Science-Earthquake

A forum for beginners and members of other Buddhist traditions to ask questions about Theravāda (The Way of the Elders). Responses require moderator approval before they are visible in order to double-check alignment to Theravāda orthodoxy.
User avatar
Hanzze
Posts: 1906
Joined: Mon Oct 04, 2010 12:47 pm
Location: Cambodia

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Hanzze »

_/\_
Last edited by Hanzze on Sun Oct 31, 2010 7:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Just that! *smile*
...We Buddhists must find the courage to leave our temples and enter the temples of human experience, temples that are filled with suffering. If we listen to Buddha, Christ, or Gandhi, we can do nothing else. The refugee camps, the prisons, the ghettos, and the battlefields will become our temples. We have so much work to do. ... Peace is Possible! Step by Step. - Samtach Preah Maha Ghosananda "Step by Step" http://www.ghosananda.org/bio_book.html

BUT! it is important to become a real Buddhist first. Like Punna did: Punna Sutta Nate sante baram sokham _()_
Shonin
Posts: 583
Joined: Wed Apr 28, 2010 5:11 am

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Shonin »

Yes. Apart from the words, the concepts, the relationships between them, the level of detail and the closeness to reality, the passage attributed to the Buddha and our present understanding of the geo-physics of earthquakes are exactly the same. :jumping: The mind has a remarkable ability to reinterpret things so that they conform with what we want to see.
User avatar
Hanzze
Posts: 1906
Joined: Mon Oct 04, 2010 12:47 pm
Location: Cambodia

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Hanzze »

_/\_
Last edited by Hanzze on Sun Oct 31, 2010 7:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Just that! *smile*
...We Buddhists must find the courage to leave our temples and enter the temples of human experience, temples that are filled with suffering. If we listen to Buddha, Christ, or Gandhi, we can do nothing else. The refugee camps, the prisons, the ghettos, and the battlefields will become our temples. We have so much work to do. ... Peace is Possible! Step by Step. - Samtach Preah Maha Ghosananda "Step by Step" http://www.ghosananda.org/bio_book.html

BUT! it is important to become a real Buddhist first. Like Punna did: Punna Sutta Nate sante baram sokham _()_
Sanghamitta
Posts: 1614
Joined: Wed Jul 29, 2009 9:21 am
Location: By the River Thames near London.

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Sanghamitta »

lojong1 wrote:The New Akashic recordsp.139 chips away at the flat layer assumption, and the assumption that Buddha was repeating the "commonly held knowledge of the time."

Another possibility for the grammatical change at vāto ākāsaṭṭho is that patitthati establishes a more direct relationship between the elements than a simple locative. i.e. there are one or more supports between vāto and ākāsaṭṭho that play no significant part in causing an earthquake. Fire is the first to pop into my head.
You are seriously throwing in to the discussion the Thoughts (sic) of Blavatsky, Olcott, and their Theosophical nutjob cronies ?.. :jawdrop: And expecting them to be taken seriously ? The same Blavatsky and Olcott who claimed to be channeling disembodied Masters and Jesus from Himalayan Caves via teleportation..? The same Blavatsky and Olcott who gleaned from the "Akashic record " the fact that black people are less karmically evolved than caucasians, but that Tibetans are more evolved ?
I will join Bubbabuddhist in grabbing a bag of popcorn and watching the fun.. :popcorn:
Oh the problems that ensue when we take the metaphors of another time and place and attempt to crowbar them to our scientific world view...
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
lojong1
Posts: 607
Joined: Sat Dec 26, 2009 2:59 am

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by lojong1 »

Sanghamitta wrote:Seriously...?
Tight, thanks for adding something better. You were in the wrong chapter, although the mere mention of Blavatsky does kinda discredit all the info in the book. The part I had thought might at least compare in utility to the wiki articles quoted so far contains entries on "Hindu Concept of Akasha" and "Theravada and Akasha," which look reasonable and are relevant to the thread (which makes no attempt to study dhamma essence, so why are you and Shonin still here?).
Rahula80 wrote:Heavier things, logically, would support lighter stuff. No?
Yes, with the English word "support", that's a logical possibility. "The monk is supported (patitthati) by heedfulness"-- which is heavier? This is an example of patitthati that unquestionably supports the position that layering of heavier under lighter might not be intended in the sutta. No one has posted an example of patitthati used unquestionably in the gross physical sense of "standing above," yet I'm repeatedly accused of crowbarring with wacky assumptions? Herein, the person with a crowbar who does not understand it as it actually is thus: "I have a crowbar," is called the inferior of these two persons with a crowbar.
Sanghamitta
Posts: 1614
Joined: Wed Jul 29, 2009 9:21 am
Location: By the River Thames near London.

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Sanghamitta »

Holdsheadinhands emoticon.....Non sequitur after papancic non sequitur. Its a pity that the Tardis is unreal. otherwise an option would be to travel back to ancient India where those who attempt to hold quaint cosmological views would be in the mainstream and would therefore have no dissonance at least in this sphere.
Of course the downside would be placating personifications of thunder and shaking noisy objects to protect themselves from the dragons that eat the sun during eclipses...oh and medicine might be slightly different from what we have come to expect. However as life expectancy would be considerably shorter for most, that might not be an issue.
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
Laurens
Posts: 765
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2009 5:56 pm

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Laurens »

At the time of the Buddha they didn't understand how earthquakes happened. You can't blame him for making such an assumption.
"If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?"

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Shonin
Posts: 583
Joined: Wed Apr 28, 2010 5:11 am

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Shonin »

Laurens wrote:At the time of the Buddha they didn't understand how earthquakes happened. You can't blame him for making such an assumption.
Absolutely. And instead of trying to retrospectively reinterpret him to be saying something that conforms to our modern understanding just focus on the many valuable aspects of what he taught.
Paññāsikhara
Posts: 980
Joined: Wed Oct 14, 2009 5:27 am
Contact:

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Paññāsikhara »

rahula80 wrote:"This great earth, Ananda, is established upon liquid, the liquid upon the atmosphere, and the atmosphere upon space. And when, Ananda, mighty atmospheric disturbances take place, the liquid is agitated. And with the agitation of the liquid, tremors of the earth arise. This is the first reason, the first cause for the arising of mighty earthquakes." (Digha Nikaya 16)
"Ayaṃ, ānanda, mahāpathavī udake patiṭṭhitā, udakaṃ vāte patiṭṭhitaṃ, vāto ākāsaṭṭho. Hoti kho so, ānanda, samayo, yaṃ mahāvātā vāyanti. Mahāvātā vāyantā udakaṃ kampenti. Udakaṃ kampitaṃ pathaviṃ kampeti. Ayaṃ paṭhamo hetu paṭhamo paccayo mahato bhūmicālassa pātubhāvāya."

Note the terms carefully, as English renditions are approximate.

"vāta" (noun) translated as "atmosphere"
"vāyanti" (verb) translated as "disturbances"
Both are from the same root, vā, which is the root for a number of terms involving air, gas, wind as nouns, but the dynamic sense of movement in general. These terms are closely connected in the Indic languages, but not really at all in English.

The general model was that the earth rests on "udaka", which often gets translated as "water". It could just as well be "liquid", in the sense that the mantle of the earth rests on the molten magma below. And this rests on some sort of "air / gas" as a movement. This in turn on space, but considering most Buddhists don't accept "space" as a thing per se, it is more like saying "and this doesn't rest on anything"!

One could also render a sense of "... liquid rests on gas / movement, gas / movement rests on space ...", "... when the moved / gas makes a great movement, the liquid moves ...", etc. In the Indic it is not as far fetched as it seems in English. As has been pointed out earlier, all the English terms such as "earth", "water", "air" or even more abstract "solid", "liquid", "gas", etc. don't quite match up with their meanings in ancient Indian thought. We have to go into that thought world to work with it (in a kind of Schleiermacherian sense).

Movement seems to be movement of the gas, which in turn moves the liquid, which moves the earth. The last two points are basically the same as the seismic model we have today. The first part is not though. But what exactly is this "movement / gas" anyway?

Still not quite the modern model of science, but it is interesting to look into.

Another issue is the idea that the Buddha was just following the world view of his day and age. I ask: Which worldview? There were several different worldviews around that time, some of them match, others do not really. Moreover, have a good look into what period the appropriate worldviews even surfaced. It may be surprising. To paraphrase Gombrich, one best know which comes first and which later in order to ascertain causal relations.

But as I've said elsewhere, just look into other versions of this text, and ask whether or not it is part of the earliest strata of suttas, or one of the later strata, in the first place. The later strata tending to have more content added by the compilers, rather than the straight teachings of the Buddha. That would be a scientific (sic?) way of asking the very question in the first place.

Please compare this to the other versions of the text and have a look. Give some dates for this material. Give some dates for other similar material in non-Buddhist systems. Who made this statement in the first place?
My recently moved Blog, containing some of my writings on the Buddha Dhamma, as well as a number of translations from classical Buddhist texts and modern authors, liturgy, etc.: Huifeng's Prajnacara Blog.
Sanghamitta
Posts: 1614
Joined: Wed Jul 29, 2009 9:21 am
Location: By the River Thames near London.

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Sanghamitta »

But Pannasikhara, even if it could be shown that the "water" referred to was actually magma..which would be jolly convenient for the literal minded, it still begs the same question...We are still left with the notion that the arising or passing of a Buddha causes a disturbance in the earths subterranean magma... :roll:
This is quite clearly the world view that arises with Indic myth...not a statement that describes an objective event in consensual reality.
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
Paññāsikhara
Posts: 980
Joined: Wed Oct 14, 2009 5:27 am
Contact:

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Paññāsikhara »

Sanghamitta wrote:But Pannasikhara, even if it could be shown that the "water" referred to was actually magma..which would be jolly convenient for the literal minded, it still begs the same question...We are still left with the notion that the arising or passing of a Buddha causes a disturbance in the earths subterranean magma... :roll:
This is quite clearly the world view that arises with Indic myth...not a statement that describes an objective event in consensual reality.
Well, did you read the last two paragraphs of my last post?

(And given some of the broader meanings of "air" in Indian thought, it isn't as strange as it sounds in English. But of course, as already mentioned, this would mean actually reading the text in it's own thought-world.)
My recently moved Blog, containing some of my writings on the Buddha Dhamma, as well as a number of translations from classical Buddhist texts and modern authors, liturgy, etc.: Huifeng's Prajnacara Blog.
Sanghamitta
Posts: 1614
Joined: Wed Jul 29, 2009 9:21 am
Location: By the River Thames near London.

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Sanghamitta »

I did and was ageeing with you...the "but" was for the benefit of other readers. I was being your stooge. :smile:


:anjali:

Valerie.
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
Paññāsikhara
Posts: 980
Joined: Wed Oct 14, 2009 5:27 am
Contact:

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Paññāsikhara »

Sanghamitta wrote:I did and was ageeing with you...the "but" was for the benefit of other readers. I was being your stooge. :smile:


:anjali:

Valerie.
Okay, gotcha. These sorts of nuances often go amiss in the digital communication realm.
My recently moved Blog, containing some of my writings on the Buddha Dhamma, as well as a number of translations from classical Buddhist texts and modern authors, liturgy, etc.: Huifeng's Prajnacara Blog.
Sanghamitta
Posts: 1614
Joined: Wed Jul 29, 2009 9:21 am
Location: By the River Thames near London.

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by Sanghamitta »

They do....they do.
The going for refuge is the door of entrance to the teachings of the Buddha.

Bhikku Bodhi.
beeblebrox
Posts: 939
Joined: Thu Dec 31, 2009 10:41 pm

Re: Science-Earthquake

Post by beeblebrox »

Paññāsikhara wrote:"Ayaṃ, ānanda, mahāpathavī udake patiṭṭhitā, udakaṃ vāte patiṭṭhitaṃ, vāto ākāsaṭṭho. Hoti kho so, ānanda, samayo, yaṃ mahāvātā vāyanti. Mahāvātā vāyantā udakaṃ kampenti. Udakaṃ kampitaṃ pathaviṃ kampeti. Ayaṃ paṭhamo hetu paṭhamo paccayo mahato bhūmicālassa pātubhāvāya."

Note the terms carefully, as English renditions are approximate.

"vāta" (noun) translated as "atmosphere"
"vāyanti" (verb) translated as "disturbances"
Both are from the same root, vā, which is the root for a number of terms involving air, gas, wind as nouns, but the dynamic sense of movement in general. These terms are closely connected in the Indic languages, but not really at all in English.
Thanks, Ven. Paññāsikhara. It shows how important it can be in understanding a language, especially within its own terms...

Here's a loose translation:
This Great Earth, Ānanda, has the characteristic of "water" within it (not 100% stable). This "water" has the characteristic of "wind" throughout it (energy). This "wind" is unsupported (existing in space).

And when, Ānanda, this "wind" is manifesting itself as the great "wind," it is manifested through the "water." This "water" in turn, is manifested through the Earth. That is the first explanation for the arising of mighty earthquakes.
See how easy that was? :geek:

The commonly used model of convection current by the way, (to explain the different manifestations of stress within the tectonic plates), is still incomplete... because there are still some inconsistencies when compared to the actual patterns of certain geological features, as observed in nature.

The following is a simplified explanation from http://www.tectonic-forces.org" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (which seeks to remedy some of the shortcomings with the current model, by including the unstable rotation of the earth in space):
In 2001, the author, R.Maurer (Chartered Engineer, UK) while on a mineral collecting expedition in Bolivia, noted uplifted but undisturbed alluvial sedimentary beds at the top of the Andes near Potosi. Taken together with his finding of new species of fossilised cretaceous fish and stromatolite beds, these observations prompted him to look at the magnitude of the forces involved in lifting the vast Andean mountain range from approx. 3 km below sea level to approx. 8 km above sea- level.

The author (drawing on his engineering expertise) concluded that the forces needed to sustain the unrelenting and uni-directional movements of the continental plates in a conflicting omni directional heated convection current system (based on the Hess Model) was mechanically unsustainable.

The first clue came with the observation that the precession of the equinoxes (Milankovitch Cycles) [Fig.7.], the longer-term cyclical changes in the inclination and obliquity of the central axis of rotation of the Earth taken together with the observed magnetic polar wandering suggested that the Earth was behaving like an unbalanced rotating cylindrical body. A domestic spin dryer with an unbalanced wet load is a good everyday example of an unbalanced rotating system. Vibrations are induced in rotating bodies when the centre of mass is not co-incident with the centre of rotation. In these cases, counterbalance weights are fixed to balance the rotating system. Another simple everyday example is the positioning of balance weight on the wheels of motor vehicles.
Last edited by beeblebrox on Wed Oct 13, 2010 6:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Post Reply