• Internet pharmacies are more dangerous than they need to be

    5. Mai. 2009, 21:37



    Ah, the Internet! A new world of pure thought, free of the limits and coercion of the physical world. "Ours is a world that is both everywhere and nowhere, but it is not where bodies live," wrote John Perry Barlow four years ago in "A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace". Barlow had no monopoly on Internet euphoria--the idea that cyberspace is too intangible, too slippery, too ubiquitous to be controlled by
    government. Even today, sober analysts make much the same argument in less hyperbolic language, and technologists talk about "building the future" to bypass political barriers. But human beings do not exist apart from their bodies. We are
    matter-bound creatures.
    The same desires for independence, expression, and identity that cyberutopians like Barlow celebrate in the world of bits operate in the world of cells. People want control not only of their words and thoughts but of their bodies. We're a long way from having such control--our bodies have a nasty habit of failing us--but biology is
    clearly the next great technological frontier. Already, medicine has gone beyond the traditional realm of curing illnesses to give us tools for enhancing our capabilities. Rather than hewing to a clear-cut model of "disease," we are increasingly changing
    biological conditions we simply don't like. Sometimes we treat these conditions with pharmaceuticals, such as birth control pills, hormone replacement therapy, or Viagra. In other cases, we just wax our eyebrows or dye our hair. Once we leave the disease model, the doctor-patient relationship changes. When a condition does not require a diagnosis, there is less detective work involved, and hence less expertise. Certainly, physicians usually know more than patients about possible treatments, just as hairdressers know more about color combinations. But the Internet makes medical information accessible and abundant, and in many cases patients would rather take care of themselves. They may have already seen a physician and just want more of what was prescribed at that time. Or they may prefer the privacy and
    convenience of a Web-based medical consultation to the invasiveness and hassle of a physician visit.

    [googlevideo] http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1332346450541812490&ei=f7EASoPOJaHg2wKF4q3wCg&q=[/googlevideo]
  • become aware of the body

    14. Jan. 2009, 0:50



    We are not conscious even of our physical body. We remain unaware of it. Only when some part is diseased do we become aware. One must become aware of the body in health. To be aware of the body in disease is just an emergency measure. It is a natural, built-in process. Your mind must be aware when some part of the body is diseased so that it can be taken care of, but the moment it becomes alright again you become sleepy about it. Tension means a gap between what you are and what you want to be. If the gap is great, the tension will be great. If the gap is small, the tension will be small. And if there is no gap at all, it means you are satisfied with what you are. In other words, you do not long to be anything other than what you are. Then your mind exists in the moment. There is nothing to be tense about; you are at ease with yourself. You are in the Tao. If there is no gap you are religious; you are in the dharma. It is said of Jesus that he never laughed. It was perhaps his sad look and the picture of his physical form on the cross that became the focal point of at traction for people, most of whom are themselves unhappy and miserable. In a deep sense Mahavira and Buddha are against life too. They are in favor of some other life in some other world; they support a kind of liberation from this life. Krishna does not use the word dharma to mean the traditional religions like those of the Hindus, Christians and Mohammedans. The Sanskrit word dharma really means self-nature, one's innate nature, one's essential nature, and it is in this sense that Krishna divides it into the primal nature or the self-nature, and the alien nature, the nature other than one's own. It is a question of one's own individuality, one's own subjectivity being quite different from the individuality of others. It is a question of your being truly yourself and not imitating another, not trying to be like another person, whoever he may be. Krishna says, "Be immaculately yourself. Follow your own true nature and don't follow and imitate any other." He says, "Don't follow a guru or guide. Be your own guide. Don't allow your individuality, your subjectivity to be dominated, dictated and smothered by anybody else. In short, don't follow, don't imitate any other person."

  • do not think that you do anything

    10. Jan. 2009, 16:11

    Now I am going to make a statement here. I don't know whether it fits into the category of other people's statements or not. But whether it fits into their category or whether it doesn't, it obviously fits into some category. So in that respect it is no different from their statements. However, let me try making my statement. There is a beginning. There is a not yet beginning to be a beginning. There is a not yet beginning to be a not yet beginning to be a beginning. There is being. There is nonbeing. There is a not yet beginning to be nonbeing. There is a not yet beginning to be a not yet beginning to be nonbeing. Suddenly there is nonbeing. But I do not know, when it comes to nonbeing, which is really being and which is nonbeing. Now I have just said something. But I don't know whether what I have said has really said something or whether it hasn't said something.



  • Leibnitz and the Taoist „I Ching“

    16. Nov. 2008, 19:54

    In 1734 Leibnitz published „Mathematical Proof of the Creation and Ordering of the World“. The mathematics was correct and was based on the discovery of binary notation that allowed writing any integer using only 0s and 1s; for instance, 2 becomes 10, 3 becomes 11, 4 becomes 100 and so on. Leibnitz had the idea while meditating on the hexagrams of classic Taoist „I Ching“, whom he had learnt about through some acquaintances of his who were missionaries in China.