Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id PAA15500 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Tue, 6 Feb 2001 15:02:04 GMT Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 14:09:44 +0000 To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Soul and Self Message-ID: <20010206140944.C757@reborntechnology.co.uk> References: <3A7F9D39.30053.21FB508@localhost> <Pine.LNX.4.10.10102061834490.20443-100000@sushrut.sgpgi.ac.in> <3A7FA8A1.9308.24C44FA@localhost> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.12i In-Reply-To: <3A7FA8A1.9308.24C44FA@localhost>; from joedees@bellsouth.net on Tue, Feb 06, 2001 at 07:32:49AM -0600 From: Robin Faichney <robin@reborntechnology.co.uk> Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
On Tue, Feb 06, 2001 at 07:32:49AM -0600, joedees@bellsouth.net wrote:
>
> The whole is more than the sum of its parts; it is also constituted
> by the synergy of their interrelations. However, the widespread
> religious belief in a soul has resulted at least partially from the
> misgeneralization of the principle of the conservation of quantities,
> where pattern and configuration do not matter, to its misapplication
> as a conservation of qualities, where they do. When the neural
> configuration and dynamic patterns disintegrate, so does the
> emergent self they support. The idea, self-contradicorally held by
> some selves, that there cannot be such an entity as a dynamically
> recursive and complex-configuration grounded emergent materially-
> based self seems to me to be, at least in part, an unfortunate
> overcompensation for this dogmatic error, erring in the opposite
> direction. As I have said before, when Buddha looked at each of
> the individual skandas and proclaimed that he could not find a self,
> this was an error akin to tearing down a wall, then claiming that
> one cannot find it in any of the bricks. Claiming that the self is
> nothing is fundamentalist buddhist literal-mindedness; seeing that
> the self is instead no-thing, that is, not a thing since it is not static
> and fixed into a definite being like a rock, but dynamically
> becomes, is to allow the metaphor to point beyond itself instead of
> to erroneously take it literally.
I'm very happy, Joe, to see that our views on the self are converging.
It's just a pity you do not have a wider/deeper knowledge of Buddhism.
If it is anything, it is the central path, avoiding both eternalism (the
self is a real thing) and nihilism (there is no self). The argument
from the skandas is used only with eternalists, and most Buddhists --
and certainly the Buddha -- would understand that it demonstrates the
unreality only of a certain concept of the self. The most profound
Buddhist teachings assert that the self neither exists, nor does
not exist. I'd be grateful if you'd stop slandering Buddhism and the
Buddha this way. After all, I think you have reason to know better!! ;-)
-- Robin Faichney robin@reborntechnology.co.uk=============================================================== This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing) see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
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