Tag: hypothesis

Unacceptable Hypotheses

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

How we view and to an extent assimilate our notion of world is underpinned by a number of hypotheses which we may deem fact or gospel. Counter hypotheses are therefore cognitively unacceptable. This is because they can literally change our world and view thereof. Different hypotheses can upset the mundane power balance. And we cannot allow that can we.

For a long time, according to history, mankind imagined a flat Earth with earth at the centre of all things heavenly. Others suggested a heliocentric solar system and a quasi-spherical planet. Such views were considered heretic and punishable. For a long time the hypotheses of heliocentricity and orb-like planet were totally unacceptable especially to those in power, in the church. The infallibility of a human pope kept bums on seat and pennies on the collection plate. The infallibility of the pope was deemed factual and not hypothetical. It was the sort of “fact” that was enforced at the end of a blade or a noose.

Human history is littered with old hypotheses which have been used as the reason for slaughter. Hypotheses can be used to justify blood and murder.

The implications of a spherical globe are significantly different from a flat “2d” world. There is no edge off of which to sail. Without a round planet we would not have satellite TV nor surveillance satellites. A flat earth would be bad for NSA and CIA. The hypothesis of a quasi-spherical planet is game-changing in its implications.

An example of a hypothesis which is unacceptable to some is that Jesus was and is the long promised biblical messiah, the saviour. A significant population in the world find such a hypothesis unacceptable. No rabbi could accept this hypothesis and others see him more as a significant prophet. Were a rabbi to accept such a hypothesis it would radically change the assimilation of world and the recounting and recollection of history. You can argue that there is a vested interest not to accept such a hypothesis.

Some hypothesis cannot therefore be accepted because the implication of accepting them is too vast, it changes far too much.

Scientific causality and locality was a notion of Newtonian mechanics. Quantum entanglement kind of fucked with this idea and people like Einstein found this a swede masher and difficult to accept. Nowadays there is a burgeoning quantum aspect to science, business and technology.  

One could argue that there is precedent for old, dated hypotheses giving way to newer more widely applicable ones. Things of significant implication always face resistance and slow uptake.

I like the idea of a how a change in hypothesis can fundamentally and significantly alter how a world is and has been assimilated. A benign example of this is when adopted children find out they have been adopted and search out the backstory. The world is turned upside down for a while, perhaps permanently. Modern DNA testing has scuppered many a dubious narrative about parenthood. The hypothesis that Bob was dad to Alice was incorrect, it was Sergei in reality.

A while back somebody insisted that I was a so-called Man of Action and for many years dozens of people interacted with me on the basis of that hypothesis. It underpinned their assimilation of our interaction. It was a hypothesis which may not have been well founded. People might struggle to re-assimilate the world and the nature of interaction given an alternate notion.

Hypothesis can be a close relative of assumption. The working assumption here in France is that I am “anglais”. It is the first “hypothesis”. It is pretty easy to change intellectual understanding of this but still people behave towards me as if I have the same orientation as an English. Although the hypothesis has changed its latent implementation remains.

Based on various visions and dreams I have had one can draw up at least two different hypothetical explanations. These might be radically different in implication both locally for me and more globally.

The simplest explanation is that the nocturnal dreams and waking visons are a form of hallucinatory psychosis. I am off  my trolley and provided that I don’t cause any discomfort / break laws there is no need to have me locked up in a psychiatric unit. I am not a threat to anyone and by and large understand my day to day reality such a taxes and medical appointments. Although socially isolated I am not dangerous to myself or others. This is a facile hypothesis with only a very local implication. It does not impinge outside of our immediate geo-location.

Another interpretation is that some of the dreams are to do with previous incarnations of mine. If we accept this as a hypothesis then we can assimilate an explanatory narrative which has me having several Buddhist flavoured lives etc. As this stands it  has no wide implication. It is the sort of thing someone well into their cups might claim down the local boozer. No drama. Just another hippy-trippy fruitcake believing something which cannot be proved nor directly unequivocally disproved. Disproof is implied from lack of proof. If however this points at a tulku incarnation of a high lama, this has wide implication in at least one context. Some would struggle to accept this as a hypothesis specifically because of the way they see me and have behaved towards me. It would need a rewrite of life narrative.

This points at an obvious. Hypothesis can not ever be completely separated from context; they are nearly always highly context specific.

In 2009 I had a “conversation” early one morning walking around a wood near Tring. In that I was told that I was a very close disciple of Buddha, Siddartha. Implied that I had been a contemporary of him and spent time with him. The default hypothesis of psychotic hallucination or schizophrenic voice hearing explains this easily.

To accept the “conversation” as factual or hypothetically correct would be a push for some, particularly those who have made my acquaintance.

In 2011 I had a dream which pointed at Bakula one of Buddha’s closet disciples, a scholar who came late to the path according to text. He is named as arhat in scripture and hagiography has him as an enlightened being. I am less convinced that enlightenment of a disciple happens in a single lifetime just from hanging out with the Siddhartha dude. In certain circumstances he is revered as a kind of Buddhist “saint”. Prior to the dream I had no conscious memory of having heard the name Bakula.

The facile invocation of grandiose psychotic dreaming is easily made. Maybe I want to be important subconsciously and made up a story to make me significant.

For me to accept it as hypothetically possible is not tricky. For others it may be harder. For example what does one do with that? How does one treat a reincarnated person who actually met and hung with Siddartha? What is the precedent? What is the protocol?

Quickly such a hypothesis becomes cognitively unacceptable. It cannot be proven true and it would take more evidence than Mulder and Scully could ever furnish for it to be believed, no matter how much we may want to believe. I’ll suggest that there may be many hypotheses which describe an aspect of reality which are totally unacceptable. These hypotheses may be before their time. In time they may become less unacceptable until such time as people are ready to believe them.

Careful if you believe, you might fall off the edge of your world…

Challenges – Genetics – Having to Endure – Lama Dorje

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

A working hypothesis I have is that because I do not strut about, talk a lot and generally bullshit, people feel that I am need of education by them. Somehow, they are kind enough to bestow the benefit of their grandiose and unsolicited opinion on me so that I, a mere lowly pleb, might learn from their magnificence. So many offer me their opinions. Obviously, I am in dire need of education.

It is a catch 22. Do you let them rabbit on {endlessly} or flash intellect and make them feel more insecure than they already are. I don’t have an answer. Neither works well.

You may infer from the above that I am an arrogant arsehole. Your reflection in the mirror which is me may not reveal my essence.

Given all the tests in a medical sense that I am having its sounds a bit like someone meandering around in search of some kind of elusive diagnosis of sorts. That could be the case. Or it could simply be the generosity of the French healthcare system in action. The tendency for prophylaxis here is higher than in the UK.

The “health” finger continues to point at genetics. There is a non-normal make up, perhaps. Maybe I am special, so fucking special, or a creep, or a weirdo.

In my extensive recapitulations there is a recurring theme, “having to endure”. I have had to endure all sorts of things starting with bullying at school(s) and being gossiped about extensively, especially when my back was turned and I was not there. I am not paranoid; I have anecdotal evidence in support of this tendency. People curry favour by gossiping and in the past, they have claimed power by association to me. Those days are long gone.

I have an inkling that the current health drama belongs to the subset of “having to endure” challenges. There is little I can do; I simply have to endure and remain calm.

Śāntideva in the Bodhicaryāvatāra, has a whole chapter on forbearance. Bodhidharma was rumoured to have sat watching a wall for nine years.

Maybe one day instead of enduring I may give both barrels. I doubt many could handle it if I ramped up to 9/10 face to face with them. It would be very intense. Outside of experience.

The other working hypothesis I have is that I am tangentially involved in the drama, schemes and socio-political shenanigans of others. The thing is they are over “there” and I am only truly involved in their illusions. People make shit up; they make a drama out of it and somehow, I am caught up in their imaginations. I am written into their imaginary scripts.

I used to wear black Levi’s 501 jeans for decades. I now wear army surplus combat trousers. This dress makes me look a bit like a pikey prepper. I do not look for one minute like an ex-intellectual or the co-founder of a high technology high power laser company. So people tend, in the first instance, to talk down to me, even worse I do not speak high quality French, God’s only intellectual language. I must therefore be an idiotic stupid moron. They judge a book by their mis-interpretation of the cover. The French are as, if not more, arrogant than the English.

What can you do? Let them rabbit on {endlessly}. There is no point in trying to change their habits or self-opinion.

The wife and I have a joke. If I wore Buddhist robes people would treat me entirely differently. If they saw me thus attired in their dreams, they would find it weird.

“Alan always wore jeans in life!!”

There is a part of me that might order some robes on line and do a TikTok type experiment. Go in jeans to an estate agent one day and in robes the next…

But that would be fucking about…

Is there some as yet unseen diagnoses?

Or am I simply enduring the Gattling gun fire of multiple medical tests and appointments?

The current bet is towards the latter…

The Proliferation of Syndromes and Deterioration in Mental Health

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In my life time I have seen a marked proliferation in so-called mental health or developmental syndromes and those diagnosed therewith. They are quite trendy. Unsurprisingly the number of people qualified to make said diagnoses has also increased. There is a demand for diagnoses hence a growing supply of those qualified to diagnose. There is money in it, several grand per diagnosis.

Is this a real phenomenon or a market created one?

I heard the other day that some people were giving fluoxetine to pet dogs, FFS.

Anything which strays from the peer defined normal is at risk of being labelled a syndrome conferring fame upon the person who “discovered” it.

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We can lock up the weird and abnormal. Give ‘em loads of drugs and excuse them from the workplace in case they disturb the humdrum predictable mediocrity of petty power struggles and cock waving. Give them some unemployment benefits and teach them how to weave baskets and package wellness products that do not work but smell nice.

Is ADHD real or are people just bored fucking rigid with the way school is taught, controlled and examined?

Discuss…

I have tutored quite a few people diagnosed with ADHD, 1:1. I had no problem keeping their sharp attention for an hour or more. One just has to invent and teach better, to stimulate instead or bore.

I have a hypothesis. It says:

The apparent mental health crisis is simply tens of thousands of minds rejecting the way “normal” society is and the societal compulsion to conform therewith. It is not a mental health crisis rather an increasing failure of society.

It is not going to get better. There are no fairy godmothers.

The average, normal fearfully compliant people, don’t like this.

What percentage of people need to be treated for mental health “problems” until it is the so-called normal who are diagnosed as having a syndrome?

The human mundane-obligatory-compliance syndrome, FOMO for short. There are hordes who already suffer and can be diagnosed therewith. It is a social media pandemic.

There will come a time when those with so-called mental health problems are the majority. This will flip the entire notion of sanity, whether polite or otherwise.

I’ll wager that if I had to sit “A” level physics and chemistry as they are currently examined in the UK, I would not do well. I would get frustrated at the intransigence and tick box, mark by template mentality. I would not be happy having to adhere to verbatim parrot dogma.

I have an honours degree in chemistry and a Ph.D. in chemical physics.

I would probably join the Royal Marines instead of going to university if I was 18 now. I would certainly not have written ~60 science based publications.

People don’t like to face reality; they tend to prefer increasing the number of exceptions and justifying new extensions to rules and theories. They tend to keep ideas and notions, long after their sell by and use by dates.

If it does not fit, make it a syndrome, a special case, an exception. Write several theses about why it errs or strays from the norm. Refer to multiple other authors who are doing the same things. Make a career out of it…

But whatever you do, you must not question the societal norms… that is heresy.

Gelugpa Wrasse – Dreams and Snippets 21-02-2025

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

The first thing to say here is that what follows is inordinately difficult to verbalize.

Leading up to the last few days and despite numerous appearances of Tibetan based themes in dreaming I have been fairly certain that I have never had a Tibetan-Bhutanese-Nepalese incarnation. In whatever visions or dreams I have had with a Buddhist flavour I have never been wearing the maroon robes of that locality and certainly never any groovy hats.

Nevertheless, the tulku {or nirmāṇakāya} phenomenon has been resident at the periphery. I have never had the Mahayana urge or thought form pertaining to a bodhisattva training journey of coming back for the benefit of all sentient beings, to teach and to aid. This idealised wish form projected onto would be bodhisattvas seems a human thing and potentially prevents beings from leaving when they ought to be exiting the wheel of rebirth. “Please don’t leave us”, is not an empowering or enabling sentiment.

A few days ago, in the twilight between sleep and wakefulness I had a few images of me dressed in maroon monks robes with a yellow hat characteristic of the Gelug lineage of Tibetan Buddhism. I was surprised. It was a “turn up for the books” and does not fit with my hypothetical chronology. The only Tibetan stuff I have felt akin with are the tales of Chögyam Trungpa though I met at a distance Akong Rinpoche. Their relationship was complex if I understand it correctly. I have a hypothesis as to why Trungpa resonated.

What is safe to say is that the thought-forms associated with and to centuries old Buddhist traditions, studied and recited by thousands are firm, almost solid. The lineage has a “mind” all of its own, nurtured by devotees of and with a ruthless and tireless devotion. It exists in the mental and emotional space of humanity. People reciting and chanting for centuries make something almost tangible in a physical sense. The traditions and practice are kept vital and alive by regular enactment, quasi-archaic though they may be. They are alive.

Newtonian mechanics dominated the human psyche to be improved upon around a century ago for microscopic systems. Yet Newton is useful to this day in our everyday reality. These mechanics are a part of the mental space of humanity. They have merit. They work. There is a loose analogy.

This morning, I had a brief dreaming sequence in which I encountered a fish in a tank. The tank was large, beautiful and with coral. The fish was an ocean going wrasse. It introduced it self as a Gelugpa Wrasse. It told me that even if I had been previously associated with the Gelug, there was no place for me therein in this life. Such a thing would be way too disruptive. The wrasse was calm and relaxed. It was just conveying without colouration.

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It said that way back in the 1990s in Switzerland there had been a possibility but life circumstances had scuppered that. “Not to worry”, it said. It showed me some images of Bern.

I struggled to hold more of the dream but the wrasse part remained clear. Fish is the dreaming symbol for awareness or the need to be wide awake. The wrasse was pretty enough though contained in a tank. It was not free.

I am not sure what to make of it.

Last night we watched the Netflix programme “Adolescence” in which life for a family changes dramatically overnight. It was very good and left one with a breathless reminder of how normality can be completely flipped in a matter of hours.

We have had a few flips over the years.

Freaky Friday, an equinox talking with fish again…

A Fondness for Thought Experiments

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I speculate that many like to “win” an argument and be “right”. Some dread being demonstrably wrong. But the diamond sutra advises against seeking the absolute…

Our schooling demands answers which correspond in alignment to the quasi-consensual mark scheme. I have seen “A” level students marked wrong because, even though their answer was correct and accurate {according to my expert opinion}, it did not comply with the dogmatic mark scheme prepared by the thought police. Straying from the agreed dogma yields a poor grade and can prohibit further education.

There is an ethos to conclude, to be right, and to want to know where one stands. People can seek certitude when in fact there is none. They may misconstrue adamant assertion with accuracy and broad applicability. In fact, over simplification can be very attractive. There is a bit of laziness. Many rely on the imagined omniscience of “they”. If the herd deems it so, then it must be. Individual thinking and the expression thereof can lead to prompt and irrevocable social isolation.

One of things, I like to do is to take some kind of conceptual framework and then apply it to my life, to see if there is any fit. I don’t do this in a quantitative way rather I try it on like a moccasin. If it appears to fit as a thought experiment, I note the fit and then like a child with a sandcastle rub it out. I am really not fussed if I am right or wrong, nor with the quality of fit. I am fluid and don’t need fixed descriptors nor to be corralled by a conceptual framework. I am mindful that were the outcomes of these experiments accurate and those within the framework aware of this, implications might follow. Some of these within the model could be wide ranging.

Some might find this annoying.

“Tell me the answer!!!”

I also like the idea of all or nothing situations in which there is no negotiable middle ground. Herein lies a problem. Whenever I mention that I do not negotiate people immediately see it as a negotiation strategy which it is not. I am not responsible for the perceptions and conclusions of others. If they like to interact transactionally via negotiation, they may transfer their preference onto their interpretation of me. They may see me through their lens, which may have aberration and distortion.

Which model, which thought experiment applies? The answer is quite a few.

It would be very easy to characterise me as a spendthrift quasi-functional alcoholic who threw it all away, and as a result is a socially isolated loser eking out his end of days in self-induced poor health.

This model has only a very local implication and using Occam’s razor, paraphrased:

Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem.

As a model which fits it is the simplest and the best.

Therefore all other models are speculations and by way of embellishment.

People like complexity and may not be satisfied, though it is possible to leave things here with this characterisation. My (our) physical plane life does not impinge beyond a small geographical radius and a set of healthcare professionals. I very rarely travel more than 35km in radius. I have only travelled more than 150km once in six years.

There is no need to invoke any other explanation. I have played with various alternatives.

This then is a nothing situation, a null, a default

There are various other interpretations which may be a tad more grandiose, but although there is a hint of applicability, they are inconsistent with observable circumstance. These interpretations may further be inconvenient. Any model must have use or else it cannot be tested thus a theoretical possibility remains speculation and likely to fade into the mist. There is no point developing a use-less model, when viewed from one angle. Inconvenience is also not a desired property of a model. This can lead to jettison.

Reductionist thinking can limit but it also simplifies.

The thought experiment in the absence of tangible and measurable data often leads back to the null or near null hypothesis, which is the safe conclusion.

We all often unconsciously apply the model or bias which suits us best, which is easiest for us to assimilate and has little inconvenient implication for us.

Belief and Proof

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I’ll speculate that many believe things, ideologies and religions for which there in no possibility of proof. Half of the UK “believed” that Brexit was a good idea, many were adamant even though the outcome was unknown. They professed with absolute certainty about something which had not yet happened. Some Americans chant the MAGA mantra. Exactly when was America ever a great and equal place? Bad stuff has always gone on there to some extent.

People will believe whatever it is they want to believe. The strength of belief may vary. The war in Vietnam seemed like a good idea at first. Someone thought agent orange was good.

The church had a vested interest in making people God-fearing. Bums on seats meant coins on collection plates and salaries for clergy. The gold held by the churches and all that chavvy stuff goes against my interpretation of New Testament Christianity which differs from Old Testament Torah. Yet many who name themselves Christian believe in an eye for an eye instead of turning a cheek. I personally cannot envisage any deity in human or anthropomorphic form. {With the exception of Ganesh} I was made to draw God as a white bearded white geezer at the convent school in Zambia.

People born with penises believe that they can be “women” after a few hormones and a change of clothes, a new frock.

Some of the conspiracy theories floating about are to my eyes far-fetched, yet they have their devotees. I do believe that the world is controlled loosely by rich people. The extent to which they conspire is moot. It is all about profit and the best way to get that is by being good at business and ensuring calm by means of pecuniary compliance. There is no need to do weird far-out stuff. 

Yep, some get corrupted by power and this can be expressed by abuse, sexual abuse and coercion. There are a number of ring-like groups that take advantage of those who are corruptible by promise of an easy ticket. Sometimes the cost of association to/with a powerful figure is high. Savile, Epstein, Al-Fayed. There are mini-mes of these scattered through the population, the degree of unpleasantness varies.

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Between belief and proof, we might have working hypothesis. In which one tries out a framework or context to see how well it works, what the generality is like. There are “proofs” which are more circumstantial than direct.  There are things which suggest or point at an idea.

I believe in the concept of karma, there is sufficient observable causality for me to trust it as a concept, a working hypothesis. However, the subject is vast. I once did a whole blog exploring karma. The cornerstone of karma is evolution. One needs to learn from mistakes. Evolution and karma are of the same process. There is a cost associated with some actions which “the universe” wants paid. Karma not worked at in a timely fashion and with willing mood accrues karmic debt, much like a bank loan. One learns the effect of a causal action or behaviour. Sometimes people are slow learners.

The coypu no longer trouble our lotuses. Electric shock training with 0.25 Joule pulses at kilovolts works. We have a low electric fence which I installed. Cause and effect. Coypu karma.

I have had sufficient circumstantial evidence via visions and dreaming to believe in reincarnation. There is no way, on this planet, that I could ever prove reincarnation to the satisfaction of my scientific training. I could not put data into a spreadsheet and plot a graph with a fitted equation and a statistical quality of fit metric. I share the belief in reincarnation with millions. I probably believe it more strongly than most.

Karma and reincarnation as concepts are internally consistent. Karma spans lifetimes so that we can evolve. Karma is a teacher of sorts, in my world.  It takes lifetime after lifetime to learn somethings.

Is it significant that I who once was a pukka scientist at a pukka institution can remember three lives as a Buddhist monastic?

Depends upon what you think is significant. To your average common or garden UK football supporter it means nothing.  To someone who is a committed Buddhist it would not be a huge surprise, it might be tad interesting. Why not a scholar scientist and a scholar monk? It is not so different. Both have cerebral elements. To a bunch of scientists, it might be a red flag which needs disproved.

Have you noticed how science has a negation bias?

I’ll speculate that most people have a host of things which they believe which cannot be proven and moreover they do not question their beliefs or the provenance of the source from which they were obtained / picked up. Gossip and tittle tattle being a common currency which can become Gospel or God’s honest truth. “They” know and say an awful lot, do they not?

People can be very adamant about things which they have not checked or researched themselves. There is heavy reliance on hearsay. There are a lot of soap box orators both in real life and on-line. Hearsay has it that the spread of disinformation is huge and increasing.  This is consistent with what I see on Twitter. 

If you watch BBC, Sky, France 24 and Al-Jazeera the reporting on Gaza is very different. The British news is very sanitized and biased. People trust the BBC but it is reporting on a very different “war” to Al-Jazeera. Chalk and cheese. The UK right think the BBC is luvvie-socialist oriented.

People will believe whatever they want to believe. Convenience is a major factor in belief. They will believe what is the most convenient for them to believe. Inconvenient truths are generally not preferred. Coming round to an inconvenient belief takes time and is resisted, exemplified by the three individuals mention previously.  So far nobody has said a great deal about the Princess Diana – Al-Fayed relationship. That narrative is altered by recent news. Did King Charles have her bumped off? Is he still the villain or are there other factors now?

Belief is also mutable…

What you believe today is impermanent…I can’t prove it to you…I can offer it as a working hypothesis which you might see to be applicable.

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How many of your beliefs are convenient?

Why did you prefer them?