(Kiri gets into a lively discussion on knowledge and the acquiring of knowledge. She brings up her grandmother who is in her 800’s and has a large store of knowledge. She provides some useful ways of properly asking her grandmother to share some of that knowledge.) 

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Kiri: uh-huh.

Russ: hi Kiri.

Kiri: yo.

John: hello.

Kiri: hello, greetings.

Russ: good evening my dear, how are you?

Kiri: I’m doing fine, and you?

Russ: I’m doing good.

Kiri: uh-huh, he is wise.

Russ: I agree......

John: who, Omal? Yeah.

Russ: I personally feel so too but.....

Kiri: yes.
 
John: yeah.

Russ: he says it’s an external perception.......

Kiri: uh-huh.

Russ: and if we all three agree that he’s wise, is he wise?

John: yeah.

Russ: there’s only three of us, I mean then how much does it take to make a majority to make a person wise? I don’t know.

Kiri: I think the true wise man does not admit that he is wise.

John: right, exactly. Yeah, I can understand that and what do you think about Russ being a wise ass?

Russ: I don’t agree that I am wise so therefore I must be doing something right here right?

Kiri: I’m not getting involved in it.

John: okay yeah, I don’t want to put you in a precarious situation.

Kiri: uh-huh. Okay, so where were we? Uh-huh?

Russ: oh I wanted to discuss with you what we were discussing about the other night.

Kiri: okay, what we were discussing on Saturday night, wise men is the perception I think.

Russ: okay.

Kiri: does that answer your question?

Russ: yeah but at the same time.......

Kiri: it leaves it open to further discussion.

Russ: yeah it does but that’s why I want to get into the discussion part of it. For example, we first discussed the acquiring of knowledge…..

Kiri: uh-huh.

Russ: and then adding to that patience.

Kiri: uh-huh.

Russ: okay now, with the acquiring of knowledge, what establishes knowledge? I mean, I can look at baseball scores and memorize who’s on what teams and I call that knowledge.

Kiri: yes that is knowledge but knowledge is such a broad term that it definitely needs a definition on what constitutes real knowledge……I think a better way to elaborate would be, useful knowledge......

Russ: okay.

Kiri: not trivia.

John: is there such a thing as universal knowledge?

Kiri: that would cover everything such as trivia, useful knowledge, obsolete knowledge and so on. I think it should be split into categories of trivia knowledge, useful knowledge, ancient knowledge, working knowledge, in fact I could sit down all night and break it down into so many subcategories that it would be ridiculous. But definitely the most important one in my opinion is working knowledge. Knowledge of vast quantities of information that can be used in a positive way, not just in a narrow field but can be applied to other things other than its own original purpose. For example, you can apply baseball information to only baseball, it doesn’t translate into anything else.

Russ: right.

Kiri: however, engineering knowledge translates into a myriad of different possibilities. By being able to understand, theorize and establish a premise, that is much more useful than to be able to cite that in 1932 that Ruth hit 60 home runs or was that 27? I don’t know.

(Ed. note: it was 41 including the famous shot he called in the world series)

Russ: right.

Kiri: but what purpose does that serve? That serves nothing but being able to sit down and say that in 1938, a gentleman by the name of Whitley produced the first fully functional jet engine that worked efficiently.

Russ: but then knowing the functions of the jet engine and how he came about it would be also considered quite useful.

Kiri: that’s correct and it does serve a function because with jet engines, you can progress on to higher levels of engines. Once achieving a scientific level, you can take the next step up and the next step up and the next step up and the next step up. For example, piston engine right? No, no lets skip that, steam engine becomes internal combustion engine becomes the jet engine in turn becomes the ramjet followed by the scramjet in turn followed by spatial travel. You see what I’m saying?

Russ: uh-huh.

Kiri: whereas baseball stats of Babe Ruth, where do they go?

Russ: right, so that’s the difference between trivial knowledge and useful knowledge.

Kiri: that’s correct, so it is important to elaborate when you use wisdom or knowledge and patience to steps towards wisdom, you have to elaborate on useful knowledge or working knowledge.

Russ: what about psychic knowledge?

Kiri: psychic knowledge? That is part of the step towards wisdom certainly but it is not just one type of knowledge that makes you wise, it is a wide variety of knowledges that makes you wise. I could be the smartest engineer in four dimensions.......

Russ: right.

Kiri: total genius when it comes to it but if I don’t know that I have to wind up my wrist chronometer every morning, then it’s useless. If I don’t know that I have to have patience to achieve a goal or how to operate the computer, then again it’s wasted. So to become patient, you have to have a lot of different types of knowledge to achieve one’s end.

Russ: to be patient?

Kiri: to be patient, yes.

Russ: hmm.

Kiri: but that is part of the key to our society is being able to be patient with knowledge is a step on the road to wisdom. It is taught very extensively in our monastic society when somebody takes an oath of monasticism….

Russ: uh-huh.

Kiri: because we go to those people for information and help. Take my grandmother for example, whenever I need help or somebody to talk to, who do I go to? I go to her because she has access to knowledge that I don’t have. By putting herself in a situation where she steps out of her body basically, astral travels to a different plane of existence, she can communicate with people that have gone before and that are ready to come again to achieve the information that she needs.

Russ: hmmm, now has she been able to do this for a long time or is this something she's able to do because she’s getting close to that point herself?

Kiri: I think it’s a little bit of both that she’s been working on achieving that goal for a long time but she’s also getting ready for it herself. She’s been a nun now I believe for about 30 of your years? Maybe a little bit more but I’m not too sure. So I think it is partly due to the fact that she has reached a wisdom level or a knowledge level and she has an inordinate amount of patience but her life is bound by rituals. For example, you missed a golden opportunity as I said to learn a lot of information from her. She would’ve been delighted to have sat patiently and talk to you for hours on end giving you information if you had asked the right questions in the right way. How you would’ve done that would have been that you would’ve sat down at her feet and called her mother because she is mother in a way and you sit down to her and you would ask, “mother, tell me.” And you would pause and wait patiently and she would look at you and she would go, “what do you wish to know my son?” A little bit like your society.

Russ: uh-huh.

Kiri: and you would then explain the situation but you’d have to be very careful and ritualistic about it. You being a man would be slightly different from the way that I would do it. How I would do it would be, I would say, “mother, I wish to have understanding.” And she would say, “understanding of what?” And I would say, “understanding of just a small matter that has concerned me for some time.” And she would go, “what has concerned you for some time?” And I would say, “it is whether or not it is appropriate to open up a particular file?”....but I would name that file you see?

Russ: uh-huh.

Kiri: and she would go, “why would you want to open up that file?” And I would say, “I am searching for knowledge, truth and wisdom.” And then she would ask me what wisdom is. You see how ritualized it is?

Russ: I don’t think I could do it without goofing up.

Kiri: I think she would understand your…..

Russ: we come from third dimension.

Kiri: yeah.

Russ: I mean we don’t deal with the patience yet.

John: but it sounds like the method you use, every question stimulates a question?

Kiri: uh-huh.

John: is that basically what you’re doing?

Kiri: yes, yes it is because…..

John: interesting.

Kiri: the age that she is, is that sometimes she’s not sure of which world she’s in or which plane of existence, whether or not she’s on a higher or lower plane.

John: but is that a good learning tool, answering a question with a question?

Kiri: yes.

John: and continuing back and forth like that?

Kiri: it is something that we as an engineer are taught.

John: oh okay.

Kiri: for example, if I turn this wheel here which is touching this wheel right? Which way will it turn? Will they both turn in the same direction or will one turn in the opposite way than the other one.

John: one will turn the opposite way to the other one.

Kiri: why?

John: well if you're turning one counterclockwise and the two wheels are touching, the one you’re turning counterclockwise, the other wheel will turn clockwise. No?

Kiri: no, they turn in the same direction.

John: they turn in the same direction.

Kiri: they’re touching, they push each other around but why?

John: but why? Because of the physical force involved.

Kiri: yes, but why? Why is the physical force involved?

Russ: friction.

Kiri: why is friction involved?

Russ: because they’re touching.

Kiri: why are they touching?

Russ: I guess because you put them together.

Kiri: but you see what’s happening is that each answer stimulates the next question.

John: yeah, I understand, that’s interesting.

Kiri: uh-huh which is very important and it’s the same in our ritualized society when we are asking questions of the nuns or the priests or the brothers, we ask them a question. By asking them a question, that makes them go through the ritual of asking you a question and in turn you both learn by asking the question and giving the answer. Now finally you get to the final question of questions and you will say, “oh mother, this is the last question that I will ask.” And she will go, “what is it that you wish my daughter?” And I will say, “the question that I wish to ask is but of an insignificant matter.” And she will say the final comment, “nothing is of insignificance, the most littlist and so on…….” That she will say something along the lines of, “the most littlist of things is of much importance in the understanding of all. But what is the question?” And then I ask the question.

Russ: uh-huh, well being as I won't be talking to your grandmother for a while.

Kiri: well she’s fine at the moment but she has been ill for a little while when I last talked to her.

Russ: oh she was?

John: do you mind me asking how old of a woman she is?

Kiri: oh she is coming up on her 802nd birthday.

John: yeah, that’s getting up there.

Kiri: uh-huh.

Russ: in 800 years, we won’t look this good.

Kiri: she always looks good though.

Russ: she looked happy.

Kiri: uh-huh, she always looks happy.