Religion Vs. Philisophy

Nah, what you are saying is absurd. Definition for life


life
līf/
noun
1.
the condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death.
"the origins of life"
synonyms: existence, being, living, animation; More


However, This doesn't preclude life from being reliant on other things.

 

I think you are more concretely showing how there is Religious Buddhism and then there is this sort of hipster new age atheistic philosophical Buddhism, which seems to be trending on this forum a bit and I'm sure elsewhere, and is more just another branch of interpretation from Westerners who aren't really connected to Buddhism directly, and has led to such ridiculous comments as "Buddhism isn't even a religion, brah. It's a philosophy."

 

Ok so what about a Crystal? Is that life or no?

 

I didn't write the definition Cat

I have to go to work now...

 

The definition means nothing to me. It just shows how humans in this modern materialist world separate themselves from Nature continuously. You have literally proved my point this whole time on the perspective of Materialism.

 

To argue that stars don't literally die is crazy. Birth, life, and death are universal essentials that even Buddhism completely acknowledges.

 

I'm not sure how you can conclude that a materialist came up with that definition, but regardless if we are to have discussions that go anywhere, going by commonly accepted definitions is good etiquette, so we don't have to talk past each other.

If you're using a bunch of obscure meanings and pseudo-metaphors that's your prerogative but not really useful for discussion on these topics.

Anyways, I'm out for the evening.

 

Actually if you find conclusive research on this-----please pass it on to me-----I don't want to be writing things in my books that are contradictory to scientific evidence.

Though some things to be careful of---there are recent experiments where they have changed the results of the double slit experiment---this does not change the original experiment itself, rather it says that having produced one quantum state, we may now able to go back and reverse that change--which is even more interesting in that it says we can observe it one way, and then again change it by observing it another way. This is still questionable as it is not a true reversal. (I mention this because someone sent me on a wild goose a few years ago chase claiming that it disproved the double slit experiment, and when I referred to this experiment they said it was different, and in the end it turned out to be the same thing.)

Decoherence is another way that we have determined quantum wave collapses to occur. Don't confuse articles of decoherence with the double slit experiment. I see decoherence as a way that nature moves on its own course---if you wanted to be all Eastern about it, you could say it is 'The Way' i.e. the Tao. A simple way to explain decoherence is that when two quanta interact in a certain way that the positions of both are determined, then they must both, at that moment in time, have a specific position (i.e. undergo a probability wave collapse)--for example, when a photon is absorbed by an atom. HOWEVER, if the results you say are true, it would be that they have determined that the measuring of the quanta passing through the double slits creates a decoherence----however, I believe that this has already been ruled out.

However, for it to be truly conclusive, it must also now rule out the Zeno Effect, which has recently been proven. The Zeno Effect is that an observation momentarily freezes something in time---resulting in something, for example, such as the slowing down or stopping of radioactive decay by repeated observations. If you consider that decoherence must occur very frequently in a natural way, then radioactive decay must occur naturally without repeated conscious observation. To rule out the Zeno Effect, it must demonstrate that decoherence has the same impact as a conscious observation.

 

You can meditate and work on reducing your attachments to everything in life without believing that there is anyone or anything that hears prayer, or in heaven and hell. Traditional religious Buddhists might say, "no you can't", but... who is going to stop me? Nobody.

If this needs a new label, then call it New Age Buddhism. Call it whatever you want. Call it Buddhist apostasy and blasphemy. It will still continue on. Most people pay little or no attention to theological purists.

 

Not that I am attacking it, I just find it interesting. It is perhaps more natural and genuine to the post modern condition than is the New Age Movement in general.

But, perhaps Meagain has more to add to show that I am mistaken on this being a modern phenomena...

 

Little point in saying anymore. You are entitled to your view, I am entitled to mine.

It's impossible to communicate to someone who has never experienced spiritual reality what it is.

 

This is what I would call anti-Essentialist. So you feel that nothing has an actual internal Essence to it? This is what Spirit would be, or what was once referred to as Aether.

You could just as easily argue that your inner Spirit is what's noticing the most subtle of subtleties regarding your mind.

You have never experienced anything in your life that wasn't mind. You know this because whatever it was, it happened in your mind. Even standing back later and applying the label "not mind" to it is an act of mind. So subtle

But there's still an undefinable YOU that is experiencing and witnessing the subtleties of mind. For example, there is an awareness that notices when thoughts are present and when they're not present. You could still argue that this happens in your mind, but you could also argue that Consciousness is what witnesses mind. It's what would decipher the difference between "mind" and "no-mind". But obviously, if you feel that Consciousness is created BY the brain, then you'll always argue that it's only in the mind. Many on here have argued that Consciousness ceases during dreamless sleep. If this is true and everything only happens in your mind, then wouldn't this mean that the mind ceases as well during dreamless sleep? How is this possible without killing you? And how can some part of you still decipher between dreaming and dreamless sleep?

And when you say mind, are you equating mind with brain? If so, you could just as easily argue that whatever you've ever experienced, it's happened in your body, as your brain is part of your body.

But to say that you have never experienced anything in your life that wasn't mind in another context would be equivalent to what the Hermetics said about The All is Mind, which implies a Universal Spirit or Mind that functions through all of life. You said yourself that no matter what you have experienced, it's only experienced in your mind. If this is so, then how do i even know that you exist outside of my experience of you? Might sound Schizophrenic of me but it equals out and is no longer self-centered when the perspective changes to that all of manifestation is an expression of a Universal Mind. You don't exist except for in my mind, but even from my perspective, you still have a brain, so it would be the same for you. All of our brains are an expression of a singular Mind.

Not that it matters for you, but I believe that Buddhism would acknowledge some sort of primordial Awareness prior to mind which the aim of Zen and Meditation would be to get in contact with this awareness or Consciousness. But perhaps this is more Vedanta or Hindu perspectives.

 

The Zen people seem to focus on mind or no-mind. I'm not clear if they believe in or experience anything prior to mind. Vedanta definitely says there is That which is higher than mind.

 

Yes, they just call it Rebirth instead, but it is still implying a Consciousness that survives death. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebirth_(Buddhism)

 

I'm going to do this kind of backwards because I think it may be easier to follow, I'm not sure anything you say is 'contradictory' per se, it just seems from the recent information I've gathered regarding the experiment, it's a bit of a truism with a subtle twist on what the actual results are. You may understand it better than I, this is by no means an area of expertise for me but I do think I understand these concepts well when they are explained.

http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/21st_century_science/lectures/lec13.html

There is some anthropomorphic talk in there as well but I tried to limit that so we don't go the same issues as yesterday... I basically checked out some physics forums and several of the responses were similar to the one below regarding the topic. I don't know their educations but it seems fairly convincing to me, particularly as this seems to representative of a substantial segment of the views on these forums. One of the forums had another link as well that even explained the double split even better but I cannot find that one now.

 

Notice how you still need conscious observation to come to this conclusion?

 

Coward (jk of course, couldn't resist posting mr Writer's most common reaction to posts like these )

 

In general Yoga philosophy says that to get any spiritual realization is not at all an easy task. It takes many years of struggles, fall downs, returns to the path, partial realizations etc. If a person not only has no interest, but is consciously opposed to any idea of spirituality, it's really just a total waste of time to discuss it with them.

Since I'm not likely to reject my own experience and embrace materialism, it's going to be non productive on both sides.