Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

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Assaji
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Assaji »

Hi Rui Soisa,
Rui Sousa wrote:I see the brain as the rupa that supports the sixth sense, in the same way the ear, with all its mechanics, supports earing.
In Vibhanga 253 there's indeed a mention of rupa that supports the sixth sense and the mind:
http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=12799" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Metta
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Rui Sousa
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Rui Sousa »

Dmytro wrote:Hi Rui Soisa,
Rui Sousa wrote:I see the brain as the rupa that supports the sixth sense, in the same way the ear, with all its mechanics, supports earing.
In Vibhanga 253 there's indeed a mention of rupa that supports the sixth sense and the mind:
http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=12799" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Metta
Hi Dmytro,

Thank you for the reference.

I have been discussing the concept of Namarupa very much latelly, but not in the context of Paticca-samuppada. For me, it makes much more sense that way: what "becomes" is this bound up and supported bundle of the four elements of rupa and the five elements of nama, both conditioned by kamma.

:anjali:
With Metta
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Alex123
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Alex123 »

Rui Sousa wrote: The leap from rupa to nama is something I don't understand. How electrical signals in the brain condition vedana, sañña, sankhara and viññana is beyond my understanding. But I can easily understand and accept the nama-rupa bound and mutual support relationship.
This is very difficult question. How does matter condition mind? Their properties are totally different:
Matter has a location, mind does not.
Matter can be seen, mind cannot.
Matter doesn't know, only mind knows.

If there is one quality, then there might not be a problem. But two different qualities? How can they interact?
daverupa
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by daverupa »

Related:

Double exposure: cutting across Buddhist and western discourses, by Bernard Faure & Janet Lloyd

"This book explores the possible relations between Western types of rationality and Buddhism. It also examines some clichés about Buddhism and questions the old antinomies of Western culture (“faith and reason,” or “idealism and materialism”). The use of the Buddhist notion of the Two Truths as a hermeneutic device leads to a double or multiple exposure that will call into question our mental habits and force us to ask questions differently, to think “in a new key.”

"Double Exposure is somewhat of an oddity. Written by a specialist for nonspecialists, it is not a book of vulgarization. Although it aims at a better integration of Western and Buddhist thought, it is not an exercise in comparative philosophy or religion. It is neither a contribution to Buddhist scholarship in the narrow sense, nor a contribution to some vague Western “spirituality.” Cutting across traditional disciplines and blurring established genres, it provides a leisurely but deeply insightful stroll through philosophical and literary texts, dreams, poetry, and paradoxes."
  • "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting oneself one protects others? By the pursuit, development, and cultivation of the four establishments of mindfulness. It is in such a way that by protecting oneself one protects others.

    "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting others one protects oneself? By patience, harmlessness, goodwill, and sympathy. It is in such a way that by protecting others one protects oneself.

- Sedaka Sutta [SN 47.19]
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Rui Sousa
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Rui Sousa »

Alex123 wrote:
Rui Sousa wrote: The leap from rupa to nama is something I don't understand. How electrical signals in the brain condition vedana, sañña, sankhara and viññana is beyond my understanding. But I can easily understand and accept the nama-rupa bound and mutual support relationship.
This is very difficult question. How does matter condition mind? Their properties are totally different:
Matter has a location, mind does not.
Matter can be seen, mind cannot.
Matter doesn't know, only mind knows.

If there is one quality, then there might not be a problem. But two different qualities? How can they interact?
I don't konw how they interact, but to see them interacting I just need to take some coffee. (a couple of beers would make the interaction more evident, but also less skilful)
With Metta
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kirk5a
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by kirk5a »

How about the fingers typing? How does that work, exactly? :shrug: It does happen, though, so there is no "problem." Unless we make one...
A centipede was happy – quite!
Until a toad in fun
Said, "Pray, which leg moves after which?"
This raised her doubts to such a pitch,
She fell exhausted in the ditch
Not knowing how to run.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centipede's_dilemma" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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Alex123
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Alex123 »

kirk5a wrote:How about the fingers typing? How does that work, exactly? :shrug: It does happen, though, so there is no "problem." Unless we make one...
Science can measure the physiology, kinetics, physics, biochemistry related to movement of fingers. Signal can be altered and that would alter the movement of fingers... If one would drink a lot, or take drugs, or too much anesthetics, etc, that would alter the movement of the body and fingers...

But specifics of interaction between mind and brain... That is a mystery.
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kirk5a
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by kirk5a »

Alex123 wrote: Science can measure the physiology, kinetics, physics, biochemistry related to movement of fingers. Signal can be altered and that would alter the movement of fingers... If one would drink a lot, or take drugs, or too much anesthetics, etc, that would alter the movement of the body and fingers...

But specifics of interaction between mind and brain... That is a mystery.
Has science measured intention yet?
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
daverupa
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by daverupa »

kirk5a wrote:Has science measured intention yet?
It's a known field of inquiry; here is an example:
[i]Science[/i], 2004 wrote:"Intention is central to the concept of voluntary action. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we compared conditions in which participants made self-paced actions and attended either to their intention to move or to the actual movement. When they attended to their intention rather than their movement, there was an enhancement of activity in the pre-supplementary motor area (pre-SMA). We also found activations in the right dorsal prefrontal cortexand left intraparietal cortex. Prefrontal activity, but not parietal activity, was more strongly coupled with activity in the pre-SMA. We conclude that activity in the pre-SMA reflects the representation of intention."
  • "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting oneself one protects others? By the pursuit, development, and cultivation of the four establishments of mindfulness. It is in such a way that by protecting oneself one protects others.

    "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting others one protects oneself? By patience, harmlessness, goodwill, and sympathy. It is in such a way that by protecting others one protects oneself.

- Sedaka Sutta [SN 47.19]
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Alex123
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Alex123 »

kirk5a wrote:Has science measured intention yet?
There is such POV. We can see brain and its workings. We can measure. We can alter the functioning of the mind by altering the brain. At least some mental states seem to correspond, and appear to be causally dependent on the brain. There is big problem with interaction to assume two phenomena (mind & brain).
Some scientists claim that mental state = brain state . So then the science DOES measure intention.
Nyana
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Nyana »

Alex123 wrote:
kirk5a wrote:Has science measured intention yet?
There is such POV. We can see brain and its workings. We can measure. We can alter the functioning of the mind by altering the brain. At least some mental states seem to correspond, and appear to be causally dependent on the brain. There is big problem with interaction to assume two phenomena (mind & brain).
Some scientists claim that mental state = brain state . So then the science DOES measure intention.
Well, for what it's worth, a point that should be acknowledged is that believing in the philosophy of physicalism based on the current Western scientific knowledge of consciousness is quite unsatisfactory. John Searle, quoted in The Future of Consciousness Studies:
  • At our present state of the investigation of consciousness, we don't know how it works and we need to try all kinds of different ideas.
Jerry A. Fodor, The Big Idea: Can There Be a Science of the Mind:
  • Nobody has the slightest idea how anything material could be conscious. Nobody even knows what it would be like to have the slightest idea about how anything material could be conscious.
Ned Block, "Consciousness," in A Companion to the Philosophy of Mind:
  • We have no conception of our physical or functional nature that allows us to understand how it could explain our subjective experience.... in the case of consciousness we have nothing -- zilch -- worthy of being called a research program, nor are there any substantive proposals about how to go about starting one.
Alan Wallace, Hidden Dimensions:
  • A true revolution in the mind sciences has been delayed by an enforced conformity to the unnatural ideological and methodological constraints imposed by the assumptions of scientific materialism, particularly neo-Darwinism. One such assumption is that mental phenomena are equivalent to neurophysiological processes in the brain, an empirically uncorroborated belief. If the first revolution in the mind sciences is to take place, such unsubstantiated ideas must be suspended and new methodologies must be employed that are uniquely suited to the scientific study of mental phenomena, including consciousness. In other words, science can either continue to let its study of the mind be dominated by the metaphysical assumptions of a well-established ideology or pursue the open-minded, empirical investigation of mental phenomena, even if it calls into question some of the most deeply held scientific beliefs based on classical physics and contemporary biology.
And just one area of investigation that isn't easily compatible with physicalism is the phenomenon of NDE experienced during cardiac arrest. Sam Parina, et al, A Qualitative and Quantitative Study of the Incidence, Features and Aetiology of Near Death Experiences in Cardiac Arrest Survivors:
  • The data suggests that in this cardiac arrest model, the NDE arises during unconsciousness. This is a surprising conclusion, because when the brain is so dysfunctional that the patient is deeply comatose, the cerebral structures which underpin subjective experience and memory must be severely impaired. Complex experiences such as are reported in the NDE should not arise or be retained in memory. Such patients would be expected to have no subjective experience ... or at best a confusional state if some brain function is retained. Even if the unconscious brain is flooded by neurotransmitters, this should not produce clear, lucid, remembered experiences, as those cerebral modules which generate conscious experience and underpin memory are impaired by cerebral anoxia. The fact that in a cardiac arrest loss of cortical function precedes the rapid loss of brainstem activity lends further support to this view.

    An alternative explanation would be that the observed experiences arise during the loss of, or on regaining, consciousness. However, it is unlikely that the NDE arises either when the cortical modules are failing, that is, during the process of becoming unconscious, or when the cortical modules are coming back on line, that is when consciousness is returning.
The point of mentioning the NDE is to give one example of a fairly widespread phenomenon that isn't easily reduced to neurological brain activity. There are also other phenomena that don't fit easily with physicalist reductionism.
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Alex123
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Alex123 »

John Searle wrote:At our present state of the investigation of consciousness, we don't know how it works and we need to try all kinds of different ideas.
If one assumes that consciousness is somehow separate from complex functioning of the brain and related material things, then perhaps the above it true.
Jerry A. Fodor wrote: Nobody has the slightest idea how anything material could be conscious. Nobody even knows what it would be like to have the slightest idea about how anything material could be conscious.
It may depend about what "material" and "conscious" mean. Is it possible that "consciousness" is a very complex material action in the brain?

There can't be swimming without a water, and person/being doing certain kinds of motions with arms and legs to swim.
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rowboat
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by rowboat »

Excerpt from - Facing Up to the Problem of Consciousness
David J. Chalmers
http://www.imprint.co.uk/chalmers.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If any problem qualifies as the problem of consciousness, it is this one. In this central sense of "consciousness", an organism is conscious if there is something it is like to be that organism, and a mental state is conscious if there is something it is like to be in that state. Sometimes terms such as "phenomenal consciousness" and "qualia" are also used here, but I find it more natural to speak of "conscious experience" or simply "experience". Another useful way to avoid confusion (used by e.g. Newell 1990, Chalmers 1995) is to reserve the term "consciousness" for the phenomena of experience, using the less loaded term "awareness" for the more straightforward phenomena described earlier. If such a convention were widely adopted, communication would be much easier; as things stand, those who talk about "consciousness" are frequently talking past each other.

The ambiguity of the term "consciousness" is often exploited by both philosophers and scientists writing on the subject. It is common to see a paper on consciousness begin with an invocation of the mystery of consciousness, noting the strange intangibility and ineffability of subjectivity, and worrying that so far we have no theory of the phenomenon. Here, the topic is clearly the hard problem - the problem of experience. In the second half of the paper, the tone becomes more optimistic, and the author's own theory of consciousness is outlined. Upon examination, this theory turns out to be a theory of one of the more straightforward phenomena - of reportability, of introspective access, or whatever. At the close, the author declares that consciousness has turned out to be tractable after all, but the reader is left feeling like the victim of a bait-and-switch. The hard problem remains untouched.
Rain soddens what is covered up,
It does not sodden what is open.
Therefore uncover what is covered
That the rain will not sodden it.
Ud 5.5
danieLion
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by danieLion »

Rui Sousa wrote:I see the brain as the rupa that supports the sixth sense, in the same way the ear, with all its mechanics, supports earing.
HI Rui Sousa,
Our brains extend throughout our bodies via the nervous system. Sensations depend upon nervous sensations. Therefore, the brain extends throughout the sense organs. Therefore, the "brain as rupa" 'supports' all the components of vinnana, not just mano. In other words, according to dependent origination, with vinnana as condition, nama-rupa arises, not the reverse, as you imply.
Kind regards,
Daniel
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Kim OHara
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Re: Uncertain Minds: How the West Misunderstands Buddhism

Post by Kim OHara »

danieLion wrote:
Rui Sousa wrote:I see the brain as the rupa that supports the sixth sense, in the same way the ear, with all its mechanics, supports earing.
HI Rui Sousa,
Our brains extend throughout our bodies via the nervous system. Sensations depend upon nervous sensations. Therefore, the brain extends throughout the sense organs. Therefore, the "brain as rupa" 'supports' all the components of vinnana, not just mano. In other words, according to dependent origination, with vinnana as condition, nama-rupa arises, not the reverse, as you imply.
Kind regards,
Daniel
What, then, does the eye consist of? Are the cones and rods of our retinas are part of the brain?

:namaste:
Kim
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