'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22383
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

cappuccino wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 11:29 pm
Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 11:01 pm Neither apply, because there never was anything to begin with.
In theory but not actually


The problem of no self
It is most perplexing for you, yes.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
User avatar
cappuccino
Posts: 12876
Joined: Thu Feb 11, 2016 1:45 am
Contact:

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by cappuccino »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 11:39 pm It is most perplexing for you, yes.
What is?
Spiny Norman
Posts: 10157
Joined: Fri Mar 05, 2010 10:32 am
Location: Andromeda looks nice

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Spiny Norman »

Coëmgenu wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 11:15 pm
This sort of thing can go on ad infinitum. It's the bread and butter of those who want to twist the Buddha to agree with them. He doesn't not exist, and he doesn't exist either. All ātmavādas of those who wrongly call themselves Buddhists hinge upon this "doesn't not exist."
Yes, it's being in denial about the implications of "sabbe dhamma anatta".
Or trying to make Buddhism into another school of Hinduism.
Buddha save me from new-agers!
Cause_and_Effect
Posts: 1067
Joined: Fri Jul 23, 2021 7:39 am

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Cause_and_Effect »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 10:51 pm
Pondera wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 10:33 pm
As you say, those are questions about what happens after death. A non-existing thing doesn’t live forever nor is it destroyed. Existence and non-existence then do not apply. Existence and non-existence do not apply to the Flying Spaghetti Monster when it dies, because there is no Flying Spaghetti Monster.
These are all misdirected applications of the teaching on not self . Nowhere did the Buddha give these kind of analogies whereas he could have.

Not-self means nothing of the aggregates can be clung to as 'yours'.
If 'no-self' were true as you are taking it, why then is your kamma not the same as someone else's?
Why does your set of aggregate feel pain and not someone else's?

There is obviously a form of individuation. It may not be called a 'self', but it is very real.

There's individuated kamma and stream of lives.
Spiny Norman wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 7:25 am
Coëmgenu wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 11:15 pm
This sort of thing can go on ad infinitum. It's the bread and butter of those who want to twist the Buddha to agree with them. He doesn't not exist, and he doesn't exist either. All ātmavādas of those who wrongly call themselves Buddhists hinge upon this "doesn't not exist."
Yes, it's being in denial about the implications of "sabbe dhamma anatta".
Or trying to make Buddhism into another school of Hinduism.
You can't discern the Buddha's teachings by trying to conceptualize "this is what I think Hinduism is, so Buddhism can't be that".
Later schools such as Advaita and Mahayana share significant similarities, and both are very much deviped from ideas in the early Buddhist canon.
"Therein monks, that Dimension should be known wherein the eye ceases and the perception of forms fades away...the ear... the nose...the tongue... the body ceases and the perception of touch fades away...

That Dimension should be known wherein mentality ceases and the perception of mind-objects fades away.
That Dimension should be known; that Dimension should be known."


(S. IV. 98) - The Dimension beyond the All
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22383
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

cappuccino wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:31 am
Ceisiwr wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 11:39 pm It is most perplexing for you, yes.
What is?
Emptiness.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22383
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 9:39 am
These are all misdirected applications of the teaching on not self . Nowhere did the Buddha give these kind of analogies whereas he could have.

Not-self means nothing of the aggregates can be clung to as 'yours'.
If 'no-self' were true as you are taking it, why then is your kamma not the same as someone else's?
Why does your set of aggregate feel pain and not someone else's?
There isn’t a contradiction between no-self and individual things. All trees have no self, but there are still different (individual) trees. When the Buddha said all dhammas are not self, that means there is no self. If I say all things lack blueness, then there are no blue things. If everything (sabbe dhammā) lacks a self, then there is no-thing with a self.

There's individuated kamma and stream of lives.
I thought there was 1 kamma field that we all participate in?
Last edited by Ceisiwr on Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:51 am, edited 1 time in total.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22383
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sat Sep 24, 2022 10:08 pm
I have argued that all beings including you are part of a larger 'protoconscious' field of witnessing from an infinite number of unique locus of experience. I haven't called it an 'eternal citta' as though it's some kind of entity, it's a participatory field that each individual can liberate. I have had insight into its nature and the mechanics of it that doesn't mean I have liberated it...You have it the wrong way around and thats the problem with logical inference as a method. You wont deduce an answer. The nama-rupa and aggregates arise around the witnessing aspect of this field is the best I can describe it.
You have said that it is something. It is a citta. You have also said it is permanent, doesn't change etc. This means it is eternal. An eternal citta. If it is one singular "field" that is defiled then when the Buddha awakened we all did. We aren't all awakened however, so how is it just 1 background field? How did this unchanging field also become tainted with the āsavā, if all it does is simply "reflect"? If all it does is reflect, it isn't tainted at all. If it isn't tainted, then we are all already liberated. You just said though, you are not liberated. Others are not liberated either. If there are unliberated people, there are cittas tainted by the āsavā. If the citta is tainted, it doesn't simply "reflect" conditioned life. It partakes in it. If it partakes in it, then it is impermanent.
This is another, complex topic and this is neither the place nor you the person to be discussing it with. I would say that I don't find these methods mutually exclusive on the contrary they can be reinforcing of the spiritual practice for some if used rightly and some research supports this
I don't think there is any research to show that taking drugs improves development in the Dhamma.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
Cause_and_Effect
Posts: 1067
Joined: Fri Jul 23, 2021 7:39 am

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Cause_and_Effect »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 10:55 am There isn’t a contradiction between no-self and individual things.
So there are 'individuals'. What makes an individual not a 'self' in relation to another individual, given one individuals pain and pleasure is not another individuals pain and pleasure?

There is a 'provisional self' which can designate individual experience. There is 'my' kamma and pain and pleasure in relation to 'your' kamma and pain and pleasure.
But within the individual I cannot say it is truly 'mine' as it cannot be grasped and passes via impersonal laws.

Ceisiwr wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 10:55 am
Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 9:39 am There's individuated kamma and stream of lives.
I thought there was 1 kamma field that we all participate in?
There is one protoconscious and kammic field that we all participate in, which is also infinitely individuated into separate locus of subjectivity. The nama-rupa dependently arise around each locus, and continue and are maintained by the kamma generated by each individual subjectivity locus and it actions over the course of its life. Ultimately though the individual locus cannot be identified as a self, as it is part of the broader protoconscious field that belongs to no one.

Each locus can however be liberated from involvement in any of the three planes of re-becoming and taking up of nama-rupa, and instead attain to the Supreme Unformed and Unending state as opposed to becoming involved in the conglomeration of shifting conditioned and transitory dhammas.


I am still waiting for your response to the points raised about Bhikkhu Bodhi's refutation of the nihilist view also.
"Therein monks, that Dimension should be known wherein the eye ceases and the perception of forms fades away...the ear... the nose...the tongue... the body ceases and the perception of touch fades away...

That Dimension should be known wherein mentality ceases and the perception of mind-objects fades away.
That Dimension should be known; that Dimension should be known."


(S. IV. 98) - The Dimension beyond the All
User avatar
Coëmgenu
Posts: 8150
Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2016 10:55 pm
Location: Whitby, Canada

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Coëmgenu »

So now the field is internally differentiated. The bit that the Buddha interfaced with was Awakened, but not the bits that worldlings interface with.

It's a sloppy theory that pretty much leads straight to hongaku. The field being internally differentiated, you might as well say "many fields," not "one big singular field." But having "one great field" appeals to the Western monotheism-tinted mind more appealingly.

Obviously the field is supposed to be the great liberated background onto which the non-liberated impute their ignorance. That is consonant with your argumentation thus far, not "many fields." But you can change it if you want. It would be for the better if you did, in fact.

I mean, consider the fact that you're mixing an agrarian metaphor about an agricultural field that you grow crops in (i.e. crops that require literal "moisture") with pseudo-quantum woo vaguely inspired by quantum field theory. That's not a good sign.
What is the Uncreated?
Sublime & free, what is that obscured Eternity?
It is the Undying, the Bright, the Isle.
It is an Ocean, a Secret: Reality.
Both life and oblivion, it is Nirvāṇa.
Cause_and_Effect
Posts: 1067
Joined: Fri Jul 23, 2021 7:39 am

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Cause_and_Effect »

Coëmgenu wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:05 pm So now the field is internally differentiated. The bit that the Buddha interfaced with was Awakened, but not the bits that worldlings interface with.
That's not how I am seeing it but I can see how these kind of speculations can arise. They would at best be metaphors for what's happening though.

The Deathless Dimension has always been there and so has Samsara. In this sense they are two sides of a coin, the Unconditioned and the Conditioned.
Coëmgenu wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:05 pm The field being internally differentiated, you might as well say "many fields," not "one big singular field."
Maybe, or perhaps both. I doubt language can really convey it.
Coëmgenu wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:05 pm Obviously the field is supposed to be the great liberated background on which the non-liberated impute their ignorance. That is consonant with your argumentation thus far, not "many fields." But you can change it if you want. It would be for the better if you did, in fact.
I don't know about that it sounds like some Mahayana readings.
I will state very clearly I have little to no real reading of Mahayana or Advaita or any such thing.
My views come entirely from trying to make sense of my experience, and reconciling to with the Pali Canon which I view as the most authentic teaching of the Buddha.
"Therein monks, that Dimension should be known wherein the eye ceases and the perception of forms fades away...the ear... the nose...the tongue... the body ceases and the perception of touch fades away...

That Dimension should be known wherein mentality ceases and the perception of mind-objects fades away.
That Dimension should be known; that Dimension should be known."


(S. IV. 98) - The Dimension beyond the All
User avatar
Coëmgenu
Posts: 8150
Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2016 10:55 pm
Location: Whitby, Canada

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Coëmgenu »

Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:13 pmI don't know about that it sounds like some Mahayana readings.
I will state very clearly I have little to no real reading of Mahayana or Advaita or any such thing.
What it sounds actually is "the stuff Cause_and_Effect likes to post on DhammaWheel." You not having a background in Advaita or Mahāyāna has little to do with that.

The metaphor in the Pāli Canon refers to a field for planting crops. Not to a ubiquitous background field of proto-consciousness or kamma or whatever. Because of this discrepancy between your theory and the original passage in the Pāli Canon, as well as numerous other discrepancies such as "many jātis per bhava," I don't think you're doing a good job of sticking to the Pāli Canon, whether or not you think it's the most authentic body of work attributed to the Buddha.
Last edited by Coëmgenu on Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.
What is the Uncreated?
Sublime & free, what is that obscured Eternity?
It is the Undying, the Bright, the Isle.
It is an Ocean, a Secret: Reality.
Both life and oblivion, it is Nirvāṇa.
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22383
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Ceisiwr »

Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:13 pm I don't know about that it sounds like some Mahayana readings.
I will state very clearly I have little to no real reading of Mahayana or Advaita or any such thing.
My views come entirely from trying to make sense of my experience, and reconciling to with the Pali Canon which I view as the most authentic teaching of the Buddha.
It would be better to read the early texts on their own terms and see what they say, rather than look for confirmation of your own beliefs in them or backread later ideas into them.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
Cause_and_Effect
Posts: 1067
Joined: Fri Jul 23, 2021 7:39 am

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Cause_and_Effect »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:16 pm
Cause_and_Effect wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:13 pm I don't know about that it sounds like some Mahayana readings.
I will state very clearly I have little to no real reading of Mahayana or Advaita or any such thing.
My views come entirely from trying to make sense of my experience, and reconciling to with the Pali Canon which I view as the most authentic teaching of the Buddha.
It would be better to read the early texts on their own terms and see what they say, rather than look for confirmation of your own beliefs in them or backread later ideas into them.
We each bring assumptions to our readings of the Suttas. It's unavoidable. You for example bring your nihilist beliefs to bear and try to fit the canon into that interpretation .

Your statement 'its better to read the texts and see what what they say' is thus naive and meaningless.
The Buddha's teachings point us to our experience.

My points of reference are my experience, my reading of the texts, and learning about experience of monastics in traditions I respect such as TFT.

As I see resonance between all three I am more confident to look deeper.

The fact others on a Buddhist forum have a different view and belief is not of particular concern to me when the above mentioned sources are aligned.
"Therein monks, that Dimension should be known wherein the eye ceases and the perception of forms fades away...the ear... the nose...the tongue... the body ceases and the perception of touch fades away...

That Dimension should be known wherein mentality ceases and the perception of mind-objects fades away.
That Dimension should be known; that Dimension should be known."


(S. IV. 98) - The Dimension beyond the All
Cause_and_Effect
Posts: 1067
Joined: Fri Jul 23, 2021 7:39 am

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Cause_and_Effect »

Coëmgenu wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 12:16 pm
The metaphor in the Pāli Canon refers to a field for planting crops. Not to a ubiquitous background field of proto-consciousness or kamma or whatever. Because of this discrepancy between your theory and the original passage in the Pāli Canon,
You seem very blind to your own assumptions. Don't assume that you understand kamma as field analogy or what it's implications may be.
If you can use the analogy to help your practice thats enough.
"Therein monks, that Dimension should be known wherein the eye ceases and the perception of forms fades away...the ear... the nose...the tongue... the body ceases and the perception of touch fades away...

That Dimension should be known wherein mentality ceases and the perception of mind-objects fades away.
That Dimension should be known; that Dimension should be known."


(S. IV. 98) - The Dimension beyond the All
User avatar
Coëmgenu
Posts: 8150
Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2016 10:55 pm
Location: Whitby, Canada

Re: 'Consciousness without Surface': Not Eternalism?

Post by Coëmgenu »

Field, crops, moisture. It's pretty clear it's an agrarian metaphor.

Also, as a side note, please stop misrepresenting Theravāda as "nihilism" and implying that only Ceisiwr believes in Theravāda or that Theravāda stems from his personal opinions.
What is the Uncreated?
Sublime & free, what is that obscured Eternity?
It is the Undying, the Bright, the Isle.
It is an Ocean, a Secret: Reality.
Both life and oblivion, it is Nirvāṇa.
Post Reply