A friend gave me a book by Jed McKenna called _Spiritual Enlightenment: The Damnedest Thing_.
In the book, Jed satisfied me with an answer to a koan that I've run into time and time again. You know, the one that goes, "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?"
Jed says that the tree and the forest exist without being seen, so it naturally follows that the tree makes a sound without being heard.
How logical! Way to go, Jed.
By the way, I know Jed isn't a real person, but if you're reading this and you're pretending to be Jed McKenna, would you please shoot me an email? Thanks. You just never know who's going to google the words "Jed McKenna".
28 comments:
I recently read a different interpetation of this. If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it does it make a sound? No, because to have sound you must have a receiver, if there is no receiver then there is no sound. Think about all of the radio waves in the air, can you hear them? No, you can only hear them if you have a receiver tuned into that radio wave. Therefore in the forest if there is no receiver there is no sound.
That interpretation is very "human-centric". Do you really think that humans are the only receivers of sound?
I live at the edge of a forest, and have observed that everything hears a tree falling, the forest itself hears the tree's fall. Only a human could be egotistical enough to think that it matters one way or another if we hear it. Life goes on regardless of us noticing it or not. The universe (and the forest) contain more than just us.
Hi Mark and Mushtaq,
What if there were no bugs, no animals and no humans to hear the sound of the tree. Would the tree still make a sound? Of course there is no way to test this. I thought for a split second that perhaps someone could put a sound recorder in the woods and find out, but that is a receiver of sound, and in the end, a human would be hearing it, so I can't use that as an example. Or could I? Would the tape record count as "someone?"
Mushtaq is probably right. Why does it matter? I don't know, really. Koans can be so distracting. I see a puzzle in front of me and I feel like I have to solve it.
Next, I may be asking what the sound of one hand clapping is. But I won't do that to you! :)
Wait, I just thought of something. (Here I go again!) Sound is a measure of waves. As a tree falls, its movement is bound to create some waves. Anyway, my chatter on the topic is probably defeating the purpose, so I'll stop now. :) If I wasn't distracted by this I'd be distracted by something else!
How do we know that trees exist independant of perception?
My guess is that they don't.
Sophia,
Plants as well as animals respond to vibration. We humans like to think of ourselves as being at the center of things, but we're not. Remember, the forest is alive.
Mossy,
Thee is no way to refute solipsism.
One might as well ask though "how do we know that we exist independently of the tree's perception?"
The tree only exist separate from us as vibration of moving waves in whatever is the medium, the medium is spirit, we call it whatever we want to, and we perceive the movements in that medium as 'trees' animals, etcs. Our perception is only ours, not anyothers interpretation of the same vibration/movement-wave.
How about that, does that further complicate the puzzle? What about if none of it exist except within one of us, so if none, there is none.
perception-centric, all is, and from the movements that give rise to the perception. How many ways can I say it? Is it all the same thing?
Very interesting Sophia, thanks for the invigorating thoughts.
"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?"
Lets look at this in terms of awareness or consciousness. Without awareness or consciousness would anything exist?
Talking about trees and forests is meaningless without consciousness.
There would be nothing to be aware of a forest, let alone a sound in the forest if there was no consciousness. Saying birds or bugs would hear it is not relevant because they have consciousness too. If you removed consciousness from the universes it would in effect cease to exist. The reality is that consciousness and form (matter) need each other. Without consciousness there could be no matter. Without matter consciousness would be completely empty and still with nothing to be aware of.
The question seems to ask, "In what way does our subjective experience correspond to an objective reality?"
Mossy,
According to Jed McKenna, there is no way to know anything other than the fact that I exist. Other things seem likely to exist, but I can't verify them.
Jed speaks of an exercise he calls Spiritual Autolysis. In this exercise, one writes down everything they think or know to be true. The point is to get rid of everything that we don't know to be true, so that we are only left with the truth. My list would be quite short. I can't verify that you exist, and I can't verify that the sun really rises in the east and sets in the west, simply because I don't even really know that the sun exists. My list would say, "I exist." This doesn't mean that I exist in bodily form, because even that might not be the truth. My body might be an illusion. But my awareness is not an illusion. I don't know, I could have misinterpreted this. I'm still involved in the book, meaning, I still have some more to take in. Maybe the fact that I exist is an illusion, too. Maybe I should say, "Something is."
Mushtaq, you are right. I didn't think about the plants! And, it would be kind of hard for me to create a hypothetical situation where trees existed without surrounding plants. :)
Mossy, and anyone else who's interested:
Here's an excerpt from Jed McKenna's _Spiritual Enlightenment: The Damnedest Thing_ on his technique called Spiritual Autolysis:
http://www.livereal.com/spiritual_arena/practical_experiments/spiritual_autolysis.htm
Jim,
Saying that the tree exists separate from us is saying that we are dual in nature.
I like this bit: "What about if none of it exist[s] except within one of us..."
"One", I think, is the key word!
Anonymous,
Good points!
Without awareness or consciousness, no one or no thing would be able to say that anything exists. Therefore, I'd say it would have to follow that nothing exists (were there no consciousness or awareness).
I was thinking about your statement, though, that without matter consciousness would be empty. What if the universe stopped expanding and started to backtrack, simply disappearing. What would happen to consciousness? Would the consciousness that is conscious through all of us cease to be?
Mossy,
I would almost say there is no correspondency.
What if the universe stopped expanding and started to backtrack, simply disappearing. What would happen to consciousness?
Imagine yourself in a light less black room. It is completely sound proof.All smells have been removed.
It is vibration proof, and there is no sense of temperature. Assume that the mind is still and that there is no thinking of loverly sensations from the past (or dreams of future sensation)
Then consciousness would be there, but there would be nothing to be conscious off. It would be pure empty consciousness. Pure awareness with no sense of time or place.
Anonymous,
This might be a silly question, but if this were so, do you think consciousness would get bored?
Thank you for putting this perennial riddle up for discussion. Great topic. Loved reading all the responses. The tree question itself arose from Bishop George Berkeley (1685 – 1753).
If nothing else is there to hear it, the tree itself is there to hear it (and feel it) in the way that trees hear, perceive, and know.
Celtic beliefs consider trees to be magical, mystical, healing life forms with unique spirits all their own. From the Celtic view trees are bearers of great wisdom bridging the corporeal and spiritual world, and messengers to the Gods. Gives the whole tree question a different perspective.
The original question arose from looking at trees from one point of view. If we look at trees interculturally and interspiritually from the Celtic point of view, the question need not have been asked.
If anyone's interested here's a link to an old post of mine on Celtic tree lore. romancingthecrone.wordpress.com/2007/08/25/tree-of-life/
Anonymous, in addition to the question above, what would pure awareness be without anything to be aware of?
Motherwintermoon,
Thank you for telling us where the riddle came from. For some reason I always imagined it came from an ancient Buddhist monk. Now I know.
Also, thanks for bringing another point of view to this discussion. I read a little bit on the Internet about trees with spirits. I think the ents from Lord of the Rings got me started. Then there is also Yggdrasil, the World Tree in Norse mythology.
Your link didn't show up well in the comments so I'll repost it here so others can click on it.
http://romancingthecrone.wordpress.com/2007/08/25/tree-of-life/
I'll go now and check it out. :)
Outstanding!
The Jed McKenna link is IT!
"Sit down,
shut up,
and ask yourself what's true until you know"
No books, no study, no twisted theology, no authority, only what is.
Way to go!
Think on this...are you in the world or is the world in you?
Hi Joe,
Thanks! Glad you liked the link.
Jed's blunt but necessarily so. He certainly doesn't sugar coat things. But his sharpness and bluntness really help to get the point across. Sometimes his words really are like getting hit with a Zen stick!
I think the world is in me. Do you think this is like solipsism?
Solipsism (Latin: solus, alone + ipse, self) is the philosophical idea that "My mind is the only thing that I know exists". Solipsism is an epistemological or metaphysical position that knowledge of anything outside the mind is unjustified. The external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist.
solipsism is only a step away from narcassism.
Solipsism makes the mistake of putting the mind separate, personal and on top of the pyramid. What evidence do I have that what I use for mind is indeed separate or at the top of the food chain outside of it being the most insistant feature I experience? What is needed is something beyond the mind. An element where everything is unified.
Since I know you have a mathmatics background, look to set theory. If a set is described general enough, it contains all other sets. That's what to look for. What set description encompasses you AND everyone else?
A more obscure visualization to contemplate is how much water does a glass at the bottom of the ocean contain?
Solipsism is right, but only if "my" mind is universal and encompasses all mind - no separate individual minds. After all, when I dream, what mind does the thinking for the dream characters?
Hi its me again!
you say "What is needed is something beyond the mind. An element where everything is unified.
Perhaps your visualization slightly adapted can help:
"how much water does a glass at the bottom of the ocean contain?"
The ocean is consciousness or awareness that hold all things.
The glass at the bottom of the ocean is the mind, it sits within the infinite sea of consciousness...
with this addition - the glass is made out of ice.
All is one.
vinito
Hi Joe,
I think I get what you're saying. Solipsism is the idea that only my mind exists. But that idea does not include all the other minds, so there would be no cosmic consciousness with only my mind.
In set theory, the set that contains me and everyone else would be like this:
(A U B) where A = me and B = everyone else. In other words, it is the union of me and everyone else. I hope this is right; it's been a while since I had set theory in class.
I think that the glass on the bottom of the ocean contains all the water in the ocean.
Thanks for helping me to understand this better.
Hi Vinito,
That's a splendid addition. If the glass is made of ice, then there is no separation between the water inside the glass and the water on the other side of the glass, because all is water.
Great contribution, thanks!
Thanks for the link Sophia.
It looks like it could work. The real challange is to actually do it.
Most people would have to first spend a lot of time trying to convince themselves that something could be gained, then spend a long time thinking about how it would actually be done. If they are not off the track by then, as soon as they get any results then they would stop and talk (internally) about that. Eventually they might recognize and talk about the problem of staying focused on not thinking.
If they still do not forget their original aim then yes I think they would succeed. The real problem is that the mind keeps going in the opposite direction. Who is going to turn it around, again and again, perhaps a million times?
I think that this process is how the evolution of consciousness proceeds but it seems so strange that it has to be so painfully slow and filled with irony.
Mossy,
Yes, I'd say the first step to using this technique is to want to do it. If one does not want to do it, they obviously are not interested in getting down to the truth. Maybe they are afraid of the truth. I sympathize with them, because while I do not know what the truth is at this moment, I believe it would be threatening to my ego. (My ego made me say that!)
I do not remember Jed speaking much about trying not to think. It is possible he does in his next installments, but I doubt it. I think his method involves simply knowing Truth. If I'm wrong on this, someone please correct me. I can't remember exactly what I read, even though I just finished the book yesterday!
Anyway, it is possible that once one figures out the Truth, they won't have a reason to think much.
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