Being nothing is not the goal here. By being nothing, with no thoughts or motion, we would be dead!
The point here is Understanding that we are nothing, to make it easier to let go of the material world, or to let go of any pains that befall us. In this way we have calmness, and gain wisdom.
As for your analogy, that our thoughts and selves are an object in motion, which we must curb to reach a desirable point in space: the reality is, there is no object.
>As for your analogy, that our thoughts and selves are an object in motion, which we must curb to reach a desirable point in space: the reality is, there is no object.
Ah, how convenient, a single objective reality where nonexistence is possible :)
To more precisely define my analogy and convey my understanding: current thought is a recurrence relation with previous thoughts. Inertia is the strength of the recurrence relation, the degree by which previous thoughts determine present thought. This is measurable as neural adaptation and learning. Ego or self is an observed distribution of thoughts occurring during a certain duration. As with statistical distributions, we tend to construct parameter estimators to make sense of the data[1].
Now, as with statistics, whether these generated parameters contain information and are useful in describing the distribution is up for debate and dependent on the question the investigator seeks to answer. But simply stating 'there is no object' is as sensical and productive as claiming 'there is no mean, there is no standard deviation'.
Ah, I see. I'm sorry, I thought the object was ego, but if it's thought in that abstract form, then that was my misunderstanding of your explanation.
Indeed, you are correct in that analogy, to that extent.
No apologies necessary, I did indeed use a newtonian object as the particular for ego in the first analogy. In regards to abstract forms and mental constructs as not existing in the same manner as objects, I'd disagree with you and the OP and hold that they do exist, at least in the same manner that everything else can be said to, if anything else is said to. In other words, I would assert there is no difference in types of existence nor duality between existence and nonexistence, object and nonobject, that is derivable and non-arbitrary. What I would concede is that an ego (and everything else) is "empty" of perfect causal independence. In other words, it must be emergent and generated.
Not only is this Zen Buddhism, but this is actually all Buddhism, in its ultimate form.
Letting go of yourself, and saying I am nothing, quite literally means that. We are nothing, simply mounds of flesh and bone. Even our thoughts, and our minds, are not a self. There is no such thing as free thought, no thinker behind the thoughts. All feeling and sensation, touch smell, taste; they all have an origin in the physical realm. Thoughts and ideas are the same, and they have an origin in the mental and physical realm. No idea is an idea floating by itself. They all originate from somewhere, like the sensation of touch or smell. Like, this conversation we're having. The ideas we both put forward have been taught to us, either by books, teachers, or our environments. They cannot be without cause.
An idea: The sun is bright. Why is the sun bright? Because the accepted lexicon of 'bright' is associated with a tingling, slightly painful feeling in the eyes. Why did I say the sun is bright? Because I needed an example in order to explain my words better. Why do examples explain words better? Because I've read words with examples, and felt I had understood more because of them, and so on. See? Where in thinking is there free thought? No where. Then, if we are neither thought nor sensation, what are we?
The pain and frustration we feel from life come from trying to fight with this, trying to see ourselves as a self; a self that has wants and needs that Must be fulfilled. We've become so accustomed to this idea of 'self' that we even shelter it, and protect it. We create elaborate explanations and excuses in order to protect this idea of self, when instead, it should be let go.
By letting go of oneself, you see this person realistically, and in an unbiased way. Pain or circumstance that befalls this person is simply as it is, neither good nor bad; it simply is. We then can improve this person: we are able to see these flaws and these unskillful actions objectively and clearly. Once these are seen, they can be easily changed, since there is no I or me, but a person. Unmetaphorically, and unequivocally, that is what is meant by 'I am nothing' and how it should be used.
According to California state law, it states that you are not allowed to issue warrants, or abjudge items owned by anyone working for news organizations.
The fact that the police literally broke into his home is ridiculous, and a violation of that penal code.
* Organized crime syndicate starts a money-laundering operation.
* At the same time, they start a small local newspaper.
* They keep the money-laundering records on a computer that's also used to make their newspaper.
By your, and the EFF's, interpretation of California's shield law, at this point the police must simply give up and say, "oh, darn, that computer and everyone who's ever used it is now immune to us forever". Somehow, though, I don't think that'd hold up in court, because if it did there'd be a whole lot more mob newspapers floating around...
* A man publishes a watchdog paper on corruption in the police department.
* He has inside sources in the police department that he has on file; sources whose lives are at risk if their identity is revealed.
The point is, we can both construct hypothetical situations in which this law can protect the just and villainous alike.
However, these made up occurrences only distract from the situation at hand, and do nothing to add or subtract from the argument.
My original point still stands: The police were breaking the rules set upon them in accordance with the penal code; thus, this break in and seizure was unlawful, and Gizmodo is well in their rights, whatever decision they make.
The point is, we can both construct hypothetical situations in which this law can protect the just and villainous alike.
Except for the fact that police, by themselves, can't just go search someone. They need a warrant signed off by a judge, which provides the necessary check against police carrying out a vendetta against someone.
The police were breaking the rules set upon them in accordance with the penal code
Again, this appears to be highly debatable. The law's purpose is to protect sources of stories, and interpretation of the law must be done in that context. EFF wants it interpreted to declare anyone/anything involved with journalism immune to law enforcement. The police, meanwhile, seem to be acting on the presumption that the law only forbids them pressuring for sources, not investigating crimes committed by people who, in addition to suspected criminals, also happen to be journalists.
> The law's purpose is to protect sources of stories, and interpretation of the law must be done in that context. EFF wants it interpreted to declare anyone/anything involved with journalism immune to law enforcement.
No they don't. They're saying use subpoenas, not search warrants to obtain the information so the publication can filter out all items not specific to the case at hand.
But turn the reasoning around and it seems just as bad... the police chief gets annoyed by a local paper or wants to know something about their informants. So the police act on an anonymous hot tip that the paper is hiding some money laundering and rifle through all the paper's records for anything they might want to use. The shield law wasn't made law for no reason. Lawmakers thought about it and made a trade off.
The "warrant" concept is existing legal machinery that provides the same protection from this hypothetical annoyed police chief, isn't it?
After all, the chief cannot write his own warrants. A judge must be involved, and there must be probable cause.
The definition of probable cause in the case of a search warrant is already pretty narrow: the chief would need to present the judge with information sufficient to warrant a prudent person's belief that evidence of a crime or contraband would be found in a search.
I'm sure that is all great comfort to those who have had their homes searched based on an anonymous tip that drugs were there. Finding friendly judges is a task that cops learn to do very well.
The legislators weighed this all out and made the shield law. You are second guessing them, which is fine, but second guessing doesn't change the actual law. It was made to protect journalism and with very good reason. And in this case it is very easy to see that the line drawn in the law may have been crossed.
You are mistaken that I am second-guessing them. While one could argue that the shield law provides "extra protection under the law" in violation of the 14th amendment to the constitution, this is not my opinion.
My opinion, rather, has to do with the distinction between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. The spirit of the shield law is was never to allow a journalist to commit a felony and evade discovery. Rather, its spirit was to allow a journalist to protect sources who may have committed a crime.
(And, even then, shield laws won't protect a journalist from being jailed - despite a shield law - for contempt of court. Judith Miller, a NYT reporter, was jailed for 3 months for refusing to reveal, to the government probe, the source of the leak of Valerie Plame's identity.)
Admittedly, the current case is a mixture of the two, because it's possible that the source committed one felony, and some folks at Gizmodo committed another.
I'm not saying that the search warrant should have been allowed. I was just responding to the alarmism about the hypothetical police chief run amok.
