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It (literally) means 3000 realms in a single moment of life.  This means that for any given moment your life is composed of everything; all thoughts, all history, all presents and all futures.  You only ‘sense’ things one at a time, yet they’re always there.

Four Mile Beach, Port Douglas, Australia

1. I’ll soon be toddling off to the beach above.
2. 

   Beautiful Sunset

   It’s a fantastic holiday destination, see the sunset here, or click on the image for more shots.

3. You’ll see it’s a beautiful blue.
4. You’ll see it’s a beautiful green.
5. You’ll see it’s a beautiful yellow.
6. It’s the Coral Sea.
7. Steve Irwin, the mad Aussie crocodile bloke was killed here, by a stingray.
8. The Great Barrier Reef is just offshore.
9. They erect stingray nets for swimmers, just like shark nets, only different name.
10. You can get coral-coloured condoms.
11. About a day or so’s sail away, the Battle of the Coral Sea was fought in 1942 where well over 1000 people lost their lives.
12. Most of the survivors are dead now, as they’re getting very old.
13. All life renews.
14. Four Mile beach looks like something Robinson Crusoe would’ve recognised.
15. Both the fictional Crusoe and the actual man on which the story was based couldn’t wait to get off their beach.
16. I’m going to Four Mile Beach soon.
17. 

    Lexington Explodes

    You’ll see it’s a beautiful blue.

18. You’ll see it’s a beautiful green.
19. You’ll see it’s a beautiful yellow.
20. I made music as Crawling Chaos.
21. I’ve renamed one of our tracks, the track  playing, to “Castaway” after I’d re- jigged it a bit.  It seemed “better”.
22. As a boy my father read a book called “The Coral Sea” and decided to become a sailor who would one day sail that very sea because of it.
23. He joined the war.  His ship was originally called CVE-32.
24. The Lexington which blew up in the Coral Sea was originally called CV-2.
25. I’m going to Four Mile Beach soon.
26. What’s it all mean?

Four Mile Beach again

It means that we are all connected.  In many more ways than the 3000, we are all intimately connected both now, to the past and the future.  Sometimes the connections are obvious, sometimes not; but as sure as eggs are eggs all our lives are entangled, it’s a part of life.

The Buddha said “work hard for your own salvation” just before he died.  It means to take action for your own happiness.  Don’t rely on external factors like people, events or gods because you’ll always be dissatisfied.  Suffer what is and enjoy what is as if they’re the same.

Enjoy being a Castaway! Enjoy life.

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A. Those who practice Buddhism do so without any expectation of grace or favour.  They do it for two reasons:

1. To Improve their own life and continuing existence
2. To improve other’s lives and future existences

You don’t have to believe that they do this – after all, it could all be a big deception, couldn’t it?

But a true Buddha, revealing their Buddha nature and pointing out the iniquities and devilish qualities of the world, does believe this.  Wholeheartedly.

This is why, in all the Buddhist schools, there is a phrase passed down from eons back.

Those who vex and trouble [the practitioners of the Law] will have their heads split into seven pieces.

Now What Does That mean!

It’s an allegory, that quite often is remarkably accurate….   I’ve seen it happen;  where people have vexed and insinuated against someone that’s revealing their Buddha nature – and then come a cropper!  You name it:

• Bad illnesses
• Bad finances
• Bad relationships
• Brain cancer
• Business or company breakups
• Family break up or polarisations

3000 Realms in a Single Moment

If Buddhism were just capable of punishing without change, then it’d be no good.  It’d be just like Judgement Day, which it’s not.  The principle of 3000 realms in a single moment [of life] means that everyone can be bad and good at the same time.

Really.  That’s what it means.  It’s the complete essence of Buddhism.

Therefore, even very bad people, who have “harmed or vexed” a Buddha, can reveal their good side and instantly become a Buddha – just like that!

Conversely, anyone can go over to the dark side of animality.  At any time.

Belief

You don’t have to believe any of this, of course.

But I do.

• From someone with the very worst excesses of delusions and animality being transformed instantly to a person of great note – I believe it.
• For someone that harms a Buddha having their head [metaphorically or literally] smashed into seven pieces – I believe it.

Like I said, you don’t have to believe it – but I do, and so do millions of Buddhists. We know what will happen because we’ve seen it.

Sub Text

Why am I talking like this?

A. Because, as a practitioner of Buddhism, I’m being attacked for trying to protect people and to turn the attacker into something better;

And it’s my warning.

I don’t have to do anything – the universe will make it so, (as Captain Jean-Luc would say).

References

These are the instances when the famous Buddhist monk Nichiren talks about a “head being split into seven pieces” from his writings.  As I say, you don’t have to believe it.  All that matters is that I do.

• The Universal Salty Taste
• The Opening of the Eyes
• The Opening of the Eyes
• Letter to the Brothers
• Letter to Horen
• Letter to Horen
• The Selection of the Time
• Letter to the Lay Nun of Ko
• The Supremacy of the Law
• A Sage Perceives the Three Existences of Life
• A Sage Perceives the Three Existences of Life
• A Sage Perceives the Three Existences of Life
• The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra
• The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra
• The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra
• The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra
• The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra
• The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra
• On the Four Stages of Faith and the Five Stages of Practice
• On the Four Stages of Faith and the Five Stages of Practice
• On the Four Stages of Faith and the Five Stages of Practice
• The Letter of Petition from Yorimoto
• The Two Kinds of Faith
• An Outline of the “Entrustment” and Other Chapters
• The Sutra of True Requital
• The Drum at the Gate of Thunder
• The Proof of the Lotus Sutra
• The Bodies and Minds of Ordinary Beings
• The Bodies and Minds of Ordinary Beings

For a clue to what this about, this is a neat definition of the term “scammer”, taken from The Urban Dictionary:

One who does everything in his/her power to steal from another, usually by means of trickery, deceit, and force. With the accesibility and anonymousity that the internet provides, scammers have become increasingly prevalent in modern times. Usually driven by personal greed or even outright amusement, they are unhindered by sympathy or morals and are the very face of human corruption.

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(This posting originally released on 16 Dec 2007.  Reposted and edited because of the subject’s death.)

Claire and Tereska

This is a BBC News article on the women of the French Resistance who worked with De Gaulle in London and then went to Paris with him for the Liberation.

Tereska and Claire visit de Gaulle's headquarters in London

Claire is one of our local SGI Buddhist group and she has told me many stories of those times. Recently she was musing on what she would have done and what would have happened to her if they she’d been asked to join SOE (like some were) and be dropped in France (because of her good French etc).

She also mentioned about a sniper’s bullet aimed at De Gaulle that just missed him (and her) while he walked down the Champs Elysée but hit a young man from their London party who had had a premonition that he’d die if he went back to France with them.

I must ask her if it’d be okay to write more of this down for her (and us). She’s eighty odd, you know.

Claire Chicoteau

Postscript Added 28/6/2010

Claire died this week, peacefully, with her family around her, in France.  Bravo for her big, big,  life.  Too late to ask any more questions….

Information on her wartime exploits can be found here:

• http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7142424.stm
• http://genrehistoire.revues.org/index373.html#bodyftn29
• http://jcdurbant.wordpress.com/2006/03/27/comme-des-barbares-attention-une-face-cachee-peut-en-cacher-une-autre-d-day-for-french-revisionists/

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Being justifiably upset by the events at the Heysel Stadium many years ago, the recent comments on a video I made about it …

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxqjTZYV5do

… on the 25th anniversary of the awful event made me recall some TV reporting of what was reputedly  to be a Juventus “fan” brandishing a gun on the pitch.

This was well reported and many people remember this (see later link rferences).

However, I’ve trawled the internet looking for pictures of this person and after an hour’s work, have found absolutely nothing, which, given the nature of the event, the host of personal recollections and the ease with which information can be posted and retrieved from the web, is very strange indeed.

So why can’t I find a single picture of this?  Why?

If I recall correctly, the gunman was one of the Juventus owner’s family, or party.  Everyone seems to remember that after the event, the gun was found to be a starting pistol and that he was chastised by the family and grounded for a bit.  However, for anyone who has ever been threatened by a gunman, post event information is small cheer indeed!

Meanwhile:

• Liverpool “fans” were convicted and later the town and club had a double hit of karmic retribution.
• Football in the UK, after being banned from Europe, has cleaned up it’s act, (generally, with the odd notable exception), moved on and is moneyed up to the eyeballs.
• Football in Italy is as partisan and violent as ever with corruption at every level of the sport that sees clubs dropped a league or two and opposing teams’ support afraid to visit the country.

So where is the Heysel gun (and man)?  Where are the pictures?  I’d like to know, if only to clarify my mind.  All I see are the fans on the pitch with iron bars and dead and dying fans under a wall.

Joe Fagan, the Liverpool manager, left the pitch, from what was planned to be his last match in charge, in tears.  I’m sure it was because he saw what had happened to his beautiful game.

Now, the xenophobes and unforgivers need to move on.  Justice was doubly served on Liverpool and a picture of the Juve “fan” with a gun would balance some memories of the time.  Juve people need to accept this or else the hate and violence that we see on the Italian terraces will never go, until they too, have their own karmic retribution.

There’s a lot that still needs to be done.

Links

• Karma & karmic retribution – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karma
• “What is really tragic is that the underlying tribal and, to put it mildly, xenophobic attitudes amongst so-called fans and the police that lead to this and other tragedies are still prevalent twenty-five years on.” – http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/may/28/heysel-disaster-25th-anniversary#CommentKey:424a1ae9-2644-49d4-842e-8f63043a73ad
• http://bianconeri.tripod.com/heysel.html
• http://uefa.theoffside.com/europe/heysel-footballs-darkest-hour.html
• http://www.economicexpert.com/a/Heysel:Stadium:disaster.htm
• http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/liverpool-fc/liverpool-fc-news/2010/05/27/we-heard-a-gun-go-off-the-italian-fans-had-a-gun-a-photographer-s-memory-of-heysel-100252-26529987/ – read comments!
• http://blog.emiratesstadium.info/2010/03/heysel-25-years-on-the-view-from-belgium/comment-page-1/#comment-19512

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The Deeper I Go, The More Knowledge I Know

Quite simply, there can be no true democracy unless the citizens of a country realize that they are sovereign, that they are the main protagonists, and then with wisdom and a strong sense of responsibility take action based on that realization.

Democracy cannot be successful in its mission unless the people rouse themselves to become more informed and involved, unless they unite, unless they establish an unshakable force for justice and keep a strict eye on the activities of the powerful.

Daisaku Ikeda, for Tuesday, April 13, 2010

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Of foremost importance are the people – not celebrities, the powerful, the rich, scholars or others whom society deems great or praiseworthy. The purpose of all things must be the happiness of the people.

Everything else should be but a means to that end.

Those who fail to recognize this fundamental point and look down on the people and exploit them are thoroughly vile and contemptible; they are a hindrance to people’s happiness.

Daily Encouragement by Daisaku Ikeda
Friday, March 26, 2010

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My old friend Jeff recently died.

Waqqaz

The track now playing was one of the last pieces we did together.  It’s Jeff’s creation  and is one of my favourite Crawling Chaos tracks.  This is a pre-Waqqaz version from a cassette that has travelled round France, been in various glove compartments and cupboard floors.

I’ve taken it straight from cassette and it’s encoded at the maximum bitrate for MP3 files in Reaper for your enjoyment.  I’ve just used a noise gate set at -20dB and a bit of compression to follow in this extract.   For me, the mix is better than the final vinyl one despite the 12kHz frequency cut-off.

It’s Jeff at his finest.

Jeff(R), Rees(L)

I remember him sitting cross-legged on the floor at Bebside for about a fortnight getting the various harmonies planned out.  My input was minimal and I just did a few block keyboard chords as instructed, to bulk out the end as well as the mixing on the guitars and the drums set-up.

The real work was within the complex interlocking guitar parts, of which there are at least six, all played by Jeff.  The only words I could think of came to me in a dream.

E.ver Y.oung, E.ver S.pecial

Purple Flower

I ensured that they were on the penultimate bounce so that they couldn’t be removed.  I didn’t know why, at the time, I thought of them (apart from the corniness) or why I strove to ensure their longevity.  I instantly knew though, that this was Jeff’s finest work, for me, and I’ve listened many times to it since, mainly this cassette tape version.

But now, I know that one’s karma transcends space and time and that one can affect one’s karma in the distant past.

Currently, I am heavily affected by EYES, believe it or not.  I have chanted to change my karma both now, in the future, and in the past, and the benefits are immense.

So now I know why I woke up with those words in my head 25 springs ago.

It was so that I could write this piece about my old friend Jeff, and remember him and all the joint experiences that we had together  since we were 14.

Goodbye Doomage.  Till next time.

This is a copy of the page here: http://crawlingchaos.co.uk/e-y-e-s/ (any comments to there, please)

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Indian police officers look down from a bridge at the wreckage of a bus after an accident in Sawai Madhopur district, nearly 185 kilometres west of Jaipur, India, Monday, March 15, 2010. (AP / Rajasthan Patrika)

The above headline is awful enough for the people involved, but in reality, it’s subject, a road crash, is common enough in my own country, the UK.

What is really bad is how the BBC is reporting this.  They should know better but essentially, they’ve reported verbatim the same “superiority complex” story being bandied about the globe in a “mass denigration” of India, (see here and here for instance), originally sourced from AP and which includes the objectionable phrase,

Road accidents claim hundreds of Indian lives every year. Most are blamed on bad driving or poor roads and vehicles.

There are two things wrong with this:

ONE:  The statistics are incorrect and they imply that somehow India is much worse than anywhere else.

TWO: The causes of accidents are reported as if they are specific to India, e.g. bad driving, vehicles, roads.  This is obviously wrong – my personal experience and the accounts of countless others tell me so….

Statistics

People are killed on the roads in far greater numbers than “hundreds” as the BBC and everyone else is saying.  Not only that, India’s figures are in the thousands, not hundreds, the same as every other country on the planet!…

You see,  ~4,000 are killed in the UK and ten times that, ~40,000 are killed in the USA!    Every year.

In the USA it’s so bad now that the main cause of death for people aged from 5 to 27 is on the road! (source)

Bad Driving? Bad Writing? Bad Editing?

So is it okay to compare bald figures?  What are they?

Of course, the statistics for India are hard to come by.  But this website for 1998 gives road deaths figures for India, North America and Europe as:

• India:               217k
• N. America:     49k
• Europe:             66k

From Wikipedia, these are the (2008) figures for population of the three areas:

• India:               1,150M
• N. America:     528M
• Europe:             830M

So from these figures, road traffic deaths per 100,000 persons are:

• India:               18.8
• N. America:     9.3
• Europe:             8.0

So India is about twice as bad as the two major OECD areas in the world, for road deaths as a percentage of population size….  Not that we can all sit easy in our Western smugness….  there are still 10 people dying every day in the UK, on the road.

(I know the above calculations are back-of-fag-packet stuff and the data doesn’t line up correctly, date-wise.  As I said, Indian data is hard to come by. This document makes plain that the OECD median is 7.8 for 2007, which is close to my calculations, and my calculation uses figures from the same year for each geographical zone down a given metric.)

USA Paradox?

But what about the distance travelled?  Surely Americans drive more and thus crash more compared to their fellow Europeans which will lower their rates?

This document again makes plain that the above supposition is false!  When allowance is made for distance travelled, the USA fares only slightly worse than the UK for deaths per 100 million vehicle kilometres; 0.8 compared to 0.6

But this “slightly worse”, in percentage terms, is about the same as the whole variation across all OECD countries, N. America and Europe as seen above.  This means, that Americans DO drive farther, but they still crash at their same higher rate compared to Europeans.

Conclusion

Where does this leave India?  As I said, the data is hard to come by.  But that’s not the point, is it?

The point is that the reporting of this bridge crash is being done in a mocking, superior way, and we have nothing at all to be smug about in the arena of road deaths.

NOTHING.

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The fundamental spirit of Buddhism is that all people are equal. A person is not great simply because of his or her social standing, fame, academic background or position in the organization.

In the world of faith, the truly great are those who spread the Mystic Law and strive for kosen-rufu, who actively work for the sake of Buddhism and the happiness of others.

Supremely respectworthy are those who champion the cause of kosen-rufu.

Daily Encouragement by Daisaku Ikeda
Tuesday, March 9, 2010

I was much impressed with this quote of Ikeda’s yesterday.

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Note: This was originally published here http://buddhastate.co.uk/blog/?p=30 on Sunday, September 24th, 2006 at 4:28 pm and filed under Buddhism..  The link has been dead for quite some time, looks unlikely to re-appear,  so I’m showing the words here as they are so wonderful because they deserve to be preserved.  The material is straight from Google’s cache as it isn’t in the Wayback Machine.  Use the contact page if you think this is unreasonable.

Through enlightenment we escape the confines of the physical and realise the unlimited potential of the human spirit. Just as the sun that dries the newly hatched butterfly’s wings, the compassion of the Lotus Sutra allows us all to soar from our pitiful cocoons and look out over the landscape of infinite possibility.

The potential for enlightenment exists within all human beings, just as an ungainly chick has the potential to become a great eagle, the single roe egg to become a great salmon, or the young cheetah to become faster even than antelope. Why then, do human beings endowed with the capacity for intelligence and great understanding constantly fail to fulfil their potential?

Physical confinement refers not only to tangible barriers, like walls, or borders, but also by those barriers caused by our lesser consciousnesses. Our lesser consciousnesses often serve to withhold our true potential, making us feel trapped within the lower life states of hell, hunger, animality and anger. We constantly fall into the three evil paths of greed anger and foolishness, and we commit the ten evil acts – all serving only to deepen our suffering and further delude us from our most true and pure nature.

Lotus Flower

This one moment of insight transformed Mr Toda’s life, and catalysed the growth of the SGI in post war Japan, and subsequently revitalised the cause for Kosen Rufu throughout the world.

It surprises me not in the least that given such a supreme teaching, and aware of his inability to directly influence the affairs of the world outside his cell, that the causes inherent in Mr Toda’s experiencing the Lotus Sutra ultimately led to such profound effects upon so many people today.

Trapped in a prison cell one is all too aware of his physical confinement. Given such an environment, and removed from every day affairs, even the ignorant would have much time to ponder. Many great people of compassion have suffered this kind of confinement – not just such great names as Mandela and Terry Waite, but the countless common people who have found their lives curtailed by cruel regimes bent on every kind of domination.

A prison cell is a relative confinement. The insects that must have occupied Josei Toda’s prison cell were most likely unaware of the rest of the prison, far less so the existence of the country of Japan, it’s people’s anguish, or the needless suffering being delivered upon countless millions of people due to the war. Those insects surely went about their daily business, oblivious to these facts. Spiders would spin their webs, and flies, being such, would daily find themselves trapped therein.

Josei Toda although knowing his mentor and friend Tsunesaburo Makiguchi was also in prison, must have felt a terrible sense of isolation from the world outside, and finally upon learning of Makiguchi’s death a year after his last brief meeting with him, he wept in his devastation all night. For a time he must have felt as isolated as a single ant in the middle of a great desert.

The hell of incessant suffering is indeed realised in this life due to our ignorance of our true nature and the way of the Lotus Sutra. Josei Toda’s prison cell provided him with the opportunity of transcending his own difficulties, realising within himself the Buddha nature which in turn blessed him with the vision that this world and all life within has the potential for buddhahood – that the potential existed for the land of tranquil light to be experienced in this life.

The relative confinement of the prison cell is no different from our confinement upon this planet. To live on a world the size of a grain of sand, human beings would be too small to see even under a powerful microscope. Imagine now that this grain of sand upon which billions of human beings depend may be more than 16000 miles from the nearest grain of sand which may also be inhabited by sentient life. It is impossible for common people to comprehend our isolation.

Surely then, humanity is more physically alone within the vast reaches of the universe than Josei Toda was within his prison cell. Yet, like the flies in Mr Toda’s cell, we are ignorant of our physical isolation and the darkness in our hearts. Why does humanity, more isolated in the universe as was Josei is his cell, not see it’s salvation in the compassion and supreme law of the Lotus Sutra? It is not unheard of for a person to exhibit great wisdom. People [pluraly] on the other hand, have never been recorded with the possession of a collective wisdom to match.

It is because people are amused by meaningless trinkets, misled by the poisonous machinations of our rulers, deluded by jealous and vengeful doctrines, and hungry for power that humanity has successfully delivered itself into a time where the great mystic forces have delivered the hell of incessant suffering before our very eyes.

Nichiren stated “those who stay long in privies forget how foul the smell is”, and so it is with humanity and the three evil paths. Our task as votaries of the Lotus Sutra and disciples of Nichiren is to make the great Law as irresistible to humanity, as the copy of the Lotus Sutra in Mr Toda’s cell was to him.

The movement for Kosen Rufu must make the Law accessible to all and to propagate it at every opportunity. True votaries of the Lotus Sutra see our worldly attachments for the illusions of smoke and dust that they are.

It is not enough simply to become comfortable exchanging our views with fellow believers at regular meetings. This time calls for shakubuku to be practiced with great wisdom, courage and compassion. To provide demonstrable proof to all those around you – your employers, employees, family and friends – is paramount if this world is ever to be transformed into the land of tranquil light. This world may not be transformed in my lifetime, but if we are to take true faith in kosen rufu then we will surely be reborn in the land of tranquil light.

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This is a follow-up to Colony Holidays and Tubby the Tuba where I talked about Colony Holidays (the CCHS), Chris Green’s part as Tubby the Tuba, and my fond memories of such a formative part of my life.

Recent News

Chris Green (Tubby the Tuba)

Chris Green, one of the two full-time driving forces behind the original CCHS, is now using his retirement to push forward the agenda for proper summer camps, ideally modelled on the CCHS concept, with modern changes suitable to our era.  (Currently, the ‘camp’ business is stuck at a crossroads of uncertainty, direction and funding.  Chris sees things in a much more positive light, as you’ll see from his booklet below.)

As part of this, he is asking former CCHS/ATE people and anyone else with an interest in the well-being of children, society and thus the world, to lobby their local MP by telling them about their positive personal experiences about CCHS, and other views on the matter.

He’s encapsulated his agenda in a booklet which I’ve reproduced here, (How Summer Camps Could Change Britain),  along with the original PDF files for download.  Please read and use these..  Their links are below:

• Letter to MPs February 2010 Suggested letter format to lobby your local MP on behalf of Chris Green’s summer camps’ initiative.
• How Summer Camps …inline This webpage as an inline PDF.
• How Summer Camps Could Change Britain 2010 A PDF file similar to the previous one, suitable for booklet printing.

For myself, I’ve already mentioned the high regard in which I hold Chris Green and his work with the CCHS in the post Colony Holidays and Tubby the Tuba, and how, in reality, it has formed a large chunk of my current persona.

I’ve also found a Facebook group here called Colony Holidays Remembered.  This is worth a check for any former Colony Holidays folk…!

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“Of course, you’re free to live your lives how you like, but don’t forget the fundamental path of life.

“The Soka Gakkai teaches us this fundamental path–a path for accumulating good fortune, helping others, and working for peace. That’s why we now have so many members around the world, and why our numbers continue to grow steadily. Support and praise for our movement promoting peace, culture, and education is spreading across the globe, transcending all boundaries and divisions.

“Nichiren Daishonin expounded his teaching for the eternal future. There’s no need for us to rush or hurry. All the pieces are in place. The tide of history is moving in the direction of humanism. With profound conviction in this truth, please advance with a calm, relaxed, and broad-minded attitude.”

These are Daisaku Ikeda’s words of encouragement for today, Monday, March 1st, 2010.  Fantastic!

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Apparently, new research shows that people previously thought to be in a vegetative state can respond to questions “in a funny way” by being prompted to think of things as a way of answering the questions.  The scientists get the answer by looking at brain scans.

Buried in the news article was a sentence which I’ve summarised as this post’s title:

Awake but not Aware

You see, even though the person is vegetative (i.e. half-way to being dead), they can still hear and think – but are not aware that they are doing so!

I don’t think I can see anything that’s more bizarre.

It’s a kind of dream.

For a worst case scenario, consider hearing your relatives talking about switching your machines off.  To you, you see it as a dream – or as a witness to a film.

In a film you see horrors and niceties, but are always aware that it’s a film.

In the vegetative state, you see horrors and niceties, but are never aware that it’s real.

This is what this latest research tells us,

- and it implies that many judicial cases could be on the way.  What price a life?

It also shows that the gap between life and death is an even fuzzier one than we imagine, or legally define, in this land.

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