Ervinn

Something surprised me and made me think. It was about a story when the Buddha himself was teaching for days about 'impermanence', 'selflessness', 'cause and affect', and so on. At the end he said the most important think. "Do not be dogmatic, do not be caught up with any teachings and ideas, even Buddhist one." Those are not the truth. Those are only instruments to understand impermanence and selflessness, but those are not absolute truth. So do not be caught up with the notion of impermanence and selflessness, because if you do you are not better of then if you stay with permanence and the self. I was confused, I did not understand. I thought he was just playing with words.

But if those are only instruments to get us closer to the absolute truth, what is the absolute truth then? The absolute truth can not be described by words, it needs to be experienced. In Buddhism the absolute truth is nirvana. Again it looks like an easy escape. What we like to know the most can not be described, so what's the point. I felt angry and frustrated. But he pointed out that in our life there are lots of thinks that can not be described by words. It did not occur to us, at least not to me. I had the illusion that most of simple thinks can be described by words.

Let’s do an experiment. Imagine that you meet a person who came from Mars and never tasted and apple. Apple looks a simple think. Your job is to describe in words how the apple tastes. Good luck. You could say it is a bit sweet and watery, but that is not exactly the truth. The apple needs to be experienced in order to know precisely. Apple taste like apple. When the Buddha was asked to explain nirvana. His reply was: That is it is. Nirvana can not be described by words, it needs to be experienced.

Not only that but nirvana is free from all concepts and notions. So to reach nirvana we must be free from all concepts and notions. We need to be free from notion of good and bad, right and wrong.

I think the main aim of the Buddhist teaching to help us first intellectually understand, with the help of those instruments we talked about before, that we must be free from thinking in terms of good and bad, being and not being, right and wrong. It teaches us that we do not have independent existence that we all depend on each other not only for survival, but also for happiness. Not only we can not live alone, we can not be happy alone. Feeling compassion and doing good acts get us closer to happiness.

But then it warns us that this intellectual understanding could be a danger if we form a strong attachment to it. If we are taken over by this understanding, if we are caught up with it, if we take it as THE truth, and we feel the need to defend it by any means. If that happens then we are not better of than not having acquiring this understanding in the first place. Our focus should be on experiencing or going closer to experience happiness (nirvana), rather than, thinking about it. (So instead of caught up in the notion how healthy and delicious an apple is, take one. The apple has to be tasted.) I feel this is a very important point that we should not be caught up with the any teaching. This gives us an open mind, knowing that many roads leads to the absolute truth.

If the teaching is not the truth, just a help to reach the truth, then it should not matter what road I take to get there. I am not attached to any of them. I should not expect others to take my road. This should help to make harmony among religions. We all want the same think, but we may go in different ways to get it.

Also it should help to make harmony between religion and science. They both search for the meaning of life, the reason for our existence. But again both of their teachings are not the truth, they are only instruments to get there.

Science is usually good at asnwering the How? question, and not so good at answering the Why? questions. Religion is usually good to give an answer to the Why? question, but not so good to answer the How? question. Ervinn 04:26, 16 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

What is the meaning of life? The non-creationist simple answer could be to survive. But then you could ask why should I survive? Because natural selection selected you to survive. Natural selection made sure that you want to survive. Those who did not want to survive died out. How natural selection started is a different story. And why natural selection started in the first place? Were there any reason for natural selection to start? Ervinn 02:29, 15 July 2006 (UTC)Reply

Genes exist so DNA molecules can survive. --> People exist so their genes can survive. --> Civilization exist so people can survive.

DNA molecules build the genes. --> Genes have the information to build people's body. --> People have the knowledge to build civilizations. --> Civilization has the power to alter and destroy all of that. Civilization would change or replace Genes, would change or replace people if evolution and natural selection demands it, in order the civilization to survive.

Genes depend on DNA. --> People depend on Genes. --> Civilizations depend on people, for the time being.

Ervinn 04:17, 16 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

People who suffers deadly genetic diseases, usually labeled as nice guys. The definition of nice guys in this context is those people who have different tolerances for themselves and for others.

They tolerate almost abuse from others, at the same time they are nice to them. This kind of behaviors may turn on some "bad" genes that can cause the illness.

So, it is not enough to apply the golden rule, that says: “You should do things to others that you’d like them to do to you.” We need to add: “You should only tolerate things from others that they would tolerate from you.” , and apply the double golden rule.

That explains why women do not like "nice guys", "nice guys" may develop illness, and evolution made them avoid nice guys.

Ervinn (talk) 21:00, 24 June 2008 (UTC)Reply

Hi Ervinn,

Please don't do "copy and paste" pagemoves (like the ones in programming). Instead, use the "move" button on the top of the page, which preserves the contributions history. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 15:22, 8 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Hi John, I reply here, I hope you'll get it. Thanks for the advise, I was thinking about what the best way to merge. I've used "move" before on a page that did not exist on the keep-version of the book. Some cases however, simular pages already existed on both books. How to merge them? Should I move them and then delete on the keep-version of the book, if not needed. Will the contribution history be kept on the deleted pages? If yes, then I agree, that first the pages should be moved, and that what I will do. Thanks for your note again, and I would appreciate if you let me know if you've got my note here. Thanks - Ervinn 17:59, 8 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Hi again, yes, pagemove won't work if there's a page there already (even if it's a crappy little stub, unfortunately). The best way to handle this is:

1. Blank the destination page

2. Add {{delete}} to the page, and also have it redirect to the page that you intend to move (so that you can fix any links in the meantime while waiting for the deletion).

3. Don't worry... I make it a point to empty the speedy deletion category daily, so it won't be long before the deed is done.

(BTW, I'm posting about this on the staff lounge too) --SB_Johnny | ^talk 18:26, 12 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Hi John, Thanks for your reply. I have one more question. Don't we loose the history of the destination page when we delete? Is it not the same I did, just the other way around? We still need a "copy and paste", if we need to keep content from the destination page. Do I miss something? Please explain.

Also, I think wiki technologhy missing a merge functionality, right now. Hopefully that will be solved in the future. May be you could post a recommendation to solve this. Ervinn 13:25, 13 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yup, it's lost. But if it's just a stub, it probably doesn't have much of a history, and if it's being deleted, then the history doesn't matter anyway. Sort of a philosphica bind, eh? I'd say that the more developed page should take precedence, but that's just me. If it was of real concern, it may actually possible to delete the destination page, move the material, and then restore the old edits...I'll do some experimenting and see if that's true. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 23:23, 13 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Hi Ervinn... You can either mark them for speedy (just put {{delete}} on the page), or just leave them there... they're not hurting anything :). Nice job moving that whole book! I'm doing that to another book, and know how much work it is :). --SB_Johnny | ^talk 21:21, 18 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

Hi Ervinn,

I know you left an edit comment saying to mark your images as self-made, but actually you have to do that. See Wikibooks:Image_copyright_tags for a list of licences you can use for them. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 13:16, 4 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

Thanks, I'll do that. Ervinn 03:00, 5 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

Hi Ervinn, could you clarify your use of the word 'syntact' in your articles about Java keywords. Is it a spelling error (instead of 'syntax') or just a term I'm unfamiliar with? Clayton Carter 23:57, 30 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

Spelling. Feel free to correct them. Thanks,Ervinn 15:18, 1 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

I was looking through the Java wikibook and noticed that many of the diagrams were encoded as jpegs. It would be much better if you could upload SVG versions of them. At the moment, I don't have the time to work on them myself and it would be best if they were done in a consistent style. Thanks. Mikm 07:28, 19 January 2007 (UTC)Reply

Clarification: I would be happy to work on them myself. I just think it would be best if one person does it. Mikm 07:39, 19 January 2007 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for the note. What do you mean by SVG? If that is a better format, I'll be consider it in the future. Thanks, again. Ervinn 14:36, 19 January 2007 (UTC)Reply

Check out w:SVG. Basically, it is a vector image format that's excellent for simple diagrams. Also, great job with the Java wikibook. It's in a much, much better condition than I left it :) Mikm 05:57, 20 January 2007 (UTC)Reply

I saw some of your edits on this book, thanks for helping! I created this book last week, as a place to store my class notes. I'm glad to see other people helping out already! I'm going to continue working on this book as the semester progresses, but you are welcome to add whatever you want to it as well. If you need anything, please let me know. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 20:18, 23 January 2007 (UTC)Reply

I was programming in Assembly languages long, long time ago. I write down what I still remember, hope it can be used by someone. And I hope I can learn something new as well. Ervinn 20:33, 23 January 2007 (UTC)Reply

I assumed that's what was meant in Wikibooks:Dewikify. Quote: "Wikibooks modules use wikilinks rather sparsely, and only to reference technical or esoteric terms that are critical to understanding the content. Most if not all wikilinks should simply be removed. See Wikibooks:Dewikify for details" But I could be wrong - I'm relatively new. --Jimmyatic 15:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

I agree that there should be no unrelated links in the page different from the topic discussed. Wikipedia are full of unrelated links that can be confusing. One obvious example when they make a year ,let say, year 1999 as a link.

My understanding of the 'dewikify' process is when a page is copied over from wikipedia, those links should be removed.

The page in question is an overview page, and the links are meant to let the reader find additional information about the topic. Obvious link could be removed, however. Ervinn 20:51, 5 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

Good question. I have put some musings on the page but I dont know the answer. RobinH (talk) 11:15, 19 September 2008 (UTC)Reply