I don't get Buddhism

Note to others:

What on earth is he talking about? How is my post above responding to his post as he describes it here? What haven’t I responded to?

Oh, and what exactly was his “explanation” above as it relates to the behaviors he chooses on this side of the grave as that relates to his thinking about either Buddhism or any other religious path that connects the dots between here and now and there and then.

Here’s what you didn’t respond to:

Are you aware of your perseverative and impoverished rhetoric? I underlined some of it above. And what’s up with the desperate hand waving?

I’ll just have to wait for someone [other than karpel tunnel of course] to explain to me what in the hell you are talking about.

Either that or you can bring a particular value judgment of yours down out of the clouds and explain to us how it precipitates a set of behaviors based on what you now think your fate will be after you shuffle off this mortal coil into the beyond.

Or explain to me [yet again] why you refuse to go there.

Iambiguous is a closeted dictator who has zero self reflection or awareness.

I can prove the pro-choice argument beyond any reasonable doubt, and iambiguous will say, so what in fact is my friend Mary supposed to choose?!?!

Well it’s not a fucking choice if I told her how she HAS to choose?!?!

In iambiguous’ strange universe, either we are all robots or everything is completely determined!! Honestly? Wtf!! But this is what he really believes!

But that’s not enough. It even gets worse. Iambiguous is of the belief that if ANYONE ever changed their mind about something, that NOBODY can know ANYTHING forever and ever and ever.

All because iambiguous himself didn’t know everything to start with, this is a deep ego wound to iambiguous (who is a classic narcissist)… if iambiguous could ever be wrong about anything, then all human and beyond knowledge must be wrong!

Like I said…a “condition”. :wink:

That the article which you complain about doesn’t have anything to do with what you complain it doesn’t do for you. That’s one example. Another was that you asked people to answer

to answer

what their responses and opinions would be if they had complete knowledge of Buddhism

or

Western philosophy.

I pointed out the absurdity of this question.

It’s trolling or a loss of rationality in the post as a whole.

That’s a couple of things I said in the first post and then again in the second.

And yet you cannot find what you did not respond, despite having responded to NO points I made and some of them being repeated twice.

And then that you don’t take these questions where experts might actually be.

So you throw up your hands to the gallery. Poor you dealing with the crazy person (whose posts you are unable to actually read).

[/quote]
Exactly. In a thread someone else started about Buddhism, one of your criticisms of my post is that it does not do what you want. What my post did was critique your use of a Buddhist text, point out assumptions in your post in the thread and a number of other practical and philosopical lines. But because of your in practice solipsism here, a post is problematic if it doesn’t demonstrate the afterlife is X or conflicting goods are resolved as Y.

YOu are a functional narcissist.

And that is precisely what you did to the randomly picked Buddhist article about logic in Buddhism and how this is being reevaluated, now, in Western philosophy.

You took some random post out of Buddhism and critiqued it for not doing what you wanted it to.

And the reason seem to be so you can keep posting in the thread without merely repeating yourself completely, when you have nothing new to say, so perhaps some non-expert Buddhist fan, here, might come and fail to do what you want them to do

rather than actually trying Buddhism or whatever.

You’re a troll. How could you possibly have read those two posts and not noticed things that were central to them that you did not respond to. If you are dyslexic or nearly blind, let us know. But you actually played to the gallery after failing to read or deciding to pretend.

This is a basic reading comprehension failure, repeatedly, or worse just plain lying.

It is utterly amazing how much you say you might be wrong, but never once admit to having been wrong.

Back on ignore until I notice you seem to be luring in others.

I already explained that. Apparently you can’t comprehend my explanation. You just talk around it. You haven’t even demonstrated that you read it. Like I said there are many other approaches to religion than the one you’re stuck on.
I think Buddha was an agnostic who sought practical means of alleviating suffering. So his religion is outside your box. You would have to think outside the box to get it. But, you seem to be very attached to being stuck inside the box.

Fine. Do that.

But my offer still stands:

Based on my assumption that…

The part that has “fractured and fragmented” my own particular “I”.

With me, it’s less a question of being right or wrong about these relationships and more an effort to explore how, using the tools of philosophy, it can be determined if there is a right and a wrong way to grasp them.

Out in a particular context out in a particular world understood in a particular way. Something that [in my own opinion] you and phyllo and felix avoid like the coronavirus. On this thread for example.

As soon as anyone tries to discuss right and wrong it gets labelled as an existential/intellectual contraption in the head. And that’s the end of that discussion.

It’s like trying to play a hockey game without any agreed rules. A frustrating waste of time.

If you establish “this is what right is like” and “this is what wrong is like”, then you can talk.

Beyond true and false
Buddhist philosophy is full of contradictions. Now modern logic is learning why that might be a good
Graham Priest

Well, which is it? Or is asking that entirely missing the point of being enlightened?

But: How could contemplating one’s fate after death ever really be a waste of time? After all, the time we spend from the cradle to the grave is basically a blink of the eye compared to the eternity to come. In particular when it seems entirely reasonable to connect the dots between living as an enlightened human being on this side of the grave and whatever that portends for “I” in eternity.

From my frame of mind time is wasted instead when your thinking about this never goes much beyond what you believe is true “in your head”. Indeed, why not spend considerably more time contemplating ways in which to demonstrate that what the Buddha noted in his sutras is in fact “the case”.

Why? Because to the best of my knowledge no one ever has. So the focus always comes back to the way in which you think about being enlightened. That can be used to bring about the actual benefits of a disciplined mind. A more contemplative and serene outlook on life.

No small thing of course. But that is just not my own “thing” in regard to religion. I’m more intent on grappling with morality and immortality. What in this regard does it mean to live as an enlightened human being.

And here there is either demonstrable arguments or there are not.

Here we go again. Another “general description intellectual contraption” that tells me absolutely nothing about the things that “I” want to “get” about Buddhism. How, in a particular situation involving behaviors chosen here and now in order to impact one’s thinking about there and then, does one encompass these “empty” things?

For example, If those here who do claim to “get” Buddhism properly contemplate the ongoing global clamor over the coronavirus, how does “emptiness” fit in there? How are all things here to be understood as related to everything else? If no “intrinsic” nature then how is the enlightened man or women to interact with others in a context in which this disease does become a full blown global pandemic?

Okay, so note what you deem to be right and wrong about human behaviors in a particular context. Something new. Something other than Communism and abortion.

That way you can substantiate your claim here by noting when I do these things.

And even with these two “conflicting goods” my point was ever and always to distinguish between what we believe about them and what we are able to demonstrate that all rational and virtuous human beings are obligated to believe in turn.

The historical fact of Communism, the biological/medical fact of abortion. How is that the same or different from our reactions to them embodied in particular moral and political prejudices?

Instead of simply stating : “These are my criteria for right and wrong. Let’s play with those.”

It’s : Phyllo needs to do something for me now.

As usual, the onus is on everyone else and you sit in judgement on them.

Spoiler : Everyone is found lacking.

At least a billion times — right? — I have noted that “here and now” my criteria for right and wrong is rooted in dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.

While your criterion seems to be rooted in what to me is still an entirely obscure intertwining of objective morality and…God?

And you will either do what I think needs to be done here in order to explore our differences more substantively or you won’t.

If that’s where it’s rooted, then right and wrong can change at any time and for any reason. There is no structure. It’s purely in your mind (and my mind).

There is nothing to discuss because it’s impossible to establish any common ground whether in similarities or differences.

Biggus hockey game:

High sticking is a penalty for Bob but not for John.

Then 30 seconds later, high sticking is not a penalty for anyone. Then 10 seconds later it is a penalty for everyone.

Then the height of the hockey stick that is considered ‘high’ changes.

Then the meaning of hockey stick changes.

Reasons for all that : whatever.

Apply the same logic to every aspect of the game.

Result : chaos.

Any right and wrong there? None whatsoever.

Nobody is going to play this game.

How preposterous!!

Structurally, morality is always rooted genetically and memetically out in a particular world historically, culturally and experientially. In some regards, we can all agree on what is in fact true for everyone, but in other regards we cannot. But to speak of moral values changing at anytime for any reason has little to do with the actual human condition down through the ages. People do give reasons for what they do. People on both sides of any particular conflict. And people change their minds for reasons too. It doesn’t just all unfold or happen out of the blue.

That’s why we need to focus in on a particular context: to sort out [to the best of our ability] what can be agreed upon and what cannot.

And, yes, given new experiences, “I” can be radically reconfigured. That’s what troubles the objectivists the most. For example, many want to believe that however dramatically their own reality changes if the coronavirus explodes into a particularly deadly worldwide pandemic, there is still the “real me” in sync with “the right thing to do” that remains intact.

And who knows how each of us as individuals will react if that does become the reality. That’s the part I attribute to dasein. But how likely are we to all agree on what ought to done in order to be deemed rational human beings?

Just look at the complex reactions to the AIDS virus. And imagine those reactions if AIDS had been a far more easily transmitted, air born pathogen.

That’s precisely why I focused in my post above on how Buddhists themselves might react to the coronavirus in their own lives. What does it mean to be enlightened then? When the context that you are in literally revolves around life and death?

Then you should be able to state the underlying structure of right and wrong in society (let’s say Baltimore 2020) without too much difficulty.

Once you do that, we use the tools of philosophy :

Yup.

Let’s look at the nihilistic hockey players.

They’re not trying to change the rules for “no reason”. Their reasons are fairly clear … gain a personal advantage, an advantage for your own team and a disadvantage for the opposing team. (Sure, that’s rational.)

But if every player, coach and spectator is yelling for these changes, then there won’t be much of a game.

The greater underlying “structure” is that all the participants want a game of hockey to be played.

That trumps limited personal desires for an advantage.

It’s decided ahead of time that certain rules will be used to play. They aren’t dropped off by God on stone tablets but they’re objective rules that make the game possible. And they’re founded on what people objectively consider to be fun, fair, challenging, entertaining.

What’s more pathetic, that this is your attempt to actually make a substantive point, or that this is your attempt to be…clever?