Intelligence and the desire to reproduce.

[David Quinn]

Neil,

Similar to how you can be emotional towards truth after abandoning emotions.

A sage isn't even emotional towards truth. He continues to place value on it, however, because he can't think of any reason to stop valuing it. It has become part of his nature.

-

[Carl G]

Condescension noted, but really, Nick, your level of mental prowess and powers of expression don't warrant it.

Don't let your ego get in the way of learning a thing or two.

More condescension. That's ego. You're really quite the projectionist. And apparently you don't know it.

Question: Why does it matter what form a sage takes?

Whose question? Not mine. In reply to your, "Well if we are to define one as a sage, then yes it would necessarily follow," I asked, "If we are to define one what as a sage?" I was just trying to clarify for myself what you were saying.

My apologies, I assumed you knew how to use the English language. In place of "one" you could substitute "someone", "a being", or "an individual". It wasn't meant to be followed by any entity.

More condescension, and more sarcasm. Talk about emotional. You keep proving my point, which was that you post from your emotions (and faulty thinking).

You want to define sage as someone or something for which emotion is not the motivating factor.

Here's an example of your superficial understanding. What you said here only scratches the surface of what it means to be a Sage. A sage's motivation all stems from a pure understanding of Reality that he lives in accordance with. I'm being absolutely sincere when I tell you that you need to think things through a bit more.

You're being sincere, and egotistical. And you are projecting your own poor comprehension. Where did I say that the definition for sage that I paraphrased from your garbled posting was comprehensive? Do you disagree that for a sage emotion is not the motivating factor?

And it is poetry. Let's move on.

Well we could move on if it actually were poetry. If what I said stirred your emotions it's only because of the way you perceived it.

Is that how you define poetry? As something which could stir my emotions? I mean it as something artistic and subjective, as a contrast to logic and reason. Like your opinion that the Sun shines without emotion. I could have just as well said that's a bald unsupported assertion, which it was. But, hey, you put it so eloquently. Passionately, even.

All I was doing was making a logical comparison that there are many things in Nature, including people, who do things without an emotional motive.

It wasn't logical, because you do not know the nature of the Sun.

I pointed out to her that there are countless things in Nature that happen without emotion being the cause of it.

But that's not what you said. You said simply "without emotion."

No it's not.

Yes, I quoted you verbatim. You said "without emotion."

I essentially said, the Sun shines (a thing that happens in Nature) without emotion as a motive, or cause if you like.

You may have been thinking that, but it isn't what you said. You said, "without emotion." Anyway, in either case, you could not know that. You are speculating, and are not being logical. You are being poetical. Despite my showing you this, you refuse to be logical.

[vicdan]

No, you didn't get the criticism which was openly put in there, with no attempt to hide.

Bullshit. That's like claiming that your refusal to answer my question 'are you still abusing your wife?' is an evasion of the direct, explicit meaning.

Me: "Why would embracing them fully be an advantage to you? "

That wasn't what you had said, asshole. You had implied that emotions are bad in any quantity, by your alcohol comparison.

You: The usual blabber when you don't know what to say ('idiot', smearing, etc)

Uh-huh. As i said, nobody ever accused you of intellectual honesty.

This is no explaining

No, it's not. I do not engage liars and demagogues on their own terms. I will not accept your presupposition that emotions are bad. if you want an honest discussion, try having one. if you want a straight answer, ask the question without weasely demagoguery and dishonest red herrings.

Yes, like all behavior they can be traced back on various neurological mechanisms that facilitate them. It doesn't validate any of them.

of course not -- but you seem to be under illusion that saying 'emotions are just neurochemistry' invalidates them. I simply pointed out how this in no way constitutes their invalidation.

Perhaps the comparison could be done with the eating of meat. There are times and circumstances where it makes sense to eat meat, when available. These days it's mostly done out of pleasure and attachment while putting a heavy strain on resources. In an increasinlgy populated world and diseased bio-industry the option becomes less sane by the minute.

Meat is not necessary to human survival, but a complete protein complex is. Any number of specific emotions may not be necessary to functionality, but emotions as a whole are. Nice red herring though.

No need for desire in the sense you've defined it (as emotion) unless you want to argue for emotion in lower lifeforms like ants.

Big difference. human cognition in this regard cannot even be compared to that of many other mammals. For example, reaction in rats occurs within about one millisecond. Reaction in humans occurs within about 50 milliseconds at best, even though the potentiation of certain areas of the brain is as fast as the rats'. our decision-making process, even about really simple things, is far more complex than that of other mammals. just because ants and rats need's be driven by emotion (though they could be, that's a different topic) doesn't imply that this tells us anything about how human mind works.

To answer inline Shahrazad here: one would still get out of bed since when the body and mind are rested; no need will be present anymore to lie down, unless attached to the comforting, nurturing aspects of a warm bed perhaps. A rational person has outlined his goals quite clearly

And where do those goasls come from? From his nature as the sage, as David would claim? Are you suggesting that those goals are simply reflexive, kinda like our pulling the hand away from fire is reflexive, the way breathingis reflexive? Are you suggesting that the sage is simply mindlessly going through the motions?

and will proceed to act upon them. With great determination if needed. He's his own master and slave and he can command and obey his own commands. It's like spontaneous arising of order in Chaos theory in the sense that one doesn't need to calculate all the complexity: it arises out of the initial iterated formula. That's the closest way I can currently describe it.

You should have put more thought into it.

Where did you got the impression I got a faith?

Oh, from the fact that you take the coherence of those religious questions at face value for example...

Hahaha! You should have asked them before adding to your behind. I doubt most of them would like your posturing with their accomplishments.

Why should i care? newton would assuredly hated many people who use calculus today, being the crabby jerk that he was, but that doesn't invalidate calculus. i am sure kant for example would not be very happy about the way I use his ideas, but his ideas are still good.

What's this shit with intellectual tribalism, dude? You seem to be under delusion that ideas should be applied according to ideological allegiances and philosophical group-think, rather than based on the merit of their contents.

Me, i find major problem with buddhism from the get-go, the very first noble truth. The world is full of suffering, but also joy and fulfillment, and abandoning passion will rid you of both. I prefer to manage my passions constructively, rather than dampen and suppress them. Not playing at all may be preferable to losing the game, but playing well is better than not playing at all. Buddhism arose in the world where suffering indeed overwhelmed the joys one could have, but that needn't be the case today, at least not in the developed world. My life is certainly full of far more joy and pleasure than suffering, and I see not the slightest reason to be rid of that.

Perhaps you're just denying your suffering

is that like me denying the voice of Jesus which tries to speak to me?

I acknowledge the suffering I undergo. inf act, i bet dollars to donuts that I have experienced far more suffering than you have, in my life. i was subjected to political persecution. i was under missile bombardment. I worker 80 hrs/week for $2/hr. I almost lost my son. Yet, with it all, there is only one thing I would do differently if i could, supposing that it would somehow not affect my family later -- i would not have left Israel. All the other suffering i went though, the joys and happiness were greater. it was all worth it. I made many mistakes and bad decisions, but there's only one i actually regret.

I do not deny my suffering, dude. i merely don't fixate on it, i don't let it obscure everything else. Unlike you obviously. What a sad life yours must be.

You're partly right in that Buddhist thought could easily be abused as comforter, like a believe in the afterlife can. The ironical thing is that the pure religious road embraces suffering, rejection and pain. It doesn't reject or suppress anything. It sees the 'joys' and 'pleasures' as clown masks on top of suffering, a coping mechanism but not capable of addressing the underlying twists - therefore passing it on each generation without even knowing what hides behind.

Exactly. Blind religious faith -- not very different from the xian concept of original sin, really. Even the joy and happiness are really suffering, i am just not aware of it yet! And god speaks to me, too, if only i would listen. Hallelujah!

So, where are your supposed arguments and empirical studies supporting buddhism? Why aren't you posting them? if a xian apologist were in your place, surely you would agree that the existence of millenia of xian apologia does not free the apologist from the need to actually present his arguments (and BTW, i have never encountered a xian argument for god which I couldn't counter on my own, though the ontological argument had given me a bit of trouble). So why are you, having laid claim to such arguments and experiments, seem to be so reluctant to present them?

[vicdan]

Time for some Philosophy 101.

hahaha. Using an academic metaphor, are you? And n such an unjustified way, too...

And then, as he develops, his rationality and love of truth begins to chip away at the very foundations of emotion - namely, the illusion of inherent existence [emphasis mine -V]. Most people fall away at this stage because they are far too attached to emotional living and don't want to see it eroded. Their emotions call an immediate halt to this rational process of becoming increasingly more truthful and they begin to turn their backs on truth. However, the person who has cultivated a strong passion for truth and developed some serious momentum will continue, almost in spite of himself, to chip away at these foundations until there is nothing left.

This is another one of your great pernicious lies, David. i had shown you before that the two -- lack of inherent existence (of self, the ego, soul for short if you will), and emotions -- aren't in conflict. One needn't believe in soul in order to accept the validity of emotions. One's nature can be fluid, ever-changing, just like the proverbial river you cannot step into twice -- and yet the river is still there, even though it always changes.

In fact, if you studied cognitive science*, you would know that by now it's well recognized in science that the singular self doesn't exist. human mind is not a horse racing forward, but an entire herd thundering in more or less the same direction. The singularity and atomicity of self, the inherent existence as you put it, is most definitely a delusion; but that in no way invalidates emotions. One can fully recognize the lack of inherent self, its ever-changing nature, the inseparability of self from the Universe, and yet acknowledge emotions as being an integral aspect (not 'belonging to', but comprising) this fluid, dynamic self, ever-changing self -- the self which is surfing the waves of Being, changing them and being changed by them

You conveniently cut off the rest of my sentence, which read "at least in this area". There is no question that the emotional attachment to comfort greatly hinders the rational process, often shutting down lines of reason in mid-sentence, as it were, before they have a chance to be completed. This would never happen in an emotionless person.

no, the emotions shut off the specific lines of empirical inquiry in mid-sentence, not the lines of reasoning; and yet, your typical emotionless sage would most definitely do something similar. Let's say the sage is a spelunker (it's his nature!) and comes across a very interesting cave; alas, his canary just died. Instead of further investigating this cave, the sage would backtrack, shutting off a line of empirical inquiry in mid-sentence, because its pursuit would incur inordinately high cost. he is cutting off a line of empirical inquiry without compromising his rationality. Your cop does the same.


* Dammit, dude, i wish you had studied pretty much anything outside your idiotic navel-gazing. You have no idea what wealth of knowledge, understanding, and insight you are missing out on.

[maestro]

Me, i find major problem with buddhism from the get-go, the very first noble truth. The world is full of suffering, but also joy and fulfillment, and abandoning passion will rid you of both.

I think that by suffering he means philosophical suffering, which has in fact afflicted many thinking persons from time immemorial, and even in the developed west the philosophical suffering has intensified, what is the purpose of life, what is a meaningful life, such questions are asked by a man with lots of creature comforts and not by a starving dude.

Not playing at all may be preferable to losing the game, but playing well is better than not playing at all. Buddhism arose in the world where suffering indeed overwhelmed the joys one could have, but that needn't be the case today, at least not in the developed world. My life is certainly full of far more joy and pleasure than suffering, and I see not the slightest reason to be rid of that.

If you can take something from Buddhism it would be the empirical study of your mind. Which would tell you how it functions rather than relying on the media to tell you that doing x increases happiness by y%. Or the advice of experts on how to live a fulfilling life. Or for that matter whole of your cultural and societal conditioning and expectations. You will have to agree that an accurate knowledge of the instrument by which you play the game would help you in making the most out of the game, Buddhism encourages you to do this and not take Buddha's words at face value, but as metaphors and teaching devices. In fact if you reject all of them, that is very excellent and Zen indeed urges you to do this post haste.

Here is a Zen quote reflecting this sentiment.

If you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha.
If you meet your father, kill your father.
Only live your life as it is,
Not bound to anything.

[vicdan]

I think that by suffering he means philosophical suffering, which has in fact afflicted many thinking persons from time immemorial, and even in the developed west the philosophical suffering has intensified, what is the purpose of life, what is a meaningful life, such questions are asked by a man with lots of creature comforts and not by a starving dude.

oh? I heard a couple of different interpretations of the suffering thing, but this one is new. let's run with it, however.

This sort of suffering is not at all such that only the cessation of desire can alleviate it. The existential angst -- which is what you are talking about -- is a disease of the spirit brought about by religious indoctrination, by the enculturated view (not even belief, just a gut feeling) that there ought to be meaning and purpose.

This is of course bullshit. The existential angst stems from such a conflict between enculturated values, and the world as our intellect reveals it to us -- devoid of meaning and purpose, brute Being without rhyme or reason. Sure, ceasing to desire in general will rid you of this anxiety; but a much more targeted way to deal with this existential void is to cease desiring those specific things -- absolute meaning, purpose, etc. Why cut off the whole arm when a minor incision will do the job?

Me, I see the purposelessness of the universe as Freedom. We create as much as we breathe. We create the way trees exude oxygen. We can take this existential void, and fill it with ourselves, our own meaning and purpose. This is Freedom, baby! and I am a cheerful nihilist who embraces the existential void.

Believe it or not (and most xians don't), i truly have no emotional need for the higher purpose or being. I rid myself of this existential nausea without ridding myself of emotions. I know I succeeded because I was in a life-or-death situation (my son nearly died, for about 5 minutes i didn't know which way it would go); those were the most painful five minutes of my life, but not once during that time did I feel an impulse to appeal to higher power, to call out for cosmic justice, to question the purpose of such an event or to rail against this purpose, etc. It's not that I restrained myself because I know better intellectually (which I do), i did not even feel the impulse to do so.

So yeah, if by dukkha you mean the existential angst, then buddhism's prescription for it is bad medicine, and I would recommend anyone who takes this issue seriously to study western philosophy instead (but not stop at existentialists).

If you can take something from Buddhism it would be the empirical study of your mind.

Been there, done that. Did grad work in AI, and spent years introspecting.

Which would tell you how it functions rather than relying on the media to tell you that doing x increases happiness by y%. Or the advice of experts on how to live a fulfilling life. Or for that matter whole of your cultural and societal conditioning and expectations. You will have to agree that an accurate knowledge of the instrument by which you play the game would help you in making the most out of the game, Buddhism encourages you to do this and not take Buddha's words at face value, but as metaphors and teaching devices.

Great. Does this have relevance to the topic at hand?

[maestro]

Me, I see the purposelessness of the universe as Freedom. We create as much as we breathe. We create the way trees exude oxygen. We can take this existential void, and fill it with ourselves, our own meaning and purpose. This is Freedom, baby! and I am a cheerful nihilist who embraces the existential void.

Well there is no void, the void is created since there is anxiety created by the tension to uphold the self and not appreciating the universe as is. Fill it with ourself our meaning and purpose is a line commonly chanted nowadays, but what does it mean. Where is the ourself, and the purposes and meanings it is coming up with should be discovered first of all.

Been there, done that. Did grad work in AI, and spent years introspecting.

HaHa grad work in AI, I thought AI was not about introspecting the mind or anything. It is all about searching, classification and inference algorithms and such stuff.
Your argument is equivalent to saying is that after defeating Federer on your Nintendo you should be crowned the new world champion.

[vicdan]

Well there is no void

Sure it is -- the same sort of void which exists in the absence of Santa Claus and the tooth fairy.

the void is created since there is anxiety created by the tension to uphold the self and not appreciating the universe as is.

Indeed.

Fill it with ourself our meaning and purpose is a line commonly chanted nowadays, but what does it mean.

<sigh> Surely you understand that much. Do you really need me to spell it out?

Where is the ourself, and the purposes and meanings it is coming up with should be discovered first of all.

Done that too. See my earlier point about dynamic self constantly changed and redefined through interaction with the world.

You seem to sincerely believe that anyone who disagrees with buddhist dogma (and there is dogma, the 'kill buddha' thing notwithstanding) must not have done the legwork. Dude, my whole fucking life has been all about it -- about understanding the world, what we can know about it, what knowledge is, how we relate tot he world, etc.

HaHa grad work in AI, I thought AI was not about introspecting the mind or anything.

You'd be surprised how much you can learn about your own mind by studying the empirical findings of AI and related disciplines. But perhaps the only 'empirical findings' you are interested in, are the buddhist ones?..

Here are some random tidbits I learned while in grad school studying AI.

• Did you know that primate babies who grow up without physical touching, end up profoundly dysfunctional?
• Did you know that kittens which had their eyes slit open prematurely, can never develop mother homing instinct because the visual data overwhelms the smell which is what the mother-homing is initially honed on?
• Did you know that humans make the decision about .2 seconds before they recognize the decision as being made, suggesting that what we perceive as self, our internal narrative, is not so much a king as a royal scribe?
• Did you know that emotional decisions often approximate very complex utilitarian heuristics?
• Did you know that recognizing something, and being able to describe it as being recognized, are two very distinct functions?
• Did you know that we don't remember what we see, but how we interpret what we see?
• etc.

Dude, you have no fucking idea how much we have learned about the mind since the subject started getting pursued scientifically.

It is all about searching, classification and inference algorithms and such stuff.

it's about far more than that. Among other things, it's about understanding how real cognition, both human and otherwise, works. Science has greatly improved on buddhist understanding of the mind, just as it has greatly improved upon ptolemaic astronomy.

Your argument is equivalent to saying is that after defeating Federer on your Nintendo you should be crowned the new world champion.

Whatever, dude. if you just want to affirm some religious dogma, do in by yourself.

[Shahrazad]

David,

In the beginning stages, when a person first begins to seek truth, he is still very egotistical and emotional, and thus his valuing of truth will certainly be emotional. Indeed, ideally, his emotional love of truth will be very strong, such that it can overpower all of his other emotional attachments and values that would cause him to remain untruthful.

And then, as he develops, his rationality and love of truth begins to chip away at the very foundations of emotion - namely, the illusion of inherent existence. Most people fall away at this stage because they are far too attached to emotional living and don't want to see it eroded. Their emotions call an immediate halt to this rational process of becoming increasingly more truthful and they begin to turn their backs on truth. However, the person who has cultivated a strong passion for truth and developed some serious momentum will continue, almost in spite of himself, to chip away at these foundations until there is nothing left.

If he succeeds, the momentum of the entire preceding process will continue unabated, even when all of his emotions have vanished, and it is this momentum which leads the sage to continue having values and to keep getting out of bed to work for the cause of rationality and wisdom.

Let us assume that all you said here is true. Even then, the goal of the sage was set by emotions (love of truth), and his values are as arbitrary as mine. Even if he is now above emotions, he is following an emotional goal. And without this goal, he would have nothing to apply his reason to. Why would he?

But really, David, is this sage really rational? He is working like an automaton towards a goal he knows is futile, because since he shed his emotions, he knows loving truth is silly. He gets out of bed driven by a goal he set when he was a deluded man, and now he just can't stop it.

Seems to me that he has become less conscious, not more.

-

[Shahrazad]

* Did you know that primate babies who grow up without physical touching, end up profoundly dysfunctional?

Yes, I remember that study.

* Did you know that kittens which had their eyes slit open prematurely, can never develop mother homing instinct because the visual data overwhelms the smell which is what the mother-homing is initially honed on?

No, but that is interesting.

* Did you know that humans make the decision about .2 seconds before they recognize the decision as being made, suggesting that what we perceive as self, our internal narrative, is not so much a king as a royal scribe?

I knew there was a lapse there in the order of tenths of a second, but I didn't know it was exactly .2 seconds.

*

Did you know that emotional decisions often approximate very complex utilitarian heuristics?

Sure.

* Did you know that recognizing something, and being able to describe it as being recognized, are two very distinct functions?

Sure. I can recognize thousands of faces instantly, but could not describe any of them to save my life. I also often recognize a face and think "who the hell is this person?"

* Did you know that we don't remember what we see, but how we interpret what we see?

Absolutely. And that applies to all other senses.

I only answered no to one. And I didn't even study AI in grad school, only in undergrad school.

-

[ataxas]

I think there are certain signs, For instance: A child that is able to sit alone with nature and play through observing how things are, while using his imagination with or without toys is a good sign, and the less emotion in his playing the better. And the more obsessive he is with studying things the better.

The autistic spectrum: intellectual development at its best.

[Nick]

More condescension. That's ego. You're really quite the projectionist. And apparently you don't know it.

Carl, I was merely giving you advice, if I were projecting anything on to you I would have had to state some unfounded assertion about you, like you have done to me through out this entire discussion.

More condescension, and more sarcasm. Talk about emotional. You keep proving my point, which was that you post from your emotions (and faulty thinking).

Regardless of whether I am responding to you out of an emotional impulse, which incredibly I'm not even after all this, I'm still proving you and your assertions wrong over and over again. I've noticed this is how you argue with most people on here. They prove you wrong, and instead of dealing with the matter at hand you accuse them of being emotional. It's like clock work.

You're being sincere, and egotistical. And you are projecting your own poor comprehension. Where did I say that the definition for sage that I paraphrased from your garbled posting was comprehensive?

You're being insincere and egotistical. It's obvious you're only looking for a fight rather than trying to actually understand what I, and others are trying to say.

Do you disagree that for a sage emotion is not the motivating factor?

Define Sage, and tell me what the motivating factor is for.

Like your opinion that the Sun shines without emotion. I could have just as well said that's a bald unsupported assertion, which it was.

Actually the assertion has plenty of support. Go talk to any member of the scientific community and see if they think the Sun is emotional. But if all you are trying to say is that I can't state with Absolute certainty that the Sun operates without emotion then I'll agree with that. Still, by saying this it's clear you are only looking for a fight instead of trying to actually understand the point I was trying to convey.

But, hey, you put it so eloquently. Passionately, even.

Like I said before, I can understand why someone who doesn't have a pure understanding of Reality, like myself, would get their emotions stirred by what I said.

I essentially said, the Sun shines (a thing that happens in Nature) without emotion as a motive, or cause if you like.

You may have been thinking that, but it isn't what you said. You said, "without emotion." Anyway, in either case, you could not know that. You are speculating, and are not being logical. You are being poetical. Despite my showing you this, you refuse to be logical.

So you admit to understanding the point I was trying to get across, yet you continue to try and get me to argue with you about it and fight with shadows. I knew you were just a troll.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

No, you didn't get the criticism which was openly put in there, with no attempt to hide.

Bullshit. That's like claiming that your refusal to answer my question 'are you still abusing your wife?' is an evasion of the direct, explicit meaning.

Wrong again. But lets blame it on my shortcomings as communicator. This is what I attempted to do, now in abstract:

d: please explain a.
v: we might as well have a big A
d: where lies A's advantage? it's like saying B is better than b, and claim to have explained it.
v: i hate it when you imply a is like b!

I just hope you don't have a drinking problem. If that's the case my apologies. Your writing style hints at typical substance abuse though. But I chose the analogy on a whim and is often used in Eastern philosophy; likening the passions or even life's impressions with alcohol. In any case I prefer sobriety as much as possible, also in communication.

You had implied that emotions are bad in any quantity, by your alcohol comparison.

Actually one or two glasses a day seem to be a health benefit for most people according to current medical opinion.

I will not accept your presupposition that emotions are bad.

But you want me to accept your presupposition that emotions (still rather unspecified) are a requisite? My presupposition is a bit more complex though and my analogy was not intended for that purpose but only to show how your answer was not usable to my inquiry. It was that simple, no need to drag it all down into another example of your rather defective self-hating style of communication at this board.

V: Even simply surviving is driven by emotions -- desire to live and fear of death.

D: One can just as easily say that emotions refer to basic reflexes and drives that are inherent to the human existence.

V: Well, duh. Emotions are the neurochemical tools we evolved to deal with the world
ven simply surviving is driven by emotions -- desire to live and fear of death.

D:Yes, like all behavior they can be traced back on various neurological mechanisms that facilitate them. It doesn't validate any of them.

V:of course not -- but you seem to be under illusion that saying 'emotions are just neurochemistry' invalidates them. I simply pointed out how this in no way constitutes their invalidation.

No, I never said that invalidates them. But I don't need to. You just need to provide some precise validation.

Meat is not necessary to human survival, but a complete protein complex is. Any number of specific emotions may not be necessary to functionality, but emotions as a whole are. Nice red herring though.

You liken emotion to the protein in our diet, I likened it to meat. If there's a herring here we both have supplied one. Something more interesting though: "emotions as a whole". There lies the catch. Are you sure you don't smuggle feeling, intuition, drives and reflexes into the equation? Because that way you always win. In my view these are very distinct processes.

our decision-making process, even about really simple things, is far more complex than that of other mammals. just because ants and rats need's be driven by emotion (though they could be, that's a different topic) doesn't imply that this tells us anything about how human mind works.

Stating the obvious and I said a similar thing already: "Of course a complex mechanism will need complex strategies to get the food and as such more complex drives". My whole point of the hungry feeling was to show an example of how feelings and emotions could relate in avoidable ways. The emotional layer doesn't add anything, it seems more like a by-product here perhaps like unhealthy fumes from a factory. And yes, the analogy puts emotions in a bad light. Sue me!

And where do those goals come from? From his nature as the sage, as David would claim? Are you suggesting that those goals are simply reflexive, kinda like our pulling the hand away from fire is reflexive, the way breathing is reflexive? Are you suggesting that the sage is simply mindlessly going through the motions?

Those goals do not manifest as emotion; they don't need to be. Of course this only works if there's no other goal still pulling the emotional string of attachment. It's like a water surface of a canal, as long stones are thrown in, a battle of ripples decides the course. Only when the surface is quiet, the natural current will decide the singular direction and the spinning stops. The direction becomes merely obvious and doesn't need emotional markers anymore.

What's this shit with intellectual tribalism, dude? You seem to be under delusion that ideas should be applied according to ideological allegiances and philosophical group-think, rather than based on the merit of their contents.

You imply here to have obtained a level of objectivity, free from ideology and group-think. It's something I sincerely doubt. Nobody can escape to be result of thousands of years of predecessors caught into some narrow cultural interpretation when it comes to application.

Perhaps you're just denying your suffering

I acknowledge the suffering I undergo. inf act, i bet dollars to donuts that I have experienced far more suffering than you have, in my life. i was subjected to political persecution. i was under missile bombardment. I worker 80 hrs/week for $2/hr. I almost lost my son. Yet, with it all, there is only one thing I would do differently if i could, supposing that it would somehow not affect my family later -- i would not have left Israel. All the other suffering i went though, the joys and happiness were greater. it was all worth it. I made many mistakes and bad decisions, but there's only one i actually regret.

The joys and happiness made the suffering worth it, then? If it weren't for the joy and happiness would you have been able to cope with all of that on longer term? This is why it's been said that they're the same 'suffer mechanism'; two sides of the same medallion called 'desire'. This is why the Buddhist talk about a different suffering than you're doing here. And don't make me start about the idea of 'measuring' up your suffering to mine, it only makes me wonder if you have are still stuck in the psychological age of 14 despite your life experiences.

It sees the 'joys' and 'pleasures' as clown masks on top of suffering, a coping mechanism but not capable of addressing the underlying twists - therefore passing it on each generation without even knowing what hides behind.

Exactly. Blind religious faith -- not very different from the xian concept of original sin, really. Even the joy and happiness are really suffering, i am just not aware of it yet!

Correct! The concept of original sin wasn't that original after all. And yes, on a deeper level joy is the upside of pain. They both press down on us but we uplift one and reject the other. It's wiser to uplift both, or even reject both - at least consistency!

So, where are your supposed arguments and empirical studies supporting buddhism? Why aren't you posting them? if a xian apologist were in your place, surely you would agree that the existence of millenia of xian apologia does not free the apologist from the need to actually present his arguments (and BTW, i have never encountered a xian argument for god which I couldn't counter on my own, though the ontological argument had given me a bit of trouble). So why are you, having laid claim to such arguments and experiments, seem to be so reluctant to present them?

It was brought up for one specific point: that David's ideas were quite common thinking in Buddhism and your 'diagnosis' of a possible physiological dysfunction should then take this into account. That's just my opinion and by now you indeed have addressed some of it in a Buddhist context. But 'empirical studies'? My god, have I laid any claim to Buddhist truths anywhere?

Here are some random tidbits I learned while in grad school studying AI.

Most of it you can pick from popular literature too, like Dennett, Dawkins, Damasio. But one thing caught my attention, you sneaked it in:

-Did you know that emotional decisions often approximate very complex utilitarian heuristics?

No, but this is commonly called intuition or feeling. I'd like to see a source that explicitly links higher emotions to something utilitarian. And not in the sense that they appear in utilitarian situations (like anger during a fight) but if they need to arise to force a more efficient decision

[Kevin Solway]

Did you know that emotional decisions often approximate very complex utilitarian heuristics?

"Complex utilitarian heuristics" sounds so vague that I reckon just about anything could be said to approximate them, such as blind rage, murderous anger, extreme selfishness, fear of truth, love of untruth, ravenous greed, suicidal self-hatred, etc.

[Carl G]

More condescension. That's ego. You're really quite the projectionist. And apparently you don't know it.

Carl, I was merely giving you advice, if I were projecting anything on to you I would have had to state some unfounded assertion about you, like you have done to me through out this entire discussion.

You were merely giving advice in a condescending egoistic way. But, by now I know you don't want to look at yourself honestly. You are delusional and think yourself a sage. What a laugh.

More condescension, and more sarcasm. Talk about emotional. You keep proving my point, which was that you post from your emotions (and faulty thinking).

Regardless of whether I am responding to you out of an emotional impulse, which incredibly I'm not even after all this, I'm still proving you and your assertions wrong over and over again.

You are not proving anything here. You are just yapping, with a condescending authoritarian tone.

I've noticed this is how you argue with most people on here. They prove you wrong, and instead of dealing with the matter at hand you accuse them of being emotional. It's like clock work.

Liar. Name some.

You're being sincere, and egotistical. And you are projecting your own poor comprehension. Where did I say that the definition for sage that I paraphrased from your garbled posting was comprehensive?

You're being insincere and egotistical. It's obvious you're only looking for a fight rather than trying to actually understand what I, and others are trying to say.

False. My purpose is to point out your faulty thinking and faulty communicating.

Do you disagree that for a sage emotion is not the motivating factor?

Define Sage, and tell me what the motivating factor is for.

That is immaterial. This is about understanding and discussing your definition. And, I happen to agree with the part of it in question. What I disagree with is your statements about the sun, earth and trees, and the aptness of your metaphorical connection of them to the sage in that respect.

Like your opinion that the Sun shines without emotion. I could have just as well said that's a bald unsupported assertion, which it was.

Actually the assertion has plenty of support. Go talk to any member of the scientific community and see if they think the Sun is emotional.

LOL! You're kidding. That's your defense?

But if all you are trying to say is that I can't state with Absolute certainty that the Sun operates without emotion then I'll agree with that.

No sir, I'm saying you or I don't know anything about the Sun in that regard. If you wish to speculate, fine, do so, but let's call it poetry, or myth.

Still, by saying this it's clear you are only looking for a fight instead of trying to actually understand the point I was trying to convey.

I took you at your word, verbatim. Now you are telling me I have to read your mind. Or you are saying, finally, yes, it is poetry, please read between the lines. In any case you are blaming me for your poor communication skills.

But, hey, you put it so eloquently. Passionately, even.

Like I said before, I can understand why someone who doesn't have a pure understanding of Reality, like myself, would get their emotions stirred by what I said.

Now you are fantasizing about yourself and about me.

I essentially said, the Sun shines (a thing that happens in Nature) without emotion as a motive, or cause if you like.

You may have been thinking that, but it isn't what you said. You said, "without emotion." Anyway, in either case, you could not know that. You are speculating, and are not being logical. You are being poetical. Despite my showing you this, you refuse to be logical.

So you admit to understanding the point I was trying to get across, yet you continue to try and get me to argue with you about it and fight with shadows. I knew you were just a troll.

More fantasy. I came to understand it after several of your follow-up posts. It doesn't change the argument.

It still seems you don't wish to see yourself.

[Shahrazad]

Diebert,

Are you sure you don't smuggle feeling, intuition, drives and reflexes into the equation? Because that way you always win. In my view these are very distinct processes.

Explain why you have this view. Do you think emotions are different in kind to the other four things? And if the phrase "emotional processes" is not accurate enough to cover them all, could you please come up with a better phrase?

Any time I get into an argument on emotions, the disagreement on definitions of terms gets in the way.

-

[Boyan]

Me, I see the purposelessness of the universe as Freedom. We create as much as we breathe. We create the way trees exude oxygen. We can take this existential void, and fill it with ourselves, our own meaning and purpose. This is Freedom, baby! and I am a cheerful nihilist who embraces the existential void.

Believe it or not (and most xians don't), i truly have no emotional need for the higher purpose or being. I rid myself of this existential nausea without ridding myself of emotions... not once during that time did I feel an impulse to appeal to higher power, to call out for cosmic justice, to question the purpose of such an event or to rail against this purpose, etc. It's not that I restrained myself because I know better intellectually (which I do), i did not even feel the impulse to do so.

This is the central aspect of the Overman. I have a similar attitude.

[vicdan]

Wrong again. But lets blame it on my shortcomings as communicator.

Yup.

But you want me to accept your presupposition that emotions (still rather unspecified) are a requisite?

Not at all. I merely expect you to argue honestly.

Stating the obvious and I said a similar thing already

It's completely different from what you said already. The 50-fold difference between response time in humans and in rats suggests a qualitative difference in how the decision-making process occurs, so your dismissive example of an ant (what do even ants have emotions?) was sadly misdirected. Even rats can have their fundamental drives function in a very different way from humans, though rats have emotions too, albeit more basic ones.

You imply here to have obtained a level of objectivity, free from ideology and group-think.

I know I haven't. However, I never claim that someone shouldn't use someone else's ideas just because that someone else would disapprove of such use. I am willing to treat ideas on their own merit.

The joys and happiness made the suffering worth it, then?

Yeah. if my life was unrelentingly full of shit, I might turn to buddhism too; but this suggests that the buddhist prescription is, at best, a rather narrow one, that buddhism does not speak of the human condition in general.

If it weren't for the joy and happiness would you have been able to cope with all of that on longer term? This is why it's been said that they're the same 'suffer mechanism'; two sides of the same medallion called 'desire'. This is why the Buddhist talk about a different suffering than you're doing here. And don't make me start about the idea of 'measuring' up your suffering to mine, it only makes me wonder if you have are still stuck in the psychological age of 14 despite your life experiences.

Oy vey. Whatever. i was pointing out that I am not ignoring the suffering I underwent.

Correct! The concept of original sin wasn't that original after all.

There you go. First Noble Truth is religious dogma.

And yes, on a deeper level joy is the upside of pain. They both press down on us but we uplift one and reject the other. It's wiser to uplift both, or even reject both - at least consistency!

Kinda like the consistency of eating both broccoli and broken glass?.. What sort of consistency would that be, dude? Please give me one single reason to treat both joy and suffering equally, uplifting both or rejecting both.

It was brought up for one specific point: that David's ideas were quite common thinking in Buddhism

I can point you to any number of xian ideas which are quite common too. That fact alone doesn't make them correct.

and your 'diagnosis' of a possible physiological dysfunction should then take this into account. That's just my opinion and by now you indeed have addressed some of it in a Buddhist context. But 'empirical studies'? My god, have I laid any claim to Buddhist truths anywhere?

Are you going to claim that 'experimental' and 'empirical' are completely different?

'The Buddhists have already a few centuries thought, written and debated about the role of desire, passion and emotions by experimental and existential research.

You said that to me to warn me of the mighty edifice of knowledge i am attacking. Guess what? Xians had built up such an edifice as well, yet it crumbles at the slightest touch of critical analysis.

-Did you know that emotional decisions often approximate very complex utilitarian heuristics?

No, but this is commonly called intuition or feeling.

'Feeling' as in 'I feel bad about it', yes. That's emotion.

I'd like to see a source that explicitly links higher emotions to something utilitarian.

You want me to remember the paper I read at a seminar nearly a decade ago?.. uh-huh... but I will give you a couple of specific examples I recall from that paper.

The feeling of disgust often reflects health hazards of a substance

Fear has an obvious utilitarian function, including physiologically

There were more complex emotional reactions discussed there, but I no longer remember what they were. The point of the paper was that emotions often behave as a trained neural net, giving you nearly-correct instant answers to problems which could not be rationally analyzed that fast. Sorry, that's all you get.

BTW, since you mentioned Damasio's work, you surely know what he found in people with impaired emotional function.

And not in the sense that they appear in utilitarian situations (like anger during a fight) but if they need to arise to force a more efficient decision

But fear in danger does force a more efficient decision -- and primes the organism for a more efficient response, too.

[maestro]

You'd be surprised how much you can learn about your own mind by studying the empirical findings of AI and related disciplines. But perhaps the only 'empirical findings' you are interested in, are the buddhist ones?..

Here are some random tidbits I learned while in grad school studying AI.

* Did you know that primate babies who grow up without physical touching, end up profoundly dysfunctional?
* Did you know that kittens which had their eyes slit open prematurely, can never develop mother homing instinct because the visual data overwhelms the smell which is what the mother-homing is initially honed on?
* Did you know that humans make the decision about .2 seconds before they recognize the decision as being made, suggesting that what we perceive as self, our internal narrative, is not so much a king as a royal scribe?
* Did you know that emotional decisions often approximate very complex utilitarian heuristics?
* Did you know that recognizing something, and being able to describe it as being recognized, are two very distinct functions?
* Did you know that we don't remember what we see, but how we interpret what we see?
* etc.

Dude, you have no fucking idea how much we have learned about the mind since the subject started getting pursued scientifically..
it's about far more than that. Among other things, it's about understanding how real cognition, both human and otherwise, works. Science has greatly improved on buddhist understanding of the mind, just as it has greatly improved upon ptolemaic astronomy.

Ha the examples you quote here I knew all about them (except the kitten) but these are not what a Phd in AI is supposed to know, these are from psychology and congintive sciences and neurology etc.
And I am not affirming the theoretical psychology of Buddhism which I have not read. Anyhow to illustrate my point I will give you a simple example.

Now psychology is a very very primitive science. Even if say it advanced to the level of physics, there is a difference between knowing and using.

For example if you know all equations of motion is it sufficient for you to play tennis?
It is definitely not. You need first hand experience and lots of it. Same is the case with the mind even if you knew all of its laws in compact mathematical notation (which is far far away) you need to have experience to use it well. Buddhism's emphasis is not on dogma but on this practical aspect.

You seem to sincerely believe that anyone who disagrees with buddhist dogma (and there is dogma, the 'kill buddha' thing notwithstanding)

The whole Zen is based on cutting through all dogma and to know the mind in a most intimate fashion (as with my tennis analogy above). This notion of religion and dogma is the curse of monotheistic religions based on fairy tales and dogma without any value. And the need to classify things makes people place Zen in the category of religion, and since they have seen creatures such as Judaism and Islam in that category they hasten to conclude that Zen must be such a thing, it is not.

[vicdan]

Oh yeah, almost forgot...

I just hope you don't have a drinking problem. If that's the case my apologies. Your writing style hints at typical substance abuse though.

I don't drink, don't smoke, and don't do drugs. I don't even consume caffeine if i can help it. I prefer my mind undistorted.

Your response though was about as slimy as i expected.

[Shahrazad]

Your response though was about as slimy as i expected.

Does this mean that hinting that someone might have a drinking problem is hitting below the belt, while directly insulting him is not?

-

[vicdan]

Ha the examples you quote here I knew all about them (except the kitten) but these are not what a Phd in AI is supposed to know, these are from psychology and congintive sciences and neurology etc.

But it is what a PhD in AI is supposed to know. A big chunk of AI is understanding how human actual cognition works. There was a lot of work done in my CS department on various aspects of biological cognition, and many classes offered which looked at them.

For example if you know all equations of motion is it sufficient for you to play tennis?
It is definitely not. You need first hand experience and lots of it. Same is the case with the mind even if you knew all of its laws in compact mathematical notation (which is far far away) you need to have experience to use it well. Buddhism's emphasis is not on dogma but on this practical aspect.

Great. And the practical reality of my life is that I have a pretty good one, and I did it without plunging into buddhist dogma and ceasing desire.

More concretely, if we take your claim about 'suffering' being the existential angst type of thing, then obviously there are multiple ways of dealing with it other than ceasing to desire -- at the very least there's my way (ceasing those specific desires, the desires for higher meaning and purpose), and there's the typical religious way, which is deluding yourself into believing that those desires have been satisfied most thoroughly. Sure, the typical religious way is BS -- but it does take care of the suffering issue, and i don't see how buddhist way is better.

The whole Zen is based on cutting through all dogma and to know the mind in a most intimate fashion (as with my tennis analogy above). This notion of religion and dogma is the curse of monotheistic religions based on fairy tales and dogma without any value.

But the First Noble Truth is dogma. It's basically the concept of the Original Sin wearing a funny hat. See Diebert's posts.

[vicdan]

Your response though was about as slimy as i expected.

Does this mean that hinting that someone might have a drinking problem is hitting below the belt, while directly insulting him is not?

Yup. if you are gonna insult me, have the decency to do it out in the open. A direct insult is much more honest than slimy insinuation. Plus, this is poisoning the well.

Yes, Sher, all of the above applies to you too.

[Shahrazad]

[insert rolling emoticon here]

[maestro]

You still do not get it. The idea at least in Zen is to forget the dogma and to goad suffering people to study their mind.

There is suffering, i.e. if you do not suffer psychologically then Zen is not for you if everything is smooth you do not need to fix a thing which is not broke.
If you life is conflict free and smooth you do not even look at Buddhism, then entry sign itself reads, if there is suffering in your life come here.

Great. And the practical reality of my life is that I have a pretty good one, and I did it without plunging into buddhist dogma and ceasing desire.

Suppose I play tennis everyday, but I perform pathetically at it, and the opposite returns come so fast I play habitually and have no idea how to improve.
The meditative technique is a way to help me improve my game by observing the process and breaking habits, and there are some ideas from Buddhism which I can accept or reject as I see fit and I am encouraged to do so (i.e. gauge their worth), but this is strictly in the process of training.

Contrary to popular perception meditation is not for relaxation, it intensifies suffering, since there is a lot of conflict created between acting habitually and stopping to observe.

After you have created a good skill set so that you enjoy the game and feel confident to take on whatever comes you must discard the training equipments post haste, this includes all all noble truths etc in fact Buddha told his followers that this teaching is like a thorn used to remove another thorn, the idea is not to keep both thorns in you but to remove one with other and throw both of them away.

In fact many ideas are like that i.e. they are contrary to popular opinions to weaken the grip of ideas on the mind. In popular opinion desire is a good thing, without desire we would not work for goals and achieve anything right? Now the coach comes and says that desire in fact is the cause of your suffering. A great conflict is created with this idea, whenever you desire the opposite idea comes up and torments you even more. The end result would be seeing the reality of desire and not to condemn it or justify it, but to put it in its proper place.

The idea is not (as you think) to stop desiring, which would be equivalent to extracting the first thorn and put the second one in its place.