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No question there, just another rant about 'transpersonal, stuff.
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Don’t ask about jhana attainments, don’t claim them. Arrogant stuff, nothing to do with your OP.
The OP’s title asked a question. The answer is, yes.
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Yes I have already heard that view expressed by you. Try not to repeat what you have said ad-nauseum!
I gave you a response, I made it clear that I was not talking about the vanishing of the meditating individual sitting on the cushion. I am talking about the state of mind of the meditator. I am saying that in Jhana there is no sense of self. There is an experience but there is no identification with what is happening. An experience with no one taking hold of the experience. This leads to the dissolution of the sense of ‘self’.
Now answer the other 2 paragraphs directly!
So, this is mostly nonsense right?
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The opening question is about transpersonal insight in relation to Secular Buddhism. You have failed to provide an account of a single transpersonal insight. Therefore, as a Secular Buddhist you have answered the opening question.
I’m pretty sure laurence is up in the night on this one.
The most generous explanation I have is that it’s an ESL issue, where the word “subjective” has, for them, some unsavory connotation that isn’t present in my use of the term.
Otherwise, I’m the only one who’s cited Sutta on this matter…
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This already happened. I said “2” and “3” so you’d be able to see them.
You seem sort of agitated; maybe let’s both go have a cuppa and wait it out for a spell?
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Ok, so it looks like the source of much of this dispute is just a semantic one involving three competing senses of the term “subjective.” The three senses seem to be roughly these:
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An experience E of some individual X is subjective if and only if it is an experience that does not include any self-conception of X, or any awareness of X, itself, as the subject of the experience E.
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An experience E of some individual X is subjective if and only if it is solely an experience of X, and not at the same time an experience of any other individual Y.
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An experience E of some individual X is subjective if and only if it a direct and pure experience of ultimate reality, and hence is not intrinsically colored and conditioned by any previous experiences or cognitive formations of X.
Some experiences of some meditation practitioners might be subjective in the first sense because their content is “empty of self” in some way. But the same would also be true of all experiences of animals who are cognitively incapable of having self-concepts, or of experiencing conscious self-awareness, in the first place. I’m pretty sure the Buddha’s teaching is that this kind of total eradication of self-awareness, and complete elimination of I-making and my-making, only occurs at the highest level of attainment and complete liberation, and that even the higher jhana attainments involve a subtle sense of self.
Experiences will be subjective in the second sense whenever they are the experiences of a single individual, and the states and events transpiring in that individual’s mind are not literally shared by, or components of, the minds of others. I don’t know that there is anywhere in the suttas where this idea of two minds literally sharing a single experience - as opposed to having two different experiences which happen to be qualitatively identical - is ever raised.
Experiences will be subjective in the third sense whenever the intrinsic characteristics of those experiences (and not just the bare fact that the experiences are occurring in the first place as a result of practices the experiencer has undertaken) have been influenced by the previous life experiences, native mental tendencies and cognitive training of the person having the experience. Presumably most worldly experience is of this sort, and this type of subjectivity is only eradicated when moha has been completely eliminated.
I don’t think disputes about this last kind of subjectivity have much, if anything, to do with the dispute between secularists and non-secularists. Secular Buddhists understand as well as non-secularists that there is a big difference between actually having an experience, on the one hand, and only possessing some intellectual and discursive conceptualization of an experience, on the other hand. And the prior conceptual grasp of the higher experiences by non-secular Buddhists is going to be just as defective, and just as colored by intellectual conditioning and life experiences, as the prior conceptual grasp of these experiences of secularists. Only once one has actually had the relevant experiences themselves will one know directly what they are like. But that’s a problem for both secular and non-secular mediators and path-followers alike.
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Once having had the experience only then can you know - in hindsight - what it is like. It is obvious to me through direct experience that formless Jhanas are without a trace of subjectivity. I hate to be a bringer of inconvenient News to information buffs but, there is not any form of subjectivity in any Jhana in the Buddha’s teachings. The experience of the beautiful Jhanas are just the experience of the beautiful - no subject. Likewise, the formless Jhanas are without any sense of self. This is a transpersonal insight not a theoretical conjecture. To understand the significance of the non-subjective nature of Jhana is only understood by the Jhani. You have to have transpersonal happenings before you can see why they have an indispensable place in the Buddha’s teachings. In fact, without them the Buddha would not have been able to set the wheel in motion.
An inability to see this is to reduce the Buddha’s teachings to a belief system - an ideology, secular or religious - that happens to produce a few therapeutic outcomes. Something akin to new-age nonsense or Secular Buddhism. Sad but true!
I saw a Sutta quote on another thread where the Buddha stated: “I did not claim full and complete AWAKENING before I had entered and left the eight Jhanas - and, nirodhasamapatti* - in ascending and descending order.”
I will find the quote and post it! From this, we can get a clear sense of the importance of transpersonal insight in the teachings.
Thankyou Dan, for your last comment. It helped a great deal in clearing away a misunderstanding of the meaning of not-self in a Jhanic context.
“Ananda, as long as I had not attained & emerged from these nine step-by-step dwelling-attainments in forward & backward order in this way, I did not claim to have directly awakened to the right self-awakening.” - AN9.41
*Phalasamapatti is attained by each of the four kinds of noble beings just after attaining the knowledge of the path, and it can be cultivated and extended by them as well. Nirodhasamapatti however, can only be entered by non-returners and arahats.
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Not agitated just disappointed - my expectations of my fellow practitioners is to high - at least in this context. I need more compassion instead of astonishment and disbelief. I will work on it - thanks for the heart-felt concern! 
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I have added an important Sutta quotation - at the top and near the bottom of the thread. I hope the lights go on!
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Thank you Mat - with your comment - we have now established that the use of the term (transpersonal) is appropriate with regard to the Jhanas - and various other important topics in the Buddha’s teachings. Clearly, there is a perception among (some) Secular Buddhists that the ‘transpersonal aspects of the teachings’ are controversial or problematic - as evidenced in this thread - for (various reasons). The reasons may include a conceptual deficit - a limitation - in the language-game* of Secular Buddhism? Making it difficult to talk about the transpersonal teachings of the Buddha in a coherent and reasonable way. This seems likely - don’t you think? Different ‘forms of discourse’ contain different terms and definitions that reflect their specific areas of concern.
The other concern that some Secular Buddhists have is related to their ideology. Many Secular Buddhists lack an open-mind when it comes to the teachings of the Buddha - as found in the EBT’s. However, they may ‘pretend’ to be open-minded for ideological reasons.
Many - not all - Secular Buddhists operate from a ‘cognitive and perceptual background’ that determines what is possible - and impossible - according to their preset conclusions and ideological commitments. They then tend to dismiss or trivialise important aspects of the Buddha’s teachings. They may dismiss early teachings on the basis of a (claim) to modern understanding. They say, that many of the Buddha’s insights are the fables or myths of the ‘ancients’ - people who did not know better!
Some Secular Buddhists believe they know-better than ‘traditional’ Buddhists because they (claim) that many modern findings have discredited various teachings. Truth-claims of this nature is ideology in disguise! They ‘cherry-pick’ what they like in the teachings and ignore that which does not fit into their Secular Buddhist ideology. This leads to an intransigence - an inability to move freely - to be open to surprise! This is also true of people with a commitment to religious ideologies - that have been adopted without due reflection.
We cannot wake-up unless we are ‘open’ to ‘new’ and transformative forms of liberating insight. This is an indispensable virtue in the Buddha-Dharma.
Regarding your comment about the noosphere: “This cannot be experienced - an envelope of consciousness around the world -so must be relegated to box named ‘imagination’.”
We do not have to believe in the existence of a subtle sphere of consciousness enveloping the world to understand the meaning of the term: noosphere! We can understand it as a ‘lexical analogy’. An analogy is not an actual sphere or domain enveloping anything - it can be used to refer to the ‘world’ of human concepts and ideas! We are inhabiting that ‘world’ as we inquire and explore the theme of this thread.
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My assessment of this thread is that you posed an argument that relied on several premises or axioms. The feedback you received from 3/4 respondents could be summarized as “huh? I don’t understand the premises”.
For instance my understanding of the implications of the noosphere seemed to be the opposite of yours.
It seems to me that you interpret “in way do you mean that, please say more” as proof of your conclusions rather than taking the Occam’s razor path. That “I don’t understand” or “that is vague with multiple plausible meanings, please narrow it down” may have been intended as a “I don’t understand but I’m willing to listen”.
What is the evidence in this thread of references to " transpersonal dimension of the Buddha’s teachings" that are “controversial or problematic”?
Again, you may be confusing other people’s confusion with conclusions.
There is a secular Buddhist sitting right over there. Let me ask her.
She says she likes transpersonal stuff and asks similar questions about how coherent and reasonable the anti-secular Buddhist thinking is.
Correction. Many anti-secular Buddhists do that too.
If this is to be about throwing dogmatic assertions around then I can come up with my set of highly plausible ones. Thus, to ‘turn around’ a recent statement , it seems plausible to assert:
Critics of secular Buddhism ‘cherry-pick’ what they like in the teachings and ignore that which does not fit into their ideology - this is completely self-evident! This leads to an intransigence - an inability to move freely - to be open to surprise!
IMO the paragraph above is in the dogmatic territory – yet I believe it fairly captures a pattern of expression found in recent threads critical of secular Buddhism. This technique of ‘turning around’ or ‘turning back’ what we say about others is a powerful technique for ‘catching ourselves out’ and uncovering our own blindspots.
Speaking of surprises … The philosophy of science is perhaps a lot more open to the transpersonal than you think.
Because of this, IMO, the “reductionists” and dualists on this site are well represented among the critics of secular Buddhism.
For example:
Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Science: New Essays
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A reminder friends!!
Please avoid anything that may even have the appearance of personal or ‘ad hominem’ attack, as this is against our forum guidelines.
Thank you!
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I don’t understand what you mean are you making a comment or asking a question? You are welcome to add something of consequence if you find this thread meaningless?
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So , the Buddha enlightenment had to do with the nine steps of jhana ?
But , some think Nirodhasamapatti only can be accessed by arahant .
However , the 9 th stage i.e. the Nirodhasamapatti also attained by the other ascetics .
Where did you hear this?
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I guess I was wrong , thought heard it from a YouTube . Apology .
Probably another topic- suttas say non-returners come out from nirodhasamapatti and become arahanths (not sure what EBTs say about those lower than non-returner).
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A Secular Buddhist could keep an open-mind and be undecided with regard to the transpersonal teachings of the Buddha.
An open-minded attitude is next to impossible for those who have strong ideological commitments that deny the existence of transpersonal insights. Secular Buddhist practitioners who are also ‘believers’ of Scientism would not accept the existence of transpersonal insights. See the first definition of Scientism (below):
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Scientism is the view that only scientific claims are meaningful.
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Scientism can also be used to refer to the methods and attitudes typical of or attributed to the natural scientist.
A believer of Scientism would not be willing to accept those aspects of the Buddha’s teachings that have not been validated through empirical techniques and procedures. They would never accept the truth of any statement found in Buddhist teachings on the basis of the Buddha’s methods of inquiry as for them ‘empiricism’ is the only valid means to arrive at compelling and persuasive evidence and results. The possibility of a ‘contemplative science’ that did not meet empirical requirements would be labelled as: pseudo-science or complete nonsense!
It just so happens that there are many people in society at large - with a secular orientation - that express an interest in Secular Buddhism. It is likely, that many of these ‘converts’ are not aware of the underlying assumptions in Scientism. They may have views and opinions that are scientistic in nature and they view the Buddha’s teachings through a scientistic prism. This is what I was referring to with regard to preset conclusions and ideological commitments - earlier in this thread. It takes time and research to sort out the confusion. Not everyone has the time or interest to bring all the pieces together. Without this interest and effort misunderstandings proliferate!
Paradigmatic shifts and iterative transformational combinations do not require metaphysical explanations. Modern practice is less focused on what was true 2500 years ago and more on what we have learned since then. Bikkhu Bodhi has answered this same question in discussions online, including podcast with Robert Wright. His answer dependent on whether one was radical atheist or agnostic/open. Secular practice is not homogeneous. Neither is the sangha.