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> ultimate truths OMG man, this is delusional. We are not all the same person. To be specific, you and I are not the same person by any reasonable non-trivial
by lostmsu 5y ago
> ultimate truths
OMG man, this is delusional. We are not all the same person. To be specific, you and I are not the same person by any reasonable non-trivial definition of a person. We may only be parts of some larger entity (duh) like humanity, which may or may not be considered a person (separate from us, its parts) depending on definition you choose.
- sammalloy 5y agoSee nondualism. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nondualism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nondualism It's considered an "ultimate truth" in those traditions. The question isn't whether or not this is delusional, it's why is this experience widely shared across human history.
- lostmsu 5y agoJudging from the page description they make the same mistake of simply ignoring definitions and coming up with their own. Is there anything special to this experience? Historically, all kinds of delusions were "widely shared". This is true even today. People "talked" to trees everywhere around the world.
- sammalloy 5y ago> Is there anything special to this experience? Yes, it is plausible, but logically impossible.
- lostmsu 5y agoWhat do you mean by "impossible"? I just described exactly how people get that experience: they mess up definitions. It is a perfectly logical description. Under influence people think peeing in public is OK is plausible, though logically it is not the best action to take. So that is not unique either.
- sammalloy 5y agoUse the concept of paradoxes in Taoism as a metaphor for nondualism: > The paradox is that by talking about the Tao, and by attempting to define the Tao, we ensure that the reader does not actually grasp the concept. At its heart, the Tao is nonverbal in its essence, beyond the confines of language. The Tao is an experience rather than definition. Each tradition has their own version. For the west, it's the coincidentia oppositorum of Nicholas of Cusa. This goes beyond definitions because language can't describe it. This is not a failing, this is the essence of its impossibility.
- lostmsu 5y agoWhat you just described makes about as much sense as Seado - a word that I just came up with - e.g. no sense at all.
- sammalloy 5y agoYou're starting to get it. Paradoxes, contradictions, and nonsense is how these traditions attempt to get the practitioner to overcome dualism. The problem is that you think you can use either-or logic to understand it when the practice is designed to destroy it.
- lostmsu 5y agoGet what? Understand what? Destroy what?
- sammalloy 5y agoDualistic thinking.
- lostmsu 5y agoAs I explained above, what you call "dualistic thinking" is just refusal to follow common definitions for relatively simple concepts. For example, Wikipedia's entry for abovementioned personhood is clear enough to say, that I and you are two distinct persons. The two of us may be called a person, but it has nothing to do with the "way of thinking", and only has to do with the definition of a person. If a definition of a person had a clause, that would prevent congregates of persons to be a person, no amount of "dualistic thinking" would make two of us, or the entire humanity a person.