Speedlinking 8/14/06

Happy Monday.

Here is this morning's deep thought from my Zen page-a-day calendar:

In the midst of nothingness, there is a road that goes directly to my true home.
~ Gesshu

And with that, let the linking begin:

~ For those who enjoy hating on Ken Wilber, Geoff Falk has announced that "Norman Einstein": The Dis-Integration of Ken Wilber is now online -- in both html and pdf formats.

~ Edward Berge at Open Integral attempts to define the myth of the given. Personally, for those who find issue with Wilber's vast body of work, this approach (seeking to refine and define the material) seems far more productive than merely hating on the man, as in the previous item. But that's just me.

~ P2P Foundation discusses a proposal that might allow a wireless internet commons on unused radio bandwidth. What a cool idea.

~ American Buddhist has provided a link from a listserve to a video created by the people at Google featuring B. Alan Wallace, Ph.D., lecturing on "Toward the First Revolution in the Mind Sciences." Wallace is cool, so it should be good.

~ Elza Maalouf of Lebanon Rising considers the Israeli-Hezbullah war a lose-lose-lose situation, with the US earning the third lose in the scenario.

~ For those science geeks out there who enjoy taxonomy, Oaksong's Nemeton provides a link to an article that suggests red pandas may be more closely related to skunks than either raccoons or bears. (This link is for you, Kira.)

~ In my wanderings around the net last night, I stumbled upon this gem of a site: Manual on the 4 Main Meditation Methods: The Buddha’s Core Teachings on Mental Training. Here are the four main methods, which link to the text.

The 4 Main Meditation Methods are:

1: Metta (the 4 Divine States) - Universal Friendliness. The medicine for curing Aversion & Anger.

2: KayagataSati – Knowing the Body to be a mere Form of Matter. The Antidote for curing Attraction.

3: AnapanaSati – Mindfulness focused by Breathing. The Complete Concentration Method.

4: The 4 Satipatthanas - Form-Feeling-Mind-Mental States. The Purification of Insight Method.

~ Deepak Chopra has an entry at his Intent Blog that largely serves as a sales pitch for his new book, but it's interesting anyway.

~ Truthdig reprints a recent news item about a study that shows that women's brains are hard-wired for much more emotional expression than are men's brains. There is some discussion of this article over at the Integral Relationships pod on Zaadz.

And now, for the politically minded:

~ Andrew Sullivan offers some much need perspective on the Joe Lieberman loss. He muses about the possibility of a McCain/Lieberman independent ticket.

~ On a more bizarre note, Sullivan also muses on the NPR story last week about herders being killed in Iraq for not putting diapers on their goats. No, really, it's true. It apparently incites men to want to fornicate with the goats if their privates aren't covered. This story was confirmed by one of my clients who worked in Iran for nearly 15 years before the Shah was deposed.

~ Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker has a new article about the White House's investment and involvement in the Israeli-Hezbullah war. Supports the idea that the US comes out a loser in this whole mess along with Lebanon and Israel.

~ While the White House, FBI, and everyone else who can possibly take responsibility for the capture of the terrorist in England have staked their claim, an insider is now revealing that Washington forced the Brits to make arrests before they were ready to and that no attack was "imminent." In fact, no airline tcikets had been purchased and some of the men did not even have passports yet. Oops.

Finally, on a lighter note -- and I mean really lite, there's this:

~ Cracked.com has compiled The 10 Best Robot Chicken Sketches of All-Time. Enjoy -- not for the easily offended.

Tags: robot chicken, cracked.com, terrorism, Seymour Hersh, Andrew Sullivan, goats, diapers, Joe Lieberman, emotions, women's brains, four meditation methods, red pandas, B. Alan Wallace, wireless internet commons, the myth of the given