Inspiring talk by Matthieu Ricard on TED a couple of years ago

Det finns ett mönster i avsaknaden av mönster som kanske är det viktigaste mönstret av dem alla

Eftersom min engelska blogg dog ut ska jag försöka mig på att skriva på svenska istället. Jag måste dock erkänna att jag inte är bra på det där med att uppdatera varje dag. Jag får mer utav underliga infall då och då när jag skriver väldigt mycket och emellan dessa perioder sysslar jag med andra saker. Det är inte riktigt min grej att fotografera frukosten jag äter. Det är inte så spännande, en mix av Havrefras och Nesquik chokladpuffar – så nu vet ni det.

Det regnar ute. Iskalla tårar från himlen. Jag är förkyld och lider av en släng lappsjuka som jag brukar kalla den men som kanske inte är riktigt samma sak som den gängse vedertagna definitionen. Det spelar ingen roll var jag befinner mig, plötsligt breder öknen sig ut över landskapet och lägger sig som ett täcke över det som egentligen finns där under. Jag ser bara öken och tomhet vart jag än blickar. Jag får en obehaglig känsla över att jag är den enda människan på hela jorden. Det går inte att skaka av sig den där känslan. Man får sitta med den tills den passerat. Jag finner tröst i att det trots allt är en mycket gammal tanke. I buddhismen är det centrala koncept att världen är tomhet och alla människor är ett. Även många västerländska filosofer har varit inne på idén som kallas solipsism, vilket för dem inte är någon insikt utan ett rationellt resonemang kring att man inte kan vara riktigt säker på att någonting förutom det egna sinnet verkligen existerar.

På NASA diskuterar man något som kallas solipsism syndrome, ett slags tillstånd som drabbar astronauter som vistats länge i isolation i rymden. De beskriver att allting framstår som overkligt som en dröm, att ingenting egentligen existerar. Många av dem väljer att dra sig undan världen. Man har diskuterat hur man ska kunna undvika detta, diskussionen blir väldigt rolig tycker jag – ungefär som att man försöker bygga in ett skydd mot intelligens och för djupa insikter om vad livet och världen verkligen är. De passar sig enbart i vissa forum som i de buddhistiska munkklostren och i asketernas grottor men utanför vill vi inte höra talas om någonting sådant. Blir inte det lite utav en motsägelse? Vi skickar astronauterna ut i rymden för att de ska uppleva den fruktansvärda insikten av att se hela sin värld som en liten ärta i världsrymden. De kliver runt alldeles ensamma på ökensatelliten där det inte finns något liv och förmodligen aldrig funnits och blickar i sina teleskop ut mot evigheten och förstår att stora delar av universum inte innehåller någonting alls. Men när de kommer tillbaka och ska förklara vad de sett vill vi inte höra på och förstår att vi måste begränsa deras seende något om de envisas med att berätta sådana där obehagliga saker.

Since my English blog died out I decided that I’m going to try to write in Swedish instead with a short summary in English down below. Today it’s raining, I have a cold and everything feels empty like the desert. I read that NASA are discussing that what they call the solipsism syndrome, a condition which might be faced by those astronauts who live in isolation in space or other planets for a long time. They say they experienced an overwhelming feeling that nothing is real, everything is a dream. The discussion is about how to prevent this from happening which sounds a bit funny to me, like we have to prevent people outside the Buddhist convents from receiving too much insight of what the world really is.

Isn’t it a little bit of a contradiction that we send the astronauts out to space to experience the horrible insight that comes from seeing their whole world like a little pea in the great emptiness. All alone they walk on the desert satellite where no life exist and when they in their telescopes gaze out in to the infiniteness they understand that most of it is probably completely empty. But when they come home and try to transmit what they experienced we don’t want to listen and try to figure out ways to make them see a little bit less.

It was told about a man who due to a bet was determined to stay in the white room for a whole year. A piece of cake he thought and bragged about how easy it would be since everything he could ever wish for would be in that room. Plate after plate with delicious meals came out of the nothingness and was placed before him together with brimful pots of wine. All around him there were large chests filled with gold, diamonds and the most precious gems ever to be seen in the world. With glowing eyes he let the gold pour from one hand to another. Never had he seen so much gold before, he was the richest man in the world! But every morning when he woke up the room was as white and shiningly empty as the morning before. He quickly got started wishing it all back. On the tenth day he woke dizzy from all the wine he had been drinking. He was lying on the floor like a newborn child with his arms around his head shielding himself from the vastness of the infinitely white. Was he really all alone? But if he was the only one there, how could he be the richest man on Earth? Wouldn’t he be the richest man even if he had only one single gold coin? His stomach was aching from all the food he had been eating. It was very uncomfortable. He started to suspect there were some vicious magic in this room that made the whine poisonous and the gold worthless. He had been fooled! He must find a way out of there.

He walked for what felt like hours, but he didn’t seem to be getting any closer to the wall. He wondered if he had been travelling in circles. Exhausted he sat down on the floor wishing for a glass of water. The marvelous taste of clean cold water spread in his palate and he immediately wished for another glass. With the empty glass in his hand he gazed out in the air. What could he really wish for that would be meaningful when it was gone the next day like it never even existed? In a way he was glad that no one could see him there in all his pitifulness, feeling sorry for himself. Salty tears fell down his cheek. He was very surprised, not since he was a child he had cried even a single tear drop. Deep inside of him, from the secret rooms of his heart he heard the faint whisper of a wish, and suddenly a beautiful silver flute lay in front of his feet on the floor. He gently picked it up and blew into it and the notes flew off like birds through the air. The rest of the day he continued practicing on the flute. The next day he wished for it again and so it continued for a month. He was surprised when he realized he could now play a tune on the beautiful flute. Another wish came to him, he wished for a book. Eagerly he read it from the beginning to the end. Although the book disappeared every night the knowledge stayed within him and kept his heart warm. He let his beard grow long so that it could reach the floor where he sat. When the year had past the room disappeared as quickly as it once occurred and he found himself sitting on the floor in the living room of his beautiful house in the city. He immediately hurried home to the friend with whom he had made the bet. He pounded on the door until the friend opened. When he saw his friend he threw himself at his feet and thanked him from the bottom of his heart. The friend was very surprised at first but smiled when he saw that it was good.

Empty handed is man born to this Earth, but empty handed do we not leave. Inside is the knowledge that we collected. The white room is inside every one of us. The road there can be long or short. In the white room there are no religious sins, you can only hurt yourself. In the white room there are no hunger for power, the thoughts of other human beings are not a concern for you. No one can there take what do not belong to them. Your belief and your knowledge are your own. All the books humanity has ever produced is there for your disposal and it is up to you to learn to see what is right and what is wrong or misunderstood. But always remember this, the world is what it is regardless of the humans understanding of it.

Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
Life is but a dream

I always wondered about the phrase Life is but a dream. It suddenly struck me that this must be what in Mahayana (great vehicle, sometimes boat) buddhism is called śūnyatā – void, unreal or non-existent. It’s kind of a peculiar thing to teach to children that everything you see is really non-existent. On the other hand, for children this might just not be so very strange after all. Children are curious and crave the answers to questions most adults stopped asking a long time ago.

I grew up in the countryside, far away from the disturbing pinkish city lights. The sky were as black as black can be. In winter people living in the northern regions do not see very much of the sun, but that didn’t use to bother us. We went for long walks only guided by the light from the distant stars above. I remember when my dad once pointed at the sky and told me that when we look into space we look back in time because the light that hits the human eye on Earth has been travelling for so long that we only see ancient pictures of stars that existed millions of years ago and might even ceased to exist by now.

I thought about this for a while and just made it part of my view of the world. A creature standing today on a planet far far away, about 4.5 billion light years away looking in our direction with a high tech telescope would be able to see the astonishing birth of our solar system. In the beam of light information is stored for eternity unless something is blocking it’s way. Amazingly enough there are such gaps in space reaching back almost to the birth of the universe. The Hubble telescope was directed towards a spot like this and was able to see 13 billion years back in time. This is a concept that is best if understood in an early age otherwise difficult philosophical questions appear. What am I in all of this? Is my contribution to the universe information in a hand full a light beams rushing through the universe bearing witness of my existence millions of years ago? Merrily, merrily. Life is but a dream.