AlexW wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:56 am
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
I'm sure you'll combine the two and say they are part of the same thing, but then that's nothing because plus + minus = 0.
Yes
But we have to stop thinking about things - we are not combing things, not adding up plus and minus, but simply seeing through the belief that there are separate things in the first place. As long as you are trying to combine things with the aim to end up with the resulting no-thing then you are trying to reach infinity from the finite (which will not work).
It's no problem for me to see that there are no separate things, but my problem is in understanding how that view necessitates infinity.
The revelation of the nondual comes with realizing that in order to have the saved, we need the damned. Other than that, I don't see a point to the melting away of reality.
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
Relative points are the only points that can exist. Likewise there is no such thing as objectivity since any observer would be a subject observing an object.
Agree. The problem is that, even we understand this, we still argue about partial truths that only exist when seen from a relativistic position. It doesn't matter which position one takes - it will never be True. All positions are thus equally wrong (they seem to make sense and are more or less correct when viewed from a point of view, but never ulimately true). We can understand the fact applying (higher) reasoning but still we continue trying to make our point and get upset when somebody else has a different opinion... Isn't this madness?
Truth is relative by definition since there is no objective truth and it makes no sense to claim so. Truth is only applicable within a context. Whether or not it's hot in here depends on there being a here and someone to feel anything, so hotness is not an objective attribute that could exist, but is always a subjective interpretation. But that doesn't mean there is no truth or that subjective truth is any less valid. 2+2=4 is still valid within the context of math even though math doesn't exist.
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
If there were only an object, but then the object decided to look at itself, the object would have to divide itself into a subject that can view the remaining part of the object and at that moment, reality is born
No, reality is not born from dualistic perception. Maybe your definition of reality is different to mine... If to you reality is the world of separate objects observed by an independent witness then you might be right, but this is what I see as the mind-made overlay to reality.
But the reality you're talking about can't be an experience because there is either no experiencer or nothing to experience. How can a singularity experience itself?
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
Infinity is an artifact of reality and not fundamental to it.
No, infinity and reality are one and the same (it is not the same if you define reality as the universe of things).
I suspect you're simply defining that to be so rather than arriving at that conclusion deductively. Infinity is often employed as an explanation of the unexplainable because infinity cannot be understood.
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
It's that circular observation that produces the illusion of infinity.
There is no illusion of infinity -
By definition infinity cannot be real because it is always unbounded, has no border, and can never be reached. Never means never. The idea of infinity comes from a camera looking at its own monitor which produces the infinite regression. There is no way you can see yourself just like teeth cannot bite themselves and a knife can't cut itself. I once told my buddies I has a dream about a cat with its head in its mouth and they laughed at me
I have 2 postulates for the universe: either it is simply having fun (no purpose) or it is trying to see itself, to realize what it is, and that can never be done. When we try to peer into the innerworkings or the quantum world, we're trying to look at ourselves and our own innerworkings, so we see causeless events as a result of that infinite regression of a camera trying look at itself through it's own monitor. That's where the idea of the infinite comes from: that circularity of self-inspection. Otherwise, it's fantasy because it's defined as something that can never exist. Perhaps, when "never" arrives, then the infinite will be real, but that can never happen.
Now I can agree that eternity is the absence of time and infinite space is the lack of anything, but all that is nothing. And in a state of nothingness, there is nothing to know, nothing to do, nowhere to go, nothing to see. What I can't imagine is infinite-something. Clearly there is not infinite matter because there exists places where there is not matter, and since there are places where more matter could fit, obviously matter is not infinite... and if it were infinite, it would be ubiquitous and therefore nothing.
there is only the illusion of separation which is established by believing in artificial borders drawn up by the mind.
I don't think that is the only illusion, but that is indeed an illusion.
When you look at the cup on your desk you really see infinity, but you have learned to believe that you see an object separate from you. This is a wrong deduction. Trust your senses, they work perfectly fine, its only your interpretation that draws borders where there are none.
I see what you mean, but not sure how it implies infinity. If the cup were infinite, it would not be part of me. On the other hand, if the cup is part of me, then fake-me + cup = me. The All could be a finite size and still produce the illusion of a smaller you and a cup within it. The All doesn't need to be infinite to make that happen.
If you feel like it, try this simple exercise: Look at the cup and try to find the observer, then the border separating you (the observer) from the cup, then the object cup you are looking at. Do you find any objects in looking?
Everything that I see is an object of my observation, and that includes deduction. I make no distinction between a priori and a posteriori. The one thing I cannot see is myself, but only effects of myself on the objects.
Where do you find them? What do you find in pure looking (without listening to thought stories about looking)? See if you can answer your own question: "In what way is the cup infinite?"...
Yes, yes I totally understand being one with the universe, but my objection is that the realization of that is a state of nonexistence. If you could really melt yourself into the universe and assimilate like the Borg on Star Trek and do everything subconsciously like Zen master recommend, then obviously you'd have no consciousness of it, at least not in any way other than being simply a cog in a process.
But as the great Sixth Patriarch of China pointed out, you must learn to distinguish between a living Buddha and a stone Buddha, because if a buddha was simply one who was not affected by anything, then lumps of wood and pieces of stone would be Buddhas. https://books.google.com/books?id=flUud ... od&f=false
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
That's because without duality, there is no reality.
Without duality there is no
objective reality. But reality is not objective.
No it's subjective reality. There is no objective reality because there is no subject for it to be real to.
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
A fair game against who? There is only one player
True, so why would you cheat yourself into believing there are many?
For fun; why else?
Gotta make it believable too... can't just pretend I'm 2 soccer teams. I think the Hindus have it right.
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
Is there an objective truth?
No. Truth is absolute/infinite/eternal...
Objective is absolute. It's the same question.
Partial truth seems to work in our relativistic view of the world - but it really doesn't as there are no different versions of truth.
If there is an absolute truth, then we can never know it. I guess that's an absolute statement of absolute truth that there is no absolute truth, but it's up to you to believe or not and is still subject to your subjective interpretation of my assertion which makes it not an absolute statement because I do not have absolute authority to issue absolute truths.
Absolute truth depends upon an absolute authority.
Still we believe our view of the world is truer than that of our neighbour and so look down on him and feel superior...
And therein lies the problem. The sin the garden wasn't suddenly coming into possession of the knowledge of good and evil, but in presuming that we could know the difference (ie objective truth exists). That's the sin of arrogance, which is the only sin. Therefore all religion is counter-productive, even the religion of no-religion.
Serendipper wrote: ↑Tue Apr 17, 2018 2:05 am
I see this world existing because there is nothing to do without it. There is no existence without the duality. There is just an eternal now, which really sucks.
Haha... thats funny. Lucky we have the belief in time, in the past, a mindset that makes the present barely perceivable and a bright ideas for the future so we can escape this uncomfortable NOW.
Yup, I'll drink to that!
Nice convo! Hopefully we can keep it up because, what else do you have to do for all eternity?