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iambiguous wrote:Okay, fair enough. But, in regard to religion, I can't think of a more potent motive than the one that, historically and culturally, revolves around exploring the actual practical ramifications of connecting the dots existentially between morality here and now and immortality there and then. What could possibly be of more importance than that? For the lives that we live.
iambiguous wrote:Sure, if some can convince themselves that "Everything is an illusion. The self is no exception. The self is an invention clung to by desire as a means to attain satisfaction", what can I say. We'll just have to agree to disagree about that.
iambiguous wrote:But: if you choose to interact with folks of other religious denominations and atheists and the nihilist who own and operate around the globe that we all reside on, be prepared to have your own sense of identity challenged. See if there are not some very, very real aspects of the self that are challenged by others.
For example, others might insist that you actually demonstrate to them what your own morality "stems from". In regard to, say, the very real parameters of abortion, or animal rights, or gender roles, or sexual behaviors. What are you going to do, plead "illusion" when they challenge the things you say and do?
iambiguous wrote:gib wrote:Ah, now that is a question of more substance."
Actually, that can be seen as the least substantive question, in that Buddhists are no more able to demonstrate what one's fate on the other side of the grave will be. Unless, of course, the Buddhists here are able to link me to such proof.
iambiguous wrote:This is just intellectual gibberish to me, the sort of religious mumbo jumbo that the faithful [Buddhist or otherwise] are able to think themselves into believing but are entirely impotent in regard to substantiating. Again, from my perspective, the whole point is not in what you believe but that you believe it. It is the belief itself that instills the equanimity enabling one to deal with a world that is ever and always bursting at the seams with so many terrible things. And that's before oblivion.
iambiguous wrote:Start here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... ock%2Dwise
Even in regard to Buddhism itself: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_Buddhism
MagsJ wrote:iambiguous wrote:
Note to the Buddhists here:
So, where does Brahman fit into something like this? Am I more likely to be reincarnated into, say, a cat?
What has Brahman got to do with that? Nothing, is what.
MagsJ wrote: Such thinking occurred after the fact, of what Brahman initially was, by those who weren’t born under it's societal umbrella.. otherwise, they would know and understand exactly what it is.. they would breathe it, feel it, bathe in it.. like one does in the Ganges river or the Bengal Bay.
In other words, here it becomes the equivalent of the Christian God's "mysterious ways". Mere mortals are not able to put it into words. How convenient. So, it can really become anything you want it to be. Anything you need it to be.
MagsJ wrote: Sounds.. malleable
MagsJ wrote: It’s about a place.. a place in time, but not in space.. a place in the mind, that sprang, from one place.
MagsJ wrote:iambiguous wrote:Note to Buddhists/Hindus:
Choose a set of circumstances in which to discuss Brahman. That way I can distinguish between words that, in my view, define and defend other words alone, and words that, in my view, focus in on actual human behaviors relating to morality on this side of the grave and the fate of "I" on the other side.
What would or does your set of circumstances look like, for a discussion of Brahman based on Your view? Is that onus not on You, in setting out the terms of that which you want to understand?
Beyond the dream, beyond the illusion, is the reality that you are striving to see. Enlightenment enables you to see the world as it really is.Then I don't understand. Every Buddhist source I've come across says the world is an illusion and that the dream analogy fits.
Obviously, analogies shouldn't be taken literally, so maybe the unreality of dreams is one aspect of the analogy that doesn't carry over well, but I thought this was the key reason enlightenment brings so much peace of mind.
Now we could say that though a dream isn't real, someone in the midst of a nightmare experiences real fear, and maybe we have a moral obligation to wake him up to relieve him of his fear. Is that what you have in mind?
phyllo wrote:Beyond the dream, beyond the illusion, is the reality that you are striving to see. Enlightenment enables you to see the world as it really is.Then I don't understand. Every Buddhist source I've come across says the world is an illusion and that the dream analogy fits.
Obviously, analogies shouldn't be taken literally, so maybe the unreality of dreams is one aspect of the analogy that doesn't carry over well, but I thought this was the key reason enlightenment brings so much peace of mind.
Now we could say that though a dream isn't real, someone in the midst of a nightmare experiences real fear, and maybe we have a moral obligation to wake him up to relieve him of his fear. Is that what you have in mind?
Why not stay in the dream? Because it's a painful. And you don't have to stay in it.
Enlightenment is better than non-enlightenment. It doesn't matter if there is an afterlife or reincarnation or oblivion.
If you don't achieve enlightenment, pursuing the path is still better than not pursuing the path.
gib wrote:iambiguous wrote:Okay, fair enough. But, in regard to religion, I can't think of a more potent motive than the one that, historically and culturally, revolves around exploring the actual practical ramifications of connecting the dots existentially between morality here and now and immortality there and then. What could possibly be of more importance than that? For the lives that we live.
You can take the halo for that if you want. My motives are far more selfish. I'm here because Buddhism frustrates me. It delivers promises that only bear a possibility so long as I don't pursue them.
iambiguous wrote:Sure, if some can convince themselves that "Everything is an illusion. The self is no exception. The self is an invention clung to by desire as a means to attain satisfaction", what can I say. We'll just have to agree to disagree about that.
gib wrote: Really? You're just gonna leave it at that? I thought your goal was to probe until you could show that all my claims are vaccuous, or that you've fragmented my 'I'? I thought for sure you'd ask for a demonstration that all rational men and women are obligated to agree with.
iambiguous wrote:But: if you choose to interact with folks of other religious denominations and atheists and the nihilist who own and operate around the globe that we all reside on, be prepared to have your own sense of identity challenged. See if there are not some very, very real aspects of the self that are challenged by others.
For example, others might insist that you actually demonstrate to them what your own morality "stems from". In regard to, say, the very real parameters of abortion, or animal rights, or gender roles, or sexual behaviors. What are you going to do, plead "illusion" when they challenge the things you say and do?
gib wrote: Well, that's more like it. So speaking as the Buddhist that I'm not, I would argue that the truth as I see it is the truth regardless of what happens when I confront other people who disagree with me and insist that I demonstrate to them the truth of my convictions.
gib wrote: Just like science remains true even when the scientist is confronted by religious zealots who insist that he's wrong or that he prove to them the claims of his science. If it's a question of how I would convince them if pressed to do so, I *might* plead illusion if I thought that might help, but I can only go so far. Some people just will not be convinced. In that case, I would try to avoid the subject with them, and (if they really do "insist") maybe avoid them. The answer to your question really depends on to what extent they insist on involving themselves in my life? Are you suggesting an all-or-nothing scenario? Like I prove my position to them or die?
iambiguous wrote:This is just intellectual gibberish to me, the sort of religious mumbo jumbo that the faithful [Buddhist or otherwise] are able to think themselves into believing but are entirely impotent in regard to substantiating. Again, from my perspective, the whole point is not in what you believe but that you believe it. It is the belief itself that instills the equanimity enabling one to deal with a world that is ever and always bursting at the seams with so many terrible things. And that's before oblivion.
gib wrote: Then I'm not sure what you want me to say. You asked me a series of questions, I gave my answers. If it comes across to you as "intellectual gibberish" or "religious mumbo jumbo", I'm afraid I cannot help you. Is that the end of the line, or did you want to try again rephrasing your request?
iambiguous wrote:Start here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... ock%2Dwise
Even in regard to Buddhism itself: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_Buddhism
gib wrote: I think you took my question a little too literally. The question is: how can you know that literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of religions down through the ages insist that only their own take on morality here and now and immortality there and then reflect the real thing? I mean, to the extent that you seriously question my response: possibly.
gib wrote: I'm sure the sheer number of religions that have seen the light of day throughout literally all of history must be at least in the thousands, and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds which have insisted that they've got morality and the afterlife bang on with dogmatic certainty seems a fair bet...
gib wrote: ...but reading between the line of your statement, I infer that you mean to say "the vast majority". 300 religions out of a thousand would count as "hundreds and hundreds and hundreds" technically, but I don't think you mean it that literally. We know a lot of religions in the modern world, and a lot have survived in the history books to be added to the count, and there is definitely a noticeable portion of them that take stances on morality and the afterlife with a dogmatic arrogance, but I'm going to hold back on saying that I know with certainty that almost all of them are like that. So... possibly.
iambiguous wrote:And that fits into this...MagsJ wrote:What has Brahman got to do with that? Nothing, is what.
“Brahman alone Is. The world is Brahman.”
...how?
Or is the part where, at death, the enlightened are reincarnated into that which might be construed as a higher form than those who are unenlightened just understood "spiritually" to be what it is?
Either Brahman can actually be discussed substantively [and then demonstrated] in regard to 1] the lives that we live and 2] the part where we are no longer among the living or, as an intellectual contraption, it can become anything you need it to be "in your head".
Same with dasein. That's why I attempt to explicate its meaning by noting how in regard to my own existence, it seems relevant to me. I merely make a distinction between I in the either/or world and "I" in the is/ought world.
MagsJ wrote:Such thinking occurred after the fact, of what Brahman initially was, by those who weren’t born under it's societal umbrella..
What is this other than a "spiritual" observation that you make about Brahman that I and others either grasp or don't grasp depending entirely on our own understanding of the words alone?
What does it have to do with, well, reincarnation and Nirvana?
In other words, here it becomes the equivalent of the Christian God's "mysterious ways". Mere mortals are not able to put it into words. How convenient. So, it can really become anything you want it to be. Anything you need it to be.
MagsJ wrote: Sounds.. malleable
Well, there's not much that can't be shaped and molded into reality if it all unfolds only in the human mind. As I noted to Gib above, here are examples of some of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... ock%2Dwise
MagsJ wrote:It’s about a place.. a place in time, but not in space.. a place in the mind, that sprang, from one place.
In the mind. Let's just leave it at that.
phyllo wrote:Beyond the dream, beyond the illusion, is the reality that you are striving to see. Enlightenment enables you to see the world as it really is.
Why not stay in the dream? Because it's a painful. And you don't have to stay in it.
Enlightenment is better than non-enlightenment. It doesn't matter if there is an afterlife or reincarnation or oblivion.
If you don't achieve enlightenment, pursuing the path is still better than not pursuing the path.
iambiguous wrote:From my point of view, there are either material, empirical, biological, demographic etc., aspects of the self that we can demonstrate to be anything but illusions, or, instead, everything is an illusion. The either/or world claims are not deemed by me to be vacuous. I am not fractured and fragmented in regard to human interactions in the either/or world. Sure, I may be misunderstanding what is true, but what is true is there to be demonstrated. Or, rather, demonstrated to the best of our ability given all that we don't know about existence itself.
iambiguous wrote:Yep, that's how the moral and political and spiritual objectivists see it. The truth is demonstrated by them merely in the act of believing it.
iambiguous wrote:Science deals with claims that are either able to be demonstrated or they are not. Lots and lots of claims a 100 years ago may have been scoffed at but they have since been reconfigured into the astounding technologies and engineering feats that today we take for granted. On the other hand, with claims made regarding enlightenment, karma, reincarnation, Nirvana, Brahman, the Four Noble Truths etc., where is the evidence demonstrating the whole truth about them? After all, Buddha died 2,600 years ago.
iambiguous wrote:Or, sure, we can just agree to disagree regarding what that in itself means.
iambiguous wrote:What can I say? I can spend the rest of my life going down this list from wikipedia and, one by one, concluding that what they preach about morality and immortality is thought to be the One True Path...
iambiguous wrote:For me the assumption is that down through the ages, religions are invented in order to connect the existential dots between the life that one lives here and now and the life that one wants to go on living there and then. One or another rendition of morality, then one or another rendition of immortality.
iambiguous wrote:Show me.
Sure.This isn't a moral "better", it's more of a desirable "better". Peanut butter cookies are better than chocolate chip... because I like peanut butter better. A life free of suffering is better than a life with suffer... because I like freedom from suffering better.
I don't think that morality is detached from self-interest. It's not just "right" in some abstract sense, it's also good for you. And good for your family, your friends, your society.Morality is something you do for it's own sake--because it's right--which is why it's so much easier to regard doing things for others as moral--it controls for self-interested motives.
That's you personally?If I were a Buddhist, I'd find it a lot easier to regard the need to relieve others of their suffering as a moral imperative than my own suffering. I might still desire the relief of my own suffering but I might also desire a peanut butter cookie--hard to regard that as a moral imperative.
phyllo wrote:If your suffering doesn't bother you "too much", then you could/may choose not to pursue Buddhism.
phyllo wrote:I don't think that morality is detached from self-interest. It's not just "right" in some abstract sense, it's also good for you. And good for your family, your friends, your society.
...
A Buddhist would see reducing his own suffering as also reducing the suffering of others and reducing the suffering of others as reducing his own suffering. It goes together.
How did "moral imperative" enter the discussion?The path I choose to pursue depends on what I believe works. And my suffering may bother me a lot, but I wouldn't regard that as a moral imperative. A moral imperative, to me, requires an "ought" that would remain even if the desire went away.
I have an interest in various religions.Just an aside, phyllo, are you speaking from some level of authority on the subject or is this just your opinion?
MagsJ wrote:How the ancients practised their Dharma and why.. or whatever their local nuanced Practice was, is not pertinent for today’s needs, so the How and Why are based on the Here and Now, to aid the individual in the There and Then.. whatever that There and Then might be.
MagsJ wrote:Words cannot always express a thought(s) or a feeling(s), that has become entrenched in a Nation’s psyche over millennia and therefore become innate.. an unspoken word, or is it a thought, passed on through genes but not necessarily memes.
gib wrote:iambiguous wrote:From my point of view, there are either material, empirical, biological, demographic etc., aspects of the self that we can demonstrate to be anything but illusions, or, instead, everything is an illusion. The either/or world claims are not deemed by me to be vacuous. I am not fractured and fragmented in regard to human interactions in the either/or world. Sure, I may be misunderstanding what is true, but what is true is there to be demonstrated. Or, rather, demonstrated to the best of our ability given all that we don't know about existence itself.
And you don't regard the illusory self the Buddhist believes in to be part of the is/ought world?
iambiguous wrote:Yep, that's how the moral and political and spiritual objectivists see it. The truth is demonstrated by them merely in the act of believing it.
gib wrote: Who said anything about believing?
iambiguous wrote:Science deals with claims that are either able to be demonstrated or they are not. Lots and lots of claims a 100 years ago may have been scoffed at but they have since been reconfigured into the astounding technologies and engineering feats that today we take for granted. On the other hand, with claims made regarding enlightenment, karma, reincarnation, Nirvana, Brahman, the Four Noble Truths etc., where is the evidence demonstrating the whole truth about them? After all, Buddha died 2,600 years ago.
gib wrote: What are you aiming at here? Are you simply asking me to demonstrate the reasoning behind my Biddhist convictions, or are you asking what I would do if confronted with
iambiguous wrote:Or, sure, we can just agree to disagree regarding what that in itself means.
gib wrote: Then why don't we do that--agree to disagree.
iambiguous wrote:What can I say? I can spend the rest of my life going down this list from wikipedia and, one by one, concluding that what they preach about morality and immortality is thought to be the One True Path...
gib wrote: You can conclude what you want (and you will), but when I read between the lines of your statement, I read that you're expecting dogmatism, not just objective sounding statements. If you inquire into the beliefs and values of any religion, what else would you expect but statements delineating what they believe and value structured in the usual objective grammar. That's more or less the default structure of language. But when you say "religions down through the ages insist" it's the insist part that I read as "dogmatically insist" and I'm not sure you can say that about every religion on that list.
iambiguous wrote:For me the assumption is that down through the ages, religions are invented in order to connect the existential dots between the life that one lives here and now and the life that one wants to go on living there and then. One or another rendition of morality, then one or another rendition of immortality.
gib wrote: Quite possibly. But connecting the dots is one thing. Insisting is another.
iambiguous wrote:Show me.
gib wrote: Show you what?
iambiguous wrote:What I would like to explore with Buddhists is the distinction I make between the either/or Self rooted in human biology, demographics and empirical fact, and the extent that, in the is/ought world, "I" construe human identity not as illusive so much as elusive -- an existential contraption rooted in dasein from the cradle to the grave. And then the part about after "I" die.
iambiguous wrote:gib wrote:iambiguous wrote:Yep, that's how the moral and political and spiritual objectivists see it. The truth is demonstrated by them merely in the act of believing it.
Who said anything about believing?
Don't we all? In other words, believe what we do -- here and now -- about this and everything else? Instead, my focus is more on the extent to which we are able to demonstrate to others that they are obligated to believe what we do. If they wish to be thought of as a rational human being.
iambiguous wrote:Again, I'm asking anyone to demonstrate that what they claim is true, all rational men and women are in turn obligated to believe. There are scientific claims and religious claims. What's the difference between them? Well, scientific claims revolve mostly around the either/or world in which objective answers seem within reach. Depending how far out into the really, really big or far down into the really, really small you go. But what of religious claims? Up there or down here, what of demonstrations regarding claims pertaining to "enlightenment, karma, reincarnation, Nirvana, Brahman, the Four Noble Truths etc."?
iambiguous wrote:gib wrote:Then why don't we do that--agree to disagree.
Works for me.
iambiguous wrote:First, we'll need a context. "Dogmatism" or "just objective sounding statements" about what? Values revolving around what actual behaviors in what set of circumstances in which enlightenment, karma, reincarnation and Nirvana are broached, examined and assessed.
iambiguous wrote:gib wrote:Quite possibly. But connecting the dots is one thing. Insisting is another.
"I" try to make it clear that my own assessments of these relationships are no less existential contraptions rooted subjectively/subjunctively in dasein. I would never insist that others are obligated to think the same. Unless, of course, I have new experiences, new relationships or access to new ideas which prompts me to insist on it.
iambiguous wrote:That, in regard to the main components of Buddhism, one is able to demonstrate to me that all enlightened men and women are obligated to become Buddhists.
phyllo wrote:A koan can help you get out of the intellectual trap that you are in.
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