[Buddha-l] The course of Nature

[John Willemsens]

>>
>> Dear Joanna,
>> Thank you very much for your remarks.
>> I shall look at them very carefully with more time.
>> I would however like to comment in the meantime that what we say
>> is that human beings _experience as progress_  that which accords
>> with the overall course of Nature.
>> I.o.w. not that the overall course of Nature is progress -
>> overall existence is as such quite indifferent.
>> But allow me to revert.
>> John Willemsens.
>> ===========================
>
>> John,
>> Thanks for clarifying--I got a distinct impression from reading
>> your website that the "experience as progress" (a relative)
>> qualification was absent. In any case, I wonder what your support for 
>> this interpretation
>> of humans experiencing Nature as progress might be. There's abundant 
>> evidence in media of various sorts -- good, bad,
>> or indifferent in quality-- of  people who contrarily do not
>> "experience" the "overall course of Nature" as progressive at
>> all, but instead as destructive and teleologically negative,
>> especially today in conditions of global warming, cyclones,
>> tornados, earthquakes, oceans rising, meteorites, and so on.
>>
>> Best,
>> JK
>>
>
> Dear Joanna,
> Might I ask you to please have a look at our Q&A page in the meantime :-)
> Thank you.
> John Willemsens.
> http://www.euronet.nl/~advaya/qanda.htm (Q&A page)
>

Dear Joanna,
I hope that you have been able to read some of the entries on our Q&A page.
You might have gathered that our position is that, if you look closely, all 
those unpleasantnesses you mention do not pertain to overall existence but 
are the result of mistaken views and mismanagement. When we say how man 
experiences the neutral course of Nature we of course mean man unencumbered 
by these contingent shortcomings and mistakes that impair his vision and 
understanding - the reference standard is overall existence and not failing 
mankind. "Not the human manifestation of life (...) is the measure of things 
in space and time, but the whole of infinite interdependent reality itself, 
which, hardly affected, if at all, by the negligible impact of mankind's 
doings on the overall scheme of things, will continue to become exactly as 
it, by definition, must."
But this is not the place for proselytizing. :-)
Thank you,
John Willemsens.
http://www.euronet.nl/~advaya/index.htm