The Three Basic Facts of Existence II: Suffering (Dukkha) - Buddhist ...

IX. The Growth of Dukkha in the World of Today—Wealth or Wisdom?Whoso in this world grows in wealth and store,in sons and wives and in four-footed beasts,has fame and worship, as a man of means,from relatives and friends and those who rule.But whoso in this world in faith and virtue,in wisdom, generosity and lorealike makes growth—a very man like this,keen-eyed, in this life grows alike inboth. 47 When man first emerged as a species distinct from his cousins, the apes, physically hewas at a disadvantage. He lacked their strength of limb and agility, and compared with theother animals in the battle for survival, he had neither tooth, claw, fang, nor nail with which toprotect himself. He seemed foredoomed to early extinction but for one characteristic the rest ofhis contemporaries lacked. His brain was equipped not only to think, but to reason—to thinkout logical conclusions from observation, and to deal with abstract ideas for weal or woe.For defence and offensive survival he armed himself with a club. Finding it insufficient forhis needs at times, he loaded its head with a stone, and later with the metal he had learned towork. He made for himself a spear to lengthen his reach beyond that of his enemies. Heinvented the bow to project a small spear still further beyond the striking distance of thepredators and to bring down game for food at a distance. He also learned to use these weaponsagainst his fellowman.From those primitive days and ways man has progressed to gunpowder, and to guidedmissiles capable of carrying the products of atomic research, and of orbiting the earth every fewhours to discharge their lethal loads on a pin-pointed target. The weapons of survival havebecome those of domination.In the long progression from the primitive hunter to the modern technician there has beensuccessive periods of stagnation shattered eventually by new inventions. The invention of thewheel is still acclaimed as one of the major breakthroughs, followed by steam-power, and thenthe internal combustion engine, with the harnessing and exploitation of electricity in its manyuses. It is less than 200 years since Watt conceived the idea of the high-pressure steam-engine,and introduced the industrial era. A hundred years later Rudolf Diesel invented the internalcombustion engine and mechanical transport leaped ahead, making aeronautics possible. About50 years later—in 1945—the atomic bomb was first tested in New Mexico in July, and furthertests were carried out on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the following month, and we entered theatomic age. Though roughly 60 pounds of uranium will release the equivalent energy of 20,000tonnes of T.N.T., there is a limit to the size that can be manufactured, so now we have thehydrogen bomb, which releases several times the energy of a uranium bomb, with no severelimitation on the size that can be manufactured, and the cobalt bomb is top secret, which is saidto be as a cannon to a cracker when compared with its forerunners.Certainly man’s capacity to think and reason has brought him a long way from his primitiveancestors, but has it brought him any peace, contentment, or happiness?47A V 137.34