
Ask HN: Is karma real? - smithmayowa
What are your thoughts on the concept of karma, do you think it is real or do you think it&#x27;s supposed occurences are but bye products of universal randomity. I will like to know what your thoughts are or better still what your mental justification is for doing &quot;good&quot; every day.?<p>I asked this cause I am starting to feel that perhaps there are no real rules anyway, and that justfull actions, and upright deeds weigh and slow you down. I mean the bad guys seem to be on a roll.
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oblib
I spent my teens in Hollywood and surrounding areas in the `70s. I sat in on
many discussions about "Karma" there. Here's a summation of what I heard...

If your goal is to gather more wealth, or celebrity, or political power, then
it is true that "justfull actions, and upright deeds [might] weigh and slow
you down".

But you miss the entire point of Karma if you think those are worthy goals.
Those are selfish goals and silly distractions in the work towards obtaining
enlightenment, which is the intended goal (why we are here).

Aside from that, Karma is the law of cause and effect. But it's not a reward
system that tallies up your good deeds and pays them at the end of every
month.

Good Karma is what allows one to break down in their car in South Chicago and
a stranger appears with the help you need to get back up and running and
safely on your way.

You obtain good Karma via selflessness and a true sense of caring for others
and doing what is right.

To trust in Karma means you must not seek revenge because it's a waste of time
when you're seeking enlightenment. You leave the work to teach those who screw
you up to Karma.

Now, if you screw up, screw others, cause pain and suffering, you will also
cause a visit from Karma intended to provide you with the lessons you need.
This will continue until you learn those lessons. The real lesson is you must
seek enlightenment.

Ultimately, to believe in Karma you must also believe in everlasting life. If
you don't, well then, Karma will make no sense at all to you.

Now, what you asked is "Is Karma real?"

All I can tell you is that I am poor but I live much better than most of those
I met while living in LA, and everyone that's ever screwed me has had bad
things happen to them that I had nothing to do with. And that I've been
smacked down a few times too, and needed it. And that my work over the years
has touched and made life better for a lot of people, and I feel good about
that. My grandkids are visiting with my wife and I now. When they grow up the
stories they hear about us will be of good times that were had with us. And
even if I don't live on those will for quite some time.

So it's worked for me.

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DoreenMichele
I think the concept of karma is an attempt to find a way to talk about
impossible to prove patterns suggesting cause and effect of social phenomenon.

You can't really prove that honesty or kindness or whatever is directly
responsible for various positive outcomes, but the concept of karma
encapsulates such ideas in a somewhat actionable fashion.

My son read a book that contained a story about a primitive village with a
concept of _a lucky jaguar._ The village believed that if there was a jaguar
in the area and it wasn't bothering the villagers, you should not kill it
because it's presence was a blessing on the village.

Somehow modern scientists were able to determine that the big cat was eating
wild pigs and the wild pigs were feeding on the crops at night. In years with
a _lucky jaguar_ in the area, the crop yield was 50 percent higher than
average.

So villagers could observe that when there was a jaguar around, life just
mysteriously worked better. They were unable to pinpoint cause and effect, but
they could recognize correlation.

Similarly, I think the concept of karma is an attempt by humans to say that
pro-social behaviors like honesty and treating others well observably
correlates to a better life, though we often fail to identify the exact
mechanism by which such traits come back to us in a positive way.

~~~
smithmayowa
I think you meant to write "shouldn't kill it" up there, and by the way, your
thoughts up there makes a lot of sense but it still has that air of non-
exactness that I've always felt around the subject of karma.

~~~
DoreenMichele
Yes, I meant _shouldn 't._ Corrected. Thank you.

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kulesh
As a creator of [http://karmabot.chat](http://karmabot.chat) – I can confirm,
it is real ;)

Philosophically, there is no justification for the existence of balance of
good and evil. Humans tend to believe in such thing, that makes it somewhat
real, but not in the material sense.

AFAIK, there is generally a chaos: in life, in the universe. It can be
carefully observed, rationalised and handled with great deal of care and
toughness. It is hard but not impossible to bring more order in one's way of
living. Karma rule is a by-product of such process.

Possibly good read: [https://jordanbpeterson.com/12-rules-for-
life/](https://jordanbpeterson.com/12-rules-for-life/)

~~~
smithmayowa
Nice work on karmabot.

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blackflame7000
Consider the following Thought Experiment:

Let's assume for a moment that the "six degrees of separation" theory is true.
(six can in-fact be any number so long as it is some valid number)

Let's also assume that for every person to whom you bestow a good deed, pays
that kindness forward at a rate P, where P > 0;

Then it can be mathematically proven that given sufficient acts of kindness,
eventually, a loop will occur where the good deed has propagated back to the
source, thus proving Karma to be True.

~~~
smithmayowa
Thanks for your reply, I have sadly never heard of the six degrees of
separation theory, but I will give it a look up, but then what happens if
certain people (or a lot of people, consider ing the fact we are talking about
humans here) in your kindness path "graph" do not pay it forward I.e their P
rate is 0?

~~~
blackflame7000
I would argue that there are very few people whose P rate is actually zero.
AKA someone who has never done a good dead in their lives. I don't believe
there are enough Karma Sinks to outnumber the Karma Sources and propagators.

Even at very small P values, while yes the propagation time is longer, loops
will still appear. Now the question is what is the average P value, and how
many good deeds must one do to realistically see a Loop within their lifetime.
The answer is that the likelihood of small loops is fairly high even with low
P-Rates assuming someone performs say 1 good deed per day.

