Hullow again dear @Javier,
First, and most important, I feel like I made a friend here. I feel like I know a lot about what really matters to you, and I can’t say that of some of my “real life” friends. So that is cool. 
As I said, I was in doubt whether to post my last reply, because it felt I was addressing the wrong thing. I couldn’t really find the right words. Now, emotions and values aren’t unrelated, but, yes, value is better than emotion. I think that’s what I meant, anyway, but you seem to have a more well-defined idea of what a value is than I do. I’m happy you saw what I was really getting at despite the word ‘emotion’. I get the feeling you studied like philosophy or something, but just so you know, I did the exact opposite (engineering, lol), and my English vocabulary also isn’t the greatest. 
Thanks for explaining some of the terms, I like learning.
Yes, it’s been nice this discussion. I’m getting something out of it, looking at myself and seeing how you think, and learning how to address it in a courteous way (I try). I live in a monastery where we all have the same idea about nibbāna, and while that is great (no arguments!), the interaction you get with other views is usually through books, so the personal dimension isn’t there. In a way I’m exploiting you, by the way. I’ll be giving a workshop on nibbāna soon, and I’ll keep some of the things you said in mind when we address what we call “myths” about it. This gives some of them a personal touch for me, which is helpful. Because people in the audience will also have such views and I don’t want to be too insensitive, you know.
I was hoping we were winding things down, but your reply is quite long. 
It’s very interesting though, I read it with a big smile. I’ll try to address most of it, but my writing style will suffer, because I do want to do finish it within a certain timeframe. I’ll be responding on the fly, basically. I hope you understand. Even though your reply deserves better.
Anyway,
Of course I’ve also created values and emotions about this! In a sense that is exactly what I’m trying to get across, that cessationism can also be seen as something beautiful, something inspiring and emotionally uplifting. Because that is what you didn’t seem to see, and you were basing your reasoning on that. To simplify, I felt you sort of argued along the lines of, “There can’t be value in cessationism, therefore it can’t be what the Buddha taught.” But when I read the Buddha speaking of “the shelter”, I’m like WOW that is really a cool shelter! So there can be value in it, at least from a certain individual’s perspective.
(I’ll get back to values later, though, and I’ll say something which may seem like the opposite. Because this is just one way of looking at it. Hint: I don’t think things have inherent value.)
That is to say, I don’t think that only cessationalism is a candidate for a view that could be mistaken for annihilation.
I still find it unlikely that continuitism would be so mistaken, unless it was very poorly taught. But could we agree it at least more likely that cessationism would?
it’s dynamic […] It’s not something that you already have […] it’s something you attain […]
I see differences with the brahmin atman here, so that’s illuminating. But am I right, it’s changing and something that comes to be? That doesn’t align well with how the Buddha described the goal, as something stable and not created and so forth. Also, I never heard of this view before, so pardon my ignorance. I did assume until now that it was somewhat like the permanent mind ideas.
But the text says he found it, not that “I will find it when I die”.
He found it, but he hadn’t reached it yet. We can find a destination before we reach it, of course. When he said he found it, it means he understood it, and he knew it was going to happen.
By the way, the Buddha didn’t come right out and say that nibbana is non-existence either. So, your view also has some 'splaining to do.
Let me do that, then. We have “nibbāna is the cessation of existence” (technically not spoken by the Buddha but by others). It isn’t called “non-existence” per se because nibbāna refers primarily to the event of cessation rather than the resultant state. Because the extinguishment of a flame is an event too. Nibbāna is just a metaphorical synonym for cessation. Most people nowadays only call the result of this event nibbāna, but in the suttas that’s not the primary meaning.
Regardless, event or result, if we say “nibbāna is the cessation of existence”, the effective idea is the same. Which is that existence comes to an end. And I of course read this as all existence. So to me this is a pretty clear statement on what the goal is, what nibbāna is.
And nibbana is also just one word for the goal, a metaphorical one at that. Just simply “the cessation of existence” by itself (without “nibbana is”) already describes the goal, and this is repeated allover, especially in SN12. Likewise with the cessation of the five aggregates, of the six senses, nāmarūpa and consciousness, the six elements, the sensual, form, and formless, and so forth. Because I don’t posit anything beyond any of these groups, all talks on their cessation boil down to the same thing: the cessation of existence.
And because there is nothing beyond them, just saying “these things cease” is enough to explain nibbāna completely. The Buddha didn’t need to say anything more, because there isn’t anything more! That’s why the Buddha is always extremely clear to me. His fundamental ideas are all over the place.
But for your view, every time you read such statements on cessation, there is a “disclaimer” attached which says, “there’s still this pure awareness outside of the aggregates, six senses, and so forth”. The Buddha doesn’t tend to mention this though, certainly not very explicitly!
What’s more, every time the Buddha mentions the aggregates to be suffering, for example, I don’t have to think “but he leaves unmentioned this thing which is not suffering”. To me, suttas like the Dhammacakkappavattana, Aditta, and Anattalakkhana are all complete. Because they mention the aggregates/senses to be suffering. That says all I need to know about existence and the end of suffering. I don’t have to rely on a few references here and there. Do you see where I’m coming from?
And that’s the way the Buddha’s teachings should be, because nowadays we have the whole canon digitally and many other resources. But in the time of the Buddha you’d be lucky to hear a few discourses. So he had to make sure he conveyed the whole message as often as possible, not leaving out the essentials (like a pure being) only for occasional mentions. Of course, people also got right view after hearing teachings where no special awareness is spoken of.
Again, I think the Buddha was a very lousy teacher if he actually taught continuitism. I could have done a better job myself, let alone you.
Is your daily sense consciousness infinite or limitless?
No, but infinite or limitless consciousness is one of the formless states. And it is an aspect of the mind, hence it falls under mano-viññāṇa.
with a limitless mind […] So, it seems we can have a limitless mind unattached from consciousness. This seems to support a reading where there are different ontological forms of mind/consciousness.
Meaning “mind set free”, according to the PTS dictionary. It’s just another way to state that the mind is no longer attached to things. It doesn’t mean that it is something apart from them. (If I remember that’s also how the commentary explains it, but it’s been a while.)
We spoke about these claims by Bhikkhu Bodhi already. I haven’t changed my mind since, but I’ll watch that video later. I will grant you that it is some of the harder to rebuke evidence in favor of your view, which is probably why Bhikkhu Bodhi, whom I admire, sticks to that and not vinnana anidassana and so forth that other teachers bring up. (Unless he does mention it in the talk, which would be sort of disappointing.)
I can understand you not buying the emotional/ontological distinction I made with reference to some of these terms, but then there’s another option. Because I can also talk about a “sphere” of absence, a “state” of non-existence, a “realm” of nothingness, and all that doesn’t sound particularly odd to me. What “sphere” means is qualified by what follows, namely absence. And that is exactly how it is in the Ud8.1 on the āyatana, which is followed by a long list of things NOT being there, and nothing that is there.
It’s basically the spiritual form of suicide.
This term seems overly negative since it’s colored with people’s emotional ideas. Perhaps “spiritual euthanasia” would make it a bit less laden; or better, “spiritual voluntary end of life”. I myself don’t take it the wrong way, though, and I’ll go with it. I have no negative bias toward the word myself. So let’s say it is spiritual suicide, even though I’d never call it that myself.
Then there is still a huge difference. And that’s because there is no self to kill. People who are suicidal have a very strong sense of self. As you say, they have “the desire to annihilate themselves, to bring all their pain to an end”. To me, it’s only suffering that comes to an end and it’s nothing to do with “me”. So no, the logic is actually completely different. I have no personal interest in ending existence, it’s just what naturally happens if I let go of desire. So there is another thing that separates my view from suicide other than rebirth, and it is a very important thing.
But I also still don’t agree with your argument that rebirth makes no difference. It does, because the amount of suffering that ends is millions times greater. As the Buddha said: “Bhikkhus, this saṁsara is without discoverable beginning. […] Just that [knowledge] is enough to experience revulsion towards all formations, enough to become dispassionate towards them, enough to be liberated from them.” The ontological outcome of cessationism versus one-lifetime suicide is perhaps the same (we’re speaking hypothetically!), but its emotional value is measured against that of the antithesis. Cessation after one life is not very emotionally “rewarding”, because one life, especially if it’s a good and healthy life like I hope you have, may not be considered that bad. But cessation after “undiscoverable” many lives is very much more emotionally valuable, because the amount of suffering is compounded, and it’s not at all fun to do the same thing all over “again and again” as the Buddha said, even if it were a good life.
We argued before why cessationism isn’t annihilism, that it is the self view that’s makes the difference. Let’s keep that in mind. I prefer not to mix annihilism with nihilism though, because the latter has all sorts of meanings. In the Buddha’s times what is sometimes translated as “nihilism” was not believing in kamma for example. That’s not what we call “nihilism” nowadays. And even nowadays the word has many meanings, as you’ll probably know. So I won’t say whether my views are nihilistic or not, because that’s too vague a term to me. Also, like suicide, it just has too much of an emotional burden for people, to the extent that just calling someone a nihilist is already considered to be an argument sometimes. (Luckily this discussion is not of that nature.) Perhaps define nihilism more clearly, and I can say what I think.
I can answer the extinction button thought-experiment, though. That’s a fun one! The answer is, I don’t know if I would press that button, and I don’t feel I would be logically forced to either. Because since there is no self, it also doesn’t really matter if suffering continues. Yeah, it’s suffering, but it’s like the rock in front of my hut: it’s just another thing in nature. Me not pressing the button is like paccekabuddhas didn’t start teaching. Why didn’t they? I think because it didn’t really matter to “them” if self-less aggregates kept continuing. (Including their own, by the way. But it’s just natural that if seen as suffering, they can’t possibly continue.)
Now, I think cessation is a cool idea, and I can make it valuable to me. But in reality non-existence and existence both have no value, because there’s no-one to whom it applies.
Because what is value really? To me it’s a construct of the mind, not something intrinsic in the universe or in anything in itself. Value is what we give to things. Because it’s a mental construct to me, that’s exactly why I mixed it up with “emotion”, I hope you understand now.
However, nibbana is still emotionally positive. Because it’s still suffering coming to an end. If suffering is understood, it is a natural inclination of the mind (called disillusionment/fading away) to move away from it. Nibbana doesn’t need to have any intrinsic value for that to happen.
What I meant is, cessationalism is an extremely rare view in the history of religions, I dare say it is a unique view.
Exactly!!! Yes! YES. The Buddha was a genius. As I said, he wouldn’t have had to discover things for himself if he believed in continuism. But he did have to, because nobody else had awoken to the truth, so nobody could teach him. Even though his society was extremely spiritual with all sorts of views. That’s why the Buddha had to teach “things not heard before”. The dhamma is indeed truly deep, difficult to see.
I don’t get how this would be an argument against my view, I think it heavily in favor of it, considering also what the Buddha himself said about few beings crossing over the river, most just walking down the bank.
Well, I don’t think that the nibbanic awareness that I accept is “holding on to awareness”. It’s precisely an awareness that has completely let go of all things, even sense consciousness, and even itself.
But that’s not the statement. The question is not are you holding on to it, but is it WORTH (alaṃ) holding onto? (Note: others may translate alaṃ differently, so you could argue the Buddha never posed this. I’ll just give you that. But I think that’s what he’s saying.)
This nibbanic awareness is something like the appatiṭṭha viññāṇa (unestablished consciousness or consciousness without barriers) of SN 22.87 that Mara could not find. It’s like the consciousness that is “unestablished, not coming to growth, nongenerative, liberated. By being liberated, it is steady; by being steady, it is content…” (SN 22.53). It is similar to the anissita viññāṇa that the devas cannot find in MN 22: “When a mendicant’s mind was freed like this, the gods together with Indra, Brahmā, and the Progenitor, search as they may, will not discover: ‘This is what the Realized One’s consciousness depends on.’ Why is that? Because even in the present life the Realized One is not found, I say.” Thus, here we have a kind of consciousness that does not depend on anything.
Furthermore, this nibbanic awareness is similar to the unsupported consciousness that does not land on anything
I’ll send you a PM later with a draft paper explaining what I think this all means.
Similarly, nibbana is described as something that can be directly known (e.g. MN1), but can one “directly know” non-existence?
Yes. But not in the moment itself. It’s like the Buddha not having reached the destination yet, but being able to see it. Because he understood how existence is dependently originated and how it will cease when the conditions are no longer present. It goes deeper than that, since it’s not just a theory, and they have also seen the mind cease temporarily already. Coming back after that cessation, they have “directly known” what it is like.
I also want to say that even though I use terms like consciousness and awareness, this nibbanic experience is radically different than what we call “consciousness” in everyday speech, since it is contentless, unestablished, limitless, not suffering, and so on. Thus, even though it is a kind of subtle experience, it is only in a metaphorical or very loose sense that I say it’s a “consciousness.”
That doesn’t make sense to me. If there is an experience, there must be some sort of awareness or consciousness. How can you experience something without awareness? Perhaps this is just trying to fit a specific view in with the suttas, which mention the cessation of consciousness and so forth. What is the ontological difference between experience and awareness? To me it’s just different words for the same thing. A bit of the equivocators’ “I don’t say it’s this, I don’t say it’s that. I don’t say it’s so, I don’t say it’s not so.” (DN1) That is what it feels like. No offense meant at all. I just don’t understand it!
I’ll end with this. (MN60, my translation, so check some others too. Added some brackets with my opinions.)
“Householders, there are some renunciants and brahmins who have the doctrine and view that there is no complete cessation of existence. [=continuitism] And there are some renunciants and brahmins whose doctrine directly contradicts this, saying that there is a complete cessation of existence. [=cessationism] Householders, tell me what you think. Don’t these doctrines directly contradict each other?”
“Yes, sir.”
“A clever person reflects on this as follows: ‘Some say there is a complete cessation of existence, but I have not seen so. Others say that there no complete cessation of existence, but I have not seen so either. As long as I don’t know and see, it would be inappropriate for me to take one side and declare that it is the only truth and other ideas are mistaken. If those who say there is no complete cessation of existence are correct, it is possible I will be guaranteed a rebirth among the formless gods consisting of perception. But if those who say that there is a complete cessation of existence are correct, it is possible I will get extinguished in this very life. The view of those who say there is no complete cessation of existence is close to desire, attachment, enjoyment, clinging, and taking up. But the view of those who say there is a complete cessation of existence is close to desirelessness, non-attachment, non-enjoyment, freedom from clinging, and freedom from taking up.’ After reflecting like this, they practice just [! (eva)] for disillusionment towards existence, for loss of desire for existence, and for the cessation of existence.”
Now, I’ll let you have the final word, then after that I can hopefully pinpoint our difference and summarize my thoughts for you to respond to, so we can finish this as nicely as it started. (Unless you already see the main disgreements, then perhaps you can summarize them.)
I know I skipped a few arguments, sorry 'bout that. Perhaps one day in the future I’ll come back to this. There were also some philosophers you mentioned that I didn’t know of, and I didn’t want to assume to understand what they were teaching. Hence I didn’t reply to those bits.
PS. “Like the monks who committed suicide after practicing death contemplation.” They did body contemplation, I belief. The difference is perhaps interesting, but let’s not get into it. I find it quite an unbelievable story anyway, if you’re referring to the one in the Vinaya. At least it’s highly exaggerated there for dramatic effect, I’d say. Anyway.
Thanks for the nice exchange.
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But if you’re able to see the similarity with the tetralemma in the Pali of this discourse, you may rethink this. It has the exact same word structure.
I thought we were winding down too, but I guess I had wayyyy more thoughts to share than I thought… I will try to keep my last reply as short as possible and only address some key points in a cursory way. I also don’t really have any further arguments to introduce so I’ll just be clarifying some things.
If ending suffering is not the central concern, then what are we doing?
