Plus in regards to Buddhism behind different than other religions is still the science. - XianThis is a science inquiry forum, so if you are going to say there is science, you should show the science. Plus, it would be good for you to match up what you are thinking is true with what you can verify as actually true.
Also - did you mean to put this comment on this thread? It seems out of place?
Also – did you mean to put this comment on this thread? It seems out of place?I wondered the same thing.
This is a science inquiry forum, so if you are going to say there is science, you should show the science. Plus, it would be good for you to match up what you are thinking is true with what you can verify as actually true.Yes. Xain, I'm not sure whether you realize that Buddhism isn't unique in "having science behind it." All religions, systems of meditation, etc., have been studied, in terms of effects on the brain (and that is the only kind of "science" that would apply here) ... I am getting ready to post on that separately right now.
If you mean Buddhism has been proven “scientifically true” in terms of physics or whatever, I’ll disagree: no religion or philosophy can be “proven” this way, and if it had, civilization would have stopped in its tracks to pay attention. Any attempt to match up ancient teachings, traditions and texts with modern study about the universe and reality requires modern interpretations that didn’t exist at the time.
The "inevitable" demise is the illusion itself. There limitation of having only those "options" is the illusion - the notion of "utility" is what is samsara/maya. When the man realizes that he is neither the doer of action, nor the enjoyer of the strawberry, has no volition nor efficacy and that he is the tiger himself as well as the strawberry as well as the man - then he has metaphorically climbed up and killed the tiger. You are right in the sense that it is not an "option" - killing the tiger is the reality, the true reality, beyond the "options." It is scary because it is not meant for the faint hearted, However, on a tangible non spiritual level you are correct, however if after reading this you still believe that you exist as an individual conscious being in between birth and death and have to get "the most you can" out of "life" then I have not done a good job with this, and have failed you. Truth is you don't need the strawberry, never did - and yes you can "win" against the tiger. But don't take my word for it, try it yourself.The above is is to show that Buddhism has a bit lore philosophical and logical rigor behind it than others.
Same with the above, it’s a difference in how reality based their works are.
And as for science:
Meditation, the brain researcher Francisco Varela told me before he died in 2001, confirms the Buddhist doctrine of anatta, which holds that the self is an illusion. Varela contended that anatta has also been corroborated by cognitive science, which has discovered that our perception of our minds as discrete, unified entities is an illusion foisted upon us by our clever brains.
Further evidence of the science behind the no self and sexuality: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.huffpost.com/entry/sex-and-the-illusion-of-p_b_334491/amp
and another regarding gender as an illusion: pali canon - Male & Female - Is gender an illusion? - Buddhism Stack Exchange
The short answer though is that Buddhism is indeed different from the rest and you can’t just lump it in with them.
The above is is to show that Buddhism has a bit lore philosophical and logical rigor behind it than othersInteresting. How did you came to this conclusion? Did you study all the major religions in depth? How did you decide the above was more true than this:
Christianity Teaches the Correct WorldviewAmong all the religions and philosophies, how do we know Christianity is true? While there are many ways to address the question, let’s begin by saying that Christianity makes sense of the world around us. In other words, it presents the most correct worldview based on the world in which we live.
There are three worldviews that lie at the foundation of all religions and philosophies: theism, naturalism, and pantheism. Theism teaches there is a personal God who created the universe. Naturalism teaches there is no divine being and that the universe is the result of time and chance. Pantheism teaches that the universe is eternal and that the divine is an impersonal force made up of all things. All three worldviews cannot be true at the same time and if one of them is true, the other two must be false.
The evidence from our study of the universe points to theism. Unfortunately, time will allow me to go over only three lines of evidence.
The first is the argument from first cause or the cosmological argument, which states if something exists, it must have either come from something else, come from nothing, or have always existed. What is the most reasonable conclusion of the three for the existence of the universe?..
Or this?
Evidence for the validity of IslamPraise be to Allah
The evidence for the validity of Islam and the truthfulness of the Prophethood of the Prophet Muhammad (blessings and peace of Allah be upon him) is abundant and can hardly be enumerated. This evidence is sufficient to convince any wise and fair-minded person who is impartially and sincerely seeking the truth. We can sum up some of this proof as follows.
The evidence of sound human nature
The call of Islam is in accordance with sound human nature, as is indicated by the words of Allah, may He be glorified and exalted (interpretation of the meaning):
“So set you (O Muhammad (blessings and peace of Allah be upon him)) your face towards the religion of pure Islamic Monotheism Hanifa (worship none but Allah Alone) Allah’s Fitrah (i.e. Allah’s Islamic Monotheism), with which He has created mankind. No change let there be in Khalqillah (i.e. the Religion of Allah Islamic Monotheism), that is the straight religion, but most of men know not”…
Or this?
How Do I Know That the Book of Mormon Is True?I have known for a long time that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, but only in the last couple of years, while serving as a Mormon missionary, was I finally able to put into words the way that my answer came. There is a promise given by Moroni at the end of the Book of Mormon that if a person reads, ponders, and prays to know the Book of Mormon is true, the truth will be manifest to them by the power of the Holy Ghost. (See Moroni 10:3-5)
As I read this verse I realized how I know that the Book of Mormon is true. I know that the Book of Mormon is true because when I read it my heart is changed by the Holy Ghost. I don’t simply feel that it is true. It motivates me to change and to be more Christlike. I want to be a better person. My very desires are changed. My desire to sin is removed and I am given a greater desire to serve my Father in Heaven and my fellowmen.
I invite anyone who may read this to read the Book of Mormon along with the Bible. I can promise, just as the prophet Moroni promises, that anyone who sincerely reads and ponders the Book of Mormon and asks God in faith to know that it is true will know by the power of the Holy Ghost that it is true.
Varela contended that anatta has also been corroborated by cognitive science, which has discovered that our perception of our minds as discrete, unified entities is an illusion foisted upon us by our clever brains. -- XianYour links are not science. Pointing out that we are made of water doesn’t prove Buddhism. The Valera thing was interesting, but in the end, it’s a legitimate scientist who also liked Buddhism and found it interesting to try to connect the two. I found his Mind & Life Institute, which has been around for a long time. What scientific proof of Buddhism has come out of it? The idea of Mindfulness has gained acceptance and has some value, but that doesn’t mean that it defines life or is a path to removing all suffering or finding some other true version of reality.
I randomly picked one video and the cat jumped on my lap so I ended listening to a lot of it. Most of it is random connections that are unsubstantiated. And if you listen carefully, when he quotes Einstein about the “optical delusion of consciousness”, Einstein says we can’t free ourselves from this completely. The quote is on a slide at 46 min 20secs. He’s talking about being compassionate and embracing our world, not disconnecting from it.
A finer point is made at 23min. You might want to start a little earlier, but he makes a joke as an aside. He’s talking about those who think they are enlightened, think they have risen above their base humanity, “anyone who says they have transcended the self”, is fooling themselves. He laughs, and everyone in the audience gets the joke. He says he would challenge them with, “And who is it that is claiming that?” This is an MIT scientist who has been doing this stuff all his life. He is your scientific proof. And he’s saying you can’t transcend the self. The self may be an illusion, but it’s part of who we are. We understand ourselves better by recognizing that and deepening our relationship with the world, not by trying to escape it.
The link from the huff post article seems to be proof enough about the body being an illusion, though I can’t shake that something feels off about it
something feels off about itYour instinct is correct on this. There are people who study religion and psychology and make useful conclusions about how we evolved and how ancient writers had some insight but didn't have the data to back it up like we do. Then there's guys like the one in the HuffPo who just connect some random facts like how we are made of water but we call ourselves solid. They are riding on the coattails of those who are doing actual scientific work. They see a scientific paper that adds legitimacy to Buddhist thought, and they say, "hey, I do Buddhist thought, I can say, blah, blah, blah, Buddhism." People eat it up like the junk food that it is.
You have to do the work of critical thinking for every article. One article might have some actual science about meditation or mindfulness, but that does not add any value to all the spiritual garbage out there. Even though both might claim to be based on Buddhist teachings, they aren’t equal.
L, do you think cats might be secret Buddhists?
The link from the huff post article seems to be proof enough about the body being an illusion,I'm still curious, Xain, about how you have decided that a small handful of articles prove Buddhism is true, when there are similar articles about every belief system, religion and philosophy. Particularly Christianity.
Some time ago, I took the time & effort to post a long list of Christian philosophers, many of whom were foundational for how Western Society developed, and whose names we recognize. Did you even see it?
There has likely been more written about the truth of Christianity than the truth of Buddhism.
Did you choose Buddhism without fully exploring ALL other possibilities?
Could you be wrong?
though I can’t shake that something feels off about it@Lausten is right. Could this be trying to tell you something?
Well the thing about Buddhism and schools of thought like it is that the logic behind it is hard to ignore. I mean sure there were many arguments in the past for the Existence of god: Watchmaker analogy, Pascal’s wager, etc, but these have all been shown to be faulty and easy to defeat.
But Buddhism and it’s ilk is harder because it’s rooted far more in human psychology. I can’t dismiss it like the Christian ones because at least the possibility of a god existing is easy to write off. But stuff like:
Yeah, it's tough not to judge the lower stages. You really gotta grow into deep Yellow and Turquoise in order to be able to look upon Blue and the other stages without animosity. At Turquoise there is a deep realization that everything within reality is necessary and perfect. When you realize that, you see that every person is precisely where they must be. It makes no sense any longer to blame or criticize people for their ignorance because they know not what they do and they cannot help themselves.The only way to attain peace for yourself is to totally drop all judgment of people and reality. And this can only happen by becoming conscious of the truth of nonduality. You have to realize that self/other are literally identical.
If you accomplish that, you will be left with unconditional love for all. You will see the world the way God sees it: perfect as it is.
One of the biggest obstacles to enlightenment is giving up all your judgments, demonizations, and criticisms of reality.
Imagine being unable to judge anyone or anything ever again. Such a notion scares most people. Unconditional love is very radical. The ego cannot stand it. It’s too dangerous from the ego’s perspective.
At the deepest levels of nonduality all action is pointless. You could just shoot yourself and it would be okay. It’s all perfect. Teaching is pointless of course. But in practice you will probably just carry on with life, for shits and giggles, and probably teach.
The world cannot be improved in any way at all. It is an Absolute singularity, and everything is already contained within it for eternity. But this is not something that can be explained, and it certainly sits outside of Spiral Dynamics so I don’t even talk about it. You will only discover this for yourself, at the very deepest levels of nondual consciousness. At which point, you will no longer need me or anyone else to guide you.
It’s based on this: http://www.cruxcatalyst.com/wp-conte...amic-image.jpg and this is the thread: https://www.actualized.org/forum/top...video-is-good/
Or to put it in a quote: Shunryu Suzuki - Everything is perfect and there is always...
“Everything is perfect and there is always room for improvement.”
Xain, I think you just told a joke. Nice.
You really gotta grow into deep Yellow and Turquoise in order to be able to look upon Blue and the other stages without animosity....We discussed Spiral Dynamics before. How do you see Spiral Dynamics confirming the truth of Buddhism, specifically? Here are Christians saying it proves the truth of Christianity.* [By the way – as an aside – I haven’t yet found evidence that Clare Graves, Don Beck and Chris Cowan were/are themselves Buddhists. If true, I wonder why the obvious truth of Buddhism didn’t hit them, given that Spiral Dynamics is their own model…?]
Next:
If you accomplish that, you will be left with unconditional love for all. You will see the world the way God sees it: perfect as it is.But you questioned this, right? You posted recently asking if the world is perfect. (So did it not seem logical or obvious) to you?
Last, teachings on the importance of “unconditional love,” and how to attain it, exist in most world religions and philosophies:
In short, Xain, is it possible we are talking about “truths,” but that they did not originate with Buddhism alone, and Buddhism alone does not teach them?
If so, then how could Buddhism be “the” truth?
Is it possible your your certainty about Buddhism comes down to confirmation bias?
A confirmation bias is a type of cognitive bias that involves favoring information that confirms your previously existing beliefs or biases.____
*Apologies – something was funky with one or more of these URLs, so my post would not go through. I had to do it this way. You can Google the titles.
I can’t deny I have a bias to Buddhism but I was referring to how convincing the way they put it is. I can ignore the god bit but Buddhism has reason to be their stuff.
Same in regards to the self:
The arguments seem sound and convincing.
Plus when it comes to “everything is necessary and perfect” it’s like yin and yang. You can’t have one without the other: good and evil, beauty and ugly, etc.
Congratulations @snowcity,
This is to announce that out of anyone on the planet, you are the very best Yes-Butter of all time.
It’s because while religions do share many traits the thing about Buddhism is the logic behind its arguments. It hasn’t been refuted unlike the watchmaker analogy and other arguments for god used by theists. And if you say the video you c am see their arguments about there being no self are solid too, but I don’t see atheists arguing them. Rather they go for the easy marks of other religions
Buddhism isn’t abusing as many children or trying to get their religion into science classes or trying to keep laws that discriminate against LGBT or rescind Roe v Wade.
And some of their monks know Shaolin Kung Fu (or the milder Shaolin Wu Shu). You must snatch the pebbles from the master’s hand, Xain glosshoppa.
