Otis

Beautiful! The distinction I hear you making, and the one I've been trying to make, is not a denial of the importance of the concept of "no self". It's merely an acknowledgment that a two word sound-bite is not literally accurate. The phrase points at something deeper. What exists is more subtle than "self" or "no self". I don't even know why this is controversial. You and I (and Seth and CowTao) have not been denying the words of the Buddha, but rather doing what he asked, which is to thoroughly explore the middle way between the dualistic concepts. To take any bit of scripture, and say: "mine is the only possible interpretation" is nothing but fundamentalism and folly.

I've been watching a number of WWII documentaries lately. It's mind-boggling, because it seems like such a different world than we live in now. The capacity to hate, to sublimate "evil", to rationalize horrible deeds, is far beyond what I see when I look around at the (admittedly troubled) world today. I am fascinated by why people believed as they did, and how they were able to see virtue in horrific acts. Whether it's the Holocaust, the fire-bombing of Germany, or the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, truly horrible horrible acts were committed under the rubric of necessity. In particular, I'm fascinated by the actions of everyday Germans, who agreed to carry out the Final Solution, exterminating their former friends and neighbors, in order to satisfy some twisted master plan by the Fuehrer. Gunning down defenseless women and children, leading people into gas showers. How could anyone see this as anything but evil? As far as I can tell, there was nothing inherently special about the German people. Nothing extra monstrous. They were human beings, no different than I. If there was one single important lesson to be drawn from all these documentaries, it was: I am them, too. I am not special. I am neither good, nor evil. I am composed of the exact same stuff as all other human beings, just in slightly different proportions. And that's why I say: "I am Hitler". Because I learn nothing from his horrific legacy, if I pretend that he is not a mirror to me. If I make myself above all that, then I miss the horrible truth of that time, which is that humans have the capacity for evil. And I see no reason to believe that I am somehow made of different stuff. Hitler is the reminder of that part of me that wants to be right, wants to be above, wants to be special. Therefore, I do myself no favors, if I pretend that I am too "right, above, or special" to make those same awful choices.

Excellent! Thanks for sharing!

You're still doing it! You're still making arguments that rely upon the superior view of your vaulted perspective. Once you get to where I am now, you'll know. I call B.S. X 1000! You keep just saying the same thing over and over again, but you never justify your "knowledge" and you never honestly deal with the exceptions I have pointed out in "self-evident" arguments. You dismiss away, you distract away, you quote authority, and you make a bunch of zen-sounding talk which all boils down to "I don't have to explain this, because I get this and you don't." This is all very lame behavior, Xabir. I was inspired by your OP's links to try a confrontational approach to disagreement, and since you were the OP, and had just declared your "awakening" in Twinner's thread, you seemed like a perfect person to practice on. If you had passed through the gauntlet of RT, I figured, then my nice little hounding would seem like nothing. And if you were indeed enlightened, then my poking at you would mean nothing to you, and provide a nice learning experience for me. If you were not enlightened, then I was only doing you a favor, by helping to ground you, and by reflecting the delusion in your arguments, back at you. I guess only time will tell whether there was anything gained by confronting. It's too time-consuming to do as a regular practice, and I sure didn't seem to make a dent in your certainty. But at least I got to make some arguments out in public, and maybe they will resonate with somebody else. In the meantime, enjoy your "vaulted perspective". You know I'll never see value in the argument that you're right because you say so, but you don't have to convince me of anything, either. Best of luck.

Thank you, Aaron, for bringing that up. They badger you into accepting one very specific idea, and then once you capitulate, they reward you with the idea that you are now "enlightened". You have now moved into the special group, and should join us now to convert others to this esoteric truth. In other words, the rewards are not for making sense, or thinking it through carefully, but for giving in and believing what they say you should. If you push back, the way that they push you, they kick you out. The founder of the site describes himself (indirectly, by quoting someone else): as half-God / half-genius. Says he believes in "no self" but sure acts full of self. Which one is more convincing, the words or the actions?

LOL to WHO and WHO! I think that self-description is wholly delusional and mostly worthless Heroic self-description, in particular, is screaming for self-doubt.

I don't think that to "not know", I have to say "I don't know". I don't have to do anything. All I have to do is stop. Stop knowing. No action need be taken; nothing needs to be changed. An action is just stopped. Knowing isn't even really a thing. There is no separate place in our brain for "knowing". Knowledge is just a subset of opinion, with extra certainty added on to it. Certainty is not a thought, but an emotional attachment to a thought. The more certain I am of an opinion, the more I feel the need to defend it, the more I feel like "I" am being attacked, when the idea is attacked. So "knowledge" is just the word we have for "belief" that has strong emotional importance for us. So why should we value strong emotional importance for a belief? Why not just believe, without being defensive about it? Why not surrender the delusional realm of "knowledge" and just admit that our beliefs can never be more than the best model thus far available. It is not "truth", nor can we ever say what "truth" actually is. It's just "what has worked thus far". That, in a nutshell is what habit is: what has worked thus far. And all belief falls within habit, and all knowledge is just a delusional subset of belief.

I am not agreeing that there is an objective yardstick of insight, if that is what you are asking. I was agreeing primarily with the idea that the separation of self from object is an illusion. Not because that is what is so in the actual world, which is unknowable. But because that is what is so in the the conceptual reconstructed world of an individual's subjective reality. Everything we experience is part of ourselves, because all we experience is the simulacra, which is merely a representation of the actual world. Thus every object-that-we-can-know is actually a product of mind. That's what I was agreeing with. I was also agreeing that this is a subtle point. Not much. Primarily I've been talking about epistemological humility, like I did to you on the other thread. Xabir chose to rebut my statement that God could not be disproven, with "Once you realize the nature of reality, you'll have direct insight into how a God is impossible." Well, I don't think that anyone here would accept someone else's argument that: "well, I know better, so therefore I'm right", and so I pointed that out. He has since then, steadfastly declined to justify his "rightness" in either the case against God or self. Since then, I've been inspired by the links in the OP to try confrontation, and see if there's anyway to break through, by continuing to hammer the same questions. I've been trying to get him to admit his own epistemological limitations, like I did to you, and like I have done to Twinner. Because you have all relied upon your own vaulted authority to "prove your point". It's just flat out a bad argument, and a sign of delusion ("I know because I know"). And no one would accept that argument from anyone else. Any fool can be certain without a reason; it is no sign of wisdom. So why accept that argument from yourself? is what I've been asking Xabir. Non-self and the existence of God just got dragged into the conversation, because they were the examples that Xabir gave of self-substantiated knowledge.

Excellent!

LOL. I thought you might say that.

I do think that "I don't know" is a path of freedom. In improv dance, "I know" is nothing but a trap. Whether it's: this is the right way to dance, or this looks cool / bad / gay / white / whatever, these stories only inhibit my body's exploration. When I forgo stories, then I witness my body dancing on its own, going off in new directions, doing things that "I" had no idea I could do. Even witnessing my dance can be problematic. If I suddenly realize: "hey, I'm standing on one foot", then all of a sudden, it gets hard to do. Why? Because what I had previously been doing was not "standing on one foot". What I had been doing was surrendering, which is all mystery, all "I don't know". But now that I am "aware that I am standing on one foot", then surrendering is gone, to be replaced by this new known action, and the flow is lost. So even the simple story of "I'm standing on one foot" is a lie. It replaces the truth of what was happening with a concept, and it locks me into the tyranny of that concept. So when I surrender concepts (and especially certainty), then I also surrender "I". When I indulge in concepts (like when I try to reify my experience into knowledge), then I strengthen "I". The "self", as I understand it, is made up of habits, which are little quanta of certainty: this is the right way to do or perceive X. Habits include all beliefs, and beliefs include all knowledge. They're all some form of habit, neural encodings of certainty. To surrender "self", it isn't enough just to pretend that I now believe that "self" is not real. Instead, to surrender self, I really have to start shedding "my" habits, doubting "my" knowledge, and surrendering "my" need to be right. I have to go from "I know" to "I don't know".

'There is no need to know or not know' covers it pretty well, I'm sure. "I don't know" is a personal thing for me, because that is my reminder, as I am tempted to believe in stories. The story arises, and some mechanism in my brain wants to buy into the story, but I remind myself that "I don't know", and that allows the story to remain just that: a story. And of course, the stories that I already carry around, they need to be doubted, as well, or I will never separate the wheat from the chaff. My stories, from life thus far, are largely an accident of history and genetics. When it comes to other people, in particular, I have to admit "I don't know". That's why I try to stick to commenting on the contents of people's posts, not of their character or insight. However, when someone else claims: "I know, because I am enlightened", or "... because I am wiser/smarter/more advanced than you are", than I do hear delusion. Because how would they know? How would they know they're enlightened, or that they "get it" more than me (without relying on circular reference to what they already believe)? At the very least, I would hope that an enlightened person would be able to put themselves in my shoes enough, to realize how unsatisfying their claims of enlightenment are (as rationale for being "right"). That doesn't mean, of course, that I'm right. I prefer to think that I am not right about anything (because it gets me into less trouble). But I still have my reasoning, and my patience, and my willingness to look deeper. I will use those tools at my disposal to evaluate new input and old stories, even though I know that I am limited and uncertain. It is not a paradox, just a trade-off.

Thanks, K and Informer.

I agree with what you're saying. I'm not disputing the Buddhist view. From a phenomenological perspective, there is no need for the "I" to do the hearing. There is no need for "I" to be living the life. There is no part of "I" that is separate from life, so why create separation, where none exists? I agree with all that. This does not mean that "no self" is literally true. And it certainly doesn't mean that knowledge is ever literally true.

I agree with Dennett's reasoning. In fact, my earlier take on "non-self" is very much in concert with that. Of course it's possible. I've given good reasons why I don't think truth is knowable, and no one has given good reason why they think that it is, but it is possible that I am, as you say, attached to that belief. (In fact, of course I am, because all beliefs are attachments). But let's consider what delusion means. Delusion is someone mistaking their view of reality for actual reality. Now, given that, what is the best way to avoid being controlled by delusion? Stop being so certain that my view of reality is correct. With 7 billion people in the world today, none of whom share my "view of reality", it seems pretty darn unlikely that it is my interpretation of the world that is correct. So I hold myself to the same standard I am pushing Xabir with. Of course, I don't automatically reward others' certainty with my credulity, because that would just mean that the person most sure of themselves is the most right, which experience suggests is opposite from the truth. I only grant my credulity when someone makes sense. So far from Xabir, I have only heard him quoting other people who make sense, and making assertions about his own "realizations", as if they were something deeper and brighter than my "realizations". Never has he explained why he thinks he can tell what the level of my "realizations" is. He even claimed that he had the perspective to know that God can not exist, which seems like lunacy to me. Of course I don't recognize within him some vaulted perspective, some beyond-subjective view; why should I? He's given me no reason to believe that he is any less limited than I am. He's given me a bunch of circular arguments, and he's virtually ignored the central question that I've been asking for the last several pages: "how do you justify this knowledge"? The only attempts at explaining his justification comes from the "self-evident" nature of "hearing, no hearer". And that's why I am challenging his "self-evident" arguments. Certainty is easy. Every troll on the internet has certainty. Dualism is all about certainty-over-reality. Certainty is not a virtue, and its adherents are among some of the worst criminals in human history. Dependent origination and emptiness both point toward "I don't know". They both insist that causality and self-evidence are illusions, that what we see is merely the surface of what's happening deeper. "I don't know" is freedom, whereas "I know" is self-tyranny.

I have never said there was a "core of me". I have spent a good deal of time on these boards, arguing against a "core of me", including in my take on "no self", earlier in this thread. But just because no part of me is the core of me, does not mean that I don't exist. I have been, from the beginning of this conversation, arguing against the "self-evident" quality of your knowledge, not against any "core of self". The question remains: how do you justify making claims of certainty in the actual? You have responded with some "self-evident truths", but you have not satisfactorily explained why these "truths" are self-evident. When I point out the flaw in your evidence, you changed the argument to being about the identifiable "core of me", which was never in dispute. Dodging and ducking only makes you seem like you are trying to hide, not that you are making sense.

Of course, all language is a convenient label. That does not mean that car does not exist! Nor self, for that matter.

LOL! So are you saying that there can be seen without a seer? Hearing without someone to do the hearing? How does that happen?

Yes, and body is a collection of parts, and a sentence is a collection of words, etc. But that does not define away "weather, self, body, or sentence".

What!? So if I say that a car is merely (list of car parts), I can claim that there is no car? No matter how you slice and dice the hearer, it does not make that person "not there". You have just defined away the hearer, not made a point.

Whatever. Saying woo-woo zen-sounding things doesn't resolve the issue. You haven't explained away the seer, the sleeper, or the one who experiences blackness.

What you're doing here is trading out the word "realization" for "experience" and treating it like it is "knowledge". The seeing is only an experience. You can call it "realization", but that does not make it anything more than an experience. No matter how deep, or important-feeling, or holy-seeming this experience is, it is still nothing but an experience. You still have to rely on your previous beliefs to take that experience, and turn it into a concept, and you still have to delude yourself into thinking that you have a special view on the actual, in order to call that concept "knowledge".

No. You still have to go farther than this. There must be a source of air vibrations, there must be air, there must be an organism with the capacity for hearing, there must be ear, cilia, nerve cells, auditory cortex, wakefulness and attention. Well, where do you find "ear, cilia, nerve cells, auditory cortex, wakefulness and attention"? You do not find them, without first finding "an organism with the capacity for hearing". In other words, a hearer. Still sure that "no self" is self-evident?

I have never said that experience is deniable. I have been very clear to say otherwise. For the most part, you seem to be agreeing with me. You say "an inherent reality existing on its own apart from experience, that is just a concept." That is the exact point I have been making, throughout this thread. What do you think "knowledge" is? Is it experience? No, it is precisely "an inherent reality existing on its own apart from experience", i.e. a concept. Knowledge is not the same as what's actual; it is never the same as the experience. There are no facts, only useful approximations. Yes there is. Take away the eyeball or the visual cortex, or even close my eyes, and there is no "just seen". Your "truth" is not self-evident at all.

Nonsense. Otherwise, a dead person, a deaf person, a statue, or a disembodied ear would hear sound. Try harder.