So when we talk about Buddhists, then we say religion was part of their culture, but not part of their teachings. — god must be atheist

It isn't quite as simple as that. If deities occur in Buddhist texts then it is hard to tell what was culture and what was actual teachings. There was very little distinction between culture and religion in those days. In the case of the Buddhist masses the distinction would have been negligible. But this is just a guess as none of us were there at the time or if we were we don't remember.

You must have some sort of measuring system, that would be interesting to know about. — god must be atheist

It would indeed. Unfortunately, it isn't my measuring system. I'm just relating what I've heard from Buddhists and Hindus. But some texts do describe what might amount to "evidence" or "signs" of enlightenment. You can always consult them or ask a "guru".

How about focusing on what I and others actually say rather than labeling us and attacking the label? — Fooloso4

That's exactly what I'm saying. It wasn't me who started the labeling. And the topic wasn't about Heraclitus, though you may have missed that point in your zeal.

And why are you upset for being called a Marxist? Surely that ought to be a compliment?

I'm not sure the majority of early Buddhists looked on the gods and other supernatural beings as "Hindu" or "non-Buddhist", they were just part of Indian culture.

As for enlightenment you can't declare anything in advance, you're just stating what normally happens, and in those cases where you can see that you yourself or some other practitioner has not attained that state in their lifetime.

Actually, depending on the group or movement we're talking about, most seekers are said to attain enlightenment after many lives, the lucky ones after two or three and very rarely in this lifetime. I think you can see the dangers of us Westerners trying to attain that "here and now". A lot of realism and proper guidance is needed to avoid potential problems. I'm not trying to put anyone off anything, just advising some caution.

Most of the supernatural beings of Buddhism were of course taken from Hinduism. You'll find devas (gods), asuras (demons), gandharvas (celestial beings), everywhere in early Buddhist text. You can see it in religious (temple) art, etc. It looks like Buddhists did worship some of them from the start. Obviously, not in the sense of a supreme being as in most religions.

It was funny, but true. — god must be atheist

Unfortunately, I've seen too many people looking for "enlightenment" or whatever for years without result, only to start taking stuff to "speed up" the process and end up in a way that I wouldn't wish on anyone. Just ask Indian locals in Goa and other parts. People brought up with the Western mentality of materialistic consumer society often fail to understand what it all involves.

Can you give me an example of something that never undergoes any change?

By the way, the larger context of my comment is in reference to Heraclitus and flux. Some here may have picked up on it, obviously you have not. — Fooloso4

Well, your context must have been so large as to have no bearing on the permanence I was referring to in the topic. The normal meaning of permanent is "lasting (for a long time)". It doesn't need to be everlasting in the absolute sense. That's why we've got phrases like "permanent ink", "permanent scar", etc. It isn't eternity we're talking about here.

But Marxists are always right, so you can relax.

What a rookie. — baker

That was meant as a joke.

While you, of course, are inevitably close to nirvana, or already there, right? Right. — baker

I never said that. But from all the questions you're asking here it's hard to tell what it is that you actually want.

Neither side can prevail until the other is vanquished. — NOS4A2

Correct. Politics is about accumulating as much power as possible just like others accumulate wealth. Once one side has become dominant there is nothing to prevent it from exterminating the opposition. It's happened many times throughout history and we shouldn't pretend otherwise.

Permanence is slow change. — Fooloso4

No it isn't. That's not the definition of permanence.

It is the political extremes who see politics literally as a battlefield where the other side is the enemy. — ssu

The extremes inspire, influence or manipulate and mobilize the mainstream. And political parties do conduct their election campaigns like military operations on an ideological battlefield, not just the extremist factions within them.

Don't forget that political parties started off as small (radical) groups that overtime won the support of large sections of society through propaganda of all shades, etc.

This brings us to the other thing which is that the polarization started with the left who rose in opposition to the status quo. Without the left's opposition, there'd have been no polarization. So, the issue of how the polarization came into being is another aspect to the problem that needs looking into.

Something of a strawman given that I think only Apollodorus takes that book seriously — praxis

Funny enough, it looks like it's others who keep talking about it.

Belief is involved in everything. Marxist material atheists have a belief, too. — god must be atheist

Well, Marxists would probably like to see their system as a "science". However, the fact is that some historians and even socialists have described it as a form of messianic religion.

As to Buddhism, at least in some forms of it, it does believe in supernatural beings, there is no doubt about it.

“The Psychology of Politics: How does psychology make sense of the madness of politics?”

By Lisa J Cohen, Psychology Today

“The extensive media coverage of politicians' lives provides ample opportunity for clinicians to make inferences about politicians' psychological traits. Notably, the conclusions that different clinicians draw are quite similar. One of the most common traits that clinicians talk about is that of narcissism […] Interestingly, attitudes toward the 5 categories of moral concerns[1] may also influence political beliefs. In other words, political conservatives and liberals may emphasize different categories of moral instincts from one another […] This study helps us understand why people with equally strong moral convictions may vehemently disagree on political issues such as abortion, capital punishment and flag burning.

1. Harm/care, Ingroup/loyalty, Authority/respect, Purity/sanctity, and Fairness/reciprocity.

So, politics does have something to do with psychology after all, But it takes a "philosophy forum" to deny it ...

Here's another interesting piece from Live Science;

Firstborn Siblings Are More Conservative, New Study Finds

And, of course, we all know how the media has been branding its political opponent Donald Trump as suffering from some "narcissistic personality disorder".

It's worth noting that all sorts of things have been tradition at some point or another. Female genital mutilation, human sacrifice, animal sacrifice, inter cousin marriage, prescribed royal incest, etc. Sometimes going against the flow and being loony for they times isn't a bad idea. — Count Timothy von Icarus

By the same token, some traditions may be worth keeping. By definition, when you introduce a change, you can't predict its impact in all its ramifications. You may yet come to regret the change you've made. And the way things are currently going, changes - some intended, others less so - are happening at a speed and to an extent that they threaten to get out of control, like a vehicle travelling at increasingly higher velocity along uncharted ways and with the rising likelihood of ending in a crash. Civilizations come and go and sometimes the cause is self-inflicted. There can be no harm in taking a step back and doing some thinking before it's too late.

Done with a different attitude, using psychology can perhaps be useful. — ssu

That was exactly my original assumption and I still believe this to be the case. Unfortunately, emotions and political activism tend to intervene and before you know it the discussion gets dragged into the gutter.

By the way, my topic was not Bolton but the fact that something like a political "left" and "right" exists along with the ever-rising tension between them.

Personally, I tend to believe that society must urgently depoliticize itself and start taking a more holistic view of itself and of its problems. The interests of the whole, not of political factions or special interest groups must be made the primary concern.

Why have alternative governments of the right and left, each trying to cancel what their predecessor implemented, when a single, consensus-based government might do the same job with less friction and without wasting billions on elections, etc. ?

Well, desire is fundamental to our psychological make-up, it's extremely difficult to get rid of. And there is always that secret nagging desire to attain nirvana. But it looks like our friend @baker will require a good few rebirths - hopefully as a Buddhist - to achieve that. Should he have decided what path or epistemology to choose, that is.

You seem to be concerned about (1) "Buddhist epistemology", about (2) "Western political correctness" and about (3) "how to choose a religious/spiritual path".

If "How on earth does one choose a religious (etc.) path" is your question, then you need to go back to choosing one in the first place and then worry about practice or about what Western political correctness thinks of it. Asking that question suggests that you haven't decided yet. Or have I misunderstood something?

I agree that this was probably one factor but surely not the only one? Buddhism had many centuries to defeat Hinduism before the arrival of the Mughals. Why did it fail to do so? Besides, the Hindu (non-Buddhist) critique of Buddhist momentariness does seem valid to me - at least in terms of logic.

To be clear, any attempt to psychologically map out an explanation for why and how conservatives and liberals or whatever political appellation believe what they believe is nonsense. It's about as vague as astrology and just as predictive. — Maw

Not at all. It may be vague in general outline but less so once you've looked into the more detailed facts of it. Most scientific theories start off about "as vague as astrology and just as predictive". If we dismissed everything before even considering or discussing it there would be no science.

Trial, error, modification, refining, certainty, that's how thought and knowledge progresses. But it often starts with a "vague" suggestion or proposition.

I only pointed out that doing some practices and holding some views can lead to some trouble for the practitioner — baker

Well, even if some Buddhist teachings aren't flawed in terms of logical consistency, they may still be "flawed" in the sense and to the extent that they lead to "some trouble for the practitioner". That's why a qualified teacher is absolutely necessary. Without that, there is absolutely no way knowing whether you are headed for nirvana or for something else. Manipulation of and interference with psychological processes can lead to more than just "some trouble" without qualified guidance, especially in the case of Westerners who often don't have a clue (not referring to you personally).

So the question is, how on earth does one choose a religious (etc.) path??? — baker

If I’m not mistaken, the traditional means of knowledge (at least in Indian philosophy in general) is said to be (1) pratyaksha personal experience, (2) anumāna, reason and (3) shabda, trustworthy testimony or authority.

The last one (3) would be either scripture or a qualified teacher. Problem is that scripture is often unclear or incomplete and qualified teachers are hard to find so you have to rely on (1) and (2) a lot of the time especially nowadays.

But I do agree that some assumptions that are fundamental to Buddhism can be flawed. Impermanence or momentariness (kshanikavada) is one example. If all things are momentary, it may be hard to explain memory, whereas if we admit a permanent soul the problem doesn’t arise. I remember reading somewhere that this was one of the arguments Hindu philosophers used to refute Buddhist teachings, leading to the decline of Buddhism.

This may be Hindu propaganda, but it used to be customary to accept a rival philosophy if its proponent could show in a debate that yours is wrong. In Europe, people used to progress from one philosophy to another until they found one that suited them. That's how many arrived at Christianity.

In the case of Buddhism, I suppose you either accept Hinduism or hold on to some Buddhist views and accept others from Hinduism.

I do not need to see the book to find out who the author is. I am not accusing you of anything. I am simply pointing to what has been said about him. — Fooloso4

Well, you are accusing me by implication: the author is a "Nazi", his book must be promoting "Nazism" (as well as "Odinism" and "anti-semitism"), therefore I must be a "Nazi" for reading the book or for daring to mention it. Guilt by association, in other words. Wasn't that what the Nazis (and the Stalinists) did?

If the author was a far-left Marxist or Stalinist, would your argument be the same? Or is far-left extremism OK to you?

And look at other comments on here, like "anyone who looks to psychology to explain politics is a moron".

Political psychology is an established academic field, so there must be lots of "morons" around.

Plus, psychology aims to understand human behavior in all kinds of situations, so why should politics be any different? Is it because some people are afraid of having their political thoughts and behavior scrutinized? Is that why they are trying to suppress discussion by attacking people and calling them names???

Though one wonders whom it is we should be consulting in matters of economics, psychology, or sociology. Roll dice presumably... — Isaac

I'm beginning to think that consulting the Communist Manifesto would be the default procedure around here ...

If it was just one of you I might understand. But you're ganging up on people like a pack of dogs, which in my opinion only proves my point. But never mind, you can keep your "discussion". I don't need it.

I have not seen the book in question — Fooloso4

I see. You haven't seen the book, haven't read it, don't have a clue, but still talking and accusing people. Sounds about right, doesn't it? "Loony Left" is just a joke, for sure.

Don't tell me what to do. I'm not taking orders from Stalinists and far-left Fascists.

You can't come up with any reasoned arguments that's why you're inventing this "Nazi" conspiracy theory to suppress discussion. On a forum, too!

You guys are delusional.

Imagination fueled by paranoia, that's how.

Yeah, just like yourself. Have you come out of your closet yet or do you still spy "Nazis" under the bed?

Epistemology has a name in Indian philosophy, it's pramāṇa-vāda — Wayfarer

Correct. I thinks it translates "means of knowledge".

From what I've seen Abhinavagupta who developed the philosophical system of Kashmiri Shaivism seems to have borrowed something similar from Buddhists in the context of his theory of perception. I've mentioned this on the thread on Platonism and Indian philosophy. But I'll have a look at the Wikipedia article, thanks.

I am under no legal obligation to know who an author from New Zealand is.

If a book is in a regular bookstore, it's on political psychology and has endorsements from psychology professors on the back cover, why the hell would you google the author?

And if you knew about the author why didn't you say something from the start?

You've only come up with it now because you didn't know what else to do to suppress the discussion. And you call others "Nazis"?

Anyway, I couldn't care less if they banned me!

I haven't seen any "Nazi" views in the book and I wasn't discussing the book.

So, I don't see what your point is. It was YOU who brought up Nazism not me.

And I'm glad you aren't a communist terrorist although these days one can never know.

Well, I didn't know that and you can't really blame it on me, can you? Anyway, conspiracy theories aside, what in the book are you objecting to?

Or are you just upset that I started a discussion that's inconvenient to some people on the far left?

I think part of the problem is that people tend to invest a lot of emotional energy into things they often don't really know or understand.

By definition, politics is about power and politicians will do anything to acquire as much power for themselves as possible, including manipulating the public.

So, it looks like modern society is going in the wrong direction and we need to return to more civility and respect for each other.

And take a more philosophical approach to things instead of jumping headlong into political activism.

Not only that, but I'm not even discussing the book, I just said I was reading it. Maybe you need some reading glasses or something?

I fail to see your logic. Just because you're a Marxist that doesn't make the rest of us "Nazis", "Odinists" and "anti-semites"

The book has nothing of that sort in it at all. IMO, you're talking conspiracy theory there, my friend.

Have you rejected Marxist terrorism and genocide yet? If not, why not???