Edward Thorp's single most important piece of advice: think for yourself and think critically ( <-- that's a hyperlink to an article to read)

from my non-Dhamma blog, article link:

Edward Thorp's single most important piece of advice: think for yourself and think critically  ( <-- that's a hyperlink to an article to read)

There wouldn't be any jhana controversies in Theravada if people would just spend about 40 hours and read through the relevant suttas carefully and critically.  What Thorp is talking about he applies to the secular world, but the process behind it is the very nature of Dhamma-vicaya awakening factor, and vitakka and vicara of first jhana (critical thinking applied to skillful Dharma topics). 

And when I say 40 hours to read the relevant sutta passages, what I really mean is that's probably the amount of time it takes to understand the passages, IF you think critically with Dhamma-vicaya. I've already dissected every single occurrence of vitakka and vicara in the pali suttas, analyzed it and walked you step by step through all of those ideas connect and cohere, all handed to you on a silver platter here:

http://lucid24.org/sted/8aam/8samadhi/vitakka/index.html

You can probably read all of it in under 2 hours, and after some weeks of cogitating and reflecting and rereading the passages, after 40 hours or so, it should become quite clear that later Theravada interpretations of jhana, vitakka and vicara,  and even some EBT proponents don't have an interpretation that cohere. 

'Incoherence' means that in many key passages, their ideas are broken and inconsistent with how that interpretation fits in other passages. 

'Coherent' means that if you plug the correct interpretation of vitakka and vicara (thinking and pondering) in every single occurrence, such as canonical KN Pe 7.72. explanation of V&V, every passage makes sense and agrees with every other passage.

🐎You can lead a horse to first jhāna

but you can't make him think.🐴💭