From: Scott R (jse885@spinn.net)
Date: Tue Nov 18 2003 - 02:41:20 GMT
Johnny,
> Some of those Pinker quotes resound for me. The first quote is a lot like
> the Buddhist concept of no-self, or anata. They each envision the self
> forming around nothing, except in Pinker's case, it's formed by billions
of
> nuerons, and in Buddhism, it is formed by aspects of personality that
karma
> lays together into a self. In the MoQ it is formed by patterns of value
> that collect together. Nathan's last comment is exactly like the Buddhist
> image of the self as a tree branch on which are sitting hundreds of birds,
> each bird representing an aspect of the personality. When they all fly
> away, we discover there was no branch there at all, the "self" was all
> birds, top to bottom. I think the birds are like patterns, with one
> conceptual difference between Buddhism and the MoQ abeing that the idea of
a
> self is called an illusion in Buddhism but is a very high quality pattern
of
> value also. (but still the same, actually, isn't it?)
Not the same, and not the same with materialist no-self notions like
Pinker's or Dennett's. Pretty much the same if you restrict yourself to
early Buddhism, but insofar as (Mahayana) Buddhism refers to itself as the
"Middle Way" it is just as much an error to say that the self doesn't exist
as to say that it does. The latter is the false way of substantialism (.e.g,
SOM), the former the false way of nihilism. Since most Buddhist
argumentation/preaching is done with non-philosophers, those who seldom or
never gave a thought to the possibility that they might not exist, one tends
to hear mostly the "no-self" speech.. Unfortunately, that's all one hears
from Pirsig too.
- Scott
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