The world is an illusion....wtf does that mean ?

[wandelaar]

1 minute ago, windwalker said:

Funny all here talking about nothing, trying to prove what they talk about with something.

 

"無"

 

It sure is funny, but that's how our world (in all probability) is constituted. Mind you that there is a difference between nothing and no-thing. Clearly it is not the case that there is nothing, because even an illusion would be something. What the Buddhists and Taoists are saying is that what we in daily life consider to be self-subsistent things are not really things at all but rather temporary dynamic structures within the larger world process. This can and has all been explained in the literature. Wondo mentioned Nagarjuna, read about his guy if you want to know how it all fits together.

[Wondo]

50 minutes ago, windwalker said:

Funny all here talking about nothing, trying to prove what they talk about with something.

 

"無"

 

"趙州和尚、因僧問、狗子還有佛性也無。州云、無。"

It is a forum, that’s what it is for, to discuss things. Sorry, if I offend. Just trying to have a discussion. Nothing to prove. 

 

[Jadespear]

funny how the concept of real has to do with so many things, but that in the end everyone is talking about subjectivity. 

 

The eternal tao is real and constant

The created world is real and changes 

Existence is perceived through flows of consciousness states of mind and open choice-less impersonal awareness

One's experience of all these aforementioned things in real 

 

The whole illusion concept is actually misleading and stupid, perhaps our western lexicon misses the root meaning of where this concept came from... but from my point of view trying to recognize illusion from reality is pretty easy... things that people believe that are not in line with what is actually real - are illusions, falsehoods, and wrong knowledge.  Such as statements like " the earth is flat ".  No - it only appears that way from a certain point of view, hence that statement is an illusion.  Obviously the world is spherical.  So, stating that the entire world is an illusion is also wrong and stupid... at  least from my point of view.  Where does one go with this statement?  What could ever be learned from beginning with this mindset?  If you believe nothing is actually real, then you are actually a nihilist - someone who believes in nothing, stands for nothing, and is absolutely nothing.  Then you become nothing, your existence means nothing, simply because you have bought into the stupid idea of " illusion ".... 

 

 

[Stosh]

On 2/23/2019 at 10:45 PM, Jadespear said:

funny how the concept of real has to do with so many things, but that in the end everyone is talking about subjectivity. 

 

The eternal tao is real and constant

The created world is real and changes 

Existence is perceived through flows of consciousness states of mind and open choice-less impersonal awareness

One's experience of all these aforementioned things in real 

 

The whole illusion concept is actually misleading and stupid, perhaps our western lexicon misses the root meaning of where this concept came from... but from my point of view trying to recognize illusion from reality is pretty easy... things that people believe that are not in line with what is actually real - are illusions, falsehoods, and wrong knowledge.  Such as statements like " the earth is flat ".  No - it only appears that way from a certain point of view, hence that statement is an illusion.  Obviously the world is spherical.  So, stating that the entire world is an illusion is also wrong and stupid... at  least from my point of view.  Where does one go with this statement?  What could ever be learned from beginning with this mindset?  If you believe nothing is actually real, then you are actually a nihilist - someone who believes in nothing, stands for nothing, and is absolutely nothing.  Then you become nothing, your existence means nothing, simply because you have bought into the stupid idea of " illusion ".... 

 

 

Some good sound thinking is represented there. But the world presented to you is a filtered model of what is outside your brain. For instance, colors are a fabrication of your sight mechanism. And a person seen as constant, is actually a thing in flux.

Saying no things are real , is very similar,if not identical, to thinking all things are real. 

Consider whether it matters if your experience of life is not real. Then that is just what a life is!

Do you have power to affect things in this unreal world?....

[Jadespear]

3 hours ago, Stosh said:

Some good sound thinking is represented there. But the world presented to you is a filtered model of what is outside your brain. For instance, colors are a fabrication of your sight mechanism. And a person seen as constant, is actually a thing in flux.

Saying no things are real , is very similar,if not identical, to thinking all things are real. 

Consider whether it matters if your experience of life is not real. Then that is just what a life is!

Do you have power to affect things in this unreal world?....

 

The world is not presented to me... the world of the actual physical existence is an objective one.  It is impossible to argue this any other way; the laws of physics and nature do not depend on your own point of view to operate.  Colors are not a fabrication of my sight mechanism, colors exist on the physical level as colors due to the nature of what they are and how they come to be,  red is red, green is green.  " consider whether it matters if your experience of life is not real..."  ?  WTF are you trying to say...  this is obviously a dumb question.  Of course my experience of life is real, it's just like the fact that it is real that you asked such a dumb reflective question.  "Unreal world"...  what are you even talking about...  

 

ALL these words and mental mind games about how to describe what is, serve the only purpose of sharpening one's real perception, which can only be validated by the past or the present.  If something happened, it did, you can't change it - that's real.  What is happening now, is in flux - that's real.  What will happen in the future is unknown - that's real.  

[Stosh]

Fine, starting with colors, would you agree that you would see a rainbow of hues passing white light through a prism? RGBIV? Well juxtapose that the wavelengths are a progression with no distinctions of RGBIV.

Why do you think that there is red and blue?

It's such a complete illusion that people don't believe it even when explained. They still see colors.

[Lakshmi]

The world is Brahman's dream... And you are helping him dream it, since you are a part of Brahman. However, while you are dreaming, the dream is real enough to you! I hope that makes sense...

[3bob]

only perception can be wrong never reality, thus there is only reality and no illusion.

[Mudfoot]

14 hours ago, Jadespear said:

 

The world is not presented to me... the world of the actual physical existence is an objective one.  It is impossible to argue this any other way; 

Actually, there are many arguments against this, they form the core of Kashmir Shaivism and a bunch of other traditions. 

 

You don't have to buy it though. 

[Jadespear]

5 hours ago, Mudfoot said:

Actually, there are many arguments against this, they form the core of Kashmir Shaivism and a bunch of other traditions. 

 

You don't have to buy it though. 

... i would love to hear anyone try to argue against the laws of physics. All I would have to do would be to prove that by doing so they are simply proving my point.  Just because existence can be influenced through one's intent, doesn't mean that "reality" is unreal or even "presented" to oneself.  The cause and effect law of karma is what is the force that governs the entire created universe.  It does not work or operate in a way that one can avoid or bypass.  If you are alive and thinking and speaking and existing, then you are subject to the laws of existence to exist.  

 

Ancient arguments as translated through time lose their meaning through subjective interpretation... it is quite hard to translate conceptual and literal meaning from ancient cultures.  

 

...doesn't matter to me though, as the language of science supercedes all of them and does not depend on interpretation.  

[Mudfoot]

Ask voidisyinyang to do his quantum attack, and see where science is these days. 

[Pilgrim]

On 9/9/2018 at 6:33 AM, Arkx6 said:

So what is the buddhas teachings on illusion mean to you?

To me it means the following.

 

1. As Human Beings we experience only a portion of what there is via limited sense organs therefore all data received is incomplete and full of illusion, delusion and error therefore there can not be any absolute knowing by reason or the senses. To further complicate this everything is filtered through the conditioning of the mind which is influenced by culture , gender, cast color and creed. We have shared similarities,  commonalities but my experience of life is much different than yours. Both are equally illusory and the realm itself is only partly perceived in a very minute way.

 

2. The world of waking life like the world of sleeping and dreaming life are equally dream worlds.

 

3. We the dreamers through group karma inhabit the same realm and are governed by the laws of said realm even though both waking and dreaming are equally dreams if you walk off of a building in the waking dream realm you will not fly,  you will fall and become hurt and or die transition out of the waking realm.

 

[dwai]

Illusion might not be a correct term to use. I would use the term "appearance". What it means is that, the world is not independently existent (self-existent). It's existence is predicated on the existence of a subject who experiences the world. But this subject is not merely the mind-body complex that a human being is. The subject is the awareness underlying all phenomena, including sentient and insentient things. And you are that awareness!

 

 

[thelerner]

I wonder if the more useful phrase is 'Our perception of the world is filled with illusion'.  That statement allows you to start looking into things.. cultural biases, looking for things that you don't currently notice, or things you over emphasis or misunderstand. 

[manitou]

On ‎2‎/‎23‎/‎2019 at 1:11 PM, whitesilk said:

 

The closest rationalization that I can make for you @Arkx6, is that taoism praises the formless over form. 

 

The physical scientific reality of the atoms that make up matter is very turbulent on a microscopic level, yet also, there is empty space within matter on a microscopic level. The small negative spaces are gaps in the positive spaced reality. Those gaps allow for change. To help your family, focus on, in my own opinion, what you don't see about their lives. You do not live their day to day reality. Your headaches as you say could be the cause of an overactive desire to help those you are connected to.

 

 

This is my way of seeing it too.  It has to do with the fact that we are 99.9999999% not here.  The .0000001% remainder are the  mass of the protons, neutrons, electrons, quarks, neutrinos spinning.  The rest of the atom is space.   And the components of the atom is being broken down further.  As our instruments get bigger and smarter, I'm guessing that the end realization will be that we are nothing but the dream of the One Intelligence.  Without the spinning action of the atomic components (or the solar system, for that matter) we wouldn't be here at all.

 

I read recently where the scientists involved with the Hadron Collider have found that some atomic components, when split, actually bend time by splitting into the past!  So much we don't know.

[doc benway]

On 9/9/2018 at 6:33 AM, Arkx6 said:

So what is the buddhas teachings on illusion mean to you?

 

 

To me it means that I do not see the world as it is, I see the world as I am.

[manitou]

On 3/8/2019 at 5:40 AM, steve said:

 

To me it means that I do not see the world as it is, I see the world as I am.

 

 

I believe this is incredibly profound, brother Steve

[wandelaar]

The simple fact of the matter is that our perceptions of the world are the result of both the situation in the world itself and our own ideas about the world. Marblehead would have made a joke about it to bring back some common sense to this discussion, but unhappily I am not that spiritually advanced and I only get irritated.

[Mudfoot]

5 hours ago, wandelaar said:

The simple fact of the matter is that our perceptions of the world are the result of both the situation in the world itself and our own ideas about the world. 

Yes, that is the idea. 

And the situation in the world is the result of innumerable precedents, that is, no situation have a permanent and independent existence. 

Add that at any given moment, depending on a bunch of factors, you will interpret any situation in a very subjective way. 

 

Thus, the view that anything you experience has a permanent and independent existence is an illusion. 

 

Now, if you want a rational (or "rational") explanation for your experience in meditation when you feel Awareness and that which Awareness is aware of, you will gravitate towards quantum theory. But for the rest, it is simple. 

 

You stub your toe on a stone,and it hurts. 

But you stub your toe because at that moment, you and the stone try to fill the same space. 

And the pain will feel different if you have eaten and are playing with friends, compared to if you are hungry, alone, cold, and already feel miserably. 

[wandelaar]

@ Mudfoot

 

Agreed. The Buddhist and philosophical Taoist insights about change and insubstantiality perfectly accord with modern views within physics about the nature of the material world. But the nondualist dogma that takes consciousness or awareness as being the foundation of everything else goes way beyond what can be known. That's why I prefer the sober Taoist approach of just posing Tao as the foundation and the modest refusal to further speculate as to its fundamental nature.

 

Edited March 10, 2019 by wandelaar

[Mudfoot]

1 hour ago, wandelaar said:

 

But the nondualist dogma that takes consciousness or awareness as being the foundation of everything else goes way beyond what can be known.

No, not true. And it is Awareness, not awareness. 

 

But you have to replace Awareness with a more modern term to get it. Try "five-dimensional string theory" . Ok, so that is utterly meaningless to me, but probably full of significance for people who are smarter than me. 

[wandelaar]

7 minutes ago, Mudfoot said:

No, not true. And it is Awareness, not awareness. 

 

But you have to replace Awareness with a more modern term to get it. Try "five-dimensional string theory" . Ok, so that is utterly meaningless to me, but probably full of significance for people who are smarter than me. 

 

Introducing string theory into the equation only makes matters worse. Maybe string theory will one day become legitimate physics, but currently it's just mathematically inspired speculation. No better than religious dogma.

[Mudfoot]

8 minutes ago, wandelaar said:

 

Introducing string theory into the equation only makes matters worse. Maybe string theory will one day become legitimate physics, but currently it's just mathematically inspired speculation. No better than religious dogma.

You see, we make it up as we go, in an attempt to explain things that pop up in our consciousness. 😁 

Some of these explanations are really good. 

Didn't say valid..... 

[wandelaar]

Explanations need to be tested, it's not enough to "resonate" with some explanation or to have a feeling of absolute certainty. At least that is my position. And I am in good company as even Lao tzu and Chuang tzu had no problem with acknowledging that even they didn't know everything. There is no need for dogma's to fill up the holes in our fallible human knowledge.

[Mudfoot]

So, as you wrote earlier, you can always take the position that this is a subject that cannot be talked about. A lot of mystics took/take that one..... 

 

Differentiating between manifestations that can be described with words and the unmanifest that can not, keeps speculations at bay. 

 

But that can also become dogma.... 

 

For all that we know, the mystic experience might just be parts of our brains turned off and creating weird psychological states (which we give meaning and value to). 

 

Unless you believe that the brain can detect sub-atomic particles and the space-time matrix.