Years ago at a newcomer meeting at the Los Angeles Zen Center, the meeting started with newcomers asked to say something about themselves and why they were there. One of the newbies said some things about himself that completely escapes me, but I distinctly remember him finishing confidently with “… until I reach enlightenment”. The roshi and head monks all laughed at this. It wasn’t a mean spirited laugh but more like an ‘isn’t that adorable’ laugh. Kind of like a child who proclaims their ambition to be an astronaut when they grow up. I’m sure that being an astronaut has its rewards, but the child’s vision of being an astronaut and the adult vision may be somewhat different.

I like Kant’s idea of enlightenment:

Enlightenment is man's emergence from his self-imposed nonage. Nonage is the inability to use one's own understanding without another's guidance. This nonage is self-imposed if its cause lies not in lack of understanding but in indecision and lack of courage to use one's own mind without another's guidance. Dare to know! (Sapere aude.) "Have the courage to use your own understanding," is therefore the motto of the enlightenment.

http://www.columbia.edu/acis/ets/CCREAD/etscc/kant.html

Though it's more applicable to his time, in some sense it pertains to the old sage, too.

I imagine that person is now cheerfully fucking up the world for Apple or some other conglomerate. Self-realization being but a footnote to their youthful dream life. I had the same experience in reverse - a young person at a Buddhist group I attended started with, "Hi I'm Andy; I'm here tonight to attain enlightenment." Giggles and groans. I was immediately struck by that 'attain'. Pretty sure the monks have heard it all.

Have the courage to use your own understanding," is therefore the motto of the enlightenment.

I wonder if this understanding is what lubricates the Dunning-Kruger effect.

Sorry NOS, a cheap shot...

It’s a good cheap shot, in my opinion. But the Dunning-Kruger effect applies as much to the competent as it does to the incompetent.

a young person at a Buddhist group I attended started with, "Hi I'm Andy; I'm here tonight to attain enlightenment." Giggles and groans. I was immediately struck by that 'attain'. Pretty sure the monks have heard it all. — Tom Storm

As if it is more noble or more realistic to think that enlightenment is impossible to attain.

I think also for some people, and I'm not thinking of anyone particular here, there's an emotional, almost visceral reaction to certain words. Before the person even considers the idea, the response is there already, dismissive and pugnacious - almost like a 'lizard brain', flight or fight response. You say Christianity, they immediately blurt out 'deception and pedophilia..'. That kind of thing. Maybe attachment can be added to the list of provocative trigger words. — Tom Storm

Except that "attachment" can do all that provoking and tirggering on its own, no specific bias or prejudice needed. Because attachment is powerful like that.

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I don't think it's uncommon for notions like unattachment and detachment and apathy to merge into a maelstrom of studied indifference in mainstream Western eyes. — Tom Storm

You can think about it like this: For most people (not just Westerners), their feelings or emotions for something or someone are conditional. People typically like someone or something as long as said person or thing is in a particular way that is pleasing to them. And the opposite for disliking someone or something. Neutral feelings are typically interpreted as dislike (if an ordinary person doesn't feel anything particular about someone or something, they eventually interpret this as dislike -- that's that meh feeling).

An ordinary person doesn't imagine what an unconditional love (or an unconditional hatred) would be like, so in their minds detachment (not relying on persons or things to supply one with pleasures) feels like apathy.

Reminds me of Varela and Thompson’s account of the zen buddhist Nishitani’s critique of Nietzsche.

“Nishitami deeply admires Nietzsche's attempt but claims that it actually perpetuates the nihilistic predicament by not letting go of the grasping mind that lies at the souce of both objectivism and nihlism. Nishitani's argument is that nihilism cannot be overcome by assimilating groundlessness to a notion of the will-no matter how decentered and impersonal. Nishitani's diagnosis is even more radical than Nietzsche's, for he claims that the real problem with Western nihilism is that it is halfhearted: it does not consistently follow through its own inner logic and motivation and so stops short of transforming its partial realization of groundlessness into the philosophical and experiential possiblities of sunyata.”

I think what Nishitami failed to grasp was that will to
nothingness is still willing. Self for Nietzsche isnt an entity but a vector of change. — Joshs

I haven't read the above sources, so I'm just going by your quote.

I think what Nishitami failed to grasp was that will to
nothingness is still willing.

This shouldn't be the case for a Buddhist, though. "The will to nothingness" is roughly equivalent to the Buddhist concept of vibhava-tanha, craving for non-existence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ta%E1%B9%87h%C4%81

Self for Nietzsche isnt an entity but a vector of change.

Sure, we can find a similar conception of self in Buddhism as well, by some Buddhist teachers, although this isn't mainstream.
For example, Thanissaro Bhikkhu: Selves & Not-self
He talks about the self as a strategy, as something one does (identifies with some things, disidentifies with others).

Why should enlightenment be the same for each of us? — Banno

If such is the case, if enlightenment is something different for every person, then all efforts to attain it are idiosyncratic. Then no path to enlightenment can be taught, nor learned.

And if such, enlightenment becomes irrelevant, or, at best, magic.

So this thread can go on indefinitely, as the various opinions of the participants vie for prominence. It's not that nothing can be decided so much as that whatever one decides will be right. — Banno

Only if one insists on being Humpty Dumpty.

A sure sign that someone has not achieved enlightenment is their claim that they have achieved enlightenment.
Enlightenment is attributed to someone by others. — Banno

No. At least in some schools of Buddhism, enlightenment is something one knows as such.

The standard phrasing is as follows:

He discerns that 'Birth is ended, the holy life fulfilled, the task done. There is nothing further for this world.

He discerns that 'Birth is ended, the holy life fulfilled, the task done. There is nothing further for this world. — baker

"He"?

Who is "he"? I thought the "non-existence of self" (anatman/anatta) was taken for granted in Buddhism.

Self for Nietzsche isnt an entity but a vector of change.
— Josh’s

Sure, we can find a similar conception of self in Buddhism as well, by some Buddhist teachers, although this isn't mainstream.
For example, Thanissaro Bhikkhu: Selves & Not-self
He talks about the self as a strategy, as something one does (identifies with some things, disidentifies with others). — baker

I recall a Buddha quote something to the effect that the self, or rather what constitutes the self, shouldn’t be construed as an entity but a description of suffering.

As if it is more noble or more realistic to think that enlightenment is impossible to attain. — baker

Yeah, as if. It's a good thing no one has introduced this ridiculous proposition into the discussion then.

And if such, enlightenment becomes irrelevant, or, at best, magic. — baker

Pretty much.

enlightenment is something one knows as such. — baker

Like pain, one does not know one is enlightened, one is just enlightened. The rest of us are left to decide if someone is enlightened based on the behavioural evidence. That seems on observation to involve sex and luxury cars.

Like pain, one does not know one is enlightened, one is just enlightened. — Banno

And you know this, like, firsthand?

But perhaps enlightenmemt is a pain in the arse!

The rest of us are left to decide if someone is enlightened based on the behavioural evidence.

If your guru says so ...

Yeah, as if. It's a good thing no one has introduced this ridiculous proposition into the discussion then. — Tom Storm

Meh, kids these days. No ambition.

Though it's more applicable to his time, in some sense it pertains to the old sage, too. — NOS4A2

Oh? People tend to use their own understanding these days? A lotta folks seem to use the understanding of Fox & Breitbart News. People like yourself.

And you know this... — baker

...from the analysis found in Wittgenstein. You know, philosophy. Like some do on the philosophy forum.

It looks like zen and stoicism taught you a lot.

I think it's actually a very ordinary problem with a very ordinary solution; but there are so many distractions. The trick is that you have to want a solution; if you don't then you won't. That's not a problem either; unless it is.

It looks like zen and stoicism taught you a lot. — NOS4A2

Zen taught me to let go and stoicism taught me to hang on, so I'm basically back to where I started. :roll:

I think it's actually a very ordinary problem with a very ordinary solution; but there are so many distractions. The trick is that you have to want a solution; if you don't then you won't. That's not a problem either; unless it is. — Janus

I don't think we are far from agreement. Word choice problems are indeed ordinary, and one ordinary solution is for one party to stipulate the word choice of the other, which I happily do. We are also in agreement on the abundant distractions. And we agree that not wanting a solution is no problem, unless it is. Which brings us to wanting a solution. That in itself can present an obstacle. Unless it doesn't. :smile:

P.S. If any moderators are reading: Why, when Janus replied to me, did it not register or notify me of such like it usually does? I find that sometimes people respond or otherwise properly use my name, highlighted as a link, yet I don't get a notice like I do most of the time.

It makes me wonder if I'm missing anything specifically citing my name as a link? Just curious.

:up: The thing you are asking about: not being notified of responses happens to me sometimes too.

and stoicism taught me to hang on, — praxis

You know they were talking about patience, not attachment, right?

To be concerned with virtue and well-being is to be attached.

Sure, but the idea is to free oneself from forms of attachment which enslave, not from those which liberate. Can't you tell the difference?

The nature of attachment is connection or binding, and there’s no escaping the fact that we’re all connected and bound, so reason demands that we accept this enslavement. :flower:

The meaning of 'yoga' is union or binding, but it's being bound to Brahman, not to some sensation or emotion, which is the meaning of liberation in the Yogic sense.

As if it is more noble or more realistic to think that enlightenment is impossible to attain. — baker

When studying my honours thesis in comparative religioin, I found a book by a Russian Orthodox philosopher of religion, Simon Frank, called 'The Unknowable'. The flyleaf had an inscription in some strange language, from Nicholas of Cusa, with a translation helpfully added: 'The unattainable is attained through its unattainment'. A very Buddhist formulation, I felt.

Why, when Janus replied to me, did it not register or notify me of such like it usually does? — James Riley

That does happen sometimes. I think it's a software glitch, mods can't do anything about that.

That does happen sometimes. I think it's a software glitch, mods can't do anything about that. — Wayfarer

Roger that. Thanks.

To be silent. Or a pariah. An outsider looking in as far as this world and society goes. A very lonely existence or a very disingenuous one. Take your pick. Few alternate options remain. Besides, enlightenment has long been overrated since the CD player and some would argue color TV.

And anyway, philosophers often don't end up living very long.