whocoulditbe?

No, but thanks for the reference. All I found from searching was a video of a story being told. I'm curious about why you called it Sufi.

@NaturaNaturans I just skimmed the thread and noticed you're also arguing for virtue ethics throughout. Do you have any thoughts on the idea that modern rights-based ethics is basically the inversion of virtue ethics? I've come across some interesting writing on this in the context of Confucianism. (link) There's also care ethics, a form of virtue ethics developed by feminists in reaction to the patriarchal nature they percevied in rights-based liberalism. The increasing focus on human rights really worries me because it seems to lack any defined form of accountability when rights fail, and leaves positive ethical activity out of the picture. Edit: Spinoza's Ethics is also good stuff, and nice username!

I can tell you I'm addicted to coming up with all sorts of personal projects to dedicate my time, energy, and love to, and I think this tendency is due to a lack of confidence in any overarching purpose in my life. Every time I've formulated and really believed in some definite worldy "meaning of life," it has resulted in harm and regret. This probably wasn't as much of a problem during periods when everyone's purpose was firmly assigned to them from above, but in the current age, it's better to have a modus operandi in life than a fixed plan, especially if you happen to be a lonely, drifting person. In practice that takes the form of virtue ethics: be decent and kind, improve yourself, develop an appreciation for beautiful things, etc., all the while seeing the purpose of all this as lying outside of life, far beyond this or any other world.

Haven't read this yet, but posting here for storage: https://studenttheses.universiteitleiden.nl/access/item%3A2711225/view

This is a perennial question at the Dhamma Wheel forums, and though the responses often yield good advice, I haven't seen much solid info. I don't have an account there so I'd like to see if anyone here has any more information/insight. The precept, which many lay Buddhists observe on Uposatha days, says: The same prohibitions are repeated in the ten precepts regularly observed by novice Monks and Nuns. The precept causes plenty of confusion, with people asking what "entertainments" (visūka) includes, how music and chanting can exist in Buddhist monastic practice, whether some medical products count as "cosmetics" (vilepana), and whether passive exposure to music should also be avoided. Some people in these discussions assert that it's just a precept against "going out," while others claim it's fundamentally a warning against excessive sensuality. The most useful thing I've seen is the suggestion that parts of the Samaññaphala Sutta are meant to elaborate on the precepts: These are interesting lists, especially the mention of mirrors, but they leave the role of music in Buddhist practice mysterious. IMO "addicted" (viharanti) is the key word here, and supports the view that the point of this precept is to moderate sensuality. Other interesting points of reference are this short sutta, the Gītassara Sutta, and the Legal procedure of banishment in the Vinayapiṭaka; but these have an unclear relation to the precept. Additionally, I'm convinced that precept #30 from the Taoist 180 Precepts Spoken by Lord Lao 老君說一百八十戒 must have been influenced by Buddhism, as many of its other precepts are known to have been: ...but Taoist rituals also often include music and intruments ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ At least in English, the scholarship on these questions isn't very detailed, especially compared to the similar debate in Islam. Most sources on Buddhist music focus on the positive aspects, and don't say anything about scriptural warnings against it, but I did find a couple of relevant sources: Sean Williams argues that music is avoided in Theravada but embraced in Mahayana, and that chanting is okay in either, in his chapter from Sacred sound: experiencing music in world religions: Ian W. Mabbett says basically the same thing about the difference between Mahayana and Theravada in this paper. So I guess this means instrumentation should be less common in Theravada? Apparently drums are important but vocal melody is very conservative when chanting, while in Mahayana and Vajrayana all sorts of instruments are involved. But does this mean Mahayana schools disregard the scriptural opposition to music? or just that they see religious music as a separate affair? Nor does this tell us anything about the lay relation to music on Uposatha days, especially in Mahayana traditions that kept them, like Nichiren. Overall, I'm really confused. If you know of any detailed commentaries on the 8/10 precepts that cover this, please post them. I'd also love to see any historical/literary descriptions of lay people observing the abstinence, as well as any modern accounts of what goes on in places where Uposatha days are practiced (I've heard about restaurats changing their menus in Vietnam, but nothing about radio stations!) I'm going to keep searching for clarification on this, and will post anything useful in this thread. Thank you.

Stack – an insanely good singer who only does touhou songs

I love Shing02's Luv(Sic). Part of what got me thinking about this was Part 4, which follows the months starting in January, and breaks into a massive lyrical diversion at In a new semester, back in September.

People like autumn because it's essentially modern-day spring. I have better luck making my new-years resolutions around this time than in January. Almost every formative turning point in your life–your first day of school, your first day of high school, maybe university, graduation, and in many cases, your first experience of work–took place in September. Thus, in our age, falling leaves and darkening weather have become subconscious symbols of renewal and growth, things that should belong to Spring. But if you look at the features of Autumn for what they are, even with the celebration of some harvests, they correspond more to death, depression, and preparation for rest. I think this irony of the calendar is a long-term sign of the end times. Compare the old agricultural calendar, where summer was industrious, to the summer holidays we spend our youth enjoying today. We grow up relegating work, which should be fulfilling enough to feel like the purpose of our lives, to the darker months, while celebrating the light of the sun through sloth.

It's annoying, but I don't think going on and on about getting suspended should be a valid cause for suspension, which is all you're really doing here. Mods please don't bite.

Is he blindfolded? I wouldn't want him to get fried.

The best way of arguing that the observer is the obsevred is to argue that there is neither observer nor observed, but this line of argument can also be used to support the claim that ducks are frying pans.

One can accurately predict the obnoxiousness of a post from the saturation of line breaks \half-joking

How could 各異 have been replaced with 異名? Is it down to visual similarity?

That's surprising to me. Are there any other instances of this compound in the DDJ or other classical Chinese texts?

I suppose it's strange to say that the nameless differs in name from the named. Could 異 refer to the difference between presence and absence of a name, or only to difference between names? I.e., is it closer to the meaning of English "difference" in the sense of subtraction between quantities, or of qualitative variety?

Lurking is fine, though I didn't do it for more than a week before joining here. There are plenty of sites where people get told to "lurk moar" if they post something out of line with the culture.

What are the circumstances which culminated in these deaths? Please. This is very important to me. Is there anything else that is known besides their reflection on their body? What sort of monks were they? You should take a look at meditation sickness.

I've experienced an even better kind – try having someone break a promise and then hearing them apologise for making it to you in the first place.

Continuing from pages 14–16 of The Grades of Initiation It just seems like you think A being a subset of B requires that A is in B, which is rarely the case. The idea of a set which is it's own power set is interesting, but I'm not sure if it's possible.

What do you think a subset is?

Well, I'm also to blame after idealising slower posting here. The discussions drift so much on this forum, but the mods don't seem to be in the habit of spliting threads.

How is "fail to percieve" compatible with "awakened"?

A set is something that can include. It also turns out that all sets do exclude, because there is no universal set. There is nothing especially strange about an empty box, an empty set, a silent room, or a muon no heya. You are projecting some kind of horror vacui onto set theory, yet it works perfectly well as it is.

This is plainly false. try A = {1, 2} and B = {2, 3}.

I'm denying this. It's not in any axiom and you haven't shown it to be true. You've put an exact equivalent of your conclusion inside the premise. (A => B means the same thing as ~B => ~A by contraposition)