What is it that is reincarnated? — Banno

What is it that is born and dies? If we can clear that up, then probably there's nothing further to discuss.

What is it that is born and dies? I — Wayfarer

What's your answer?

What is it that is reincarnated?

Telling us that there is no problem will not do. — Banno

I already told you, several times: the soul. Do we really need to go through a couple of hundred pages of summaries of soul doctrines?

I find it hard to believe that while chanting the Names of of the Lord and eating all that curry, you didn't pick up on the theology.

Oh, I picked it up, thought about it and left it behind.

What is the soul?

What is it that is born and dies? If we can clear that up, then probably there's nothing further to discuss. — Wayfarer

As far as Hindu-style reincarnation goes, it's the soul that gets reincarnated, and the body is that gets born and dies.

The question as to what, specifically, belongs to the body and what to the soul, is answered differently by different soul doctrines.

I think the real question is which soul doctrine to choose and commit to, and whether such a choice can be made and justified rationally or not. I'm inclined to think it can't.

Don't be silly. You know damn well that the term has many definitions.

It was your answer, so I'm asking you to share the definition you chose - the one that answers the question "what is it that is reincarnated?"

"The soul is what gets reincarnated" is the part that several soul doctrines have in common. Where they differ is in the details. From this point on, one has to choose which soul doctrine to go with. I haven't made that choice, so I can't say.

What I'm pointing out is that in the Buddhist view, there is no entity that incarnates, but that a set of causal factors originates from the living being's actions, which then assume the form of another being in 'the next life'. There's no literal soul, entity or person who 'goes' from life to life, or who is 'reborn' in that sense. — Wayfarer

Vicarious guilt (or redemption). In other words, fate – and whether one affirms or denies it, those "causal factors" afflict some yet-born life. Ok. So why should I care about some "next life" which my actions (karma) in this life will have fated if that "next life" isn't mine?

So the question was "What is it that is reincarnated", your answer is

the soul — baker

which is...

the part that several soul doctrines have in common — baker

and...

...there are soul doctrines that have all this figured out. — baker

...but when one tries to track it down,

one has to choose which soul doctrine to go with — baker

...and this is supposed to be adequate to our purposes.

Oh, well,

I am very disappointed in you. — baker

↪baker It was your answer, so I'm asking you to share the definition you chose - the one that answers the question "what is it that is reincarnated?" — Banno

How about answering that question yourself, seeing that you know better than anyone else?

I did, in the only way that I can see that is sensible...

When you die, your memories, experiences, desires, intentions - all that stuff - dissolves into nothing. However your energy and substance persist. The stuff of you body might become over time the bodies of microbes, of the invisible hoards; then progressively it might enter into the bodies of the boneless or those with shells. The energy that was you becomes the energy of mud and muck, but then by chance might progress to that of a rodent or other vertebrate. If you are worthy, what was once you may become part of a beggar or a vagabond, or that of a fair maid or emperor.

Drop the persistence of the self, and reincarnation becomes a fact. — Banno

So why should I care about some "next life" which my actions (karma) in this life will have fated if that "next life" isn't mine? — 180 Proof

Nobody says you should care. It's your choice. Plus, different traditions explain reincarnation and karma in different ways. Which they're entitled to do.

Drop the persistence of the self, and reincarnation becomes a fact — Banno

I don't think that answers the question. People who believe in the self or soul aren't mad. In fact, most inhabitants of this planet do. The non-believers are a minority. Even atheists and neo-Marxists say "myself".

So why should I care about some "next life" which my actions (karma) in this life will have fated if that "next life" isn't mine? — 180 Proof

Whoever it is that lives, he sees his life and sufferings as ‘mine’.

So ... no need for me-of-this life to be concerned because that "next life" won't be, or affect, me-of-this life.

Argumentum ad populum.

People who believe in the self or soul aren't mad — Apollodorus

Yep; just wrong.

Edit: No, I take that back - you are also vacillating, "self or soul" as if they are the same.

What I'm pointing out is that in the Buddhist view, there is no entity that incarnates, but that a set of causal factors originates from the living being's actions, which then assume the form of another being in 'the next life'. — Wayfarer

But that is not the same as this:

If every timber is replaced, is it still the same ship? I would say 'yes' if it maintains the same shape and is owned and operated by Theseus. — Wayfarer

The form of another being does not maintain the same shape or is it owned and operated by some other being.

Put differently, why should I care about another being in the next life? In what way have I been liberated from the cycle?

Edit: I see that @180 Proof asked the same question.

Put differently, why should I care about another being in the next life? In what way have I been liberated from the cycle? — Fooloso4

I'm just jumpin' in, so I may say things that have been resolved already, so please I beg you to be patient with me.

There is something, according to reincarnation, that you share with some strange singular future being: your thing that reincarnates.

Whatever that thing is, is not operatively important to know its precise identity. There is a thing that gets transmitted to a new living being. That thing was in your body, and it is suggested that it owned your body.

It is true you have the reason to not care what the body's lot in life will be after the thing gets passed to him or her from you. But you don't focus on the body; it is not the body that gets to Nirvana, but the thing.

So you care not about the next body and its relationship with the thing, instead, you wish the thing will get to nirvana sooner than later, and therefore you do your part to expedite that. You do your part, and don't fret what other housers-providers do with the thing, because you have no control over that. (Recite the serenity prayer here.)

you are also vacillating, "self or soul" as if they are the same — Banno

I'm not "vacillating" at all. They're often treated as the same. In normal life, we identify with our thoughts and emotions, i.e. the lower aspects of the soul. That's precisely why Platonic and other philosophical systems recommend identification with the higher aspect of the soul for the purpose of spiritual elevation and salvation.

you are also vacillating, "self or soul" as if they are the same — Banno


I'm not "vacillating" at all. They're often treated as the same — Apollodorus

Correct. BTW, do you actually believe in reincarnation?

Correct. BTW, do you actually believe in reincarnation? — frank

I do at least for the purposes of this discussion. Nobody denies that terms like "soul" are hard to define but it doesn't help when people ignore the sources and try to relegate reincarnation to clinical psychology.

I do at least for the purposes of this discussion. Nobody denies that terms like "soul" are hard to define but it doesn't help when people ignore the sources and try to relegate reincarnation to clinical psychology. — Apollodorus

So you're being a devil's advocate?

Truth is also hard to define. It's indispensable, though.

IMO it's a legitimate topic on a "philosophy forum".

As already stated, I believe that @Bartricks' argument(s) come very close to what I had in mind.

IMO it's a legitimate topic on a "philosophy forum".

As already stated, I believe that Bartricks' argument(s) come very close to what I had in mind. — Apollodorus

I don't read his posts. He's kind of a lunatic.

Put differently, why should I care about another being in the next life? In what way have I been liberated from the cycle? — Fooloso4

You're re-born in one of the six realms until craving for becoming (or even craving for non-being) are overcome. I don't say I believe it or necessarily understand it.

You're re-born — Wayfarer

But I am not an entity that is re-born?

I learned when I used to post on Buddhist forums that there is belief in Buddhism in a gandharva (or gandhaba) which dwells in the intermediate (bardo) realms and attaches itself to the human fetus post-conception. I could never get an answer to the question how that is differentiated from a self or soul that transmigrates.

In the Mahātaṇhāsankhaya Sutta of the Majjhima Nikāya, the Buddha explains to the bhikkhus that an embryo develops when three conditions are met: the woman must be in the correct point of her menstrual cycle, the woman and man must have sexual intercourse, and a gandhabba must be present. According to the commentary of this sutta, the use of the word gandhabba doesn't refer to a celestial Deva, but a being enabled to be born by its karma. It is the state of a sentient being between rebirths. — Wiki

I think, possibly, that is just the kind of interpolation from Hindu culture that Western secular Buddhist critics refer when they seek to show that belief in re-birth is not indigenous to Buddhism. But I don't know for sure.

In any case, there is said to be continuity between births, although the theory is, that there is no eternal changeless core or entity. That's why I keep referring to it being a process philosophy.

My personal feeling about rebirth is that first, the evidence of children who remember their past life can't simply be wished away. There's far too many corroborated details - places and dates and times of birth and death, possessions, geographical features, accident reports, and so on. There's a mountain of detail. Besides, I had early in life a sudden vivid sense of having remembered or known something from before birth (although of course it accounts for nothing objectively). I'm open to it and it seems to me some form of it has to be true. Myths of heaven and hell are more than simply cultural artifacts in my view; this present life is part of a continuum that spills over the book-ends of birth and death. I believe it enough that it concerns me.

It's a very vexed issue for Westerners who are interested in Buddhism, so much so that the 'secular Buddhism' movement posts long polemics against the idea of 'literal re-birth'. There are heated arguments about it on the Buddhist forums I used to frequent. The best account of it from a traditionalist point of view is facing the great divide by Bhikkhu Bodhi (who is an eminent translator and monk).

Classical Buddhism sees human existence as embedded in the condition called samsāra, understood literally as the beginningless chain of rebirths. From this standpoint, humans are just one class of living beings in a vast multidimensional cosmos. Through time without beginning all beings have been roaming from life to life in the five realms of existence, rising and falling in accordance with their karma, their volitional deeds. Life in all these realms, being impermanent and fraught with pain, is inherently unsatisfactory—dukkha. Thus the final goal, the end of dukkha, is release from the round of rebirths, the attainment of an unconditioned dimension of spiritual freedom called nibbāna. The practice of the path is intended to eradicate the bonds tying us to the round of rebirths and thereby bring liberation from repeated birth, aging and death.

Secular Buddhism, in contrast, starts from our immediate existential situation, understood without bringing in non-naturalistic assumptions. Secular Buddhism therefore does not endorse the idea of literal rebirth. Some Secular Buddhists regard rebirth as a symbol for changing states of mind, some as an analogy for biological evolution, some simply as part of the dispensable baggage that Buddhism drags along from Asia. But Secular Buddhists generally do not regard rebirth as the problem the Dharma is intended to resolve. Accordingly, they interpret the idea of samsāra as a metaphor depicting our ordinary condition of bewilderment and addictive pursuits. The secular program thus reenvisions the goal of Buddhist practice, rejecting the ideal of irreversible liberation from the cycle of rebirths in favor of a tentative, ever-fragile freedom from distress in this present life itself.

I tend to favour the traditionalist view, even though I'm plainly a secular type.

I believe that Bartricks' argument(s) come very close to what I had in mind. — Apollodorus

Problem with Bartricks is that his polemics are powerful but he constantly insults and derogates anyone who challenges him.

You're barking up the wrong tree. I'm not an advocate of reincarnation or the existence of a soul. For myself, I resolved this issue by taking a middle way in that I contextualized it (ie. by pointing out how the key terms have different meanings in different discourses, and that the choice of which discourse to consider authoritative cannot be conducted deliberately), thus rendering it moot. I think that's a fine solution (it's based on the standard psychological approach of dealing with double binds), and I wonder how come more people don't accept it.

In any case, there is said to be continuity between births, although the theory is, that there is no eternal changeless core or entity. — Wayfarer

It's difficult to discuss these things with people who aren't fluent in Buddhist doctrine, specifically, in dependent co-arising, and it's too much to try to present these doctrines in forum posts and discussions.
(Earlier, I posted some passages from the Visuddhimagga, but nobody took note of them. If already that is too much, then what about the suttas that explain dependent co-arising?)

So ... no need for me-of-this life to be concerned because that "next life" won't be, or affect, me-of-this life. — 180 Proof

Oh, but it will affect you, because you do not simply stop when your heart stops beating. The "stream of kamma" that is "you" continues on after the death of this current body. -- But this doesn't mean much to you, does it ...

Like I said above, the discussion here breaches what is normally possible for forum discussions. I cannot rightfully expect other posters to study a topic that even many Buddhists shun because of its complexity and extent. So I'm kind of at a loss here ...

( I write here about Buddhism to test my own understanding of it, not because I'd be an advocate.)