I'm a Buddhist ... And I Didn't Even Know It

"Daibatsu-2"

My daughter Kathryn has been right more than once on the big issues in my life. The first was when she explained that I ate too many carbs - I was vegetarian at the time - and that can't be good for you. I've written lots about that realization.

The other day the family was having a philosophical conversation about free will, cause and effect, natural universal laws and the like, and Kathryn said "Dad, you're a Buddhist and you don't even know it".

I didn't think much about that comment, but then she started saying it more and more often to me .. so I started to investigate.





The basic tenets of Buddism (There are several lists - but the basic ones are here) are:

1. Not killing
2. Not stealing
3. Not misusing sex
4. Not lying
5. Not abusing intoxicants
6. Not talking about others' errors and faults
7. Not elevating oneself and blaming others
8. Not being stingy
9. Not being angry

Notice how they say nothing of religion, belief in a higher power or spirituality? Buddhism at it's core is about the examination and introspection of ones own mind. This is often through meditation.

There are some precepts that go further and believe in some supernatural or metaphysical phenomenon. The great thing about Buddhism is that you can choose to ignore these.

I'll not call myself a Buddhist, but it's nice to know that people have been thinking like me for thousands of years.

BTW, if you're interested, Sam Harris (one of those vocal atheists) has an excellent article on all of this titled "Killing the Buddha".

Charity Fatigue

I have nothing but admiration for what the ALS Organization has done with the "Ice Bucket Challenge" meme it has created. It's been fantastically successful, and has raised millions of dollars for ALS research. A home run.

I'm convinced, however, that many people are doing it more to see themselves on video than to donate to a charity. It's now the charity of the day, and I'm sure it's had an impact on other worthy causes.

"I've just given to ALS research so I can't give to your cause" ("Your cause isn't cool because nobody can see me on YouTube.")

The end justifies the means, so the ALS people have a hit on their hands. I have no idea how they could ever hope to raise this much notoriety or money. But we need some perspective now. I think we've entered the realm of "Charity Fatigue".

ALS affects 2 out of 100,000 people. Here's a list of other diseases which might be worthy of your money (Wikipedia). Time to give them some attention again.

Mortality Rates (death rate per year, from data for 2002^[2])

Group[3]	Cause	Percent of deaths	All Deaths per 100,000	Male Deaths per 100,000	Female Deaths per 100,000
–	All Causes	100.0	916.1	954.7	877.1
A	Cardiovascular diseases	29.34	268.8	259.3	278.4
B	Infectious and parasitic diseases	23.04	211.3	221.7	200.4
A.1	Ischemic heart disease	12.64	115.8	121.4	110.1
C	Malignant neoplasms (cancers)	12.49	114.4	126.9	101.7
A.2	Cerebrovascular disease (Stroke)	9.66	88.5	85.4	95.6
B.1	Respiratory infections	6.95	63.7	63.5	63.8
B.1.1	Lower respiratory tract infections	6.81	62.4	62.2	62.6
D	Respiratory diseases	6.49	59.5	61.1	57.9
E	Unintentional injuries	6.23	57.0	73.7	40.2
B.2	HIV/AIDS	4.87	44.6	46.2	43.0
D.1	Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease	4.82	44.1	45.1	43.1
–	Perinatal conditions	4.32	39.6	43.7	35.4
F	Digestive diseases	3.45	31.6	34.9	28.2
B.3	Diarrhea diseases	3.15	28.9	30.0	27.8
G	Intentional injuries (Suicide, Violence, War, etc.)	2.84	26.0	37.0	14.9
B.4	Tuberculosis	2.75	25.2	32.9	17.3
B.5	Malaria	2.23	20.4	19.4	21.5
C.1	Lung cancer	2.18	20.0	28.4	11.4
E.1	Road traffic accidents	2.09	19.1	40.8	10.4
B.6	Childhood diseases	1.97	18.1	18.0	18.2
H	Neuropsychiatric disorders	1.95	17.9	18.4	17.3
–	Diabetes mellitus	1.73	15.9	14.1	17.7
A.3	Hypertensive heart disease	1.60	14.6	13.4	15.9
G.1	Suicide	1.53	14.0	17.4	10.6
C.2	Stomach cancer	1.49	13.7	16.7	10.5
I	Diseases of the genitourinary system	1.49	13.6	14.1	13.1
F.1	Cirrhosis of the liver	1.38	12.6	16.1	9.1
I.1	Nephritis/nephropathy	1.19	10.9	11.0	10.7
C.3	Colorectal cancer	1.09	10.0	10.3	9.7
C.4	Liver cancer	1.08	9.9	13.6	6.2
B.6.1	Measles	1.07	9.8	9.8	9.9
G.2	Violence	0.98	9.0	14.2	3.7
–	Maternal conditions	0.89	8.2	0.0	16.5
–	Congenital abnormalities	0.86	7.9	8.1	7.7
J	Nutritional deficiencies	0.85	7.8	6.9	8.7
C.5	Breast cancer	0.84	7.7	0.1	15.3
C.6	Esophageal cancer	0.78	7.2	9.1	5.2
A.4	Inflammatory heart disease	0.71	6.5	6.7	6.2
H.1	Alzheimer's disease and other dementias	0.70	6.4	4.7	8.1
E.2	Falls	0.69	6.3	7.5	5.0
E.3	Drowning	0.67	6.1	8.4	3.9
E.4	Poisoning	0.61	5.6	7.2	4.0
C.7	Lymphomas, multiple myeloma	0.59	5.4	5.4	5.4
A.5	Rheumatic heart disease	0.57	5.3	4.4	6.1
C.8	Oral and oropharynx cancers	0.56	5.1	7.1	3.1
E.5	Fires	0.55	5.0	3.8	6.2
B.6.2	Pertussis	0.52	4.7	4.7	4.8
C.9	Prostate cancer	0.47	4.3	8.6	0.0
C.10	Leukemia	0.46	4.2	4.7	3.8
F.2	Peptic ulcer disease	0.46	4.2	5.0	3.5
J.1	Protein-energy malnutrition	0.46	4.2	4.2	4.2
D.2	Asthma	0.42	3.9	3.9	3.8
–	Endocrine/nutritional disorders	0.43	3.9	3.4	4.4
C.11	Cervical cancer	0.42	3.8	0.0	7.7
C.12	Pancreatic cancer	0.41	3.7	3.9	3.5
B.6.3	Tetanus	0.38	3.4	3.4	3.5
C.13	Bladder cancer	0.31	2.9	4.0	1.7
B.7	Sexually transmitted diseases excluding HIV/AIDS	0.32	2.9	2.9	2.9
B.8	Meningitis	0.30	2.8	2.9	2.7
G.3	War	0.30	2.8	5.0	0.5
B.7.1	Syphilis	0.28	2.5	2.7	2.3
–	Neoplasms other than malignant	0.26	2.4	2.4	2.4
J.2	Iron deficiency anemia	0.24	2.2	1.5	2.9
C.14	Ovarian cancer	0.24	2.2	0.0	4.4
B.9	Tropical diseases excluding malaria	0.23	2.1	2.5	1.6
H.2	Epilepsy	0.22	2.0	2.2	1.8
B.10	Hepatitis B	0.18	1.7	2.3	1.0
–	Musculoskeletal diseases	0.19	1.7	1.2	2.2
H.3	Parkinson's disease	0.17	1.6	1.6	1.6
H.4	Alcohol use disorders	0.16	1.5	2.5	0.4
H.5	Drug use disorders	0.15	1.4	2.2	0.5
B.1.2	Upper respiratory infections	0.13	1.2	1.2	1.2
C.16	Melanoma and other skin cancers	0.12	1.1	1.1	1.0
–	Skin diseases	0.12	1.1	0.8	1.4
C.15	Uterine cancer	0.12	1.1	0.0	2.3
B.11	Hepatitis C	0.09	0.9	1.1	0.6
B.9.1	Leishmaniasis	0.09	0.8	1.0	0.7
B.9.2	Trypanosomiasis	0.08	0.8	1.0	0.5
I.2	Benign prostatic hyperplasia	0.06	0.5	1.0	0.0

The Demise of the LBS (in Suburbia)

I bought a new bike.

A couple of weeks ago, I went on a 50km ride with my brothers and came to the realization that I was going half as fast as them, and expending twice the energy.

When we got back I weighed their bikes - probably a bit more than half the weight of mine. Plus my all-steel, wide tired mountain bike had limited gearing and lots of rolling resistance on pavement. All this combined to push me over the edge and get something  modern and more practical for the type of riding I do today.

So I bought a new bike.

Things went well for several days, but after a bit of cable stretch (all new bikes will have cable stretch and need to be adjusted after a couple hundred kilometers) it was time for a tune-up. I had also noticed a low-end "rumble" in the gearing that was hard to pinpoint - but I thought the tune-up would resolve it.

I left the bike for two days, and then picked it up and rode it home. The rumble was even more pronounced, so I asked my friend Bruce to take it for a short ride and see if I was imagining things. He confirmed he could feel it too. So back to the bike shop.

The shop took the bike in right away (after all, I had just picked it up) and started to troubleshoot. I stuck around for three hours of trying this and that (new pedals, changing wheels, check bearings, change bearings) and then walked home.

After dinner (they had the bike from 11am to 7:30pm) Laura and I drove to the shop to find they had just solved the problem!

Bad chain.

The bike shop had spent over eight hours on a bad chain.

This got me to thinking - this shop is mostly run by twenty-somethings, and I doubt that their "service team" has any accumulated experience at all (their "sales team" likely doesn't either). While I was waiting for my bike, I overheard two other customers with problems that weren't as simple as a tire puncture. Neither was happy.

Unfortunately, given the price war waged by these folks ("we'll match any price") it's removed any knowledgeable competitor from the field. Someone that could afford a real mechanic or experience sales people. So it's run by inexperienced amateurs that know about as much as me.

Kathryn said to me "Dad, you should have bought it downtown - everybody there knows bikes, because if you don't you can't survive". She's probably right.

Another case of price trumping service.

If anyone wonders who the bike store is, suffice to say I live in Port Coquitlam. Guess.