I just came up with this.
1. You feel a will to believe something.
2 You refute it, using Platonic/Zenoan dialectic, or empirical evidence.
3. You refute your refutation, not by saying that the original hypothesis was true, but only that your refutation was false. But even though your refutation was false, performing it still got rid of the original will to believe.
4. You realize you’ve arrived at Pyrrhonism, so you appeal to the fundamental paradox that Pyrrhonism is itself a belief to refute your Pyrrhonism.
As a Buddhist wold say, you feel a rising thought or attachment, but you then acknowledge that it is only a thought to eliminate it. But this western version is both more rigorous and more amenable to a western mind. By “you feel a will to believe something” I mean you get any idea in your head about what’s good or what you should do.
For example, I feel like following this method will solve my problems, so I refute that by remembering how all my ideas fail and I never consistently do anything, that everything is just a fad with me. Then I refute that by realizing I’m in a performative contradiction, or by appealing to the virtues of this method to show why it will perpetuate itself. Now I refuted my original belief first, so I already resolved the tension/appetition/appetition caused by my believing it. So even though I refuted my original belief, I don’t return to it. All the second refutation did was get rid of my attachment to my pessimism. So now I’ve arrived at a state of no belief, but it is still a quasi-positive intellectual act, so I finally return to the fundamental paradox of Pyrrhonism to complete the cycle and escape thinking.
>So even though I refuted my original belief, I don’t return to it
Even though I refuted my refutation I don’t return to my original belief*
>By “you feel a will to believe something” I mean you get any idea in your head about what’s good or what you should do.
So, instead of will to believe, you may as well say "ideas come up", and I presume you would also say that ideas (whether they are about what you should do or about anything else) are generally a response to something physical, ie. they are interpretation of your current state.
As I get it, you're discussing a sort of dialectic that would help get rid of the attachment to ideas and thinking. The problem here is that I doubt thinking solves thinking.
I don’t say ideas because idea can be taken many different ways. It’s not ideas that are bad but the will to believe them anyway. I think your idea that thinking can’t get rid of thinking is just an alternative to use instead of the Pyrrhonist paradox or even just another way of saying it. Also, I use “thinking” to get rid of it because it’s a lot more difficult to just block your mind of thoughts through willpower or some other method, whereas once your brain starts are logical train of thought it kind of wants to run with it. And I think the traditional way of just recognizing it is an attachment is a way of thinking as well, but it requires a sustained belief in the whole idea of attachments that would be harder for a westerner like me to make habitual.
>I don’t say ideas because idea can be taken many different ways.
What I was trying to say was that "will to believe" sounds more like a constructions of thoughts rather than a separate category, ie. the actual will to believe in something.
>it’s a lot more difficult to just block your mind of thoughts through willpower or some other method
It's not the willpower, however. It's plain recognition. Once you recognise what your thought is, there is no need for struggle or overcoming. It may sound difficult to do since we're mostly used to thinking our ways out of things and in this case, thinking our way out of thinking.
>I think the traditional way of just recognizing it is an attachment is a way of thinking as well
How come? You see, you recognise. In this case, attachment isn't some sort of thought concept. It's an actual thing.
>it requires a sustained belief in the whole idea of attachments
It doesn't though. Attachment isn't a belief.
>What I was trying to say was that "will to believe" sounds more like a constructions of thoughts rather than a separate category
Well I definitely think you need to believe or want to believe something to be able to think at all, but I think you really get a separate pull to do something that goes beyond what is practical or what you need to figure something out. For example, a mathematician may be motivated to solve a problem because its his job, and the idea that something might be true (the will to believe a certain proposition) is the only used as a tool to try and get the proof. Whereas a religious person might really want to believe some doctrine for a totally abstract and harmful, even delusional psychological reason.
>It's not the willpower, however. It's plain recognition
>How come? You see, you recognise. In this case, attachment isn't some sort of thought concept. It's an actual thing.
>Attachment isn't a belief.
Whether attachment is real or not, you still need to believe that it exists in order to recognize it, and in order to determine that something is an attachment, you have to think about it.
And btw many people would argue attachment isn’t real, such as eliminative materialists.
>Well I definitely think you need to believe or want to believe something to be able to think at all
Okay, let's make it simple. Thinking is subvocal talking. You don't need a belief for that.
>the will to believe a certain proposition
I don't think there is such will, only ego that wants to get a confirmation.
>Whether attachment is real or not, you still need to believe that it exists in order to recognize it
No, you're getting really tangled here. You perceive things, you don't need to believe perception exists. You feel emotions, you don't need to believe in feeling emotions. You have sensations, you don't need to believe in sensations. You believe in something, you don't need to believe in believing. You are attached to something, you don't need to believe in attachment.
I think there are enough things in life that illustrate our attachments, such as things related habitual responses and living.
>in order to determine that something is an attachment, you have to think about it
No. I suppose in the beginning, some labelling may be need, as described by Mahasi in his meditation. Other than that, no.
>And btw many people would argue attachment isn’t real, such as eliminative materialists.
Yeah, well I need an actual argument. Not that there is a group of people that doesn't believe something.
But you’re contradicting yourself because you clearly believe that there is attachment and belief if you say that you have attachments and beliefs. But if you didn’t believe that you can believe something without believing in belief, it would affect your practice. If it didn’t affect practice it would be irrelevant and you wouldn't be bringing it up. Your whole practice is dependent on the fact that you think you should stop thinking. This is why Pyrrhonism applies here because its an insoluble paradox. Anyway this is my whole point, you maybe can just accept that attachment exist, but I have a western scientific mind and have read Plato so I compulsively am thinking about these things. I have a different problem so I’m using a different method. I think culture ends up pretty deep in the subconscious and controls your thoughts.
>Yeah, well I need an actual argument. Not that there is a group of people that doesn't believe something.
See, you can dogmatically ignore the eliminative materialists. I on the other hand know that I may one day agree with them, and one day not, so I can’t base my practice on having some belief, like that attachment exists.
>But you’re contradicting yourself because you clearly believe that there is attachment and belief
No, I don't believe in them. They are there.
Just like sensations are there. They don't require my belief.
I'm trying, in a gentle way, to point out that you're getting more and more into word salad territory.
>Your whole practice is dependent on the fact that you think you should stop thinking.
No, and I didn't say that.
I said "Once you recognise what your thought is, there is no need for struggle or overcoming."
>but I have a western scientific mind and have read Plato so I compulsively am thinking about these things
Not scientific, but compulsive. What about your thinking is scientific exactly?
>See, you can dogmatically ignore the eliminative materialists.
I don't "dogmatically ignore" them. I haven't even read about them, which is why I need an argument rather than a label for a group. Else we can just throw names of groups at one another, without much use.
>I can’t base my practice on having some belief, like that attachment exists.
So, belief is atop of everything? Meaning you have to believe in believing so that believing is real? I'm really struggling to show that no, attachment isn't some sort of thought concept that you can elect to believe in or not to believe in. It's something that you either recognise when it is experience, or you don't.
>They are there. Just like sensations are there
This means that they exist, that you believe they exist. How can you say that they exist as sensations if you don’t believe in them?
>Once you recognise what your thought is
This is another ontological commitment, you’re saying my thought “is” an attachment. This is clearly a belief. That there are a million ways to deny, for example, by saying that the whole idea of “attachment” is a linguistic construct just as you say I’m getting into word games, and that all of this is just pointless because we are using vague concepts to try and talk about what are really deterministic brain processes.
>What about your thinking is scientific exactly?
I don’t accept anything at face value
>Meaning you have to believe in believing so that believing is real?
No, you have to believe that it is real to do something about it. It’s about practice. If you have attachment but don’t believe you do, then you won’t get rid of it. This whole idea of “recognizing” is prediated on belief
>How can you say that they exist as sensations if you don’t believe in them?
Because they are experienced? It's getting really ridiculous at this point.
>you’re saying my thought “is” an attachment
... Can you agree that your thought can be related (attached) to an external object? It's not based on a belief either. Just as you getting a sensation of wind on your skin isn't based on you believing that that is the case.
>by saying that the whole idea of “attachment” is a linguistic construct
It's not, just as I illustrated above. Though as related, attached to some-thing.
>we are using vague concepts
I'm not using vague concepts. I clearly told you what thinking is and what attachment is.
>I don’t accept anything at face value
Doesn't seem like it.
>This whole idea of “recognizing” is prediated on belief
No, just as you don't have to believe you are seeing in order to see.
>If you have attachment but don’t believe you do, then you won’t get rid of it.
False trauma also exists. You can believe you have something that you do not have. Hence the difference. Recognising means you experience what's really there.
So you’re just changing your belief into belief that what you experience is really there, and that when you call your experience “attachment” you are accurately representing it. But you can easily misrepresent your own experience. And attachment is a vague concept. The use of the word attachment to begin with is based on the metaphor of grasping so I can easily claim that you can’t put physically grasping something into analogy with a pure mental experience. You have no reason to accept that what you think is an adequate and precise concept really is so. I can even claim that attachment is not the best metaphor and that it’s better to use terms like desire or impurity. There are endless layers to this that would prevent me from simply accepting the concept of attachment, which I have to do in order to recognize that my thoughts are attachments.
Everything is a thought for you and you don't see how even by your own logic, you would refute yourself.
Anyway, I'll let you google what attachment means in common language and what it can refer to (spoiler: it's not only physical grasping). I'm not interested in expanding further on something just to have it labelled "belief". That isn't scientific approach, but plain ignorance and laziness. You've built a wall and when I point to something outside of the wall, you close your eyes and point toward the wall. Not interesting for me.
I’ve been telling you that you aren’t interested
>how to meditate
by paying sincere attention, you fricking bugmen. that's all it is, figuring our what your mind has to offer
I’ve sat around and waited for days for my mind to “offer” something and it’s just endless thoughts. Not even any new memories or whatever come out. Maybe your method is only useful for non-bugmen.
that's like reading a choose your own adventure book from cover to cover. you can't brute force it
Meditation is boring and I do not understand the appeal.
Shut the frick up, pseud.
Basically just Madhyamika
5. you suck on penis