PZ Myers goes somewhere he shouldn't...

I'm a Buddhist kind of guy that deprecates the usage of the word "spiritual" because it means more things to more people - as well as less things to more people-  than I wish to convey with my practice.   Here, Professor Myers goes over the line wth someone who himself goes over the line, as far as "spiritual" things and "Buddhist" things are concerned:

Take some woo-inclined individual, put their brain to work on some incompletely understood process, and it’s pretty much guaranteed that they’ll come back to you utterly convinced that mundane physical events are ultimately confirming evidence for whatever metaphysical nonsense is poisonously wafting about in their heads. And now we have a wonderful example of this kind of sloppy stupid bullshit right here on freethoughtblogs.

I have no idea why Daniel Fincke is indulging this Eric Steinhart character, but he’s had a number of guest posts lately that are raving mad rationalizations for ‘spirituality’, whatever the hell that is. Here’s an example.

Spiritual exercises typically involve mental preparation for performance through visualization or emotional preparation for performance through arousal regulation. Visualization involves working with mental imagery while arousal regulation involves conscious control of physiological and emotional arousal (it involves neocortical control of the limbic system and autonomic nervous system).

Now I haven't read Fincke, and frankly I've no problem with calling certain practices "preparation for performance," since that's sometimes largely what a practice is.  Sometimes - oftentimes - the practice is the performance itself.   But I actually agree with Myers that this is a bunch of pseudo-scientific gobbldey-gook.

Just practice!  You don't have to justify to me or anyone else why you're doing it.  But Myers goes on:

Notice the scientific justification of “neocortical control of the limbic system and autonomic nervous system” — sure, that’s the core of your brain that is involved in arousal, and we know that from scientific experiments and observations. But look what he does: he calls these spiritual exercises.

They are not. They are physiological exercises. They do not manipulate “spirit”, they change the physical state of the brain. But these glib pseudoscientific quacks just love to borrow the language of science and slap the label of “spiritual” or “Wiccan” or “transcendental meditation” or “Buddhist” onto them. It’s intellectual theft, plain and simple: it’s woo-meisters doing their damnedest to appropriate natural phenomena to their cause. It’s the same thing as when Pat Robertson ascribes a natural disaster to the wrath of a divine being — he’s pointing to reality and claiming it for the kingdom of irrational supernaturalism.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Spiritual, physiological, blah, blah, blah. Just practice!

I really don't mind if you call them "spiritual," "physiological," or "performative" exercises. (Heh, folks like Myers could do well to read more po-mo stuff - they'd get more words.)

Point is, if you don't mindfully practice, you won't mindfully perform anything whatever it is and whatever you call it, and your chance at attaining any skill is worse than a shooting craps.

I realize that not all Buddhists - maybe most! - don't have the viewpoint I have here,  but Myers should understand that not all Buddhists are woo-meisters.

Updated shortly after I wrote the above:
OK, now I've read Fincke, and I understand a bit why Myers is peeved: it looks like a justification for applying "spiritual" things to "atheist" things.  Once upon a time I thought "spiritual" wasn't a bad word, and my embrace of Buddhism was an attempt to reconcile the "spiritual" aspirations I thought I had with the reality I encountered.   Eventually - via practice - I realized that the aspiration itself was an issue - which meant the "spiritual" could be dropped as well.  But having said that, I still take issue with Myers.  There ought to be no problem with an atheist doing meditation; ask Stephen Batchelor, or me.  I don't call it "spiritual;" I don't know what Batchelor calls it.  But the meditation is good practice for the practice of actually being there in your day to day life, whatever adjectives you might append.  Myers would do well to ...um...pay attention.

More water...

I generally like Brad Warner's blog posts; he's sincere, and he actually has some knowledge of what he's doing, even if there are some subtle differences in what he does and was taught versus me. But....

 Let's first go where I largely agree...

I've said several times that I feel like Buddhism is sort of like advanced physics. Albert Einstein pioneered so much of advanced physics it might be considered appropriate to call it "Einsteinism." But if we did that we would not want to stop all of advanced physics at the point of Albert Einstein's death and say anything that came after is not legitimate.

Same with Buddhism. Buddha never claimed to be a prophet or messiah. So to say Buddhism stops with the death of the historical Buddha would be a grave misunderstanding of Buddhism. Westernization and modernization of Buddhism is inevitable and helpful....

 Yeah, Buddhism continues with the Buddhist practitioner, and the Buddha can be made into an idol even by iconoclastic Westerners in the same manner as Che Guevara or Bruce Lee.  This "nowness" of Buddhism is one of those things that was extremely attractive to me, and resolved some of the conundra of Christianity, viz. the issue of dead folks before "Jesus," people at "Jesus'" "time" in history, and us now...and yeah, it resolved those conundra by saying there was too much myth and thinking overlayed onto what might have been - or not - a reformer of Judaism.  

And then...

 I was going over the galleys of Nishijima Roshi's translation of Nagarjuna's Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way. It's due out in about a month. In the translation, Nishijima Roshi insists upon translating the Sanskrit word shunyata as "the balanced state."

Everybody knows that the word shunyata means "emptiness." This is the accepted translation of shunyata and has been for many years. Nishijima himself is well aware of this. But he also felt that the word "emptiness" in English really did not convey what Nagarjuna was talking about when he used the word shunyata...

"Balanced state" is an improper translation of shunyata. No doubt about it. But it may convey more of the meaning of shunyata than the word "emptiness" is able to. That was Nishijima's feeling anyway.

The translation is idiosyncratic. It does not match other English translations. But there are several more standard versions easily available to anyone who wants them. There is no reason for yet another one of those.

People worry themselves far too much about the Westernization and modernization of Buddhism. It's nice to have faithful versions of ancient texts. But we also have to be aware that even the most faithful versions we can produce are not faithful. Even if we read the texts in their original languages, we come from such a different place culturally we still won't be able to get what the people who wrote them meant exactly. Even the people who read those texts during the authors' lifetimes may not have fully understood what their writers meant.

It's hopeless!

Brad, I know you must defend your master (oh, no, I quoted Uma Thurman's character in Kill Bill Vol. I!) but really there's no excuse for an inaccurate  translation, and "balanced" simply does not convey shunyata, especially either to Westerners or Japanese.

His post goes on to quote Nishijima-roshi on these things, and I am pretty sure he gets the science all wrong here.  For example,  the autonomous nervous plays a large role in the "fight or flight" response, and it's actually the conditioning of both nervous systems that allows us to do stuff like swim, abstain from bodily functions when necessary, and so forth. It's not in any way a "balance" of these nervous systems so much as a training of them to be able to function in the world in a manner that's more effective for all beings.  And of course to say that "Nagarajuna appears to me to be saying here that until the autonomic nervous becomes balanced, it is impossible for the real universe to become clear," mixes anachronism into it.  I've read Nagarajuna, Brad, and you can't find a whiff of neurophysiology in his Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way.  You will find deep precursory thought to the existentialists and post-modernists, but not neurophysiology.

And yet despite all of the above, I still have a great admiration for Warner, and via him, his teacher Nishijima-roshi.  They've actually done the practice, jumped off the 100 ft. pole and all that stuff. It's not so much that I don't care that they're wrong; I care more for who they are, so that even when they're flat out wrong, I can still write the above with that level of respect.

But I tell you, there's more science in Wing Chun - namely mechanical physics, and yes, behavioral psychology - than there is in any of the above. Much more.  We don't need to overlay pseudo-scientific gobbledygook into Zen practice, especially when there's enough empirical evidence to show that, regardless of the "spirituality" involved or not, it's helpful.

More Holiday Woo!

Via a tweet by ~c4chaos I learned of this article. That article refers to this paper here.  I will go into more detail later about it, but I suspect these are yeah, poorly done studies, and I'll explain why later. I could be wrong, but I will have more to say later.

Can we pursue happiness? Should we pursue happiness?

A recent post on the Tricycle blog talked about "The Pursuit of Happiness Project," which is some kind of conference:

Hosted by Emory’s Center for the Study of Law and Religion, the conference marks the fifth year of a project in which 18 senior fellows studied the traditional teachings of happiness versus scientific understanding of what happiness is.

It's at Emory University, which I believe is in Georgia (Atlanta area?), and its website states:

Most famously formulated in the American Declaration of Independence, "the pursuit of happiness" theme is an ancient and enduring Western ideal grounded in various Hebrew, Greco-Roman, Christian, and Enlightenment sources. Recent developments in positive psychology have brought the idea of happiness back to public attention with a flurry of books and undergraduate courses. By putting religion and science in conversation, and by focusing on the relation between altruistic love and happiness, our project will retrieve some of the rich traditional teachings captured in this ideal and reconstruct them for our day in light of the new findings of the human and social sciences and of the new liberties of constitutional democracies.

Before I go any further, the Voice of Cynicism (see? I can do Big Mind speak too!) in me wants you to know about the rest of the story, also from their website:

Project Accomplishments

• Roundtable, October 13-15, 2006
• Roundtable, April 20-22, 2007
• Roundtable, October 12-14, 2007
• Roundtable, April 11-13, 2008
• Roundtable, April 17-19, 2009
• Roundtable, October 16-18, 2009
• Roundtable, April 16-18, 2010

Sponsors

The John Templeton Foundation and an anonymous donor

Voice of Cynicism:  Now, I tell people regularly working on my project never to write in status reports, "We had a meeting"  and call that an accomplishment.  What I, and those in upper management want to know is the results: inquiring minds want to know just which rich traditional teachings were captured in this [Judeo-Christian and Western philosphical]  ideal and reconstructed for our day in light of the new findings of the human and social sciences?

Blogging Me: Of course the John Templeton Foundation's famous for not asking  questions that result in answers that can stand up to criticism (just ask Richard Dawkins), and it's a good gig, I suppose, for those that can make the right pitch.  OK, well, that's the Voice of Cynicism for you; always trying to ask about those damned results.  

 But, as I often do, I digress.

I want to know, and perhaps it's worth asking in depth: should we be happy? Should we pursue happiness?

I once admit I actually bought and read the book to the left above here; it's probably still in my house somewhere.  I don't remember the details other than a warm and fuzzy feeling throughout.   But I also remember the book I  read to the left below here (many times in Japanese hotels, and finally obtained a copy in a Pure Land Japanese-heritage Buddhist temple); and especially it brings to my mind the story of the Buddha himself.

The Buddha lived in the lap of luxury; he had a family, and yet was still disturbed at the sight of sickness and death.  The Buddha came to realize that sickness, death, and suffering were our lot.  It is the condition of being human.  There is simply no escape from this.  We are born to die. 

So what's this about happiness anyway?

Well, the Buddha said,

A man struggling for existence will naturally look for something of value.  There are two ways of looking -- a right way and a wrong way.   If he looks in the wrong way he recognizes that sickness, old age and death are unavoidable, but he seeks the opposite.

If he looks in the right way he recognizes the true nature of sickness, old age and death, and he searches for meaning in that which transcends all human sufferings.  In my life of pleasures I seem to be looking in the wrong way."

The true nature of these things,  like happiness, is that they are fundamentally empty.   There is no essence of happiness; the pain is really felt, the happiness is really felt, but it cannot be captured and mounted like a butterfly. Happiness is pleasurable, and that should set off warning bells right there that from a Buddhist standpoint, it is neither to be craved nor avoided.  Yes, one should not be attached to happiness in the same way that one should not be attached to the avoidance of suffering.

Of course, deep mindful  practiced existence of this will bring relief via transcendence of suffering via profound, heavy compassion for all beings.  But to want to "get happy" by doing these things is simply another attachment, and you'll be sure to avoid the happiness that comes from radical acceptance of what is really there..  The highest principle in the transcendence of unhappiness is vast emptiness and nothing holy.

Just do your best with what you have at the time; remember the sufferings you feel are echoed in every other being and their sufferings are resonating in your suffering.

And just forget about pursuing happiness.  You'll be happy When the Revolution Comes. Or Jesus. Or Maritreya, or the 12th Imam. Or Bono.

You're not there anyway, so maybe it'll be a good idea to try to be nice to those around you and give them a break.

Scientific findings (more or less)

• Brains are found to "re-network" themselves in response to "Integrative Mind Body Training," a meditation technique.
• Exercise can apparently moderate anger to at least some extent.
• I too like swimming, though I've never had a serious exercise related injury...that I can remember.

“I was frankly demoralized that I’d be one of those people who ‘used to run’ and athletics would slowly become part of my past,” Jason said. It took time and effort to learn a new sport, he added. But now he loves swimming, especially, he says, the meditative aspect. “For 45 minutes, I can see little, hear only my thoughts, and talk to no one.” 

• I have to contact a good friend who needs me.
• Low carb diets are good for your heart.  Squaring that with wanting to leave a smaller earth foot-print to me is akin to "eating less."  As readers of this blog probably know, I am not a vegetarian, and I have moral and ethical issues with the idea that humans, who clearly have been evolving from and as meat eaters, should abandon all animal-based protein.  But in keeping with preserving life as much as possible, and in understanding that there's over 6 billion of us to feed, we have to do better about how we gather, prepare, and consume food.
• Thankfully, nipple piercings have given some researchers a topic to study, and the study indicates that some serious things might happen.
• Ray Kurzweil is a quack.  Oh, and for a variety of reasons I doubt his "singularity" will arrive. But PZ Myers isn't completely right either.

More on Reincarnation and Buddhism

As I was reading the recent book on Hakuin to the left, it became clear to me, a quite rationalist, scientific minded person, that the notions or rebirth do indeed permeate much of the thought of Edo-era Japanese Buddhism.  Hakuin, is quite cosmopolitan in his use of devices which, if interpreted literally,  would be dismissed as woo and superstition today among the skeptics and rationalists.  And frankly, those bits would get in the way   of the larger purpose of Hakuin.  Similarly, jn my opinion, attachment to the tulku system and the merging of politics with religion has been disastrous for Tibetan Buddhism and the young boys who undergo déformation professionnelle to support that system.  What is the place, if any, for rebirth in Buddhism?  Yeah, we can interpret rebirth in such a way as to reconcile it with modern notions of multiverses, of awareness arising and descending and so forth.  But a literal rebirth?

As I said, Hakuin uses many opportunities for introducing the supernatiural into his writing.  Among the opportunities taken, there is kami speaking through a young boy, as well as the implicit understanding of a soul-less rebirth in which the reborn has no prior memory of "his previous life."  And of course there's the precipitating events of his life, about being worried about being reborn in a kind of Buddhist hell.   Although I have not read all of the existing English literature of Dogen,  what I have read does not leave me with a memory of what I would call the superstitious, so perhaps in this regard the Soto folks have it easier.

How to reconcile all of that with a modern outlook?  Well, is that even the right question?  In a certain sense, I think it it is: clearly if one engages in the practices developed and promulgated by Hakuin, one clearly develops an understanding and skill to be able to function in previously difficult circumstances.  There is no doubt about that, and I could set up an experiment to verify that, and indeed these practices do have their counterparts in mindfulness-based cognitive behavioral therapy.   So the reconciliation of the more superstitious elements of the traditions of Buddhism is a) something humans do naturally (resolve issues of cognitive dissonance) b) is useful for deepening the practice, and c) is a way of enhancing the view of the world that allows for this practice to be extended and useful for all beings.  So, yeah, how to reconcile?

Well, I would submit that it is necessary that, as I've previously written, that claims that are at variance with that which can be falsified via science should not be made as though science does not matter.   And those claims which cannot be falsified one should not demand that others respect them or honor them, simply as a matter of compassion and mercy as well as  savior-faire. Realistically, Tibetan monks finding the dead lama reborn as a young boy are treating the dead lama as the Virgin Mary and the young boy as a piece of toast in which they see her, or at least it is impossible to to show that they are not, and it is a bit arrogant to suggest that the rest of the world honor that decision simply because it is a "belief."   It may be honored for other reasons (such as wanting to not injure others' feelings, or wanting to ensure that things of higher priority are given the attention they deserve),  but there is no more reason to accept these sorts of things than it is to allow creationists to teach their kids creationism instead of science.

So my basic "reconciliation" is simply: that which is not useful to the objectives of Buddhism (helping beings, remember them?) should be treated sensibly and with compassion and mercy.  But we should be sincere about what is and what is not science and what is and what is not verifiable. 

In good science we have well-constructed experiments; these experiments allow for observation of results of  hypotheses to be well-separated.  That means that the possibility for  mis-identificatin of hypotheses causing the observation is minmal, or as we say there are a minimum of false detections and false alarms (or false positives and false negatives). In addition, these experiments are repeatable; they can be done time after time after time,  and the outcomes can be predicted. In communication systems, for example, a radio receiver is in effect a device which is constantly separating hypotheses of one type of signal received compared to others or no signal at all.  When real scientists speak of evidence, they mean  evidence in this way.  That's how you can tell a scientist from a non-scientist .  If they are talking about anecdotal evidence (e.g, "evidence" of reincarnation) , they are not talking about scientific evidence in the sense that scientists would use.  They may be talking about observations which might be able to be verified scientifically, but if such phenomena cannot be separated from naturally occurring explanations, we should insist that extraordinary claims do require extraordinary proof.  With regard to reincarnation, there just has not been that kind of evidence shown, and to insist on agnosticism in the face of such a damning lack of evidence is, in my opinion, unreasonable; it is as unreasonable as asserting that  we should be agnostic as to whether unicorns exist because there has been no good observation as to whether they do or do not exist.

So regarding my comments on Dr. Tart's work previously: if he does want to subject his work to scientific scrutiny, I will be happy to assist him in the protocols,  if I have the time, to help him collect $1 million from the James Randi foundation. 

Perhaps they'd like to talk to a real science/engeineering guy...

The Buddhist Geeks, did that nice interview with Genpo Dennis Merzel, which enabled Gniz to consider Merzel's responses here. It turns out the Geeks are also planning on having a "Dharma 2.0" conference in Boulder CO in 2010.

I tweeted them. I presume that means I tweeted Vince Horn, since the agenda seems to cover some of what I cover here:

* Buddhism & Technology – The information age has radically altered almost every dimension of our personal lives, our society, and economy. What impact will it have on the Buddhist tradition, and are there ways we can consciously adopt technologies to benefit Buddhist communities?

* Cutting-edge Buddhist Practices – Many Buddhist teachers are being informed directly by other pre-existing traditions of personal exploration and change. The result is that all sorts of innovate and interesting hybrid practices are emerging in the Buddhist world. Are these practices as radical as their creators claim? Or are there examples of teachers who are simply watering down the teachings of the Buddha, re-packaging them in fancy garb, and charging gobs of money for them? We’ll explore these questions, as well engage in some of the more promising of these hybrid practices.

* Buddhism & Science – Scientific explorations into the benefits of Buddhist-style meditation have exploded in the past several years. What is the implication for the Buddhist tradition, and for the wider populous?

* The Future of Buddhism in the West – Underlying all of the previous topics is a question about where we are now, and where we are heading tomorrow. With such an array of complex factors influencing the development of Buddhism today, how can we engage with the future in a way that honors the rapidly changing nature of things, and the need to act quickly at times, with the deep-rooted need to stay present with what is?

I figured, with all I have recently said about "Intelligent" "Design," (especially the Wilber kind), "Biocentrism," and other fads, it would be useful to have a real engineer (i.e., and applied scientist) with over 50 patents (or is it 60?) address some Buddhists to talk about What Science Really Is, and How Buddhism Relates to Science.

Or I could talk about Buddhism and Technology. As a guy whose work is actually in phones I use, I know something about the latter, and as a Buddhist, well, I know something about the former. But then if I went there I would go all Nagarjuna/nullity on the whole issue, because ultimately it's how you behave, it's how you practice with the other sentient beings, not things that increase our footprint and are hard to recycle.

Of course, I could also talk about "The Future of Buddhism in the West," especially given my position that whatever I've seen from the Big Names from Buddhism in the West, there simply has not been anyone like a Lin Chi, a Yun-Men, a Dogen or a Hakuin.

I could also talk about Buddhism and Western Ethics or What I Have to Do Ethically in My Job versus What Some Buddhists Do. With respect to some Buddhists, those that give away the Dharma, I come up short (well duh, I labor in a capitalist enterprise!) With others, though...

Anyway, if they reply maybe it would be useful to start a dialogue there. Worst comes to worst, Boulder's not such a bad place...

Keeping the woo out of 無

The confluence of a post by PZ Meyers mentioning one Robert Lanza, and a post on The Buddhist blog on "Biocentrism" makes me realize that it's a good idea to put up a post on science and Buddhism. Perhaps it will illuminate other posts and comments made this week.

This is something I'm quite passionate about as an engineer (we are applied scientists, you know). And I'm quite passionate about it as a Buddhist. So so so much of what spiritual hucksters push is based on the assumption - often a correct one - that their markets are ignorant and gullible. This is true whether you're talking about "meditation technology," "voice dialogue," or creationism and textual literalism. It's all bunk.

Science has to do with the observable, measurable, that can be explained within the natural world. We may need machines to help us with the observation, but if we can't make an experiment that can answer questions about it, it's not falsifiable and it's not science.

For more on this, see "Baloney Detection Kit" (google with Carl Sagan).

Or watch this:



Now having said all that, what is outside the range of what can be measured and observed rightly belongs to the metaphysical, and make no mistake about it, even die hard methodological naturalists who say "There is nothing else!" are making claims about the metaphysical.

When we say "Buddha nature pervades the whole universe" we are making a statement about Buddha nature and the universe. To a certain extent this seems to comport with observation (the impermanence of phenomena, e.g.) and to a certain extent we are making a statement that is beyond physics (an aware Buddha nature pervades the whole universe). When we speak of satori (悟り)we are making claims about awareness that likely are correlated with observable patterns in brainwave activity that themselves are absent when the living brain ceases to exist. The permanence or impermanence of awareness is a metaphysical question, though from all available evidence the idea that this memory (of myself, or even my particular experience of 悟り - assuming I have had it of course) survives brain death is absurd, or at best unprovable, especially given what we know about brain damage and the structure in which memories are formed in the brain. That there may be a universal awareness is another issue entirely, but it - like the very issue of subjective awareness itself - seems to elude the ability to assess an objective repeatable observation.

Now while as a Buddhist and a scientist I have no problem with "What we perceive as reality is a process that involves our consciousness," and ". Our external and internal perceptions are inextricably intertwined," there are other "tenets" of Biocentrism that are simply absurd from a scientific (and should be therefore from a Buddhist) point of view. Quoting from James Ure's quotes from Wikipedia:

• The behavior of subatomic particles, indeed all particles and objects, is inextricably linked to the presence of an observer. Without the presence of a conscious observer, they at best exist in an undetermined state of probability waves.
  
  This is mashing up a few concepts from quantum physics and imposing a metaphysical subjectivism on the whole mush. There are quantum states linked to specific probability distributions. Wave/particle duality - a phenomenon that has to do with specific ways of making specific experiments - should not be invoked to conclude that without an observer all particles are in some kind of shadow maybe existence. This is a big leap away from what the actual theory says! In fact, these theories imply that there is are well-known predictable relationships among the parameters describing the objects! In particular, they imply that position and momentum are Fourier transform pairs, and it "just falls out of the mathemtatics" that there is forever dual uncertainty in both measurements.
  
  Moreover, if one reads a bit about quantum physics on the 'net, you'll see the idea being referred to with respect to observers is quantum coupling of states (i.e., multiple normally separate systems are connected somehow), which again, need not invoke living beings.
  



• The structure of the universe is explainable only through biocentrism.
  It should be immediately apparent that this is not the case.
  



• Time does not have a real existence outside of animal-sense perception.
  
  To a certain extent this is a metaphysical statement; but it seems to be absurd given what we know about cosmology (i.e., it is pretty much a given that spatial dimensions and time came into being with the advent of the universe).

I could go further, much further on this.

That we "inter-be" with the rest of the universe does not mean that the laws of physics depend on us for their existence, and if we were all to perish, and there was no way to communicate in a sophisticated way inter-specially, we could not have a way to assess the human aspect of biocentrism, and so we could not assess the theory.

But let's go in one more direction (sorry for the length of the post). Recently...

Scientists say they've made a breakthrough in their pursuit of computers that "think" like a living thing's brain - an effort that tests the limits of technology.

Even the world's most powerful supercomputers can't replicate basic aspects of the human mind. The machines can't imagine a wall painted a different colour, for instance, or picture a person's face and connect that to an emotion.

If researchers can make computers operate more like a brain thinks - by reasoning and dealing with abstractions, among other things - they could unleash tremendous insights in such diverse fields as medicine and economics.

A computer with the power of a human brain is not yet near.

But this week researchers from IBM are reporting that they've simulated a cat's cerebral cortex, the thinking part of the brain, using a massive supercomputer.

You see where I'm going I hope: is the computer included in biocentrism? Why not? Why?

We might be electrochemical thinking meat machines. We can't seem to observe otherwise. Clearly we're connected to the rest of existence, and we can sometimes sense a greater awareness of that than at other times.

But let's not push woo into 無 (which is pronounced as "wu" in some forms of Chinese, in case you didn't get the pun).