The article isn't as aggressive as the headline, but it also doesn't really give a clear picture of Watts. He had a lot of issues in his personal life, but as the article parenthetically mentions, he helped a lot of people too. If you want to know more about Watts and what he means to people, I would suggest finding some of his lectures on YouTube (avoid the ones with new agey music).
Watts was a connoisseur of fascinating ideas. It's easy to criticize his syncretism as "watered down Buddhism", and you can't take everything he (or anyone) says as gospel, but there's plenty of insight in his lectures. And he will point you towards a hundred other thinkers with amazing ideas to share.
I used to own a CD collection of his lectures and have very fond memories of listening to him on road trips. Agree that he shares many wonderful ideas in his talks, no need to diminish that by calling ideas “watered down” or “lazy”. He synthesized many religions and philosophies into a cohesive system (even if sometimes pretty esoteric).
For those subscribed to the Waking Up app: they recently (well, around a year ago) added a large Alan Watts lecture collection to the Theory section.
It is not necessary but you won't make much progress without one. Spiritual practice without a teacher is like navigating without a map, you may end up in America thinking it's India.
If you are somewhat serious about spiritual practice, of course you should find someone who walked some of the path already, otherwise it's impossible for you to know - by definition, you haven't walked the path yet so you don't really know.
At this point we are basically nitpicking over the Internet, but even if you want to take a journey just for the sake of the trip, a map is still very useful.
Most of the human endeavors (art, science, etc) are facilitated by having teachers. Spiritual advancement is no different and in my book, anyone who thinks different is delusional. You may be perfectly happy with no teacher, but you are leaving out a huge chunk of it by navigating on your own. Of course you are free to disagree, but I think it is essential to know about the range of possibilities before deciding if it's worth to have a teacher, and most people simply have no idea.
I’ve listened to a lot of Watts, which isn’t to say I understand it but rather I can recall it. your p1 concerns making progress, p2 on being serious. Watts talks on progress being an illusion, that the deer hunter doesn’t see the mountains. He also talks the same in being serious, rather than sincere, in that it’s like being an oak that cannot away in the wind, constantly concerned with holding yourself together lest you might accidentally fall through the ground.
By trying for America while worrying about India, would be like being hung up on trying not to be hung up. Or competing about who has attainted the most enlightenment, who sat for longest or the most uncomfortably. ~it cannot be grasped by thinking, it cannot be perceived by not thinking. ~The goose flying over the lake doesn’t mean to cast a reflection, and the lake has no mind to retain it. But still, it happens.
Try the Waking Up app for a complete, organized collection of Watts’s work. I don’t take all of it at face value - some of it certainly hasn’t aged well - but I’ve derived a lot of wisdom from his work. If you’re interested in looking at the world a little differently then the typical western way, it’s worth your time to give his talks a listen.
Alan Watts is a sore subject to me. I've given his philosophies a fair shake and many don't ring true for me.
However, I've met several people in the tech industry who are adherents. Whenever any conversation entered slightly philosophical in nature, which happens unusually often in tech in my experience, the individuals I'm thinking of would immediately ask, "Well, have you ever read or listened to Alan Watts?" I'd simply say something like, "Yeah, but he doesn't really do it for me." And I'm met with this condescending "You'll understand/agree when you get older (aka wiser)" response. I'm 35, not 15.
Anyway, yeah, I'm sure it's not all Alan Watts stans, but isn't it weird that it happened 3 times? I now regard advertising Alan Watts as a red flag.
I don't think these people in the HN thread are trying to convert you and make you accept Watts, I think they want to understand what isn't resonating and how.
I myself found Watts helpful a few years ago, but I got a little tired of what I perceived as his egotism and how he sort of defends selfishness. I imagine some of the issues in his personal life vaguely alluded to in this thread overlap with that. Still an interesting character.
I think it's probably dangerous to go "all in" with a guy like Watts. Seems like it would put you vulnerable to a personality cult. He has things to say and he's flawed.
The only personality cult that threats you listening to him is finding out your own self. Cultivating own self may be called selfish by somebody without self or somebody selfless. But it's just one of choices.
The same way you have no obligation to do anything in this world or be anybody.
Nobody is born as saviour of world, not even own saviour.
In times where world imposes on you more and more this basic idea of personal freedom & choice suddenly starts being controversial.
the world 100 years ago was dirtier, poorer but much less suffocating for a free soul.
Before total ideologies, statism, centralisation of everything including free minds & basic cultural realities.
The most dangerous thing nowadays is going all in with what the main flow is flushing everyone into ;-)
He also "defends" the darker side.
He considered people plainly imperfect or openly corrupt more trustworthy than these with best intentions.
Because they getting a clear deal don't break the trade while some Saint goodies tend to hide ungly face.
Enough to observe fates of businesses built on "friendships"... splitting up more often than modern marriages and in uglier way..
This includes the ugly truths behind hypocritically democratic, narrow-minded binary systems, like a hammer seeing everywhere a nail.
At leasts these points made perfect sense for me observing reality.
Maybe it's just incompatible with your actual ideology. Maybe time to go deep into validity of it?
Who said selflessness or altruism is not dangerous? If somebody imposes it on others that becomes really ugly really fast?
Like why somebody modifies my choice in shop by some ideological carbon footprint? that's my personal choice what I want. Especially when you are aware it's a complete unscientific bs.
Respectfully, this is a wall of text and it isn't really about me and my opinion. I suspect you're maybe too deep in the personality cult.
I've seen it mostly on the internet, and Watts is one of those that evokes heavy denial from adherents. People will defend mild criticism of their heroes very fervently like you've done. They can do no wrong. But no human being is perfect and that's all I said, with brief reference to the parts I liked least.
I don't like 100% of what Watts said and did, I think a bit of it is misguided or the wrong emphasis, and we're all human and sometimes we misguide ourselves, that's not a huge problem or harsh judgment. I'm not denying that he had interesting and good things to say as well.
Asking for an elaboration is not a disagreement (or an agreement) with your position — or any position.
If that was worth incrementing the counter, I wonder about the first three. There's a large, large delta between "can you elaborate" and "advertising."
YouTube has certainly made him into some kind of prophet. Which is hilarious given he referred to himself as a cunning entertainer.
I can see how this cult of persona can turn you off. The ideas he presents are not new just in an amusing way. People tend to flock and hype such storytellers.
I tell everyone within the hearing range of my voice and written word not to listen to the YouTube mashups of Alan Watts. They take his words out of context of the original lectures and turn them into something completely different. And if you need music to listen to Watts, you’ve pretty much missed the entire point of what he’s saying. Sure, people want to feel good, but that can also get in the way of meaning and interpretation.
Unfortunately, his son and associates have taken down most of the full length lectures within the last five years, as you probably already know. Other than purchasing the audio directly from his son on his site, I believe they did release many of the transcripts of the full length lectures on his and other sites, so you can still read them.
I don’t recall what year the copyright takedowns began, but about five years ago it became noticeable. In the late 1990s to early to mid 2000s, you could find hobbyists uploading them all over the place. When YouTube got started there was a brief point in time where almost half (or maybe more than half) of all Alan Watts recordings were uploaded. Podcasters like Lorenzo made it even more popular (don’t recall where he got his recording from, but pretty sure he was later served with a takedown notice by the Watts family).
I haven't really listened to Watts seriously in any capacity, but can you explain what you don't like about him? If I had to guess I'd wager that you explaining it might undo your own philosophy, which is something I'm sympathetic to, as expressing what's 'wrong' can often fall short of grace
It’s okay if you don’t get it, but it seems to me that you’re just getting in your own way over it.
It’s not imperative, but when I personally sense that I’m obstructing myself around a topic, I take some time to reset myself and give things a fresh go. The hardest part is leaving out all my preconceptions and keeping my stink face off, but it’s proven worth it enough times that it’s become something I’ve made a habit.
I think he got it well enough, it's just not his truth.
Like if Watts says, "Life isn't a journey, it's a dance," one can hear that and say, "Ok, I get what you're going for, I've reflected on it deeply, but for me, life is a journey, not a dance." And it's not necessarily true that, if one reflects deeper, and grows wiser, and puts down one's preconceptions, etc etc, they will eventually, in the fullness of time, realize Alan was right. That's the sort of presumptive condescension that is being called out.
No, he is entirely right. He just complained about the condescending tone of fans and what does the above commenter do, he does the exact thing, pushes the exact button.
In a different context this would have been played for laughs, or it would have been considered trolling. I do not think the above commenter was trolling. People are just attached to idols and ideas they like and having them tarnished results in an impulsive reaction to defend them.
It has nothing do with Alan watts and everything to do with the people ?
Like I resonate a lot with him but I never preach or condemn people for not liking it ?
I used to criticize Watts for what I thought was not practicing what he preached: he died of alcoholism. That was until I suffered late-stage alcoholism myself. Fortunately, in the modern era I had available all kinds of help not available to Watts at the time. Very people in those days escaped the ravages of late-stage alcoholism, enlightened or not.
Buddhism and Christianity make it sound like you have to be perfectly clean and disciplined to be “enlightened”, causing feeling of guilt and failure when you stray from the behavioral/moral prescription.
Indians like Siddarameshwar and Nisargadatta were addicted to tobacco. Nisargadatta (who claims he was in the “highest state” and I have no reason to doubt it) died of throat cancer due to hardcore smoking of cloves. When pressed about his addiction he would say “When I showed up in this body I found it with certain habits and didn’t see any reason to interfere.”
> Buddhism and Christianity make it sound like you have to be perfectly clean and disciplined to be “enlightened”, causing feeling of guilt and failure when you stray from the behavioral/moral prescription.
I don't really get why this is. I'm not saying it's wrong. But it's only a couple pages into the Bible that you find Noah getting drunk and blacking out naked (Genesis 9). And this is someone who is trusted to hear the voice of God, know the future, and save humanity. Seems to be a pretty low bar for being 'good enough' for God.
Christianity in practise does not strictly correspond to "what's in the Bible", and I say that as a Christian. Maybe sometimes for the better, but often for the worse. And that's before we even talk about how to interpret something like Genesis 9.
I'd say that mainstream and powerful Christianities do have the effect the parent commenter noticed, especially in America. And to me, it's quite plain that that is a perversion of the message of grace that is central to the Gospel.
Lack of coherence is a major benefit for a sacred text. It allows the cult clerics to be flexible, to pick and choose what they like, what is socially acceptable at the time.
A rigid sacred text that claim things are one way or that something must be done someway will inevitably fail when reality shows that things are some other way or that the results of some other action are better.
Cultural norms are often described (and perceived) as being ~sacred (beyond reproach, discussion, etc).
After the events of January 6 at the capital (the "literal" coup attempt), "Democracy, our most sacred institution" quickly coalesced as a common sound bite across the mainstream media complex.
As religious people are reluctant to question the axioms of their religion (as a consequence of psychological conditioning, at least in part), I propose the same general phenomenon (and causes) exists with respect to "facts" and power structures within culture.
To be even more clear: I believe that "democracy", the flavors that are currently practised in this era, are highly illusory...and, I also believe that most people have ~"cognitive viruses" within their mind that activate when any criticism of democracy arises, plausible artifacts of which can be seen in massive quantities across social media conversations. /r/politcis is famous for this sort of thing, but on certain topics it is not difficult at all to find the same thing on HN.
This is kind of a tangent, but driving the J6 conversation toward “sacred democracy” is a red herring that focuses away from the real issue, which is jockeying for power by playing dirty and bending the rules to create unexpected outcomes.
For example McConnell inventing a rule from thin air that you can’t fill a scotus seat in an election year. Then cynically breaking his own “rule.” Or Trump insisting Mike Pence “can send the votes back to the states.” Or submitting “alternate” electors who would break the pledge to match their votes to the majority vote. Or install a DOJ puppet AG who would seize voting machines.
This has nothing to do with whether America should be a democracy or not. It’s all about whether we should normalize a toxic culture of scummy power jockeying.
One problem I have with claims, sincere as they may be, about "the" issue is that there are many, many thousands" of "the issues" in circulation. It's a lot like God(s): how shall we tell which "the one" is THE "the one" (is there only one?). And, I suspect the underlying epistemology/cognition of each resembles that which underlies religion more than a little.
> This has nothing to do with whether America should be a democracy or not. It’s all about whether we should normalize a toxic culture of scummy power jockeying.
I think it may be worth noting that for any given issue, whether it has "nothing/anything to do with" something else is often subjective (such as in this case), and also that the mind has a tendency to render subjective matters as objective at runtime (more so with some topics than others).
I am not opposed to democracy per se, I am opposed to fake democracy (or fake anything for that matter), where "fake" means approximately "what it says on the tin does not match the product inside"....kinda like the picture of a Big Mac on a poster vs what you get when you actually buy one.
You have the order reversed. In Buddhism, you learn to let go of attachments, and because of that you let go of smoking, alcohol, etc. It's not the other way around.
* >Buddhism and Christianity make it sound like you have to be perfectly clean and disciplined to be “enlightened”*
I'm my no means a scholar of such matters but I don't get than impression of Christianity at all. From the concept of original sin, to the tale of Jesus kicking off in the temple, the embracement of man's flaws seem to me to be one of Christianity's biggest selling points.
> Christianity make it sound like you have to be perfectly clean and disciplined to be “enlightened”
Yes, it is true that the church often presents it this way. Which is odd, because the bible is almost always presenting the other case, that the person with the issue is the enlightened one.
For example, the bible lists 5 women who are in the geneology of Jesus. This includes a prostitute (Rahab), a Moabite (Ruth, and according to the bible marrying a moabite was punishable by death), and an adulteress (Bathsheba; she may have been innocent but this isn't clear).
Heck, even the idea of extending the blessing of God to the gentiles is sus. The gentiles are by definition unclean.
All of which could be seen as a way to highlight that "enlightenment" is due to the grace of god, not works of man. And yes, "enlightenment" means something very different in christianity vs buddhism.
Prayer, meditation and therapies like CBT certainly help prevent relapse, but hard core alcoholism requires medical intervention to manage the shakes and delirium tremens (the best and most vivid hallucinations I have had. Better than plant hallucinogens.) The very definition of the disorder is a total loss of control. It's a very scary feeling to know you're going over the falls and there's no way to the safety of shore. The medical community long ago classified addiction as a disease (substance abuse disorder)
I used to read Nisargadatta to try and get sober, but it didn't help. He seems to imply there's some deeper level of consciousness beyond just resting without thought or emotion in the present moment.
I found the teachings of Zen to much more helpful and in fact many Western therapies like DBT and Wise Mind are based on those principles.
> I used to read Nisargadatta to try and get sober, but it didn't help.
Reading is just another kind of attachment. You have to practice, even and perhaps especially when it seems challenging and difficult. Most spiritual traditions are very clear on this, including yoga itself.
this! all of my favorite zen teachings describe it as 'your practice'. Zen Mind Beginners Mind says something like "in the mind of the expert there is only one path, in the beginner's mind there are many" and urges the zen practitioner to always keep the beginner's mind... It emphasized to me that it should be _your_ practice of the teachings, not just inhaling more and more teachings
> He seems to imply there's some deeper level of consciousness beyond just resting without thought or emotion in the present moment.
I’ve come to realize that all paths lead to the same state, including Christianity. Christian worship is a form of Bhakti. It’s all a matter of what fits your personality.
> feeling of guilt and failure when you stray from the behavioral/moral prescription.
Those feelings are caused by attachment and craving. Learn to let go of your attachments; that's a big part of the "discipline" that's conducive to spiritual practice.
This is specifically mentioned in Buddhism as one of the ten hindrances, "sīlabbata-parāmāso," attachment to rules and rituals. In Christianity, this is similar to the idea of works-righteousness which was the basis of Martin Luther's Protestant Reformation. In either case, spiritual practice would be meaningless without passing through the messiness of life and learning from mistakes rather than dwelling on them.
What I find incredible about Watt's history is how so many of his talks were recorded with fairly high fidelity. There was almost nothing that could have been done with these in the 60s, yet they were preserved for 40 years until an appropriate distribution mechanism materialized.
I do like his content but there is almost kind of a defeatist element to it. I often wonder if this somewhat dark shading was, in part, due to the alcoholism.
I disagree about the defeatism. Acceptance and "giving up" in the productive sense of not bashing your head against a wall and maybe doing something else are encouraged, but I think defeatism is part of a world vs me attitude which is exactly what he is trying to offer a counterpoint to.
He also speaks about mastery as a key element to his philosophy, and to enjoying the world, and of discipline as being the key to mastery - I think, the opposite of defeatism.
Off topic, but talking about recorded talks, it bugs me that there seems to be no recordings of this:
“In 1985, [Powell] Janulus entered into the Guinness World Records for spoken fluency in 42 languages. To qualify, he took a two-hour conversational fluency test with a native speaker of each language he spoke at that time. This testing took place over one month. Powell said that he considers himself skilled in 64 languages” - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powell_Janulus
That is recent enough that it could have been recorded on tapes or video and extraordinary and interesting enough to be worth it, but it doesn’t seem that it was.
> so many of his talks were recorded with fairly high fidelity
Just a possibility here. I have the impression he worked for KQED TV for a time in the 1950s. That might have put him in touch with competent sound techs.
I recall someone who was also at KQED at that time relating this: Alan Watts told her he would write a blurb for any book author who requested one. (Speaks to some flare for self promotion.)
I thought he had a steady job working for KPFA on an assigned slot, which is where he honed his talent for talking for long stretches to fill the air on the radio—all while chain smoking at the console and answering calls from little old ladies in Berkeley, who would ask him obscure questions about whatever topic he was going on about. I think I remember reading that the archival audio tapes for those shows are still around somewhere, but I’ve never once heard them. I got interested in this like 15 years ago or so, and took a look-see in the Pacifica archives, and I think they are still there locked up in a vault somewhere, unless a fire or a flood took them out, which happens more than you might think.
Probably right -- mine was based upon impressions.
In terms of archives, and 20/80, whatever "Alan Watts from the archives" they now offer as a donation premium is probably enough for KPFA's purposes. I don't know when they moved to the new building, except it must have have been since 1990. So possibly "fire, flood" or move between facilities.
While he couldn’t save his life, he surely saved a great deal of others. I will always remember listening to his lectures while going on runs during a dark time in my life. He helped me find peace, and introduced me to ideas I would probably have never found until much later in my life. For anyone to do that, I think we owe a great thank you.
If you like Alan Watts, you should play the David OReilly's videogame Everything. Gameplay might seem a bit funny at first (with the rotating animals and such), but the gameplay along with Alan Watts' speeches makes a lot of sense. It's a wonderful experience!
Watts and Osho were on the same wavelength when it comes to imparting their own definition of religion and philosophy. Both had their human flaws and didn't care. Their message was and is still sound (no wonder they are popular on YouTube).
Why is it still sound if they themselves could not live and follow their own philosophy? I am wary of anyone who professes something that sounds technically sound, but which they themselves cannot live up to.
That's an extremely common theme in the world. Teachers, therapists, doctors, etc. Often the instructor is completely fucked up, and is trying to cope with that by teaching/helping others. But they still have insightful and good advice, even if they don't follow it themselves. Don't focus on the instructor as some kind of idol that, if their perfection wanes, so does your attention to their teaching. Instead focus on the message and whether it will work for you. Many people find that it does, and it's that direct result that matters.
If you want to learn sword smithing, do you take notes from a sword smith who can barely make a sharp blade? Or a master sword smith who embodies their craft to the highest level? I suppose the former might have some unpracticed insights by stealing them from others, but the latter is where I’d be most interested.
On teachers - I know relationship counselors who can’t even have a functioning relationship themselves, and yes I suppose maybe they have some pithy takes on how to have a relationship and also some theoretical knowledge, but I like taking my lessons from doers.
I don't think that's a fair comparison. It's more like would you want your physical ailments treated by an unfit but talented medical professional or the fittest person at your local gym?
Well to bring in a Christian notion here that is useful: We’re all sinners and therefore destined to fall short, but that isn’t an excuse to not try, and to keep trying.
Or to put it another way: Hypocrites aren’t wrong. They’re just hypocrites.
Maybe because I've been an ardent atheist since my mid-teens and an agnostic before that, I enjoyed listening to Alan Watts as a good explainer of how it all works. How the eastern and western ideas of spirituality differ and where they came from. He seemed very knowledgeable about that. I was never tempted in to Christianity, Buddhism or any other form of spirituality or enlightenment after listening to many of his lectures. The author of the link seems a bit resentful that other philosophers, especially those of the 60's and 70's had a lot more fun than him after reading this piece and a couple of others on his site...
I think we in the modern era have some tremendous advantages in understanding Eastern spirituality in light of developments in neuroscience, Western philosophy, and a longitudinal overview of several traditions like Advaita, Neo-Advaita, Taoism, Dzogchen, Mahamudra, Mahayana, and the original Zen.
I think they point toward the ability to shift one's way of being in the world using one's whole capacity as a human being. Generally, an interconnectedness or oneness counts as a fundamental insight; however, I think these traditions have doctrines like karma so that such an insight does not become a regressive excuse for lackluster moral behavior. For instance, the human frontal lobes give us distance in the world, the ability not to react, to take a different perspective. This enables the Bodhisattva ideal of Mahayana Buddhism using the highest faculties available to man--necessary distance to be guardians of the world, not merely to, say, become stoically un-reactive, or to distance one's self from moral responsibility.
The "supreme insight" preached by Alan Watts seems ironically potentially harmful if not well-understood and grounded, a flight crashed halfway so that it would've been better not to get on the plane--to let the original error of separation in through the back door, ethereal "insight" not bound together with the rest of relative existence. Spiritual traditions have these proverbial cracked jugs with real insight of a sort, like Chogyam Trungpa.
Can you explain a bit what neuroscience adds to the picture? To use your example, once we know that humans can take a difference perspective, what does it help to know which structure in particular is responsible for that ability?
It helps to know that the shift has a solid foundation, that it's not some kind of act one just needs to put on forever.
We know, for instance, about mirror neurons, and that seeing some else's pain can light up some of the same parts in the brain of the observer. You can tune them out, or strengthen them.
We know that the right hemisphere has entirely non-verbal modes of thought and generally sees the whole without breaking things into pieces--we don't have to put together some mystical oneness, but just tune into those aspects of our own being.
Without understanding these things about the brain, I'd take pointing out the potential for transformation as just moralizing and conceptualizing, just a draining act to put on for all time. There's a solid foundation to build on--it will run on the hardware, it's not just emulation.
I find this post and your original comment quite elucidating. It illustrates the main dilemma I have with Alan watts' and western new philosophy.
At the least bit, it's all incredibly ambiguous to the point of losing most meaning and lending itself to interpretation in any direction.
Not to say most religious do not have a similar nature, but that this particular view is incredibly easy to turn into what lever perspective or belief system you want that's just as dogmatic as traditional western systems of belief.
The 'you are IT' and everyone is "it" and perfect at nature is just too easy to reduce in literally any direction you want. From anarchy to magical thinking to justified narcissism. Hints the section mentioned in which watts and his swami guy argue over the exact point.
I think mirror neurons are a good example. I still don't understand what difference it makes which neurons are involved in empathy. Pretty much every signal in the brain can be tuned out or strengthened, right?
In what sense does the right hemisphere "see the whole without breaking things into pieces"? Especially when it's implemented on a distributed computing medium like neurons.
Your last paragraph seems to make a more concrete claim, which is that we can tell which kinds of cognition are more or less draining, analogous to native vs emulated execution. This makes sense to me, but it's not clear that we couldn't already tell roughly how draining different modes of thought are without neuroscience, nor that the main claims of Eastern spirituality depended on how draining these different states are to hold.
> In what sense does the right hemisphere "see the whole without breaking things into pieces"? Especially when it's implemented on a distributed computing medium like neurons.
https://www.amazon.com/Master-His-Emissary-Divided-Western-e... goes into this a lot. It does that fairly literally. In split brain patients, if you have them, say, draw a picture using their left hand (right hemisphere), they tend to draw it impressionistically without much detail--you get the sense or form of the whole--it really doesn't see the "parts". The left hemisphere typically can't do this, and seems rather preoccupied with what it knows. If you ask a split brain patient to, say, draw an elephant with their right hand, they might draw a trunk, and ear, a tail, etc. and actually not have the ability to put them together in relation to draw an elephant. They might even draw skeleton, because they know about it--it really doesn't have a sense of the whole.
> I think mirror neurons are a good example. I still don't understand what difference it makes which neurons are involved in empathy. Pretty much every signal in the brain can be tuned out or strengthened, right?
I don't think it matters which neurons, but I think what the brain does matters quite a bit, like the difference between, say, someone who can work out a sum with a pencil and paper, vs someone who sees numbers and landscapes and just kind of squashes the images together and knows the sum (some people with exceptional calculation abilities have unusual synesthesias like that and can't actually tell you how they calculate at all). If Buddhism, say, makes a claim like "there's no difference between self and other", it makes a difference if, say, my brain just feels distress at seeing someone in pain, or if my brain has a representation of just exactly what that would feel like on my body in some detail. We know empathy is a thing, but neuroscience tells us in more detail by, say, various failure modes of the brain, that some people can't differentiate self and other, that seeing others, say, can invade their mental space in a very direct way that they can't tell from themselves. So to me, without knowing in detail by having already accomplished it, what the hardware could possibly do, then we can train it. Like, people run 4 minute miles all of the time now, but it was once considered not possible. Someone sets a new standard, and a kind of mental block of "that's impossible" seems lifted. Knowing just what various brain regions can do removes some mystery of what's possible--were some old spiritual masters spitballing theoretical possibilities, speaking perhaps metaphorically, or very literally describing something they achieved? It leans toward the possibility of the latter, and the ability to train the latter, if you know in detail that exactly some region of the brain does some thing exactly.
> Your last paragraph seems to make a more concrete claim, which is that we can tell which kinds of cognition are more or less draining, analogous to native vs emulated execution. This makes sense to me, but it's not clear that we couldn't already tell roughly how draining different modes of thought are without neuroscience, nor that the main claims of Eastern spirituality depended on how draining these different states are to hold.
I think my line of thinking on this is more of the same sort of thing. How would you know, say, that you're not emulating what's possible to run in hardware. Like you said, you could strengthen any signal of the brain. How would you differentiate between the thought that everything is one, vs the intuitive perception of it? So I tend to think that the reason they're pointing these things out is because of that sort of thing. Some claims of Eastern spiritually do depend on how draining a state is to hold. In Tibetan Buddhism, for instance, the recognition of emptiness is clarified as not being a matter of effort, and they use the metaphor of a bell. You don't continuously hammer the bell, you ring the bell and the tone simply continues to ring as long as it rings. If you notice it has stopped, you can ring it again, and eventually, recognition is continuous; it should not be a matter of effort, and effort would be one way to spot that you're not doing it right. So, I do have an unsupported suspicion that they're pointing alternative ways of being that aren't a matter of effort and that people often don't recognize.
Thanks for elaborating. I'm still not convinced about the strengths of claims that can be made in this instance, but I like the analogy to the 4-minute mile. However, I think that people didn't determine that a 4-minute mile was possible by using their knowledge of human anatomy. But I concede that knowledge of physics and thermodynamics could be used to rule out something like a 4-second mile.
Regarding the effortlessness, I think it completely depends on the stage of the practice. I can relate to that, sometimes I do strain myself too much only to discover an effortless flow sometimes. But I understand that without that extreme effort put prior, I would not get that effortless flow. It's like yin-yang to an extent. Of course, someone who's very experienced will probably find it all mostly effortless, but to get to that stage in the first place, intense effort is required. If I was in a very anti-Zen state, like being "in my head" / feeling disconnected from my body - which I still get quite often unfortunately, as I work 60h/week+... if I felt like that and I really lacked momentum and I decided to take the effortless way, I would just not get out of it. I would be drowning in my own thoughts. I have experienced that so many times as I experimented with it. Only intense effort and intense focus could help me break through a major lack of Zen-momentum. Sometimes when I do have Zen momentum, if I put good effort and focus very intensely during the time I reserve just for Zen practice, just taking a walk and dropping any effort and just trying to be subtly aware makes sense all out of the sudden. But it drops without prior intense practice, at least that's what I have noticed on myself. I do hope to get to the point where I could just "ring the bells", but I'm not there yet and I would warn anyone new to the practice to stay away from shortcuts or anything involving effortlessness. It's an easy trap to fall into in the beginning. I fell into it after the first 6 months, when I made very good progress, I started to wonder, woah, it could be all so effortless. What followed is that I started taking the regular practice less seriously, and before I noticed, I got into the "thinking that I'm aware" thing - that set me back for like one year or more. It took me a long time to realize what I was doing and then to fix that.
It sounds like you have just almost like contempt for these beliefs until they're validated by an authority in the form of materialist science? That what neuroscience contributes is not anything to the practice itself, but just permission for you to participate.
I'd agree it's not anything to the practice itself, but I would argue that it is something to a path to practice. Arguably, Elon Musk found out what happens if you commit to large purchases without due diligence. What else would make me think that it's even an executable algorithm? How do you get from non-belief to belief at all? Why investigate if the whole thing looks shaky or like some kind of weird scam just to invest society with morality?
A lot of religious trappings seem partially to function as theater, show, or advertising. This generates some interest without understanding. The first understanding and further interest will probably come intellectually thereafter.
The Dalai Lama has characterized one of the strengths of Tibetan Buddhism as laying out a complete path, no "missing steps." In his Introduction to Buddhism, he describes how a beginner might start out with analytical contemplation before meditation, getting familiar with the idea.
I think that understanding this sort of thing can help the thing scale. Quite a few traditions hold that you must have living transmissions of sorts, or need a guru. I think that serves, in part, to show in a living being that it is possible and not an act...but we don't have 3.5 billion spiritual masters to mentor 3.5 billion other people, and I don't see anything wrong with replacing a little trip or roadblock on the path with intellectual understanding. The traditions, understanding, and concepts all exist to create a workable path. Scaffolding doesn't have anything to do with having a building in the end, but if you want a building, you'll probably find scaffolding useful along the way.
> We know that the right hemisphere has entirely non-verbal modes of thought and generally sees the whole without breaking things into pieces--we don't have to put together some mystical oneness, but just tune into those aspects of our own being.
Agreed and not agreed.
I don't see any mysticism in practice of Zen for instance in particular, but there's something mystical about just being a self-aware being I guess. It's just so normalized, we take it for granted, and the practice can uncover that. If you take it purely as psychology (which it is to great extent), you still somewhat have this rooted in the "world of ideas" and not the "absolute reality" that you perceive in the moment (at least as how it's taught in Zen for instance). I.e. like scientist could try to find what the consciousness is, but even if we do get a scientific definition for that, I would argue it's more important to find out what consciousness is at individual observer level - something that could only be perceived/experienced and not described.
Also with the practice itself, any idea can become a baggage - whether it is neuroscience or some Buddhist teachings. Like understanding how the right brain hemisphere works is of no importance to the practice, if for instance Zen practice is a lot about full body awareness, external awareness and being rooted in hara. I know that it changes neurons in my brain but I can't perceive that in my brain, I perceive that in the spatial awareness (which is generated by the brain - but that's just an information, just an idea that I comes to me, that I perceive), but it's important understand that those practices were developed by people who probably didn't even know the role of the thing inside the skull.
I do use some of psychology / neuroscience to aid my practice though. At the basic level I understand that everything is a habit and gets automated away, including any advances in the practice. I take quite an athletic approach to it. I also discovered that understanding of Pavlov triggers can be of aid when trying to integrate the practice into the daily life. I think that new methods and technology could be developed that would make Zen practice easier for instance.
So I agree that we have tremendous advantage now and this can improve further as technology develops. The knowledge can be as much of use, as it can be an obstacle - it just depends on how it's used.
While I do find Watts pretty based overall, some of his talks do give me that TED talk vibe, i.e. man on stage who says things that sound intelligent and an audience of middle class people sitting there spellbound and thinking they're educating themselves, whereas in reality most of them will forget everything they heard during the drive home.
In counterpoint, the wisdom and knowledge that Watts delivers has massively helped me out of chronic mental health problems (being the middle class white target audience).
The thing I really enjoy about Watts, and what seems this article seem moot, is that lazy mysticism is half the point. He is offering a counterweight to social pressure and an 'age of anxiety' by suggesting new points of view in which desperate clawing and ladder climbing are absurd. He says very clearly not to take him too seriously, because he's not offering a new totalizing point where you should be anxious about nothing - just showing that there is an alternative, and you are poorer for not having considered it.
And if that doesn't work for you, no worries, he's a lazy mystic not a preacher.
Watts said he enjoyed Speaking because he enjoyed hearing himself Talk
And if anybody should start getting Giddy over any great Pearls of Wisdom he delivered, he said that it would be like a Thief returning a Pocket Watch they had just taken from you - Humans are already equipped to exist in Nature, and whatever Watts says doesn't change that
He's not delivering Weather Forecasts or Road Conditions (Facts upon which to Deliberate) - He's populating Silence with the Word of Alan Watts, and if tomorrow you don't remember all of the words then so what? There will be more words.
Went on a spree of listening to Alan Watts videos on YouTube some years back during a major bout of depression. It was after accidentally stumbling across a programme about him on the CBC. The premise of his talks would intrigue me but honestly I didn't find much to remember in those talks, and the main benefit is they were vaguely comforting.
Since Rumi was mentioned as one of the messengers of "joyful" spirituality, just for the record, Rumi extensively used the story of Joseph (as told in Quran) as a metaphor for the journey of the successful spiritual seeker. A key element of that story was the fact of 10 near-murderous 'brothers'. Also the fact that 11 stars and the sun and the moon bowed to Joseph in his dream. Rumi's mysticism very much belongs to the category of spiritual schools that assert the existence of an 'elect of spirit' among humanity, who further require 'training' under the guidance of an adept (the Pir or Elder) involving great demands on one's will power and mental states. (Which was basically the guru mentioned in the article's point.)
The hard-rock band Nothing More features a bit of Watts in the song "Ships In The Night," the second half of this music video: https://youtu.be/lR4yR_rjhEg
I recommend not watching the actual video; I really detest the dark imagery and lyrics of rock music and worry about how such imagery affects people, even in a subtle manner. (In Buddhism (perhaps primarily in Theravada) there is the notion of "guarding the sense doors," being careful about what one allows into their head. I enjoy the music in spite of that, but the imagery I think is problematic.)
Guarding the sense doors from dark imagery? This is a questionable interpretation- and I say that as a Buddhist!
My teachers (Tibetan scholars) have talked about a lot over the years but have never breathed a word about that. If you want to be dark, or goth, that’s not an issue.
What is a problem is avoidance- how we tend to avoid death (the opposite of “darkness” in a sense). You know: we’ll keep on living like this, the good life, permanently, death is an aberration, let’s not be “morbid,” etc. Then something which is absolutely possible & even inevitable happens - your friend dies, your dog dies, your grandma dies - and people are shocked, even though it is very clear that not only is that a possibility, given a large enough sample size (like, everyone you’ve ever met) & time frame, it is a certainty.
Guarding the sense doors can be done by sitting in a cave on the side of a mountain. Buddha saw this as useful, for a time, until he realized that coming back and sharing what he gleaned while sitting as also useful. He about died in a river heading back into town, after deciding to end his ascetic lifestyle (and get a bite to eat).
His discovery was more or less about how practicing a good balance between asceticism and sensual indulgence leads to a means of escape through realizing the Four Noble truths:
1. Dukkha: An innate characteristic of existence in the realm of samsara; it is the constant cycle of birth, death, and rebirth.
2. Samudaya: The cause and origin of dukkha through tanha. Tanha can be seen as the factor tying us to dukkha, or as a response to dukkha, trying to escape it. It is the result of our unguarded sensory contact with the world, which gives rise to craving and attachment to impermanent states and things.
3. Nirodha: Translated as "cessation," "ending," or "confinement." In the context of the Four Noble Truths, it refers to the idea that dukkha can be ended or contained by renouncing or letting go of tanha.
4. Magga: The path leading to the confinement of tanha and dukkha.
The path consists right understanding (Samma ditthi), right thought (Samma sankappa), right speech (Samma vaca), right action (Samma kammanta), right livelihood (Samma ajiva), right effort (Samma vayama), right mindfulness (Samma sati), and right concentration (Samma samadhi).
Now we ask GPT-3 about something very specific using the above as a prompt:
Human> Theorize on the loss of the ability to recall imagery and audio, in mind, in the population as related to the path in Buddhism.
GPT-3> There is no real answer to this question as it is purely speculative. However, one could theorize that the loss of the ability to recall imagery and audio could be related to the path in Buddhism in a few different ways. First, it could be argued that the loss of these abilities is a result of the practice of mindfulness and concentration. When one is focused on the present moment and not letting their mind wander, they may be less likely to remember things from the past. Additionally, it could be argued that the loss of these abilities is a result of the practice of renunciation. When one is trying to let go of attachment to things in the world, they may be less likely to hold on to memories of past experiences. Finally, it could be argued that the loss of these abilities is a result of the practice of right effort. If one is constantly trying to improve their mental state and focus on the present moment, they may eventually lose track of memories from the past.
Human> So, forgetting may be a useful trait?
GPT-3> There is no easy answer to this question. On one hand, forgetting may be seen as a useful trait because it can help one to focus on the present moment and let go of attachment to things in the past. On the other hand, forgetting may be seen as a hindrance because it can prevent one from learning from their past experiences. Ultimately, it is up to the individual to decide whether forgetting is a useful trait or not.
To be a bit less mystical than my original comment…
I used to think “letting go” meant “giving up”…
“Letting go” in the Alan Watts sense means being willing to give up on the means — not the outcome. I’ll let go of the way I’ve been doing things, let a small part of me die, so I have a better chance of meeting the outcome I am looking for. The psychological establishment might call that flexibly minded or low aversion to loss.
Giving up is convincing yourself a difficult the outcome/goal wasn’t worth it — instead of finding new means to reach it.
While I don't think blindly emulating successful people will necessarily make you successful, I am even more confident that taking life advice from an abusive alcoholic is an even worse idea.
What does fame or being an alcoholic have to do with giving good advice?
Watts was smart, insightful, highly versed in philosophy and religion. Does being an alcoholic or a smoker or <choose your transgression> negate that?
Edit: it’s really sad that you would summarize this complex man as an “abusive alcoholic”. He dedicated decades of his life to learning and sharing knowledge, inspired millions of people, certainly advanced Western philosophy. In his late years he drank heavily - 30-something years after publishing his first book. What an unforgiving hypocrisy! A man with such a complicated story, a difficult relationship with his dad, failed marriages, just human drama that _all_ people have or will experience in their lifetime… what right did he have to disappoint you so tremendously?
> What does fame or being an alcoholic have to do with giving good advice?
You asked the OP to name someone, so presumably you're after someone famous.
> Watts was smart, insightful, highly versed in philosophy and religion. Does being an alcoholic or a smoker or <choose your transgression> negate that?
Not necessarily. Giving advice about those things is a separate matter though.
> Edit: it’s really sad that you would summarize this complex man as an “abusive alcoholic”. He dedicated decades of his life to learning and sharing knowledge, inspired millions of people, certainly advanced Western philosophy. In his late years he drank heavily - 30-something years after publishing his first book. What an unforgiving hypocrisy! A man with such a complicated story, a difficult relationship with his dad, failed marriages, just human drama that _all_ people have or will experience in their lifetime… what right did he have to disappoint you so tremendously?
I was using the OP's words. Was he an abusive alcoholic or not?
Sounds like you approach this debate as an exercise in argumentation, not as a discussion of Watts' life or his publications.
When I asked OP to name someone, I did mean someone well-known. That makes sense in the context of a discussion of a famous philosopher. Maybe a childhood friend gave you a good advice 40 years ago - we won't be able to discuss the character of that person here.
What kind of a person one must be for you to value their life advice?
> Was he an abusive alcoholic or not?
He drank heavily at the end of his life. Was he an alcoholic? Maybe. Was he abusive? I haven't heard anyone call him abusive before this comment.
> Sounds like you approach this debate as an exercise in argumentation, not as a discussion of Watts' life or his publications.
This thread is about whether we should take advice from an abusive alcoholic or not.
> When I asked OP to name someone, I did mean someone well-known. That makes sense in the context of a discussion of a famous philosopher. Maybe a childhood friend gave you a good advice 40 years ago - we won't be able to discuss the character of that person here.
So, unless you have connections, you're going to preclude people that actually know you?
> What kind of a person one must be for you to value their life advice?
It's a good question. I guess someone worthy of being emulated, and relatively consistent in their actions. Not abusive, at the very least. (I'm not claiming he was abusive.)
I think the best advice I have ever got was when I was talking to a shrink. He just asked me questions and let me talk, and then it was obvious what I should do because he had helped me make it clear to myself what it was that I wanted. So maybe I'd add that if someone is patient enough to listen, it would probably do you good to listen to them.
Why is that a problem? Are you your best you every day or do you fail at some things and still persist at trying? It's natural to know what's best and yet not to be able to follow that to a T.
I don't even fully understand the scope of this concern. He became a heavy drinker in his late years, not a child murderer.
Theatrics are a big part of first year science lectures. At least when I went. A lot of the chemistry lectures had demonstrations on the level of a Harry Potter play... special effects; kaboom and smoke in many classes. It made you feel special to be there. Alan Watts makes his audience feel special.
Kind of like Sam Harris lulls his audience into feeling smart.
Broadly, I think, what happens is that "wisdom can't be taught." New ideas can get thrown at you and it can be fun and exciting to play with them, but sometimes even the people putting them out there can't really handle it. I don't know about Watt's story, but that's 100% Jordan Peterson; the epitome of "smart but not at all wise."
(I think e.g. Slavoj Zizek and Nassim Nicholas Taleb have correctly figured figured this out in their own ways. I think the former knows how much he's "trolling" sometimes)
This piece accusing Watts of laziness is just as guilty.
`It’s true that Buddhism, and particularly Zen Buddhism, teaches that we are perfect just as we are, we have merely forgotten our true nature.`
As someone who has studied Zen Buddhism for a few decades, you will be very hard pressed to find anyone practiced in it refer to the words 'true' and 'perfect' so casually.
True is only meaningful with respect to an abstract system of rules, and this extends likewise to perfection. You need an external metric to determine what is, and by the same token, is not, perfect.
Zen Buddhism teaches people how to experience the world independent of that part of your mind that is actively categorizing the world into true, false, imperfect, perfect, etc. To experience your own experience of life as directly as possible, without mediation through your linguistic centers or moral philosophies. Since we're programmers, one analogy would be to reduce all those needless abstractions in the call stack down to the essential turing-complete read/write add/sub and jump instructions.
So Alan is forcing an important point on the Yogi. You can only know or define enlightenment with respect to an abstract system of thought. Remove the abstraction, and there is a complete liberation. No meaningful way to form distinctions. "Doesn’t he see the Brahman everywhere, and in all people, all beings". All becomes one. There is no difference between the enlightened and the non-enlightened in the non-conceptual world. Which is the world that Zen teaches how to experience, if for no other reason than to reveal that it is possible, and provide a renewed perspective on the seemingly ordinary miracle of conscious life.
> "The Swami retorted that if Watts was really enlightened, he would feel no suffering, not even a pinch."
This article really is a hatchet job. It's the worst take with the worst references to source from. Enlightened has nothing to do with not feeling pain. The article goes on to judge his personal life as well as his children. The article quotes Alan as having not been a good father, but who can say they have lived the ideal?
This is the same kind opinion piece that would call Mr Rogers an evil man [0].
Pain is not suffering. Pain is a sensation. Suffering is the mental resistance to it that we add on ourselves, making our experience worse than necessary. Suffering is optional.
Please don't complain about tangential annoyances—things like article or website formats, name collisions, or back-button breakage. They're too common to be interesting.
Hmm. Well, personally speaking, I find the concept of "enlightenment" itself to be delusional at best, but probably actual grifting. So, to my mind, someone insisting that Watts isn't doing it right seems rather rich. But, to each their own, and if I can live and let live, then the author can.
Every time Baizhang, Zen Master Dahui, gave a dharma talk, a certain old man would come to listen. He usually left after the talk, but one day he remained. Baizhang asked, "Who is there?"
The man said, "I am not actually a human being. I lived and taught on this mountain at the time of Kashyapa Buddha. One day a student asked me, 'Does a person who practices with great devotion still fall into cause and effect?' I said to him, 'No, such a person doesn't.' Because I said this I was reborn as a wild fox for five hundred lifetimes. Reverend master, please say a turning word for me and free me from this wild fox body." Then he asked Baizhang, "Does a person who practices with great devotion still fall into cause and effect?"
Baizhang said, "Don't ignore cause and effect."
Immediately the man had great realization. Bowing, he said, "I am now liberated from the body of a wild fox. I will stay in the mountain behind the monastery. Master, could you perform the usual services for a deceased monk for me?"
Baizhang asked the head of the monks' hall to inform the assembly that funeral services for a monk would be held after the midday meal. The monks asked one another, "What's going on? Everyone is well; there is no one sick in the Nirvana Hall." After their meal, Baizhang led the assembly to a large rock behind the monastery and showed them a dead fox at the rock's base. Following the customary procedure, they cremated the body.
That evening during his lecture in the dharma hall Baizhang talked about what had happened that day. Huangbo asked him, "A teacher of old gave a wrong answer and became a wild fox for five hundred lifetimes. What if he hadn't given a wrong answer?"
Baizhang said, "Come closer and I will tell you." Huangbo went closer and slapped Baizhang's face. Laughing, Baizhang clapped his hands and said, "I thought it was only barbarians who had unusual beards. But you too have an unusual beard!"
That kōan has an obscure codicil. Not many know it, but if this response is given, the student is known to be enlightened, and can skip all further training:
Huongbo looks dazedly up from the smoking ash pile of the former fox spirit and into the eyes of the grinning Baizhang. Speechless at first, he finally stammers "Baizhang. That's quite an act. What do you call it?" Baizhang wraps both fists in Huongbo's beard, pulls him close and screams "The Aristocrats!!"
> the student is known to be enlightened, and can skip all further training
Wait, I thought we all had Buddha-nature and were already enlightened? In fact, Alan Watts himself said so. If everyone is enlightened, how can it be that only the enlightened can skip all Zen training? That's a difficult kōan, indeed.
Watts was a connoisseur of fascinating ideas. It's easy to criticize his syncretism as "watered down Buddhism", and you can't take everything he (or anyone) says as gospel, but there's plenty of insight in his lectures. And he will point you towards a hundred other thinkers with amazing ideas to share.