Guest guest Posted August 25, 2001 Report Share Posted August 25, 2001 Damn you, Rob. I hate doing heavy writing in the evening. Keeps me from sleeping. But your comments were so stimulating that I couldn't get them out of my mind all evening. So I won't sleep anyway till I write this. And you're partly to blame, Nitin, for having started the discussion. Love, Gary > Dear Nitin, > >> Nisargadatta's original observations were >> made in mystical language, from the >> background of his particular spiritual lineage >> (Naath lineage), and were not >> meant to be read scientifically or logically. >> (For example, " there is no God >> but the Self " ). > > But why do you call this statement illogical? > It's simply the familiar Upanishadic assertion that > " Atman is Brahman " translated as well as can > be done into English. You may disagree with > it, and you may point out that it is unproven, > but there is nothing illogical about it. I take Nitin's point to be that the statement doesn't parse under ordinary logic. That this is true follows from you own and the universal claim that you must experience the truth of the assertion; ordinary mind cannot understand it. > >> The actual specifics of explaining how >> this works in day-to-day >> life is a burden that Gary (and to an extent, >> I) have taken up upon ourselves. > > How can you do this until you have the > experience of self-realization for yourselves? Two issues here. First, if you are implying that Nitin and I aren't fully realized, how do you know that? That's an honest question. Trying to answer that would shed light on what you understand enlightenment to be. (Hint: Nitin is very unenlightened and I'm too modest to speak up for myself.) Second issue is that I disagree with what seems to be your assumption that you have to be enlightened to explain it. More below. > > Until then, precisely because the existing > written descriptions of this experience are > inadequate, you cannot know what you are > talking about. By your logic, Rob, only if you yourself are fully realized can you know that written descriptions are inadequate. Until then, you're only reporting what you've heard. The fundamental issue is that, either enlightenment is an experience that is completely discontinuous from ordinary experience or it is continuous with ordinary experience in some way. If enlightenment is COMPLETELY discontinuous from ordinary experience then you shouldn't be talking about enlightenment in any way unless you are fully realized. And if you are fully realized you'll be unable to communicate with the rest of us (well, at least with Nitin). And if enlightenment is COMPLETELY discontinuous, then you're either fully enlightened or you're not. On the other hand, if enlightenment is continuous with ordinary experience ‹ that is, if it shares something with ordinary experience ‹ then language can tell us something, however haltingly, about it. Furthermore, there is the possibility to be enlightened in degrees. So if you ask me if I'm enlightened, I have two answers. First, the question is irrelevant, since enlightenment does not come from authority, but from experience. If my writing instructs you in any way, you'll continue to read; if it doesn't, you'll stop. Second, to answer your question directly: I'm enlightened more every day. > > These people were describing something > they experienced. It is a real phenomenon. > > If you want to learn more about the phenomenon, > you must see it for yourself. You cannot > learn more about it than they expressed by > dissecting their statements. I've answered this objection with my comments above about continuity and discontinuity. To sum it up, according to your logic you can learn NOTHING about enlightenment from their statements. > > Trying to do so is like a biologist trying to > learn the anatomy of a yeti by analyzing > descriptions made by farmers in Nepal. > If the biologist wants to add something to > the farmers' descriptions, he must catch a > yeti himself and examine it. > This is an invalid analogy. By your argument above, a biologist could learn about yeti only by becoming one. Best to all, Gary Gary Schouborg Performance Consulting Walnut Creek, CA garyscho Publications and professional services: http://home.att.net/~garyscho Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 25, 2001 Report Share Posted August 25, 2001 Dear Gary, > Damn you, Rob. I hate doing heavy writing > in the evening. Keeps me from sleeping. From the bottom of my heart, Gary, my profuse apologies! From now on I'll try to post earlier in the day! > I take Nitin's point to be that the statement > doesn't parse under ordinary > logic. That this is true follows from your > own and the universal claim that > you must experience the truth of the > assertion; ordinary mind cannot > understand it. I think several things are getting jumbled together here. Yes, somebody needs a special kind of experience to judge whether the statement is true, but that doesn't mean the statement is illogical or that special experience is needed in order to understand it. Here's another statement that requires special experience to judge its truth -- " Asparagus tastes like broccoli. " -- but surely we will agree that this statement is neither illogical nor difficult to grasp. But why are we even bothering to talk about " Atman is Brahman " as if it raises difficult logical issues? Do you really have any trouble understanding the meaning of " Atman is Brahman " ? I can't believe you do. As philosophical ideas go, it's not terribly difficult. " Atman " just means " inner self " or " soul " or " subjectivity " or " awareness. " Brahman means " the monistic aware substance of the universe, " or, very loosely, " God. " The statement means that the " thing " that feels like your soul is not really a part of " you, " but rather, is an essential property of the universe as a whole. It reminds me very closely of the discussion in Plato (I think it's in the Parmenides, but my memory is bad ) of the nature of the relationship between universals and particulars -- there's a discussion of whether a universal (in this case Brahman) subsumes all the particulars (in this case the Atmans) in the same way that a sail covers objects, etc. These ideas may be difficult in the sense that any abstract philosophical idea is hard for some people to grasp, but I don't think a person must be a yogi in order to understand them. If somebody requires an analogy to help make the idea intelligible, the metaphor I suggested the other day works very well -- Brahman (the universe) is like a computer; each person is like a character in a computer game; consciousness (which we regard as our Atmans) is a process that takes place in the computer as a whole, not in the individual animated characters. > First, if you are implying that Nitin and I aren't > fully realized, how do you know that? That's an > honest question. Well, for one thing, if either you or I were self- realized, our conversation of a few days ago about Ramana Maharshi's awareness during sleep would have taken a different course. Surely one of us would have simply told the other about the actual state of affairs. > By your logic, Rob, only if you yourself > are fully realized can you know > that written descriptions are inadequate. Oh dear. Now we come to the whole second half of your message. Gary, I really owe you an apology. You've taken great pains to answer what I said, but I feel disinclined to answer in any detail because what I said was sloppy and we will be wasting our time if we take it as a point of departure. What happened was, Nitin said: > I do not think that Nisargadatta was offering > spiritual candy. In fact, his > speciality was that he was quite blunt and > to the point. Regarding the > specific statements mentioned (I presume > they are from " I Am That " ), they are > not really his writings. He wrote nothing > himself, not being highly educated. > " I Am That " is an English translation of > selected Marathi conversations, > translated by a Polish Jew, and so there may > be some inadequacies there. The > context of the two observations also > obviously differs. Moreover, > Nisargadatta's original observations were > made in mystical language, from the > > background of his particular spiritual > lineage (Naath lineage), and were not > > meant to be read scientifically or logically. > (For example, " there is no God > but the Self " ). He was not concerned much > with the practical aspect because > probably he himself did not see any conflict > between " theory " and " practice " . > His point was that if you see the theory > of it, the practice happens > spontaneously. They are not separate issues. > ( " Understanding is all that is > required " ). In a way, Zen takes a similar > position (effortless effort or > no-effort). The actual specifics of explaining > how this works in day-to-day > life is a burden that Gary (and to an extent, I) > have taken up upon ourselves. When I read Nitin's last sentence about the " burden " that you and he have taken up, I jumped to some conclusions about what that burden is -- I imagined that your goal is to generate a type of information that cannot (in my view) be generated without direct personal experience of a special kind. But now that I reread Nitin's paragraph, I realize that I was jumping to conclusions. In fact, I have no idea what your " burden " is -- no idea what sorts of conclusions you and Nitin are trying to generate. So perhaps the best thing, if you want to continue this, would be to give some examples of the kind of information that your " burden " is intended to produce. Then I can reply in a more precise way and we can keep the conversation on a narrow, targetted path. I'm sorry for not replying more specifically to the rest of the comments in your letter, but I really believe it won't be productive. We would just be talking about things that are actually far from either your views or mine. Best regards, Rob - " Gary Schouborg " <garyscho " Realization " <Realization > Cc: " Liberation Group () " <libn > Saturday, August 25, 2001 1:00 AM Nisargadatta Damn you, Rob. I hate doing heavy writing in the evening. Keeps me from sleeping. But your comments were so stimulating that I couldn't get them out of my mind all evening. So I won't sleep anyway till I write this. And you're partly to blame, Nitin, for having started the discussion. Love, Gary > Dear Nitin, > >> Nisargadatta's original observations were >> made in mystical language, from the >> background of his particular spiritual lineage >> (Naath lineage), and were not >> meant to be read scientifically or logically. >> (For example, " there is no God >> but the Self " ). > > But why do you call this statement illogical? > It's simply the familiar Upanishadic assertion that > " Atman is Brahman " translated as well as can > be done into English. You may disagree with > it, and you may point out that it is unproven, > but there is nothing illogical about it. I take Nitin's point to be that the statement doesn't parse under ordinary logic. That this is true follows from you own and the universal claim that you must experience the truth of the assertion; ordinary mind cannot understand it. > >> The actual specifics of explaining how >> this works in day-to-day >> life is a burden that Gary (and to an extent, >> I) have taken up upon ourselves. > > How can you do this until you have the > experience of self-realization for yourselves? Two issues here. First, if you are implying that Nitin and I aren't fully realized, how do you know that? That's an honest question. Trying to answer that would shed light on what you understand enlightenment to be. (Hint: Nitin is very unenlightened and I'm too modest to speak up for myself.) Second issue is that I disagree with what seems to be your assumption that you have to be enlightened to explain it. More below. > > Until then, precisely because the existing > written descriptions of this experience are > inadequate, you cannot know what you are > talking about. By your logic, Rob, only if you yourself are fully realized can you know that written descriptions are inadequate. Until then, you're only reporting what you've heard. The fundamental issue is that, either enlightenment is an experience that is completely discontinuous from ordinary experience or it is continuous with ordinary experience in some way. If enlightenment is COMPLETELY discontinuous from ordinary experience then you shouldn't be talking about enlightenment in any way unless you are fully realized. And if you are fully realized you'll be unable to communicate with the rest of us (well, at least with Nitin). And if enlightenment is COMPLETELY discontinuous, then you're either fully enlightened or you're not. On the other hand, if enlightenment is continuous with ordinary experience < that is, if it shares something with ordinary experience < then language can tell us something, however haltingly, about it. Furthermore, there is the possibility to be enlightened in degrees. So if you ask me if I'm enlightened, I have two answers. First, the question is irrelevant, since enlightenment does not come from authority, but from experience. If my writing instructs you in any way, you'll continue to read; if it doesn't, you'll stop. Second, to answer your question directly: I'm enlightened more every day. > > These people were describing something > they experienced. It is a real phenomenon. > > If you want to learn more about the phenomenon, > you must see it for yourself. You cannot > learn more about it than they expressed by > dissecting their statements. I've answered this objection with my comments above about continuity and discontinuity. To sum it up, according to your logic you can learn NOTHING about enlightenment from their statements. > > Trying to do so is like a biologist trying to > learn the anatomy of a yeti by analyzing > descriptions made by farmers in Nepal. > If the biologist wants to add something to > the farmers' descriptions, he must catch a > yeti himself and examine it. > This is an invalid analogy. By your argument above, a biologist could learn about yeti only by becoming one. Best to all, Gary Gary Schouborg Performance Consulting Walnut Creek, CA garyscho Publications and professional services: http://home.att.net/~garyscho /info/terms/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted August 26, 2001 Report Share Posted August 26, 2001 Rob, > I think several things are getting jumbled > together here. Yes, somebody needs a > special kind of experience to judge whether the > statement is true, but that doesn't mean the > statement is illogical or that special experience > is needed in order to understand it. > > Here's another statement that requires special > experience to judge its truth -- > > " Asparagus tastes like broccoli. " > > -- but surely we will agree that this statement > is neither illogical nor difficult to grasp. > > But why are we even bothering to talk about > " Atman is Brahman " as if it raises difficult > logical issues? > Comparing the asparagus and atman assertions is helpful. Their differences have to do with context, which is at the heart of the difficulty with talk about spirituality. For all practical purposes, the meaning of the asparagus assertion is unambiguous. Anyone who knows English will understand your claim and know how to verify it, since there is little doubt that the context is one of ordinary daily living. On the other hand, the Atman assertion is a whole 'nother thing. I can easily imagine a context in which it is like the assertion, " Clark Kent is Superman " . In fact, when I first read anything Eastern, I implicitly placed what I read in pretty much that sort of context. It took quite a while of puzzlement before I realized that the context was quite different, expressing subjective experience. More below. > Do you really have any trouble understanding the > meaning of " Atman is Brahman " ? I can't believe > you do. As philosophical ideas go, it's not > terribly difficult. " Atman " just means " inner > self " or " soul " or " subjectivity " or " awareness. " > Brahman means " the monistic aware substance > of the universe, " or, very loosely, " God. " > > The statement means that the " thing " that feels > like your soul is not really a part of " you, " > but rather, is an essential property of the > universe as a whole. Apparently, all the concepts that you enumerate have a tangible, experiential meaning for you. They also have for me. But the ambiguity comes in the fact that I have not yet a clue whether our meanings match. In contrast, I have a great deal of confidence that we both know what asparagus and broccoli looks like and we know what to do to decide if they really taste alike. What I am trying to do in my article, " Enlightenment in Action " is develop a context so we can all agree on what we're talking about. Anyone reading the article may agree or disagree with my account of the nature of enlightenment, but, if I have achieved my primary aim, they will not put the article down wondering what the hell I was talking about. > > It reminds me very closely of the discussion in > Plato (I think it's in the Parmenides, but my memory > is bad ) of the nature of the relationship between > universals and particulars -- there's a discussion of > whether a universal (in this case Brahman) subsumes > all the particulars (in this case the Atmans) in the > same way that a sail covers objects, etc. Yes, the Parmenides concerns the problem of " the one and the many " , a problem of ontology (the nature of reality or being). It should be read along with the sister dialogues of the Sophist and the Theaetetus, which comprise Plato's theory of knowledge, arguing that there is no way to put the one and the many together coherently. Typically, Westerners tend to begin reading Eastern writings as if they were ontology (about reality independent of subjective experience), and therefore find them incoherent until they realize that Eastern writings are not ontology but a kind of poetry ‹ not in the pejorative sense of being fictional or expressing mere sentiment, but in the deepest poetic function of expressing subjective experience. To put it in Western terms, Eastern writings are incoherent when taken as ontology, but begin to make sense when taken as phenomenology. > > These ideas may be difficult in the sense that any > abstract philosophical idea is hard for some > people to grasp, but I don't think a person must > be a yogi in order to understand them. > Agreed, though I understand " yogi " to mean merely a seeker, not necessarily a master. One burden of my article is to show that anyone can understand what enlightenment is once the context of experiencing it is identified. It nevertheless remains true that to understand what enlightenment is is not to experience it, but we could also say that about almost anything. > If somebody requires an analogy to help make > the idea intelligible, the metaphor I suggested > the other day works very well -- Brahman (the > universe) is like a computer; each person is > like a character in a computer game; consciousness > (which we regard as our Atmans) is a process > that takes place in the computer as a whole, not > in the individual animated characters. > >> First, if you are implying that Nitin and I aren't >> fully realized, how do you know that? That's an >> honest question. > > Well, for one thing, if either you or I were self- > realized, our conversation of a few days ago > about Ramana Maharshi's awareness during > sleep would have taken a different course. Surely > one of us would have simply told the other about > the actual state of affairs. This either begs the question by assuming that it is RM who knows the truth about awareness and sleep, or it mistakenly assumes that the enlightened make only apodictic pronouncements. My claim was that RM is either mistaken or an imperfect teacher of his experience. I don't believe that either is incompatible with his being enlightened, since I believe that all that is required to be enlightened is to be experientially aware that one's deepest happiness is independent of satisfying one's desires. That seems to be the point of the Buddha's famous allegory of the man shot by the arrow. One can know that critical truth and still be a poor philosopher, empirical psychologist, and teacher. As to apodictic pronouncements, I believe they work only with the gullible. Even if I were fully enlightened, I would not simply tell you the truth of things, since that would only motivate you to believe me. What I would try to do is what I am doing here, clarify the issues so that you can decide for yourself where the truth lies. > >> By your logic, Rob, only if you yourself >> are fully realized can you know >> that written descriptions are inadequate. > > Oh dear. Now we come to the whole second half > of your message. Gary, I really owe you an apology. > You've taken great pains to answer what I said, > but I feel disinclined to answer in any detail because > what I said was sloppy and we will be wasting our > time if we take it as a point of departure. > > But now that I reread Nitin's paragraph, I realize > that I was jumping to conclusions. In fact, I have no > idea what your " burden " is -- no idea what sorts > of conclusions you and Nitin are trying to generate. > > So perhaps the best thing, if you want to continue > this, would be to give some examples of the kind of > information that your " burden " is intended to > produce. Then I can reply in a more precise way > and we can keep the conversation on a narrow, > targeted path. > > I'm sorry for not replying more specifically to > the rest of the comments in your letter, but I > really believe it won't be productive. We would > just be talking about things that are actually far > from either your views or mine. > This is quintessential Rob, and what I consider a very enlightened response. You are clearly a seeker of truth not a competitive debater, a pleasure for me to get to know. There was a moment or two above when I was tempted to put in some zinger, an expression of the intellectual aggression it takes for me to work through confusion to get to some clarity. However, your own obvious good will softened me up. Thank you for that particular contribution. My comments above about my article speak to the " burden " issue. When I have completed it, I will let you know. I hope you will read it and provide feedback that is as thoughtful and helpful as what you've given me so far. Best to all, Gary Gary Schouborg Performance Consulting Walnut Creek, CA garyscho Publications and professional services: http://home.att.net/~garyscho Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted September 6, 2001 Report Share Posted September 6, 2001 Hi Gary, The letter to which I'm replying was written eleven days ago. Sorry! (And there are even older ones waiting, I know.) > For all practical purposes, the meaning > of the asparagus assertion is unambiguous. Yes, because we define it ostensively, i.e., by pointing at a piece of asparagus. I'll return to this below. > Apparently, all the concepts that you > enumerate have a tangible, > experiential meaning for you. Actually, my point was the opposite. I was trying to point out that " Atman " and " Brahman " can be understood intellectually as philosophical concepts without any special experience. > But the ambiguity comes in the fact that I have > not yet a clue whether our meanings match. I don't think the terms are particularly ambiguous when defined philosophically. However I agree with you that the more interesting use of the words is the experiential one which you stress in your letter. I agree that this other kind of meaning, and the other kind of " understanding " that is associated with it, is difficult to define because we can't point at the the denoted entities. (Purely as a joke, though, I can't resist saying that it's easy to point at Brahman because the finger can be aimed in any direction.) > What I am trying to do in my article, " Enlightenment > in Action " is develop a context so we can all agree on > what we're talking about. Anyone > reading the article may agree or disagree with my account > of the nature of enlightenment, but, if I have achieved > my primary aim, they will not put the > article down wondering what the hell I was talking about. That sounds both useful and interesting. I look foward to seeing it. > Rob: Well, for one thing, if either you or I were self- > realized, our conversation of a few days ago > about Ramana Maharshi's awareness during > sleep would have taken a different course. Surely > one of us would have simply told the other about > the actual state of affairs. > Gary: This either begs the question by assuming > that it is RM who knows the truth > about awareness and sleep, or it mistakenly assumes > that the enlightened > make only apodictic pronouncements. The two questions were (1) Is Gary Shouborg self-realized and (2) was Ramana Maharshi aware during deep sleep? I don't think I begged either question. What I did do was implicitly define " self-realized " as " the state that Ramana Maharshi was in. " This is an ostensive definition, with Sri Ramana playing the asparagus. I think it's a good working definition for my purposes. It may not be as good for your purposes. Yes, I agree that I assume that Ramana Maharshi knew whether or not he was aware during sleep. But this seems reasonable to me. If a person can't tell whether he's aware, then we're dealing with a version of " awareness " that's pretty far removed from the ordinary meaning of the word. How do *you* define " self-realized? " > since I believe that all that is required to be enlightened > is to be experientially aware that one's deepest > happiness is independent of satisfying one's desires. I guess this answers the question! When I say " self-realization, " I think I mean something quite different from this. The salient features of Sri Ramana's experience, as he describes it, seem to be (a) the descent of the mind into the heart-cave and (b) the permanent dissolution of the ego. It may be the case that the experiential awareness in your definition only takes place at the same time as the two events in my definition. But I don't know that to be the case. > This is quintessential Rob, and what I > consider a very enlightened response. > You are clearly a seeker of truth not a > competitive debater, a pleasure for > me to get to know. There was a moment or > two above when I was tempted to put > in some zinger, an expression of the > intellectual aggression it takes for me > to work through confusion to get to some > clarity. However, your own obvious > good will softened me up. Thank you > for that particular contribution. This is an enlightened response from you too, Gary! I was afraid you would think I was trying to weasel out of the obligation to hold up my end of the argument till one of us cries uncle. I don't think it is particularly to my credit that I'm not out for blood here. To tell you the truth, I take practically no interest in this question of deficiencies in other people's accounts of enlightenment. I am bewildered as to why it interests you so much. What difference does it make whether other people described their experiences clearly? I agree with you that they didn't, but so what? Unless they are lying, they experienced *something* quite interesting, and the easiest way to find out what it is, is to duplicate their experiences. This is the main thing that interests me. I don't know why you don't feel the same way. These people are like 16th century cartographers. We are explorers, you and I. Yes, the poor quality of the maps is exasperating, but isn't your main interest to see the new lands yourself, rather than critique the maps? I've followed the maps for some distance already and have found that so far, they have been good enough for the purpose of duplicating the reported experiences. Not only that, but when I duplicated the experiences, it turned out that the descriptions were not as bad as they seemed ahead of time -- the descriptions were instantly recognized as references to particular phenomena that I observed. It is perhaps for this reason that I don't find Ken Wilber's article as irritating as you apparently do. > My comments above about my article > speak to the " burden " issue. When I have > completed it, I will let you know. > I hope you will read it and provide > feedback that is as thoughtful and > helpful as what you've given me so far. Despite my lack of interest in the deficiencies in traditional accounts, I am extremely interested in a modern effort to do better, and I look forward very much to reading your article. Best regards, Rob - " Gary Schouborg " <garyscho " Realization " <Realization > Cc: " Liberation Group () " <libn > Sunday, August 26, 2001 1:09 PM Re: Nisargadatta Rob, > I think several things are getting jumbled > together here. Yes, somebody needs a > special kind of experience to judge whether the > statement is true, but that doesn't mean the > statement is illogical or that special experience > is needed in order to understand it. > > Here's another statement that requires special > experience to judge its truth -- > > " Asparagus tastes like broccoli. " > > -- but surely we will agree that this statement > is neither illogical nor difficult to grasp. > > But why are we even bothering to talk about > " Atman is Brahman " as if it raises difficult > logical issues? > Comparing the asparagus and atman assertions is helpful. Their differences have to do with context, which is at the heart of the difficulty with talk about spirituality. For all practical purposes, the meaning of the asparagus assertion is unambiguous. Anyone who knows English will understand your claim and know how to verify it, since there is little doubt that the context is one of ordinary daily living. On the other hand, the Atman assertion is a whole 'nother thing. I can easily imagine a context in which it is like the assertion, " Clark Kent is Superman " . In fact, when I first read anything Eastern, I implicitly placed what I read in pretty much that sort of context. It took quite a while of puzzlement before I realized that the context was quite different, expressing subjective experience. More below. > Do you really have any trouble understanding the > meaning of " Atman is Brahman " ? I can't believe > you do. As philosophical ideas go, it's not > terribly difficult. " Atman " just means " inner > self " or " soul " or " subjectivity " or " awareness. " > Brahman means " the monistic aware substance > of the universe, " or, very loosely, " God. " > > The statement means that the " thing " that feels > like your soul is not really a part of " you, " > but rather, is an essential property of the > universe as a whole. Apparently, all the concepts that you enumerate have a tangible, experiential meaning for you. They also have for me. But the ambiguity comes in the fact that I have not yet a clue whether our meanings match. In contrast, I have a great deal of confidence that we both know what asparagus and broccoli looks like and we know what to do to decide if they really taste alike. What I am trying to do in my article, " Enlightenment in Action " is develop a context so we can all agree on what we're talking about. Anyone reading the article may agree or disagree with my account of the nature of enlightenment, but, if I have achieved my primary aim, they will not put the article down wondering what the hell I was talking about. > > It reminds me very closely of the discussion in > Plato (I think it's in the Parmenides, but my memory > is bad ) of the nature of the relationship between > universals and particulars -- there's a discussion of > whether a universal (in this case Brahman) subsumes > all the particulars (in this case the Atmans) in the > same way that a sail covers objects, etc. Yes, the Parmenides concerns the problem of " the one and the many " , a problem of ontology (the nature of reality or being). It should be read along with the sister dialogues of the Sophist and the Theaetetus, which comprise Plato's theory of knowledge, arguing that there is no way to put the one and the many together coherently. Typically, Westerners tend to begin reading Eastern writings as if they were ontology (about reality independent of subjective experience), and therefore find them incoherent until they realize that Eastern writings are not ontology but a kind of poetry < not in the pejorative sense of being fictional or expressing mere sentiment, but in the deepest poetic function of expressing subjective experience. To put it in Western terms, Eastern writings are incoherent when taken as ontology, but begin to make sense when taken as phenomenology. > > These ideas may be difficult in the sense that any > abstract philosophical idea is hard for some > people to grasp, but I don't think a person must > be a yogi in order to understand them. > Agreed, though I understand " yogi " to mean merely a seeker, not necessarily a master. One burden of my article is to show that anyone can understand what enlightenment is once the context of experiencing it is identified. It nevertheless remains true that to understand what enlightenment is is not to experience it, but we could also say that about almost anything. > If somebody requires an analogy to help make > the idea intelligible, the metaphor I suggested > the other day works very well -- Brahman (the > universe) is like a computer; each person is > like a character in a computer game; consciousness > (which we regard as our Atmans) is a process > that takes place in the computer as a whole, not > in the individual animated characters. > >> First, if you are implying that Nitin and I aren't >> fully realized, how do you know that? That's an >> honest question. > > Well, for one thing, if either you or I were self- > realized, our conversation of a few days ago > about Ramana Maharshi's awareness during > sleep would have taken a different course. Surely > one of us would have simply told the other about > the actual state of affairs. This either begs the question by assuming that it is RM who knows the truth about awareness and sleep, or it mistakenly assumes that the enlightened make only apodictic pronouncements. My claim was that RM is either mistaken or an imperfect teacher of his experience. I don't believe that either is incompatible with his being enlightened, since I believe that all that is required to be enlightened is to be experientially aware that one's deepest happiness is independent of satisfying one's desires. That seems to be the point of the Buddha's famous allegory of the man shot by the arrow. One can know that critical truth and still be a poor philosopher, empirical psychologist, and teacher. As to apodictic pronouncements, I believe they work only with the gullible. Even if I were fully enlightened, I would not simply tell you the truth of things, since that would only motivate you to believe me. What I would try to do is what I am doing here, clarify the issues so that you can decide for yourself where the truth lies. > >> By your logic, Rob, only if you yourself >> are fully realized can you know >> that written descriptions are inadequate. > > Oh dear. Now we come to the whole second half > of your message. Gary, I really owe you an apology. > You've taken great pains to answer what I said, > but I feel disinclined to answer in any detail because > what I said was sloppy and we will be wasting our > time if we take it as a point of departure. > > But now that I reread Nitin's paragraph, I realize > that I was jumping to conclusions. In fact, I have no > idea what your " burden " is -- no idea what sorts > of conclusions you and Nitin are trying to generate. > > So perhaps the best thing, if you want to continue > this, would be to give some examples of the kind of > information that your " burden " is intended to > produce. Then I can reply in a more precise way > and we can keep the conversation on a narrow, > targeted path. > > I'm sorry for not replying more specifically to > the rest of the comments in your letter, but I > really believe it won't be productive. We would > just be talking about things that are actually far > from either your views or mine. > This is quintessential Rob, and what I consider a very enlightened response. You are clearly a seeker of truth not a competitive debater, a pleasure for me to get to know. There was a moment or two above when I was tempted to put in some zinger, an expression of the intellectual aggression it takes for me to work through confusion to get to some clarity. However, your own obvious good will softened me up. Thank you for that particular contribution. My comments above about my article speak to the " burden " issue. When I have completed it, I will let you know. I hope you will read it and provide feedback that is as thoughtful and helpful as what you've given me so far. Best to all, Gary Gary Schouborg Performance Consulting Walnut Creek, CA garyscho Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted September 6, 2001 Report Share Posted September 6, 2001 Rob, you are a master conversationalist, willing both to listen empathetically and forthrightly and cogently assert your own views. > Hi Gary, > > The letter to which I'm replying was written > eleven days ago. Sorry! (And there are > even older ones waiting, I know.) Please don't feel obligated to respond. I write according to my needs, which may not match yours. > [snip] > > How do *you* define " self-realized? " > >> since I believe that all that is required to be enlightened >> is to be experientially aware that one's deepest >> happiness is independent of satisfying one's desires. > > I guess this answers the question! It's a thumbnail answer. I'll give a developed one in my article. > > When I say " self-realization, " I think I mean something > quite different from this. The salient features of > Sri Ramana's experience, as he describes it, seem > to be (a) the descent of the mind into the heart-cave > and (b) the permanent dissolution of the ego. > > It may be the case that the experiential awareness > in your definition only takes place at the same time > as the two events in my definition. But I don't know > that to be the case. I think you and I are at the same ballpark but coming in from different entrances. > >> This is quintessential Rob, and what I >> consider a very enlightened response. >> You are clearly a seeker of truth not a >> competitive debater, a pleasure for >> me to get to know. There was a moment or >> two above when I was tempted to put >> in some zinger, an expression of the >> intellectual aggression it takes for me >> to work through confusion to get to some >> clarity. However, your own obvious >> good will softened me up. Thank you >> for that particular contribution. > > This is an enlightened response from you too, Gary! > I was afraid you would think I was trying to weasel > out of the obligation to hold up my end of the > argument till one of us cries uncle. With some people, like you, I get a sense of genuine inquiry toward improved understanding. Sometimes the conversation stops because we don't know how to proceed further and have to agree to disagree, at least for the time. With other people, I get a sense, right or wrong, that we are going around in the same circles and the best thing to do is opt out. Uncle doesn't really come into it. > > I don't think it is particularly to my credit that > I'm not out for blood here. To tell you the truth, > I take practically no interest in this question > of deficiencies in other people's accounts of > enlightenment. > > I am bewildered as to why it interests you so > much. What difference does it make whether other > people described their experiences clearly? > I agree with you that they didn't, but so what? > > Unless they are lying, they experienced *something* > quite interesting, and the easiest way to find out > what it is, is to duplicate their experiences. This > is the main thing that interests me. I don't know > why you don't feel the same way. > > These people are like 16th century cartographers. > We are explorers, you and I. Yes, the poor > quality of the maps is exasperating, but isn't > your main interest to see the new lands yourself, > rather than critique the maps? Yes. > > I've followed the maps for some distance > already and have found that so far, they have > been good enough for the purpose of duplicating > the reported experiences. Not only that, but > when I duplicated the experiences, it turned out > that the descriptions were not as bad as they > seemed ahead of time -- the descriptions > were instantly recognized as references to > particular phenomena that I observed. It is > perhaps for this reason that I don't find Ken > Wilber's article as irritating as you apparently > do. > Thanks for the well-wrought, developed question, which helps me explain my " burden " . The mapping metaphor is helpful. Maps point not only to lands that are interesting, but lands that are dangerous. People have lost their minds and their lives following poor maps. You have clearly benefited a great deal following the maps that we have. However, I believe you underestimate the unnecessary suffering that many have experienced trying to follow those maps and losing their way. Less tragically, others have incurred tremendous, unnecessary cost because of poor maps. Perhaps what you experience now you could have experienced 20 years ago, had the maps been better. Finally, many people don't even both to explore the territory because the maps seem so confusing to them. Better maps might open that territory up to many more people and reduce a great deal of suffering. Best wishes, and gratefully, Gary Gary Schouborg Performance Consulting Walnut Creek, CA garyscho Publications and professional services: http://home.att.net/~garyscho Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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