Zwerver

Thanks for letting me know. I have changed my bookmark for this forum to this new address.

Very good!

I think you have to take into account the dynamics of the situation. Joining a forum like The Dao Bums with the purpose of having interesting discussions of a spiritual kind and seeing the focus of an increasing number of members drift away from spiritual matters to heated political debates is an unhappy thing to experience. This changes the general atmosphere on the site even when there is (or would be) no spillover from the political discussions to the rest of the site. The dynamics on Original Dao will be different because on joining the new forum you already know that it's part

If the political section of the new forum fails (we'll have to see how it goes), then I hope that the political section will just be closed down and that the spiritual part will go on and survive. I will probably not participate in the political section anyway, as I no longer like heated debates.

Good to see the forum started!

Yes - but as the ToS are hardly ever read by anybody it might be a good idea to give those basic rules a prominent place on the forum, so that (potential) users realise that those rules are indeed meant to followed. A long list of rules will very likely not be read at all, so I agree that a short basic list is much better.

There is some confusion about the meaning of "UFO". It simply means: "unidentified flying object". So saying that UFO's don't exist is the same as saying that there are no flying objects that we are (as yet) unable to identify, which clearly is absurd. On the other hand a UFO doesn't need to be an alien device to qualify as a UFO. Personally I consider it highly likely that we are not alone in the universe, given how large the (known) universe is. Whether some UFO's are alien devices I don't know.

The ignore button is a very handy device indeed, but I don't think it's enough. One shouldn't want the new site (and in particular its private section) to become involved in any sort of violent and/or illegal activism. I think one should draw a clear line there.

Good! Particularly this: And as Patrick's own tread about his forum as well as his forum itself have already disappeared, I want to take this opportunity to thank Patrick here for the time he put into his own forum. Take some rest and don't let the trouble you had at The Dao Bums spoil your life, it's not worth it.

More info: http://www.fractal-timewave.com/index.php

Yes - some time ago I collected all kinds of theories (serious and lunatic) about the logical/mathematical/scientific underpinnings of the I Ching. McKenna's book is one of them. There are some serious problems with this theory, see: http://www.secretsofcreation.com/2012.html A good general overview of English books and articles on the I Ching is given in: https://www.crcpress.com/I-Ching-An-Annotated-Bibliography/Hacker-Moore/p/book/9781138873346

@lifeforce It all depends on what you are after. Personally I found much (non-esoteric and down to earth) wisdom in the Analects. The I Ching also contains wise words but there you will have to dig deeper to interpret them.

Ah - I see. I read some translations of the Analects and I don't remember having found much in there in the way of magic, alchemy or meditation. But if the alchemy is read into the Analects by later alchemists who declared it to be in code messages then the connection could indeed be made even if it wasn't there originally.

This is interesting! I can imagine what "stop being the boss of yourself" means: stop our endless internal dialogues as soon they no longer serve any purpose. But how do we know what Tao says? Is following all and every uncontemplated impulse "following Tao"? I don't think so, as those impulses (at least in my own case) frequently go against the best advise of Lao tse himself. But than we are back with the "Boss inside" deciding what to do and what not to do.

@ rene I don't follow any particular path, but I read and think a lot. And I regularly do some "just sitting"-meditation.