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Subscribe to B. Alan Wallace's Podcast Series Listen online or download into your MP3 players. Free! NEW: Opening Talk: Vajra
Essence Vipashyana Retreat
Excerpts from 2008 Retreats What is mind? Emptiness & Quantum Mechanics. Nyam Two Modes of Happiness ****** "Is
the Dalai Lama an Atheist?" Experience, Reason & Faith in Science & Religion Recorded at Unity Church, Santa Barbara, Sept 17, 2008 In today's world, religion is strongly
tied to faith, whereas science is thought to be ruled by experience and
reason, and when the two are viewed in this way, they appear to be largely
incompatible with each other, or at least mutually irrelevant. Although
there is some truth in this simplistic distinction, it overlooks the
fact that religious people have experiences that do not easily lend themselves
to scientific inquiry, and scientific thinking throughout the ages has
always been strongly influenced by metaphysical beliefs and assumptions.
In this Achieving Free Will: A Buddhist Perspective In this lecture Alan Wallace discussed how Buddhism focuses on achieving greater freedom in the choices we make, rather than struggling with the metaphysical issue of whether we already have free will. The Buddha began by first identifying the ways in which we are clearly not free, then showed ways in which we may achieve greater freedom in the present moment, as well as reshape the influence of the past upon our present experience and direct the flow of our lives into the future. Central to the question of free will is the nature of human identity, and it is in this regard that the Buddhist view of emptiness and interdependence is truly revolutionary.
Paths to Perfection: Contemplative Practices Jesus counseled his followers to be perfect as their Father in heaven is perfect, and for centuries, mystical union with God—understood as perfect love and omniscient wisdom—was the ideal of Christian contemplatives. Buddha counseled his followers to realize perfect freedom from suffering by irreversibly dispelling all the afflictions and obscurations of the mind. The ideals of personal liberation and perfect enlightenment have been pursued by Buddhist contemplatives over the past 2,500 years. While these two contemplative traditions appear to have had little contact throughout their long histories, they did exhibit remarkable parallels as well as differences. Ideals of perfection and the means to realize it will be explored in this lecture, with the hope that the vitality of both the Christian and Buddhist contemplative traditions may be revitalized in the modern era, which could so deeply benefit from their insights and wisdom.
THE CONSCIOUS UNIVERSE Recorded at Unity Church, Santa Barbara, CA , Jan. 16, 2008 Physicists have long assumed that the universe is fundamentally composed of matter and energy and that life and consciousness are accidental byproducts of configurations of matter. But a growing number of distinguished physicists are now suggesting that consciousness may play a much more fundamental role in nature than scientists previously believed. In this lecture Alan Wallace will review some of the most provocative theories presented by such leading physicists as John Wheeler, Stephen Hawking, and Andre Linde that challenge many of the materialist assumptions based on outdated19th-century physics. And he will discuss how these theories may relate to Buddhist theories and practices, including those of the Theravada, Mahayana, and Dzogchen traditions. THE SHAMATHA PROJECT Unlocking the Power of the Focused Mind During the spring and fall of 2007, 70 people participated in two 3-month, intensive meditation retreats, during which the effects of their 8-10 hours per day of practice were meticulously studied by a team of psychologists and neuroscientists. With a wide array of psychological and physiological measurements taken toward the beginning, middle, and end of this training, this was the first longitudinal scientific study of its kind. Alan Wallace originally conceived of this project and has been working closely with this team of cognitive scientists for four years, and he served as the resident instructor for these retreats. In this lecture he will give a preliminary report of the findings of this historic study.
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© 2005 Santa Barbara Institute for Consciousness Studies |
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