Maddie

Then may I ask how you Tao specifically? At least as much as you feel comfortable sharing that is?

I had a feeling someone was going to say that lol.

I very strongly agree with this statement. If you add energy to an imbalance you just make the imbalance stronger.

I guess that depends on how you look at it. One of the major factors in the current environmental state of the world is run by greed. Greed for the profits that can be made off of the resources of the planet without consideration of how this will affect the planet and those that live on the planet, so also a lack of compassion and empathy. Greed, compassion, and empathy are all things that can be considered spiritual issues.

I'm curious. Do you mean immortality in the physical literal sense? Or is this some kind of metaphorical definition?

Something I have noticed for a long time but haven't said anything about yet is the gender divide in this forum, but also in spirituality in general. It seems that the majority of the "Dao Bums" are male, and most (most not all) of the videos on youtube about Buddhism, and Taoism are made by males. On the other hand most of the videos I see on youtube about witchcraft, paganism, and wicca are female. I wonder why that is. Please keep all comments respectful and kind though as the motive here to to truly understand and not start an internet flame war.

That is certainly your prerogative.

Fair enough, I'll have to read that later when I have a little more free time.

Of course the experience of imagining is real, even neuroscience will say as much, but that does not mean that the thing imagined is real, unless of course its Kings Cross train station immediately after destroying a horcrux by sort of dying.

This makes me think of the story where some of the Buddha's disciples asked him why he didn't often preform displays of super natural power to convince people of his dharma. Basically the Buddha's answer in a para-phrased nutshell is that magic tricks don't help people understand the dharma which in turn does not lead to the end of suffering so it is of little use. The only power he did say was useful was the power to teach the dharma effectively.

The Buddha said birth is suffering, aging is suffering, death is suffering, not getting what one wants is suffering, getting what one does not want is suffering, impermanence is suffering, delusion is suffering. Tell me what is the appeal to existence in Samara if this is the experience?

The goal of science isn't to invalidate anything (though this may happen as a by product) but rather to validate what can be measured and observed. It is for this reason that I used the word "base line".

And why do we need to grow at all? Or be at all?

Imagination is the ability of the mind to visualize and think about things that are not currently present. One can imagine a pizza in their mind without actually having a pizza. There is value in wanting to quantify the reality of things otherwise we open ourselves up to delusion. If I were to tell you that last night a twenty foot tall unicorn princess appeared to me and said I need to spread the word that all who do not worship the unicorn princess and make regular cash donations to her priest (the priest being me) will be doomed to eternity in hell would probably cause you to want some sort of proof before feeling obligated to worship the unicorn princess and make your cash donation. Investigating the validity of this claim would be reasonable. The first thing you would want to know most likely is how to know if I wasn't just making this up or having some sort of hallucination as a result of a substance or a form of neurosis. You would want to know by what means I could show you this was true.

The reason I think it is a fair base line is because the materialist atheist has a point we are able to prove the existence of what we can measure and observe from an objective point of view. Things that we can not do this with become problematic to "prove" objectively. This is not to say that our instruments can detect everything yet (something I think science forgets) but at the moment at least there are supernatural claims that go beyond the means of science to measure. So how do we demonstrate that these things are "real" and not just the workings of the imagination?

Yes fair enough. So if you're willing to bear with me here I will attempt to show you how this works. First tell me what is it that you believe causes someone to reincarnate in the first place?

That's the baseline in the west I was referring to.

If you become enlightened you are not reborn. It's one of the main aspects of enlightenment.

If enlightenment is the end of suffering permanently how is it sad?

Yes, detachment sounds crazy to the attached.

Generally in Buddhism when someone claims to be enlightened the first test is to see if they can be angered. An enlightened being will have no sexual desire An enlightened being will have no desire for powers

You don't prove the non-existence of things you prove the existence of things. I could say you cannot disprove that the entire world exists on a hair on the back of Jake the dog sort of Horton hears a who style. But the burden of proof is on me if I make such a claim to prove that it is true.

Doesn't sound like you need one either.

That is a good point though I have noticed from watching hardcore materialist atheists on YouTube that they will reject any arguments for the supernatural just as out of hand as a fanatical religious person will reject anything that contradicts their religion out of hand.

What about starting from the baseline of the materialist atheist who says there is nothing beyond the physical reality that science can verify and that all these other things that we think of as being metaphysical are just the brain's ability to abstract?