Single-handedly destroyed Hinduism and Buddhism

[Anonymous No.16941096]

How did he do it frens?

http://home.messiah.edu/~rcollins/EASTR1.htm

[Anonymous No.16941103]

>/lit/ is for the discussion of literature, specifically books (fiction & non-fiction), short stories, poetry, creative writing, etc. If you want to discuss history, religion, or the humanities, go to /his/. If you want to discuss politics, go to /pol/. Philosophical discussion can go on either /lit/ or /his/, but those discussions of philosophy that take place on /lit/ should be based around specific philosophical works to which posters can refer.
All you /rel/ spambots need to be purged for good

[Anonymous No.16941111]

>>16941103
>discussions of philosophy that take place on /lit/ should be based around specific philosophical works to which posters can refer.
Which it is.
Seethe harder faggot

[Anonymous No.16941113]

>>16941103
Brainlet

[Anonymous No.16941129]

You don't need to "destroy" every religion individually. Every one is stupid period. Even the weirdos who think they can be Hindu/ Buddhist while being atheist are just cherry picking from an outdated philosophy.

[Anonymous No.16941130]

>>16941111
>>16941113
>Expecting basic reading comprehension from relitards
kys

[Anonymous No.16941137]

>>16941129
>You don't need to "destroy" every religion individually. Every one is stupid period.

>>16941130
Cringe, gtfo

[Anonymous No.16941828]

holy fucking based

[Anonymous No.16941837]

>you will never be the leading expert on the teleological argument

[Anonymous No.16942323]

>>16941828
Isn't he?

[Anonymous No.16942753]

>>16941096
wtf that's actually good

[Anonymous No.16942765]

>>16941828
>>16941837
>>16942323
>>16942753
Yikes

[Anonymous No.16942819]

Who?

[Anonymous No.16942896]

>>16941096
>http://home.messiah.edu/~rcollins/EASTR1.htm
>How did he do it frens?
He didn't though, at least not for Advaita Vedanta

>a. The View is Self-Contradictory: The first problem with the core of Sankara's philosophy is that it seems to be self-contradictory. As advocates of the other Hindu schools of thought have pointed out, if the only reality is Brahman, and Brahman is pure, distinctionless consciousness, then there cannot exist any real distinctions in reality. But the claim that this world is an illusion already presupposes that there is an actual distinction between illusion and reality, just as the claim that something is a dream already presupposes the distinction between waking consciousness and dream consciousness.
This objection ignores the distinction the between conventional truth/existence (Vyāvahārika) and absolute truth/existence (Pāramārthika) which occurs in Shankara's metaphysics. There is no contradiction in the sense he implies here as maya is not 'reality', so there is no conflict with saying that (absolute) reality itself is devoid of the true existence of maya. When Advaita says that Brahman is the only (absolute) reality, this is not mutually exclusive with non-realities being perceived in the midst of Brahman via ignorance, anymore than saying waking life is reality is mutually exclusive with us also experiencing non-realities while dreaming. That which is subject to sublation (maya in the former example and dreams in the latter) cannot actually be used to establish a mutual contradiction with that (Pāramārthika or waking life) which remains after the sublatable is sublated.
>Moreover, Sankara's idea of salvation--that is, enlightenment through recognition that all is Brahman--already presupposes a distinction between living in a state of unenlightenment (ignorance) and living in a state of enlightenment. So this view contradicts itself by, on the one hand, saying that reality (Brahman) is distinctionless, while on the other hand distinguishing between maya and the truth of Brahman, and by distinguishing between being enlightened and unenlightened.
This objection is a reformulation of the above point and has already been addressed.

[Anonymous No.16942909]

>>16942896
>b. The Impossibility of Maya: A second and related problem is that ignorance, which Sankara and his followers claim is the source of maya, could not exist. According to the Sankara school, Brahman is perfect, pure, and complete Knowledge, the opposite of ignorance. Hence, ignorance cannot exist in Brahman. But, since nothing exists apart from Brahman, ignorance cannot exist apart from Brahman either. Thus, it follows that ignorance could not exist, contrary to their assertion that our perception of a world of distinct things is a result of ignorance.
It is false that Shankara claims ignorance to be the source of maya, Shankara actually uses avidya and maya more or less interchangeably in his works; both on predicated on and sustained by Brahman. The Upanishads describe Brahman as the omniscient and omnipotent Lord who is unconditioned author of time, space, causation etc as well as Brahman being undifferentiated non-dual Being-Conciousness-Bliss, so the objection is not a problem for Shankara, because his scriptures explain how Brahman causes this and to deny this is practically to deny that God can be omniscient and omnipotent, and it would be similar to the notion of denying that any God could create the universe, which many metaphysicans and theologians would find to be an unintelligent claim.

>c. The Lack of Evidence: A final problem is that it seems that one could never have any satisfactory experiential basis for believing in Sankara's philosophy.
Shankara did not believe that the absolute truth could be reached through independent reasoning, and that it could only be arrived at through revealed scriptures. In his works he attacks 'logicians' as pitiless fools and sophists as he refutes many of the typical arguments made by them. Also, in order for this claim to be taken seriously it would be incumbent upon those who bring it forth to give an example of how one could establish an evidence-based way for believing in things and for assuming that one's knowledge is unquestionably true in a way that solves the Gettier problem (fulfilling the hypothetical satisfactory basis), which was first written about by a medieval Advaita philosopher.

[Anonymous No.16942916]

>>16942909
>Certainly, everyday experience and observation are completely in conflict with his claim, since they overwhelmingly testify to the existence of a real world of distinct things and properties.
Shankara agrees, which is why for him there is an empirically real world existing in conditional reality, but not in absolute reality, but within this conditional reality sustained by Brahman's omnipotence and omniscient wielding of His own maya, there is a shared world of experience which includes objects existing outside of our bodies, it's not just the illusion of one individual mind or soul. When the jivas attain illumination they cease to perceive themselves as being different from the omnipresent basis of everything, but the jivas who still slumber in spiritual ignorance still retain their own subjective experience of being embodies until they attain illumination. It is because of the illogical nature of denying that there is an empirically-real shared world of experience existing outside of our mind that Shankara attacks and offers refutations in his works of the Vijnanavada or Yogachara schools of Buddhism, in particular the doctrines of Dinnaga and Dharmakirti, and in the process of doing so explored many points that would later be revisited a millennium later when Kant decided to distance his own ideas from those of Berkeley. For Shankara though, this observing consciousness is untouched and unaffected by the thoughts and perceptions of the mind, as the Atman-Brahman It is already liberated but as jivas we can't normally perceive and experience this for ourselves until ignorance is sublated by realisation.

[Anonymous No.16942923]

>>16942916
>Indeed, even if we assume that the entire material world does not exist, but is merely a dream, experience would still overwhelmingly testify against Sankara's claim: for, within our dream itself there are innumerable distinct experiences, from the experience of feeling sad to that of seeing what looks like a rainbow. Thus Sankara's philosophy cannot even explain the world we experience as being an illusion or dream. As a result, it ends up providing close to the worse possible explanation of our experiences.
Shankara explains why this is wrong in his works. Our innermost Awareness by which we apprehend everything is different in nature from everything else about the world and our mind or intellect, it is the illuminator of the outer objects in the form of sense-perceptions as well as the interior objects like thoughts, memories, emotions and urges. Individual thoughts and sense-perceptions etc surely are not self-illuminating or self-apprehending, for, given that we have so many of them at once such as the perception of the body, perception of color, thoughts etc blending together into one continuum of detail-rich conscious experience it would be like so many minds existing disparately from one another with no way without one knower of all of them like us. Shankara examines the absurd contradictions of this idea here:

“Since the aggregate of body etc., is substantially indistinguishable from (knowable objects like) sound, etc., and hence it, too, is equally a knowable, it cannot reasonably be the knower. If the aggregate of body etc., though constituted by colour etc., can perceive colour etc., then the external colour etc., may as well know each other as also their own individual feature. But this does not tally with facts. Therefore […] people perceive colour and other attributes, in the form of the body etc., etena eva, through this only – through the Self which is consciousness by nature and which is distinct from the body etc.” - Śaṅkara’s commentary on the Kaṭha Upaniṣad, III.1.3

[Anonymous No.16942926]

>>16942923
But if these sensations and thoughts are not self-illuminating then maybe then they illuminate each other in a stream which witness eachother? No because this is also contradictory and absurd. If the individual thoughts, perceptions and sensations are not individually self-apprehending but combine in a stream, then it results in an infinite regress where we can never have knowledge of anything, because in order for us to have the actual conscious experience generated by the mental factor being illuminated by another, that would first have to be illuminated by another 3rd one separate from those 2 in order to be experienced and so on ad infinitum. Thus, the only explanation of consciousness and sentience which makes sense is that it is different in nature from the mind/intellect and its activities such as thoughts, memory, etc, it is the unchanging light and presence by which the mind and body are observed and impelled with movement and life.

Consciousness is normally reflected in the intellect like a face appearing to exist in a mirror as Shankara gives in one example, and it is due to an error of misidentification that we perceive our mind consisting of thoughts to be self-aware and sentient, instead of realizing that this description belongs to that which illumines the mind. Every distinguishing feature and sensation which occurs to your conscious experience is really a non-sentient thing observed by your sentience which you are describing. But sentience itself is formless, homogenous, without partitions, transparent and immediately self-revealing knowing. Sentience is to thoughts and sensory perceptions as the sunlight is to the inanimate objects scattered across the face of the earth. So, because of this the authors claim that the experience of emotions like being sad or seeing the sensory perception of a rainbow establish that our consciousness is not actually omnipresent, eternal, unconditioned, pure, untouched by grief and pain etc is not actually sound, because as these things and evidences which he marshals forward are inevitably different from the apprehending sentience about which those things are being used to generate a claim about, they do not prove anything directly about that sentience other then that there is a sentient entity by which the interior and outer objects are illumined. Shankara explains that point in passages like these:

[Anonymous No.16942930]

>>16942926
If he says, " The pain due to burns or cuts in the body and the misery caused by hunger and the like, Sir, are distinctly perceived to be in me. The supreme Self is known in all the Srutis and the Smritis to be free from sin, old age, death, grief, hunger, thirst, etc and devoid of smell and taste'. How can I who am different from Him and possess so many phenomenal attributes possibly accept the supreme Self as myself and myself, a transmigratory being, as the supreme Self ~ I may them very well admit that fire is cool I Why should I, a man of the world entitled to accomplish all prosperity in this world and in the next and realize the supreme end of life, i.e., liberation, give up the actions producing those results and yajnopavita etc., their accessories?"

The teacher should say to him, " It was not right for you to say, ' I directly perceive the pain in me when my body gets cuts or burns'. Why~ Because the pain due to cuts or burns, perceived in the body, the object of the perception of the perceiver like a tree burnt or cut, must have the same location as the burns etc. People point out pain caused by burns and the like to be in that place where they occur but not in the perceiver. How? For, on being asked where one's pain lies, one says, ' I have pain in the head, in the chest or in the stomach. Thus one points out pain in that place where burns or cuts occur, but never in the perceiver. If pain or its causes viz burns or cuts were in the perceiver one would have pointed out the perceiver to be the seat of the pain, like the parts of the body, the seats of the burns or cuts. "Moreover, (if it were in the Self) the pain could not be perceived by the Self like the colour of the eye by the same eye.

[Anonymous No.16942936]

>>16942930
or as he says in another text:

How can a fool who does not know his own self know its unity or difference? What will he infer about it? And on what grounds? For the self has no characteristic that might be used to infer natural differences between one self and another. Those characteristics having name and form which the opponents will put forward to infer differences in the self belong only to name and form, and are but limiting adjuncts of the self, just as a jar, a bowl, an airhole, or the pores in earth are of the ether. When the logician finds distinguishing characteristics in the ether, then only will he find such characteristics in the self. For not even hundreds of logicians, who admit differences in the self owing to limiting adjuncts, can show any characteristic of it that would lead one to infer differences between one self and another. And as for natural differences, they are out of the question, for the self is not an object of inference. Because whatever the opponent regards as an attribute of the self is admitted as consisting of name and form, and the self is admitted to be different from these. Witness the Śruti passage, ‘Ākāśa (the self-effulgent One) is verily the cause of name and form. That within which they are is Brahman’ (Ch. VIII. xiv. 1), and also ‘Let me manifest name and form’ (Ch. VI. iii. 2). Name and form have origin and dissolution, but Brahman is different from them. Therefore how can the unity of Brahman contradict inference, of which It is never an object? This also refutes the charge that it contradicts the Śruti

[Anonymous No.16942954]

>>16942896
>This objection ignores the distinction the between conventional truth/existence (Vyāvahārika) and absolute truth/existence (Pāramārthika) which occurs in Shankara's metaphysics.

He answers your objections, in chapter "2. Responses to First Two Critiques"

Selected extract :

Advocates of the Sankara school respond to accusations of logical incoherence raised above in several ways, all of which I believe are ultimately unsatisfactory. First, some Indian thinkers have defended Sankara by pointing out that he never claimed that maya exists: rather, Sankara claimed that ultimately maya has some form of reality between existence and non-existence.(2) It is difficult to see, however, how this response helps. The claim that Brahman is pure, distinctionless knowledge implies that maya has no reality whatsoever, not even the quasi-existential status of neither existing nor non-existing. The contradiction thus remains.

The second and more powerful response that advocates of the Sankara school have given is that human logic and reason operate from the standpoint of ignorance or maya, and thus are invalid.(3) Moreover, once the true perspective is obtained (in which we recognize that everything is Brahman), ignorance vanishes and consequently the self-contradiction resulting from the so-called existence of ignorance no longer poses a problem. With regard to our first two critiques of Sankara, those who offer this response could claim that the law of non-contradiction, the fundamental rule of logic according to which a statement cannot be both true and false at the same time, is ultimately invalid because it is based in ignorance. Thus, they could argue, we cannot legitimately reject their view because it is self-contradictory.

This second response, however, faces two major problems. (...)

[Anonymous No.16942966]

>>16942954
First, it is what philosophers call "epistemically self-defeating." If human reason is invalid when it comes to the ultimate nature of reality, then Sankara himself could never offer us a valid reason--whether based on experience, testimony, or anything else--for believing in his philosophy. So why believe it? Moreover, this second response underestimates the seriousness of the charge that Sankara's view is self-contradictory. Certain Eastern philosophers, such as Garma C. C. Chang (pp. 133-4 ), are correct in pointing out that Western philosophers have not proven that reality itself must always obey the law of non-contradiction; rather, Western philosophy assumes its truth. Even so, the law of non-contradiction nonetheless typically functions as a condition for the meaningfulness of statements within language. If, for instance, someone insists that their friend, John Doe, is a bachelor and then they turn around and assert that this very same person, John Doe, is married to a woman called Jane Doe, we would become very puzzled and begin to lose our grip on what they were trying to say. At best, we would begin to wonder whether they were using the English words "bachelor" and "married" in the normal English sense. If they agreed that they were, then we would have to admit a failure to understand what they were trying to say. The reason for this is that their statement that John is married to Jane would simply negate their statement that John is a bachelor, given the normal English meanings of the words "married" and "bachelor". Hence, we would be left with no meaningful conception of John's marital status.

[Anonymous No.16942971]

>>16942966
A similar point can be made regarding Sankara's philosophy. When he says that he is offering a path to enlightenment, and that our problem is that we are in a state of ignorance, we understand him to be saying that we are in a certain state of ignorance now, and that through diligently following the Hindu meditative practices, we can arrive at a state of enlightenment and bliss at some point in the future. But, when Sankara goes on to say that each of us is already identical with Brahman, and that Brahman is pure, distinctionless consciousness without a trace of ignorance, he completely negates any understanding we had of his first claim, namely that each of us in a state of ignorance. For, if we take his claim about our identity with Brahman seriously, we must conclude that each of us is actually presently in a state of pure Knowledge, not ignorance. Accordingly, the problem for Sankara, as he is standardly understood, is not merely that what he says must be false because it is self-contradictory, but rather that the self-contradictory character of his claims precludes our forming any definite conception of what he is saying in the first place. At best, we could understand him as using language not to so much to describe his view of the nature of reality, but to point to a "reality" beyond language--much as poetry and art does, according to some. If all Sankara is doing is using language to point to the inexpressible, however, then what he says is not necessarily in conflict with most worldviews, even a Christian worldview--after all, the existence of a reality that is ultimately not completely expressible by language is certainly compatible with orthodox Christianity.

[Anonymous No.16942979]

>>16942971
The final response we will consider to the objection that Sankara is inconsistent is that offered by philosopher Keith Ward. Essentially, Ward argues that Sankara has been misinterpreted. First, Ward claims that what Sankara means by reality is "that which is self-subsistent; which does not change or cease to be; which is not corruptible or dependent on other things." (p. 146). Thus, Ward tells us, when Sankara says that Brahman is the only existing reality, and that Brahman is distinctionless, this does not mean that the world does not exist. All it means is that the existence of the world is not self-subsistent and independent; rather, things in the world exist "only as appearances--that is, in relation to minds to which they appear. Taken out of relation to minds, they would cease to exist at all." (Ward, p. 146)

The problem with Ward's interpretation is that if one takes these "appearances" (and human subjective experiences in general) as really existing in relation to some mind or minds, then either: i) the mind which is having these appearances and experiences must be Brahman; or ii) there must be minds other than Brahman that are having the appearances and experiences. If alternative (i) is adopted, then it follows that there are internal distinctions within Brahman's consciousness corresponding to the multitude of differing experiences we have every day, such as being sad, fearful, happy, or seeing a snow capped mountain. Worse, however, if (i) is adopted, then Brahman would have the experience of being ignorant, of performing evil acts, of experience suffering, and the like. But, these are all contrary to what Sankara (and the other schools of Vedanta) claim about Brahman: namely, that Brahman is perfect, pure, and without ignorance. If Ward adopts (ii), on the other hand, then our selves or minds become distinct from God's consciousness, and hence Sankara's claim that we are in reality identical with Brahman is lost. Finally, if either of these alternatives is advocated, then Sankara's philosophy loses its distinctiveness and simply becomes a form of qualified non-dualism or dualism, that is, a version of Ramanuja's or Madhva's metaphysics. If this is right, then we will be forced adopt the implausible position that most Indian intellectuals were mistaken in thinking they were different from each other.(4)

[Anonymous No.16943024]

3. Response to the Final Critique of Sankara

Above we argued that there is no sufficient reason to believe Sankara's philosophy because it is in conflict with almost all of our experiences. The most immediate way advocates of the Sankara school could respond to this charge is by offering positive reasons for believing his claims. Three major sorts of reasons have been offered by Sankara and his followers for their belief system.

>>16942909
>Shankara did not believe that the absolute truth could be reached through independent reasoning, and that it could only be arrived at through revealed scriptures.

First, Sankara himself primarily supported his belief system by appealing to the Hindu scriptures, particularly the Upanishads. Clearly for us Westerners who do not already presuppose the inspiration of these scriptures, this reason will not carry much weight. Moreover, other Indian thinkers--such as the philosophers Ramanuja and Madhva--offer very different interpretations of the Hindu scriptures.

[Anonymous No.16943032]

Second, followers of Sankara presented skeptical attacks on human reason that attempted to show that we have no adequate basis for trusting human reason. Moreover, they attempted to argue that our ordinary view of the world, which includes the belief in the distinctness of things and properties, is inconsistent.(5)

>>16942909
>In his works he attacks 'logicians' as pitiless fools and sophists as he refutes many of the typical arguments made by them. Also, in order for this claim to be taken seriously it would be incumbent upon those who bring it forth to give an example of how one could establish an evidence-based way for believing in things and for assuming that one's knowledge is unquestionably true in a way that solves the Gettier problem (fulfilling the hypothetical satisfactory basis), which was first written about by a medieval Advaita philosopher.

Since the practice of reason rests on making distinctions between things and properties, this latter set of arguments ultimately amounted to a further attack on human reason, namely that it is self- contradictory. Although the arguments they presented show great philosophical sophistication and insight, they ultimately cannot be used to support Sankara's philosophy. The reason for this is straightforward: if reason is ultimately invalid, then ultimately we cannot have valid reasons to believe anything, including Sankara's view. This is something that many followers of Sankara have recognized. Thus in the end many of them considered these arguments useful only as a way to help us break the grip that the ordinary view of reality has on us, thus preparing us for enlightenment (see Deutsch, p. 86 and 93-94).

[Anonymous No.16943050]

>>16942896
Read everything before answering, he anticipates and addresses the points you raise.

[Anonymous No.16943064]

>>16942954
>. The claim that Brahman is pure, distinctionless knowledge implies that maya has no reality whatsoever, not even the quasi-existential status of neither existing nor non-existing.
Maya/ignorance is taught in Advaita to be anirvachaniya, neither classifable as completely real or completely unreal. Like the middle ground that dreams occupy between the empirical reality of waking life, and the complete non-existence of something we never ever experience (unlike dreams), maya occupies a middle ground between complete non-existence and total lack of experience and on the other hand the absolute reality of Brahman,

>The contradiction thus remains.
the contradiction he is alleging was explained here >>16942909 in the first half already, all the rest of the section of Advaita is just revisiting and rephrasing the same 3 attacks he makes on it which I explained were all wrong

>>16942966
>Sankara himself could never offer us a valid reason--whether based on experience, testimony, or anything else--for believing in his philosophy. So why believe it?
He is not writing to convince you, these teachings belong to religious esoterism and were originally only taught to people of the requisite castes who entered into the Hindu stage or ashrama of monkhood or sannyasa and who approach the Advaita order for instruction, they were not explained in detail to anyone and everyone freely. It is a theology devised for Hindus who already accept the revealedness and infallibility of their scriptures as a given, and not even for all of them but only ones who renounce everything and become initiated into monkhood. So this is not a objection traditional Advaita would care about at all because it doesn't matter to them at all.

[Anonymous No.16943126]

>>16943032
>>16943024
>First, Sankara himself primarily supported his belief system by appealing to the Hindu scriptures, particularly the Upanishads. Clearly for us Westerners who do not already presuppose the inspiration of these scriptures, this reason will not carry much weight
>Although the arguments they presented show great philosophical sophistication and insight, they ultimately cannot be used to support Sankara's philosophy.

Shankara and Advaita have never claimed that their doctrine has to be proved from the ground up through rational discursive knowledge as some sort of logical system, they confine themselves to simply refuting all the objections raised against Advaita. It is an exegesis of how the scriptures point the way to spiritual enlightenment. this point is basically attacking them or not being able to build a bridge to spiritual enlightenment and liberation built purely of rational thought and discursive reasoning, which any retard can analyze and follow at a distance and immediately know the result of like they were following the steps in a math equation. But anyone with an ounce of insight knows this is retarded and its not how spiritual illumination works. You either have the drive for the spiritual, or you don't. It's not Advaita's responsibility to place that in peoples hearts.

[Anonymous No.16943157]

>>16942954
>He answers your objections, in chapter "2. Responses to First Two Critiques"
no, he doesn't

[Anonymous No.16943356]

>>16943064
>Maya/ignorance is taught in Advaita to be anirvachaniya, neither classifable as completely real or completely unreal. Like the middle ground that dreams occupy between the empirical reality of waking life, and the complete non-existence of something we never ever experience (unlike dreams), maya occupies a middle ground between complete non-existence and total lack of experience and on the other hand the absolute reality of Brahman,
The only thing between being and non-being is potency, and if maya is only potential then it isn't actual, so it don't exists. Furthermore, even if maya is what you said, it doesn't exist ultimately so it really has no reality whatsoever, in fine.
Like Collins said :

> The claim that Brahman is pure, distinctionless knowledge implies that maya has no reality whatsoever, not even the quasi-existential status of neither existing nor non-existing.

>not even the quasi-existential status of neither existing nor non-existing.

[Anonymous No.16943368]

>>16942896
>>16942909
>>16942916
>>16942923
>>16942926
>>16942930
>>16942936
>>16942954
>>16942966
>>16942971
>>16942979
>>16943024
>>16943032
>>16943064
>>16943126
Jesus fucking Christ.

[Anonymous No.16943433]

>>16941096
>>http://home.messiah.edu/~rcollins/EASTR1.htm


>Except for certain Westernized versions of Buddhism (and some Zen Buddhists), Hindus and Buddhists both accept the doctrines of rebirth (or reincarnation) and karma

lol the vedas don't even talk about karma and rebirth.


>The two doctrines of rebirth and karma form the fundamental belief structure from which all Indian philosophies spring. As Edward Stevens writes with regard to Hinduism,

no, some indians rejected karma and rebrith, it's in the buddhist sutras as wrong views

all those sects and buddhism and jainism died though


>Generally speaking, both Buddhists and Hindus see salvation (or enlightenment) as liberation from the cycle of rebirths and its associated karma.

still nothing to with the vedas

[Anonymous No.16943530]

>>16943433
>lol the vedas don't even talk about karma and rebirth.
Kys brainlet

[Anonymous No.16943549]

>>16943433
>The First Noble Truth is that life is suffering
that's really the NPC view

>Now this, bhikkhus, is the noble truth of suffering: birth is suffering, aging is suffering, illness is suffering, death is suffering; union with what is displeasing is suffering; separation from what is pleasing is suffering; not to get what one wants is suffering; in brief, the five aggregates subject to clinging are suffering.


>according to this doctrine, everything is impermanent in the sense that nothing lasts for more than an extremely brief period of time. Everything is in an almost complete state of flux, like a river Applied to the self, the doctrine of impermanence implies that there is no enduring self that continues to exist for more than a brief moment

and here we go.
This is not what impermanent means and as usual it is pop buddhims, the commentarial traditon of theravada and the core of mahayana (bc umahayana is 100% based on commentaries)


being conditioned means there is a condition for the arising and falling, it's not about being in flux.


>According to the Buddha, once we truly recognize the momentary nature of all existing things, especially the self, we lose all attachment and thus achieve the state of nirvana, either in this life or at the time of death

it's not ''momentary nature'', it's ''conditioned nature''


>According to Therevada Buddhists, the self is like a candle flame.

there is no self to begin with


>Thus, if we consider the flame as nothing over and above the sum of its parts, then the candle flame is literally not the same flame from one moment; rather, from moment to moment, one aggregate of molecules is replaced by a new aggregate of molecules.

again with he momentariness
the guy should check out the word kṣaṇa in a pali dictionary and try to find in the sutras, instead of taking commentaries for the sutras.


>Under this view, therefore, what we call a person is really a succession of selves instead of a single enduring thing. As expressed by the Buddhist Monk Walpola Rahula,

there is no self in the first place and never creation of a self

god the guy is is like a woman addicted to her clichés on buddhism from her yoga class

>According to Therevada Buddhists, through meditation and right action we can eventually come existentially to recognize the momentary nature of the self,

wrong

[Anonymous No.16943635]

>>16943549
>Rebirth and karma, however, seem to require the existence of an enduring self: how, for instance, could we reap the fruits of our past deeds unless our self continued to exist in the future?

no

karma is conditioned, no need for a self

>Moreover, the doctrine of nirvana also seems to require the existence of an enduring self: if your self does not continue to exist from moment to moment, why bother trying to obtain nirvana?

the goal is to end dukkha

> Thus, on the one hand, Therevada Buddhists deny the existence of an enduring self, but on the other hand their doctrines of rebirth, karma, and nirvana seem to require that the self continues to exist through time.


false

>This, however, seems highly implausible: cases of such intricate apparent design, such as a watch, a computer program, or the human body, seem to require an explanation.

holy shit lmao

also the knowledge of the working of karma is not relevant for nirvana


so a recap for the brainlet Robin Collins:

The claim is that controlling the citta is making it peaceful + the vedana-sanna (ie feelings perceptions) are fabrications of the citta + excited citta gives displeasing vedana-sanna, ie sensuality, ie what is felt by humans and animals and ghosts, and calmed citta gives pleasant vedana-sanna, ie what is felt by devas.

So the path is to stop polluting the citta by greed, aversion and delusion, which will make vedana-sanna better than when they are polluted and resulting in sensuality, and even better they will stop like it is the case for arahants..
>Therevada Buddhists, such as Alexandra David-Neel

wtf, she was not theravada


> The tranquility and peace that some Buddhists experience simply show that the meditational practices are often effective psychological techniques for producing these mental states, not that the doctrines of nirvana, rebirth, or karma are true.

you can't get right samadhi without right knowledge. cringe.


>Finally, these purported cases of past life memories at most provide evidence for the claim that some people are reborn; it does not provide evidence for the belief that everyone has gone through this cycle of rebirths for all eternity, or for the belief in karma and nirvana. But besides this, in my judgement the vast majority of reports of so-called past life memories can be easily explained without any appeal to the doctrine of rebirth.(14)

only women and normies care about records of past life memories

and this knowledge is not the higher knowledge triggering nirvana anyway.

>Another response Therevada Buddhists could give to this critique is to reject some of these traditional doctrines, particularly that of rebirth and karma, as some Western Buddhists seem to do.

nobody view western buddhists as buddhists

[Anonymous No.16943650]

This is the most autistic thread I've ever seen.

[Anonymous No.16943717]

>One reason Madhyamika Buddhist philosophers give for this "position" is that it represents the logical implication of the doctrine of impermanence taught by the Buddha. If all things are completely impermanent, they argued, then nothing could exist for more than a instant. But in order for something to have any real existence, they claimed, it must exist for some finite amount of time--that is, for more than an instant.

yeah but momentariness is not impermanence. Only intellectual commentators drooling over other commentaries say this.


>en Buddhists, on the other hand, reject philosophy and argumentation as a practical means to enlightenment and instead utilize a set of meditation techniques in order to break through the barrier of reason and language and achieve enlightenment.

zentards crave intellectualism just like the other mahayna bugmen, as seen by their numerous bulky books full of crap


>For this answer requires the existence of still another distinction: namely, that between knowing you are enlightened and not knowing you are enlightened.(17)

this why the bugmen in mahyana and vedanta turned nirvana into resting in the pure lumnious mind.
THis gnostic crap is moving the goalpost wrt to the theravada, where gnosis is a tool to reach nirvana and not the destination.
In other word, the bugmen confuses mediation with nirvana.
>

Perhaps the above discussion can best be summed up by noting that since Mahayana Buddhists deny the validity of reason, they could never legitimately offer a good reason to believe their view.

this is peak rationalists' thought hahahahahhaha

[Anonymous No.16943728]

>Given these conclusions are correct, we can draw several lessons from them for the Christian apologist. First, they undermine the key assumption of those so-called religious pluralists who claim that all of the major world religions have equally valid claims to being true. (See Chapter ?? of this book.) Second, the above points show that of all the major Eastern schools of thought we discussed, it is the two theistic schools of Hinduism that present a philosophically viable additional challenge to Christian belief. Finally, since the two other major world religions, Judaism and Islam, are theistic, the above conclusion suggests that the primary apologetic challenge the major world religions present Christianity is not that of challenging belief in a personal, omnipotent, all good God, but rather that of providing alternative conceptions of other aspects of the nature of God, along with alternative conceptions of God's relation to the world and of how God has acted in human history.

yeah it's a good thing buddhism does not offer a challenge to the followers of a jewish fiction. Dwt.

[Anonymous No.16943749]

>>16941096
>Single-handedly destroyed Hinduism and Buddhism. How did he do it frens?

[Anonymous No.16943755]

>>16943549
>>16943635
>>16943717
>theravada and mahayana are wrong!!! read the suttas!!!

Except that he responds to the metaphysics of these schools, you idiot.

[Anonymous No.16943798]

>>16943749
Nothing personal.

[Anonymous No.16943836]

>>16943635
What school do you belong to? As a non-Buddhist, I can't make head-or-tail of this. Do you have some authors/gurus/references you prefer?

[Anonymous No.16943855]

>>16943717
>momentariness is not impermanence
What's the difference? If I say this cup is impermanent, or momentary, am I not saying the same thing : that it'll be at some point, and not at some other?

[Anonymous No.16944144]

>>16943798
do you really think aristotle is in opposition to plato?

[Anonymous No.16944153]

>>16943635
>karma is conditioned, no need for a self
yes, what conditions it?

>the goal is to end dukkha
as is in all religions

>false
see above on karma

>the knowledge of the working of karma is not relevant for nirvana
why not?

[Anonymous No.16944195]

>>16942896
Based Shankaraposter, I am grateful to you!

t. Gitafag

[Anonymous No.16944252]

>>16942896
what he wanted to manifest in that commentary, which you missed the point, is the brahman-maya duality. you advaitards still can't explain the dualism in your system

[Anonymous No.16944278]

>>16942765
Schizophrenic buddhist

[Anonymous No.16944511]

>>16944278
What?

[Anonymous No.16944569]

>>16944278
Anon, I don't think "yikes" implies an accusation of samefagging.

[Anonymous No.16944593]

>>16942909
>in a way that solves the Gettier problem (fulfilling the hypothetical satisfactory basis), which was first written about by a medieval Advaita philosopher.
Can you expand on this, and tell us which philosopher you're referring to?

[Anonymous No.16944600]

>>16944144
yes

[Anonymous No.16944653]

>>16944593
Swami Godelananda and Sri Schrodingerana

[Anonymous No.16944662]

>>16944144
You pseuds need to at least read the Metaphysics. He goes on and on about why Plato's theory of forms is mistaken.

[Anonymous No.16944890]

>>16944662
>You need to read
cringe

[Anonymous No.16945290]

>>16944890
Kek
You need to remember*

[Anonymous No.16945393]

>>16942909
>The Upanishads describe Brahman as the omniscient and omnipotent Lord who is unconditioned author of time, space, causation etc as well as Brahman being undifferentiated non-dual Being-Conciousness-Bliss
One more proof that Brahman = Nirvana/Sunyata

Brahman : Sat-cit-ananda = Being-Consciousness-Bliss

Nirvana/Sunyata : Ngo bo-Rang bzhin-Thugs rje = Essence - Clarity (of the luminous mind) - Compassion :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_(Dzogchen)#Three_qualities

[Anonymous No.16945463]

>>16944153
Not him, but:

>karma
Karma is just "Actions". It's just cause->effect. Certain actions cause a being that is, at least in part, composed of what composes you now to be born in certain conditions. There doesn't need to be a Self for this, and indeed, if there was it wouldn't work. The whole reason rebirth can happen at all is because of Not-Self. If it was in your intrinsic nature to be (You), then you could never not be (You). It's also why the entire concept of nirvana works at all. If it was in your intrinsic nature to suffer, you could never stop suffering.

>you don't need to know how karma works
There's a few ways to get in a position where you will end up reborn solely as a human, and there's a few ways to end up in a state such that you will attain enlightenment within some number of lives (for example, a dozen, which is REALLY FUCKING LOW by Indian standards; the best guarantee you can get in Jainism is something like 1,024 more lives to go, for example). The intricacies of karma are irrelevant because the goal is to no longer be subject to karma. Who cares about meticulously finding out what will get you reincarnated as a toad or whatever if the Buddha has already told you how to be assured you'll reincarnate as a human? The Buddha was explicit on this, and the soteriological goal of Buddhism. Knowing this sort of thing doesn't help you stop the wheel of rebirth.

[Anonymous No.16945945]

>>16944600
>>16944662
here i'll give you some books to read:
Lloyd P. Gerson's From Plato to Platonism
Gerson's Aristotle and other Platonists
Eric Perl's Thinking Being

Most if not all of Aristotle's work was written with reference to Plato. The ideas that Aristotle reject, such as the third man (which was already shown by Plato in parmenides to be retarded and not part of his philosophy), two worlds eidetic and instantional, are not platonic. These things are criticized by Plato, even.
Do yourself a favor and read a book.

[Anonymous No.16945969]

>>16945945
>he does not know that Aristotle refutes the Platonic theory of forms

[Anonymous No.16946085]

>>16945945
>two worlds eidetic and instantional, are not platonic. These things are criticized by Plato, even.
On the basis of what in Plato do you assert this? Parmenides? There's a debate as to whether or not the latter Plato changed his mind on the forms as Parmenides seems to suggest.
In Metaphysics M5, Aristotle writes against the Phedo explicitly on the forms as the cause of the things, as principles of things. What's your explanation of that passage?
Even if I accept your stance on this, it doesn't change the fact that Aristotle opposes Plato on other matters. For exemple, he refuses the esoteric doctrine, of the One and the Dyad. He explicitly argues against it in Metaphysics N1 and 2. Do you think Plato didn't hold to the dichotomy of the One and the Dyad? Then who is he aiming at, Speusippus, Xenocrate? Apparently Speusippus held that the multiple is opposite of the One (see Ravaisson). Do you deny Plato's letter and the traditional interpretation of his secret doctrine of the One and the Dyad?

[Anonymous No.16946211]

>>16945969
there is no two worlds, imbecile. try reading the books i mentioned, or at least the first half of parmenides

>>16946085
>On the basis of what in Plato do you assert this?
read the essay on plato in Eric Perl's Thinking Being, but in plato is already rather evident that the forms are not something separated, but within their instances, otherwise the instances wouldn't be intelligible (or wouldn't have any intelligibility, for it is only the forms that are intelligible). but see that EIDOS means literally ''look''.
the separation of a ''world'' of forms and a ''world'' of instances is a metaphor for their ontological disctinction, the forms are not transcendent for being in a place different from their instances (they are not physical things), but they are ontologically transcendent.

[Anonymous No.16946220]

>>16946085
also, there is no dichotomy of a one and a dyad the dyad IS in the one so to speak, it is an unfolding

[Anonymous No.16946340]

>>16946211
>read the essay on plato in Eric Perl's Thinking Being, but in plato is already rather evident that the forms are not something separated, but within their instances, otherwise the instances wouldn't be intelligible (or wouldn't have any intelligibility, for it is only the forms that are intelligible).
You'll note *I* never said there were two worlds, merely that Aristotle denied Plato's doctrine of the forms. I think it's clear there is only one world in Plato, because only the forms have being. However, I'm not sure I agree with you that the forms are truly "in" the sensual objects in the relevant sense, but I'm willing to hear your take on it : what about all the talk of participation? Of "copy" and "models" in the Timeus? Why not just say the forms are in the bodies, why does Plato never say *that* and instead has people contemplating them *in themselves, separate* from the body before death in the Phaedrus? I think quite clearly Plato thinks bodies are a hindrance to percieving the forms, not the place where they are located, although dialectically it may be useful to use them. Rather than two worlds, sensual things would rather be mere illusory, inferior reflection of the forms ; hence the "copy" or "participation", and the accent put on the forms incorruptibility and the body's corruptibility. If forms are in the body, how aren't they corruptible too? Note I'm just asking a question there ; I don't actually hold to a particular stance.
Anyway, I still think that Aristotle denies Plato's doctrine of the forms. Two arguments, a big and small one.
First, in Metaphysics M5, what Aristotle denies is that the forms are the cause of things. He says that the forms are not all that makes things the way they are. Isn't this in opposition to Plato? Plato's khôra isn't caracterized like Aristotle's hyle ; khôra is clearly just space which is "modelled" (metaphorically) on the forms, there is no notion of it being potential.
I'll further add that it's obvious that in Aristotle it's not even all that's intelligible ; I can understand what matter is (the substantial function of potentiality in a substance), and it's not form. Forms are necessary for human intelligibility but not all that's intelligible. This is not Plato's theory.
Second, I'd also assert God can have intellection of other things, since he has a nous, but no senses, and forms are percieved only in sensory objects, as the form is always instantiated united with matter for Aristotle, but that's another subject and it's more contentious. But that goes against Plato's theory of the Demiurge too (if you hold to the Timeus, or if you identify the Demiurge with the World-Soul, however you want to go with it).

[Anonymous No.16946360]

(cont.)
>>16946340
Sorry, I could've phrased the first paragraph of the last post more simply. I basically agree that there aren't two independant worlds but that it doesn't mean that the forms are inside the same substance as everyday objects alongside matter for Plato, as they are for Aristotle. I think Plato's text actually implies the opposite. I don't know what Plato actually thought though.
>>16946220
That's an interpretation, I disagree, I think the Dyad is just the relative, so it depends on the One whereas the One doesn't depend on it, that much is clear. I don't think we can know if Plato thought it was produced by the One, but since he mentions it alongside it all the time, we can think he held to two basic principles, not one. I don't actually think you can derive the necessity of the Dyad from the One, incidently, and I think people like Plotinus were mistaken.

[Anonymous No.16946514]

(cont.)
>>16946340
Actually this is making me think. I guess for Aristotle the bodies's corruptibility is their capacity to change, that is, for some form to be within a substance the matter of which has the potential to contain a different form (even a substantial form), a change which will trigger given privation. That's in Physics. But the forms itself are just what they are, simply, instantiated as many times as there are things that have this form. Why, indeed, couldn't Plato say the same thing? I guess I just always thought Plato said there was only one form of Beauty (for example) as in, there is only one instantiation of it, but maybe that's wrong. Maybe he means there's only one definition of Beauty, more simply. Maybe you're right that his theory of forms is more similar to Aristotle.
I do think the arguments I listed stand though, at least as questions to resolve.

[Anonymous No.16946602]

>>16946340
>Aristotle denied Plato's doctrine of the forms
See Met. Z.3, 1029a6. See also Met. Z.1, 1028a10. Here he says that the whatness is the being (or what gives being) to a being.

>the forms are truly "in" the sensual objects
I said that merely out of habit, I even made the point that the forms are not in a spatial location.

>what about all the talk of participation? Of "copy" and "models" in the Timeus?
This is the role of matter, differentiation, nothing in itself. Aristotle says the exact same thing, Met. Z.3, 1029a-b.

>>16946360
>that's an interpretation
This is more or less what he writes in Parmenides. See Parmenides 143a-144b.

Sorry anon, I could write more and make my post much better and informative but I'm kinda tired. Please I insist on the importance of the books I mentioned earlier.

[Anonymous No.16946612]

>>16946514
>Actually this is making me think. I guess for Aristotle the bodies's corruptibility is their capacity to change
https://www.amazon.com/Aristotles-Revenge-Metaphysical-Foundations-Biological/dp/3868382003

[Anonymous No.16946865]

>>16946602
>Sorry anon, I could write more and make my post much better and informative but I'm kinda tired.
I'll be reading the quotes and answering you too fast myself, since this would need some more research time. So I won't mind if you don't answer or answer quickly.
>See Met. Z.3, 1029a6. See also Met. Z.1, 1028a10. Here he says that the whatness is the being (or what gives being) to a being.
Second quote says that the primary sense of being is the what, the substance. First quote says : "Thus if the form is prior to the matter and more truly existent, by the same argument it will also be prior to the combination." Aristotle writes a few lines down that matter can't be susbtance, since it can be separated. My understanding of this is that separatability refers to what the intellect does when he abstract forms out of bodies. So substances are the forms as separable and the bodies as already separate ; the substances are separable because they have whatness and the bodies are separate because they are instantiations of whatness. Have I got it right?
If that's your understanding, I agree with it. I'm just not sure thats what Plato thought.
>I said that merely out of habit, I even made the point that the forms are not in a spatial location.
I just don't understand how then, if the forms are not in a spatial location, they aren't separate. I think for Aristotle they are in a spatial location. They are in the body. They are indistinguishable from the body ; the body is a bundle of properties, the properties are the forms, the "bundle-ness" is a type of matter (among the three) as a potential to acquire this or that form. And I think for Plato the forms aren't in space.
I think we'd have to go quote-mining. I may be wrong with regards to either author.
>This is the role of matter, differentiation, nothing in itself. Aristotle says the exact same thing, Met. Z.3, 1029a-b.
Yes, in 1029a20 : "By matter I mean that which in itself is neither a particular thing nor a quantity nor designated by any of the categories which define Being.For there is something of which each of these is predicated, whose being is different from that of each one of the categories; because all other things are predicated of substance, but this is predicated of matter."
I think you're right actually. Thinking about it, Aristotle adding his conception of potential to the khôra doesn't negate anything about the khôra. It just adds a further specification of the theory.

>>16946612
I'll look at the books you mentionned but I have a big Aristotle reading list this year, so maybe not very soon. Or maybe I'll just skim through them for now and read them closely later.

[Anonymous No.16946871]

>>16946865
*the "bundle-ness" is a type of matter (among the four/five counting ether)

[Anonymous No.16948007]

>>16946871
yes

[Anonymous No.16948955]

>>16944153
>>>the goal is to end dukkha
>as is in all religions
lol no

>>16944153
>>the knowledge of the working of karma is not relevant for nirvana
>why not?
it just isn't

>>16944153
>>>karma is conditioned, no need for a self
>yes, what conditions it?
"And what is the cause by which kamma comes into play? Contact is the cause by which kamma comes into play.

[Anonymous No.16948992]

>>16943755
and metaphysics is not part of buddhism, and if he wants to talk about commentaries then he can say so, you drooling tard

[Anonymous No.16949157]

>>16948992
Not that Anon, but I think he says quite clearly he's talking about theravada and mahayana. I ask again, what school do you subscribe to if you reject both like that guy implies?

[Anonymous No.16949860]

bubmp

[Anonymous No.16949951]

you have to be braindead to debunk buddhist commentaries. Be attacking some speculations by non-enlightened intellectuals and calling this debunking buddhism is the usual deception by Jews and gentiles.

[Anonymous No.16950004]

>>16948955
>lol no
lol yes, all of them propose salvation, liberation in some way and these lead to some sort of paradise, henosis, reabsorption into the principle etc.

>it just isn't
great response! but karma is what conditions rebirths and nirvana is exactly the break of the cycle of rebirth

>contact is the cause which kamma comes into play
what contacts what?

[Anonymous No.16950007]

>>16948992
>metaphysics is not part of buddhism
>nirvana
>not apophatic
>not metaphysics
reatrd

[Anonymous No.16950012]

>>16948992
>metaphysics is not part of buddhism
>nirvana
>not apophatic
>not metaphysics
retard

[Anonymous No.16950020]

>>16950007
>>16950012
lmao

[Anonymous No.16950812]

>>16949951
>you have to be braindead to debunk the traditional schools of Buddhism
retard

[Anonymous No.16950887]

>>16949951
>NOOOOOO, YOU CAN'T REFUTE BUDDHISM BY ATTACKING ITS TRADITIONAL SCHOOLS, YOU HAVE TO TALK ABOUT MY OWN PERSONAL INTERPRETATION!!!
Braindead

[Anonymous No.16951023]

>>16950812
faggot

[Anonymous No.16951088]

>>16943356
>The only thing between being and non-being is potency, and if maya is only potential then it isn't actual, so it don't exists.
That is not actually true and this claim has been refuted by medieval Advaitins already, because we still have the conscious experience of things which are not real, as for example, in dreams when we believe it to be real life in the waking world when it is really not. Or for example, when you see something in your room and your mind tells you its a spider, and for a few seconds you have a fear response and it actually looks completely like a spider to you, but then it turns out to just be an object looking like one. In both of these examples, humans have the conscious experience of some encounter or object which is not itself true, and this experience is sublated.

If you don't admit that there is a third category between the completely non-existent and the completely real, then you would be forced to include the category of dreams under one or the other of the those two categories. But this results in contradictions, since dreams are not real events taking place in the world, but neither are they identical with non-existent things we don't ever experience like snowboarding on Mars, because we actually have the conscious experience of dreams. So assigning dreams and optical illusions to either being or non-being produces contradictions, which speaks to the inadequacy of limiting oneself to being and non-being as the two sole categories. There is a third valid category of the relatively real, which contradicts neither the law of non-contradiction not the law of the excluded middle.

To below for how Advaitins have already explained this argument to be wrong, a Vishishtadvaita Vedantin named Vyasatirtha tried to voice similar arguments in the 15th-16th century and was subsequently refuted by the Advaitin Madhusudana Sarasvati:

[Anonymous No.16951096]

>>16951088
The first definition of falsity is given by Padmapâda in his Panchapàdikà and runs thus: ‘Falsity is the indescribability either as being or as non-being. Vyâsatïrtha, like Râmânuja against avidyà, says that as being and non-being are contradictories, which are exclusive and exhaustive, there can be no third alternative and therefore both cannot be denied. Everything must necessarily be either being or non-being. The denial of both is against the Law of Excluded Middle and also against the Law of Contradiction. Again, ‘different from being* means ‘non-being’ and ‘different from non-being* means ‘being’; so ‘different from being and nonbeing’ means ‘both being and non-being’ which is admitted to be self-contradictory by the Advaitin himself. Madhusüdana replies that being and non-being are not exhaustive as these are used by us in their absolute sense and between the two is the third alternative, ‘the relative being’ to which belong the entire world-objects. So the Law of Excluded Middle is not violated. Again, as being and non-being belong to different orders of reality, there is no contradiction in their simultaneous affirmation or simultaneous denial. Moreover, non-contradiction is admitted as the test of truth and that which is contradicted is said to be false, so the Law of Contradiction is maintained in tact.

The second definition of falsity is given by Prakashatma in Vivarana which runs thus: ‘Falsity is the counter-entity of an absolute negation with regard to the substratum in which it is cognised. This means ‘falsity is that which can be denied at all times even where it appears to exist*. Vyasatirtha objects that if falsity is true, then non-dualism of Brahma will vanish; and if falsity is false, then the world will be true. Again, appearances are said to be ‘real' as long as they appear. Now, if they are denied even at the time of perception, then they are absolute non-being like the hare's horn. Again, the falsity of the world is also treated as false. Thus the falsity of the falsity of the world leads to the affirmation of the reality of the world.

[Anonymous No.16951103]

>>16951096
Madhusudana Sarasvati refutes all these objections. To the objection that if falsity is true, then non-dualism of Brahma will vanish, Madhusudana replies that falsity is not true for it is set aside by knowledge and therefore non-dualism of Brahma is not destroyed. Moreover, as the world-appearance and its falsity are simultaneously removed by the same Brahma-knowledge, nondualism remains in tact. And as falsity is not absolute unreality but only apparent reality, its falsity does not make the world real. To the objection that the falsity of the falsity of the world does lead to the affirmation of the reality of the world, Madhusudana replies that negation of negation in all cases does not mean reaffirmation. Negation of negation leads to affirmation only in those cases where the thing negated and the negation enjoy the same status and have identically the same scope.

But when a negation negates both the thing and its negation, then negation of negation does not lead to affirmation. True negation is always a cancellation of illusion. Only the apparent can be negated and that which is negated must be false, for the real can never be negated. Negation is rooted in the real which is the negation of that negation and in itself is positive. If die object negated and its negation remain in the same ground, then negation of negation does not re-instate die object negated but only the ground on which negation rests. Negation of world-appearance is identical with its ground Brahma, and therefore the negation of this
negation does not re-instate the world, but reaffirms only Brahma, the ground-reality.

>To the objection that if world-appearances are denied even at the time of perception then they are absolutely unreal like the hare’s horn, Madhusudana replies that though ultimately the indescribable world-appearance (anirvachanlya) and the hare’s horn (tuchchha) are equally unreal, yet, empirically these two must be distinguished. The indescribable appearance, whether pratibhdsa (ordinary illusion) or vyavahara (world-illusion), does appear in knowledge as ‘real* and is mistaken as ‘real’ during perception, while the hare's horn cannot even appear in knowledge and is therefore called absolutely unreal. Moreover, appearances cannot be denied during perception when they are mistaken as ‘real’; these can be denied only when their ground-reality is known and then it is realised that these did not really exist even during perception.

[Anonymous No.16951128]

>>16951103
>Like Collins said :
>> The claim that Brahman is pure, distinctionless knowledge implies that maya has no reality whatsoever, not even the quasi-existential status of neither existing nor non-existing.
>not even the quasi-existential status of neither existing nor non-existing.
This point by Collins is refuted above in the discussion of Vyastirtha and Madhusdana, Brahman is not impotent knowledge which has no power, but the same scriptural source which establish that It is pure knowledge also establish that It is omnipotent and omniscient and is thus able to continually generate and sustain the virtual maya-world existing under the 3rd category of the relatively real. It sounds like Collins is having to make guess about what certain things in Advaita "imply" because he doesn't actually know the theology well enough himself and is just making random incorrect guesses about it from a distance.

>>16944252
There is no absolute duality in Advaita, dualism in Advaita is only conditional and contingent upon a higher non-duality which is ontologically above and prior to it that duality, some brainlets have a hard time understanding this though. The original higher, absolute non-duality remains non-dual and completely unaffected by the lower contingent duality, so the absolute non-duality remains intact the whole time. The duality only appears to exist to the jiva, and not for Brahman, and when the jiva attains spiritual illumination, their unreal experience of duality comes to an end and is realized to have never truly existed to begin with. So from beginning to end, and at all times, the original higher non-duality remains pure, pristine, unconditioned and intact while sustaining the contingent unreal perception of duality at lower ontological levels for the jivas.

[Anonymous No.16951132]

>>16951088
what do u think of jesus and christianity ?

[Anonymous No.16951217]

>>16951132
I like Jesus and I feel a certain affinity for Christianity. I agree with Hindu, Sufi and Neoplatonic conceptions of God more then I agree with what Christian theology generally teaches but I don't take issue with Christianity itself and think it's much better to be a Christian than a materialist or whatever. It is my intention to eventually read most of the major Christian Neoplatonists and mystics despite not being Christian myself.

[Anonymous No.16951228]

>>16951217
*and I think it's much better

[Anonymous No.16951262]

>>16951103
(3) The third definition of falsity is also by Prakashatma which runs thus: ‘Falsity is that which* though beginningless and positive is sublated by right knowledge.’3 Vyasatirtha objects that appearance or illusion cannot be beginningless nor can it be positive nor can die world be sublated by knowledge. Illusion is due to defects in the causes of knowledge and so knowledge sublates the non-existent thing. But the world is neither non-existent nor is its knowledge due to any defects. Hence it cannot be sublated by knowledge.

Madhusudana replies that though avidyd is neither positive nor negative, it is called ‘positive’ because it is not merely negative as it is generally mistaken to be. As Vyasatirtha himself admits that it is only the appearance of the non-existent ‘shell-silver’ as the existent ‘silver’ that is sublated, similarly the world-appearance, though ultimately unreal, is taken as ‘real’ during empirical life and is sublated by the immediate experience of Brahma, the ground on which it is super-imposed. The sublation of the illusory objects like ‘shell-silver* and also the world-objects is possible only when the ground-reality (shell in the former case and Brahma in the latter case) is directly realised and not before. The world-appearance is beginningless because its locus, Brahma, is beginningless.

[Anonymous No.16951271]

>>16951262
(4) The fourth definition of falsity is given by Chitsukha in Tattvapradipika which is as follows: ‘Falsity is the counter-entity of its absolute negation located in its own substratum.’1 Madhusudana explains it thus: ‘Falsity is the appearance in the locus of its absolute negation.* Vyasatlrtha objects that according to such definitions falsity becomes present as well as absent at the same time and in the same locus. This reveals utter self-contradictions in the Advaita position. This sweeps away all distinctions between existence and
non-existence and as such even practical existence cannot be claimed for the world.

Madhusudana replies that falsity (miihyatva) or avidya is not reality, but a self-contradictory appearance, so it is possible for it to be both present and absent in the same place and at the same time. Moreover, as has been shown before, only the apparent can be negated. Negation is rooted in the real, which is the negation of that negation and in itself is positive. Thus the apparent object and its negation are located in the same ground and the negation of this negation is identical with the ground.

(5) The fifth definition is taken from Anandabodha’s Nyayamakaranda and runs as: ‘Falsity is that which is different from the real. The real is defined as that which is never contradicted and Brahma alone is real in this sense. The unreal is defined as absolute non-being (tuchchha) like the hare’s horn which can never even appear in knowledge. All our empirical experiences including pratibhasa (illusory objects, dream-objects, etc.) and vyavahara (world-objects) fall within the sphere of the indescribable either as real or as unreal (sadasadaniruachaniya) which is treated as false.1 As the unreal, the absolute non-being, is below our empirical experience, it is ruled out of the above definition and the false is defined as ‘different from the Real’ meaning ‘the apparent* including pratibhasa and vyavahara. This explanation rejects the objection of Vyasatirtha that ‘different from the real' means only ‘the unreal'.

[Anonymous No.16951311]

>>16951217
How would you respond to those who see in mystical states, union with the whole (the realization of Brahman) understood, a simple particular state of the brain?

some reach similar states through drugs, for example.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceanic_feeling#Other_explanations
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholarly_approaches_to_mysticism#Inducement_of_mystical_experience

[Anonymous No.16951324]

>>16941103
Seethe, but also dilate.

[Anonymous No.16951346]

>>16951311
For example, it is common, with certain drugs, to reach a state that adepts call "ego death", where the ego dies and the addict feels united to the absolute. these states are observable and quasi-explainable with an MRI, and their subjective descriptions resemble those reported by mystics: the "death" of the ego (jiva) which leaves only the totality (brahman) : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fana_(Sufism)


I encourage you to read this (and browse this site) : https://qualiacomputing.com/2020/05/19/5-meo-dmt-awakenings-from-naive-realism-to-symmetrical-enlightenment/

[Anonymous No.16951381]

>>16951346
>There is a mind-independent world out there and you never get to experience it directly. In some sense, we each live in a private skull-bound world-simulation that tracks the fitness-relevant features of our environment. Hence, during meditation, dreaming, or psychedelic states you are not accessing any sort of external reality directly, but rather, exploring possible configurations and qualities of your inner world-simulation. This is something that Leo may implicitly not realize. In particular, interpreting 5-MeO-DMT experiences through direct realism (also called naïve realism – the view that you experience the world directly through your senses) would make you think that you are literally merging with the entire cosmos on the drug. Whereas interpreting those experiences with indirect realism merely entails that your inner boundaries are dissolving. In other words, the partitions inside your world-simulation are what implements the feeling of the self-other duality. And since 5-MeO-DMT dissolves inner boundaries, it feels as though you are becoming one with your surroundings (and the rest of reality).

[Anonymous No.16951387]

>>16951311
brainlets fails to understand that they value psychedelics only because they value materialism. And as the feeling of enlightenment fades (which proves it's not enlightenment), they need more drug to get it back.

And because they now have a view opposite to what they believed before, it means their view is truer. They fail to think outside the box.

So The psychedelic experience is a doorway which leads to a hallway which leads to only what you want to find within yourself.

In other terms, a drug is nothing but a high-yield (fast but not perfect) technique to reach partly what your reason and heart cannot achieve fully in your opinion. If anything, it is a total lack of confidence in your reason and in your abilities to philosophy to be at ease with life.

[Anonymous No.16951570]

>>16951387
your message reminds me of this (pic related)

is this what you think? that the experience of non-duality is not awakening? but how to explain that the "practical" experience of this metaphysical position is attainable and explicable by purely material means? (drugs, dissolution of the thinking ego from internal borders, which provokes the sensation of non-duality).

you don't have the impression that the metaphysical non-duality on which the doctrines of enlightenment are based comes from this experience that we now know how to explain? and if it is not the experience of non-duality that demonstrates this position, what proves that it is the truth? knowing that the non-dualist paths must necessarily abandon reason at some point.

[Anonymous No.16951627]

>>16951311
I know from my own experience that psychedelics and metaphysical/mystical realization are still two qualitatively different experiences in spite in their certain parallels, and I don't consider the materialist explanation of the brain producing consciousness to be true to begin with. What other people want to believe about such things doesn't really concern me, if a person is going to write off the possibility of genuine mystic states as being caused by changes in brain patterns then to me they seem like someone who lacks an intuitive grasp of spirituality and I wouldn't take much else they would say about religion, mysticism or metaphysics very seriously.

[Anonymous No.16951816]

>>16951627
what do u think of prayer? does praying a personal god can work? because isvara/krishna are illusions

Btw I think you might like this quote from Guénon on the Gita (I translate):

> Now, it will be easy to understand that Bhagavat, being identified with the Supreme Principle, is none other than the unconditioned Âtmâ; and this is true in any case, whether this Âtmâ is considered in the "macrocosmic" or in the "microcosmic" order, depending on whether one wants to apply it to various points of view; we cannot obviously think of reproducing all the developments we have already given elsewhere on this subject1. What interests us most directly here is the application that we can call "microcosmic", i.e., the application that is made to each being considered in particular; in this respect, Krishna and Arjuna represent respectively the "Self" and the " me ", personality and individuality, which are unconditioned Âtmâ and jîvâtmâ. Krishna's teaching to Arjuna is, from this inner point of view, the supra-rational intellectual intuition by which the "Self" communicates itself to the " me " when the latter is "qualified" and prepared in such a way that this communication can actually take place.

[Anonymous No.16951829]

>>16951816
> It should be noted, for this is of the utmost importance for the matter at hand, that Krishna and Arjuna are represented as riding on the same chariot; this chariot is the "vehicle" of the being envisaged in its state of manifestation; and, while Arjuna fights, Krishna drives the chariot without fighting, that is, without being himself engaged in the action. Indeed, the battle in question symbolizes action, in a quite general way, in a form appropriate to the nature and function of the Kshatriyas, for whom the book is more specifically intended;2 the battlefield (Kshêtra) is the domain of action, in which the individual develops his possibilities; and this action does not affect the princely, permanent and immutable being, but concerns only the individual "living soul" (jîvâtmâ). The two who are mounted on the same chariot are thus the same as the two birds of which it is spoken in the Upanishads: "Two birds, inseparably united companions residing on the same tree; one eats the fruit of the tree, the other looks without eating. 1 Here too, with a different symbolism to represent the action, the first of these two birds is jîvâtmâ, and the second is unconditioned Âtmâ; the same is also true of the "two that entered the cave," which is discussed in another text;2 and if these two are always closely united, it is because they are truly one in the face of absolute reality, for jîvâtmâ can be distinguished from Âtmâ only in an illusory mode.

What a beautiful interpretation of the Gita!

[Anonymous No.16952137]

>>16951829
>What a beautiful interpretation of the Gita!
interpretation is always coping projections of intellectuals addicted to mental gymnastics glorified by atheists. Symbolism is really the lowest of the low and escapism, which is why women love it so much.

[Anonymous No.16952578]

>>16952137
Well... That's your interpretation

[Anonymous No.16952918]

>>16943549
>>16943635
Your replies are tainted by reddit spacing. I cannot take you seriously.

[Anonymous No.16953167]

>>16951387
if enlightenment is necessary more than once, doesn't that mean Brahman is unenlightenend?

[Anonymous No.16953198]

>>16941096
>This book is an excellent anthology of essays on Christian Apologetics written by a group of young philosophers.
>>16941137
Since jannies clearly will not do their fucking job, you all just keep circlejerking each other.
But what's funny is the infighting. You all know you are irrational crazies, and yet the ones you have it out for the most is exactly your own kind.

[Anonymous No.16953832]

>>16953198
>>This book is an excellent anthology of essays on Christian Apologetics written by a group of young philosophers.

[Anonymous No.16954933]

>>16941096

I haven't read this, but reincarnation never made sense to me mathematically because of the variation in the human population, iirc 40% of all humans who have ever lived are alive right now

reincarnation can only make sense with new human souls being created too, otherwise, I am sure it would be possible to create a mathematical refutation of reincarnation

[Anonymous No.16954948]

>>16954933
this refutation does not really work because Buddhist reincarnation is not a closed system: there are many worlds and a human being who is born may have been an animal or a god in his previous life, which explains why, from our point of view, the population may increase. it is a system of communicating vessels between many worlds.

[Anonymous No.16955808]

>>16951816
>what do u think of prayer? does praying a personal god can work? because isvara/krishna are illusions
bump
interesting question

[Anonymous No.16955933]

adi shankara, the one who said to enter in the body of a king to have sexual relations, and that to the awaken the good and the evil did not exist any more, so to pray or let a hundred people die was the same? funny vision of holiness. i prefer jesus or the buddha.

source: https://hinduism.stackexchange.com/a/15902

[Anonymous No.16955946]

>>16955933
jesus and the buddha: love and help people
adi shankara: just let people die bruh, no evil at my level i swear

guess who the saints are

[Anonymous No.16956267]

>>16951816
>>16951829
Where is this from?

[Anonymous No.16956309]

>>16942896
Casuistry AND you were too stupid and arrogant to read the whole thing

No wonder people hate you

[Anonymous No.16956339]

Is this the advaita thread? Post informative pictures about advaita

[Anonymous No.16956346]

This picture has helpful sources on advaita and its rejection by most Hindus as heretical and buddhist in nature.

[Anonymous No.16956813]

That guy looks like a pedo and his arguments are superficial

[Anonymous No.16957062]

>>16951816
>>Btw I think you might like this quote from Guénon on the Gita (I translate):
ha yes the guenon fad , it explains a lot of things

[Anonymous No.16957177]

>>16952137
So you believe those gods really exist?

[Anonymous No.16957609]

>>16952137
t. crypto-atheist (i.e. protestant e.h.g.o.) with no understanding of what symbolism means in a traditional sense

[Anonymous No.16957685]

>>16951570
What book is that pic from?

[Anonymous No.16957717]

>>16943368
good retort, bro

[Anonymous No.16957863]

>>16951570
>that the experience of non-duality is not awakening?
Yes nonduality is not enlightenment in buddhism. Non duality is what enlightenment is according to scholars centuries after the buddha, ie the vedantists and mahayana.

Even the jains don't say non-duality is entanglement, for fuck sake.

[Anonymous No.16957871]

>>16951570
>>you don't have the impression that the metaphysical non-duality on which the doctrines of enlightenment are based
Only intellectuals say metaphysics is a basis for enlightenment.

[Anonymous No.16957876]

>>16941096
One thing I've noticed about religion and supernatural woo-woo is that it's utter bullshit.

[Anonymous No.16957898]

>>16941129
>You don't need to "destroy" every religion individually.
So we don't need to care about feminism now that Isis blew up some old idols. Gotcha.

[Anonymous No.16958769]

>>16955933
>>16955946
Wtf

[Anonymous No.16958788]

>>16956267
Études sur l’Hindouisme (Studies in Hinduism), chap. Atmâ-Gîtâ,

[Anonymous No.16959076]

Bump

[Anonymous No.16959495]

>>16955933
>>16955946
based

[Anonymous No.16959778]

>>16955933
>>16955946
The reality is that the metaphysics of Jesus, Buddha, and Adi Shankara do not allow for love or imbue it with any special characteristic. Learn to read.

[Anonymous No.16959858]

>>16959076
>nigga acts like he made this when they and more, in much greater depth too, have been known for thousands of years