>From: "authfriend" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Reply-To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com
>To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com
>Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Sat Yuga Fairy Tale? was: Forcing people to
>meditate, wa
>Date: Wed, 19 Apr 2006 14:42:44 -0000
>
>--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Hughes"
><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
><snip>
> > I think the seperation from nature is the whole issue with man, not
> > as individuals but as an evolutionary thing. The seperateness comes
> > from abstract thought, we are the only animal that knows that it will
> > die. All other creatures are blissfully ignorant of this and thus
> > joined to nature by lives of pure instinct.
>
>FWIW, there's some evidence that the higher apes are
>capable of abstract thought.
>
>If you paint a red splotch on an orangutan's head, then
>give it a mirror, it will look at itself in the mirror
>and then reach for its own head to find out what the
>splotch is. This is taken to mean that the orang has
>a sense of itself as an individual, some degree of self-
>awareneness.
>
>Whether it knows that it will die is another question.
>But do we really know we will die? I suggest that we
>know only that *others* die and extrapolate from that,
>but the bottom line is that this is really just a
>speculation, well founded though it may be.
>
>Our intuition, our gut sense, tells us otherwise: we
>literally cannot conceive--except on an intellectual
>level--that our consciousness will cease to exist (or
>that there was a time before our birth when it did not
>yet exist). We come to believe in the evidence that
>we will die because we see that others die, but it's
>still just a belief, and moreover a belief that
>contradicts our intuition.
>
>An orangutan also sees that others like itself die.
>The higher apes are known to mourn the deaths of
>others. Given the orangutan's sense of itself as
>an individual like other individuals it sees die,
>it's not *too* great a stretch to think it may also
>extrapolate to the idea that it too will die.
>
>In any case, my point is that it's not so much abstract
>thought that makes the difference, but rather the
>capacity for self-awareness, which must exist before any
>abstract thought can take place. But the capacity for
>self-awareness in and of itself may mandate some degree
>of abstract thought; and since some animals apparently
>do have self-awareness, it would follow that they also
>have some capacity for abstract thought.
>
>
>
>
Yes, I guess as we share 98% of our DNA with these guys there ought to be
more similarities than just physical appearance.
Is it possible to teach one of the other apes to meditate though?
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