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No Buddhist would say that, so clearly there's some misunderstanding. There is no Buddhist claim that the true self is an inert observer. Fixating on any aspect

by mbrock 7y ago

No Buddhist would say that, so clearly there's some misunderstanding. There is no Buddhist claim that the true self is an inert observer. Fixating on any aspect of your experience as true or authentic is the problem, not the solution. Enlightened people in Buddhist traditions are functional, happy, active; they don't just sit and stare blankly.

derefr 7y ago
Okay, maybe I didn’t use the right term. I wasn’t referring to spiritual enlightenment (bodhi), but rather spiritual emancipation (moksha). Let me rephrase more clearly: a person in a state of (permanent) delirium has achieved Nirodha—that is, reached nirvana and thereby escaped dukkha and the cycle of samsara by no longer possessing any earthly desires, and so no desirous soul to reincarnate. Delirium seems to be precisely the state that the Gautama Buddha was suggesting people attempt to achieve to escape human suffering: one where their soul has been erased while they still yet live. This isn’t the same thing as the state he was suggesting people achieve to become better human beings while yet they lived as one—the state of being a Buddha, essentially—but rather, was the state he advised people in the depths of suffering seek, to find release from their suffering. Of course, the concepts are not so distant; spiritual enlightenment (bodhi) is simply the freedom and clarity that comes from the knowledge that one has ultimate control over the fate of one’s own soul—the knowledge that one is effectively free from samsara already, because one can be free from it (through nirodha) at any point in the future as one so chooses. Certainly, these people are happy and functional. But in nirvana they ain’t.
- mbrock 7y ago
  Delirium seems like quite a strange and unusual description of the refined mental states achieved through meditation and the subsequent extinguishing of suffering. Like this dictionary definition of delirium: > an acutely disturbed state of mind characterized by restlessness, illusions, and incoherence, occurring in intoxication, fever, and other disorders. That’s quite the opposite of jhana, nirodha, or nirvana, right?
  - derefr 7y ago
    Ah, well, that’s a dictionary definition reflecting lay usage of the term (i.e. how people use it in novels and the like), but it’s not the clinical definition. Delirium is a specific medical syndrome (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delirium https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delirium). The simplest way to explain it is a double definition-by-contrast: 1. You’ve got https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locked-in_syndrome https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locked-in_syndrome, where people have thoughts and intent but (mostly) can’t translate them to motor commands. But these people are clearly trying to do things, as evidenced by the fact that they can often (learn to) move their eyes to communicate what they want. 2. You’ve got https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akinetic_mutism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akinetic_mutism, which has similar symptoms to locked-in syndrome, but is due to a lack of will to move rather than a lack of ability. (Or—since that sounds a bit like a free-will thing—they have a lack of ability to induce the cognition required to conclude that movement is desirable.) 3. Then you’ve got delirium; delirium is a syndrome [cluster of symptoms] like akinetic mutism, and both have nearly identical symptoms in acute presentation—but very different symptoms when only in partial presentation, which is why they’re not the same syndrome. The syndromes are somewhat hard to tell apart, but once you’ve figured out which one someone has, it’s usefully diagnostic, leading you to a different etiology (i.e. helping you tell what the root of the problem is.) The syndrome of akinetic mutism is pretty much only caused by specific physical brain damage (like a stroke.) You can think of it as some part of the brain necessary for the “thinking” and “wanting” process, just dying, breaking that mechanism irreversibly. Usually this is damage to a pretty large region of brain tissue, and may indeed involve loss of experience of conscious qualia as well. (It’s hard to tell, since an akinetic mute is hard to interview.) But they’re not in a https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persistent_vegetative_state https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persistent_vegetative_state, since they do autonomic things, often enough to keep themselves alive (but only barely.) Delirium, meanwhile, isn’t caused by physical brain damage, but rather by some other organic (physiological) process that results in electrochemical changes to the brain which then result in a similar symptom profile as akinetic mutism. This is often reversible and doesn’t actually involve the death of any part of the brain, which is why it’s helpful to think of this as just a “state of mind” that is next-to-impossible to achieve without weird chemistry happening in the brain—sort of like the states of mind found under the influence of psychedelics. But—and this is just me going out on a limb—I have a feeling that delirium is one of the many altered states of consciousness that can be achieved through meditation (since it can also be achieved by letting oneself sink into the depths of major depression, and that sinking-into is—in theory—an entirely psychologically-driven neurochemical process, just like meditation is.) And, if it’s possible for a regular, healthy human being to put themselves in an acute delirious mental state (recall, this matching the symptom profile of akinetic mutism—a complete lack of desire) then I do believe that this is an entirely sensible thing to “prescribe” to people as a technique for avoiding earthly suffering, if one is trapped in it (e.g. if one is a prisoner of war being tortured—as the samsara conceptualization of naraka is likely a metaphor for; or if one is born into famine, poverty, and strife, never knowing any goal beyond animal survival—as the preta realm is likely a metaphor for.) In other words, delirium is a—perhaps healthier—alternative to entering a dissociative fugue state, as a coping strategy for intense trauma. Delirium involves neither depersonalization (feeling detached from yourself) nor derealization (feeling detached from reality), but instead just involves detaching oneself from one’s desires. “You” are still there, and “reality” is still there; you are mindful, there, in the moment. The only thing that is gone is the agent that was dissatisfied with the present relationship between you and your reality.

by mbrock 7y ago

derefr 7y ago

Okay, maybe I didn’t use the right term. I wasn’t referring to spiritual enlightenment (bodhi), but rather spiritual emancipation (moksha). Let me rephrase more clearly: a person in a state of (permanent) delirium has achieved Nirodha—that is, reached nirvana and thereby escaped dukkha and the cycle of samsara by no longer possessing any earthly desires, and so no desirous soul to reincarnate. Delirium seems to be precisely the state that the Gautama Buddha was suggesting people attempt to achieve to escape human suffering: one where their soul has been erased while they still yet live. This isn’t the same thing as the state he was suggesting people achieve to become better human beings while yet they lived as one—the state of being a Buddha, essentially—but rather, was the state he advised people in the depths of suffering seek, to find release from their suffering. Of course, the concepts are not so distant; spiritual enlightenment (bodhi) is simply the freedom and clarity that comes from the knowledge that one has ultimate control over the fate of one’s own soul—the knowledge that one is effectively free from samsara already, because one can be free from it (through nirodha) at any point in the future as one so chooses. Certainly, these people are happy and functional. But in nirvana they ain’t.

mbrock 7y ago
Delirium seems like quite a strange and unusual description of the refined mental states achieved through meditation and the subsequent extinguishing of suffering. Like this dictionary definition of delirium: > an acutely disturbed state of mind characterized by restlessness, illusions, and incoherence, occurring in intoxication, fever, and other disorders. That’s quite the opposite of jhana, nirodha, or nirvana, right?
- derefr 7y ago
  Ah, well, that’s a dictionary definition reflecting lay usage of the term (i.e. how people use it in novels and the like), but it’s not the clinical definition. Delirium is a specific medical syndrome (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delirium https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delirium). The simplest way to explain it is a double definition-by-contrast: 1. You’ve got https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locked-in_syndrome https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locked-in_syndrome, where people have thoughts and intent but (mostly) can’t translate them to motor commands. But these people are clearly trying to do things, as evidenced by the fact that they can often (learn to) move their eyes to communicate what they want. 2. You’ve got https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akinetic_mutism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akinetic_mutism, which has similar symptoms to locked-in syndrome, but is due to a lack of will to move rather than a lack of ability. (Or—since that sounds a bit like a free-will thing—they have a lack of ability to induce the cognition required to conclude that movement is desirable.) 3. Then you’ve got delirium; delirium is a syndrome [cluster of symptoms] like akinetic mutism, and both have nearly identical symptoms in acute presentation—but very different symptoms when only in partial presentation, which is why they’re not the same syndrome. The syndromes are somewhat hard to tell apart, but once you’ve figured out which one someone has, it’s usefully diagnostic, leading you to a different etiology (i.e. helping you tell what the root of the problem is.) The syndrome of akinetic mutism is pretty much only caused by specific physical brain damage (like a stroke.) You can think of it as some part of the brain necessary for the “thinking” and “wanting” process, just dying, breaking that mechanism irreversibly. Usually this is damage to a pretty large region of brain tissue, and may indeed involve loss of experience of conscious qualia as well. (It’s hard to tell, since an akinetic mute is hard to interview.) But they’re not in a https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persistent_vegetative_state https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persistent_vegetative_state, since they do autonomic things, often enough to keep themselves alive (but only barely.) Delirium, meanwhile, isn’t caused by physical brain damage, but rather by some other organic (physiological) process that results in electrochemical changes to the brain which then result in a similar symptom profile as akinetic mutism. This is often reversible and doesn’t actually involve the death of any part of the brain, which is why it’s helpful to think of this as just a “state of mind” that is next-to-impossible to achieve without weird chemistry happening in the brain—sort of like the states of mind found under the influence of psychedelics. But—and this is just me going out on a limb—I have a feeling that delirium is one of the many altered states of consciousness that can be achieved through meditation (since it can also be achieved by letting oneself sink into the depths of major depression, and that sinking-into is—in theory—an entirely psychologically-driven neurochemical process, just like meditation is.) And, if it’s possible for a regular, healthy human being to put themselves in an acute delirious mental state (recall, this matching the symptom profile of akinetic mutism—a complete lack of desire) then I do believe that this is an entirely sensible thing to “prescribe” to people as a technique for avoiding earthly suffering, if one is trapped in it (e.g. if one is a prisoner of war being tortured—as the samsara conceptualization of naraka is likely a metaphor for; or if one is born into famine, poverty, and strife, never knowing any goal beyond animal survival—as the preta realm is likely a metaphor for.) In other words, delirium is a—perhaps healthier—alternative to entering a dissociative fugue state, as a coping strategy for intense trauma. Delirium involves neither depersonalization (feeling detached from yourself) nor derealization (feeling detached from reality), but instead just involves detaching oneself from one’s desires. “You” are still there, and “reality” is still there; you are mindful, there, in the moment. The only thing that is gone is the agent that was dissatisfied with the present relationship between you and your reality.