Gary's Corner

[Walker]

If the world is predominantly suffering, and God is omniscient and omnipotent, then God has knowingly created a world that is predominantly suffering and knowingly placed us in it. That is little more than deliberately torturing a living being. God is NOT benevolent; God is NOT good. Simple fact. Watching others lie to themselves and trying to pass their delusion on to me is not going to change the facts of life. The facts of life are grim. I'm sorry that others wish to fool themselves and live a lie. If that's what you wish to do, then don't count me in.

The world is predominately attachment.
Attachment is a two-edged sword.
Attachment causes the reactions of both suffering and tenacity.
Suffering is a reaction to attachment, and not all reactions are the same.

Buddha's four noble truths acknowledge the reaction of suffering and the path to ending suffering.
Perhaps you ignore Buddha because you consider being a slave to feelings and emotions to be better advice than Buddha's advice, which is possible.

Attachment projects the illusory quality of permanence upon the transitory. “Our love will last forever!” is the feeling that fades resulting in disillusionment, e.g., the popularity of either breaking vows and divorcing, or expanding the concept of love (both reactions).

Folks intellectually know that everything changes but still long for the stasis of paradise and when that is threatened or disappears, become energized to maintain what is, or to reclaim what was or what could be, and make things right.

Tenacity keeps the species alive to adapt and mitigate change … of the climate for instance.

Even the promise of change will cause reactionary behaviors, likely brought about by the mindfulness that causes the questions of where am I, what am I doing, why am I doing it, which naturally, organically, and eventually leads to the enquiry of ... Who Am I?

[Walker]

(continued)

If the world is predominantly attachment, and God is omniscient and omnipotent, then God has knowingly created a world that is predominantly attachment and knowingly placed us in it.

*

When the illusory nature of the world becomes apparent and can no longer be ignored, then attachment needs a new object.
This works in God’s favour, at least according to limited human, binary analysis. The favour is S.D.G. and praise, which benefits the doer.
With the need for permanence, folks turn to permanent God.

(I took the liberty of changing the focus of your premise in your statement from suffering, to attachment, and if applying that same modification to the rest of your observation, could indicate to you, what you are attached to.)

[Immanuel Can]

If the world is predominantly suffering, and God is omniscient and omnipotent, then God has knowingly created a world that is predominantly suffering and knowingly placed us in it. That is little more than deliberately torturing a living being. God is NOT benevolent; God is NOT good. Simple fact. Watching others lie to themselves and trying to pass their delusion on to me is not going to change the facts of life. The facts of life are grim. I'm sorry that others wish to fool themselves and live a lie. If that's what you wish to do, then don't count me in.

The world is predominately attachment.

This is, for me, one of the bad answers to the question of evil.

There are two such bad answers: one, suck it up, because it's all there is; and two, bend your mind until you don't believe the problem exists at all. For me, both have always struck me as inauthentic and evasive, not helpful. It seems to me that people who opt for these two bad answers aren't facing the problem of evil at all -- they're demanding you stop asking, and do so at your own expense.

To reject "attachment" is to reject the world. It's to reject the reality into which you have been placed. It seems to me that it's to fight against the "force" that has placed you there, whether divine or a material principle, rather than addressing a problem which has always seemed very obvious to me: why does evil/suffering/pain exist AT ALL.

I think the question's legit. And I can't bring myself to find any admiration for any worldview that simply evades or denies what is so patently obvious to me. There's something wrong with this world in which we find ourselves (and yet, admittedly, something good in it, as well). Any philosophy or religion worth its salt, it seems to me, needs to face that reality, not flee from it.

[Walker]

To say that the world is predominately attachment, does not reject attachment, does not ignore attachment. It does not deny the obvious attachment. It does not say that the world is not predominately attachment. Quite the opposite.

Pain exists as an alarm system to protect the body.
Suffering is a reaction to attachment.

[Immanuel Can]

Suffering is a reaction to attachment.

I don't think it is. One can be completely preoccupied with something else -- even "transcendence" -- get poked in the eye, and feel pain. There is no way to avoid suffering in this world. It comes to the just and the unjust, to the grubby miser and the austere monk. There are only those who face up to that, and those who refuse to...but there's nobody who does not experience it.

[Walker]

Suffering is a reaction to attachment.

I don't think it is. One can be completely preoccupied with something else -- even "transcendence" -- get poked in the eye, and feel pain. There is no way to avoid suffering in this world. It comes to the just and the unjust, to the grubby miser and the austere monk. There are only those who face up to that, and those who refuse to...but there's nobody who does not experience it.

Of course people feel pain. Pain is an alarm system ... take your hand off the stove top.

Even when he had cancer the lama would sometimes pause and say, "I'm in samsara." (English was his third language, as far as I know.) Then he would proceed to speak in a quite orderly and informative way, with great economy. I suspect that pain stifled the effort of any unnecessary words.

You could say he experienced physical pain, but not mental pain.

Many people experience mental pain without physical pain, sometimes so much mental pain that they seek physical pain (as Nancy Mace recently self-diagnosed when discussing her recent tats).

[Immanuel Can]

Many people experience mental pain without physical pain, sometimes so much mental pain that they seek physical pain (as Nancy Mace recently self-diagnosed when discussing her recent tats).

Yes, I've met people like that. But I don't think their problem is "attachment."

[Walker]

Many people experience mental pain without physical pain, sometimes so much mental pain that they seek physical pain (as Nancy Mace recently self-diagnosed when discussing her recent tats).

Yes, I've met people like that. But I don't think their problem is "attachment."

If not attachment, then it’s a chemical imbalance affecting behavior and thought.

As attachment, it’s probably like the cutters … a need to regain control, therefore an attachment to that need ... but that's just in keeping with the scope of the conversation because of course one can't go arm-chair second guessing another person.

[Immanuel Can]

Many people experience mental pain without physical pain, sometimes so much mental pain that they seek physical pain (as Nancy Mace recently self-diagnosed when discussing her recent tats).

Yes, I've met people like that. But I don't think their problem is "attachment."

If not attachment, then it’s a chemical imbalance affecting behavior and thought.

Well, they're mentally ill, or bipolar, or schizophrenic, or something like that. But none of that has to do with attachment in any Buddhist sense. Buddhists think the material world is the thing we illegitimately "attach" to. It would be very odd to suppose that the cause of mental illness is too much focus on the material world, wouldn't it? I don't find that a plausible explanation.

[Walker]

Yes, I've met people like that. But I don't think their problem is "attachment."

If not attachment, then it’s a chemical imbalance affecting behavior and thought.

Well, they're mentally ill, or bipolar, or schizophrenic, or something like that. But none of that has to do with attachment in any Buddhist sense. Buddhists think the material world is the thing we illegitimately "attach" to. It would be very odd to suppose that the cause of mental illness is too much focus on the material world, wouldn't it? I don't find that a plausible explanation.

The material world is impermanent. Attachment to impermanence causes suffering. Attachment to mental illness causes suffering too, but a chemical imbalance can cause mental illness. Attachment to physical trauma can cause suffering too, but physical trauma has many causes.

[Immanuel Can]

If not attachment, then it’s a chemical imbalance affecting behavior and thought.

Well, they're mentally ill, or bipolar, or schizophrenic, or something like that. But none of that has to do with attachment in any Buddhist sense. Buddhists think the material world is the thing we illegitimately "attach" to. It would be very odd to suppose that the cause of mental illness is too much focus on the material world, wouldn't it? I don't find that a plausible explanation.

The material world is impermanent. Attachment to impermanence causes suffering. Attachment to mental illness causes suffering too, but a chemical imbalance can cause mental illness. Attachment to physical trauma can cause suffering too, but physical trauma has many causes.

Then "attachment" isn't really the problem. The pain and suffering have different causes, not all "attachment" based. In fact, most of them aren't.

I've met plenty of people who are deeply attached to this world and its pleasures. And I've men some who were not. But among them, you find bliss and suffering distributed pretty unevenly. Some crass materialists are happy to be that. Some people who have plenty of contemptus mundi are miserable. There's no reliable link between the "unattached" and the unsuffering.

This, you'll will find.

[Walker]

Unattach a happy materialist from his material and unhappiness ensues and serves as an energizer to reclaim the perceived source of happiness, which you perceive as materialism as an outside observer. However, if a happy materialist becomes unattached to his material and remains happy, then the material wasn't the source or cause of happiness. If you give a material gift that makes the receiver happy, the source of your happiness is the receiver's pleasure, not the material gift.

[Walker]

Then "attachment" isn't really the problem.

Attachment to identifying inevitable situations as problems rather than facets of continuity could be the problem. Death is inevitable. Is it a problem? If it is, the promise of death causes suffering, and the promise of life everlasting is the cure.

- The first cause of every problem, not just some problems, is attachment to self-cherishing.
- Pain is a problem because of attachment to self-cherishing.
- Pain without attachment to self-cherishing is still pain, but it’s not a problem.
- Neither is the natural need to ease pain, a problem.
- The extreme example is the bodhisattva who, unattached to self-cherishing, gives his body to the hungry tiger to ease the tiger’s suffering.
- That would be a radical bodhisattva at the final extrapolation of the principle.
- The more common example is every guardian who prioritizes the needs of others, first. Like a good parent, whose source of happiness becomes the well-being of the special people.
- Wants are not always needs, but rather can be illusory needs, as every American who can't fit anything else into the garage knows.

[Immanuel Can]

Then "attachment" isn't really the problem.

Death is inevitable. Is it a problem?

The most serious problem, at least in material reality.

If it is, the promise of death causes suffering, and the promise of life everlasting is the cure.

But, as the rich, young ruler asked Jesus: what is the way to inherit eternal life? Is it the cultivation of "detachment" from the world? Then to what is it "attached"?

I will ask the question I once asked a Hindu: is the definition of blessedness merely "the elimination of suffering"? If so, it's purely negative. Or does it have to be something positive, like "the presence of joy"?

...attachment to self-cherishing.

I don't disagree that in a world that does not cater to self-cherishing, self-cherishing would be painful. But detachment won't really help, by itself. One will still suffer, but with self-loathing, as well.

You see this with Buddhist monks and Hindu gurus. They certainly work hard at disdaining the world; but for all that, are they happy? Does sitting for hours in the lotus position, or doing the swinging puja really look like a solution to suffering, to you?

- The extreme example is the bodhisattva who, unattached to self-cherishing, gives his body to the hungry tiger to ease the tiger’s suffering.

And isn't that silly? If it weren't also tragic, it would be merely absurd.

- The more common example is every guardian who prioritizes the needs of others, first. Like a good parent, whose source of happiness becomes the well-being of the special people.

There is higher than that. "Love your enemies, and do good to those who spitefully use you." But why do either, if one's prospect is merely soul-extinction, Nirvana?

- Wants are not always needs, but rather can be illusory needs, as every American who can't fit anything else into the garage knows.

But maybe here's a better question: what does the person who is filling their garage with unsatisfying material stuff really longing for? Is it possible that his longing for a higher, better life is actually legitimate, and though he's pursuing it in a wrong and self-defeating way, is that longing in his heart also a divine yearning?

How is it to be satisfied? Certainly not by soul-extinction. The erasure of the problem, I suggest, is only half of the achieving of a genuine solution. A genuine solution not only sees the pain end, but something much better begin.

[Walker]

Rather than detachment, consider equanimity.

Detachment excludes.
Equanimity includes.

You've mentioned evil, which relates to morality and gives rise to the enquiry, what is morality of Buddhism?

Faith activates Christianity.
Compassion activates Buddhism.
The Declaration of Independence activates the US Constitution.

Faith, compassion, and the DoI activate virtuous actions when applied to the tenets of their application.
Appropriately applied virtuous actions … morality.

Some traditions of Buddhism require preliminary practices that generate humility, tenacity, and discipline, which also generates compassion as a preparation for teachings.