From: pmsc13sg@UMASSD.EDU (Stephen Grossman)
Subject: Re: MINDWALKING Buddhists, oh my!
Reply-To: pmsc13sg@UMASSD.EDU
Organization: UMASS DARTMOUTH, NO. DARTMOUTH, MA.
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 22:22:17 GMT

In article <72358@cup.portal.com>, Tagi@cup.portal.com (Thyagi Morgoth 
NagaSiva) writes:

>9212.24 e.v.

>Stephen Grossman writes:
>
>The refusal to connect mind (ie, reason) to reality results in MTV, game 
>shows, Madonna, drug addiction, hangovers, and Nehru jackets. Another result
>is Buddhism or any mysticism. I do note, however, that sticking your finger in-
>to an electric outlet might mystically connect one to all the electrons in the
>Universe.
>
>
>Response:
>
>Well, this pomposity with regard to some of the most profound metaphysical
>speculation is to be expected.  Dismissing Buddhism, one of the worlds
>most popular and peaceful religions, as 'refusing to connect mind to
>reality' shows a distinct lack of understanding regarding its depth and
>character, especially the work of its major philosophers.
>
>Mysticism, on the other hand, is more of a 'science of the mind' than
>modern Science.  Mysticism involves more directly a 'connecting of mind
>to reality' than any other activity.  Here again, it seems that your
>ideas are quite limited to Ayn Rand and objectivist speculation.
>
>Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Rand or such ideas, yet the
>way you speak about them in your post reminds me very much of rabid
>Christian preachers trying to convert through hysteria.  If anything
>smacks of removing the connection of thought from mouth, this does.
>I hope to show why below.
>    
>
>Stephen:
>
>Your concern with "flowing movement" (what is an unflowing movement?) 
>splits the Universe into movement and permanence, thus breaking the wholeness
>you seek. See Rand for the importance of "existence is identity." Parmenides
>recognized that existence is full with his "plenum." You can choose any limit 
>like and you will find something there. Existence is: all of the things it is,
>as Peikoff recognized. Unbrokenness exists and you can study it. But broken-
>ness also exists and you can study that. Everything exists equally, brokenness
>and unbrokenness. 
>
>
>Response:
>
>This much is well known among mystics, including Buddhists.  You might have 
>taken it from any of the tomes which you seem to despise so heatedly.
>
>
>Stephen:
>
>These is no metaphysical privilege, with. eg, unbrokenness
>being metaphysically superior to brokenness. Choose your concerns, study them,
>and stay within their limits. Make judgements relative to that, and no other 
>context. Your judgements will be contextually absolute. And your contexts will
>be, not subjective, but based in reality. 
>
>
>Response:
>
>Here I think you may have overstated.  Why is a subjective evaluation, made 
>with logic and in the context of strict observation, somehow NOT 'based
>in reality'?  By your words here it sounds as if one can describe 
>absolute truth through the glorious application of empiricism and reason.
>If this is what you mean, I think you are mistaken.
>
>I agree that Western philosophy has disintegrated.  I also agree that
>many people seek 'wholeness' in small areas of experience.  I'm sure
>that some people hope to find it in the things you mention.  I also
>think that there are many additional items we could add to that list
>with which you may not agree.  

SG	TMN's post was too long for me to reply to each point so I will only 
discuss the basics. Also, I have no interest in mysticism except to identify 
its destructive lack of objectivity.
	Buddhists think life is suffering because we have values which we 
should sacrifice. This is also the Jewish-Platonic-Christian-Kantian view.
Buddhists think reality is transitory and impermanent relative to a permanent, 
transcendental "nirvana." This has elements of Heraclitus, Plato, Judiasm, 
Christianity, Kant,and Nietzsche. 
There is nothing  basically unique to Buddhism or mysticism in general 
relative to the remnant of mysticism left in Western philosophy by Greek 
philosophy including, unfortunately, Aristotle. Fortunately, Rand corrected his 
errors. Recall Aristotle's Unmoved Mover and prime matter.
	Mysticism is not basically an epistemology but a metaphysics. Mystics 
split existence into one and many (discussed by the Presocratics) and claim the 
one has metaphysical primacy. This is impossible. There are no meta. splits. 
Everything is equally existence. "The one" or "nirvana" has no greater 
existence or reality than the many or nature. Everything, literally everything, 
exists equally. The object of a mystic's contemplation exists no more than the 
objects of a businessman's interest. They each exist and exist equally. There 
is no transcendental justification of mysticism. The one exists. So does a beer 
can. So what, metaphysically, that is. In other contexts there will be 
hierarchy but not in existence. So much for existence.
	Objectively, mysticism is a refusal to focus the mind onto anything; it 
is a refusal to focus the mind, period. Mystics even oppose perception for 
sensation and then symbolize their sensations with excessively complex 
"philosophy." Epistemologically, mystics oppose perception and perception-based 
reason for a state as close to unconsciousness as it is possible to get this 
side of death. Of course, having abandoned reality as known by reason, they 
render themselves incapable of human survival. Mysticism then provides many 
bizarrely elaborate methods of emotional repression/suppression to dull the 
anxiety and depression which a living organism naturally experiences when it 
knows it is incapable of survival. 
	Consider the statue of the Buddha, eyes closed, sitting and without a 
trace of the life-oriented art of the Greeks and the Renaissance. Mysticism is 
a living death. (Listen to "The Role of Religion in Human History" by George 
Walsh, Laissez Faire Books, audio, for an suprisingly horrifying account of 
mysticism)  Walsh claims that Western religion is superior to Oriental religion 
since it, allegedly, provides something beyond consciousness as a focus for 
consciousness. Small comfort.
________________________________________________________________________________
	"In that world, you'll be able to rise in the morning with the spirit
you had known in your childhood: that spirit of eagerness, adventure and cer-
tainty which comes from dealing with a rational universe."
                                                              AYN RAND
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Stephen Grossman <PMSC13SG@UMASS.EDU>
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Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.meta