Category Archives: Spirituality And Philosophy

The Mechanics Of Miracle

 
Some people believe in miracles, others think they are a superstition. One side insists that there are events that can’t be explained and that they are the work of God. The other side is convinced that no event is without a scientific explanation, therefore God cannot be responsible for them. Allow me to show you why I think that both sides are in fact wrong, and that there is an obvious way to reconcile these seemingly irreconcilable differences between miracle and science.

I have participated in many a conversation, listened to debates whether or not miracles were real. On one side, there was usually a person, an idealist, who wanted and needed to believe that there was a higher power that could in fact intervene in life sometimes via a miracle and save the day. They would tell stories from a scripture like the Bible, which are full of examples where God would step in and turn things around. Or, they would site stories they heard through the grapevine of similar nature. The science/intellectual types would dismiss the idea of a divine miracle saying that there is always a scientific explanation to these seemingly mysterious events.

I remember some one telling about a book one day they’ve read about something mysterious that happened in a village somewhere in Bulgaria. Some young children reportedly had a vision of the Virgin Mary appearing to them where she gave the prophecy of the the Sun turning red at a certain time on a certain day. The village people being devout Christians believed them and word quickly spread of the miracle far and wide. Even some scientists decided to take a closer look at the event as it occurred. People were watching the sky at the predetermined time, and sure enough the Sun, even if for a short while, turned red. Religious people were instantly convinced that they just witnessed a miracle. The scientist decided to look for a natural explanation for the phenomenon. They managed to produce a very plausible theory as to what was the likely cause of this so called “miracle” (the details of which escape me, but it had to do with some uncommon atmospheric conditions). The scientific community thus declared the event a non-miracle.

Let me start with poking holes in the theory of the scientists. I am not going to dispute the scientific merits of their findings (especially since I can’t remember them), because ultimately they are not that important. So, they could explain the “miracle” through science. So what? The elephant in the room still remains: how did the children came into possession of such specific piece information in the first place. As I recall, no one even attempted to take a stab at that. It is hard enough to predict the weather due to the enormous number of variables involved. Predicting a rare atmospheric phenomenon down to the minute is practically impossible. Taking into consideration that the ones the information was coming from were children pretty much makes it a miracle. And, this is not taking into consideration that the news of the event was predicted by a vision on the Virgin Mary, because some would probably discount that as a child’s fantasy. This particular scientific explanation falls way short of explaining that.

 
Let’s flip the “miracle” coin on the other side. Religious people can really feel that their believes, and indeed God himself, are being attacked when some one sets out to find a scientific explanation to a miracle and finds one. Folks, if something occurs in this universe, it will happen trough a process of some kind with the laws of nature involved, which can be , in turn, identified and studied. However, that doesn’t necessarily make the event less of a miracle as the above example demonstrated it. (Now, if you are talking about the face of the Virgin Mary appearing on a piece of toast that then goes on eBay and is sold for tens of thousands of dollars, then you won’t hear me say “money well spent.” Sorry.) We have discovered a lot through the sciences about life itself, just to give you another example. We have grown to take it for granted. We waste it trough the abuse of drugs and alcohol, and we take the life of others. We exploit and waste the living resources of the planet at an alarming rate. But the fact remains that the universe with its billions of star systems in the billions of galaxies it contains is a very hostile environment towards life. It is unlikely, but as far as we know it today, we may be alone. In any case, life is a rare commodity in the universe, so much so, that winning the lottery several times in a row dwarfs in comparison. If that’s not a miracle then the word has no meaning. Yet, it can be studied, understood and taken for granted.

In other words, science and religious belief can exists side by side without contradicting each other, if we just keep an open mind.

Posted 31 August 2007 † korneld § ‡ Comments (0) °

Wilderness Survival The Tom Brown Jr. Way

 
Wilderness survival is becoming a hot topic these days. There are a lot of shows of late on TV about some one showing the viewers what to do and not to do if they were to get lost in the wilderness. There is one on the Discovery Channel, I believe, and it’s called Man Vs. Wild starring an ex British special ops guy named Bear. The other show is called “Survivorman”, but I can’t recall the clown’s name who’s in it.

While Survivorman (let’s just call him that) has a lot harder job getting things done while surviving in the wilderness (he has to position the cameras himself that can really hinder one’s ability to do what it takes to make it out there), he sometimes does really dumb stuff. In one episode he was out in Utah’s Canyon Lands National Park - a really dry place -, and set out to find himself some drinkable water. He started digging in a dry river bed, like you should if you know anything about wilderness survival, because there is usually some sort of moisture down there somewhere a person in need can use. The water is also safe to drink, because the sand is a good filtering agent. He was waist deep in the whole he dug, but ended up complaining that he had to go without water, because the only thing he could find was wet sand! I mean, come on! Even if you have no experience whatsoever when it comes to wilderness survival, you should be able to figure out that if you put a handful of sand in your shirt you can squeeze some water out. Sure, it will probably smell like b.o., but hey, it’s better than dying of dehydration. Some expert, isn’t he?

I actually like Man vs. Wild quite a bit, because he shows you a lot of really useful wilderness survival skills and he is really out there. However, you can tell that he is in a more controlled environment (he’s got a crew with him and who knows who else), so you can’t be sure how real he is.

As a matter of fact, both shows are disappointment at the end of the day, because they use a lot of man-made items like a flit to light a fire, a knife etc. I know what you are thinking: “Of course, they are using some man-made items. Some things just can’t be done without them.” Well, you are almost right. Tom Brown Jr., the only wilderness survival expert to earn the right to be called that, is a purist. He is the founder of the Tracker School. He not only takes pleasure in taking to the wilderness with nothing man made (sometimes quite literally - in his books he writes about the times when he would enter the trackless wilderness with absolutely nothing and made everything he needed from scratch.), but he also recognizes that you don’t always have the luxury to get turned around in the wild with your favorite hunting knife on your belt.

All one needs to know about Tom Brown Jr. is that he learned the art of wilderness survival from an authentic Lipan Apache elder named Stalking Wolf. He was the blood grandfather of Tom Brown’s childhood friend Rick, but treated Tom as his own grandson. Stalking Wolf lived a secluded life following his vision to find the common thread among all the different philosophies and religions. He travelled far and wide (he was already in his eighties when he met Tom Brown) from coast to coast several times and even to the southern tip of South America twice, and all this on foot while living off the land. Now, that’s wilderness survival! Tom Brown, from the age of 8 to the age of 18, learned everything he could from the old man that not only included wilderness survival, but also the Native American way to relating to the Earth, skills of the people Stalking Wolf encountered during his travels, a truly extreme form of reading the tracks of animals and humans (where you can tell things like the age, sex and mood of the person/animal and even if they were hungry or if they had to pee at the time they left the track. This is no joke) etc.

I, myself, took a few of Tom Brown’s classes, the first one being a pure wideness survival course. We were taught how to create shelter, find water, start a fire with a bow that we made ourselves and find food. While it was an introductory class, it was a real eye-opener. First of all, the approach to survival was quite different than what I expected. Most of us think of survival as something painful. Tom Brown, on the other hand, looks at it as a possible way of life, like our ancestors lived for tens-of-thousands of years: living off the land lavishly, in harmony with it and if necessary, indefinitely. Pretty amazing, isn’t it.

Tom Brown offers several wilderness survival courses, the most advanced being a three week course where students go to Montana in the dead of winter and supposed to hand in all their belongings in the first 4 or 5 days. By then, they must have all the necessary things made by hand to shelter, clothe, feed and warm themselves. Now that’s extreme wilderness survival!

Tom Brown Jr. offers a lot of other cool courses besides wilderness survival through his school. You can find them here: TrackerSchool.com.

Posted 29 August 2007 † korneld § ‡ Comments (0) °

Transcendental Meditation (TM)

 
Transcendental Meditation, or TM for short, has been brought to the West by an Indian guru named Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. It’s roots can be traced back to ancient Vedic wisdom that has not only served as the basis for Hinduism, but greatly influenced other religions as well such as Buddhism. Maharishi first started teaching it in the late 1950s and the technique became very popular in the late ’60s and the ’70s. Over two million people have learned the technique. Some of the famous people associated with the practice of the TM Technique are the Beatles and filmmaker David Lynch. (Popular belief has it that Maharishi had a fallout with the Beatles and that they turned their back on him. Some believe that the band’s manager and their label got worried that they spent too much time with the guru instead being in the studio or on stage. They started spreading rumors about the guru that caused the band to become alienated from him. However, it seems that only John Lennon harbored ill feelings for the man, which he writes about in his book. Paul McCartney was asked about Maharishi a few years ago and gave no indication that he had anything but respect for the man. The late George Harrison worked closely with Maharishi and was a major benefactor of the Transcendental Meditation Movement throughout the decades.)

Watch an explanation of why Transcendental Meditation works from the clinical point of view. The video was produced by and features an expert from Maharishi University of Management (M.U.M) an accredited school founded by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.



Transcendental Meditation (TM) - The funniest home videos are here

Attention IE Users! If you are using Internet Explorer, you might have to click the video twice in order to get it to play.

 
Meditation itself has probably been around as long as Mankind has walked the Earth. As a matter of fact, no culture of any significant age is without some sort of meditative technique, though the approach to the practice varies greatly. All meditation techniques will have some sort of a “focal point,” that will quiet the mind so that the brain can experience a more relaxed state. Some techniques will use music, others an object such as the flame of a candle or the breath entering and exiting the lungs. The Transcendental Meditation technique uses a “mantra”, which is a series of sounds that are repeated every-so-often not out loud but quietly. The TM people are convinced that TM is a more effective technique, due to the nature of the mantras that are given to people. The mantras are not 100% unique to each individual, but they are at least a handful of them and the instructors of the Transcendental Meditation technique determine who gets what mantra according to a process that is kept mostly under raps. The mantra itself is said to be meaningless. While that may be true initially, since at first a person may receive only one syllable, “advanced techniques” are offered to expand the mantra for a deeper experience. The sounds used, some claim, were found to be a verse from the Vedic literature. The reason that the TM people don’t put any emphasis on the actual meaning on the extended mantra, they say, is to keep the mind and the intellect from clamping down on something concrete, thus allowing the physiology to experience the transcendent. The sound itself is believed to invoke a subtle, but overtime profound change in the physiology. The meditation is practiced twice a day for 20 minutes each time.

To transcend is to go beyond. Transcending the “small” self, and immersing ourselves in the “big” self that underlies all of existence is the said effect. This big self is supposedly the source of all things hence it’s power is great. Even a small “dose” of a split second of it can have positive effects that we then bring back and inevitably utilize in our daily lives, and it is accumulative. The more one practices Transcendental Meditation the more he/she has of the big self to work with.

According to one long time practitioner of 17 years of the Transcendental Meditation program, he has gained greatly form the practice. For instance, this gentleman has a younger brother three and a half years his junior. However, he is now often mistaken as being the younger brother, even though his younger sibling’s lifestyle basically only differs in the lack of the practice of TM. Another change he has noticed in himself relates to his very profession. He is a web programmer, which requires a considerable ability to focus. When he was a child, he had a great deal of difficulty concentrating in his math class, so no one thought him suitable for this profession. Transcendental Meditation, he believes, slowly transformed him to the point that he can now follow through with complex problems. The greatest benefit, though, that he believes to be the direct outcome of the practice is a broadened, deepened perception of the world around him. He is often baffled by how people can lose sight of the forest to a single tree. He sees the underlying similarities, he says, between seemingly unrelated fields of life, and use the core principles that helped him succeed in one to master another.

Posted 29 August 2007 † korneld § ‡ Comments (3) °

Evolution vs. Creationism: Both Wrong?

I have been witnessing the debate often referred to as evolution vs. creationism. The evolution side is taken up by the science types who devote their lives to uncovering the truth through the scientific method, which needs strong empirical evidence before drawing any conclusions. In general, these people are also atheists of the most unforgiving kind who will not consider any ideas suggesting a Divine influence of any kind or degree when comes to explaining the existence of man. One of the most vocal ones of these people is Richard Dawkins, the author of book titled “The God Delusion”, who will not refrain from name calling in the heat of the moment. (A compilation of his media appearances titled “Evolution vs. Creationism: Both Wrong” can be seen in the video clip below. It was done by David Campbell of - true.wxcs.com.) In the “blue corner”, ladies and gentleman, we have the conservative Christian community who will deny scientific fact in order to protect their believes that say man was created by God. This is widely believed to have happened about six thousand years ago based on the Bible’s chronology and, therefore, the science of evolution is false.

I have decided to throw in my two cent’s worth in this debate of evolution vs. creationism, since I’ve been pondering it for a while, since I was 14 to be exact. My high school biology teacher brought the subject up one day, and of course, the class was divided along the same, usual lines: the ones who deiced to side with science, and the ones who decided to go with religion. I’ve always been sort of a fringe thinker, if you will, always trying to come up with a new angle to approaching an old subject to see if something more sensible came out of it. I concluded and still think that both sides are ultimately wrong, though, for different reasons.


Evolution Vs. Creationism: Both Wrong? - More free videos are here

First, let me address the religious side of the evolution vs. creationism debate. They are convinced that the very core of their believes are being attacked by the science of evolution, so they are willing to go as far as dismissing it. Yet, they walk into their local grocery store and buy food for their families not being aware that most of items are there as the direct result of the research into evolution. The evolutionary process is manipulated to bring out the desired qualities in a plant or animal. However, this does not mean that their Christian believes are worthless. Far from it. The only mistake they make (a fatal one at that - today and throughout the ages) is that they think the way they interpret the Bible is the only acceptable way to do it. Somebody a long while ago (if you know who it is, please let me know in the comments section - I’d like to know), decided to determine the age of the universe by following the timeline in the scripture. The end result was about six thousand years (which is far less what science has uncovered). The problem is that, one, there are gaps in the timeline in the Bible that are conveniently set aside; and secondly, the Bible is thousands of years old and, thus, has been a subject mistranslation, malicious editing of its content etc. What was in it originally, in other words, may not be what it contains today. And even if it were 100% original, it would still be left to the individual’s ability to interpret it. Let’s face it, most of us aren’t that smart when it comes to figuring anything else out, why would this be any different? I think dismissing the knowledge in the Bible would be a mistake, but interpreting laterally would be another.

The other side of the coin of the evolution vs. creationism debate is science. Actually, let me rephrase that. It’s the people advocating those principles. While it’s hard to argue with the facts - as I said before, the “human factor” manages to taint the science behind it all. People like Richard Dawkins go on the Discovery Channel, radio talk shows and even write books titled “The God Delusion”, which is born out of frustration or perhaps opportunism (I’m sure he made good money calling religious people names and dissing their believes like a rabid dog).

They, however, don’t seem to be aware of the scientific fact that the universe is still a mysterious place. Are we sure that we know enough to rule anything out. Sure, we can probably be sure that the universe didn’t come into existence six thousand years ago. But putting that aside, we have another elephant in the room, which may seem totally unrelated, but bare with me. I believe the ultimate question is: is consciousness the function of the nervous system, or is it that the brain is there to create an outlet for consciousness to interact with the physical world directly? Crazy, is it? First of all, science knows so little about the brain that this question cannot be answered at this point. That’s a scientific fact. Two, it wasn’t that long ago that we thought that matter was more prevalent than energy. And why not? Energy was abstract like heat, light and something moving. Matter, on the other hand was concrete, something you could touch and hold. Then quantum mechanics came along and proved that energy was the basis of matter not the other way around. By this token, it could also be true that while matter is trapped energy, energy is given rise by consciousness. Ancient thinkers of various cultures certainly seem to think so (yes, it’s even in the Bible if you know who to read it) that consciousness is king.

If this were true, the only religious image that science blows out of the water is God being some guy sitting on a cloud waiting for you to die so he can pamper you. But if we look at the Creator as a sort of super consciousness that underlies all and gives rise to existence, then it is possible have your cake and eat it too. Meaning, that it not evolution vs. creation, science vs. God but the simultaneous existence of both. God, in this case, cannot be ignored, because it IS everything: the process and everything and everybody involved. At the same time, the same consciousness has given rise to the laws that regulate, if you will, how the above come into existence and how they interact, which can be studied through the scientific method. It’s as simple as that.

Until both sides, evangelical Christians and the Richard Dawkins of the world are convinced that they alone hold the key to the absolute truth, they will both be ultimately wrong.

I will appreciate any and all feedback to this article, but do me a favor. Keep a cool head. Thanks.

Posted 26 August 2007 † korneld § ‡ Comments (10) °

Native American Vision Quest

The Native American practice of the vision quest is probably thousands of years old. It is basically a technique for spiritual development. Practitioners remove themselves from their everyday activities, enter seclusion to find an answer to a pressing question, to seek guidance or to reflect. The length of the Native American vision quest is routinely four days long, but it can go as long as 40 days. It is done in a secluded place to help one keep themselves introverted, with no food and in extreme cases with no water. All Native American persons do a vision quest usually at the age of 16. It serves as a vehicle to bring one into adulthood. The more serious spiritual seeker, however, will go through the vision quest several times during their lifetime.

The term ˝vision quest˝ was probably coined by a non-native person, because the direct translation from most Native American tongues is ˝little death˝ and the goal of the practice is summed up in a simple phrase: ˝to fast from all things to find which is real.˝

I have had an interest in all things Indian for a while. I have read about the practice of the Native American vision quest early on, but I only developed an interest in giving it a try myself when I started reading the books of renowned naturalist and survival expert Tom Brown (www.trackerschool.com). While he is as white as they come, he grew up in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey where he had the good fortune of learning Native American practices from an Apache Indian named Stalking Wolf who was the grandfather of his best friend, Rick.

Tom Brown founded Tracker School where he teaches all physical skills of the Native American and most spiritual ones as well (I took a few myself), but he decided to put his student and friend Malcolm Ringwalt in charge of running the vision quest retreats (www.visionquest-spiritualretreats-womensretreats-yoga.com) This was 25 years ago. I did my first vision quest in the month of September of 2006 with Malcolm.

I wasn´t sure what expect from the vision quest. By the way, you won´t be seeing things, because you haven´t eaten for four days (but your thoughts tend to gravitate towards food a lot toward the end). That not why it is called the vision quest. Malcolm said that it is possible to receive a grand vision on your first one, but it is not likely. My personal experience was surprisingly smooth. I was expecting myself to freak out, but that never happened. I received nothing grand in terms of spirits talking to me or anything of that nature, but as I left the wilderness I felt that I took something profound with me, an inner calmness that stuck with me, something I could retreat back into for a couple more days to come. I will definitely do more Native American style vision quests in the future.

Posted 23 August 2007 † korneld § ‡ Comments (0) °