thuscomeone

Then there is no mind either. Period. You've just said that you can only have one half of a duality; without the other half. That makes absolutely no sense. And therefore you are asserting that this mind is completely self existent and independent and unchanging. Here come all sorts of logical absurdities. This mind therefore can have no influence over anything. Even if you say it only influences, it can't even do that. It is incapable of anything. It cannot interact. For to influence or interact, it must change in some way. If it changes, it is not independent. If it is not independent, it is dependent. Dependent on what? Matter. And that's that.

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Is there a smiley icon that bangs its head against a brick wall? The problem with your approach is that it far too complicated and it avoids common sense. You can't have one half of a duality. You cannot say there is mind without matter. You just can't do it, unless you force out logic and common sense. For all your intellectualizing, you can never escape this simple fact. You can try to through rationalization and relativism. "Oh it's an appearance..." But you can't get away from it. There really isn't much more to it than that. Don't sugarcoat it with that "appearance" stuff. You don't believe that there is matter at all, do you?

Xabir, what do you mean by "mind" here? Just being careful and making sure to get our definitions straight. Do you mean a separate, permanent consciousness?

The only way you could make mind-only valid would be if you said that all discriminations come from the mind. That is, all concepts come from the mind. Not phenomena themselves. All discriminations of "is" and "is not" arise from mind. And these discriminations ultimately don't apply. This isn't the same as what you are talking about -- mind being some sort of creator of everything. Discriminations don't apply because there both are and aren't phenomena -- mental and material. That is not even close to liberation. That is an extreme view which is built on a duality between a permanent and unchanging mind and this mind's changing appearances.

I don't believe you. If it were only one option among many, you wouldn't argue so much for the truth of it. You wouldn't try to prove it to anyone. You would just say "believe whatever makes you happy!" Which you don't do. Furthermore, if you are trying to say that we can just choose to see reality however we want, you are promoting lies and ignorance. That is far from "skillful means." I don't reject intentionality. I see that intentionality is just an appearance. Thought creates the illusion of the one who is intending and controlling, when actually there is no intender or controller. But those thoughts which create that illusion continue to arise spontaneously. No, it just tries to find a Middle Way. That's all.

Exactly. Zen leads to just this same understanding of mind and matter (aside from a few of the more technical aspects). In fact, Dogen lays out the entire understanding in just the first four lines of the Genjokoan.

I haven't much read the Surangama sutra, but if it asserts that everything arises from some eternal mind, I wouldn't listen to it. Regardless if it is attributed to the Buddha or not.

"Knowing is imaginary?" Then why do you keep going on about it? Right, and you are the same. From your point of view of mind-only, there is only one correct way of seeing things -- mind-only. I didn't say knowns were external to knowing. In fact, I said the opposite. They are dependent. Seamlessly linked but not the same.

So the mind, which has the contents, is the creator of the contents?

What do you mean by "appearance"? Ok...knowing requires something to know, right? Otherwise what is the point of knowing? If there is no known, "knowing" is nonsensical.

Ok, so this mind is bigger than just our individual mind? Is it like a container? As in, this greater mind contains the smaller mind and matter?

So you don't have a body? You also don't understand that mind itself implies matter.

Is the mind formless? How does matter "not exist at all"?

Sure, in the sense that everything is interdependent with everything else. If it weren't for dreams, there would be no waking life and vice versa. This still doesn't prove your point that mind is prime. Both dreams and waking life are physical and non-physical.

No, you really don't know. As long as you keep going to extremes and asserting the primacy of mind over matter, you have no idea where I'm coming from.

Both physical and non-physical. If it weren't for the physical forms that one sees and takes into ones mind in waking life, there would be no dreams.

Speak for yourself.

It means that it has a form, it is material. It is visible. It is not formless like the mind.

Again, when you say things like "it has both a constant and changing aspect," it sounds like you're just talking about emptiness. Not sure why you keep calling it awareness.

Well it's the most effective approach. Buddhism starts and ends with investigation of the self. Even if you figure out that you aren't a thing in the end, you still have to start with logic, which creates the assumption that you are a "thing."

And that requires the eyeball, which is physical. And that requires the finger, which is physical.

Does cognition need something to cognize?

Oh come on. What are you?