceptual ways of thinking we are
getting better in some ways we're
getting less and less good at being
connected to what exists though and
that's clear from our bizarre behavior
we're also adapting to the artificial
world instead of the world beyond that
so you can currently see an adaptation
you know it's an advantage to be a
psychopath it's an advantage to be a
narcissist that relates very well to the
environmental demands that we've placed
upon ourselves with our man-made cocoon
but from afar
we're not improving this is not progress
we're less connected to the thing we
need to be connected to and the brain
with fewer nutritional resources once it
was on the savanna had to steward those
to the areas that were absolutely
crucial to keeping us alive in the short
term that's what you'd go for isn't it
what keeps me alive for the next day and
what keeps your life is fear and control
the stuff that's connected to you know
the environment that that feels into
other people's experience that has
self-awareness and an artistry though
things are being sacrificed those things
are what seem to be activated when one
takes plant medicines or engages in
spiritual practices over a long period
of time so that in combination with our
brains bombardment of artifice is
clouding our lens our ability to connect
with reality how does this go with what
Buddhism suggests there are four noble
truths in Buddhism the first is that
life contains suffering this is the
layer of conceptual suffering this is
the content of the meniscus that we've
had to create I like that word life
contains suffering the second is that
the mind's tendency towards desire and
aversion is the cause of this suffering
so in the West we might treat a sickness
with a pharmaceutical and in the same
way with suffering we might find the
immediate cause of our suffering and try
to treat that situation Buddhism would
rather say eat a natural diet and you'll
never have any sicknesses you know this
is a one for all technique and similarly
it says get rid of the minds desire and
aversion and you'll never have any
suffering no matter what comes up
because the third noble truth is if you
get rid of the desire and aversion the
suffering goes away the fourth noble
truth is we have a way of getting rid of
the desire and aversion the desire and
aversion in my opinion refers to the
symbolic mapping of what we believe we
should desire to keep ourselves alive
and what we believe we should get away
from to keep ourselves alive
pain and suffering are different because
pain is a signaler within nature that
this stuff can't get rid of pain is
instructive but it only hurts you as
much as it needs to to get you to behave
in the right way
suffering the problem of suffering is
that our emotions are man-made they
don't feel man-made because they happen
in the stomach but there are attempts to
map in real time what action needs to be
taken in relation to things in our
environment that have not been written
into our DNA and so they currently just
make us suffer way too much they're a
bad map of reality the conceptual layer
that we cast over ever
thing imposes what I'm talking about an
another ibly terrible onus on us to take
responsibility for our own survival no
other animal does this like all the
problem-solving that the other animals
need to go through to survive has been
done by evolution its resident in their
physiology and the way they want to
behave but with us we're having to work
out what the environment requires of us
to stay alive is a lot of calculation
we're having to feel responsible for
other people we love staying alive so
the radical acceptance of what happens
that Buddhism rather cruelly prescribes
you should get back to well we can't
really do that can we because we have to
second guess what's going to happen all
the time and you know you could only do
that if you went and lived back in the
rainforest I think the state of
enlightenment you get to it requires you
to pare down your life an awful lot but
it's probably not that pristine
condition that we were once in it's just
so much better than the way we normally
apprehend things that we think it's
total enlightenment and the radical
acceptance is the acceptance that every
animal has you know they'll avoid pain
when they need to they'll feel scared
when they need to
however it's not their job to work out
how to stay alive and their
relationships with each other is much
simpler it's not their job to keep other
people alive necessarily but from the
relationship to one's children but even
that you can see is far less desperate
than our relationship with our children
is so everything for animals has been
taken care of no guilt no pre-emptive
fear preemptive fears a waste of time if
you need to feel fear you feel it in the
right moment they have radical
acceptance they see loved ones perish
they know there's a hole in their life
that's the shape of that loved one that
the pain will inform them about they'll
find a way to act that the pain directs
them to but it's never in their heads to
intervene with circumstance quite to the
degree it is in a human's head we feel
it's our responsibility to actually
influence what happens and to some
extent it is but our impression of how
much is totally confused so when
somebody dies we go through a stage of
bargaining with reality
case that might work we go through a
stage of denying reality what it told us
like maybe it didn't happen and in
modern life post conceptual thinking the
brain just knows it's our job to make
everything go right but how we make
everything go right it hasn't been
written into our DNA accurately part
because it hasn't had time to partly
because the the way to make things work
changes every 10 years so I'll never get
written in accurately Nature has not
taken care of us in that respect because
we have insulated ourselves from nature
we've had to nature tried to kill us so
we've gone against that and we're doing
our best year but everything is our
fault now everything and the emotions we
feel in relationships are approximations
of roughly what the body thinks is going
on and in these situations the emotions
are completely and utterly wayward and
make us act like we're mad mad meaning
that we're not seeing reality as it is
we're trying to fumble for an
approximation of how we should behave
and very often there's an amorphous
emotion that comes up that just says
advocate for yourself idiot the emotions
that have had more time to crystallize
are very specific the emotions we feel
day-to-day though are amorphous they
don't pertain to the situation because
the situation to follow Satan it's we
just basically have to err on the side
of caution with everything but that's
the thing that seems to be working in
the short-term to keep us alive worrying
about everything too much
second-guessing everything and it's
suffering it's the cause of bloody
suffering Buddhism helps you to get rid
of this conceptual operating system that
is not correctly mapping what exists
however it is a game plan for how to
operate artificial reality well so what
do you want Buddha's I mean this is I
can't do both but Buddhism says try to
get down to the writing in your DNA you
know it tries to get rid of the layer
that you place between you and
circumstance that makes you believe you
could have intervened in circumstance to
be treated better and gives you a
terrible sense of
and it shouldn't be like this because I
could have changed it instead it gets
you closer to the radical acceptance
it wasn't your problem so so she left
you don't believe what Steven Spielberg
says you know the the part of your mind
that thinks you could have prevented
that says well you're gonna die now
she's gone
so you're worthless you're as naught
without the conceptual layer that second
guess is everything you just notice an
absence fakely aware that somebody's
missing you know it would be far less of
a feeling of desperate attachment to
everything the state of non-attachment
that again I think it's unfairly
advocated in Buddhism as though it's a
choice which it isn't in modernity
doesn't make you an emotionless
automaton it just makes you in touch
with reality part of the reason
meditation makes the negative emotions
less intense and makes you a less
reactive person as far as I can tell is
because your brain becomes better at
seeing what exists all of this thing
that I've been saying in this video is a
result of meditation it's not the result
of intellectual wrestling with anything
it's like oh that's how it is so I think
meditation I mean you might not believe
this story but if you do I think
meditation just makes things more
obvious because you're taking your
consciousness out of the past and future
more of its available to plug into the
situation in front of you and so if
you're in a fight you see the other
person's point of view
you understand possibly it's not
personal you don't need to shout so the
shortcut of anger the emotion that comes
up because your body doesn't understand
the situation is less likely to come up
with as much intensity because now you
do understand the situation and
similarly meditation seems to enhance
your feelings of joy and passion because
it actually makes biological sense to
revere one's environment in a felt way
so the first noble truth life contains
suffering the second noble truth is this
tendency towards desire and aversion is
what causes the suffering Noble Truths
two and three are really say
the same thing they say if you get rid
of the desire and aversion the suffering
goes and noble truth for says we've got
a way of getting rid of the desire and
aversion it's called the Eightfold Path
again this is like saying if you live in
a natural way like if you eat a natural
diet your body's less likely to get sick
if you live in a natural way your
perception of reality and your suffering
will subside naturally this way of life
creates in the body the natural
conditions of good mental health and the
Eightfold Path says have the right view
which means know what reality is like as
much as you can have the right
intentions which means seek to do good
have the right speech don't speak ill of
others don't manipulate don't lie tell
the truth make your speech line up with
reality have the right action do things
that are good have the right livelihood
engage in an occupation that does good
make the right effort which means strive
to improve yourself engage in the right
mindfulness which means meditate engage
in the right concentration which means
direct your thoughts to what's important
and take it away from things that aren't
focus on what is meaningful everything
there is about perceiving reality as it
is have the right speech don't
manipulate means don't create a map in
your head that you're trying to convey
to others that is not real because it'll
take a hell of a lot of brain power to
store your complex web of bloody lies
mate and that's brain power you of all
people cannot afford you've got to try
and plug some of that back into reality
don't engage in scrolling through things
would be the updated version of you know
direct your concentration wisely and
every one of those steps is about
hooking up to what is you know have the
right livelihood means you won't have to
create a mental construct away you're
allowed to do the detrimental thing that
you're doing if you have a job that
harms people you have to tell yourself a
story about why you should be allowed to
do it well don't do it it just takes up
brain power if you're doing the right
kind of job it actually connects to the
community the pattern of your behavior
connects to the pattern of what things
are like and you I think that is
a way of making your puzzle piece fit
the hole that you're supposed to be in
and making the edges of your awareness
flush with reality so that you can
receive the information it's sending you
that was originally written into your
DNA by the environment all these things
look like more relaxed it's a way ah
this will be good for other people if I
live like this
but remember morality is synonymous with
seeing what exists beyond yourself it's
not charitable it's going to keep us
alive long term so enlightenment is the
ultimate state of right seeing nirvana
the state of connection with everything
a state of knowing what exists and the
nature of reality I hope I've explained
how this right scene came about why the
circuitry is there in the brain as far
as I'm concerned why it's been degraded
by the way we've had to live and why
it's a requirement of any species that
has a sustainable future which is sad
because it means that we don't probably
I hope also you can see why Buddhist
techniques combat artifice and uncloudy
the lens of perception really quite
effectively if you do them as prescribed
let's return to what Buddhism and
Christianity says to finish I know
mentioned it before Buddhism says you
can be enlightened come out of the
manmade cocoon of culture meditate for
decades and unscramble your mind and
Christianity says oh for God's sake
that's another thing I've got I don't
have time I don't have Tyler I've got
enough things on my to-do list that are
not my job
so why should I also take on you know
what ideally would be the responsibility
of nature I'm not gonna do it I'm just
gonna say no to that I'm sorry but I
need some me time Christianity says look
you've got a sacrifice enlightenment in
order to move forward but remember
you're moving forward in a state of
idiocy so we might not be given to
engage in a quest for enlightenment but
please let's remember what we sacrifice
when we don't because that is our
lifeline that you know understanding
that understanding we are disabled
when we try to perceive what's going on
and that disability is the cause of the
unwitting environmental damage we do
it's the cause of unnecessary conflict
is the cause of ill health we inflict
upon ourselves we can forgive ourselves
for behaving the way we do but we can
also seek in the right way to improve
our coping strategies for you know the
situation we're in thanks a lot for
watching please share your thoughts
below
Enlightenment: Most Comprehensive Explanation/ What? Why? How?
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•May 10, 2020
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Kerry McCarpet
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What is Enlightenment? Why do we have the capacity for it in the brain? Why isn't it switched on as standard? What is the mechanism by which Buddhism reduces suffering?