Hi Marsha and anyone else interested in my opinion (which I know leaves a few avatars out),
I have been reading through these posts, which are fast and furious, and thought I would respond to what is being called the Cartesian Me. Perhaps this will clear up some of the confusion which seems to be propagated. My exposition will be based on the distinct levels that are used to help describe Quality. The Cartesian Me does exist within the Societal Level, it has to. It is what makes up the societal level, and what the societal level influences. It is not an illusion. This is not hard to see. As a single sensing being, we cannot find a location for what we term the "I". We never will be able to, since it does not exist at this level. As a group, we can define and use the individual "I" without any problem whatsoever. Where the difficulty seems to come up is in discussions which mistakenly perform a mixing of levels. It seems that some conflate the individual consciousness level with structures within the Societal level, and this nullifies the distinction between the levels. It is like ascribing aspects of fire to those of water. There are many qualitative differences between the two. Therefore, the acceptance of levels provides a very easy solution to what seems to be circular arguments without resolution. At the societal level the self exists, but not at the individual level. In the same way, the atom does not exist at the inorganic level, whereas it does in the intellectual level. Species do not exist at the biological level, but do at the societal and intellectual levels. I hope this is not getting to unclear for readers. If we agree that the levels are useful, we must use them logically in a discussion of MoQ. By ascribing attributes of one level to another, we arrive at encompassing statements that bear no fruit at all. They are misdirections on the path of MoQ, and easily confuse and deny the existence of things. Finally, I would like to present what I have been reading concerning the use of the term "illusion". It seems that this word is being used to represent something that isn't real. However, it is quite clear that an illusion represents a specific real thing, such as an illusion of an oasis in the desert. Therefore, illusions are misinterpretations of very real things. This would be in contrast to delusions. So when it is said that the self is an illusion, this would mean that such "self" exists, just not as we think it does. Otherwise it would not be called an illusion. If we take the premise of Buddhism that the self does not exist, but arises as a result of what some fondly call Patterns in this forum, then what exactly are we pointing to with the concept of self? I certainly know that I exist, be it as a codependent arising or whatever. The fact that things do not inherently exist is obvious from chemistry and physics where everything is made up of something smaller, down to the infinitely small. In the past I have tried to begin discussion on what the levels symbolize as metaphysical tools. I have suggested repeatedly that the Intellectual level is not individual intellect. It can't be. The Societal Level is not a group of individuals, since that is not a Level. The biological is not a collection of inorganic molecules. Within one level, the other levels are of mysterious consciousness. We can look for signs of their existence; any projection of their attributes must treat them as self perpetuating entities. This does not mean that one level cannot impinge its quality on another level, since we are discussing personal opinions through the societal level, and as a result often opinions are transformed. But, this is a topic for another time. Levels can be very useful for explaining things if they are used correctly. Cheers, Mark > > > Moq_Discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org/md/archives.html > Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
