Thoughts on Buddhism

[RW_9]

Well, not only has it ended, but apparently it never was.

I mean, in terms of the actual topic of the thread.

I was attempting to address the topic of the thread, and all you guys kept doing was acting like the topic isn't even worthy of discussing.

Well, gee whiz, if you felt that way why did you ever bother to come into the thread in the first place?

That's what I would like to know.

I was just trying to understand your perspective, nothing more.

[reverendjeremiah]

I'm sorry that you are perceiving our conversations in such a negative light.

That was certainly never my intent.

You want to make friends on this forum...dont slander science. Its the one thing (other than godlessness) that keeps most of us together.

[Abracadabra]

I was just trying to understand your perspective, nothing more.

Well, unfortunately that doesn't appear to have been very successful.

But thanks, for trying.

---

You want to make friends on this forum...dont slander science. Its the one thing (other than godlessness) that keeps most of us together.

Well, again, that's your total misunderstanding of position.

I've been a scientist my entire life. I LOVE science and mathematics!

Isaac Newton was my early childhood hero. Albert Einstein became my hero as I become more educated. I still admire both of these men tremendously. Along with Maxwell, Feynmann, Sagan, you name a scientist and I'm probably a fan of him or her. Especially physicists and cosmologists.

I'm simply a very practical person. Science (as much as I love it) has limitations. That's a fact, like it or not.

It's the truth that Quantum Mechanics predicts that we will never be able to make precise quantitative predictions at certain levels of reality. That is a scientific fact. No point in pretending that it's not.

Just because you love science is no reason to pretend that it can do more than it can or that it's invincible.

I have not in any way put science down. I'm just practical enough to fess up to the reality of its limitations. I don't pretend that it's perfect, flawless, and invincible.

That would be a naive position to take, IMHO.

The very idea that science is absolutely guaranteed to provide every possible answer to the true nature of reality given enough time and tenacity is itself an unreasonable pipe dream.

There is nothing in all of science that guarantees that this will be the case.

Besides, it's not like I'm suggesting that we should cease to pursue the sciences. I'm all for scientific research! My entire library is filled with nothing but books and videos on science and math.

Ok, I almost forgot, I do have a few books on witchcraft. But I don't even keep them on the same shelves with the science books. I only have a few specific books on witchcraft and I kept them in a special altar.

Yes, I realize that you may be thinking, "What? Witchcraft and science? Is this guy a nut or what?"

Hey, I'm telling you that they are far more compatible than you realize.

And evidently that's what seems to be lost in these discussions.

[reverendjeremiah]

Ah...so much better after putting him on ignore.

[Bgood]

Spirit is best understood as emotion or feelings. There are good spirits (emotions) and there are bad. Personifying an emotion may help master it. (I stress, it may) We see fear as a mouse. We envision bravery as the Lion King. Love is a beautiful goddess. Wisdom is an old owl. This is what mythology is all about at it's root, human emotions cast into animate forms. (The stuff of dreams)

To intentionally mystify these emotions, as Abracadabra has, only places one further away from how he actually feels. It is a defense mechanism. It is in a sense, a self deception, a lie to one's self. This spiritualizing of unknown feelings can paradoxically lead to a hardening of the heart and an intellectual/emotional disconnect. What you consider "spiritual" is actually physical, and what you consider physical, is spiritual. There is no difference. You only create that difference, that duality, in your clinging, searching mind. RW9, your comments have actually sounded the closest to the teachings in the buddhadharma, perhaps not even being fully aware of it! But nonetheless, focused and clear, they are.

[Angrboda]

You know, I was considering plowing forward and reading the several pages I haven't read, in spite of having a migraine. This thread combines a number of my favorite subjects, including religion and philosophy of mind. But along the way, I saw too many of Abra's posting of *rofl* smilies, and decided that a person with this little respect for the person they were talking to is not worth bothering over. I'll waste my words on somebody else.

The way I look at it, the sages in the east, and those in the Mediterranean were basically scientists using the best tools they had at their disposal, their brains. There's a yoga called raja that, I'm told, basically consists in stressing yourself until your mind cracks, and seeing what you can learn from it. Zen is similar. And they delivered some fascinating insights. I haven't fully absorbed the breadth of the Buddha's thinking, but if what I've read about his doctrine of anatman rings true, I can understand why he made the mistakes that he did make. That dovetails perfectly with some conjectural thoughts I've had about some recent ideas in computational neuroscience.

But at the end of the day, wrong is wrong, and it makes no sense to venerate ideas that have past their prime in order to venerate the man. We have institutionalized knowledge, research, medicine, fMRI and PET scans, study of the effects of brain trauma on consciousness and cognition and so on. The Buddha had a loin cloth and a Bodhi tree. Better tools yield better results. There is no contest.

Let's just pose Abs a parting question.

You wake up one morning and you're dizzy and seeing things and you have a massive headache. Who do you turn to first?

1. A doctor at a hospital.
2. Some guru smearing ashes on his face.

[Bgood]

apophenia wrote

The Buddha had a loin cloth and a Bodhi tree. Better tools yield better results. There is no contest.

Hmm, never really thought of it like that, but excellent point! I would agree, yet also add that the good "medicine" of the Buddha's teachings seem to retain a much more humanistic "bedside manner", than all the modern machines and gadgets that scan our brain waves. Although modern man may have better tools, the Buddha has the more delicate hand and mind. Let's not forget these tools that we have manufactured are only as effective as the doctor or specialist using them. And would it be a doctor of Buddhist mentality that is interpreting these mechanical results, reading the symptoms correctly and offering the best medical advice? Or could it most likely be an uncaring doctor, or an over-worked Dr., or a Christian fundie Dr., or an under-educated Dr., or something even worse? So despite all the great technology we create, we are still human creatures prone to innumerable sufferings and misunderstanding of data.

[Abracadabra]

But along the way, I saw too many of Abra's posting of *rofl* smilies, and decided that a person with this little respect for the person they were talking to is not worth bothering over.

Oh dear me. It was never my intent to use the rolf smilie to imply disrespect for anyone. When I posted that icon I was laughing at the very things I was addressing. I was laughing at life itself and how silly things can often be. I never meant for that to be taken as laughing *at" someone.

So my deepest apologies to anyone who took it that way.

I guess it's probably best to stay away from using emoticons because you never know how someone else might take them.

Let's just pose Abs a parting question.

You wake up one morning and you're dizzy and seeing things and you have a massive headache. Who do you turn to first?

1. A doctor at a hospital.
2. Some guru smearing ashes on his face.

Truth? I steer clear of doctors as much as I possibly can. Recently I've been using "mystical" methods to improve my health, and as far as I'm concerned it's been working pretty well.

But yes, if I broke a limb, or woke up one morning with boils all over my face, I'd run to a doctor. I have no problem with modern medicine. I'll confess also that I'm not the greatest magician in the world anyway. I didn't even star practicing witchcraft until my late 50's. It's not something you learn overnight. In fact, it's almost like learning to play a musical instrument. The more you practice it the better you get at it. And I haven't been practicing it very long.

[The Grand Nudger]

Except that practice with an instrument provides results...

[Abracadabra]

To intentionally mystify these emotions, as Abracadabra has, only places one further away from how he actually feels. It is a defense mechanism. It is in a sense, a self deception, a lie to one's self. This spiritualizing of unknown feelings can paradoxically lead to a hardening of the heart and an intellectual/emotional disconnect. What you consider "spiritual" is actually physical, and what you consider physical, is spiritual. There is no difference. You only create that difference, that duality, in your clinging, searching mind. .

Where did all that come from?

I'm just curious where you get the idea that I 'mystify emotions'?

You seem to be assuming quite a bit about someone you've never met.

---

Except that practice with an instrument provides results...

I have to really restrain myself from not posting the rolf icon again.

But seriously what you just said really stuck me as being funny because I happen to be learning to play several musical instruments right now, and sometimes I wonder if practicing them actually provides results.

On some days it almost seems to work the opposite. The more I practice the worse I get.