The Dharma [related: Buddhism, The Emptiness, Gautama, Buddhist Doctrine, Samsara, Massed Vulture Mountain]
A comprehensive worldview based on the teachings of Gautama Buddha, an ascetic born around 500BCE in the area now known as Nepal. Gautama recognized reality to be a causal flowstate - often referred to as The Emptiness. Rather than being perceived by consciousness, reality in fact is consciousness, and thus absent of conventional temporal and physical dimension. According to Gautama, nothing exists outside of mind, and the world as we commonly perceive it is an emergent mental construct - the result of artificially hardened concepts created in effort to divide what is constantly manifest. The Emptiness can only be known through direct experience [1], as our perceptual system generates only a shorthand interface to assist in navigation, procreation, and nutrition. Humanity, Gautama taught, is most often caught in samsara - an endless cycle of craving and dissatisfaction based on the misconception of a discrete, physical self. Samsara, through this lens, can be represented by a cybernetic black box - a feedback loop with an ultimately unknowable mechanism. Parallels can also be drawn between samsara and the traditional Judeo-Christian "exile from paradise" origin story, with the Emptiness representing Eden, and samsara commencing with the introduction of language/knowledge (a layering of artificial mental concepts onto a causal flowstate).
Although Gautama resisted any sort of deification, claiming the knowledge he shared to be accessible to all in practice and understanding, religiosity found its way into Buddhism following his death. The resulting countless streams of Buddhist tradition introduced elements of faith, metaphysics, and divinity into what was initially intended to be a supremely grounded and almost scientific approach. In fact, over the course of the last century, developments in quantum theory began to lend renewed scientific and philosophical credence to the Dharma, resulting in what is now known as the Quantum/Buddhist Worldview.
- ↑ In accordance with the work of Donald Hoffman, our perceptual system is built to maximize fitness, and is, mathematically and scientifically speaking, therefore discouraged from accurately and comprehensively perceiving reality.