Posted by Mark H. on December 10, 2004, at 20:28:57
In reply to Re: Free will conundrum explored, posted by alexandra_k on December 10, 2004, at 16:39:08
Dear Alexandra,
I like the way you cut through to the essence of things so quickly. My thinking seems to have stalled this afternoon, and everything I write reads like crap. I don’t know whether to drill down into some of your ideas or just to sit with them for awhile. I need to confess that I don’t understand the basic paradox: “So IF having free will means that one could have done otherwise, THEN it follows that we have no free will.” How is that so? I sense that you’re on to something important, but it seems circular and impenetrable to me at the moment.
The idea of a higher/lower order of beliefs makes sense to me, in much the same way as the three ego states of Transactional Analysis (Parent – Adult – Child). Of course I don’t believe that the “inner child” exists as a separate entity, but it is useful in running my life not to discount its needs. My experience with pretending my ego states are not in conflict at times has resulted in my parent/adult intentions and priorities being undermined by my child ego state. (I find the forced simplicity of Transactional Analysis useful, because it counters my tendency to over-intellectualize.)
Today my lower order desire to respond to you right away has not been overridden by my higher order desire to give more time to considering your responses. :-)
What is consciousness? How is it different from awareness? Who is it that is experiencing these states? Where is my “self” located? I think you said it very well when you wrote, “I am not so sure that consciousness and free will can be accounted for, and I don't think that there are any even remotely satisfactory accounts of these phenomena that do not change the topic in order to explain them....”
That’s why I tend to bludgeon the topic with practical examples and chosen beliefs.
Then there’s mutual projection: at the moment you were kindly attributing to me a knack for philosophy, I was thinking that you would be a natural Vajrayana Buddhist.
Just think: 100 gods and goddesses to worship and interact with, but no creator. All phenomena as completely empty yet radiantly full in their display. The inherent purity of all phenomena. And with much practice (so I’m told): the direct experience of timeless awareness. Seems like it might be right up your alley.
The French Vajrayana Buddhists are (of course) influenced by post-WWII existentialists like Sartre. In a discussion between the Dalai Lama and a French filmmaker, the latter kept pressing His Holiness to say definitively once and for all that there is no God. To my delight, instead he said something like, “Perhaps He is directing us to have this conversation right now.”
Have a great weekend.
With kind regards,
Mark H.
poster:Mark H.
thread:424323
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20041209/msgs/427457.html