---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <mjackson74@...> wrote :
Sal, I guess Share will have to take you to task cuz you just NUKED
this Marshy sycophant! Well done, and well said.
>
On 9/4/2014 6:59 AM, salyavin808 wrote:
>
Well, I don't mind what he's into. Just that he expects me to be into
it or he'll throw a tantrum.
>
Non sequitur. I have not thrown any tantrums. And, it has already been
established that you are "into" Transcendental Meditation. If so, what
is it exactly, that you are attempting to transcend? All we expect of
you is to provide us with the rationale for your materialistic beliefs.
Most of us here on FFL are transcendentalists which is why we are here -
all the Upanishadic thinkers were transcendentalists and have rejected
the materialist point of view.
My position, and the position of all transcendentalists, is that we
*infer* that /consciousness is the ultimate reality/ and we accept that
*inference* is a valid means of knowledge. Thoughts and ideas, not being
material objects, cannot be perceived; they can only be *inferred*.
Mere perception is often found to be untrue. We perceive the earth as
being flat but it is almost round. We perceive the earth as static but
it is moving around the sun. We perceive the disc of the sun and think
it is small, yet it is much larger that the earth.
We *infer* that consciousness is the ultimate reality and not caused by
a combination of material properties. We *infer* the validity of
consciousness because we ARE conscious and we are self-conscious. To
refuse the validity of *inference* is to refuse to think or discuss. All
thoughts, all discussions, all doctrines, all affirmations, and all
denials, all proofs and disproofs are made possible by *inference.*
If consciousness means /self-consciousness/ then it cannot be identified
by logic with the human body. Animals also possess a physical body, but
not /rational consciousness./ If consciousness is a property of the
body, it must be perceived like other material properties. But
consciousness is neither seen, smelt or tasted nor touched nor heard.
Consciousness is private and cannot be shared by others - /it is the
very constructed character of knowing./
The point is that naive materialist think they perceive material objects
/as they are and as they seem/, yet knowledge tell us that this not
always the case. We could be in error. An error is something that should
not be. There may be no validity in using only perception to discover
ultimate truths. A materialist accepts perception as the ultimate
knowledge, but often our perception is just wrong. If perception is your
/only means of valid knowledge/ and you reject *inference*, that is a
thoughtless self-contradiction. We are all conscious that we exist -
nobody doubts their own existence. That would be sheer madness or lunacy.
The materialist cannot support his views without giving reasons which
/presuppose/ the validity of *inference*. Severe and contemptuous
criticism has been heaped against the materialistic doctrine by all
schools of Indian philosophy and logic for thousands of years, and with
much justification. Vedantists, Jainas and Buddhists all reject
materialism; AND they also reject notions of God and an individual
soul-monad, yet they realize that /consciousness is their very reason
for being. /
Your materialistic belief, as I understand it, is self-refuted and sheer
nonsense and no system of philosophy or metaphysics at all, according to
my philosophy professor. That is my position and I agree with Sam Harris.
<SNIP>
