do you believe in karma?

by SpiceItUp 108 Replies latest jw friends

apostatethunder

Personally I want only good karma in my life. If somebody doesn’t mind bad karma in theirs that’s their business.
sabastious

If that's all you mean Sab don't complicate things by using the word karma.
The reason I use the word is that it denotes a grander foundation beyond what is merely explained as probability. From a naturalistic point of view it's pure coincidence that both Hitler and Einstein were born 10 years apart from each other both having ultimate destinies for good and evil that would shape the face of the future of mankind as we know it. Were we lucky to get Einstein or unlucky to get Hitler? Far from it in! From a more religious perspective like that of Karma there is no such thing as coincidence, but rather only cause and effect which goes beyond human comprehension. Eventually evil is exposed and good, with all it's inherent benefits, will always spring forth to challenge evil unabated. Jesus said that the presence of the Son of Man comes like a theif in the night. It maybe appear that evil gets ahead, but when you look at the big picture it is ultimately vanquished by the forces of good. The full extent of the process may span many generations and that's why it's important to keep an open mind as to how it all plays out. But ultimately we can be sure that doing the moral thing will pan out no matter what. There is reason to be moral.
-Sab
frankiespeakin

Karma requires a patern,,paterns are the way the human psyche perceive events as happening,,they are human psychic projections,,, in other words we make the paterns according to our understanding and perceptions of the outside world it all happens in the imaginary world that we percieve as "out there",,, but in reality it is much closer because it is "us" and our perceptions and that is where it all happens.
So we either make or don't make "karma" by the way we percieve the world it is a tool of the psyche,, a projection of paterns we see,,in the mind.
frankiespeakin

The Wheel of Samara:
http://kentonwhitman.com/2007/08/13/the-wheel-of-samsara/
And getting off the wheel:
http://zennist.typepad.com/zenfiles/2010/08/getting-off-the-wheel.html
dorayakii

Karma is nothing more than a child-like desire to believe in rewards and punishments.
I agree... it is a kind of superstition.
It is child-like in the sense that it appeals to one of the earliest plaintive exclamations that we have as children: "IT'S NOT FAIR!!"
It's a human characteristic to seek justice and fairness, and we project this anthropocentric appeal onto the cosmos. However, in reality, the universe is NOT fair, it doesn't think about how to punish those who do wrong things.
As a very famous scientist said, nature is "red in tooth and claw", and humans are a part of nature, so we are not exempt from its "disinterest" and "impartiality". Because we have bigger brains we can manipulate the outcome of our actions much more than other animals...
...BUT another side-effect of our big brains is our overactive imaginations, and our subconscious search for patterns where none exist (how many people have seen an animal or a face in the clouds? or fallen 'victim' to a really good optical illusion?). What makes us human is our desire for "meaning" and order in our lives and we find it very difficult to shake off those feelings even in adulthood...

I consider myself one of the least superstitious people I know but even I the other day fell victim to my human nature to look for meaning. I saw a magpie and looked around for another one for a good while before stopping and thinking "What on Earth am I doing?". The strange thing is, I was never taught to be superstitious in that way. Brought up as a JW, I was superstitious in the sense of believing in God, angels, demons etc. but the JWs as you all know reject superstitions of the "black cat", "walk under ladder" kind. It was a minor example of my brain looking for meaning, patterns, signs... and it completely circumnavigated my rational mind.
dorayakii

Karma requires a patern,,paterns are the way the human psyche perceive events as happening,,they are human psychic projections,,,
I agree frankiespeakin, the idea of karma is not a cosmic concept, it is a psychological concept. Humans can perceive the same events as good or as bad depending on their mood or frame of mind. When we do good things, we feel that we deserve something good so we either perceive neutral events AS good, OR we notice the objectively good events more.
It is called "counterfactual thinking", and it colours every aspect of our lives. When we break up with our partner amicably we often remember the good times... when we break up violently, we immediately dwell on the negative things... If we win a bronze medal, we can feel terrible that we didn't win the gold or silver, or we can feel grateful that we won anything at all and are actually the third best at our sport in the world. It's all about frame of mind.
Human brains (and animal brains) constantly fall victim to the "post hoc ergo propter hoc" fallacy, also known as "correlation is not causation" which basically means that " since that event followed this one, that event must have been caused by this one."Sometimes it's called " Rooster Syndrome", a belief that the crowing of the cockerel actually causes the sun to rise".
Many experiments have been done on different animals showing how they associate certain actions with a certain result even though it is not the real cause. Superstitious practices such as lucky pants/socks, lucky mascots, rituals before tests examinations and other superstitious practices are a result of this behaviour trait. We ALL do it, no matter how "rational" we are.
Another human trait which probably evolved to help us in social interactions is the "Theory of Mind". In order for us to feel empathy for someone or guess what they are thinking, we need to realise that they too have a mind. This seems very simple, but it is not.
An experiment with chimpanzees and 6-year old human children was carried out recently. There were two pairs of sunglasses, the blue one was completely opaque, letter no light through; the yellow one was a normal pair of sunglasses. The participant (whether chimp or 6 year old) tried on both pairs of glasses and then the glasses were given to 2 adults sitting on a sofa. The two people had sweets in their hands.
The participant was encouraged to ask one of the sweet-bearing adults for some sweets without speaking, just indicating by gesture that you would like some. The children ALWAYS went to the person with yellow sunglasses, and when asked "why?" they replied "because he can see, and she can't see". The chimps on the other hand, approached the seated sweet-bearing adults randomly, not grasping that the blue-glasses clad woman could NOT see them, even though they'd tried on the glasses themselves. They were utterly confused at why the woman with the blue glasses would not give them anything.
The conclusion is that chimps don't have a Theory of Mind. They cannot imagine that another peoson has their own perspective, their own mind.
The Theory of Mind is one of the unique characteristics that makes us human, it enables empathy, and empathy is the basis for morality.
However, it also has side-effects:
Whenever people saw storms destroy their crops and attributed it to a sky-god, they were misapplying the Theory of Mind to storms. Whenever you shout at your computer and curse it for not working, you are assuming it has a malicious mind that is out to get you. Whenever we assume that the cosmos has a "plan" or rewards us for our good actions and seeks retribution for our bad actions we are misapplying the Theory of Mind to the cosmos.
Any discussion of karma is difficult because there are so many schools of thought about what it is. It is not a scientific term that has an internationally recognised and exclusive meaning. However, the kind of karma that means "the cosmos will punish me for bad, and reward me for good", is a misapplication of the Theory of Mind.
cofty

dorayakii - interesting stuff about the theory of mind thanks.
DarioKehl

no. i believe people remember the hits and forget the misses.
the human brain is hard-wired to automatically search for patterns within random noise or mistakenly assign significance to vague or random stimuli.
even though things like these happen, spilling coffee in my lap on wednesday has nothing to do with upsetting a coworker the previous week. giving a bum change will not make my job search any more successful.
each of us do good things and bad things, intentionally and unintentionally. each of us experience daily crises and successes. believing that there is causality or meaning to them is flawed thinking. it's an illusion. anyone can play connect the dots with multiple unrelated events and assign a special significance to an apparent connection, but, there are far more other ways in which these connections can be arranged. our brains find the ones that appear to make sense.
i do it all the time even though i know it's woo. but when left unrestrained, very dangerous things can happen. case in point: that terrible book "the secret" was responsible for ruining lives and destroying the confidence of many people because it tells you that if you just "will" or "believe" or "think" about things happening, the "energy" (GOD pseudoscientists love that word, don't they?) connected to the universe will "realign" your future and those wishes will simply "create" the desired outcome. it's pure BS. think of all the good people who suffer and the wicked who seem to have it all so easy. for every example of "karma," you can easily find a dozen of examples refuting the idea.
uncomfortable, i know. but welcome to the world of reality!
cofty

Refreshing to see so much rational thinking.

do you believe in karma?

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