A serious non-Buddhist

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
Post Reply
User avatar
Sam Vara
Site Admin
Posts: 13482
Joined: Sun Jun 05, 2011 5:42 pm
Location: Portsmouth, U.K.

A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Sam Vara »

Here is a very nice little article by "Maverick Philosopher" Bill Vallicella, explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:

https://williamfvallicella.substack.com ... ason?sd=pf

I found it worth reading and taking seriously, precisely because B.V. takes Buddhism seriously and has respect for it, including his own daily meditation regime.

I'm sure he would agree with the Millian idea that an understanding of one's own position is only enhanced by dealing with the best objections to it.
thepea
Posts: 4047
Joined: Sun Jul 06, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by thepea »

Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 11:53 am Here is a very nice little article by "Maverick Philosopher" Bill Vallicella, explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:

https://williamfvallicella.substack.com ... ason?sd=pf

I found it worth reading and taking seriously, precisely because B.V. takes Buddhism seriously and has respect for it, including his own daily meditation regime.

I'm sure he would agree with the Millian idea that an understanding of one's own position is only enhanced by dealing with the best objections to it.
I’ve never interpreted the first noble truth as
-life is suffering(dukkha)

Is it not more accurately
-there exists suffering(dukkha)?

Was Buddha alive?
Was Buddha suffering?
Does the arahant not put out the fire and end suffering?
User avatar
Sam Vara
Site Admin
Posts: 13482
Joined: Sun Jun 05, 2011 5:42 pm
Location: Portsmouth, U.K.

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Sam Vara »

thepea wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 1:23 pm
Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 11:53 am Here is a very nice little article by "Maverick Philosopher" Bill Vallicella, explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:

https://williamfvallicella.substack.com ... ason?sd=pf

I found it worth reading and taking seriously, precisely because B.V. takes Buddhism seriously and has respect for it, including his own daily meditation regime.

I'm sure he would agree with the Millian idea that an understanding of one's own position is only enhanced by dealing with the best objections to it.
I’ve never interpreted the first noble truth as
-life is suffering(dukkha)

Is it not more accurately
-there exists suffering(dukkha)?

Was Buddha alive?
Was Buddha suffering?
Does the arahant not put out the fire and end suffering?
Yes, I agree. But I think BV was probably thinking of suttas like SN 45.165, where dukkha is held to be all-pervasive because it involves viparinama and sankhara-dukkhata. That seems clear from his discussion of satisfaction and craving.
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitak ... wlsh.html

There are also references along these lines:
It's only suffering that comes to be,
Suffering that stands and falls away.
Nothing but suffering comes to be,
Nothing but suffering ceases.
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitak ... .bodh.html

BV makes an error, for sure, but I don't think it involves a lax definition of dukkha.
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22405
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Ceisiwr »

Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 11:53 am Here is a very nice little article by "Maverick Philosopher" Bill Vallicella, explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:

https://williamfvallicella.substack.com ... ason?sd=pf

I found it worth reading and taking seriously, precisely because B.V. takes Buddhism seriously and has respect for it, including his own daily meditation regime.

I'm sure he would agree with the Millian idea that an understanding of one's own position is only enhanced by dealing with the best objections to it.
Thanks Sam. Some thoughts
There is more to it than this, but this is the essence of it. The thing to note is that the claim in the First Noble Truth is not the triviality that there is a lot of suffering in this life, but that life itself, as insatiable desiring and craving for what is unattainable to it, is ill, pain-inducing, profoundly unsatisfactory, and something to be escaped from if possible. It is a radical diagnosis of the human predicament, and the proposed cure is equally radical: extirpation of desire. The problem for the Buddhist is not that some of our desires are misdirected and inordinate; the problem is desire itself. The solution, then, is not rightly-ordered desire, as in Christianity, but the eradication of desire. The root (radix) of suffering is desire and that root must be uprooted (e-radi-cated). It is thus a radical solution.
I agree here. Life is suffering.
Although Buddhism appears in some ways to be a sort of 'empirical religion' — to hazard an oxymoron — the claim that all is suffering involves an interpretation of our experience that goes well beyond the empirically given. Buddhism, as a development from Hinduism, judges the given by the standard of the permanent. It brings the meta-physical or super-sensible to bear in the evaluation of the physical or sensible. Permanence is the standard against which the ordinary satisfactions of life are judged deficient. Absolute permanence sets the ontological and axiological standard. The operative presupposition is that only that which is permanent is truly real, truly important, and truly satisfactory. But if, as Buddhism also maintains, all is impermanent, then one wonders whence the standard of permanence derives its validity. If all is impermanent, and nothing has self-nature, then the standard is illusory. If so, then we have no good reason to reject or devalue all ordinary satisfactions. Failure to measure up to a nonexistent standard is no argument in devaluation of anything.

My reasoning here is similar to that of Nietzsche’s in Twilight of the Idols:

The true world — we have abolished. What world has remained? The apparent one perhaps? But no! With the true world we have also abolished the apparent one! (The Portable Nietzsche, tr. Kaufmann, p. 486)

If all is impermanent and nothing has self-nature, then the impermanent is as good as it gets and as real as it gets and is good enough.
I think there are two ways to approach this. The first is to argue that it's never claimed in early Buddhism that "All is impermanent". Rather it is "All conditions are impermanent", which would exclude nibbāna. Nibbāna then would be where the "standard of permanence derives its validity" from. One could stop here, and make nibbāna into a "thing", the sole "thing", which is permanent. Another approach would be to go further and to say that on approaching the 1 unconditioned (and so permanent "thing") one drops all notions of permanence, impermanence and "things" altogether. With that too, suffering.

For Buddhism, the fundamental problem is suffering in the radical sense above explained, and the solution is entry into nibbana by the extirpation of desire, all desire (including even the desire for nibbana), as opposed to the moderation of desire and its redirection to worthy objects. I question both the diagnosis and the cure. The diagnosis is arguably faulty because arguably incoherent: it presupposes while denying the existence of an absolute ontological and axiological standard. The cure is faulty because it issues in nihilism, as if the goal of life could be its own self-extinction.
I question the logic here. The author argues that the cure is faulty because it entails nihilism and the cessation of life. Why though does that mean it's faulty? One might not like the conclusion, but it can still be valid.
The main reason I am not a Buddhist is that I reject the doctrine of suffering. Suffering, of course, is a datum and I am not denying the datum; I am denying the early Buddhist theory thereof. But I also reject the doctrines of impermanence and 'no self.' That gives me two more reasons. These other doctrines are inseparable from the doctrine of suffering, and they, like it, have a radical meaning. It is not just that things change, but that they are in Heraclitean flux. It is an observable fact that things change, but the nature of change cannot be 'read off' from the fact of change.

Is change Heraclitean or Aristotelian? If the former, then everything is continuously changing; if the latter, then there are enduring substrata of change which, for a time at least, do not change: one and the same avocado is first unripe and then ripe. Neither of these views of change is empirically obvious in the way that it is empirically obvious that there is change.

Now it is radical impermanence that underpins radical unsatisfactoriness and that also implies the doctrine of anatta, which, in Western terms, is the denial of the existence of (primary) substances in the Aristotelian sense of the term. This denial, too, is radical since it is not merely the denial that substances are permanent, but a denial that there are any substances at all.
I would agree that the Buddha denied substances. If there were substances, then our experience wouldn't be of dependent origination. It would be of static realities. Paṭiccasamuppāda is a denial of independent realities in experience, a denial of the bearers of characteristics and, ultimately, a denial of "things" and change. In order to posit substances, you need reason because we do not experience them at all. All we experience are momentary characteristics. The problem is that for the Buddha, like Hume, reason is a slave of the passions. Substances are posited not because reason can access realities beyond sense experience, but because the rationalist is simply following his likes and dislikes. Of course, people can disagree with the Buddha on this, just like they disagreed with Hume and others who denied substances. I don't think their arguments for substances hold, but they are free to think differently.

"[Substances are] a supposed, I know not what” - John Locke
“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
equilibrium
Posts: 522
Joined: Tue Feb 14, 2012 11:07 am

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by equilibrium »

01:
explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:
Logic and reasoning isn’t going to work, is it? ….. it’s not thinking that you know but rather knowing that you know! ….. The purification of the path is for one who knows and sees and not for one who does not know and does not sees!

02:
But if, as Buddhism also maintains, all is impermanent, then one wonders whence the standard of permanence derives its validity. If all is impermanent, and nothing has self-nature, then the standard is illusory.
Someone who doesn’t understand what the word “all” means here ….. What is the all?
SN 35.23:
What is the All? Simply the eye & forms, ear & sounds, nose & aromas, tongue & flavors, body & tactile sensations, intellect & ideas. This, monks, is termed the All.
03: ….. further on:
If so, then we have no good reason to reject or devalue all ordinary satisfactions. Failure to measure up to a nonexistent standard is no argument in devaluation of anything.
When one is under delusion, one doesn’t know one is. The problem here is one doesn’t understand that one is trapped within samsara! ….. this very existence….. bounded within. Furthermore, it’s not about the rejections of experiences within this very life ….. they come with depending on this very life itself ….. the view from “self/no-self” is that of wrong view and it’s contrary to that of the teachings of the “middle-way” ….. which transcends.

How can someone who is under delusion declare “a non-existent standard” ….. it’s like saying there is no pain in giving birth but one has never given birth to a child ?

04:
I question both the diagnosis and the cure. The diagnosis is arguably faulty because arguably incoherent: it presupposes while denying the existence of an absolute ontological and axiological standard. The cure is faulty because it issues in nihilism, as if the goal of life could be its own self-extinction.
This is completely wrongly grasped based on delusion, already noted above.

05:
My aim here is merely to lay bare the core doctrine.
Someone under delusion, standing at the side of one shore, without crossing over, declaring what the core doctrine is ? ….. doubtful!! ….. and impossible!

06:
The main reason I am not a Buddhist is that I reject the doctrine of suffering. ….. I am denying the early Buddhist theory thereof.
Buddhist is just a label anyway.
Theory is never the truth anyway. ….. but the teachings are merely a path to the other shore, is it not? …. What is Wisdom!?
Perhaps:
There is a difference between walking the path and knowing the path
07:
But I also reject the doctrines of impermanence and 'no self.
Impermanence and change isn’t the issue here, it’s inevitable, all part of life ….. existence. The point is to see the illusion so one can escape from it.
“No-self” here is wrongly grasped. ….. based on self/no-self!

08:
Now it is radical impermanence that underpins radical unsatisfactoriness and that also implies the doctrine of anatta, which, in Western terms, is the denial of the existence of (primary) substances in the Aristotelian sense of the term. This denial, too, is radical since it is not merely the denial that substances are permanent, but a denial that there are any substances at all.
….. beyond logic and reasoning ….. to be known and seen!

Perhaps:DN 22 Dangerously wrong way of grasping a snake.
He who is so much preoccupied with doctrinal controversy, furnishes, indeed, a fitting illustration of one who carries the raft of the Dhamma on his head or shoulders; and, in his case, this will be not after the crossing but before he has done, or even seriously tried, the fording of the stream.

In fact, this famous parable of the raft will in most cases apply to those who, in the words of the Dhammapada, “run up and down the river’s bank” on this side of the stream, without daring or wishing to cross. We find them using the raft for a variety of purposes: they will adorn it and adore it, discuss it, compare it — indeed anything else than use it.
Few among men are those who cross to the farther shore. The rest, the bulk of men, only run up and down the hither bank.
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22405
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Ceisiwr »

equilibrium wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:14 pm ...
I don't think that will convince non-Buddhists of much.
“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: 12879
Joined: Thu Feb 11, 2016 1:45 am
Contact:

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by cappuccino »

thepea wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 1:23 pm I’ve never interpreted the first noble truth as … life is suffering

Is it not more accurately …
Life is stressful
User avatar
Sam Vara
Site Admin
Posts: 13482
Joined: Sun Jun 05, 2011 5:42 pm
Location: Portsmouth, U.K.

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Sam Vara »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 3:35 pm
Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 11:53 am Here is a very nice little article by "Maverick Philosopher" Bill Vallicella, explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:

https://williamfvallicella.substack.com ... ason?sd=pf

I found it worth reading and taking seriously, precisely because B.V. takes Buddhism seriously and has respect for it, including his own daily meditation regime.

I'm sure he would agree with the Millian idea that an understanding of one's own position is only enhanced by dealing with the best objections to it.
Thanks Sam. Some thoughts
There is more to it than this, but this is the essence of it. The thing to note is that the claim in the First Noble Truth is not the triviality that there is a lot of suffering in this life, but that life itself, as insatiable desiring and craving for what is unattainable to it, is ill, pain-inducing, profoundly unsatisfactory, and something to be escaped from if possible. It is a radical diagnosis of the human predicament, and the proposed cure is equally radical: extirpation of desire. The problem for the Buddhist is not that some of our desires are misdirected and inordinate; the problem is desire itself. The solution, then, is not rightly-ordered desire, as in Christianity, but the eradication of desire. The root (radix) of suffering is desire and that root must be uprooted (e-radi-cated). It is thus a radical solution.
I agree here. Life is suffering.
Although Buddhism appears in some ways to be a sort of 'empirical religion' — to hazard an oxymoron — the claim that all is suffering involves an interpretation of our experience that goes well beyond the empirically given. Buddhism, as a development from Hinduism, judges the given by the standard of the permanent. It brings the meta-physical or super-sensible to bear in the evaluation of the physical or sensible. Permanence is the standard against which the ordinary satisfactions of life are judged deficient. Absolute permanence sets the ontological and axiological standard. The operative presupposition is that only that which is permanent is truly real, truly important, and truly satisfactory. But if, as Buddhism also maintains, all is impermanent, then one wonders whence the standard of permanence derives its validity. If all is impermanent, and nothing has self-nature, then the standard is illusory. If so, then we have no good reason to reject or devalue all ordinary satisfactions. Failure to measure up to a nonexistent standard is no argument in devaluation of anything.

My reasoning here is similar to that of Nietzsche’s in Twilight of the Idols:

The true world — we have abolished. What world has remained? The apparent one perhaps? But no! With the true world we have also abolished the apparent one! (The Portable Nietzsche, tr. Kaufmann, p. 486)

If all is impermanent and nothing has self-nature, then the impermanent is as good as it gets and as real as it gets and is good enough.
I think there are two ways to approach this. The first is to argue that it's never claimed in early Buddhism that "All is impermanent". Rather it is "All conditions are impermanent", which would exclude nibbāna. Nibbāna then would be where the "standard of permanence derives its validity" from. One could stop here, and make nibbāna into a "thing", the sole "thing", which is permanent. Another approach would be to go further and to say that on approaching the 1 unconditioned (and so permanent "thing") one drops all notions of permanence, impermanence and "things" altogether. With that too, suffering.

For Buddhism, the fundamental problem is suffering in the radical sense above explained, and the solution is entry into nibbana by the extirpation of desire, all desire (including even the desire for nibbana), as opposed to the moderation of desire and its redirection to worthy objects. I question both the diagnosis and the cure. The diagnosis is arguably faulty because arguably incoherent: it presupposes while denying the existence of an absolute ontological and axiological standard. The cure is faulty because it issues in nihilism, as if the goal of life could be its own self-extinction.
I question the logic here. The author argues that the cure is faulty because it entails nihilism and the cessation of life. Why though does that mean it's faulty? One might not like the conclusion, but it can still be valid.
The main reason I am not a Buddhist is that I reject the doctrine of suffering. Suffering, of course, is a datum and I am not denying the datum; I am denying the early Buddhist theory thereof. But I also reject the doctrines of impermanence and 'no self.' That gives me two more reasons. These other doctrines are inseparable from the doctrine of suffering, and they, like it, have a radical meaning. It is not just that things change, but that they are in Heraclitean flux. It is an observable fact that things change, but the nature of change cannot be 'read off' from the fact of change.

Is change Heraclitean or Aristotelian? If the former, then everything is continuously changing; if the latter, then there are enduring substrata of change which, for a time at least, do not change: one and the same avocado is first unripe and then ripe. Neither of these views of change is empirically obvious in the way that it is empirically obvious that there is change.

Now it is radical impermanence that underpins radical unsatisfactoriness and that also implies the doctrine of anatta, which, in Western terms, is the denial of the existence of (primary) substances in the Aristotelian sense of the term. This denial, too, is radical since it is not merely the denial that substances are permanent, but a denial that there are any substances at all.
I would agree that the Buddha denied substances. If there were substances, then our experience wouldn't be of dependent origination. It would be of static realities. Paṭiccasamuppāda is a denial of independent realities in experience, a denial of the bearers of characteristics and, ultimately, a denial of "things" and change. In order to posit substances, you need reason because we do not experience them at all. All we experience are momentary characteristics. The problem is that for the Buddha, like Hume, reason is a slave of the passions. Substances are posited not because reason can access realities beyond sense experience, but because the rationalist is simply following his likes and dislikes. Of course, people can disagree with the Buddha on this, just like they disagreed with Hume and others who denied substances. I don't think their arguments for substances hold, but they are free to think differently.

"[Substances are] a supposed, I know not what” - John Locke
Yes, I think I agree with everything you say here.

If BV had concentrated a little more on the difference between dhamma and sankhara, he would have done better.
All conditions are impermanent—
when this is seen with wisdom,
one grows disillusioned with suffering:
this is the path to purity.

All conditions are suffering—
when this is seen with wisdom,
one grows disillusioned with suffering:
this is the path to purity.

All things are not-self—
when this is seen with wisdom,
one grows disillusioned with suffering:
this is the path to purity.
I'm really surprised that he didn't get this. When he says "If all is impermanent and nothing has self-nature, then the impermanent is as good as it gets and as real as it gets and is good enough" then he gives the game away. Although it's outside the scope of this, I'd also like to see how Christianity stands up to this sort of analysis. "If all is fallen and sinful, then sin is as good as it gets, etc..."
thepea
Posts: 4047
Joined: Sun Jul 06, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by thepea »

Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 3:33 pm
thepea wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 1:23 pm
Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 11:53 am Here is a very nice little article by "Maverick Philosopher" Bill Vallicella, explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:

https://williamfvallicella.substack.com ... ason?sd=pf

I found it worth reading and taking seriously, precisely because B.V. takes Buddhism seriously and has respect for it, including his own daily meditation regime.

I'm sure he would agree with the Millian idea that an understanding of one's own position is only enhanced by dealing with the best objections to it.
I’ve never interpreted the first noble truth as
-life is suffering(dukkha)

Is it not more accurately
-there exists suffering(dukkha)?

Was Buddha alive?
Was Buddha suffering?
Does the arahant not put out the fire and end suffering?
Yes, I agree. But I think BV was probably thinking of suttas like SN 45.165, where dukkha is held to be all-pervasive because it involves viparinama and sankhara-dukkhata. That seems clear from his discussion of satisfaction and craving.
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitak ... wlsh.html

There are also references along these lines:
It's only suffering that comes to be,
Suffering that stands and falls away.
Nothing but suffering comes to be,
Nothing but suffering ceases.
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitak ... .bodh.html

BV makes an error, for sure, but I don't think it involves a lax definition of dukkha.
The way I see it, the arahant extinguished mental dukkha but still experiences bodily dukkha.
When there is zero attachment to the bodily sensations then one is free to be in joy and experience bodily pain or pleasure as it is without adding to it.
All of life’s joyous experiences are available to the noblest disciple.
thepea
Posts: 4047
Joined: Sun Jul 06, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by thepea »

cappuccino wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:16 pm
thepea wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 1:23 pm I’ve never interpreted the first noble truth as … life is suffering

Is it not more accurately …
Life is stressful
Is it?
Is Buddha alive?
Is Buddha stressed?
User avatar
Sam Vara
Site Admin
Posts: 13482
Joined: Sun Jun 05, 2011 5:42 pm
Location: Portsmouth, U.K.

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Sam Vara »

equilibrium wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:14 pm 01:
explaining what he thinks is wrong with Buddhism:
Logic and reasoning isn’t going to work, is it? ….. it’s not thinking that you know but rather knowing that you know! ….. The purification of the path is for one who knows and sees and not for one who does not know and does not sees!

02:
But if, as Buddhism also maintains, all is impermanent, then one wonders whence the standard of permanence derives its validity. If all is impermanent, and nothing has self-nature, then the standard is illusory.
Someone who doesn’t understand what the word “all” means here ….. What is the all?
Agreed. An incisive mind, applied to a small part of the doctrine but ignoring other bits. And I also think there is a great deal in your point that a delusional, merely intellectual grasp of the "doctrine" is always going to fail. I'm coming round to the view that practice is far more important as a condition for understanding than noting and explicating the relationships between concepts. :anjali:
User avatar
Ceisiwr
Posts: 22405
Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2009 2:36 am
Location: Wales

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Ceisiwr »

Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:31 pm I'm coming round to the view that practice is far more important as a condition for understanding than noting and explicating the relationships between concepts.
The most important things I've understood regarding the Dhamma occurred during meditation.
“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
Sam Vara
Site Admin
Posts: 13482
Joined: Sun Jun 05, 2011 5:42 pm
Location: Portsmouth, U.K.

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by Sam Vara »

Ceisiwr wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:33 pm
Sam Vara wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:31 pm I'm coming round to the view that practice is far more important as a condition for understanding than noting and explicating the relationships between concepts.
The most important things I've understood regarding the Dhamma occurred during meditation.
:thumbsup: :anjali:

Interestingly, BV is a regular meditator. When he has described the process, it has a Christian inflection but in the main it looks like the sort of thing a well-informed and motivated Buddhist would do.
User avatar
cappuccino
Posts: 12879
Joined: Thu Feb 11, 2016 1:45 am
Contact:

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by cappuccino »

thepea wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:28 pm Is it?
"Both formerly and now, monks, I declare only stress and the cessation of stress."

-Buddha
thepea
Posts: 4047
Joined: Sun Jul 06, 2014 11:06 pm

Re: A serious non-Buddhist

Post by thepea »

cappuccino wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:40 pm
thepea wrote: Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:28 pm Is it?
"Both formerly and now, monks, I declare only stress and the cessation of stress."

-Buddha

pressure or tension exerted on a material object.

This stress^^^not mental stress though.
Post Reply