Lucky7Strikes

So it happens in the mind. When I said consciousness I mean your sense of awareness of existence. So the mind/awareness itself is not dependently originated, but its varying states are, as also its contents? My point is, if this mind itself, this knowing, is itself a thing which is dependently orginated from something else, how does the Buddha verify that through direct experience?

This is stupid reasoning. This is like someone going "look at your eyes, oh you can't find them, ergo they must not exist."

The Buddhdharma makes much more sense if we say there are infinite number of minds. And the contents and experiences of the mind are dependently originating and illusion-like. Hence the Buddha is able to experience omniscience of his own coming into being as well as the elements and the multitude of realms at will. Your way is a good practice of letting go of all attachments, as the mind attributed reality is ultimately unreal. But the mind is. You can't deny your own mind. Thusness's model doesn't fully acknowledge the nature of experience except that it is illusion like. It just tosses the question to: There is some totality of appearances. As in if you deny your own awareness totally, then you are attributing yourself to a universal awareness.

This doesn't mean anything. You are just saying universe is appearances. Are you denying that there is experiencing? And since in your paradigm there is no you, there is this experiential process. So the process, no matter how illusion like it operates, is subtly acknowledged and you revert to it. It's shrouded monism/physicalism. You wouldn't have the conception of change if there was nothing observed to be changing. You also wouldn't know relativity if there are no relative things observed. It doesn't break down the ideation of entities. If it did, then one would not be able to observe relativity or change. You wouldn't be able to tell things apart from one another. It may break down ideation of inherent entities. Maha experience is simple, you attribute every experience to a totality. Just like monism. "Looks like." And why does it look like that if there are no things in the first place. Because it's magic? That's not a good explanation.

How does the Buddha know that consciousness (not the pali sense of eye-consciousness, ear-consciousness, etc) came from something. Moreover, what becomes ignorant for the consciousness to come about, matter? Can you know anything outside of the mind?

And what's your basis for this statement when you don't even know the next moment. How do you know anything if your knowing is like a dream. In fact, you can't claim to know anything. It's like, "Uh, I don't know, things just arise like dreams as part of universe." I think that's helpful to a certain degree but should not be seen as true. But it's experienced. And your explanation for this is, "I don't know. It must be magic because it's not really there." You were the one who brought up the point about non-sentient causes and conditions.

You don't have to put the y in. I just forgot to put an e in there. "Literature talk"? Is english your second language too? Way to reply with the most irrelevant part of the post just to say I am wrong in the smallest way possible. This says a lot about our interaction. Maybe the reason why you bang your head against the wall again and again is because you are always trying to tell me something instead of reading/listening/pondering. And you are driven by this needs to "tell people." 2 years ago I remember a very similar interaction you had here at the bums. You professed you had now understood the Buddha. Then people corrected you. Then you said now you realized emptiness and cried with tears of joy! That the peace you found seemingly impenetrable. Then now you came back and said you were still suffering, that the Buddha just taught impermanence. That's alarming don't you think, that you are repeating the same pattern? And showed very little spiritual progress in that time?

If you don't care why did you reply? Haha, to tell me you don't care?! Your use of language is just a parroting of what Xabir wrote. You couldn't even think of examples to support your point but to take it out of a book written in the 13th century. It doesn't make any practical sense beyond your own abstraction of them. Why does Xabir or Vaj become standards for Buddhism anyway? It's limiting if you see it that way. They are just fellow practitioners like you and me and not the Buddha. There are numerous sects in Buddhism that interpret the written dharma very differently. Your view of things is seriously narrow. Yes, it is very arrogant to say that when you haven't read enough of those people and given time to contemplate over them. It's not only arrogant but kind of pitiful like someone reading "crime and punishment" and going around pretending he now understands all Dostovsky's works. You look at them and cringe. Moreover your selection of evidence from their writing is mostly secondary. Remember, it's only been 2 weeks since you learned what the Buddha said when he became enlightened . p.s. I can narrate xabir's perspective very well. I understand his and Thusness' path of practice in deeper( I'm even quoted in his blog) because I've given them much more time/consideration/and practice than you have. I can write out very precisely what he believes and empathize with varying state of consciousness those stages entail. But there are certain inconsistencies in them I see now that does not cohere with my studies of the dharma and my own practice.

Ok, I guess "origin" wasn't the right word. But according to dzogchen literature from the primordial awareness coupled with its creative potency, the appearances of light to elements, to realms and other sentient beings arise? So you don't agree that there are causes and conditions apart from sentiece, as in there is no such thing as non-sentient causes and conditions?

I've pointed out blatant contradictions in your use of language multiple times in the past few pages. Also I've made a reply to your post on perspectives. Go back to them. If we showed anything you wrote to someone who was not familiar with Buddhist jargon, they would not find your writing and line of reasoning clear at all. Even for someone familiar with it, they would not understand you clearly. I've pointed out why this is so by simplifying them to you, which you have yet to reconstruct. Your reply ultimately was "but it just non-conceptual" crap. Who ever said anything about being liked? That says something about how you read my post. Also the mentioning of your "purpose to dispel ignorance." I remember your first post on this forum and your intent was in the same line "to clear up everything for the confused people here" only to be corrected with some of your misunderstanding. This attitude hasn't changed much and it speaks to your immature approach to spirituality, or any modes of study. Yeah, you seem to be here not to be liked, but to pat your "I am so wise" ego. Hence this ridiculous claim to be completely enlightened. Your comment above is not constructive to any sort of discussion at all. It's just a plain exercise in one's arrogance. I don't think so if you didn't even know the Buddha taught it but rejected it.

2 weeks ago you didn't even know the Buddha taught dependent origination and said he rejected causes and conditions. All you were blabbering was about impermanence. You didn't even know how to spell Nagarjuna (figuratively). You quoted sutras that you haven't read within full context by searching out phrases. Last week your view of practice shifted from "just" ending suffering to "realizing nature of reality." That's a big shift. Now you are saying you've attained complete enligtenment. You can't even explain clearly whether reality is continuous. You don't know how to explain anything clearly and end every post with, "oh, it's not this, that both, neither..I can't explain it" But right away you quickly demean other people's understandings not just here, but with Xabir in the previous discussions as well. What kind of messed up attitude is this? It's unnecessary and ugly.

Under Xabir's paradigm do you think the type of omniscience you speak of is possible? If consciousness and matter are separate, how does the Buddha know the origins of the elements, and why does dzogchen literature say that their origin is from primordial awareness?

Where is your sentience located? Moreover if you profess that sentience is a separate process from non-sentience why is it that the Buddha declares that he is able to know how the universe arises as do other beings and the elements? Why are dzogchen tantras along with Padmasambhavas teaching filled with accounts describing the way in which the elements arise from awareness and create a body and the realms? How can sentience which is derived within a process including of non-sentience, which would be beyond its knowing, know the entireity of the universe? We can say there is a universal process then. And you are basically saying you are part of this universal process that goes on according to its own rules. The Dalai Lama seems to think mind and matter are separate things. How does consciousness interact with non-sentient matter? Is it located in the body, outside, between? Or is it mixed with matter? Is it some substance? Also if consciousness only arises from itself, how could it have any contacts with a completely different medium of matter? And why, if at all, is consciousness then split into subjective experiences of "I" within the universe? If they are just appearances, that would mean, as Gold pointed out, they would lack any sense of self-hood in the first place and experiences would very easily be shared between consciousnesses like matter. I'm not saying you need to personify it. But it is alive isn't it and expressing itself via varying conscious entities and the world? It doesn't need to have a personified intent from a human perspective. But it is alive through conscious beings through its own relative principles.

Yes, maybe not consciously. But in terms of endless contextualization. I wouldn't say you "know" them all, but the potential is acknowledged. According to what you've been saying, I'm not sure under that paradigm it's possible to fully consciously know all the possibilities behind a meaning.

Ok, so just to clarify. Sentience arises from non-sentient material causes in your view. And you are part of the universe's play of causes and conditions and appearance arising according to its principles of causation. That establishes an objective universe and causes and conditions. Also, if non-sentient causes and conditions can bring about sentience, then they could end sentience too. Hence beings would be subject to annhilation, yes? Sounds very vedantic that we are part of some universal act (what difference does it make whether we call this Universe or Godhead?) just playing with itself through manifesting as multiple beings or, multiple "ignorance of a separate entity beings." Creating suffering, the sense of "me," then enlightening from it.

Didn't you say possibilities extend into the infinite and are in fact known in context of that very potentiality?

Are you suggesting the truth is separate or beyond the mind? If so how are you going to realize it? Are you saying time is at times continuous and other times discontinuous? What does that depend on if not one's perspective? Ok it seems like you are saying that the mind has to hold a range of perspectives to see something clearly. And for it to see a range, it needs to have a continuum or sorts. Maybe you are trying to say time can relatively seem discontinuous, but time is ultimately continuous. And since relative truth is contained or just a means to understanding the ultimate, shouldn't you not say "both," but rather that time is indeed continuous but our perspectives can misinterpret it to be continuous? I'm not saying this, but guessing that you are. But if you are saying this, we go back to what I said above. That time can be experienced sometimes as seemingly continuous or discontinuous.

You take an object and two descriptions of that object that are antonyms, like "round" and "not round" You say it's both and that the fact that it's round is "truth" and not round as another "truth," it wouldn't make sense unless you mean that one perspective could see it as round while another perspective could see it as not round.

But we are talking about a subject. If you can describe a subject through contradicting terms saying they are both true, you are either contradicting yourself or saying that the view of the subject is dependent on perspective.

This is really funny. I expected you to do your mantra: Not "is" not "is not, neither, or both.

Ok, so reality is determined by perspective?

Why would I take it up with Nagarjuna? I have someone who has attained complete enlightenment right here! Let me show you again an example of a contradictory statement you made: "If the past were in the present, we could still know them separately because the past and present obviously appear separate." If the past were in the present it would be the present and you couldn't tell them apart. And then you said that the present is cut off from the past. Which contradicts the above statement. The question is very simple: is reality continuous or discontinuous?

Between objects...? Or are you saying space and objects are the same if they are not "apart"? Then that would mean we couldn't tell between objects. Let me follow your reasoning here. Things arise together. Therefore: they are unfindable. (How would you know there are multiplicities when they are not "findable"?) Because they are unfindable. Therefore: they arise together (If something is not findable how do you know for those things to even exist for them to arise together? What even prompts their arising?) Let's follow this to your second example: You don't exist Therefore: You appear and function (How does non-existence prompt appearance and functioning? Or are you equating non-existence to existence? Then how do you even have a concept of the difference between the two?) You appear and function Therefore: You don't exist It's incomprehensible because you've used dependent arising to justify everything into non-sensical circular logic. Wow. What a violent and irrelevant example for someone who has attained complete enlightenment. . Oh ok. So moments are not distinct, only from perspective. I got confused because you said "But this togetherness of past, present and future is occuring at a very distinct and specific moment in time." But you also said "The past is present in the present. The past is not gone. The future is also present in the present." So ultmately, there is just the present...? But if they are only relatively distinct, are moments ultimately continuous? Can you clarify this contradiction?

This entire process of appearances and interconnectivity, is it sentient? Or does sentience arise from it. The same for the example after. Do causes and conditions manifest that moment of awareness/sentience? :lol: Do you mean entirety of that moment? That would separate that moment from the next...How does entirety go to another entirety unless the next moment is also included within its whole. Or that the entirety of the sentient universe is manifesting that moment as a part of its whole... Or rather a process of non-sentient causes and conditions manifest that moment of sentience? Ok, these are just appearances becoming relative truths, d.o. "ing" on itelf. So the universe is sentient appearance which happens to be split into different minds. It appears ignorant, then appears to become enlightened. So you are part of a universal series of appearances just playing with itself?

So the sentient universe, according to its d.o. "ing" on itself confuses itself into separate ignorant entities and becomes enlightened to its own nature. Is this what you are saying? Or the sentient universe has split up into different sentient beings and experiences itself through itself? That's very vedantic, this idea of a sentient universe. No matter how illusory and dependently originating this sentient world is, it is attributing an illusory "godhead" manifesting. Then how is the phenomenal world established? We have cause and effect here right. You are not going to suddenly defy physics and begin to fly...or are you going to say that the sentient universe confuses itself into being established and suffers samsara?