2.4 Identification revisited in light of self as illusion
...
"Now if the self is, as I have suggested it is, a construct, then a
subject's identification with a perspectival owner, such as through memory,
will not be coupled with the actual representation of a personal owner.
Identification, which elicits feelings of personal ownership, will only _seem_
to represent a persona self. So when we seem to recall _ourselves_ performing
an action, what will actually occur is that we appropriate, to our current
witnessing perspectives, those psycho-physical cues (subtending the act of
remembering) that stand our perspectives in relation to the remembered action.
Such appropriation will elicit feelings of personal ownership towards the past
action and those feelings will in turn seem to point to a _personal_ owner who
performed the action (and is now remembering it). But there will be no actual
personal owner; such is the illusion of self.
"An example will help. Suppose Ben wins a race, and then feels proud
because of it. On our analysis, Ben's feeling of pride and attendant thoughts
'I won the race!' indicate that he feels personal ownership towards winning the
race and his proud feelings. The feelings of pride are a give-away sign that,
as a current witnessing perspective, Ben identifies _with_ the perspectival
owner and agent who won. He would not feel proud unless he believed it was
_he_ who won the race. But is this belief a correct one? Not literally. He
believes that he _qua personal self_ won the race --- that is how the event
seems remembered from his perspective. His believing this much, however, has
already bought into the content of those thoughts and feelings that tell him
'I, a personal owner and agent called 'Ben', won the race, and I, the same
personal self who won the race, am feeling proud because of it'. But such
feelings, I have argued, mislead. There is in fact no such self-ent
ity who could have won the race or now believes that he won it. There is no
actual personal self who has these emotions; that is what it means to say the
self is an illusion."
(Albahari, Miri, 'Analytical Buddhism: The Two-tiered Illusion of Self ')
Marsha:
It is quite easy to state there is no such entity as a autonomous self, but it
is harder to recognize and break the habit. imho.
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