/lit/ - Literature

>>21938762
>Can you explain to a retard like me what is the difference between monism and non dualism?
Monism allows for subsuming of differences/multiplicity within a greater unity without invalidating that difference/multiplicity whereas non-duality or Advaita in Sanskrit just means "without secondness".

If one regards multiplicity as being existent and real along with the greater unity that incorporates this, then there is not really a "without secondness" since the various instantiations of multiplicity becomes a real "secondness" in relation to each other as well as in relation to the whole or entirety. This is why Vishishtadvaita (which professes this view) says it is "qualified non-dualism" instead of just "non-dualism".

If you take Plato's "theory of forms" as being his final position (the exoteric reading) then this isn't exactly non-dualism but there are various interpretations of Plato that don't think this is true, Plato has one of his characters btfo the theory of forms in his own dialogues and there is evidence for him teaching an 'unwritten doctrine' involving 'The One', under some of these kinds of interpretations the various devices that Plato uses in his dialogue are exactly that, devices that have value in helping the mind train and prepare for higher levels of understanding, culminating in the intuition/assimilation of the highest/ultimate, the very possibility of which already implies some type of commensurability or identity between the highest and ourselves. Non-dualism isn't explicitly spelled out by Plato like it is by Shankara but it's a fairly reasonable take on his works.