What's the purpose of discussing enlightenment/reality?

[Dennis Mahar]

Philosophers work with a duality.
out of a moodedness.
fixing themselves mostly.

privy to a private soliloquoy.
soap opera.

the imputing mind generates environment, body, pleasures, activities.
meaning castles to live in to.
has not marx done this?

[Pam Seeback]

But the all-pervasive suffering of conditioned states without recognition of impermanence is impossible. It’s this very recognition that causes (egoistic) clinging. It abstractly encompasses ordinary (birth, ageing, illness and dying) suffering and suffering produced by change (suffering impermanence).

If I understand you correctly, and correct me if I am wrong, you are saying that it is the recognition of impermanence that causes suffering, which is the total reverse of my experience. I am not saying that my initial reaction to knowledge of impermanence didn't cause a temporary sense of loss (of my old belief system), but once this temporary reaction passed, joy at the realization of impermanence filled the void where grief once existed. Everything is of the moment, for the moment, so joyful is this consciousness! No need to cling to form because forms are infinite and eternal! An endless supply, an eternal dance!

Selfhood, much like an apple, is therefore not in itself necessarily delusional, which means that the notion of removing selfhood as the end of the suffering of conditioned states is delusional.

You can't have your apple and eat it too. :-) The idea of having or being a 'self' only exists until the truth of infinite consciousness appearing as finite things, including 'apple', is understood. I did not say self is removed at the end of the suffering of conditioned states, what I said was the reverse, that it is the removal of the delusion of (belief in) self and (belief in) permanence that causes the end of suffering (of clinging to form).

[Diebert van Rhijn]

You love your logic and I appreciate your abilities in this area and agree that I do not have your penchant for that tight brain thinking.

It's not about "my" logic or my "tight" brain. Clever sophistry there, Ardy, not bad. But this is about clear thought, the workings of our mind and addressing the ignorance perpetuating in the mind. We're talking about qualitative, essential thinking about ones own conditioning. This is not intellectual cleverness! The cleverness lies more often in all the justification of letting ignorance go rampant in our actions and attachments. One that's famous is the rejection of reason and logic not because it hurts the brain but because it can hurt attachment when followed through.

I have NO direct knowledge of it, the same as you may have no knowledge of it either.

Well at least you KNOW that!

To hold an argument without emotion is a hard task for 90% of the population as we are emotional animals yet you seem to expect that level of discussion on a web site for Christs Sake!

Well I do not agree animals are emotional or that those 90% are just animal. Humans are born as a particularly confused animal and it's that confusion which needs first to be admitted to and then perhaps to be addressed, to understand it in the bigger picture of ones existence.

To show your level of attainment then one sentence Diebert, that is all, and I will (hopefully) recognize what you have experienced and leave you alone!

There's no experience to attain so where are you going on about here? Reason does not lead to any enlightenment but enlightenment surely can open up reasoning.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Being is always/already a priori to your linguistics. It has no characteristics, properties, functions and cannot be described.

This is what unfettered mind means: to be able to think clearly about existence and non-existence, in ways the false self has no root anymore to distort with petty emotion, ego agenda, self-serving motive or clever twisting. Only now ones view, intention, thought, action, effort, mind and focus can be right, sammā or "perfect", meaning completing, unifying or wholesome.

Here is the great misunderstanding, this straw man that reasoning "leads to enlightenment" or represents it in some way. This rejection of reason and "linguistics" while pretending to master it in ones own clever but hardly spoken or explained (subterranean) ways. Now get this: reasoning does not lead to enlightenment but enlightenment leads certainly to reason, stands to reason and functions reasonably. When ignorances is removed -- and that's how one should define enlightenment -- what's left are open roads for clearer views, purer intentions, deeper thought, truer actions, sincerer efforts and a mind perfectly aware of its own doing and undoing. Forget about all these childish, navel staring "a priori" beings....

[ardy]

If I understand you correctly, and correct me if I am wrong, you are saying that it is the recognition of impermanence that causes suffering, which is the total reverse of my experience. I am not saying that my initial reaction to knowledge of impermanence didn't cause a temporary sense of loss (of my old belief system), but once this temporary reaction passed, joy at the realization of impermanence filled the void where grief once existed. Everything is of the moment, for the moment, so joyful is this consciousness! No need to cling to form because forms are infinite and eternal! An endless supply, an eternal dance!

The idea of having or being a 'self' only exists until the truth of infinite consciousness appearing as finite things, including 'apple', is understood. I did not say self is removed at the end of the suffering of conditioned states, what I said was the reverse, that it is the removal of the delusion of (belief in) self and (belief in) permanence that causes the end of suffering (of clinging to form).

This is my experience as well Movingalways. As my understanding of the infinite emergence of life grows so my fear of death recedes and I am closer to it than most here. The final test is the key thing and like all things we hope that our understanding follows us into the final moment, expecting [hoping?] that we don't turn into a blubbering mess of fear and self interest. That permanence you refer to seems to last even though the whole universe should disappear, makes no sense but it's how I feel.

The rock pool of life, points and laughs at the sound,
of the stars in my cranium banging around.

My eyes see the sky, my heart feels the light.
The stars in my head are just perfect tonight.
me 2005

[Dennis Mahar]

Diebert,

This is what unfettered mind means: to be able to think clearly about existence and non-existence, in ways the false self has no root anymore to distort with petty emotion, ego agenda, self-serving motive or clever twisting. Only now ones view, intention, thought, action, effort, mind and focus can be right, sammā or "perfect", meaning completing, unifying or wholesome.

Here is the great misunderstanding, this straw man that reasoning "leads to enlightenment" or represents it in some way. This rejection of reason and "linguistics" while pretending to master it in ones own clever but hardly spoken or explained (subterranean) ways. Now get this: reasoning does not lead to enlightenment but enlightenment leads certainly to reason, stands to reason and functions reasonably. When ignorances is removed -- and that's how one should define enlightenment -- what's left are open roads for clearer views, purer intentions, deeper thought, truer actions, sincerer efforts and a mind perfectly aware of its own doing and undoing. Forget about all these childish, navel staring "a priori" beings....

Reasoning means going thru' a list of multiple choices, dualities, discriminations.
A sorting out into categories, properties, characteristics, functions.
not that, not that.

Enlightenment doesn't require that.

It is what it is and isn't what it isn't.
The Buddha is bereft of 'what ifs'.
Enlightenment is phenomenal.

Being is a priori to facticity, historicity and the kitchen sink.

A personhood cannot be divorced from it's facticity.
It's got its list of 'in order to's for the sake of' (logic) survival options to stay on the straight and narrow.

The phenomenal experience of ekstasis breaks thru' that junk.

ekstasis is phenomenal like a thunderstorm is phenomenal.
thunder and lightning.

[Leyla Shen]

I did not say self is removed at the end of the suffering of conditioned states, what I said was the reverse, that it is the removal of the delusion of (belief in) self and (belief in) permanence that causes the end of suffering (of clinging to form).

And what I said is that the end of suffering is the end of clinging to impermanent things; that the idea of self is not necessarily delusional; that the belief in a permanent self has absolutely nothing to do with the suffering of conditioned states.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

Reasoning means going thru' a list of multiple choices, dualities, discriminations. A sorting out into categories, properties, characteristics, functions.

A very limited, confined view. Almost robotic! Dennis the Droid.

It is what it is and isn't what it isn't.

"But things are never what they seem". Hey, I can also write meaningless generalities you see.

Being is a priori to facticity, historicity and the kitchen sink.

It isn't. And that's the biggest discovery you can make right now!

A personhood cannot be divorced from it's facticity. It's got its list of 'in order to's for the sake of' (logic) survival options to stay on the straight and narrow.

Not just personhood.... nature! And it's a bit more complex then lists. But if you insist on castrating existence and simplify it "for the sake of" Dennis, go ahead!

The phenomenal experience of ekstasis breaks thru' that junk.

Junk being the key word here. You still need to outgrow your emotional hook ups. It's distorting and infantilizing nearly every sentence you write. Which is remarkable because you're also intelligent and insightful, at least the few moments you're sober and feel no need to defend your attachment. Which is three times a year perhaps? Not with Christmas it seems though.

[Dennis Mahar]

All you've got is insults.
phenomenal.
geddit?

Bliss.

[SeekerOfWisdom]

It's not that mental formations are subject to suffering and delusion, it's the deluded belief that mental formations are permanent and self-originating that causes suffering. Remove the delusion of permanence and selfhood, do mental formations disappear? No, Remove the delusion of permanence and selfhood, does suffering disappear? Yes.

Seeker, if I am remembering correctly, you're biologically quite young. How do you plan on remaining conscious beyond your biological youth without benefit of mental formations?

It is not simply belief that causes suffering, you're talking about certain kinds of suffering.

Is a new born child suffering because of belief? Wasn't it you that was talking about animal-suffering? Is that because animals are clinging?

Suffering arises whether or not one is or isn't clinging to selfhood or apparent permanence.

Is that last question rhetorical?

Everything is of the moment, for the moment, so joyful is this consciousness! No need to cling to form because forms are infinite and eternal! An endless supply, an eternal dance!

You've been reading Dennis too much. Let's dance, let's dance, it's bliss.

You made it clear yourself, for the moment it may be joyful, but how does that indicate the suffering of beings is now left behind forever?

the end of suffering (of clinging to form).

You equate suffering with clinging to form, but that isn't all of suffering. Boundaries in language don't have power over the present arising of the experience, which you may not be able to intelligently grasp or even recollect unless you are there at the time in suffering.

[iamforhereithink]

Nietzsche and Heidegger condemned the stupidity of logic/categorical thinking that came to dominate thru Plato and Aristotle.
They went to the presocratics who spoke of ekstasis, of the phenomenal experience of pure being:

To be or stand outside oneself
a removal to elsewhere
a stand or a standoff of forces

it's the buddha's 'empty' phenomenal experience
mindfulness.

Heidegger's path of thinking is designed to generate ekstasis as is buddha's.

Heidegger attempts to show:
Being is Time

rather than Being in Time.

Being mindful is to know what time it is.
Being-toward-death.
Impermanence.
Anxious?

"Being is time" and "Being in time" i can relate to both (:

"Duration is a theory of time and consciousness posited by the French philosopher Henri Bergson. Bergson sought to improve upon inadequacies he perceived in the philosophy of Herbert Spencer, due, he believed, to Spencer's lack of comprehension of mechanics, which led Bergson to the conclusion that time eluded mathematics and science. Bergson became aware that the moment one attempted to measure a moment, it would be gone: one measures an immobile, complete line, whereas time is mobile and incomplete. For the individual, time may speed up or slow down, whereas, for science, it would remain the same. Hence Bergson decided to explore the inner life of man, which is a kind of duration, neither a unity nor a quantitative multiplicity.[1] Duration is ineffable and can only be shown indirectly through images that can never reveal a complete picture. It can only be grasped through a simple intuition of the imagination."

Inspired from Bergsons theory of Duration and not to get involved in the ongoing argument of sciences interpretation of time from a human consciousness perspective , which science more often than not conveniently forgets about in its quest to make eveything separate and measurable and so partitionally understandable to itself so it can then reproduce these results as “Facts” in the belief that this will solve the problem of human existence or at least improve human existence.
And in a way , I agree that these partitioned understandings and evolved improvements from scientific investigation are assisting the humankind in evolving and understanding itself , but because of this insistent separation of consciousness and the material world , they are equally capable of misleading and even deluding the humans understanding of it
This is why I believe the Metaphysical Philosophers Like BERGSON and his theory of DURATION are of vital importance to human existence and the humans understanding of existence at a level that science has yet to accomplish
The mistake that many institutions make from reflections of people like Bergson and all philosophers is to define their ideas from an absolutist angle and write off or fully accept their works from the societies current favoured favoured opinion of what is absolutely correct in ones understanding , instead of perceiving them as ongoing developers of thought (which I as an individual am free to do) who produced ripe fruit as well as odd rotten fruits like any healthy tree does, in their attempt to understand existence which is the true nature of philosophy
Here is a simple example I have constructed of where bergsons existential metaphysical concept of DURATION cries out for further investigation because it so obviously to me signposts something much more profound to human consciousness existence as does its scientific or social counterpunch explanation
According to science or social conditioning, the human being in relation to time goes through 3 distinct phases in its lifecycle, childhood, adulthood and oldagehood, or past present , future
According to Science or social conditioning , time is measured in distinct consistent “repetitive” mechanical intervals of seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years. And it should not be forgotten that there are astronomical events (perceived mechanical) and astrological events(perceived psychic) which appear repetitive

Its not that science and social conditioning is completely wrong, they are providing a necessary means for humans to co-exist in an industrialised world , but they refuse to accept their complete inadequacy in explaining a human beings relationship with that time or passing of mechanical measured intervals .
For example when a human being truthfully reflects back on its existence to date, there are no sudden doors that they walked through from childhood to adulthood to oldagehood, there is but a constant transition through what is called past time, which in truth can only be defined as an Endurance, some of which is highlighted by specific memorised events , but these specific highlighted events themselves are subject to change dependent on what is occuring in present time

A human beings concept of 1 hour passing can vary dramatically, illustrating that mechanical time and human existence Duration are not experience-related in a proportional measured manner
So in conclusion , Science and social conditioning considers mainly the human physical experience(where someone outside of you objectively observes you with a stopwatch) whereas a metaphysical thinker like bergson was pointing to a concept of trying to understand the psychic experience of human existence which is in off the science and social conditioned measurement and actually exists as a separate entity within that apparent mechanical consistency
The internal experience itself existing within the outwardly measured mechanical segment of which the 2 have no predictable or even consistently sensible relationship

This concept of a separate immeasarable reality that can be endured within the physically measured progressive mechanical predictable cycle , that in itself could live infinite lives within the one measured physical life , is where the metaphysical sword of investigation truly needs to point, and it is in this area that the imaginary and the psychic are now the new frontiers of science as well, through the onrushing digital age of virtual platforms , which is not so much a technological progress , but more a metaphysical hijack from the future, as the physical starts to knock on the metaphysical doors of perception itself and the “present time” predominant concept of mechanical time may just be the eventual sacrifice of this new frontier.

The purpose of discussing enlightenment /reality can be advantageous in co-ordinating / evolving psychic and physical intelligences and how best to utilise or dismiss them for your or others advance in a progressive technological spiritual conscious society and some dark humour can be encountered along the ways too which helps to retain sanity

[Pam Seeback]

Dennis: Being is a priori to facticity, historicity and the kitchen sink.

Diebert: It isn't. And that's the biggest discovery you can make right now!

Dennis, Diebert has it right here. When you wrote the word 'kitchen sink' was not the being that is you at one with the writing? Yes, there was a time when 'kitchen sink' had not yet appeared in human consciousness, but there was never a time when the eventuality of the appearance of 'kitchen sink' did not exist in the causality. 50 years ago the internet had not yet appeared as an effect for being, but its causes and conditions were always/eternally present for its eventual appearance, were they not? To divorce being from causes and conditions is akin to cutting out one's brain and expecting one's legs to still be able to move.

[Dennis Mahar]

There are possibilities for being.
the imputing mind generates environment, body, pleasures, activities.
ever changing.
wow factor.

the parts of a car laying around isolated are empty and meaningless.
bring them together as car and they are meaningful for the time being.

ultimately, it's empty and meaningless that it's empty and meaningless.

thought,word, deed.
tool-being
generating equipment to live in to.
every move you make, meaning maker.

Mighty civilisations fall like a deck of cards.

phenomenal.

[Pam Seeback]

Seeker: It is not simply belief that causes suffering, you're talking about certain kinds of suffering.

Is a new born child suffering because of belief? Wasn't it you that was talking about animal-suffering? Is that because animals are clinging?

Seeker, it always comes back to one's definition of suffering, which as I explained to you earlier, has changed for me. I no longer equate physical pain with suffering, rather, it is something that appears when the capacity for reasoning appears, around the age of six or seven in human consciousness.

Suffering arises whether or not one is or isn't clinging to selfhood or apparent permanence.

For example?

Is that last question "Seeker, if I am remembering correctly, you're biologically quite young. How do you plan on remaining conscious beyond your biological youth without benefit of mental formations?" rhetorical?

No.

movingalways wrote:
Everything is of the moment, for the moment, so joyful is this consciousness! No need to cling to form because forms are infinite and eternal! An endless supply, an eternal dance!

You've been reading Dennis too much. Let's dance, let's dance, it's bliss.

You made it clear yourself, for the moment it may be joyful, but how does that indicate the suffering of beings is now left behind forever?

One being at a time. As for the dance of joy (bliss is Dennis' thing) are you saying that you never experience joy in knowing that the causality is eternal and infinite?

movingalways wrote:
the end of suffering (of clinging to form).

You equate suffering with clinging to form, but that isn't all of suffering. Boundaries in language don't have power over the present arising of the experience, which you may not be able to intelligently grasp or even recollect unless you are there at the time in suffering.

At its core, suffering is about mis-identity. Belief in an independent self that has the power to control its objects, an erroneous belief that causes clinging to objects. Why? Because the truth is, being has no power to control its objects.

[Pam Seeback]

Dennis: the parts of a car laying around isolated are empty and meaningless.
bring them together as car and they are meaningful for the time being.

You're putting the cart before the horse. In order for the parts of a car to be laying around they have already been 'brought together.' The totality is in the parts of a car, the parts of a car is in the totality. The same principle applies when the parts of a car become a car.

[Dennis Mahar]

You just don't get the fullness of what is meant.

[Dennis Mahar]

iamforhereithink

"Being is time" and "Being in time" i can relate to both (:

every question has three parts: that which is asked about, that which is interrogated, and that which is to be found out by the asking.

Every question analyzes something that is already given to us (past: the interrogated), in order to find out something new (future: that which is to be found
out), with the resulting combination giving us the question as a whole (present: that which is asked about).
Being is Time.

Surely then Being is Toolness generating possibilities for World.

What is this Being?
Buddha says 'imputing mind'.

[Dennis Mahar]

seeker,

You've been reading Dennis too much. Let's dance, let's dance, it's bliss.

Your readership is totally appalling.
The buddha looked at the people around him and said 'all is suffering' and 'there's a way out of suffering'.
You must think he contradicted himself.


Enlightened being is imputed on emptiness/bliss as basis.

[Leyla Shen]

Philosophers work with a duality.
out of a moodedness.
fixing themselves mostly.

privy to a private soliloquoy.
soap opera.

the imputing mind generates environment, body, pleasures, activities.
meaning castles to live in to.
has not marx done this?

No, Marx did not, with imputing mind, generate capitalism in order to critique it as a meaning castle to live in to.

[Dennis Mahar]

He saw it's possibility and generated another.

[Leyla Shen]

Pay close attention, Dennis.

The core of suffering which causes clinging to objects is the belief in an independently existing self that has the power to control its objects.

The five aggregates give rise to the objects and quality of self, and each appearance of self is necessarily individual. The appearance of that independently existing, hollow form of a self (ghost, if you wish) is actually nothing more than one of the five aggregates—a mental formation appearing to the individual—that cannot possibly know suffering, or the truth of it.

[Dennis Mahar]

and suffering exists.
dependently.
you've described machinery there.
Tool being.

Being has to exist prior to that understanding of Being.
An investigation into Being took place.

As an understanding it is applied to generating an enlightened Worldhood/Selfhood.

The understanding is Toolbeing.

It does not mean existence switches off.
There is only existence.

Pam wrote,

that has the power to control its objects.

Is she now controlling her objects.
She implies that.

[Leyla Shen]

you've described machinery there.

What's the difference between truth and machinery?

She implies that.

Or do you infer it? Either way, neither proposition has anything to do with the premises of my argument.

[Leyla Shen]

Well, strictly speaking, I should say there is no coherent demonstration that either proposition has anything to do with the premises (and therefore, the conclusion) of my argument.

[Dennis Mahar]

Being has to exist prior to that understanding of Being.
An investigation into Being took place.

unconcealed.