Sashin Exists

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Related to Philosophy

A Beatific Vision

Sent 2nd November 2019

Hello everyone, I hope you are all doing well. I have made some technical updates to the website in the past week, I made what are called embed cards which allow me to style embedded content so that it is more streamlined with the rest of my website. You can...

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If reincarnation were real

Sent 28th October 2019

Hello everyone, I hope you are all doing very well. Last week I was at an Effective Altruism social event and the topic of death came up. I was speaking to a practising Buddhist who was curious about what I thought about reincarnation. I was able to respond to her...

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The Seed of Certainty

Sent 22nd September 2019

Hello everyone, I hope you've been doing well — I certainly have. My new article is finished. I have now left it with the wonderful Iona Italia for editing. It should be published within a week, you'll receive an email when it is. Who knows? "The lunatic who believes he...

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The four thoughts that turn the mind

Sent 1st September 2019

Hello everyone, Are you in high spirits? This email will be long and fun. I hope you have had a good week, for you will never get it back... This week I launched my first major update to the website in a while, you should have all received an announcement...

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Book Recommendation

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The best thing that can happen to a human being is to find a problem, to fall in love with that problem, and to live trying to solve that problem, unless another problem even more lovable appears.
Karl Popper

Quote

All life is problem solving.
Karl Popper

The lies we tell

Sent 7th July 2019

Hello everyone, I hope you are all doing well. Yesterday I had a conversation with a good friend about Sam Harris' book Lying. Sam's position was that we tend to be skilled at rationalising that it is justified when it is not and that we tend to deal needless harm...

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The Real and the Seeming

Sent 23rd June 2019

Hello everyone, We are living in very peaceful times, I hope you are enjoying them. My question for everyone this week is simple. "What is real?" What does it mean to say that something is the case? What is the difference between saying something is a certain way,...

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What is consciousness?

Sent 8th June 2019

Hello everyone, I have a question for you all. "What is consciousness?" It's not a trick question. In fact, I don't think it should be a hard question. The hard problem is how consciousness arises, not what it is. I have had conversations with otherwise intelligent people who...

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Book Recommendation

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Journey to the Present

31st December 2018

Life is suffering. This statement is widely recognised as the first of the four noble truths of Buddhism. The only thing is, it's wrong. The Buddha never said it. The word he used to describe life was the Pali word “dukkha”. This word often is mistranslated as suffering, but a...

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Musings against god

21st December 2018

My mother was having trouble opening a drawer. She pulled and pulled but it wouldn’t budge. Frustrated, she yelled “Jesus!” and it finally opened. “Did you see that? Because I asked Jesus I was able to open it.” This didn’t impress me. “So what you are saying is...

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On Radical Compassion

6th September 2018

Hatred. Anger. Jealousy. These are all forms of suffering. These are all mental defilements. It is in your own interest to banish these demons from your mind. Even from a purely selfish point of view, it can be said that there are some emotions we would truly be better off...

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How far we have come

13th May 2018

There are two biases that seem to be affecting all of us for the worse, that I would like to bring to your attention. 1. The Availability Bias[1] We judge the likelihood of events and the state of affairs based on how easily we can recall the data. Think...

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The Value of Evidence

7th May 2017

“A fire-breathing dragon lives in my garage” “Show me,” you say. I lead you to my garage. You look inside and see a ladder, empty paint cans, an old tricycle–but no dragon. “Where’s the dragon?” you ask. “Oh, she’s right here,” I reply, waving vaguely. “I neglected...

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Truths about Beliefs

21st July 2014

Two people feel the exact same sensation in their heads. One of them had just been eating ice cream really quickly, the other has just been diagnosed with a tumour. One of them registers the sensation as a mild brain-freeze and the other experiences incredible anguish. There is a lot...

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The Overrated Nature of "Nature"

31st August 2013

Nature. What comes in to mind when you read this word? Distinctly green imagery? Trees, leaves, ferns or forests? Perhaps shades of blue, the sea, or the sky with its clouds? Animals perhaps? Birds, lizards, blue whales? I suspect few people -if any- imagine things along the lines meteor showers,...

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