Nobody? Well I guess this is a philosophy forum. It's appropriate for silence.

I'll jump in. What you mentioned reminds me of koans, which I do find fascinating. I suppose I prefer the Tao to koans, but I can see the charm of koans.

Koans are an oblique method, to say the least. They are charming in contrast. But imagine if the sound of one hand clapping was all the education on tap..... I wouldn't like that. Just as I wouldn't like all paintings to be monochromes in I.K.B, or all sculptures to be found (urinals). Still, in contrast, it's a fascinating concept.

Still, the front seats are taken first. At the beginning of art and philosophy, we see, arguably, its essence. And this essence is undistorted by the anxiety of influence or secondary considerations.

Anybody know more about koans?

The word Koan actually means 'Public Case' or 'Public Record'. They are deliberately paradoxical statements, questions, anecdotes or epigrams which are given to Zen students during the course of meditation training. The aim is to provoke 'satori' or Zen enlightenment which requires stepping outside the normal 'discursive' consciousness or stream of ordinary thinking.

There is a traditional text called the Blue Cliff Records which contain several hundred Koans.

Koans often seem meaningless, paradoxical or baffling, but this is deliberate. Their aim is soteriological rather than rhetorical or logical. The student is 'given' a koan and sent back to the meditation hall (dojo). After some time the student will have a formal interview (dokusan) with the Zen Master. This does not follow a set pattern, but frequently the master will allude to the Koan, and the student will respond. The master is thought to be able to gauge the level of the student's 'attainment' on the basis of this response.

---------- Post added 04-29-2010 at 04:11 PM ----------

Zen, and Buddhism generally, are anti-philosophical in the sense of discouraging philosophical speculation and idle chatter. Zen is actually derived from the Indian word 'Dhyana' which is usually translated as 'meditation', but there is really no word for it in English. Dhyana is entering into states of profound stillness and quietness culminating in 'samadhi' wherein normal cogitation is suspended. There is nothing like that much in modern philosophy although there are some comparable practises, arguably, amongst the pre-Socratics, and Socrates himself was known to fall into trance while contemplating.

A video montage of pieces by erstwhile Zen raconteur, Alan Watts.

YouTube - Alan Watts - Atheist Spirituality

I don't really get most of the vid, but I enjoyed the last analogy where it said that you miss the whole point, when you're supposed to sing and dance while the music was playing.