Category Archives: Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will

Our Conditioned Response to Collapse

Over the past few years, I’ve made some fairly strident statements about the current state of the world as I see it. They include: That our global civilization is now in the accelerating stage of inevitable, complete collapse that we … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Our Culture / Ourselves | 3 Comments

“The Next Right Thing”, Revisited

For the first fifteen years or so of this blog, I always felt I had a kind of professional obligation, after imparting what I thought was useful knowledge, to proffer suggestions on what we should do as a result of … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will | 7 Comments

What Do You Want From Me?

New Yorker cartoon by Peter Steiner Lyz Lenz cites Rebecca Solnit as having told her “Every story men love to tell is Pygmalion.” A trace hyperbolic, perhaps, but Lyz goes on to list some of the many novels and films … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Our Culture / Ourselves | 9 Comments

Separate

This is #27 in a series of month-end reflections on the state of the world, and other things that come to mind, as I walk, hike, and explore in my local community. photo by Laitche at wikimedia, CC-BY-SA 4.0. Taken at Daisen … Continue reading

Posted in Creative Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Month-End Reflections | 7 Comments

No Choice But To Resist

Image of Ken Ward in 2016 Valve-Turners action, from the film The Reluctant Radical.  Aurélien’s latest article is about moving past despair and hope and doing what needs to be done to actually make a positive difference, no matter how small or … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Our Culture / Ourselves | 3 Comments

War, Peace, and Human Nature

Cartoon from Tom Gauld, seen on the memebrary. Thousands of books have been written about why we go to war. I’ve been trying to explore whether my evolving understanding of basic human nature offers any insights on this subject, particularly … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Our Culture / Ourselves | 4 Comments

Coping With Trauma

… in which Dave reveals some unhappy and mostly politically unacceptable truths about our having no free will, and about aspects of Christian moralistic evangelism that permeate our western ways of thinking about ‘good and evil’, ‘healing’, and trauma. In … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Our Culture / Ourselves | 2 Comments

The Humanity-as-Cancer Metaphor

source: note that OWID has been accused of misrepresenting some data to support the optimistic “the world is getting better and better” ideologies of their colleagues such as Bill Gates and Steven Pinker Since I started this blog I’ve often … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Our Culture / Ourselves | 6 Comments

Civilization’s Cycle of Trauma

Lately I’ve been trying to integrate Gabor Maté’s ideas about attachment and authenticity, with my thinking about what I’ve called Civilization Disease — the mental illness that seems, to a lesser or greater extent, to have afflicted all of us … Continue reading

Posted in Collapse Watch, How the World Really Works, Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will, Our Culture / Ourselves | 6 Comments

Why Humans Are Probably Uniquely Afflicted With ‘Selves’

more ruminations trying to make sense of what cannot make sense four worldviews of the nature of reality: (I) conventional wisdom, (II) emerging scientific consensus, (III) the entanglement hypothesis — limbo, (IV) radical non-duality In a recent comment, Vera asked … Continue reading

Posted in Illusion of the Separate Self and Free Will | 15 Comments