Bernardo's talk with Lance Butler

[lorenzop]

Ashwin wants to preserve/enrich the separate self at all costs, where as spiritual traditions suggest the separate self doesn't exist except as a thought with content of a separate self.

Yes, there is a major difference here of intent with BK, too: BK would like the separate self (the dream alter) to disappear asap. I too see it like this, though I like to think I remain open to persuasion that carrying on the separate self (after this experience packet) might be worthwhile...in some circumstances.

You might take a peak at the notion of 'lesha avidya', essentially, one does not need to worry about disappearing, banging into walls or forgetting to eat : )

[Ben Iscatus]

You might take a peak at the notion of 'lesha avidya'

Well, my bad habits are ingrained, but I have reduced my desire for 72 virgins to 36

[AshvinP]

Yes, I agree that we might need to "reduce" Ash's "flights of reason and imagination" to something we can more easily get to grips with.
Perhaps we might summarise Ash's stance as follows:
(A) "I can only experience my own thinking. It is an unwarranted abstraction to move from my concrete thinking to a mind or a consciousness"; and
(B) "There is no outside world beyond my own thinking."

(A)
There would be an immediate issue with "unwarranted abstraction". This is because
1) thinking is about percepts and concepts (beyond endogenous awareness, it can't be about anything else); and
2) without the uniting concept of a Mind, you have floating concepts like intuition, imagination, reason, feelings, perceptions which somehow need to be amalgamated into a subjective framework with which we identify (I think BK would mention the Default Mode Network and our internal narratives).

(B)
Need to explain why this is not a version of solipsism.

I also thank you for this summary of Ash's position - not sure if Ash would agree with your summary however.
The major difference between Ash's position and spiritual positions is that Ashwin wants to preserve/enrich the seperate self at all costs, where as spiritual traditions suggest the seperate self doesn't exist except as a thought with content of a seperate self. Needless to say, I can't guarantee that Ashwin would agree with what I just wrote.

I would not agree

It depends on the spiritual tradition. Western spirituality most definitely preserves the integrity of the Self (Spirit, Ego-"I") because the Self is essentially what we all are. This was not possible to comprehend prior to Christ incarnation, though. We tend to think of ancient people sitting around formulating spiritual concepts like we would over a cup of coffee or a beer today, but this isn't the case. They were following the spiritual revelations which were instilled through the natural evolution of consciousness (perception-cognition). So do we, but we have forgotten this and assume we formulate all our own concepts and ideas. 20th century psychology and cognitive science have demonstrated this is not the case, though.

The Thinking-Self is who integrates our separate and fragmented existence as individual willing and feeling beings. That is becaused meaning is essentially shared. We are in a shared medium of soul and spirit. Hence our persistent critiques of BK's alter and dissociation imagery. These boundaries simply do not exist except as reflections of our own localized perspective at any given time. This perspective has constantly evolved and, ideally, will continue to evolve. Yet there is a real possibility of devolution if we remain stuck within abstract infernal loops for too long. This is not necessarily a moral judgment, but a Cosmic law of necessity. Yet, through this law, the potential for spiritual freedom and freely given Love also exists.

[lorenzop]

I'm not a Biblical scholar but I disagree - when Abraham climbed the mountain top, he was asked to surrender everything, including every past, present and futer thought, sensation and perception Spirit refers to transcendent self.
And Jesus said “my yoke is easy” and “Even the least among you can do all that I have done, and greater things” - - - he did not say "salvation is for those who can make an adequate speech on the distinctions between Steiner/Hegel/Kant"

[Ben Iscatus]

As for "solipsism", I've felt that the arguments for primacy of consciousness as the basis for everything only really work if solipsism is true because the concept of consciousness outside my consciousness is nonsensical.

Jim, the term "solipsism" is applied to a personal mind. It is not applicable to the transpersonal mind. If it were, yes, you can't get outside the one consciousness - but you can get inside it because the unbounded, transcendent transpersonal mind can trick itself into being bounded, immanent and personal - hence dissociated alters in a dream (or nightmare) like you and me. I know you're aware of this and I know you like to keep testing (or teasing) us.

[AshvinP]

I'm not a Biblical scholar but I disagree - when Abraham climbed the mountain top, he was asked to surrender everything, including every past, present and futer thought, sensation and perception Spirit refers to transcendent self.
And Jesus said “my yoke is easy” and “Even the least among you can do all that I have done, and greater things” - - - he did not say "salvation is for those who can make an adequate speech on the distinctions between Steiner/Hegel/Kant"

There is nothing about "surrendering every past, present, and future thought, sensation, perception" in the text, and much about the opposite. This is one of those 'debates' that it's pointless to have until the other person first realizes they don't really know anything about the topic... so I will just mention here that every Christian thinker, past, present, and future, disagreed that the Thinking-Self dissolves at death, including metaphysical idealist thinkers. Christian spirituality is not about escaping from the world into impersonal and unconscious bliss, but about redeeming the world through the Thinking heart.

As for the bold, I have no idea where you got that from. My view, the esoteric Christian view, is that 'salvation' is for every human being who heeds the call to evolve lovingly and knowingly into the spiritual realms. It doesn't require any philosophical knowledge at all. Moreover, we have multiple lifetimes to heed the call, but the longer we wait the more difficult it becomes.

[AshvinP]

As for "solipsism", I've felt that the arguments for primacy of consciousness as the basis for everything only really work if solipsism is true because the concept of consciousness outside my consciousness is nonsensical.

Jim, the term "solipsism" is applied to a personal mind. It is not applicable to the transpersonal mind. If it were, yes, you can't get outside the one consciousness - but you can get inside it because the unbounded, transcendent transpersonal mind can trick itself into being bounded, immanent and personal - hence dissociated alters in a dream (or nightmare) like you and me. I know you're aware of this and I know you like to keep testing (or teasing) us.

Jim is right, though. Idealists cannot overcome the hard problem by simply declaring that they have overcome it ("everything is mind"), and likewise they can't avoid solipsism by declaring hard boundaries around themselves and/or declaring themselves to be illusions (which is reminscent of Dan Dennett declaring consciousness to be an illusion).

[Ben Iscatus]

Idealists cannot overcome the hard problem by simply declaring that they have overcome it ("everything is mind"), and likewise they can't avoid solipsism by declaring hard boundaries around themselves and/or declaring themselves to be illusions (which is reminiscent of Dan Dennett declaring consciousness to be an illusion).

Ash, your language is provocative: "overcome the hard problem", "hard boundaries" and "illusions".

It's not a problem "overcome" if it's not a problem at all. The problem for physicalism to do with interaction of different substances or substrates. The whirlpool metaphor is good, because, if everything is water, then the whirlpool is just a behaviour of water.

Nor is the "hard" boundary impervious. The dissociative boundary is more or less porous, depending on our state of mind. A whirlpool can slow, loosen and let the river in.

Nor is an alter strictly an "illusion" - it is a bounded, immanent manifestation, just as a dream avatar is a partial manifestation of our waking identity.

[lorenzop]

There is nothing about "surrendering every past, present, and future thought, sensation, perception" in the text, and much about the opposite. This is one of those 'debates' that it's pointless to have until the other person first realizes they don't really know anything about the topic... so I will just mention here that every Christian thinker, past, present, and future, disagreed that the Thinking-Self dissolves at death, including metaphysical idealist thinkers. Christian spirituality is not about escaping from the world into impersonal and unconscious bliss, but about redeeming the world through the Thinking heart.

As for the bold, I have no idea where you got that from. My view, the esoteric Christian view, is that 'salvation' is for every human being who heeds the call to evolve lovingly and knowingly into the spiritual realms. It doesn't require any philosophical knowledge at all. Moreover, we have multiple lifetimes to heed the call, but the longer we wait the more difficult it becomes.

The desire to maintain the thinking-self is very strong - and all efforts will be sought to keep it - but the thinking-self doesn't exist. There are only thoughts about the thinking-self, thoughts to rehearse and cling to with other thoughts. The thinking-self is the shiniest and perhaps most glorified of the golden calves.

[Starbuck]

The desire to maintain the thinking-self is very strong - and all efforts will be sought to keep it - but the thinking-self doesn't exist. There are only thoughts about the thinking-self, thoughts to rehearse and cling to with other thoughts. The thinking-self is the shiniest and perhaps most glorified of the golden calves.

This.

Maybe this debate has an emotional resolution rather than a conceptual one.