Taomeow

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About Taomeow

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  1. Software issues.

    Thank you for thinking about that before any decisive changes. That would be an a nightmare. I do believe a full backup is the first priority. The rest is, que sera sera. There were times when it was just banter, times when it was a god-awful mess, but there were also times when some of the bums used the site as an altar on which they made sincere and generous offerings to whatever powers, gods, mortals, immortals, spirits animate their souls. It's not out of the question that karmic repercussions of losing 20 years' worth of content from so many, some of it so genuine, some of it so emotional, some, so educational, etc., would haunt whoever might cause this for many lifetimes. (I'm only half kidding.)
  2. Gong hei fat choy losers!

    You're good. The court is full of characters who can differentiate between a joke and malice. They are gods and immortals after all, they had a whole eternity to learn the difference. I am aware of only one exception -- Sun Wukong liked practical jokes a bit too much and at one of the celebrations went jumping on the tables around which gods and immortals were enjoying their festive meals and overturning them. He got a restraining order and a prison sentence -- inside a rock! -- of 500 years. But they never took wasting food lightly, as many generations of children instructed to "clean your plate" could testify.
  3. Gong hei fat choy losers!

    Thank you. Happy New Year to you too! A first one for me, not to mention it here. I was feeling discouraged because of ________________. In any event, since your "losers" was in jest, I'm sure it doesn't count against you at the court of the Jade Emperor -- who reminds taoists and billions of their calendar's fans that one is not supposed to speak poorly of anyone on New Year's day, reprimand or curse or argue or quarrel, or otherwise invite in bad luck -- which is believed to stay with the one ignoring this taboo all year long.
  4. Wang Liping Low Level?

    Those who have been here for the longest time and still haven't kicked the habit remember many messes that far exceed this one. Max Christensen of Kunlun is one that comes to mind, then there were those sexual possession via chat or whatever times, the O at a D thing, many more, I just remember the gist of it ("what a shitshow") but not the subject matter. And the biggest one is Not To Be Talked About. All the prior ones, the forum more or less survived without losing its qi. But that one, the one Not To Be Talked About, drained something like 90% of it. And still, most places on the internet are an even bigger shitshow. Perhaps the internet imitates life which imitates the entities possessing humanity?
  5. Stranger things

    This is just something from the internet, I don't know if it's true, but would be interesting if proved real.
  6. Stranger things

    /\ Not likely to watch... the show went to shit since Evil Russians showed up in Season 3, so I dropped it.
  7. Stranger things

    Freud dancing in his grave. J.D. Rockefeller who put an end to worldwide medical traditions in favor of petroleum-derived medicine was the son of an herbalist.
  8. Wang Liping Contact

    Alas, I don't know where Li Hongzhi is. Last I heard he was in the US, but I've been out of the loop for a long time. No, I'm not sure. It's just something an organizer of his seminars abroad told me. As for your question about what I mean when I say that anyone begrudging a master his improved circumstances is no taoist material: The tradition, with the free of charge instruction, has always been only applied to one-on-one interactions, a student taught for free was chosen carefully and the relationship always implied (though never openly demanded) family-like obligations on the part of the student later. The student typically supported the master in his/her old age -- often fully if they didn't have children of their own (and if they did, that's who they taught for free, and seldom anyone else.) So asking a master to instruct you just because you're talented means you're asking him for something non-taoist and non-traditional unless you are planning on taking on a son-like role in his life later and covering his living expenses. Just as he did for his old masters.
  9. Wang Liping Contact

    The story of Li Hongzhi is pretty educational in terms of what happens to a very public and in-demand teacher who doesn't charge for his teachings. We are told that the commies went after him because they couldn't tolerate anyone competing with them in popularity. What really happened though was, thousands of qigong masters from all over China petitioned the government to clamp down on him because he was undermining their livelihood -- and that's how the persecutions of Falun Dafa really started. Chinese government, which for a while has been investing in and promoting "legacy" arts to the point of having its mastodons merge with the establishment (as these things always go with whatever is promoted centrally) didn't want to undermine its own endeavors -- and of course went along and then some (the going overboard part is also business as usual with governments). Wang Liping was not someone to overlook the lesson. And I have it on good authority that his prices are dictated by the Chinese government, by the way. He lived in a tiny one-room apartment with his family for most of his adult life (and poorer than that when younger), and IMO anyone begrudging him better circumstances in his old age is no taoist material.
  10. Everyone post some favorite quotes!

    It depends on your definitions I guess. IMO "wild" science is science -- and superior to the "domesticated" kind -- but that's for a different thread. But if we're going to use computers, it makes me feel better about it when I take into account that they are based on the binary mathematics transmitted to Leibniz via correspondence with a missionary friend in China who translated and sent him the I Ching. It was taoist sages who invented it... and who am I to tell them they weren't wild enough for my anprim ideals? There's ideals and then there's reality, I try to judge each on its own terms.
  11. Everyone post some favorite quotes!

    What's the source of this opinion? I've read Nikola Tesla's biography, he was an extraordinary guy, with many weird quirks (geniuses are prone to those... comes with the extraordinary territory) but "au contraire" is not about him. He was quite idealistic and did believe that science serves mankind, and good science serves it well. (He got screwed over by the less idealistic types, Thomas Edison et al.) The quote was from his letter to his mother (whom he considered a greater inventor than himself -- minus education and opportunities, she merely invented things around the house to make her hard peasant work easier, brilliant practical innovations.) That's confucian indeed, but taoists of antiquity were the first serious scientists, trying to understand many things and coming up with both theoretical frameworks some of which are only today being rediscovered (without giving credit of course), and practically inventing a whole lot of things we take for granted today. (The list is very long and exceedingly impressive. My favorite is a taoist nun who both invented vaccines -- in the 13th century! -- and insisted that they should never be mass administered or mandated -- going all the way to the emperor and successfully convincing him to reverse his mass vaccinations edict.) Many, many taoists were cultivators of both ming and xing... "leaving the world" and "coming into the world," emulating tao in this pattern.
  12. 2025 Year of the Green Snake (Wood)

    The year corresponding to 1966 in the 60-year cycle will be 2026. That's your years of the Yang Fire Horse, which are far more dangerous in terms of plane crashes (as well as many other things.) I'm pretty sure Raymond Lo will be predicting that when he's writing up 2026. In general, he's a mixed bag far as accuracy of his forecasts is concerned. This often happens when an authentic enough master is also an ambitious and successful public speaker, writer, and teacher of large groups. He serves two gods, so to speak -- the god of authenticity and the god of popularity, and those two seldom get along. I haven't read his 2025 forecast beyond the first couple of paragraphs (due to the unfortunate white letters on black background presentation, something I normally refuse to strain my eyes to deal with), but already noticed that clash. However, he's got better stuff than most online diviners, although his habitual obsession with Fire as the decisive phase (which he considers auspicious, always offering grimmer forecasts for Fire-deficient years and brighter ones for Fire-excessive ones) makes me think that his own chart is Fire-excessive. (Did enough bazi readings over the years to know the signs. )
  13. Stranger things

    Yeah, we're badass here.
  14. 2025 Year of the Green Snake (Wood)

    I don't know any Cantonese, alas, but I know this system, and should perhaps mention that in the sexagenary cycle the coming year is No. 42. Which evokes a peculiar Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy association. (For those who haven't read it or forgot this bit -- the great supercomputer, Deep Thought, took seven and a half million years figuring out the answer to "the meaning of life, the universe, and everything." The answer was 42.
  15. It was invented by Jews

    It's different, but there's many versions around the same idea. Pelmeni are valued by their connoisseurs when they are the smallest one can make by hand, but in West Asia and Caucasus region there's also hinkali which are bigger, manti which can be humongous, and so on. Another similar Russian and Ukrainian staple, vareniki, are bigger than pelmeni and have other kinds of fillings. My favorite are made with sour cherries, but they can also be stuffed with cottage cheese, potatoes and fried onions, cabbage, or cooked meat (which is not used in pelmeni.)