Philosophy of The Force | S1, EP 4

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Although Star Wars is a fictional work, the ideas and philosophies of the Force, the Jedi and the Sith are all analogous to real life philosophical, religious, and metaphysical concepts. The Jedi and the Force reflect parallels to Buddhist symbolism and values, particularly in what we see of them as introduced by George Lucas' first trilogy. Jedi teachings about mindfulness are connection to the present moment, freedom from attachment, and overcoming temporal obstacles are shared in large part by Buddhism. The Jedi Order shares traits with the Shalyn Monastic Order. Both orders practice a disciplined and monastic lifestyle, complete with distinctive robes, martial prowess, celibacy, and recruiting young children, to spend their lives in the service of these organizations. Both groups practice within temples built in distinctive architectural styles are devoted to ritual meditation and the pursuit of a spiritual enlightenment. For the Shalyn, who are Buddhists, this enlightenment comes in the form of Nirvana, a state which a person is free of attachment, craving and suffering, thereby extricating themselves from the endless cycle of death and reincarnation. For the Jedi, spiritual enlightenment means strengthening one's connection to the Force, a primordial energy which pervades the contents of the universe from the most complex biological sentient species to a grain of sand on a dead world. The Jedi Ultimate Freedom from Attachment comes with becoming one with the Force, which usually happens at death. Some Jedi have been known to disappear physically from the universe, becoming one with the Force moments before their physical body expires. The Force Jedi have then demonstrated the ability to step out of their oneness with the Force for a brief period to interact as Force Ghosts at critical moments in galactic history. Medical governments have persecuted and sometimes attempted genocide on both the Jedi and the Shalyn. As part of their campaigns of hate and domination, these governments have physically destroyed the temples of the Shalyn and the Jedi. Much of Buddhist teaching flows from the four noble truths. The first is existence is suffering, the second suffering arises from attachment and craving, the third suffering can stop through the attainment of Nirvana, and the fourth there is a path to achieve Nirvana. The Jedi practice of meditation and pursuit of understanding the Force is similar to the pursuit of enlightenment undertaken by Buddhist practitioners. Both the Jedi and Buddhists believe in living lives that promote altruism and benevolence. Couple these and we see in the Jedi a faithful reproduction of three of the eight parts of the eightfold path of Buddhist practice. Right mindfulness, right action, and right samadhi or meditative absorption or union. It is tension between the value of non-attachment and human nature that produces the drama of much of episodes one through three. The practice of the Jedi before Skywalker's reforms reflects that of Buddhism and the separation of children from their parents, celibacy, avoiding close personal relationships, all done in the service of preventing attachment. In the end of Skywalker, slash Vader's demonstrates an object lesson from the Jedi perspective of the dangers of attachment. Anakin became attached to Padma Amadala and her life being in jeopardy caused him to suffer. As Yoda warned, suffering led him to the dark side. Everything that followed for Vader, such as war crimes and horrible medical problems and injuries, could be considered a direct result of his attachment. The Jedi-like Taoists believe in the universality of the spirit, the interconnectedness of everything, and that nature is balanced and harmonious. This is embodied in Jedi orthodoxy by the energy field that pervades all existence, the force. In Taoism, the homologue for the force is the Tao, the one which is natural, spontaneous, eternal, nameless, and indescribable. It is the once the beginning of all things and the way in which all things pursue their course. The Jedi also draw inspiration from the samurai warriors of Fatal Japan, and include elements of Bushido, the warrior code that governs a samurai's life and sense of honor. Nevelance, compassion, chin, one of eight virtues envisioned by Natobi and Nazo. Through intense training and hard work, the true warrior becomes quick and strong. They are not as most people. They develop a power that must be used for good. They have compassion, they help their fellow men at every opportunity. If an opportunity does not arise, they go of their way to find one. The style of Jedi combat also resembles the Japanese martial art of Kendo, particularly in the earlier films where duels were only fought between humans, with a single blade, and the ability to create fantastical elements in the fighting was limited. Both the Jedi and samurai see perfection of their swordsmanship as spiritual endeavors, and bring their respective philosophies to the development of their martial prowess. Zen Buddhism teaches that existence is ephemeral, and prepares its disciple for death, which inspired the samurai to adopt that practice. The Jedi also do not fear death and accept their enjoyment with the universal force, and see the self as one part of a larger whole, similar to the teaching of Zen Buddhism. The symbolism and focus on the sword for the samurai, similar to the significance of the lightsaber for the Jedi. Terminy and practice spirituality outside of combat, developing their peaceful skills and talents, but using the same exacting discipline brought to bear on their combat practice. In practice, the Jedi adopt the apprenticeship model common to both European and Japanese warrior traditions, as well as the religious/military hybrid functions common to nightly orders of both traditions. It is likely originates from the Japanese word Jedi Geeky, which refers to genre-era dramas in feudal Japan, not unlike the term Western or Spaghetti Western in reference to Western history. George Lucas himself confirms the inspiration of Japanese, Chinese, and Eastern cultural influences. I was fascinated by a number of his movies, because they were samurai movies taking place in feudal Japan. Their atmosphere was very exotic, and I found it curious that there were no explanations. You are just thrown into this world, and if you know feudal Japan, it obviously makes sense, but otherwise it appears to be very exotic and strange world, with its unfamiliar customs and images. And I think that all of this had an influence on my science fiction movies. As I felt liberated from the idea that everything has to be explained or understood, you simply adjorn to this world. Both George Lucas and Irvin Kirschner, director of Empire Strikes Back, expressed personal interest in Zen Buddhism, Taoism and General Asian motifs, and incorporated these interests into the symbolism, names, and subject matter of Star Wars, George Lucas identifying himself as a Buddhist Methodist. The Jedi believed in the collective consciousness of the Force, and put aside their individuality to better understand and be part of the universality of the Force. Their strict lifestyles are a means to attain freedom from want, though other sects such as the Sith view this as unnecessary and restrictive. This nexus is the great source of conflict between the ideologies, the Jedi focus outward in altruistic acts, or quote unquote. quote, "right deeds" whereas the Sith are inwardly focused and seek to protect the self over others. The Sith gives themselves over holy to attachment, desire, and craving rather than trying to eliminate it, and in this find their power. There are also parallels to the Greek philosophical tradition of stoicism, wherein the force represents nature and reason, and the Jedi seek only to live in harmony with it, as it exists as a rational construct, and therefore everything that occurs, whether perceived as good or ill by the individual, is ordained as the way things ought to be. This fatalistic interpretation of the force is most evident in Disney's rogue ones, Cherute Imwe, who accepts everything that happens as, quote, "the will of the force." The Jedi's pursuit to rid themselves of attachment, particularly those considered beneficial or virtuous, like the interpersonal love and eros, also comes from a platonic interpretation. The prophecy and Star Wars of a chosen one has ties to the dying and rising god archetype, personified by mythological characters, like Adonis from Greece, Tamuz from Sumeria, Osiris from Egypt, and Addis from Frigia. Anakin Skywalker's Immaculate Conception and Virgin Birth are analogous to the birth of Christ in Christian tradition. Disaspiration to Achieve Balance in the Force has two key concepts to write from Taoism, duality and balance. Duality implies a necessary existence of an idea, and it's opposite as an innate function of its existence. The symbol of the Yin Yang illustrates the wholeness of the force, both the light and the dark. The force exists as a singular consciousness via the extinction of self, or the Nirvana state, and Buddhism. These doctrines are evident within the Jedi discipline which warns against self-interest and desire as gateways to the dark side. The concept of duality has taken on a new perspective in the Disney canon, whose snookies to be believed. Prophesies and predestination occur on multiple occasions throughout Star Wars. The force can grant a person with the ability to see into the future or possible futures, and the idea of prophecy has an interesting implications for the characters that operate within that universe. The force may be both a dynamic and passive actor, with characters exhibiting luck or coincidental events that the Jedi attribute to the force guiding their acts. Whether or not this is to say that the existence of the force results in a deterministic universe, or if the characters maintain a level of agency allowing themselves to be guided by the force, like the Jedi, or rage against fate as the Sith. The Sith are often the antagonists of the Star Wars universe, however, it may not be strictly that their philosophy is evil, but rather that it is antithetical to the teachings of the Jedi, which themselves are also the source of behavior that could be seen as wrong, for example, intervening at some points in galactic warfare, separating families, and so on. The Sith value conflict, however, this is only incidental to the true Sith values of individualism and liberty. The Sith value independence above all else, and it is from this independence and the fear of losing it in an otherwise hostile and anarchic galaxy that they create power hierarchies to protect themselves, and it is here that the Sith begin to act in a morally repugnant way to us, where they justify the domination of others, and ironically do not extend the ideals of liberty to others freely. The Sith value, the cultivation of individual progress, and pursuit of bettering the self. The Sith philosophy contains many homologous elements to real world philosophical systems, most obviously the Sith believe in master slave morality, originating from Friedrich Nietzsche. Master morality refers to the individual's pursuit of power and will to realize whatever goals they create for themselves, while slave morality is focused on altruism, empathy, and the desires of the group, even at the expense of the individual. Masters adhere to consequentialism, any act is permissible, provided that the consequences of those acts benefit the acting individual, whereas slaves codify morality on a scale of good and evil. The Sith often take on the role of masters over slave populations, and particularly resent Jedi teachings as a slave based belief system. When force aptitude becomes a means that gives a select few abilities far superior than the non-force sensitive majority, these individuals gain access, and in the Sith belief system, the right to pursue their own individual agendas and rule over anyone else that lacks the ability to fend for themselves. The Sith political views are similar to Machiavellian and Hobbesian understandings of nature, power, and the ordering of society, furthering the master slave morality to the political realizations that most living creatures live on a chaotic state of nature, one where power guarantees survival and weakness means death. The Sith view the world through this same materialistic lens, it does not concern itself with higher moral aspirations and immaterial idealism, this ties to a pseudo hedonistic mindset of the Sith, where their actions are dictated by what is good for them. Be it the enslavement of another species, or the careless manipulation and inducement of suffering for others, so long as it guarantees the Sith more power or weakens any potential threats to their power. In the view of the philosopher Thomas Hobbes and the Sith, the preservation of successful societies requires a strong, authoritative, sovereign leadership. Hobbes believes authority comes from mutually agreed upon interests for the commonwealth of people, which has materialized amongst the Sith in the form of Sith alliances, particularly those of the ancient Sith who had often more than one ruler. This system was seen as inferior and ultimately weakening of the Sith ideology by Darth Bane, who instituted the rule of two to concentrate power in the individual. Machiavelli underlines the importance of effective ruthless leadership and the methods to pursue and maintain power from enemies would be usurpers. The need for conquest and subversion of tools and the ultimate goal of a ruler is to secure their throne. The Sith implement many strategies from outward expressions of sheer force to the arts of subtle manipulation of one's enemies and the disregard for traditional morality. Power and the pursuit of power is the only way for an individual to guarantee their own liberty, less than another more powerful person comes along and takes it from you, and power is a zero-sum game where the increase of another's power is always a loss to your own. It cannot be shared. This is pivotal to Darth Bane's reforms. While the Sith may appear to value hedonistic tendencies with the ultimate good being the pursuit of individual benefit, vices are often seen as a weakness instead of a source of strength. Heedonism allows outside influences, appetites or desires to manipulate the Sith instead of being held in check by the superior willpower of a Sith effectively creating a slave of the would-be master, Machiavelli warns of the ability for vices to subvert the rule of an individual. The Sith count themselves as free from any moral code beyond self-interest and the pursuit of power and consider any actions outside of these objectives permissible and necessary. Circumstances will dictate whether or not an action is good or in their interest, and they are not above killing, manipulation, deceit, and enslaving others for personal gain. Everything is morally relative. Despite the emphasis on the individual, collectivist Sith thinking has emerged in specific areas of the Star Wars universe, and with it racialized hierarchies based in racial supremacist ideologies. When the cis species began to intermix with the gauze. galaxy at large, they believed themselves to be superior to other species, and ranked their own worth on a blood quantum level when assigning pure blood in half-breed designations, which included a place in the social hierarchy. During Palpatine's empire, he created human centric policies that discriminated against non-humans. At some points, Sith acted collectively, such as the Brotherhood of the Sith, who tried to unite to fight the Jedi, Darth Bane abolished this collectivist thinking as a betrayal of fundamental Sith philosophy. The Sith code was written for the Knights of the Old Republic game by David Gator, noted influences of Mein Kampf when writing it. Other philosophical perspectives that the Sith draw upon are social Darwinism, where the Sith believe the fittest, and in their interpretation the strongest, have the right to rule and the weak are naturally subservient and expendable. Survival of the fittest and social evolution extends through the progressive increase of power. This includes subjugation of peoples and cultures, and is used to justify the mistreatment of those unable to survive through strength or force of will. Elements of eugenics that extend from this philosophy and appear in the biological manipulation of subservient races, such as the Massassi. On a philosophical and biological level, Richard Dawkins' selfish gene illustrates the biological imperative for self-interest as a fundamental characteristic of nature, and can use even altruistic tendencies as a function of its own survival. The Sith shares this naturalistic view of selfishness as inherent to progress and life. Iron Rand's objectivism shares commonalities with the Sith in rational self-interest and the morality of the pursuit of individual happiness. Individuality and liberty are at the core of Sith philosophy, and a subversion of western-style democracies, where the individual is made equal and protected through the law, and freedom extends from these protections, the Sith believe in ultimate liberty from constraints, including protection offered by governments. This true liberty can extend to libertarianism and/or anarchism, based on the individual Sith's interpretation. Capitalism and anarchism, while sharing self-interest as a moral imperative, do conflict. The pre-Bane Sith adhere to the systematized doctrines of their belief in contrast to the rule of two adhering Sith, which are closer to the anarchist philosopher Max Sterner rejection of "a great idea, a good cause, a doctrine, a system, a lofty calling." Death is the greatest threat the Sith, or any biological entity, encounter to the preservation of the self. Any enemy except death can be beaten. Many Sith over the millennia have come to find, despite ever increasing power, death remained a foe who could not be vanquished by any amount of manipulation, violence, or treachery. This has led to many Sith becoming obsessed with attaining immortality. To the ancient Sith lords, immortality could be achieved through the preservation of one's legacy, culture, and ideas. Giant tombs and sculptures were built to immortalize Sith aristocrats, so that even though they may die in body, a facsimile of themselves would remain eternal. Not satisfied with a facsimile of everlasting life, the Sith would experiment with sorcery as a means of prolonging their lives. Resurrecting souls or binding them to artifacts, and eventually attempting to inhabit and possess bodies. This preoccupation with death is present in Sith lords creating clone bodies to inhabit, or throwing themselves into the depths of the dark side to uncover a means to preserve their own life in the face of certain death. In some cases, like that of Anakin Skywalker, it was not the fear of death of the self, but rather fear of death for those he loved, which illuminated his path to the dark side. With the obsession with death comes the desire to manipulate and control life. Some Sith discovered methods of creating life for what greater power could there be than the creation of one's own slave species and absolute authority and power over life and death. Such ideas can be paralleled with Luciferianism and Tolkien-esque ideas of the ultimate evil in rivaling and attempting to use SERP or play God. And to the Sith, what greater aspiration could there be than to become God? This has led to numerous occasions of Sith creating and mutating subservient species such as the Massassi and experimenting with manipulation of midi-chlorians and control over the force, which has been established as the wellspring of life. Anakin's denial of death is the catalyst that propels him to the dark side as he fears to lose his mother and his wife, going to greater and greater lengths to avert his fear. As opposed to the Jedi acceptance of death as a natural and cyclical part of life, Anakin instead turns to the dark side in an attempt to control death because of his attachment to life. Death is a natural part of life. Rejoice for those around you who transform into the force. Morn them do not. Miss them do not. Attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of greed, that is. What must I do, Master Yoda? Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose. So in Star Wars, the notion of needing to be balanced in the force. We here come up a lot in terms of like the prophecy, the chosen one bringing ultimate balance to the force. You have the light side in the dark side. Does the balance require there to be a dark side? Is it necessary a necessary component like endowism where both are equally necessary for balance or does balance mean the extinguishment of the dark side and the light side becoming the ultimate authority? It is hard to say. I think you'd really have to get into like the extra curricular material outside of the movies because you're not going to, the movies aren't really even I guess Obi-Wan in the original trilogy talks a little bit about balance. But there's not really any objective standard of what balance is or what it looks like. It's just obviously the Jedi and the light side users of the force are very slim and the dark side users are all over the galaxy during the Palpatine's reign. So obviously that's unbalanced but there's no real like what yeah exactly there's no standard of why yeah what does balance actually look like? Is it one-to-one ratio? I don't know if you read anything. I have sort of had a theory that like generally because everybody is connected to the force and everything is connected to the force. So is it like generally assumed among Jedi's that like everyone's got kind of dark side in them? So they're like their force influence of like the light side is bringing balance to the wider universe of the force. That's interesting. I never thought about that of like what? Yeah because everyone has a connection even though they know they're not. Yeah even if they can't reveal the force. Yeah they're like contributing to net darkness. Yeah if it were on like an S spreadsheet or something. Yeah I think there's something similar to this in that the force is kind of like a biological organism that's seeking homeostasis and so as there's like too many Jedi now the dark side comes in and sort of depopulates it and brings that level back to this net like you're saying balance sheet and then once the dark side gets too powerful then the light side comes back up and takes it down. So is the net like is a goal of the force itself to reach 50/50 parity of darkness in light? I think it's something like that and especially when you look at like the repeating sagas of like all the empires of like the Sith and the ricotta. Is it 50/50? parity or is it more sort of like the tide goes in and the tide goes out a little bit? Yeah, it's like it goes through, it goes through phases and natural cycles. Yeah, that's sort of, yeah, it's more like a cyclical thing than necessarily like a parity thing. Yeah, exactly. It's like your body's always trying to regulate its body temperature, right? And so it's not always even, it doesn't need to always be even, but it's always, look on the chart, yeah. It's always coming back to this midpoint. And it's situational too, right? Like if you're standing outside in the winter, you know, or if you're in the middle of the beach in the Bahamas, right? Yeah. There does seem to be like a lot, it does seem to be in the, I don't know about the new Star Wars movies, but it does seem to be to be like there's almost very much a determinism that's happening and that the force is like guiding the sort of, I guess the force is influencing the major powers in the galaxy to such an extent where it's almost, there's nothing you can do to stop it. Yeah, and I think that's echoed in the first trilogy as well because really at the end of Return of the Jedi, when Vader kills Palpatine, he's essentially Anakin Skywalker again and he's fulfilling the prophecy. He's bringing balance by overthrowing the dark Lord just like he was supposed to all along. Yeah. Yeah. There's also brings up another question about the whole thing about the prophecy because we know now both in the Disney Canon end with Old Lord that came out with books and things in the expanded universe that balance wasn't effectively restored with the end of Return of the Jedi. It's all implicated there and like that's where this ancient prophecy ends, but we know the Sith come back multiple times in the future. We know, or at least a dark side comes back in the future in different capacities and the Jedi, there's still that same ongoing struggle back and forth. So like as a definitive conclusion to that cycle, like where do you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah, I know what you mean. And like when you look at those extracurricular Star Wars activities, you go back tens of thousands of years and you're essentially seeing the same story. Right. It's happening. So could one of them be the inclusion to the prophecy that we have? Again, I don't think there is a conclusion to the prophecy. It's a prophecy and eternal prophecy then that is meant to be refulfilled and reaffirmed. As we were talking about earlier with Buddhism, right, it's like the wheel of reincarnation is kind of like what the force is doing with the whole galaxy. Yeah. And in the universe, it does seem like the force is more of a, I think maybe the question is there, a lot of times there's things that would suggest that maybe the force is like personified in some way that like there's a will to the force that the force is like consciousness in the sense. Yeah. But it does seem the way the force actually acts as almost like like it's a force of nature and not necessarily like a consciousness. Yeah. It's like it's like this force of nature that is inevitable and like will sort of like move the chess pieces where they will, where they may go, you know. But going back to my organism analogy, and especially with the prequels when you start looking at midi-chlorian stuff, right, that does give us some more evidence that perhaps in the Star Wars galaxy, the force is almost like an alien entity essentially that is like colonized existence kind of. So we have to get rid of it by back. You know, there is, there is in, of course, you know, and I think Jordan does too. We have a deep love for the Knights of the Older Public Game series. And that's certainly one of Craya's big points is that the force is something that that should be killed. And I think it's hard to argue with her when she's not necessarily wrong. Yeah. Like. But I mean, look at our universe too. I mean, we don't have the force, but it's full of plenty of bloodshed and awful things too, right? So what are we getting rid of? Yeah, but the force, all consciousness. The force can be, you know, it's like-- You can't feel pain if you can't feel anything, that's right. It's like discovering, you know, how to split the atom, right? Like that's why, like, wielding the force is and it can even though humans are dangerous or much more dangerous with a weapon like that, right? So we should get rid of it. Maybe. Oh, I'm not sure. Is that a consensus of this podcast? Haha. Not necessarily our own Jedi bird. But it is an interesting thought experiment. Is the force and actually like morally good? Yeah. And there's a device in that, in this universe. There's also the opposite perspective, like the Grey Jedi route, right? Where the force is just neutral, a neutral entity, and it's how you use it that makes it get naval, right? Yeah. Yeah. I think that has a lot of weight, especially when, as we're sort of doing here as viewing the Star Wars canon, canon as sort of like text, like you would study a philosophical text or something. Yeah. And the fact, again, that Darth Vader, and essentially, again, by the strict orthodox Jedi code, him killing Palpatine was a dark side act still because he was doing it purely out of his feelings and his attachment for Luke. He was still doing it a dark side thing, even though he was saving the names of the good. Yes. And that's the other question, too. Do the ends justify the means in the view of the Jedi? That comes up in the Knights of the Old Republic comic book series, which we'll get into at another point, where you have Jedi doing some very morally repugnant things, but they do it for a greater goal, right? Right. And as we mentioned, I mean, the idea of kidnapping children from, well, not kidnapping, I guess, but give away the children by coming and taking children from families when they're like, what age, like two or three? Yeah. And they have no say, right? You didn't choose to be a child. Yeah. It was. And enforcing celibacy and all that stuff. All these codes that you didn't ask for. I mean, that whole system seems like, especially by our moral ethical standards, as flagrantly abusive. Oh, my God. You're teaching them to kill when they're like five or six, essentially, like it's crazy. All a matter of perspective. Yeah. I mean, I think you're preteens when you start your combat training as a Jedi. If I remember. I can't. I can't remember these exact ages. I remember there. There was a, there's a young adult novel series about Anakin or no, no, terrible. Yeah. It was terrible. But it was about it. It had to. They have one about it. No, it's about Obi-Wan. It was about Obi-Wan. And I remember they, they covered some of his like early, early life and like the novel sort of started when he was first starting his combat training. And I think that, that's like at pre-teen age. I mean, even the movies, though, you see each small children wielding lights everywhere. Yeah. That's true. There is a scene where they're doing the, though, the visor, but how's that, how's that any different than like learning karate? Like they're not actually killing true because they're just learning of fighting. Well, well, I mean, I mean, learning to fighting is just a small example. I was, I was speaking more broadly. I was just using that as a polemic of sequestering them from their families and turning them into child soldiers. And turning them into child soldiers. Right. Which they do end up being involved in. They are for sure trained to kill, though, right. And during the Clone Wars, they're actually deployed to battlefields as kids. Like don't forget that. Was that just, was that, was that like at a necessity because they just didn't have enough soldiers. Yeah. But at what point is necessity dictate the need to, yeah, I think the overlords and, or the drug, whatever warlords in Africa would say that they need their child soldiers to. We just don't have any other troops. Yeah. Yeah. Also for the record, I, in the summer, maybe in the spring, I read a, I did read a series of graphic novels about the, it was sort of an origin story on the Sith and the Jedi, but it's 10,000 years before the Battle of Yavin. And is that Todd Don of the Jedi? Yeah. Don, I literally just read Don. Did you? Yeah. It was actually, I actually enjoyed it. I thought it was pretty, pretty decent. I loved how, just on like an aesthetic level, how the ricotta were drawn, like they, they really took the designs from the Cotor games and made them really, effing scary because I thought, I thought they looked kind of goofy in Cotor, but they made them look, look very like fish like they really accentuated how, well, alien they were from normal, normal aliens. Well, the thing, that actually like sort of ties like almost the gray Jedi would be closer to what those like original Sith were in, in sort of like, that's how they wrote it. And they actually have like these two moons, like one moon is, is like the light side and one moon is the dark side and if you're like two, if you're too much on the dark side, they send you to the opposite moon. They send you to the dark side moon, so you have to look at the light side moon until like you, you become like, it's sort of like this interesting ritual, yeah, and vice versa. Yeah, and vice versa. You're too light side. They send you to the dark side moon. And if the planet is descivilized, it actually physically affects the planet as well if, yeah, it's like super affected by like waves in the forest, like the actual planet. It's actually quite, I would, I thought, that was the thing. Yeah, I thought, yeah, yeah. I would actually recommend people read it. - It's great. - There's a novel to, I think that goes through, you can read, but graphic novels. - I think graphic novels are like the superior for Star Wars to be honest. - You know, they're pretty, yeah, I actually agree, just having the visual. - It's so gorgeous, like the things you can do in the Star Wars universe, just with panning is amazing. - But that sort of, that was really interesting because of the conception of what the Force is and like how they sort of perceived the Force, and they were like a pre-hyper space civilization, so they couldn't even travel outside of their own solar system. - Yeah. - So it's sort of like interesting how they viewed the Force, not as like this darker light side thing. - Are we gonna get into a big tangent about Tython? 'Cause I could, I could go on. - We'll say that for like another episode, but I'm just saying as an aside, yeah, it's definitely relevant how the Force is interpreted. - Yeah, and to bring this back to some of our earlier discussions, also though of the Force being that thing that's seeking homeostasis constantly, the Ricotta were the dark side Force users and came and messed stuff up for Tython, right? - Yeah, they took the balance out. - And it's again, even, I think there was another race that predated them, it's like this. - And the Ricotta were like the first civilization to, well, no, 'cause there was the road, is it the road DARREN, you had the pyramids? - Well, they gave them like hyperspace travel and then the Ricotta like started conquering the galaxy. - Yeah, the Ricotta figured out the, let's save this for that any time. Anyway, super interesting actually, pretty good stuff. - Anyways, beyond all this discussion, it was kind of, when we do Christian's galactic history episode. - Yeah, kind of into that. - Our 97th part, 50 episodes for that at least. At least, it's gonna be huge. - Anyways, beyond that question is kind of rhetorical 'cause there is, believe it or not, in answer that George Lucas gave. And I'm pulling this from an article called, - I just remind everyone what the question was again. 'Cause I certainly forgot. - 'Cause I certainly forgot. - On the balance of the forest, is it balanced really a 50/50 thing, light and dark, or is it the prevalence of the light over the dark, which if you just watch the movies alone, would be the impression you get, right? You see the good guys win in the end of Star Wars, strictly speaking in terms of the movies without all the EU stuff. But anyways, in this article from Tor.com, the true nature of the forest is way more complicated than you think by Emily Asher Perrin. She quotes, quote, "For the record, Lucasfilm has stated officially in the power of the Jedi source book that the correct philosophy where the forest is concerned is the one held up by the Jedi order in the prequels. It's an awkward insistence at best since one, this has not been confirmed in any other licensed material. Two, there are a plethora of fascinating perspectives on the forest that have been explored in the expanded universe novels. And three, this sends a lot of poor messages where the Jedi are concerned, especially when you take into account their horrible handling of, well, everything in those three films." So that is, according to Lucasfilm, the definitive. - And I, yes, I would also add to that. It's like saying it's the right philosophy. - Yeah. - It's like a philosophy isn't a thing, right? It's not a true, true or false. - While it depends if you adhere to that philosophy. - Well, philosophy is internally consistent, right? But it's not. - Sure, but if you're philosophy. - You can't have a right philosophy. - If all other philosophies, if your philosophy says all other philosophies are wrong by virtue of existing, then it is, if you believe in that philosophy, true. - Philosophy is phenomenal, phenomenological, I think. Like it's not. - Depends if you believe in objectivism or altivism, which is another discussion for another episode. - But all that aside, yes. There are, and the other thing too, is because Star Wars is put together by so many different authors who have their own take on the forest, individuals who read into the Star Wars canon, people who only watch the movies to say, "Yeah, obviously, the good guys win. The light side is right, right?" You have people who look at it more in depth, authors and things who wrote things like Don of the Jedi, who see more of a force of nature, balancing act going on. You have people who decide with a great Jedi, with every one of these nuance interpretations that we just talked about. But yeah, according to Lucasfilm anyways, there is a right path. - Yeah, and I assume that comes from Lucas himself probably, and given what he's done with the Star Wars franchise, I think we can just can it as the ravings of a cocaine and sun-addled California Buddhist. And let's be real that there are a lot of great Star Wars material as we're talking about that is like equivalent or better than his, than the original trilogy. So screw him. - Screw him. - It's all voided now anyways. The Star Wars is bigger than Lucas, right? - Well, now the Star Wars bigger than Disney is a new question. Is anything bigger than Disney? - Nothing's bigger than Star Wars now. - Anyways, does next question, which I am personally fascinated by, is does the Dark Side always have to be evil? Is it more human? Do good desires like love, hope, and ambition reflect elements of the Dark Side quote unquote as well? - Yeah, it's interesting another parallel with Buddhism that we didn't really get into with the Jedi and their philosophy is that it's essentially an anti-life philosophy. When you think about it and you don't have to think very hard, they are celibate in the first place, right? So that's one thing, but also everything that they're doing abandoning your attachment and this, you can say the same thing of Buddhism is, in Buddhism everything that you are as a human being essentially, your craving, your need to feed to love, that's all bad stuff, you shouldn't have that, right? You should abandon your attachment, and that's the only way you can get free-- - Yeah, it's a denial of-- - It's a denial of arguably human nature. - A biology essentially, and the Jedi are doing the exact same thing, right? - Yeah, and in which case, we're obviously forced into the lens of the movies that the Dark Side is bad because the Sith are bad, because that's what the narrative portrays it as, but diving into the philosophical concepts of the Sith, it's not all bad and it is more human, let's say, it appeals to your natural biological instincts, your needs, the desire for survival to perpetuate life as a biological imperative. You obviously get into the more complex elements of it in terms of domination, you have in real life philosophies that have a mutual, I don't know how to libertarians phrase it, mutually agreed, I don't know. - I think you're just talking about the non-aggression-- - Non-aggressive person. - Yeah, that's exactly what I meant. Whereas the Sith would obviously reject that, right? And it's strictly like a force of nature situation where the strongest survive and are morally obligated to survive, or the absence of morals altogether as we interpret it, they are amoral and function only as a means to perpetuate their own survival. - Yeah, it does seem it can dissent like Sith philosophy can kind of descend into just almost pure like materialism in a sense that all that matters is your pure strength and ability to survive and dominate others. - Yeah, and I think that's really personified, especially by the Sith species and the Empire they had on Coroban, as we talked about in the episode with what are they ultimately obsessed with? Immortality, because for them anything outside of life and existence is nothing to them. They don't want any part of it, right? They don't want to be one with the force. They just want to exist as they are forever and ever. And I think also now that I'm thinking about it, especially with our biological context of the force, to give some weight to Lucas's argument that maybe there is a right way, is that when you look physically at what happens to the Sith most of the time, it seems that, and this is elaborated further in the Cotor games, like as your character gets more dark side abilities. - The physical body. - His physical body and even the people around him start to deteriorate as well. And so maybe the dark side is like a drug. It's like taking speed, right? And this is really getting into a tangent. But the reason most people get into speed and like methamphetamine as a drug is for functional purposes. They don't really get into it to get high necessarily. They get into it so they can drive their truck all night long or so they can work their three jobs and take care of their kids or whatever. And it works great for a little while, but eventually the body just succumbs to it. And everybody has that typical image of a speed freak. Doesn't look that dissimilar to the typical image of a Sith Lord. So maybe the dark side is like a drug. And if you use the dark side, - It's always-- - It's just damaging you. - Yeah. But it also becomes a craving event and it becomes a craving as well. You you can't it does one See we do once you use it you have to keep using it Yeah, you have to use it more just like a drug to get those same effects Yeah, and you don't even realize what you're becoming while you do it exactly and maybe the light the light side And again looking at the code to our games. There's no physical changes from using the light side of the force if you're the most Light side person in that game. You still look exactly the same Yeah, whereas if you're the most dark side you there's a physical panel, right? Yeah Yeah, that's that's actually interesting The flip side to is an elastic view of like there is no morality and that's the one I lean more towards Yeah, it's more fun, but yeah, and so you know You're just using the force however you will and often things like personal development and stuff We view as good things right? It's especially in you know our modern context of like I go to the gym to work out I eat healthy because I want to live longer. Those are technically aspects that the Sith would encourage to obviously an extreme degree But it is self perpetuating it is self-interest there is you want to get a promotion at work You know, you might be a little more Machiavellian and how you scheme and do things you don't necessarily have to cut your co-workers throats But you're still looking to attain more power to achieve more to better yourself and that's often a principle in like a lot of self-help and like a positive self-moral understandings right Which you know is fundamentally what the Sith want. Yeah, and and again, it's like it it's all very sort of Antithetical to like the Buddhist teachings of of not releasing the self of not wanting money or Really nice body or whatever yeah of just letting go of all that stuff, right? Yeah, so it is in conflict and I mean in real life you have Eastern and Western kind of Philosophies to that. I mean there's the whole like Self-help version of Buddhism, but yeah, which is even a corruption. I'm not I'm not really well-schooled enough in Buddhism to necessarily Refute it refute it, but but it definitely exists as a corrupted version of Eastern teachings brought to a Western context I mean corrupted first Don't get me started on ontology So on reincarnation a popular philosophy found in Eastern religions Why is it absent from Star Wars since it plays so much off Eastern religion to begin with yet the concept of reincarnation is at least in the physical interpretation fairly absent and Yeah, hopefully this episode releases before episode nine and we won't get a solid answer Can ray be the reincarnation of Anakin or reincarnation of the chosen one and Just a concept of reincarnation applied to others like non Jedi or Sith Yeah, I don't really know of any specific examples in the the Star Wars literature of reincarnation it is interesting that it seems to tiptoe right right up to like the the spiritual edge Yeah of reincarnation and that's where it starts because the idea of having this Force right the force that pervades energy and that's the thing we all go back to when we die. It is very similar to Samadhi Nirvana and these kinds of things but for some reason There's not the idea of a two-way transfer of that energy really you can only it seems like you can only go into the force But for some reason you can't come back out where do babies come from except as a force ghost Yes, so it does seem to present a problem to like fundamental laws of physics But I mean in terms of like energy chance. Yeah, exactly. It seems weird It seems like the closest thing to reincarnation that's even seen it would be like especially in legends canon is like Palpatine Yeah, so that I was gonna say the only time we really see a true form of reincarnation in terms of the physical body is Actually from the dark side when they inhabit new bodies, and it's seen as a dark side ritual to Preserve yourself and I mean there is there is Kylo Ren sort of doing his in-sell Joker Cosplay of Darth Vader Trying to read the body which is sort of like reincarnation, but it's really just fandom I guess I think he sees himself as like carrying on the legacy of Vader. Yeah versus actually being But like a what but like with Palpatine right like the guy shot up that theater dressed as the Joker, right? Same idea. I don't know if that was literally the same. That's not necessarily true. They're both dressed I don't think that actually happened, but they're both dressed as that character, and they killed a bunch of people Yes, I think that's an urban legend, but well, he didn't I don't think he was dressed as the Joker when he shot the theater up But he had like a YouTube channel. Oh, maybe filled with him doing Joker impersonations and his roommates Talked about it. They would walk in on him nice Anyways on to our Batman podcast. Yeah, on to our Batman podcast But yeah, they're just a concept of reincarnation really only applies to the dark side or The negative interpretation because it's a preservation of self There is a popular theory that Ray might be the reincarnation of Anakin or a you know a re-embodied version of a chosen one that Actually keeps your incarnating throughout Star Wars history Obviously that comes in with a new Disney canon Not with the old EU. I find that an interesting theory. I would hope it to actually be true just to Lend Creed and so why Ray so Powerful and Mary Sue like but that aside. It's just Complete magic It's not even the force anymore. It's just magic. Disney magic. Yeah, Disney magic She's just powerful because she's powerful. What if she's not that powerful, but Kylo Ren is just a huge pussy You know what I mean, but he is that's what I'm saying. What if he's just like to what if he's actually just He's like way too weak and she's way too strong. It's like a very doesn't make for a compelling story It doesn't make sense in the plot. It's not great writing. Although I think in the plot It seems it seems to me like there's always supposed to be sort of a romance thing between Kylo and Ray So they didn't do it very well. They didn't do it very well But I do think that's sort of part of why they were on equal footing Yeah, combattively because that would just be kind of weird to introduce some kind of strange SNM Dominate one dominant lightsaber partner situation Palpatine theories on Ray would also have been the only acceptable version Her being either descended or something and it's an equal encounter reaction Like the force is trying to balance itself out But that would imply things like the prophecy is either on a cyclical basis or has yet to be fulfilled and is now in the process of being fulfilled Maybe this is a topic for another episode, but what exactly is the prophecy? That is a topic for another one. What is the prophecy because they like talk about it a lot I feel like they never actually state what the prophecy is where it came from. It's nowhere in the Star Wars It's part one is a through the chosen one made it at least at least in entirety. I feel like there might have been like a fragment or something about One who walks in the sky, but even but even like we read earlier George Lucas himself said he's like He he kind of when he wrote Star Wars. He was like okay with ambiguity and not like explaining Well, just leaving things left unexplained. So that could be just one of those things where he's like I'm just gonna yeah, I'm just gonna make it and Everyone can lie. We'll take it for granted. Yeah, that exists. Yeah, it does actually have a more solid Existence in the canon that was developed obviously in the EU and stuff which we will develop into in another episode So stay tuned for that Kind of going off the reincarnation conversation though a little bit more And for anybody who's wondering the EU is the extended universe expanded expanded universe And I assume Christians Referring to the legends. Yeah, well can you now only I think refers to expanded universe, which is all the legends stuff right? I believe is let's just get on the same page right Because the new the new Disney canon is just called canon. Yeah, yeah, they're trying very hard to keep it all cohesive because with the old Legend stuff it you had all these different authors and sometimes things would conflict and it was really hard for them to keep things in order Which a lot of people Curtis does actually think they did a pretty good job considering how many different authors and things they had going and I think especially though the the early early Star Wars books and comics were just like pure pulp sci-fi like not a lot of the early marvels not good at all Yeah, like you're weakly adventurous. Yeah, if you see it in a second-hand bookstore or something leave it because it's not good You can read it. I want it for like collector. I did act. I may still own it have a copy of the first Star Wars novel. Oh really ever published like the novelization of the moon no no the like the first extended. I get that in the universe Yeah, it was I think it was on Dell Delray who published a lot of pulp sci-fi and it was about Lando Calrision and I think how he got the Millennium Falcon, but I couldn't get through it because it was really bad. Sure, we'll dive into that in an episode on its own. Well, we should do book reviews. That's a bonus episode. Book review. But anyways, after a tangent, reincarnation. You see a lot, Avatar the Last Airbender is also heavily inspired by Eastern mythology. In that sense, only the Avatar seems to reincarnate. I don't know a lot about the lore of that show. But in that sense, it could be that there is a chosen one who exists as an Avatar. So Anakin, right? And any other number of prominent Jedi that existed in the, you know, thousands of years ago, I just reincarnating. I'm conflicted about that because I think it would be cool to introduce the idea of reincarnation to the Star Wars universe. It would open up a lot of cool sci-fi story possibilities, but then it just sort of makes it a sort of more typical kind of fantasy. I mean, every god damn fantasy book has a chosen one plot line and I'm sick to death of it. Well, it goes into the, the, uh, here with a thousand faces and mythology where all these stories are drawing from the same source material. Um, Joseph Campbell. Yes, thank you. I was thinking the hero's journey. Yes, I was thinking of the Conan Doyle. Anyways, that's our episode. I hope you enjoyed it. I hope you enjoyed our discussion. I hope it was informative. And I hope Lucasfilm didn't hear me accusing George Lucas of being a cocaine addict. Because I want to get sponsored by Lucasfilm and Disney. My soul is for sale, Disney. Yeah, man. Peace out, guys. See ya. May the force be with you. Scruffy looking knurper! What I was going to toss you station to pick up the power converter. [Music] Thanks for listening. Don't forget to give the show five star rating and review and give us a follow on social media. This episode was produced and edited by me, Jordan Swain, written and directed by Christian Lutz and Sam Swain. All original music was scored and recorded by my music project. Farewell to Shadowland. Thanks for flying with us. We are interested to hear from you. You can reach us at Starlora's [email protected]. Let us know your thoughts, comments, or corrections. If you enjoyed this show, please leave us a five star rating, review, and subscribe. You can also help us out through our Patreon at the Starlora's podcast. Find us on Instagram, the Starlora's podcast, on Facebook at the Starlora's podcast, on Twitter, at the Starlora's podcast, and on YouTube Starlora's podcast. We'll catch you next time.