Hello pilgrim-seeker_tom.
I have been meaning to get around to responding to this post and thought I would let someone else respond first. Given that nobody has responded yet and I have some free time I guess I am now going to post first. In my first response I will not be mentioning Hegel or the Dao De Jing because Hegel I have not read up on and the Dao De Jing just gets me excited. If you could send me a link to the Hegel video you mentioned in another thread that would be great. Later I will mention Dao De Jing as I think your “echoes of thoughts” are interesting.
I am going to present my analysis of the video in parts mainly because of the length of the video and time limitations imposed on myself.
I present here mixed and skeptical view as I feel it is important to keep an open mind. I find the video to be well worth watching.
One of the speakers mentions at around 4:20 to 4:30: That they have a long way to go. To me this is a very significant thing to take note of.
We have a long way to go.
I would like to mention here too that sometimes rules, laws and theories of science among others are dismissed in favor of the better, if not sometimes worse.
What is going on in the brain should be approached carefully as I think the mind and body certainly act differently and at the brain level we are truly only starting to probe things in focused senses as opposed to taking a holistic approach. Quantum mechanics has a few things to offer at the mico-tubule level for instance. The neural states the speaker mentions at around 7:30; the speaker states himself are relative to the subject or individual; this means that each persons neural states are unique, which makes sense.
I will now move onto compassion which is something I hold in high regard and think there is a lack of in this world. At 8:50 the speaker has a quote up on screen which speaks of non-referential compassion - this is something worthy of deep consideration. I speak in some of my other threads of self-reference which is great and all but I have thought for a while that there must be a non-reference type too.
At 13:47 the speaker says that muscle contributions do not account for the phenomenon observed - well I say they do - I say this because of research into mirror neurons - there is skepticism here but skepticism is healthy. The same skepticism should surround what this speaker says so that in the end we get it right.
At 15:15 the speaker states different neural states and this is valuable - if everyone is different then any treatment would be different. Acupuncture, pharmaceutical and massage to name a few would be tailored differently to each individual and compassion and empathy would be no different.
To be completely objective I really like the bit at 18:00 where he mentions being able to understand the suffering of sentient beings. I think to remove suffering we do need to be able to understand it and define it better.
It is very interesting how the monks are able to achieve a different state to the controls. There is a lot to be considered when it comes to meditation.
Well that is my thoughts on the first twenty minutes - I hope they are worth something.