So I haven’t been able to get over the article on Buddhism that I can’t find. It’s just the one line about “if buddhism isn’t true then our worries and correct……”. I can’t really remember the rest of what it said but it was along the lines of how if Buddhism wasn’t true then doing the opposite of it would be our only hope in the world (attachment, clinging, etc). That was the gist of it.
But for me it seemed like irrefutable proof of Buddhism being true, and that I have spend a great deal of time trying to dig this thing up but going nowhere, thinking that it is the final conclusive evidence that proves it once and for all. That I have to follow Buddhism because it is true, and if it wasn’t (accord to the line I read) then “business as usual” would be our only hope. Even now I am struggling to remember every bit of the line I read but it’s hazy and unclear.
Yet part of me sees this as an obsession. Focusing on one line that I barely remember clearly yet deeming it to be utterly decisive when it comes to Buddhism. It’s odder that for someone who doesn’t want Buddhism to be true I spend much time “proving it”. It gets me thinking that letting this go would be better, and the times when I forget about it show that. But it always comes back,and it gnaws and eats at me, and I work into a frenzy trying to dig up the article. Because if I don’t find it then it’s going to haunt me like all the other unresolved questions or philosophies in my mind.
That’s a false dilemma if I’ve ever seen one. Maybe it doesn’t matter if you’re attached or not, or maybe there are ways to be successful (or whatever) with or without attachments.
Well, if the central idea to Buddhism is that wanting things is that desire is the source of suffering, and therefore by giving up all desire we can escape suffering – then if this idea is wrong, and desire is not the source of suffering, we should desire things so that our desires can be fulfilled, right? So it seems pretty tautological, just based on your summary.
Person: Why should I listen to you? You could be wrong. What if you’re wrong?
Buddhism: Er, if I was wrong, then you have to do B, the exact opposite of A. Taken to horrible, horrible extremes. You wouldn’t want that, would you?
Person: Oh my gosh, you’re right! I guess if I don’t take your word about A, then I have to take your word about what I have to do otherwise, because you’re clearly a reliable source.
Buddhism: Yes, exactly. Now, you’re going to want to give up all your money. We have a convenient-
Person: I was being sarcastic, you idiot. If I’m not going to trust you as a correct source, why should I believe your silly claims about anything else? It’s not your way or the highway, it’s your way or billions of possible highways, many of which are better than your way in every way.
Buddhism: But I’m right! Because I say so!
Person: Shut up. Just, shut up.
Yeah, no kidding you have an obsession. A not very healthy one either, to my mind.
Machina, the one persistent link in all your threads is that you are looking for THE answer. There is no one answer to anything. We all wander through life making constrained choices as best we can We pick one of the best out of a maelstrom of possibilities and work toward that one for the sake of moving forward. If you sit on your behind waiting for THE answer that feels right in all things you will never go anywhere, and your life will be wasted.
The secret to life is to do something, anything, as best you can, and to always be looking for ways to make the world around you a little better.
Machinaforce’s problem isn’t that he’s searching for the meaning of life. It’s that he’s got this bizarre notion that buddhism must be the meaning of life, despite the fact that he has only the barest of ideas of what buddhism is. And this bizarre notion is lodged in there despite the fact that every speck of his cognition rejects buddhism at every turn. He doesn’t accept it as it is, he keeps trying to fix it into something that makes sense, while at the same time rejecting everything he comes up with because by the time it makes sense it doesn’t resemble buddhism anymore.
He pretty much has two options for a peaceful and stable cognitive existence: drink the kool-aid, or put down the dixie cup. He has to either stop caring that it doesn’t make sense and accept it as-is, or he has to accept the plainly obvious fact that buddhism as he understands it (or rather, “understands” it) is clearly untrue and thus not the meaning of anything. Until he does one of these two things, he’s stuck.
It is genuinely interesting, though, to encounter apologetics for a religion other than Christianity. And that’s just what the article you’re searching for sounds like, Machinaforce. Buddhist apologetics, with an argument that is predicted on, as Chronos says, a false dilemma.
It’s not really the most enlightening,it’s more like just something I took to be proof but that I can’t really remember beyond “if buddhism isn’t true then…” which made it sound like Buddhism is the only way. It’s been driving me crazy and I’ve been losing sleep over it
I play the bass, I consider myself something of a virtuoso, I slap, use the double-thumb technique, I can do all the two-hand tap shit, artificial harmonics, all kinds of cool shit. I used to get really drunk and record shit on tape that I thought was sheer genius after drinking straight Everclear shots for hours.
The following morning when I would listen to these “genius sessions” that I was assured would change the musical world I was met with a sad, drunken out of time, out of tune mess, but in that moment of inebriation it captivated my mind, I expect it is similar to the OP’s situation.
What I am getting at is that this article and it’s claim haunts me and I can’t find it, and I feel like I can’t move on until I find it somewhere out there,otherwise it will just eat at me. Even a year later I can feel this chewing at my mind and poisoning everything in my life.
And yet some part of me believes this will go the same way as all other Buddhist “proofs” I found, with people not saying it is so. But I can’t know that for sure, I tell myself.
There was a while when I was really gripped by the conviction that Annie Lennox is the best singer of all time, but I was frustrated that I couldn’t prove it to anybody, so I totally get where you are coming from. It just kind of came and went, I guess due to natural changes in brain chemistry that comes with aging. Some things we just aren’t meant to understand. All we can really know is our subjective experience, and in my heart I know Annie Lennox is the best, and anyone who disagrees can go pound sand. That’s what really matters.
Anyone can just, y’know, say stuff. I could just say, right now, that if the philosophy of Nietzsche (or the worship of Loki, or the way of the Jedi, or anything else) is false, then we should all set ourselves on fire and burn to death in the morning; but I’d be amazed if anyone responded to that with a quick “oh, well, I don’t wish to set myself on fire, and so — I’ll sign on for whatever you’re selling!”
Shucks, I’d be shocked that they’ve survived this long.
I’d be shocked that they hadn’t yet come across a guy who’d said something to the effect of “oh, hey: you should obey me in all things; unless that’s not true, in which case, you’d — be sad. And you don’t want to be sad, do you? Okay, so, then, we’re agreed: you’ll obey me in all things! Glad we straightened that out!”
Many here likely know Sturgeon’s Law: 95% of everything is crap. Fewer may know Sturgeon’s Creed: In the winter I’m a Buddhist; in the summer I’m a nudist. Is the dichotomy between nudists and Buddhists significant?
If you find it, you will analyze it and soon discover that it is as inconsequential as any other postulation that you have read. Let it go and move on.