Oh yes it would be, thanks to dogmatism. People believe in all kind of things depending on country. For example in my country, only 0.2% of people are atheist. It’s one of the most religious countries in the world. All people, doctors, politicians, scientist, businessman etc. - all believe in God. This would look strange to a weasterner, but it is how it is.
About materialism, only people that believe in it are people not informed about recent scientific discoveries. And by recent I mean the 50’s. Generally biology teachers from highschool and people like that believe in it. Few serious scientist believe in that anymore.
Remember you need to believe in the many world theory to defend against only one out of 4-5 things that killed materialism. I am sure if you ask any materialist reductionist, they will tell you they don’t even know what the many worlds theory is, let alone have any decent way to defend against the other 4-5 things that refuted that philosophy.
Many philosophies out there can’t be totally refuted. If you believe in the spaghetti monster, it’s hard to prove there is no spaghetti monster that created the world. Yet this it not the case with materialism. Materialism could easily be confirmed or refuted through scientific discoveries, and the second option happened.
To know what happens with consciousness after death, you need to know where it originated from. Only by knowing this can you know if it will disappear or if it will appear again through the same mechanism that it did the first time. You need to know that mechanism.
Materialism claims it originates from matter, yet this has been totally refuted. This means believing that consciousness will disappear at one’s death is based on no argument.
You can’t have a philosophy totally refuted, but still believe in the conclusions of that philosophy. Those conclusions used to be based on something before the philosophy was refuted, now they are based on nothing.
The only sensible thing to do when the philosophy a person used to believe in got refuted is to become an agnosting and honestly search for the truth. There is no point holding on to refuted ideas. No matter how much a person might get angry that the world is not flat, the world will still be round regardless of his getting angry at it.
Critical thinking is very important, especially if helped by intellectual honesty.
But we would have to establish that science is not ‘natural philosophy’ - with bells and whistles - or more precisely, MRI machines and P.E.T.-scanners?
Tell me if you see any philosophy ‘lurking’ in the following scenario?
The scientific materialist says: I got this great theory and, look, I have also got these shiny things that go beep! Now ain’t that a pretty picture? I took it on my MRI machine and now I have proved my theory - the mind is just a bi-product of the nervous system!
If this is all they can come with they need to forget about critical thinking?
The problem of induction:
"Joel Feinberg and Russ Shafer-Landau note that “using the scientific method to judge the scientific method is circular reasoning”. Scientists attempt to discover the laws of nature and to predict what will happen in the future, based on those laws. However, per David Hume’s problem of induction, science cannot be proven inductively by empirical evidence, and thus science cannot be proven scientifically. An appeal to a principle of the uniformity of nature would be required to deductively necessitate the continued accuracy of predictions based on laws that have only succeeded in generalizing past observations. But as Bertrand Russell observed, “The method of ‘postulating’ what we want has many advantages; they are the same as the advantages of theft over honest toil”. - Wikipedia
Very good - hence the philosophy of materialism is called into question on sound and reasonable scientific grounds. We also have to remember, since science produces ‘best case scenarios’ it does not pretend to have the last word on reality. It is an ongoing inquiry that is best served by open-minds - just like the Dhamma.
The Buddha had to deal with the same kind of objections to his teachings from the annihilationists. The Buddha explained: practice in the way I teach and discover Jhana’s. In the wake of Jhana’s you have an opportunity to see things in a different light. You will have an opportunity to understand - in depth - why you are suffering and what you can do about it! The annihilationists said, we have no such experience therefore it must not be true! What can be done with an attitude like this?
Here’s another excerpt from that Hayes book I’m still going through:
Supposing that a skeptical reading is accepted for Dinnaga’s system of epistemology, the question of the place of logic within Buddhism becomes rather easy to answer. Logic should perhaps not be seen, as was so often done by Dharmakirti and the later Indian traditions and many of the Tibetan traditions, merely as a means of establishing the truth of Buddhist teachings. On the contrary, putting logic to the service of polemics and apologetics is in a way to thwart the very purpose for which it was intended, namely, to counter dogmatism and prejudice. As a weapon in the battle against prejudice that rages in every mind that seeks wisdom–in minds of the vast majority of people who do not seek wisdom, prejudice simply takes full control without a contest~-there is nothing as powerful as the kind of reason that lies at the heart of Dinnaga’s system of logic. For it should be clear that very few of our judgements in ordinary life pass the standards set by the three characteristics of legitimate’ evidence [as set forth in Dinnaga’s epistemology]. Taken in its strictest interpretation, none of the judgements of any but a fully omniscient being passes. And, since there is no evidence that there exist any fully omniscient beings, the best available working hypothesis is that no one’s thinking is immune from errors that require revision in the face of newly discovered realities. Therefore, since we cannot place full reliance on the teachings of any teacher or any tradition of teachers, our only hope in the final analysis lies just in our own resources as individuals. That this is so is made all the more apparent when it is recalled that communication from one mind to another by means of language is very limited and can never do full justice to realities, as we shall see in greater detail in the next chapter.
Furthermore, since every event is strictly speaking unique and can be found similar to other events only if we disregard distinctions, every reality is a fresh discovery. The process of discovery is sensation, which deals exclusively with what is present (sat) and real (sat). The Sanskrit verb “asti,” from which the participle “sat” is formed, conveys the senses of being, existing, taking place, happening, being located somewhere and especially being present (that is, being located right here). Therefore “sat” means not only real or existent in general but more specifically being present. It also conveys the sense of being good. To be good, to be real is, in most Sanskrit philosophical works, to be right here as an object of full awareness. The fresh discovery of the presently real is one of the principal forms of Buddhist mindfulness training. But the fresh discovery of what is immediately present can be made only if the invasion of recollections of past experiences, the very recollection of which is itself often faulty and weighted with prejudice, can be kept under control. And one of the means available for keeping the invasion of memory-driven judgements and pre-judgements under control is to apply the rigorous standards of logic to them. When the weakness of our judgements is exposed by this application of the canons of reason, our opinions have a tendency to vanish into nothingness. Or, to use the favourite analogy from the Samkhya tradition, when the actress that has been performing her role realizes that the audience knows that the world she has created is an insubstantial illusion, she retires in shame behind the curtain, and the illusion comes to an end; in a similar way, when the world of experience that is created by opinion and prejudice can be revealed for what it is by the light of reason, opinion retires and the world of painful experience gives way to the joy of dispassion. Seen in this way, the task of an epistemologist such as Dinnaga is simply to provide one more way of doing so called insight (vipasyana) meditation, regarded as crucial for the attainment of dispassion and nirvana.
Anyways I can’t recommend the book enough even if it is difficult in some places when discussing the logical details of Dignaga’s system.
Yoniso manasikāra is used very widely in the suttas. A basic definition is found at MN 2:
Ayoniso, bhikkhave, manasikaroto anuppannā ceva āsavā uppajjanti, uppannā ca āsavā pavaḍḍhanti; yoniso ca kho, bhikkhave, manasikaroto anuppannā ceva āsavā na uppajjanti, uppannā ca āsavā pahīyanti.
When one attends unwisely, unarisen taints arise and arisen taints increase. When one attends wisely, unarisen taints do not arise and arisen taints are abandoned.
Here “taint” is used much in the same way as defilement is used elsewhere.
So it seems that any use of the mind that leads to an increase in wholesome qualities is yoniso manaskāra, the reverse being the case for ayoniso manasikāra. Reflection, whether “critical” or “wise”, is certainly included in this. Depending on how it is used, it would come under either yoniso or ayoniso.
But there is more to a/yoniso manasikāra than reflection. Yoniso manasikāra is used all the way to the end of the path and includes the final directing of the mind as you attain the stages of awakening. In these cases the word “reflection” probably does not do full justice to what is going on, being, as it is, quite closely related to “thinking”. When the mind is very still, as it needs to be before profound insight is possible, it is more a matter of turning the mind in the right direction than verbalisation. It is for this reason that I think the standard rendering of yoniso manasikāra as “wise attention” or “careful attention” is quite satisfactory. It includes all modes of using the mind.
So we can’t think our way to enlightenment - critically or otherwise? We can describe the necessary causes and supportive conditions for waking up but it all has to be put into practice - through body, speech and mind? The description is not the described? We need a whole-hearted and conscientious engagement with the teachings in every aspect of our lives. Its not just about what the ‘little voices’ are telling us to do, what we believe makes sense and what does not.
One of the things that destroyed it are the recent findings in quantum physics. I am not speaking here about the double slit experiment, I am speaking about the double slit ERAZER experiment that destroyed both solipsism and materialism at the same time. Explaining this would take quite some time, therefore I suggest reading a day or two on the topic to better understand these findings.
Other things that destroyed it are things regarding the relationship between imaterial things such as consciousness, perception, etc. and physical matter. Things as simple as the placebo effect destroy materialism. Neuroplasticity also killed it. Some people think that we can say “oh, we just haven’t explained that yet, I am sure there will be an explanation that will make that fit somehow with our materialist believs”. That is the same as christians opinions about evolution or things that just contradict what is written in the bible. You just can’t have things like the placebo effect or neuroplasticity existing and still consider the causality between matter-consciousness that materialism proposes to be true. That conditionality has been shown to be wrong. There is nothing you can do about it, that particular conditionality has been shown to simply not be so. It is like saying scientific findings show the world is round, yet we can still make these findings fit with our flat-earth beliefs but we just need a little more time to see how we can do that.
What I like to do with materialist is suggest them to take 5 minutes (5 minutes, not 1 minute) to really think about how could such a thing as consciousness originate from matter. How can a primitive organism like an insect having 5 neurons posses consciousness yet a supercomputer can not. Just take 5 minutes to really really really think about how could consciousness originate from matter. You can’t just say it pooped up due to magic, you must find some kind of a mechanism. You need some kind of an explanation. You can’t just say “this is so because I believe it is so” or claim there is magic that made it pop up. You need an explanation that doesn’t involve the use of magic, an explanation that provides some sort of a mechanism.
Of course these are all simply not required since materialism has been burried by quantum phisics ever since the 50s, not to mention the recent quantum erazer experiment. This is why the few quantum phisicist that still believe in materialism now believe in the 'Many-worlds-theory" - a theory that not only does not solve these problems, but it also brings more problems than it solves. And it’s as ridiculous of a theory as ridiculous theories get. The spagghete monster is less ridiculous than the many-worlds theory. This is why very few quantum phisicist still believe in materialism. As I said, only biology highschool teachers still believe in this stuff, no serious scientist, especially quantum physicist, still believes in it. Most have just turned agnostic after materialism was refuted.
“The past is like a dream and the future is yet to come. When the future actually happens, it’s always the present. Tomorrow never comes; when it does, it’s called today. One cannot live in the future nor in the past. One can only live this single moment. If we really paid attention to every single moment, we would meditate well. We would also have no doubt about impermanence (anicca). In fact we would see it so clearly, we could let go of our attachments, our clinging.” - Ayya Khema
Yes, I should mention this is based on Richard Hayes’ interpretation of Dignaga. Others scholars differ I believe. This is mainly because Dignaga’s works (1) Don’t survive in sanskrit (2) Can be quite terse.
