Twenty five hundred years ago, Gautama Siddhartha, the historical Buddha, had some deep insights and created powerful techniques that would allow major reductions of human suffering. Traditionally the Buddha is said to found a total end to all suffering. Perhaps that’s true, perhaps it’s not. I don’t know, but certainly Buddhist meditation techniques and related […]
Continue reading about Meditation, Monasticism, Buddhism, Materialism – Preliminary Thoughts
A colleague of mine, Jim Tucker, M.D., psychiatrist at the University of Virginia, wrote this excellent review of reincarnation. Tucker is one of the far too few scientists in the world actually looking at evidence for reincarnation, mainly studying young children who spontaneously recall another life. With his permission, I am circulating it. Charles T. […]
Some of you may know the web radio show Buddhist Geeks. Various Buddhist teachers are interviewed about once a week on cutting edge aspects of Buddhism, fitting it into modern times, etc., with the “geek” emphasis on what works. The show’s host, Vincent Horn, interviewed me a year or two ago at my wife’s urging, […]
Dr. Charles Tart Mindfulness Dr. Charles T. Tart, Mindfulness, Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, Lecture 4, Part 16 of 18 parts. To start class from beginning, click here. CTT: It’s a very unusual environment here at ITP, going back to William’s concerns for a minute or so. We don’t have a doctrine. We’re not a particular […]
I have been involved in a discussion on a professional list of “spiritual leaders” about the evidence for reincarnation and, more generally whether science has any value in casting light on spirituality and religion. One of the list members, an ordained Christian minister, wrote that he had a difficult time understanding my mentality. Where was […]
Continue reading about Science and Spirit: Where I’m Coming From and How I’m Doing It:
One of the folks on a discussion list I’m on was talking about her difficulties in accepting the reality of death as she got older, and asked how other people coped with death, especially hoping to hear how personal experience cast some light on the issue. I thought I’d share here what I wrote her. […]
My wife Judy and I have just completed a 6-day retreat on Dzogchen approaches to liberation with lama Tsoknyi Rinpoche, held at Mt. Madonna Conference Center. Now it’s a couple of days of camping in a redwood park to cool down, before jumping fully back into ordinary life, but I’ve been reflecting a lot and […]
Many of you know that one of my primary interests is building bridges between first-class science and first-class spirituality, so they can stimulate each other. My The End of Materialism book in 2009 was a major effort in this direction, arguing that, given scientific evidence, it is reasonable to be both scientific and spiritual in […]
Continue reading about Toward An Evidence-Based Spirituality for the 21st Century
After a long meditation retreat last month, my curiousity about one aspect of my meditation exprience led me to write the following little query about images. I’ve submitted it to the Journal of Consciousness Studies Online site, and if they accept it I may get some “expert” reflections on it, or I may get some […]
Continue reading about Where Do All Those Images and Dreamlets Come From?
Dr. Charles T. Tart, Mindfulness, Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, Lecture 4, Part 11 of 19 parts. To start class from beginning, click here. CTT: The mindfulness traditions claim they’ll take you all the way to enlightenment. And we certainly have historical examples of people who are considered Buddhas or saints or something like that, who […]
Continue reading about Meditation’s Five Percenters and Guruhood as a Way of Earning a Living