Why is God intelligently designing Avian Influenza viruses to jump to humans?

Can we be a little more respectful of each others beliefs? We have our own faith beliefs but nothing is truly proven.

 

Yes and no. Buddhism recognizes the oneness of the Universe but going further recognizes the nothingness of the Universe. Its a difficult concept to grasp and its one that I wrestle with quite a bit.

 

He is ignorant therefore he can't comment. It's not about beliefs.

 

Plus I've been around long enough to build a tough skin in this forum; ignorant? Sweet!

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatta

Anatta
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

The Buddhist doctrine of Anatta (Pāli) or Anātman (Sanskrit) specifies the absence of a supposedly permanent and unchanging self or soul (ātman). What is normally thought of as the "self" is in fact an agglomeration of constantly changing physical and mental constituents ("skandhas") which give rise to unhappiness if clung to as though this temporary assemblage formed some kind of immutable and enduring Soul ("atman"). The "anatta" doctrine attempts to encourage the Buddhist practitioner to detach him/herself from this misplaced clinging to what is mistakenly regarded as his or her Self, and from such detachment (aided by moral living and meditation) the way to Nirvana is able successfully to be traversed.

A variant understanding of the doctrine (as enunciated by the Buddha in the Mahayana "Tathagatagarbha" scriptures) insists that the five "skandhas" (impermanent constituent elements of the mundane body and mind of each being) are indeed "not the Self" ("anatta"/"anatman"), since they are doomed to mutation and dissolution, but that in contrast to this ephemeral "mundane self", the eternal Buddha-Principle ("Buddha-dhatu") deep within each being is the supramundane True Self - although this realisation is only fully gained on reaching Awakening ("bodhi").

Anatta is one of the Three Seals of Buddhist doctrines and is an important element of wisdom through the apophatic technique used to experience Nirvana, the other two being dukkha and Anicca.


The ignorant do not understand that all things are like maya (illusion), that there is no self to be imagined as an ego/soul, and that all their definitive ideas arise from their false discriminations of what exists only as it is seen from the mind itself. They assert that they are born of a creator, of time, of atoms, of some celestial spirit. It is because the ignorant are given to discrimination that they move along with the stream of appearances, but it is not so with the wise.
~The Buddha

 

My question about Buddhism would then be; What seperates it from Nihilism?

 

It's the Middle Way.

 

Meaning? Nirvana seems like nothingness; or as Nietzsche describes it, and endless wave crashing upon the shore....

 

http://www.saigon.com/~anson/ebud/whatbudbeliev/111.htm

 

I disagree with some things in that article; namely the definition of Nihilism. I'd say the writer of that article defines materialism, not nihilism, in which we live and then die and that is all. Nihilism denies existence in the present.

Second, eternalism, or the after life; seems to be defined in the boundaries of time; which is not really the way I think most Christians think about Heaven as something outside of time. The writer seems to equate the passing of life in this world as the passage of time in another. I think this is a misunderstanding of eternality as taught by many.

The article doesn't define what, besides being both mental and material, buddhism is; making out the teachings of it to be just a simple understanding of these two ideas coupled with some secret meditation that needs to be reached. To me that borders on gnosticism....

If you could clear up these issues for me that would be appreciated.

 

Ill just copy paste from wikipedia. I hope this is what you were looking for:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism


The three marks of conditioned existence

According to the Buddhist tradition, all phenomena (dharmas) are marked by three characteristics, sometimes referred to as the Dharma seals:

Anicca
Dukkha
Anatta



Anicca (Pāli; Sanskrit: anitya): All compounded phenomena (things and experiences) are inconstant, unsteady, and impermanent. (Practically) everything is made up of parts, and is dependent on the right conditions for its existence. Everything is in constant flux, and so conditions and the thing itself is constantly changing. Things are constantly coming into being, and ceasing to be. Nothing lasts.

Important point here is that phenomena arises and ceases according to (complex) conditions and not according to our whims and fancy. While we have limited ability to effect change to our possessions and surroundings, experience tells us that our feeble attempts are not guarantee that the results of our efforts will be to our likings. More often than not, the results fall short of our expectations.



Dukkha (Pāli; Sanskrit: duḥkha): "Whatever is impermanent is subject to change. Whatever is subject to change is subject to suffering" - The Buddha.
Striving for what we desire, we may experience stress and suffering. Getting what we desired, we may find delight and happiness. Soon after, the novelty may wear out and we may get bored with it. Boredom is a form of disatisfaction (or suffering) and to escape from it, we divert ourselves from such boredom by indulging in a pursuit of new forms of pleasure. Sometimes not willing to relinquish objects that we are already disinterested in, we start to collect and amass possessions instead of sharing with others who may have better use in it than we do. Boredom is a result of change. Change of our interest in that object of desire that so captivated us in the first place.
If we do not get bored already, then change may instead occur in the object of desire. Silverware may become tarnished, a new dress worn thin or a gadget gone obsolete. Or it may become broken, causing us to grieve. In some cases it may get lost or stolen. In some cases, we may worry about such losses even before it happens. Husbands and wives worry about losing their spouses even though their partners are faithful. Unfortunately, sometimes our very worry and fear drives us to act irrationally, resulting in distrust and breaking up of the very relationship that we cherished so much.
While we like changes like becoming an adult when we are in our teens, we dislike the change called aging. While we strive for change to become rich, we fear the change of retrenchment. We are selective in our attitude towards the transient nature of our very existence. Unfortunately, this transient nature is unselective. We can try to fight it, just as many have tried since beginningless time, only to have our efforts washed away through the passages of time. As a result, we continually experience dissatisfaction or suffering due to the very impermanence of compounded phenomena.



Anatta (Pāli; Sanskrit: anātman): In Indian philosophy, the concept of a self is called ātman (that is, "soul" or metaphysical self), which refers to an unchanging, permanent essence conceived by virtue of existence. This concept and the related concept of Brahman, the Vedantic monistic ideal, which was regarded as an ultimate ātman for all beings, were indispensable for mainstream Indian metaphysics, logic, and science; for all apparent things there had to be an underlying and persistent reality, akin to a Platonic form. The Buddha rejected all concepts of ātman, emphasizing not permanence, but changeability. He taught that all concepts of a substantial personal self were incorrect, and formed in the realm of ignorance. However, in a number of major Mahayana sutras (e.g. the Mahaparinirvana Sutra, the Tathagatagarbha Sutra, the Srimala Sutra, among others), the Buddha is presented as clarifying this teaching by saying that, while the skandhas (constituents of the ordinary body and mind) are not the Self, there does truly exist an eternal, unchanging, blissful Buddha-essence in all sentient beings, which is the uncreated and deathless Buddha-nature ("Buddha-dhatu") or "True Self" of the Buddha himself. This immaculate Buddhic Self (atman) is in no way to be construed as a mundane, impermanent, suffering "ego", of which it is the diametrical opposite. On the other hand, this Buddha-essence or Buddha-nature is also often explained as the potential for achieving Buddhahood, rather than an existing phenomenon one can grasp onto as being me or self. It is the opposite of a personalised, samsaric "I" or "mine". The paradox is that as soon as the Buddhist practitioner tries to grasp at this inner Buddha potency and cling to it as though it were his or her ego writ large, it proves elusive. It does not "exist" in the time-space conditioned and finite mode in which mundane things are bodied forth. It is presented by the Buddha in the relevant sutras as ultimately inexplicable, primordially present Reality itself - the living potency for Buddhahood inside all beings. It is finally revealed (in the last of the Buddha's Mahayana sutras, the Nirvana Sutra) not as the circumscribed "non-self", the clinging ego (which is indeed anatta/anatman), but as the ever-enduring, egoless Great Self or Dharmakaya of the Buddha.
The scriptural evidence of the Nikāyas and Āgamas is ambivalent with regard to the Buddha's reported views on the existence or otherwise of a permanent self (ātman/atta). Though he is clearly reported to have criticized many of the heterodox concepts concerning an eternal personal self and to have denied the existence of an eternal self with regards to any of the constituent elements (skandha) of a being, he is nevertheless not reported to have explictly denied the existence of a non-personal, permanent self, contrary to the popular, orthodox view of the Buddha's teachings. Moreover, when the Buddha predicates "anātman" (anatta) with regards to the constituents of a being, there is a grammatical ambivalence in the use of the term. The most natural interpretation is that he is simply stating that "the constituents are not the self" rather than "the constituents are devoid of self". This ambivalence was to prove troublesome to Buddhists after the Buddha's passing. Some of the major schools of Buddhism that developed subsequently maintained the former interpretation, but other influential schools adopted the latter interpretation and took measures to establish their view as the orthodox Buddhist position. One such proponent of this hard-line "no self" position was the monk Nagasena, who appears in the Questions of King Milinda, composed during the period of the Hellenistic Bactrian kingdoms of the 2nd and 1st centuries BCE. In this text, Nagasena demonstrates the concept of absolute 'no self' by likening human beings to a chariot and challenges King Milinda to find the essence of the chariot. Nagasena states that just as a chariot is made up of a number of things, none of which are the essence of the chariot in isolation, without the other pieces, similarly no one part of a person is a permanent entity; we can be broken up into five constituents - body, sensations, ideation, mental formations and consciousness - the consciousness being closest to the permanent idea of 'self', but is ever-changing with each new thought according to this viewpoint.
According to some thinkers both in the East and the West, the doctrine of "non-Self", may imply that Buddhism is a form of nihilism or something similar. However, as thinkers like Nagarjuna have clearly pointed out, Buddhism is not simply a rejection of the concept of existence (or of meaning, etc.) but of the hard and fast distinction between existence and nonexistence, or rather between being and nothingness. Phenomena are not independent from causes and conditions, and do not exist as isolated things as we perceive them to be. Philosophers such as Nāgārjuna stress that the lack of a permanent, unchanging, substantial self in beings and things does not mean that they do not experience growth and decay on the relative level. But on the ultimate level of analysis, one cannot distinguish an object from its causes and conditions, or even object and subject. (This is an idea appearing relatively recently in Western science.) Buddhism thus has much more in common with Western empiricism, pragmatism, and anti-foundationalism than with nihilism.
In the Nikāyas, the Buddha and his disciples are commonly found to ask in question or declare "Is that which is impermanent, subject to change, subject to suffering fit to be considered thus: 'This I am, this is mine, this is my self'?" The question which the Buddha posts to his audience is whether compounded phenomena is fit to be considered as self, in which the audience agrees that it is unworthy to be considered so. And in relinquishing such an attachment to compounded phenomena, such a person gives up delight, desire and craving for compounded phenomena and is unbounded by its change. When completely free from attachments, craving or desire to the five aggregates, such a person experiences then transcends the very causes of suffering.

In this way, the insight wisdom or prajñā of non-self gives rise to cessation of suffering, and not an intellectual debate over whether a self exist or not.
It is by realizing (not merely understanding intellectually, but making real in one's experience) the three marks of conditioned existence that one develops prajñā, which is the antidote to the ignorance that lies at the root of all suffering.

 

If we don't exist, why does it matter if we suffer?

 

You do exist and you don't exist. If you wish to suffer, you can always become a Jazz fan.

 

i fear offending someone...meowgi in particular...but i'll speak honestly. this concept is why i can't grasp buddhism. why it doesn't move me. i look at the smiling buddha...sitting there...and i think it's not authentic. there is suffering. people do suffer. people do get hungry. people do get thirsty. people do have real feelings. buddha sits there smiling and tell you it's not really real. i contrast that against imagery of Christ nailed to the cross...suffering...serving...and it's just so different.

again..i don't say this to offend. it's just my own view. and as i've said before..i'm either right about Jesus or i'm wrong about him.

 

but isn't the smiling buddha the image of what we should strive to attain? i.e. the break from suffering by realizing the truth in it? just like how we are supposed to be 'christ-like' in Christianity.. just that buddhist art tend to depict the nirvana stage whereas Christian art tend to show the earthly sufferings of Jesus.

the buddha did go among the world and saw suffering and suffered greatly too, I think.

disclaimer -- i'm not a buddhist but it doesn't seem to fit that jesus was about suffering and the buddha was not..

 

i'm not saying i'm right...i'm merely giving my perception of it. how i respond to it.

 

I think if Jesus and Buddha got into a fight, it would be the most boring fight ever.