Yoda Sutras: Concourse No.11

Series 1

II - 2: Serene Reflection

Mind is a tangled web.

Use it to catch the world.

Try to comprehend the infinite complexity of it all…

…elegantly embedded in the fabric of space and time.

Open your eyes in amazement.

Be Aware.

See.

Biology:

Extremophiles

Many organisms, including all plants and animals, ultimately get their energy from the sun via photosynthesis. But over the last few decades scientists have discovered more and more microbes that can get their energy directly from breaking down chemical bonds. This enables them to survive in extraordinary and dark environments such as deep inside the Earth or at the bottom of the coldest, deepest oceans, where previously no life was expected to exist at all.

Think.

Technology: Climate Simulation

Learn.

The speed of supercomputing is measured in how many calculations can be performed in a given second. Petascale computers can make 1000000000000000 calculations per second, a staggeringly high rate even when compared to supercomputers. And though true "peta" processing is currently rare, the anticipated availability of petascale computing offers a golden opportunity for climate simulation and prediction scientists to dramatically advance Earth system science and help to improve quality of life on the planet.

Imagine.

Understand.

Brain:

Insect Brains

Humans possess 100,000,000,000 brain cells. A cockroach has nearly 1,000,000 brain cells; a fruit fly, only 250,000. Still, insects exercise impressive information management: They pack neurons into their brains 10 times more densely than mammals do. They also use each brain cell more flexibly than mammals. Several far-flung tendrils of a single neuron can each act independently — boosting computing power without increasing the number of cells. Somehow that circuitry allows a honeybee, with barely a million neurons on board, to meander six miles from its hive, find food, and make a beeline directly home. Few humans could do the same even with a map and a compass.

Explore.

Investigate.

Experiment.

Human Evolution: Hominid Admixture

Although it is well established that Neanderthals are the hominid form most closely related to present-day humans, their exact relationship to us remains uncertain. The notion that Neanderthals and humans may have "mixed" is still a matter of some controversy. Research has so far offered no evidence of admixture between the two lineages although it remains a possibility. The last common ancestor of Neanderthals and humans lived about 660,000 years ago, give or take 140,000 years.

Analyze.

Know.

Study.

Astronomy:

Dwarf Galaxies

The smallest known galaxies, called dwarf galaxies, vary greatly in brightness, from 1,000 times the luminosity of the sun to 10 million times the luminosity of the sun. At least 22 of these dwarf galaxies are known to orbit the Milky Way. UC Irvine scientists studied 18 of them using data obtained with the Keck telescope in Hawaii and the Magellan telescope in Chile, with the goal of calculating their masses. By analyzing light from these small, faint galaxies researchers have discovered the minimum mass for galaxies in the universe – 10 million times the mass of the sun.

Innovate.

Ponder.

Perceive.

Create.

Genetics: Immune Cells

Penetrate.

Lymphocytes, a type of immune cell, use a kind of genetic shuffling called variable, diversity, joining V(D)J recombination. This gene shuffling occurs during lymphocyte development and helps to produce diverse immune system cells that can recognize all sorts of different foreign substances, called antigens, that might pose a threat to the organism.

Wonder…

But Beware!

Don't get caught in the mighty maze of your own mind.

_________Transcend._________

Atha Yodanushasanam

Now begins the teaching of Yoda.

A really wise man has come to the point where he is no longer separate, where he is no longer an island. Disappeared into the whole has he.

One thing you have to learn in life — not to cling.

When you live life in its totality, moment to moment, you don't feel afraid of death, nothing to be afraid of there is.

Don't say anything. Watch. Be in a silent, serene reflection. Just reflect. You be a mirror. If you can become a mirror, you have become a meditator.

Serenity has to grow, not be forced. From your innermost core it has to come, through understanding.

A moment of consciousness and you can see again with those eyes of childhood that you have forgotten completely. Psychedelic, very colorful, very alive, full of wonder the world is again.

The moment you think you know, wonder stops arising. The moment you start again becoming less knowledgeable, enters back wonder, penetrating you.

Don't for a single moment think that you know anybody. We are strangers. So is this whole existence.

Knowledge is just sheer ignorance. Life remains mysterious.

10.

Knowledge is not possible. It is not in the nature of things.

11.

Sereneness or silence is not simply calmness or quietude. Transcendence over all words or thoughts it implies. A state of beyond, of pervasive peace, it denotes.

12.

That is what meditation is all about — absence of mentation. No longer is the mind thinking, silent it is.

Close your eyes, meditate.

May the force be with you.

The Japanese have a beautiful word for it: they call it KOKORO. KOKORO means absolute nothingness; KOKORO means a tremendous absence; KOKORO means blankness — but not negative. It is very positive. When the ripples have disappeared from the lake you can say that now nothing exists on the surface of the lake. Absolute nothingness resides, floats. But this is not a negative state. In fact, now the lake asserts itself in its total silence.

- Osho