Says you, who just this minute has pasted an entire paragraph from the Pali texts into another thread. — Wayfarer

Have you noticed that I am not discussing Buddhism in the manner of Western secular academia?

I don’t see any ‘bad blood’.

You don't say. I have to take breaks from this forum, as I feel downright metaphorically bespattered with blood.

Hostile reactions are only to be expected when people’s instinctive sense of reality is called into question.

What a spiritual take on the matter!

No one knows for sure so we are stuck with what seems most plausible. — Janus

While many people say such things, I doubt many people mean them. It seems to me that people are far more sure of themselves, far more certain than you make allowance for.

But unless one is enlightened, one cannot talk about these things with any kind of integrity, nor demand respect from others as if one in fact knew what one is talking about.
— baker

I tend to agree with this, although I would say not only "unless" but "even if".

Why the "even if"? Why couldn't one talk about enlightenment with integrity even if one is enlightened?

If you believe being enlightened is a real thing, what leads you to believe it, presuming you are not yourself enlightened?

I am aware of the standard definitions of enlightenment. Whether what those definitions say is "real" or not I can't say, given that according to those definitions, one would need to be enlightened oneself in order to recognize another enlightened being.


But I certainly acknowledge a strange pull that I feel towards these topics and a desire to reflect on them.

I am aware of the standard definitions of enlightenment. Whether what those definitions say is "real" or not I can't say, given that according to those definitions, one would need to be enlightened oneself in order to recognize another enlightened being. — baker

A monk asked, "What does the enlightened one do?"

Joshu said, "He truly practices the Way."

The monk asked, "Master, do you practice the Way?"

Joshu said, "I put on my robe, I eat my rice."

The monk said, "To put on one's robe, to eat one's rice are ordinary, everyday things. Master, do you practice the Way?"

Joshu said, "You try and say it then. What am I doing everyday?" — Joshu

Maybe you are already enlightened, and didn't know it. :grin:

Maybe you are already enlightened, and didn't know it. — Patterner

According to Early Buddhism, such is impossible, because an enlightened person knows they are enlightened, they have no doubt or confusion about it. Everyone who is enlightened knows they are enlightened.

I'm just kidding around. If you put on a robe and eat rice, you might be enlightened. :halo:

'Ain't never gonna do it without my fez on' ~ Steely Dan

What do you mean by "considering the current state of science"? There are any number of examples throughout history of the most plausible explanation for something, according to that time's current state of science, being as wrong as can be. What is it about our current state that convinces you that, despite the fact that it doesn't seem to be a physical process or function, not even to you, it is? — Patterner

It is irrelevant that past scientific theories have been shown to be wrong, or at least not as adequate as some later theory. That fact does not guarantee that any present theories will be proven wrong. Also, that is all we have to work with.

I haven't said consciousness doesn't seem to be a physical process per se. From a neuroscientific perspective it does seem to be a physical process. From the naive intuitive point of view, it may seem not to be physical to some. From my perspective it seems neither determinably physical (in the sense that it is not a physical object, but an activity) nor non-physical. It certainly doesn't seem otherworldly to me and this world definitely seems physical through and through.

I've always had trouble understanding this position. The way the mind seems to itself... The mind is an illusion being fooled by itself. Illusions fool the viewer. The audience. But, in this case, that upon which everything else is built, the viewer and the illusion are the same thing. — Patterner

You continue to misinterpret what I'm saying. I haven't said the mind is an illusion, I've said that what it may seem to us may be an illusion.

While many people say such things, I doubt many people mean them. It seems to me that people are far more sure of themselves, far more certain than you make allowance for. — baker

It doesn't matter whether people acknowledge that what they believe about matters which are not either logically or empirically determinable, is determined by what they think most plausible, which in turn is determined by which starting assumptions they are making.

It is also possible that in some, perhaps many, cases people believe what they want to believe.

I haven't failed to make allowance for people feeling certain at all. But there is a clear distinction between being certain (which is only possible in cases where what is believed is empirically or logically verifiable) and feeling certain, which is possible in all kinds of cases, including self-delusion.

Sorry for misinterpreting you. Looking at your previous posts, I see what you meant, and am rather annoyed with myself.

It certainly doesn't seem otherworldly to me — Janus

As it's in this world, it's obviously not otherworldly.

and this world definitely seems physical through and through. — Janus

Since there is no physical explanation for consciousness, it's possible consciousness is not physical through and through.

From a neuroscientific perspective it does seem to be a physical process. — Janus

The physical is certainly an essential ingredient.

Cheers. I guess the basic reason for my tendency to think of consciousness as a natural physical process is that I can't imagine what any non-physical element of it could be, and no one has ever offered an explanation as to what a purported non-physical element could be other than the old idea of a separate mental substance or else some kind of unfathomable panpsychism. Anyway, I think I've explained my position about as well as i can, and I certainly don't expect you to agree with me, so I'm not sure there's much else to be said by me on this topic.

Thanks for the conversation.

Anyway, I think I've explained my position about as well as i can, — Janus

I had hoped for some specifics. If what consciousness seems to be is an illusion, what is it really? What is the explanation for the existence of the illusion? How do the physical properties of matter and laws of physics give rise to the subjective experience of the physical processes that they are obviously acting out, as opposed to those physical processes taking place without the subjective experience (as Chalmers says, "in the dark")?

But if you're done, perhaps others will give their ideas. A thread dedicated to any physicalist explanation would be great. Of course, every thread begun to explore any particular approach to the issue soon turns into a debate. I wonder if there's any chance mods would enforce rules for such a thread.

Although I might be the only person who thinks such a thread might be valuable.

I had hoped for some specifics. If what consciousness seems to be is an illusion, what is it really? What is the explanation for the existence of the illusion? How do the physical properties of matter and laws of physics give rise to the subjective experience of the physical processes that they are obviously acting out, as opposed to those physical processes taking place without the subjective experience (as Chalmers says, "in the dark")? — Patterner

I think it's probably a knot which cannot be untied. Taking sight as an example, we see things just as animals do. But we are reflexively self-aware that we see things. So we conceive of ourselves as "having experience". Do non-symbolic animals have this reflexive self-awareness or is it just an artefact of language?

The idea of things going on "in the dark" may be an incoherent idea. Do things go on in the dark for animals if they cannot be self-reflectively aware? Are we really self-reflectively aware or are we just playing with language? How can we answer these questions? If there is a way to answer them, what could that be but science?

So maybe there is really no subjective experience at all and it is all just an artefact of language—a kind of confabulation or fiction. Or if there is some spiritual, non-material, non-physical element in play and our intuitions tell us that (which has seemed to be the case historically) then maybe those intuitions are right, but we have no way of demonstrating that and must just have faith in them and stop trying to prove or disprove it. In other words, just accept our feelings and intuitions and enjoy their enrichment without trying to come to any ontological conclusions because to do so is an impossible project.

We don't and can't know why we are here or where we are headed, or even whether there is any reason we are here, or whether we are headed anywhere at all, but there's no harm in exercising our imaginations and enjoying the ride while it lasts. Anyway, that's pretty much where I'm at for what it's worth—I like to think about these questions but I'm content with uncertainty, with the thought that these questions cannot be definitively answered.

I was going to ask you about your response to the decomposition problem, but, in re-reading the OP, it doesn't sound like your view is a form of ontological idealism....

I’m interested in what you mean, regardless.

I would say epistemic idealism is any metaphysical theory which posits primacy to the mind insofar as how we understand reality; whereas ontological idealism is any metaphysical theory which posits primacy to the mind in reality (over matter).

Classical ontological idealism arguably started with good 'ole Berkeley and is still prominent in the literature today (such as with Kastrup). Although I am not as familiar with the lineage of epistemic idealism, I would imagine it starts with Kant.

Your view seems to be a form of transcendental idealism, which is about how we understand reality fundamentally through mental ideas (and cognitive pre-structures) and thusly is a form of epistemic idealism---not ontological idealism.

Re-reading your OP, I think this is supporting by your claims like:

These are the grounds on which I am appealing to the insights of philosophical idealism. But I am not arguing that it means that ‘the world is all in the mind’. It’s rather that, whatever judgements are made about the world, the mind provides the framework within which such judgements are meaningful. So though we know that prior to the evolution of life there must have been a Universe with no intelligent beings in it, or that there are empty rooms with no inhabitants, or objects unseen by any eye — the existence of all such supposedly unseen realities still relies on an implicit perspective. What their existence might be outside of any perspective is meaningless and unintelligible, as a matter of both fact and principle.

Although I think one could go the objective idealist's route and just say that all is in mind, but there is an objective reality because there is one universal mind maintaining the ideas of reality (e.g., God); your response to basic objections to idealism seems to be to go the transcendental idealist route; viz., to admit that there is a mind-independent world but that we can say nothing meaningful about it independently of the modes by which we cognize it.

A position, like Kant's, that admits of reality being fundamentally mind-independent (ontologically), is not a form of true idealism; that is, ontological idealism. Classically, by my understanding, 'idealism' is a short-hand for 'ontological idealism' which posits, like Berkeley, that reality is fundamentally mind-stuff: not physical-stuff.

Why is this important? Well, because I was going to ask you about the most difficult problem for idealism (IMHO)--the decomposition problem--but you don't seem to believe that reality is fundamentally mind-stuff; so that isn't a problem for you like it would be for a classical idealist.

The decomposition problem is how a universal mind, which is the fundamental entity ontologically, can "decompose" into separate, subjective, and personnal minds which we are. Sometimes it is denoted as how a Mind (with a capital 'M') 'decomposes' into a mind (with a lowercase 'm'). It seems like, for an idealist, the Mind which fundamentally exists for the world to be objective is toto genere different than the minds which inhabit it; and there's not clear explanation (that I have heard) of how a mind like ours would arise out of mental stuff happening in 'the Mind'.

There is no scientific evidence for dualism - verifiable separability of mental stuff and physical stuff. It is also not metaphysically parsimonious and borderline incoherent. So which is it? Mental stuff or physical stuff?

Scientific theories, or any knowledge, or even any concepts about either experience or topics like "being" and ontology cannot tell us about "stuff" or what "stuff" is independent of limited perspectives that we don't usually identify with the "stuff" we are talking about - apart from experiences. Obviously we have direct aquaintance with experience; regardless of limitions of our concepts about experience, it is hard to deny that we experience. But I would argue concepts of experience play a similar role in naturalistic scientific knowledge as any other scientific concept as does concepts of "being". And ultimately there is no self-sustaining foundation for these things independent of enactive roles within perspective.

What actually is experience metaphysically? There is no criteria for what is and what is not an experience. There is no criteria to give that question the meaning that we want it to either - what does "metaphysical" mean? Just another concept we use, and (albeit) within experience too. But again, any coherent metaphysical generalization of our direct aquaintance is impossible.

To say the world is made of experience in the same way as houses are made of bricks also doesn't avoid the hard combination problem. The strong emergence involved in stacking layers of experience on top of each other.

Talk of any fundamental metaphysics is on some deeper level a enactive game as any other knowledge - it will always be found lacking in the sense that when we talk about fundamental metaphysics we are wanting something deeper than say the mathematical descriptions that make science superficially effective. Obviously no strict dividing line between science and metaphysics (or philosophy of science I guess) though. Best we can do is have concepts that make things coherent. Does saying the world is made of experience make things coherent for me? No, because experience is something deeply tied to my personal perspective which I may share with others in virtue of being organisms.

What I can say is my experience is some coarse-grained structure in the world undergirded by finer structures.

I have been thinking all scientific paradigms are united by notions of causality.

Steven Frank:

https://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?cluster=5393718917133646068&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5&as_vis=1

https://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?cluster=16974184348648837789&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5&as_vis=1

We cannot access anything else but causal relations between "things" on different scales.

If I make the assumption of equating my aquaintance with experience as ontology (whatever this means), then it suggests reality should be conceptualized as scale-free.

Reality is just causal structures all the way down (and this is akin to scientific statement with all the limitations of our physical theories that cannot tell us what the physical is - theories of reality cannot tell us the nature of reality intrinsically):

e.g.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33286288/

We cannot arbitrarily make more fundamental some causal structures over others even if they arise from coarse-graining over others. We can only at most make the distinction that finer-grained structures carry more information about reality. Insofar as causality is like communication, that is how we may relate it to minds - information and statistical physics are two sides of the same coin. There is a weak emergence aspect of information in the sense of scaffolding causal structures on top of each other. But also a strong emergence aspect in information when we look at how structures can detect or distinguish other causal structures in a "brute" way - almost like with our own phenomenal experiences.

I cannot tell you anything else about reality other than causal structures existing that can in some sense be construed as communicating information - what does "causal structure" mean? Again there is no non-circular foundation to this concept. Maybe we can talk about cause in terms of non-redundant temporal structure? These concepts bottom out in spatio-temporal structure.

But this talk about causal structure is not distinct from how when you dissect physics, what is fundamental is things like energy and work - which are just ways of quantifying how things change, or their propensity to do so - i.e. causality.

Is there a "bottom" to reality? What would that actually mean. Don't know. Maybe cannot know.

On the otherhand, does it make sense to say experience is what it is like to be some kind of causal structures in reality? Maybe. Could we then go on to say that all structures are just experience? Maybe. But the vacuousness of this makes it almost like a personal choice.

My personal choice is not to because it brings so many other connotations that complicate the naturalistic picture of reality, sometimes not making as much sense to me. If experience is another way of just talking about information (personal to, accessible to me) then the most fundamental notion in all this is something like causality. Reality is not made of blobs of "stuff" arranged or stacked, but causal structures instead. Maybe reality should be seen in terms of blobs of "stuff". But we cannot talk about intrinsic "stuff" in a way that does justice to the word "intrinsic". We can talk about causal structure, information...

... Insofar that causal structures relate things that are sensible to us... we don't need to think about it in terms of cause as some "intrinsic" things... things too may be talked about or given meaning in terms of relations to other things.... relations all the way down another way of saying causes all the way down? Or perhaps structure.

A kind of structuralism. I have generally pushed back from Ontic structural realism in the past. I think my thoughts are closest to Otavio Bueno's empirical structuralism I think he calls it. (Or perhaps structural empiricism). Imo ontic structuralism is kind of empty or trivial -

[perhaps anti-realism too insofar that I think questions of realism may be subject to similar indeterminacy as scientific theories themselves - debates about theories being right or wrong, how right or wrong (or which bits) and in what sense right and wrong mean (e.g. Newtonian physics could be right or true in the sense of describing some of our data approximately, it could be wrong if you take it as the general principles of the universe).

Can we justify theories being correct in contexts of pluralism and empirical adequacy? Is there even a discrete dividing line between theories insofar that you can deconstruct, change them, throw bits out, retain others. Theories can be right (or useful) in some ways, wrong in others, often idealized. The significance may depend on perspective - as said before once, scientific anti-realists and realists often accept the same facts about science in terms of underdeterminism and losses with theory change.]

- while we only access structure through enactive perspectives. I guess it in some ways boils down to what you think "right" means. If you have a loose or indeterminate standard for what "correct" or "true" means then theories may seem more "real" compared to someone in which "true" requires stronger standards.

But ultimately, many theories are idealized and go on to be rejected - its always an open question how long things will be rejected or accepted for. At the end of the day, the story I use about scientific theories is an enactive one, truth too. So there is a strange loop aspect - debating about whether theories are true when you have already decided that uses of truth is nothing more than an enactive process in a real world of structure. One could try and clear this up with a simpler picture of separating subjective from objective, real from non-real - but a clearer picture comes at the cost of greater idealization. And here we see there is an element of personal preference in selecting meta-theoretical views where you trade off clarity and precision or complexity and accuracy in the context of model selection. But I think regardless of meta-theoretic views of what "truth" or "correctness" means I always endorse notions of knowledge fundamentally in terms of enaction, idealization and agnosticism of future acceptance (to various degrees of subjective certainty depending on what we are talking about - and even then, graded certainty has an arbitrary relation to acceptance or rejection in the sense that someone may have higher standards of certainty to which they accept something compared to others - belief and justification always have some kins of normative aspect in general: i.e. its not strictly about whether something is true or false but whether I ought to believe it and why. Induction may not be the best argument in general, deflating enactivism better so).

Your view seems to be a form of transcendental idealism, which is about how we understand reality fundamentally through mental ideas (and cognitive pre-structures) and thusly is a form of epistemic idealism---not ontological idealism. — Bob Ross

Good analysis Bob.

As for the decomposition problem, Kastrup does address that through his theory of 'dissociated alters'. He proposes that reality comprises a universal consciousness ('mind at large'.) This universal mind is analogous to a field of subjectivity, from which all individual experiences arise by dissociation.

Dissociation: Individual conscious beings, like humans, are seen as dissociated "alters" of the universal mind. Just as alters in dissociative identity theory are partitioned segments of a single psyche, the individual consciousness is a localized expression of the universal mind, dissociated from its broader unity.

This is very similar to the philosophy of Advaita Vedanta, which Kastrup has acknowledged in dialogues with Swami Sarvapriyananda, the head teacher of the Vedanta Society of New York. And a similar idea is expressed by Albert Einstein, of all people.

A human being is a part of the whole, called by us "Universe", a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest — a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. The striving to free oneself from this delusion is the one issue of true religion. Not to nourish the delusion but to try to overcome it is the way to reach the attainable measure of peace of mind. — Albert Einstein, Letter of Condolence

But I would add the caveat that the whole concept of 'mind at large' is problematical if it is conceived as something objectively existent in a way analogous to matter or energy. (I wrote an (unpublished) Medium essay on that topic which can be reviewed here.)

There is no scientific evidence for dualism - verifiable separability of mental stuff and physical stuff. It is also not metaphysically parsimonious and borderline incoherent. So which is it? Mental stuff or physical stuff? — Apustimelogist

If you read the OP carefully, you will note that I discuss that problem in paragraph four. I emphatically do not posit any conception of 'mind stuff' or 'spiritual substance' which i regard as an oxymoronic conception, to wit:

To say the world is made of experience in the same way as houses are made of bricks also doesn't avoid the hard combination problem... — Apustimelogist

The second objection (to idealism) is against the notion that the mind, or ‘mind-stuff’, is literally a type of constituent out of which things are made, in the same way that statues are constituted by marble, or yachts of wood. The form of idealism I am advocating doesn’t posit that there is any ‘mind-stuff’ existing as a constituent in that sense. — Wayfarer

All due respect, you're viewing the issue in the wrong register. As I say at the outset, the approach is perspectival, it is not an essay about what 'things are made of.' That is a job for physics and chemistry. But the nature of our own first-person experience is real on a different level and the question of its nature has to be approached in a different way. That's what I mean by 'perspectival'. I know from reading your post here and elsewhere, you view the issue through a certain perspective, and that challenging one's assumed perspectives is difficult. But the philosophical perspective the OP advocating is of a different kind or order.

Aha I wasn't responding to the OP - I was just puttung down thoughts. I think most people probably don't disagree with the OP at its core, but some people emphasize the points more than others.

:up:

The form of idealism I am advocating doesn’t posit that there is any ‘mind-stuff’ existing as a constituent in that sense. — Wayfarer

The form of idealism you advocate doesn't seem to posit anything at all, which leaves it looking totally vacuous.

I am aware of Kastrup's view, but his solution seems utterly implausible to me. According to his logic, people conceiving a baby is somehow an instance of the Universal Mind disassociating from itself thereby creating an alter.

I was curious what your take is on it, but, again, you don't have this problem (I don't think).

I’m not totally on board with Kastrup but I don’t know if it is implausible. Human infants possess an un-formed intelligence which will normally come to maturity as instances or instantiations of human consciousness. What differentiates one individual from another is the contents of consciousness but underlying that is a kind of generic ‘mind’ or ‘mindedness’. Works for me.

But how does that work? How is sex an external representation of a mind disassociating with itself?

How is anything? :chin: Anyway it’s Christmas Day, I’ll reply later (and Happy Christmas :party: )

How is sex an external representation of a mind disassociating with itself? — Bob Ross

From that comment, I think you have an incorrect picture of what Kastrup means by 'dissociated alter'. From a glossary entry on Bernardo Kastrup's terminology:

In Bernardo Kastrup’s framework, dissociated alters are conceptualized as individual living organisms, including humans, which are distinct expressions or manifestations of a single, overarching cosmic consciousness. According to this idealist ontology, there exists only one cosmic consciousness, and all living beings are dissociated alters of this consciousness. These alters are surrounded by the thoughts of cosmic consciousness, and the inanimate world we perceive is the extrinsic appearance of these thoughts. Living organisms, including humans, are the extrinsic appearances of other dissociated alters. This framework suggests that our subjective experiences and perceptions are localized within these dissociated alters, which are essentially segments of the broader cosmic consciousness.

This plainly bears comparision with the Plotinus' philosophy of 'the One' as well as with Advaita Vedanta. For a detailed account, see The Universe in Consciousness.