Author: John Sambrook

I have enjoyed this video from time to time. I like both the feminine energy and the music.

If the interplay of the masculine and feminine archetypes interests you, perhaps check out the work of David Deida.

Marjaneh and I have an electronic picture frame that hangs on our living room wall.

From where we sit we can see it easily.

I think we have about 500 photographs in total in it.

Most of our photographs are of our children and grandchildren. A few of them are of ourselves and others from our families. There are also a few photographs and other pictures that have special meaning to me or remind me of certain times in my life.

When I look into the pictures of our grandchildren I see a kind of light in their eyes and a sense of radiance and joy that pleases me. It is a reassuring feeling – a sense that all is right with the world.

I am putting this here for now as a bookmark for myself. I have enjoyed the work of Gregg Caruso in the past and look forward to reading this paper of his.

I spent some time this evening browsing an article in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (the “SEP.”) It’s a great resource.

I was reading was on Moral Luck. I have heard that term before, yet didn’t know a lot about it. Reading the article hasn’t helped a lot.

The author of the article claims that there are four kinds of luck: Resultant Luck, Circumstantial Luck, Constitutive Luck and Causal Luck.

As I read the descriptions of each I was waiting to see how they would be materially different from each other. You expect that there would be some real difference between them. Yet that’s not what I concluded. Here’s a one-sentence description from the article for each of the four kinds of luck:

• Resultant luck is luck in the way things turn out.
• Circumstantial luck is luck in the circumstances in which one finds oneself.
• Constitutive luck is luck in who one is, or in the traits and dispositions that one has.
• Finally, there is causal luck, or luck in “how one is determined by antecedent circumstances.”

I wrote previously that all of life comes down to luck. Isn’t it obvious that these supposedly different kinds of luck are all just manifestations of the same thing: Life doing what it does?

Maybe I’ve listened to too much Alan Watts, or smoked a bit too much weed, but it’s obvious to me that all of these four types of luck are completely explained by life just unfolding, whether that means quantum mechanics or what some ancient religions / philosophies call Brahman, the Self, the Ground of All Being, or equivalently, just God.

I just found Anna Brown’s video and YouTube channel this morning. I’m enjoying the clarity and simplicity of her presentation.

One of my hobbies is amateur radio.

During the Covid-19 pandemic I took the opportunity to get my amateur radio license. I started with the Technician class license and about nine or so months later, I earned my General class ticket. I’ll probably work on getting my Extra Class ticket before too long.

Amateur radio is a good hobby for someone like me. There really is no shortage of things you can investigate. One of the things I’d like to do is finish a 20 meter magnetic loop antenna that I started researching. One of the characteristics of this kind of antenna is that you need a high quality air or vacuum variable capacitor for tuning the loop. I bought a new vacuum variable capacitor for a few hundred dollars. They are amazing beasts. The RF voltage and current at the top of a magnetic loop antenna are intense!

Here’s an image of the current conditions:

I’m not up to speed on all of the metrics reported on these charts. As usual, you can find a good web page that goes into more detail.

The numbers I currently look at include the SFI (Solar Flux Index), the SN (Number of Sunspots), the A and K values, and the HF Conditions.

In the above, the 30 meter and 20 meter bands are open (“Good.”) Other bands are fair or poor. I usually work on 20 meters when I have time to “go play radio.”

An SFI of 100 or greater and a sunspot count of 80 or more usually seems to bode pretty well for HF propagation. Low A and K values are important too.

All that being said, you don’t really know how the bands are going to perform until you get on the air. And due to fluctuations in band conditions, the bands can open and close quickly.

It’s all part of the hobby. If you love it, you love it.

I enjoyed listening to this message from Nisargadatta Maharaj.

Nisargadatta Maharaj (17 April 1897 – 8 September 1981), born Maruti Shivrampant Kambli, was an Indian guru of nondualism, belonging to the Inchagiri Sampradaya, a lineage of teachers from the Navnath Sampradaya and Lingayat Shaivism.

The publication in 1973 of I Am That, an English translation of his talks in Marathi by Maurice Frydman, brought him worldwide recognition and followers, especially from North America and Europe.

All of life ultimately comes down to luck.

From time to time I find myself saying “Life just unfolds.” I’m suggesting that becoming attached to appearances is a mistake. When we become attached, we invariably try to control, and when we try to control we lose The Way.

No one can predict how their life will unfold. The complexity is overwhelming. So we fall back on making guesses and predictions based on past experiences of one kind or another. We do the best we can in the moment and that’s just how it seems to be.

Most people have a strong sense that they are the independent authors of their actions. This strong sense is illusory. Perhaps evolution consed it up out of spare parts and wired it into us because it conferred an evolutionary advantage of one kind or another. Anthony Cashmore has a paper (PDF) that suggests something along these lines.

Suggesting that free will is an illusion often causes people to raise objections.

A fairly common one goes something like this: “Well, if I have no free will, should I just sit on the couch all day, waiting to see how my life turns out?”

You could try to do that. Yet eventually you will get up off the couch and go back to living your life. What people often seem to overlook is how deeply and intimately we are connected to all of … this, and by this, I mean what Alan Watts called “The Colossal Reality.”

You and I cannot get outside of existence. We think of ourselves as separate beings. Yet, if I look for the place where I end and someone or something else begins, I can never find it. Buddhism and other ancient Indian religions often talk about the concept of “No Self.” I subscribe to it. And at times, I wince when language requires that I use pronouns like I, we, me, him, her. (See what happened in that last sentence? That’s what I’m talking about.)

Success definitely requires hard work. Sadly, though, it’s just not up to you whether you will or will not be able to put in the hours. You either have the factors that allow you to work hard or you do not. If you lack them, you may get them in the future. If you have them now, you may lose them in the future.

Every moment of every day, you’re a different person. As Heraclitus said, you cannot step in the same river twice. We are also never the same person twice.

In closing, here is a video that seems helpful in laying out the basic issues:

It’s been a few months since I have taken the time to get out and “go play radio.” So I rounded up my totes with radio gear and went to the North Kirkland Community Park here in Kirkland and set up my antenna and transceiver.

It was a good day. The weather was warm but not hot. Setting up the antenna was easy enough. I made about six or seven contacts, all across the United States.

I hope to head out to the Evergreen State Fairgrounds in Monroe, Washington, again soon. I like that I can park out there and set up a 20 meter (wavelength) half-dipole between two tall masts. That helps with signal strength.