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Thanks dwai, that was rather therapeutic. Someone is always taking offense when I say these things in real life.

Do you deny the Buddha was instructed by Shramana munis? Do you think Jainism is based on the Hindu tradition? Shramana is one of the oldest living religious traditions in the world. It's older by far than any of the Hindu Upanishads. Advaita wasn't even established as a philosophical tradition until long after the advent of Buddhism. Shankaracarya was born in the 8th century CE, over a millennium after the Buddha. I even said the Buddha might have been influenced by the early Upanishads, though to what extent is highly questionable and hardly comparable to the influence of Buddhist philosophy on Advaita. Seriously, what would it take to NOT be obfuscating history in your opinion? Say that the eternal Vedas have always contained the complete essence of Advaita, being the primeval root and repository of all transcendental wisdom, from which Adi Shankara distilled the purified essence of Advaita, while Buddhists wickedly and ungratefully stole these primordial truths without citing them as their sources? I hope not, one of my posts relies on that very assumption. Yeah, they developed the teachings along different paths as they saw fit, just as they had been instructed to. No Buddhist tradition is non-dualist in the sense of reducing everything to a single, undifferentiated monad. Buddhist ontology is different due to the simple fact that Advaita is a realist school, while Buddhism is not. The schools are no doubt closely related, but differences are apparent at every level. Don't let a misplaced sense of patriotism cloud your judgment like that of so many other Indians. PS. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, a favorite Indian pastime is reading meanings into Hindu scriptures which their originators probably never intended. For example, one of the Upanishads says that life is born from the rain, rain is born from the sun, ... something like that. Nowadays, most Indians will interpret this to mean the sages have always known about the water cycle. "Rain is born from the sun" was clearly intended to mean that the sun evaporates sea water to form rainclouds! Just try suggesting that Indian philosophy may have been influenced by a non-Vedic tradition, and boy will the feathers fly! You know what all this reminds me of? Precisely this: Source: http://www.sacred-texts.com/ich/icintr03.htm

I would've been more hesitant about it if I believed in qi or prana.

Advaita didn't develop from Buddhism. Buddhism developed from the Shramana tradition, probably with some influence from the early Upanishads. Similarly, Advaita developed in an atmosphere where Buddhism was the dominant philosophy. Many pundits whom Shankaracarya debated were Buddhist teachers. He was an orthodox Hindu who believed in the divinity of the Vedas, but the influences are obvious IMO.

What's up with this forum and Buddhism? Anyway, this talk has made Harris infamous in the atheist community: (I love it! )

In a word, yes. Superpowers can give us more opportunities to practice skillfulness for the benefit of all sentient beings. Knowledge is power, and there's nothing wrong with power if you don't lust after it for it's own sake.

Thanks, I hope one of our presiding gurus deign to provide some constructive criticism.

In my humble opinion, the degree of similarity between two comparable traditions is mostly dependent on the strictness or laxness of your standards of judgment, (eg. All is One ) unless they happen to be perfectly congruent. I'm sure we can all agree that Advaita and Buddhism aren't exactly the same in every respect. dragonfire45: You might want to read up on the influence of Trika Shaivism on Tibetan Buddhism.

Lol You can do better than that. I was referring to Buddhism, obviously. BTW Is Jainism Advaita too? Buddhism and Jainism are closely related, both being Shramana traditions. The main difference being Jain Pluralists say that an objective reality can be reified, but that reality incorporates multiple conclusions that may seem paradoxical from a limited perspective. "Anekantavada (theory of multiple conclusions), is a foundation of Jain philosophy. Jain scholars view both physical objects and abstract ideas from different perspectives systematically. This search to view things from different angles, leads to understanding and toleration of different and even conflicting views. When this happens prejuidices subside and tendency to accommodate increases." "The theory of Syadvada (uncertainty) is based on the premise that every proposition is only relatively true. It all depends on the particular aspect from which we approach that proposition."

I'll try and explain one subtle difference between Hindu and Buddhist realization. A man sees a crow land on a coconut tree, causing a coconut to fall to the ground. Hinduism: Uncultivated individuals would think "the crow landing on the tree has disturbed it's branches and caused a coconut to drop", while a realized being would know that causation is ultimately delusional. The event represents a seamless unfolding of the whole of Brahman and consequently, his preordained will. Buddhism: From one perspective, the event was caused by the crow. From another, it may be said that causation plays no definite role in it. Both these views present limited abstractions of the complete view, thus neither reflect the ultimately true nature of reality. It cannot be said that causation ultimately does exist or doesn't exist to the exclusion of the other. If I have succeeded in conveying my impressions, don't you think this represents a fundamental difference in thinking?

To be perfectly honest, I don't see how you can claim that Advaita is different from Trika Shaivism, but the same as Buddhism. Just as Advaita was formulated under a strong influence by Mahayana philosophy, Tibetan Buddhism developed under the influence of Kashmiri Trika Shaivism. Plus, it's also a Nastika tradition that rejects the authority of the Vedas and exhibits fundamental differences from any traditional Hindu philosophy. To understand one of the differences between Hinduism and Buddhism, just compare this with classical Neoplatonism. Here's a PDF with more details: http://www.forizslaszlo.com/filozofia/folyamat_es_valosag/Whitehead_PR_Part5_Final_Interpratation.pdf PS. Here's another article that discusses the ensuing controversy with other Platonists: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/process-philosophy/ PPS. More linx! If anyone's interested, the first few chapters of this ebook present an easy introduction to Whiteheadian thought: http://www.religion-online.org/showbook.asp?title=2736

Yep, unless you count Lobsang Rampa.

Buddhist philosophy is much closer to Advaita than Dvaita IMO, but they're exactly the same (some Advaitins) or completely different (some Buddhists) in essence only if you have a predisposed bias towards such a view. They diverge even more strongly in the department of ethical philosophy. Most Advaitins supported traditional Hindu institutions including the caste system, etc. But then, so did some divergent (now extinct) Buddhist traditions in South India and Sri Lanka.

You see, the Buddhism was never meant to be conservative. As Buddhas, we're all supposed to improve the teachings where we can, not keep them pure and correct and traditional. Even Theravada has this parable: Two men wander into an ancient, ruined city. After searching the place, they discover a length of rope each. While heading back to their village, they chance upon two sacks of spice. The first man puts down his rope and picks up one of the sacks, but the other says "this is good enough for me". Then they run across two bags of gold. The first man throws away the spice and picks up the gold, but the second man again says "this is good enough for me". When they get back to the village, the first man becomes a millionaire, but the second remains poor due to his lack of ambition. That's supposed to be the Buddhist attitude towards religion and elements of philosophy. As a result, Buddhist traditions often carry two differing accounts: one true history and one mythical hagiography. Buddhist traditions basically continue the Buddha's tradition and stick to the Four Seals the same way Neoplatonists consider themselves part of Plato's philosophical tradition. Me too please.

He denied that any existent is everlasting. Now the question is, does this argument (ie. Shankaracarya vs Buddha metaphysical showdown) qualify as a single existent?

About what, that the supreme brahman is the unchanging, uncreated essence of the world?

Awesome! This is the book that got me into Buddhism.

*facepalm* Advaita is static Parmenides-type idealism, Buddhism is the explicit rejection of that idealism. But everything is One after all, huh?

I thought Tibetan Buddhism teaches that violence can be skillful when it reduces ignorance and suffering in the bigger picture, but that it must always be kept under strict control and minimized whenever possible. (ie. the necessity of the deed should be questioned separately for each individual who's being struck down) That's what I thought at any rate. Maybe it's an advanced teaching I'm not supposed to know about.

My nomination: Braid (do yourself a favor, play it if you haven't) PS. The least Taoist game I've ever played: http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/ (I love this too )

That means you haven't played any. The name that can be named is not the eternal name.

I'm afraid there's only one sort of person scientific epistemology can't persuade due to the system of axioms built into it's reasoning: the absolute solipsist. As long as you're willing to concede the existence of anything real (in the conventional sense) outside your own mind, you must at least acknowledge a partial validity of scientific phenomenology or consign yourself to the graveyard of walking contradictions. Buddhist Mahamudra is fully compatible with the philosophy of science and the Dalai Lama unreservedly admits it. I'll bet Taoism is too, as long as you're willing to say anything definite about it at all.

Or is it the only way that we can be complete?

We Indians are a mongrelized caucasian and negrito race, with the north being more caucasian and Dravida slightly more negrito. Genetic testing has confirmed that Indians correspond to more or less one race. Most peoples east of India and Persia and mongoloids. Tibetans are a branch of mongoloids with big eyes and darker skin. It doesn't make much sense to classify all of us under a single "Far Eastern" race.

The Buddha's original teachers were Shramana (Jain) munis who taught him extreme ascetic practices and told him that all things, from stars to rocks to winds, are endowed with self-nature and reason. Many Hindu ideas were borrowed from the old Shramana tradition. All this is detailed in the Pali Canon, BTW. (Isn't it? Wait, I'm not sure.)