http://people.stern.nyu.edu/jhaidt/home.html
The emotional dog and its rational tail: A social intuitionist approach to moral judgment,
published in
Psych. Review (2001, vol. 108, pp. 814-834).
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Discover the whole content of what is
Understanding
comes with the awareness of what is. There can be no understanding if
there is condemnation of or identification with what is. If you condemn a
child or identify yourself with him, then you cease to understand him.
So being aware of a thought or a feeling as it arises, without
condemning it or identifying with it, you will find that it unfolds ever
more widely and deeply, and thereby discover the whole content of what
is. To understand the process of what is, there must be choiceless
awareness, a freedom from condemnation, justification, and
identification. When you are vitally interested in fully understanding
something, you give your mind and heart, withholding nothing. But
unfortunately you are conditioned, educated, disciplined through
religious and social environment to condemn or to identify, and not to
understand. To condemn is stupid and easy, but to understand is arduous,
requiring pliability and intelligence. Condemnation, as identification,
is a form of self-protection. Condemnation or identification is a
barrier to understanding. To understand the confusion, the misery in
which one is, and so of the world, you must observe its total process.
To be aware and pursue all its implications requires patience, to follow
swiftly, and to be still. - The Collected Works, Vol. IV,143,Choiceless
Awareness
There is understanding only when there is stillness
There
is understanding only when there is stillness, when there is silent
observation, passive awareness. Then only the problem yields its full
significance. The awareness of which I speak is of what is from moment
to moment, of the activities of thought and its subtle deceptions,
fears, and hope. Choiceless awareness wholly dissolves our conflicts and
miseries. - The Collected Works, Vol. IV,144,Choiceless Awareness
The beauty of listening
The
beauty of listening lies in being highly sensitive to everything about
you: to the ugliness, to the dirt, to the squalor, to the poverty about
you, and also to the dirt, to the disorder, to the poverty of one's own
being. When you are aware of both, then there is no effort, that is,
when there is an awareness which is without choice, then there is no
effort. - The Collected Works, Vol. XV,61,Choiceless Awareness
Friday, September 28, 2012
The mind can be aware of its limitations
Can
we understand the whole significance of what it is to be aware? Do not
let us jump to any conclusions. What do we mean by ordinary awareness? I
see you and, in watching you, looking at you, I form opinions. You have
hurt me, you have deceived me, you have been cruel to me, or you have
said nice things and flattered me, and consciously or unconsciously all
this remains in my mind. When I watch this process, when I observe it,
that is just the beginning of awareness, is it not? I can also be aware
of my motives, of my habits of thought. The mind can be aware of its
limitations, of its own conditioning, and there is the inquiry as to
whether the mind can ever be free from its own conditioning. Surely this
is all part of awareness. To say that the mind can or cannot be free
from its conditioning is still part of its conditioning, but to observe
that conditioning without saying either is a furthering of awareness,
awareness of the whole process of thinking. - The Collected Works, Vol.
X,53,Choiceless Awareness
Can the mind observe itself without accumulation?
Through
awareness I begin to see myself as I actually am, the totality of
myself. Being watchful from moment to moment of all its thoughts, its
feelings, its reactions, unconscious as well as conscious, the mind is
constantly discovering the significance of its own activities, which is
self-knowledge. Whereas if my understanding is merely accumulative, then
that accumulation becomes a conditioning which prevents further
understanding. So can the mind observe itself without accumulation? -
The Collected Works, Vol. X,53,Choiceless Awareness
Being aware
Questioner:
I find it impossible to be aware all the time.
Krishnamurti: Don't be
aware all the time! Just be aware in little bits. Please, there is no
being aware all the time, that is a dreadful idea!It is a nightmare,
this terrible desire for continuity. Just be aware for one minute, for
one second, and in that one second of awareness you can see the whole
universe. That is not a poetic phrase. We see things in a flash, in a
single moment, but having seen something, we want to capture, to hold
it, give it continuity. That is not being aware at all. When you say, 'I
must be aware all the time', you have made a problem of it, and then
you should really find out why you want to be aware all the time. See
the greed it implies, the desire to acquire. And to say, 'Well, I am
aware all the time', means nothing. - The Collected Works, Vol.
XIII,184,Choiceless Awareness
Following every thought, every feeling
If
you sit on the bank of a river after a storm, you see the stream going
by, carrying a great deal of debris. Similarly, you have to watch the
movement of yourself, following every thought, every feeling, every
intention, every motive, just watch it. That watching is also listening;
it is being aware with your eyes, with your ears, with your insight, of
all the values that human beings have created, and by which you are
conditioned, and it is only this state of total awareness that will end
all seeking. - The Collected Works, Vol. XV,242,Choiceless Awareness
If you are aware of outward things
Please
do listen to this. Most of us think that awareness is a mysterious
something to be practised, and that we should get together day after day
to talk about awareness. Now, you don't come to awareness that way at
all. But if you are aware of outward things -the curve of a road, the
shape of a tree, the colour of another's dress, the outline of the
mountains against a blue sky, the delicacy of a flower, the pain on the
face of a passer-by, the ignorance, the envy, the jealousy of others,
the beauty of the earth- then, seeing all these outward things without
condemnation, without choice, you can ride on the tide of inner
awareness. Then you will become aware of your own reactions, of your own
pettiness, of your own jealousies. From the outward awareness you come
to the inward, but if you are not aware of the outer, you cannot
possibly come to the inner. - The Collected Works, Vol.
XV,242,Choiceless Awareness
A clarity that is not induced
When
there is inward awareness of every activity of your mind and your body,
when you are aware of your thoughts, of your feelings, both secret and
open, conscious and unconscious, then out of this awareness there comes a
clarity that is not induced, not put together by the mind. And without
that clarity you may do what you will, you may search the heavens and
the earth and the deeps, but you will never find out what is true. - The
Collected Works, Vol. XV,243,Choiceless Awareness
The what is, is what you are
The
what is is what you are, not what you would like to be; it is not the
ideal because the ideal is fictitious, but it is actually what you are
doing, thinking, and feeling from moment to moment. What is is the
actual, and to understand the actual requires awareness, a very alert,
swift mind. - The Collected Works, Vol. V,50,Choiceless Awareness
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Friday, September 14, 2012
What Do Professors Do, Anyway?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/susan-herbst/what-do-professors-do_b_1396783.html
On March 23, the Washington Post ran an op-ed by David Levy, a former chancellor at the New School University, asking: "Do college professors work hard enough?" He suggests that faculty at non-research institutions don't put in enough hours for the pay they receive. Not surprisingly, this created a small firestorm among faculty nationwide who weren't shy about telling him what they thought.
I have held faculty and administrative positions only at research institutions -- where the mission is both teaching and research -- so I wouldn't presume to speak for faculty at schools focused exclusively on teaching. Yet there are some across-the-board myths about academic life in general, and professors sometimes seem to be a target.
This likely has to do with the fact that unless someone has been a professor or graduate student or worked with them, they probably don't fully understand what professors do. Instead, presumptions are made about an alleged leisurely life spent in an ivory tower sitting around in tweed coats, smoking pipes and discussing Kant or Rawls (which actually doesn't sound bad, except for the pipe smoke). That scene may happen, but it doesn't reflect how faculty spend most of their time.
So perhaps the best question isn't, "Do college professors work hard enough?" Instead, it might be, "What do professors do, anyway?"
For professors, actual time spent teaching in the classroom is the tip of the iceberg that follows a great deal of preparation: sifting through mountains of books and articles to pick the texts for students to read; creating detailed course plans; producing voluminous notes and presentations for every class and writing a syllabus, among other things. Professors don't just stroll into class and say what's on their mind.
Professors can have 20, 30, 40 to 300 students in a class or lecture and they often require individual attention for myriad reasons: help understanding the course material, to discuss their approach to a paper or why they received a particular grade, among many others. This isn't confined to the set office hours most faculty hold. The advent of e-mail changed the way many students and faculty interact, so many professors are always on duty in this respect.
Advising students and grading their work takes significant time, as does campus life -- oh, the committees. Many professors devote a good deal of their time to various other assignments: search committees to hire colleagues or administrators, tenure review committees, curriculum committees, PhD. committees; and a host of task forces and working groups formed to address all the challenges your average college and university can encounter. This takes countless hours, but must be done and is often beneficial for the institution. They must also engage in professional development on a regular basis, to ensure they are at the forefront of their discipline.
At research universities, like UConn, teaching undergraduate courses and graduate seminars are similar to one's "day job," in that it represents only part of what faculty must do. In addition to that, they must also conduct research, whether it's in a laboratory, a library or a site halfway across the world. Faculty produce research to contribute to their respective field in meaningful ways in addition to their bedrock mission of educating students. Research is what leads to things like curing illnesses, historical revelation, greater economic development and better informing the decisions and practices of governments, interest groups and businesses, to name just a few.
And most professors don't spend their breaks lounging; they often use the time to work.
Faculty are so vital that, in fact, UConn recently enacted a plan to hire 300 new professors over the next four years. And it isn't because faculty lounges are dangerously empty. It's because along with our students, the quality of a university's faculty directly correlates to the quality of a university -- both in terms of teaching and research. They not only teach our students and contribute powerfully to our state, but they also contribute to the lifeblood of innovation and progress in scores of fields that impact all of our lives.
Does that mean there's no such thing as unproductive faculty members? No, of course not. There are -- they exist in every profession. But in my experience in the academic world, they are the exception, not the rule.
On March 23, the Washington Post ran an op-ed by David Levy, a former chancellor at the New School University, asking: "Do college professors work hard enough?" He suggests that faculty at non-research institutions don't put in enough hours for the pay they receive. Not surprisingly, this created a small firestorm among faculty nationwide who weren't shy about telling him what they thought.
I have held faculty and administrative positions only at research institutions -- where the mission is both teaching and research -- so I wouldn't presume to speak for faculty at schools focused exclusively on teaching. Yet there are some across-the-board myths about academic life in general, and professors sometimes seem to be a target.
This likely has to do with the fact that unless someone has been a professor or graduate student or worked with them, they probably don't fully understand what professors do. Instead, presumptions are made about an alleged leisurely life spent in an ivory tower sitting around in tweed coats, smoking pipes and discussing Kant or Rawls (which actually doesn't sound bad, except for the pipe smoke). That scene may happen, but it doesn't reflect how faculty spend most of their time.
So perhaps the best question isn't, "Do college professors work hard enough?" Instead, it might be, "What do professors do, anyway?"
For professors, actual time spent teaching in the classroom is the tip of the iceberg that follows a great deal of preparation: sifting through mountains of books and articles to pick the texts for students to read; creating detailed course plans; producing voluminous notes and presentations for every class and writing a syllabus, among other things. Professors don't just stroll into class and say what's on their mind.
Professors can have 20, 30, 40 to 300 students in a class or lecture and they often require individual attention for myriad reasons: help understanding the course material, to discuss their approach to a paper or why they received a particular grade, among many others. This isn't confined to the set office hours most faculty hold. The advent of e-mail changed the way many students and faculty interact, so many professors are always on duty in this respect.
Advising students and grading their work takes significant time, as does campus life -- oh, the committees. Many professors devote a good deal of their time to various other assignments: search committees to hire colleagues or administrators, tenure review committees, curriculum committees, PhD. committees; and a host of task forces and working groups formed to address all the challenges your average college and university can encounter. This takes countless hours, but must be done and is often beneficial for the institution. They must also engage in professional development on a regular basis, to ensure they are at the forefront of their discipline.
At research universities, like UConn, teaching undergraduate courses and graduate seminars are similar to one's "day job," in that it represents only part of what faculty must do. In addition to that, they must also conduct research, whether it's in a laboratory, a library or a site halfway across the world. Faculty produce research to contribute to their respective field in meaningful ways in addition to their bedrock mission of educating students. Research is what leads to things like curing illnesses, historical revelation, greater economic development and better informing the decisions and practices of governments, interest groups and businesses, to name just a few.
And most professors don't spend their breaks lounging; they often use the time to work.
Faculty are so vital that, in fact, UConn recently enacted a plan to hire 300 new professors over the next four years. And it isn't because faculty lounges are dangerously empty. It's because along with our students, the quality of a university's faculty directly correlates to the quality of a university -- both in terms of teaching and research. They not only teach our students and contribute powerfully to our state, but they also contribute to the lifeblood of innovation and progress in scores of fields that impact all of our lives.
Does that mean there's no such thing as unproductive faculty members? No, of course not. There are -- they exist in every profession. But in my experience in the academic world, they are the exception, not the rule.
Thursday, September 06, 2012
To bring up children without comparison is true education
One
is everlastingly comparing oneself with another, with what one is, with
what one should be, with someone who is more fortunate. This comparison
really kills. Comparison is degrading, it perverts one's outlook. And
on comparison one is brought up. All our education is based on it and so
is our culture. So there is everlasting struggle to be something other
than what one is. The understanding of what one is uncovers
creativeness, but comparison breeds competitiveness, ruthlessness,
ambition, which we think brings about progress. Progress has only led so
far to more ruthless wars and misery than the world has ever known. To
bring up children without comparison is true education. - Letters to a
Young Friend,18
Saturday, September 01, 2012
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