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Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

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Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#91

Post by monktastic1 »

sorokod wrote: post #83
monktastic1 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to take a stab. We all carry around a default metaphysics -- a deep belief structure about the nature of reality. It is possible to transcend these beliefs in a way that allows you to grok (not just understand ) that they're not supported in the way we normally assume. That transcendence is often accompanied by an overwhelming gratitude, joy, awe, and wonder that are normally inaccessible. Of course, our bel…

Do you think humans are exclusively entitled to "grok"? Can ants transcend as well or was reallity waiting for us to come along and access the normally inaccessible?

I honestly have no idea whether ants are conscious let alone can become enlightened. I try to treat them well but I'm not planning on teaching them to meditate any time soon :)

During "the inaccessible," assumptions about an objective or pre-existing reality fall apart as well. From within the standard materialist metaphysics it seems rather unlikely that we're special (or that meditation even does anything "transcendent" besides jiggling around some neurotransmitters).

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#93

Post by RichardCA »

sorokod wrote: post #19
wodenokoto wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I expect to be in a similar vain is "Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion". While I enjoyed reading it and it helped me make sense of a lot of things related to meditation, mindfulness and spirituality in general, I can't say I felt every other sentence was highlight worthy. The chapter on spiritual frauds was however very enloghtening.

Could you briefly explain what spirituality without religion is? How is it different from psychology?

You might find some value in this video. You are asking an important question and lay people nearly always mis-explain it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtZtR9BKDYk

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#94

Post by nugga »

MichaelGG wrote: post #60
curun1r wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The important distinction between the Goenka retreats and other dogmatic religious organizations is the instructions to only accept what you find palatable...you're free to pick and choose what you find valuable and what you can validate through personal experience and ignore the rest. If you'll remember the story of the kheer and the cardamom seeds, it's meant to encourage you to be as skeptical as you feel you need…

>you're free to pick and choose what you find valuable This is what they say, and sure, they cannot force you. But if you do this, they criticize and condescend, telling you you're like a child not eating all his food and that when you grow up you'll find everything they say is correct. And Goenka is very clear that the goal of Vipassana is improving reincarnation. There is one point where they say something, maybe l…

I'm not affiliated with any sect and haven't been on a Dhamma.org retreat but I felt compelled to write that you can try to understand where they're coming from.

A 10-day retreat may give you glimpses of what is possible (that there's more than meets the senses) but that is only the beginning. This stuff (meditation and yoga) has been practiced and researched rigorously for thousands of years before being introduced to west. Iinm the many literature spells out pretty early that it's all about purifying your existence. Body, mind, soul, whatever.

Some of the things in the eastern (buddhism, hinduism, jainism, taoism) lore are more metaphorically true than in a very narrow strict literal sense. Some of it it can be understood experientially more so than to be taken on blind faith.

I have to say I really like what Sam Harris is doing and follow his podcast. He certainly has pushed me further into meditation and he seems to have had many insights into the nature of consciousness and did a lot of LSD so he has been to places for sure. Yet sometimes I have wondered if he has missed out something fundamental given his very narrow focus on stuff. Maybe I should listen to his three podcasts with the meditation teacher Joseph Goldstein again...

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#95

Post by theptip »

TravelAndFood wrote: post #27

Cool quote from the beginning section "Computing Sidebar: LISP": "The machine at the bottom of your consciousness is a strange loop. Having a look at this strange loop is a lot more fun than reading about it." Awesome. Great style and expectation-setting in the intro portion. From my perspective as a programmer, occasional Vipassana-practicer, and not-speed-reader, and having read only the intro portions, this has pi…

The phrase "Strange loop" was coined by Hofstadter, who has written a lot of enjoyable explorations of the philosophy of mind:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strange_loop

"Godel, Escher, Bach" being his most well-known, but he has a number of other very interesting works as well.

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#96

Post by ZenoArrow »

MichaelGG wrote: post #33
sgentle wrote: post #16

This paper is a pretty comprehensive take on Vipassana, so in case anyone's looking for something a bit more general, I'd like to offer a complementary summary based on my own experiences. Vipassana is a 10-day silent meditation retreat. Silent in this case really means distraction-free, entertainment-free, or stimulation-free. Think of it as the diametric opposite of social news. No noise, no conversation, no instan…

Excellent review, thank you. You capture the vividness of it very well. I will add a disclaimer, if you are talking about Goekna / Dhamma.org retreats. They are absolutely not just about technique or dogma-free, despite their marketing. They are overtly religious and the entire retreat is couched in hand-wavy woo. The retreat itself was amazing. I went to one in Quebec. Excellent facilities, crystal clear skies (it w…

Thank you. Your experiences seem to mirror my own, I was very disappointed when I learned that the vipassana course was full of woo-woo, despite proclaiming not to be. In addition, it kind of messed me up for quite a while afterwards, so I could not recommend it, despite finding some of the sensations I experienced during the course to be interesting. There are almost certainly going to be meditation retreats that teach you the same techniques without the religious indoctrination, which is what I wished I'd found.

Leaving on day 6 was probably a good move. I stayed the full 10 days but the course didn't get any better by the end.

For those that haven't done it before, there are three types of meditation that are taught at a 10-day Goenka Vipassana retreat. The first two, Anapana and Vipassana, are both very interesting and are experiences I would recommend, but the third, Metta, is basically in woo-woo territory. Metta can be described as "positive thoughts" meditation, as opposed to Anapana and Vipassana (which are both about increased self-awareness). Close your eyes, wish for world peace, now you're doing Metta. If you can find a meditation retreat that teaches Anapana and Vipassana without religious dogma then I would recommend giving it a go, but I could not recommend going to a retreat led by Goenka. YMMV.

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#97

Post by duncan_bayne »

sridca wrote: post #92

Vipassana is the ultimate form of Stoicism. A great way to dissociate from problematic feelings, instead of addressing them head on. :-P

I can't speak for Vipassana, never having tried it, but I think that's an unfair characterization of stoicism (but perhaps not of some who claim to practice it?).

http://modernstoicism.com/

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#98

Post by kashyapc »

SteveJS wrote: post #32

Somewhat related is Thomas Metzinger’s The ego tunnel. Metzinger is an applied philosopher, directly examining what is consciousness as can be determined and backed up with neuroscience. I loved Antonio Damasio’s the feeling of what happens, and the ego tunnel is like that on steroids, with years extra work from scientists making progress on teasing out distinctions you didn’t realize were there. There is zero ‘woo w…

Interesting that you mention Thomas Metzinger. I learned about him via a podcast he did with Sam Harris (who's mentioned on this thread a few times), titled "The Nature of Consciousness"[1].

From my faint recollection, Metzinger was refreshing to hear and had tighter explanations. And he called The Hard Problem of Consciousness[2] (as popularly defined by the Australian philosopher / congnitive scientist, David Chalmers) as "boring". I'm forgetting the details as to why, but it's all in the podcast.

Thanks for the mention, I made a mental note to revisit Metzinger's work, but haven't gotten around.

[1] https://samharris.org/podcasts/the-nature-of-consciousness/

[2] http://www.iep.utm.edu/hard-con/

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#99

Post by sizzle »

sgentle wrote: post #16

This paper is a pretty comprehensive take on Vipassana, so in case anyone's looking for something a bit more general, I'd like to offer a complementary summary based on my own experiences. Vipassana is a 10-day silent meditation retreat. Silent in this case really means distraction-free, entertainment-free, or stimulation-free. Think of it as the diametric opposite of social news. No noise, no conversation, no instan…

Has there ever been a study on the efficacy of Vipassana on clinical depression. How do you think this would affect a depressed person? Would it exacerbate their suicidal ideation or will their depression melt away?

Re: Vipassana for Hackers [pdf]

#100

Post by TravelAndFood »

theptip wrote: post #95
TravelAndFood wrote: post #27

Cool quote from the beginning section "Computing Sidebar: LISP": "The machine at the bottom of your consciousness is a strange loop. Having a look at this strange loop is a lot more fun than reading about it." Awesome. Great style and expectation-setting in the intro portion. From my perspective as a programmer, occasional Vipassana-practicer, and not-speed-reader, and having read only the intro portions, this has pi…

The phrase "Strange loop" was coined by Hofstadter, who has written a lot of enjoyable explorations of the philosophy of mind: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strange_loop "Godel, Escher, Bach" being his most well-known, but he has a number of other very interesting works as well.

Thanks. Just added "Godel, Escher, Bach" to my reading list.
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