Max Mednik
  • Home
  • About
  • Interests
    • Angel investing
    • Magic
    • Scuba Diving
  • Blog
  • Contact

Readings and musings

Zen Class #2: Just Human

2/24/2010

0 Comments

 
An interesting quote from the second Zen class I went to yesterday (the third and last class in the series will be next week):

A frog can just "frog."
A bird can just "bird."
But a human cannot just "human."


The key is that animals have very little that gets in the way of their just being themselves. They can sit, eat, sleep, and most importantly focus on exactly what they want and what they feel at every instant. In this way, they are somehow able to be at peace with themselves and in touch with the world around them and with other beings much more powerfully.

But people are different. It is extremely difficult for us to just sit and think of nothing. Or just eat and enjoy our food. The main "practice" in Zen is nothing but sitting -- detaching from the world and one's thoughts and just being. Just humaning.

Why is this so hard for us? Why do we have so little control of our thoughts? What makes us different from animals? I think it's much more complicated than just the fact that we are self-aware and have "intellect." I think our ability to just human changes as we age and changes based on the situation we're in, and I think it is something that we can even learn to do better through practice.

This concept of just being and why it is difficult for us has kept my attention since the class I attended. I'm curious also about how I and other people are able to see glimmers of bright spots when we are just being or doing one specific thing very effectively -- when we're "in the zone" or able to be creative or concentrated. I'm curious about what allows us to be that way from to time and how we can do that more often.

Also, what role does technology play in all this? In some obvious ways, technology really distracts and makes us the least human I can imagine, especially when it disconnects us from establishing heartfelt and direct communications with other people and brings us further rather than closer to others. However, when used in other ways, I think (social) technology can also allow us to be more human than was ever possible before, and I'm curious how we can make that happen.

This blog post isn't really meant to answer any questions; it is meant to put out there some of the questions that have gotten me thinking and welcome others' feedback and input.
0 Comments

Recreating the World

2/19/2010

0 Comments

 
This is the second idea that I've had for a while and which has always kept me wondering.

If there was some reason why all of humanity went away except for a small group of people, how could/would they recreate the world? How would they reproduce all of our inventions and achievements? Would they do things differently? What skills would be required, and what people would you want there with you if it was you and others? What if it was just you alone?

I come to think of these questions when I appreciate the simplest conveniences in life. For example, the house or building you're sitting in right now. There are so many subtle yet complicated innovations and improvements that have allowed us to have such comfortable lives in modern buildings that I have very little knowledge about. Or our electronics, like computers, iPods, and telephones. I understand the most basic concepts behind how these devices work and if I had a long time by myself with a lot of basic tools and resources, I could probably replicate them eventually, but they would be much, much more primitive.

If I were responsible for rebuilding civilization, what knowledge would I want to have? This is to some extent what motivates me to learn in life: to become as capable as I can be if I ever have to rebuild something myself, less in a disaster-preparedness sort of way and more in a community-responsibility sort of way.

Would I want to study certain specialties like mechanical and electrical engineering much more than I did in college? Or would I want to go for breadth instead of depth so that I could build at least the most basic versions of each important part of civilization.

And the above is just about our "stuff." What about us? How would I/we structure our lives and our environment socially and politically? What systems would we keep from what we have now and what systems would we try anew? What historical mistakes would we avoid, and which would we commit again because of our human nature?

I hope that this sort of situation never happens literally, but the same sort of questions apply in a different way to our lives in our current society. Even though we are not rebuilding old stuff from scratch, we are building new stuff all the time, and we have our current government and political systems. We don't have the power to change everything at once or start from scratch in a totally new direction, but we do at least each have the responsibility to learn and advance the knowledge necessary to be good citizens and members of society. If each person believed he or she was responsible for our entire world, would we be in a better place than we are now?

I think so.
0 Comments

Simultaneity

2/19/2010

1 Comment

 
Today I've decided to blog about two ideas that I have had throughout my life. I probably thought of these concepts when I was about 15 and kept wondering about them since.

Both ideas/concepts center on somewhat unanswerable questions and which relate to much of the human experience. The first one is about simultaneity.

How many people at this exact instant in time are doing exactly what you're doing? Or, How many people at this exact instant in time around the world are doing ____ (fill in the blank with whatever you want)?

I'm sure this is a common thought that most people think about at one point or another. I've only seen in it in pop culture in the movie Amélie, in the scene where multiple people around the world are shown to be doing the same "activity."

I often think about this when I'm alone or when I'm doing something that is usually very mundane, like taking out the trash. How many people are drudging through this with me? However, the thought also comes to me when I'm doing something special, like blowing out birthday candles. It is often in such special, fleeting moments that I like to realize that with the vastness of humanity (and the similarity between people) that someone else must be doing exactly what I'm doing.

This realization makes me feel less alone and somehow connected to others that I can't see or know. Maybe someone can do an analysis of how many Twitter posts happen each instant that are about people doing the same activity. I know there are many trending Twitter topics that are popular to write and think about, and I'm less interested in how many people are thinking about the same thing than how many people are doing the same thing.

Maybe someone else out there is blogging about simultaneity as we speak. Hopefully they subscribe to my feed.
1 Comment
<<Previous

    Archives

    June 2021
    May 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    April 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010

    Categories

    All
    Angel Investing
    Cacti
    Cars
    China
    Community Service
    Culture
    Design
    Djing
    Dogs
    Education
    Entertainment
    Entrepreneurship
    Family
    Finance
    Food
    Google
    Happiness
    Incentives
    Investment Banking
    Judaism
    Law
    Lighting
    Magic
    Marketing
    Medicine
    Networking
    Nolabound
    Philosophy
    Professionalism
    Psychology
    Reading
    Real Estate
    Religion
    Romance
    Sales
    Science
    Shangri-La
    Social Entrepreneurship
    Social Media
    Sports
    Teams
    Technology
    Travel
    Turtles
    Ucla
    Venture Capital
    Web Services
    Weddings
    Zen

    Subscribe

    RSS Feed

Picture
Picture
  • Home
  • About
  • Interests
    • Angel investing
    • Magic
    • Scuba Diving
  • Blog
  • Contact