Yep, rebirth again...

[Ryumon]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I've never thought that "right" and "wrong" were meant to be "correct" and "incorrect," but rather "appropriate" and "inappropriate." In other words, there are no absolutes, but rather the rightness and wrongness of what is ideal, but relative to circumstances...

[Jundo]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

Let me just say that some of these kinds of discussions can turn into "chicken or the egg" debates, so let me just say this ...

1 - Whether the mind is in the brain or somewhere else, there is no doubt of such interconnection of the so-called "outer" world, the senses and the "inner" experience of 'self and the world' which results ... that we might really also drop the idea of "mind" as "inside" or "outside" from a Buddhist perspective. You are not just what you experience behind your eyes, but the eyes and what is in from of the eyes too! Nor does it matter if one is awake or asleep, alive or dead! :shock:

2 - Whatever the Precepts are ... whether commandments writ eternally in the fabric of the universe, or something natural to the human experience, or something that some guys made up ... they express a simple truth: If we fall into anger, we create an angry life within us and anger outside. Same with greed, violence, jealousy, divisions and all the rest. Live in peace, ease, gentleness, harmony, yielding ... and so becomes life and the world.

So, give up some of the debating and just live this way. It ain't rocket science! 8)

Gassho,J

[Shokai]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

Thank you Jundo

[Kyonin]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

Whatever the Precepts are ... whether commandments writ eternally in the fabric of the universe, or something natural to the human experience, or something that some guys made up ... they express a simple truth: If we fall into anger, we create an angry life within us and anger outside. Same with greed, violence, jealousy, divisions and all the rest. Live in peace, ease, gentleness, harmony, yielding ... and so becomes life and the world.

So, give up some of the debating and just live this way. It ain't rocket science! 8)

That's exactly what I mean with my little rambling up there.

Thank you Jundo Sensei.

Deep gassho

[disastermouse]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I would contest your assertion that in "deep, dreamless sleep" you are "egoically, ... effectively dead." The brain, while not dreaming, is doing a lot of other things, which are consolidating your memories, and (re)constructing your "self." There is no break in the thread of consciousness; it's just that you can't detect that consciousness.

Do you see what you did there? I never implied that the brain was effectively dead, I argued that the ego was effectively dead. It's not that I can't detect the consciousness, it's that during deep dreamless sleep, there is no 'I', regardless of the minimal reparative activities of the brain. Brain activity =/= mind without remainder, because although the two are correlative, not all brain activity results in self-awareness. Also, the two realms although correlative, are nowhere near the same. Serotonin is powerful in feelings of well-being, but the internal experience of happiness is not registered as "Wow, I have increased levels of certain brain chemicals today!". Likewise, each realm affects the other, which is why antidepressants do not effectively render cognitive or other forms of psychotherapy utterly useless. This is to say that although the temptation is to reduce mind to a one-way projection of brain, this is hardly the full truth of it - altering the mind's landscape through subjective (meditation) and intersubjective (therapy) means can at times have a pronounced effect on the functions of the brain.

Because the brain does create the mind, which, in turn, creates the self (or, since we're in a Zen buddhist forum, the illusion of the self). The consciousness during sleep is below the level that you can notice. And I'd see that even during dreams this is the case. You only remember them when you awaken during a dream, yet you dream many times during the night.

How can you be so certain that the brain creates the mind? All we know of the brain is, sad to say, filtered through subjective and intersubjective processes. When we observe the brain, it doesn't just lie there given - see Sellars 'Myth of the Given' - the data is interpreted wholly through internal processes first. This isn't to say that nothing is there, but that what we ultimately think it is is highly dependent on non-'objective processes.

Chet

[Ryumon]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

From my reading, it seems clear that there is no doubt that the brain creates the mind. However, the question of whether the brain or the mind create the self is a totally different story. While we get input from much more than just the senses-connected-to-the-brain, that's where thinking happens. I don't think any scientists dispute that. (And by brain, I mean all of the structures in the skull, not just the cortex.)

[disastermouse]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

From my reading, it seems clear that there is no doubt that the brain creates the mind. However, the question of whether the brain or the mind create the self is a totally different story. While we get input from much more than just the senses-connected-to-the-brain, that's where thinking happens. I don't think any scientists dispute that. (And by brain, I mean all of the structures in the skull, not just the cortex.)

Keep in mind that most people have no doubt that there is a self. It's only when you look that you find that at the very least, this is not always the case.

I just want to add that I do not find this conversation the least bit acrimonious. Please let me know if it feels like it is becoming so.

Chet

[Ryumon]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I don't feel that way. I'm all in favor of lively debate. I think we're all after the same things, and discussing complicated subjects like this is a learning experience.

[Hans]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

Hello,

I just finished reading the German translation of what seems to be the following:

http://santifm.org/santipada/2010/rebir ... -buddhism/


Obviously this article doesn't resolve anything per se, but I find it highly interesting to see how much variety of interpretation there exists even "just" with the early Buddhist perspective.

I can highly recommend this article (at least the German version).

In the mean time, just chop water and cary wood...or something like that

Gassho,

Hans Chudo Mongen

[Graceleejenkins]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I feel scientific thinking is critical to our survival and continued development. If you cannot think of a way to disprove something (even if it may not be able to be tested at this time technologically), then you should be a skeptic and you should be careful about basing decisions on that belief. Basing decisions on these kinds of beliefs are how witches get burned at the stake. In science, everything is open to being disproved.

I don’t see how rebirth can be disproved at this time. Therefore, I am a skeptic and I wouldn’t base decisions on this concept. Personally, I do believe that I am part of the whole, the whole continues after someone dies, so in some way “I” continue, but probably not in the way rebirth is intended. So, I don’t live my life with an eye to rebirth. Gassho, Grace.

[disastermouse]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I feel scientific thinking is critical to our survival and continued development. If you cannot think of a way to disprove something (even if it may not be able to be tested at this time technologically), then you should be a skeptic and you should be careful about basing decisions on that belief. Basing decisions on these kinds of beliefs are how witches get burned at the stake. In science, everything is open to being disproved.

I'm not disregarding science, but I acknowledge its limits. What does or can science say about morals or values? Furthermore, what can it say about the internal experience of being a human being? We do have an internal science, however - I call it 'Zen'.

Chet

[Jundo]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I feel scientific thinking is critical to our survival and continued development. If you cannot think of a way to disprove something (even if it may not be able to be tested at this time technologically), then you should be a skeptic and you should be careful about basing decisions on that belief. Basing decisions on these kinds of beliefs are how witches get burned at the stake. In science, everything is open to being disproved.

I don’t see how rebirth can be disproved at this time. Therefore, I am a skeptic and I wouldn’t base decisions on this concept. Personally, I do believe that I am part of the whole, the whole continues after someone dies, so in some way “I” continue, but probably not in the way rebirth is intended. So, I don’t live my life with an eye to rebirth. Gassho, Grace.

I tend to agree with what you say here, Grace, and tend to be skeptical and strongly disbelieve anything which seems to have no scientifically verifiable backing or which has testable evidence which seems to point very much against the proposition. I do not think the moon is actually made of green cheese.

But on the other hand, I think we have to also be skeptical of an overly broad faith in science, as if science has all the answers (yet or ever). We need to be careful of asserting that anything science cannot prove ... or even currently seems to point against, is necessarily untrue. I often say that people of future centuries will look back at many of our firmly held beliefs and chuckle at our quaintness ("Oh Martha, do you know that those primitive folks way back in the 21st century still believed in Darwin and the Law of Gravity!?"). I truly believe so. Perhaps (though seemingly most unlikely) the moon is made of green cheese.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

So, for that reason, I tend not to say that "literal post-mortem rebirth" and "1-to-1 Karmic payback" are definitely not the case ... just that I am skeptical to the point of not believing, tend to doubt very greatly based on the evidence so far, and (anyway) it is not so vital to practice here and now.

And as Chet said, I think that there are some things that science might never grasp, and maybe only poets ... such as the beauty of a summer day (even if science finds the formula for it), a warm embrace, a child's smile.

I wrote this on another thread, about Buddhism and magical powers ...

See the miracles and magic all around life, and our lives too.

viewtopic.php?p=49912#p49912

Gassho, J

[Ryumon]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I feel scientific thinking is critical to our survival and continued development. If you cannot think of a way to disprove something (even if it may not be able to be tested at this time technologically), then you should be a skeptic and you should be careful about basing decisions on that belief. Basing decisions on these kinds of beliefs are how witches get burned at the stake. In science, everything is open to being disproved.

I'm not disregarding science, but I acknowledge its limits. What does or can science say about morals or values? Furthermore, what can it say about the internal experience of being a human being? We do have an internal science, however - I call it 'Zen'.

Chet

All due respect, but that's the kind of thing you hear religious people say in debates with atheist. Why should science have anything to say about moral values? No more reason for that than for science to have something to say about art. It can say certain things about our internal experiences, but not about our subjective experiences, other than to posits reasons to explain why we feel what we do.

[disastermouse]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I feel scientific thinking is critical to our survival and continued development. If you cannot think of a way to disprove something (even if it may not be able to be tested at this time technologically), then you should be a skeptic and you should be careful about basing decisions on that belief. Basing decisions on these kinds of beliefs are how witches get burned at the stake. In science, everything is open to being disproved.

I'm not disregarding science, but I acknowledge its limits. What does or can science say about morals or values? Furthermore, what can it say about the internal experience of being a human being? We do have an internal science, however - I call it 'Zen'.

Chet

All due respect, but that's the kind of thing you hear religious people say in debates with atheist. Why should science have anything to say about moral values? No more reason for that than for science to have something to say about art. It can say certain things about our internal experiences, but not about our subjective experiences, other than to posits reasons to explain why we feel what we do.

Further respect, but it seems you're on the whole agreeing with me. Does science recognize that all its splendor rushes headlong through a subjective primacy that it acknowledges it cannot access? Of course not. It takes such primacy for granted and then pretends it's just dealing with fact - ignoring that NOTHING is simply given.

Chet

[Ryumon]

Re: Yep, rebirth again...

I'm not sure exactly what you mean. But if you're saying that "science" is erroneous because it doesn't take into account subjectivity, I think you're mistaken. Scientists know that subjective elements affect a large number of experiments. Look at drug testing - double-blind trials are used to eliminate subjective influence. Even the social scientists are strongly aware of what is called the "observer's paradox," whereby the presence of an experimenter affects the results of the experiment.