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Kill Six Billion Demons

linkhyrule5 said:
Err.... no?

a) Why exactly do you think I don't understand Buddhism? I grew up with it, I've made formal studies of it, a third of my family's Buddhist to some degree.
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Did you commence the formal studies of Buddhism before, after or in-between your studies in *snort* quantum mechanics *snort*?


Like dude, you really need to drop the "I have formal studies in x" as a rhetorical gambit.
 
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Jemnite said:
From the Pāli Canon itself
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... none of which detracts from my point, though?

Yes, okay, all these things exist, I never claimed that Buddhism claimed they didn't. I claimed that Buddhism believes the world can't be changed.

In fact, you can even read that out of what you quoted, though it's not as explicit there as elsewhere. Note that the entire passage is focused on your mind and your beliefs, not at all about the external effects of those beliefs, not at all about your practical ability to effect change. Right view, right effort, right mindfulness -- not right consequences.

Instead, though, I'll just point at, yannow, the four Noble Truths themselves. Which start with "All life is suffering, and the source of all suffering is desire."

Or perhaps I should point at the very definition of dukkha, which claims that all the world we see is transient and impermanent (and therefore implicitly cannot be made permanent, cannot be changed fundamentally in a way that won't just get undone later)?

Or perhaps I should point at the fundamental premise, that the only solution to samsara is nirvana?

I can go on if you like. You're missing my point entirely.
 
linkhyrule5 said:
... none of which detracts from my point, though?

Yes, okay, all these things exist, I never claimed that Buddhism claimed they didn't. I claimed that Buddhism believes the world can't be changed.

In fact, you can even read that out of what you quoted, though it's not as explicit there as elsewhere. Note that the entire passage is focused on your mind and your beliefs, not at all about the external effects of those beliefs, not at all about your practical ability to effect change. Right view, right effort, right mindfulness -- not right consequences.

Instead, though, I'll just point at, yannow, the four Noble Truths themselves. Which start with "All life is suffering, and the source of all suffering is desire."

Or perhaps I should point at the very definition of dukkha, which claims that all the world we see is transient and impermanent (and therefore implicitly cannot be made permanent, cannot be changed fundamentally in a way that won't just get undone later)?

Or perhaps I should point at the fundamental premise, that the only solution to samsara is nirvana?

I can go on if you like. You're missing my point entirely.
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Hey, fam. It seems like your attachments and fetters to the transient world is blinding you to the noble truth, that the world is indeed founded on disquietude. Have you considered taking up a Bodhisattva Vow to liberate all beings from the web of dust?
 
linkhyrule5 said:
Or perhaps I should point at the very definition of dukkha, which claims that all the world we see is transient and impermanent (and therefore implicitly cannot be made permanent, cannot be changed fundamentally in a way that won't just get undone later)?
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I don't know how to explain this to you, but the world changes bud. You're talking about dukkha and desire, but you don't actually understand Tanha. What is Tanha? It is the desire that creates hardship. Fame-seeking, idealism forcing, wealth-seeking, these things are Tanha. But Tanha is not the desire to act.

Desire to act in Buddhism is chanda, one of the six pakinnaka cetasikas in the Theravada tradition and one of the five visayaniyata in the Mahayana tradition. Tanha as the foundation of dukkha is the desire for something that cannot be attained. Tanha derives from the vedic tṛ́ṣṇā, to wish. The truth of understanding and overcoming dukkha is to not to extinguish your actions, but to understand the contradiction between the ideal and the real, the possible and the possible, to face that contradiction and resolve it by embracing the anatman, the understanding that there is no permanence of self and that you will change.

The world is not static. If you believe it is static, sit and do nothing, and see if the world follows in your footsteps. Sit and try to be the same person you were yesterday.

The root of buddhism is not to avoid action. If the truth of Buddhism was to annihilate all desires and virtues, then the Boddhicitta would not be aroused by the Brahmavihara. Understand that you cannot avoid harvesting the karmaphala by refusing to bring about a cause. As Baizhang Huaihuai said. Don't ignore cause and effect.
 
Also journey to the west is a fucking Ming era novel, not actual Buddhist canon what the fuck is this bullshit. That's like saying Dante's Inferno is actually a core teaching of Christianity.
 
So I started typing this up an update or two ago and the conversation began moving in a very interesting direction that I have nothing worthwhile to contribute so I'll just leave this here.

----

The lesson with the rat is there to present the central dilemma of the volume: violence can (seemingly) only be answered with violence. Just as many have noted that violence is the solution of idiots and bullies because it requires nothing else but strength - no understanding of culture, language or personhood that a more refined and diplomatic approach would require - Meti acknowledges that the flipside of that truth in that there is no good reply to violence save for violence. The Ki Rata's monks way of complete non-interference is not an answer, but Solomon's complete interference isn't an answer either.

If violence is - in some way - necessary, how can one make it righteous or just or good?

And everyone has their own answer.

Meti seems to be of the opinion it can't. The key of kings, the power of creation itself, reduced to a particularly sharp rock. Beat your sword into a ploughshare and turn that stone to soup.

(Speaking of which, this current parable is clearly making reference towards the Stone Soup fable where a weary traveler cooks a delicious 'stone soup' by getting suspicious villagers to contribute ingredients in what he promises to be an exquisite soup - if only he had onions / carrots / etc. to go along with his stone.

Not entirely sure where Abbadon is taking this riff on it, it's clearly different)

The Demiurges all see it as necessary in some way - for life, for wealth, for oblivion, for choice, for victory... but as many note, only Solomon still sees it as righteous. The rest are resigned to their status as the corrupt god-kings of the universe (or revel in it, as the case may be).

And then there's Allison. She who looks at power and its cost and rejected it. She who sees violence as strange and frightening, but is strong enough to walk into a dragon's lair to slay the Beast - and strong enough to leave without having done so. For Allison, the road to becoming capable of violence is not a road that requires violence. She became a buff beefcake - and felt comfortable in her body. For her, violence is partially a means of self-expression, one she is still figuring out, because she is humans and humans change.

And so we finally come to the Angels.

Angels whose answer is to protect. To use violence to punish the guilty and protect the innocent. Who use discipline and emptiness - a lack of self - as a means to make violence righteous. They are following the law, not their own impulses for Selfhood is the enemy of reason and righteousness. They know it is wrong and so beg for forgiveness before performing violence - but perform it nonetheless.

It is no coincidence, then, that the final battle is between an angel rejecting the righteousness of a 'just' system and Solomon who embodies it. Like all good martial arts movies and anime battles, their battle is part clashing philosophy and part clashing fists.

This battle does not establish who is right, only who is more wrong:

Violence cannot be righteous without an element of Self. The attempt to reject the Self is doomed to failure, a system of morals and laws, obeyed with exactitude, paradoxically, only serves to create unjust outcomes. You must invest yourself into your justice, you must be, trite as the statement has become, the change you want to see in the world. You can neither apologize for your actions nor who you are.

But make no mistake: the dilemma that Meti poses is by no means 'solved' - we see it in Gog Agog rightly noting that in the end, no matter how personally enlightening this violence was, no matter how transformative, it's all part of the spectacle. We ourselves, are, after all, reading KSBD because of it.
 
ScottishMongol said:
So, one possible outcome is that Allison actually manages to convince the Demiurges to put aside their power, to accept their own eventual deaths.
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I mean the only issue I have with this is that the gripping fear of death is mainly a Mottom thing. Solomon David isn't biologically immortal due to his key and would be plenty insanely deadly without it, nor is Mammon, who was totally indifferent to the prospect of death within the depths of his despair, and there's some indication that even his senility is something he inflicted on himself rather than a product of his age considering that the servant races are supposedly truly immortal unless they are killed. Meanwhile Jadis actually wants to die.

It's never been a fear of death with most of the Demiurgs, it's the fear of change. Yes, that includes death, but it's not the overriding source of fear for most of them.
 
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linkhyrule5 said:
... none of which detracts from my point, though?

(...)
I can go on if you like. You're missing my point entirely.
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Jemnite is trying to show you that you have no point.

The "no point" starts from the most common mistake of people who have averagely dim understanding of exotic topic taken by osmosis from pop-culture.

In study of theological question, especially that of different cultural background, first thing you are cautioned to do is remember that concepts taken and translated from different social mileu just don't map well on common understanding of the words used to translate. This is true about Buddhist concepts of suffering, impermeability, emptiness and liberation. Especially emptiness, because English "Void" (as it is something translated) and related theological/metaphisical ideas tend to map in really poor way to the semantic webs those concepts have assiocieted with XX century scientific understainding of "empty space".

The second thing is that Buddhism is not "one thing", but tradition spanning continents and millennia from beginning in India to farthest offshoots in industrial Japan where the doctrine and lingeage like Tendai (天台宗, Tendai-shū) developed for hundreds of years in pretty much separate socio-cultural-religious context.

So the answer to theological question that we can state as: "in what ways, how and to what degree the world of human lives can be made more righteous/perfected/better" or "how the fundamental nature can be changed, i.e. can this world or even whole Universe become wholly Pure Land (Paradise) through action?" is not going to be easily answered.

And you are not going to find one answer if you start looking into it.

So the moral of the story is as follow: playing know-it-all on the Internet is fun and all, I will not deny it, but at least get a basic grasp on the material, because you may run into someone who know slightly more than what pop-culture trash heap put in consumer's mind.

This apply both to theology and quantum mechanics.
 
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Jemnite said:
I don't know how to explain this to you, but the world changes bud....
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changeling said:
Jemnite is trying to show you that you have no point...
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Can you two either take it down a notch or go to PM's? Look, I don't know Buddhism so I'm not going to weigh in on the merits of the points you two are making, but you two are being kind of insufferable about it and I can't see what linkyhyrule did to deserve it.
 
Rule 3: Be Civil - This Post Is Pure Sniping, And Does Not Need To Be Made In Public.
SerGregness said:
Can you two either take it down a notch or go to PM's? Look, I don't know Buddhism so I'm not going to weigh in on the merits of the points you two are making, but you two are being kind of insufferable about it and I can't see what linkyhyrule did to deserve it.
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He has tendency to claim credentials when losing arguments. Last time I run into him he was making hash of basic experiment of quantum mechanics and after three post of being shown that he know pretty much nothing he bellowed that he is graduate student in QM *snort* *bahahaha* and who we are to question his wisdom *snort*.

I am trying to show him why it's bad idea and bad faith behavior.

Can't speak for Jamnite. They probably have the same allergic reaction to ignorance that Catholics exhibit when someone call them polytheists.
 
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SerGregness said:
Can you two either take it down a notch or go to PM's? Look, I don't know Buddhism so I'm not going to weigh in on the merits of the points you two are making, but you two are being kind of insufferable about it and I can't see what linkyhyrule did to deserve it.
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changeling said:
He has tendency to claim credentials when losing arguments. Last time I run into him he was making hash of basic experiment of quantum mechanics and after three post of being shown that he know pretty much nothing he bellowed that he is graduate student in QM *snort* *bahahaha* and who we are to question his wisdom *snort*.

I am trying to show him why it's bad idea and bad faith behavior.

Can't speak for Jamnite. They probably have the same allergic reaction that Catholics exhibit when someone call them polytheists.
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Jemnite's Christian, he just lives to dunk on people with his superior knowledge has a lot of reservations when people mutilate a faith that millions of people live by. Like when the subtext of your post is that Buddhism is meaningless nihilism don't expect people to not get cheesed off.
 
Cio shouldn't feel too worried, Allison is just happy that everything's worked out so far. And she's probably laughing at the absurdity of Zaid asking her if she was okay like she couldn't snap him in half like a twig.

changeling said:
Can't speak for Jamnite. He probably have the same allergic reaction that Catholics exhibit when someone call them polytheists.
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>Catholics
>Polytheists
>Calling the Christians polytheists

There's a story there and I want to hear it.
 
Gh055twr1t3r said:
>Catholics
>Polytheists
>Calling the Christians polytheists

There's a story there and I want to hear it.
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Once upon a time, when I was a student, I was coordinator for Erasmus program and our group had both turbo-Catholic from Portugal and devout Muslim from France; to make matter funnier they lived in the same dorm-room and the kitchen across their room was party place for this Easmus group. I had another friend from that group whose family was from Iran (fleed to Turkey and from there they moved to Germany) and he was even more of zealous anti-theist than me (I am more of detached atheist); we used to drink and prod those two into debates about religion.

Fun time, fun people. We drifted apart as those things go.

(*I regret nothing*)
 
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Gh055twr1t3r said:
Cio shouldn't feel too worried, Allison is just happy that everything's worked out so far. And she's probably laughing at the absurdity of Zaid asking her if she was okay like she couldn't snap him in half like a twig.


>Catholics
>Polytheists
>Calling the Christians polytheists

There's a story there and I want to hear it.
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Ooh, I actually can weigh in on this one! So, disclaimer in that I'm not religious at all these days, but my family was Catholic growing up. By my understanding, the whole 'polytheistic Catholics' thing has to do with the way Catholics venerate the saints. The whole 'Hey, saint [whoever], can you put a word in with God for me?' thing gets close to the line of direct worship for some people. I am, obviously, simplifying immensely, but I think it's the heart of it.

Believe it or not, I've also heard people (Well, one person IRL) insist that Catholics aren't Christians, though I have no idea what the hell the logic there is supposed to be.

Laplace said:
Jemnite's Christian, he just lives to dunk on people with his superior knowledge has a lot of reservations when people mutilate a faith that millions of people live by. Like when the subtext of your post is that Buddhism is meaningless nihilism don't expect people to not get cheesed off.
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This just brings up the fact that actual Nihilism isn't what most people think it is, either. :V
 
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linkhyrule5 said:
And it's not like it denies, like, straight up literal causality; if one of the bodhisattvas goes into the afterlife and saves all the children that would otherwise be cursed to that stupid stone beach for dying before their parents, it's not like that particular suffering won't be alleviated. It just says that on the whole, you can't really meaningfully change the world. You can help one particular person, or indeed X people for any finite X, reach enlightenment -- but you can't change "the process and the system that curses the people in the world to suffering in the first place."
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This is missing the point entirely. Ksitigarbha will never save all the people. His vow is to not attain Buddhahood until all the hells are empty, and the hells will never be empty. It is a fruitless, thankless task which will never be done. But Ksitigarbha continues to do it anyway? Why?

Because it is worth doing.

The suffering of one individual should never be forgotten in pursuit of the grand goal. If you decide that because there are no consequential changes it is not worth doing, then you have failed to consider the smallest person in the picture, the individual. Ksitigarbha slaves away in hell, denying himself escape and enlightenment, working away at a thankless task because he cares so much about even the smallest, most worthless sinner that he would deny himself ultimate salvation simply to save him. This is incredibly admirable.

Why do we devote medical resources to end of end-of-life and hospice care? These individuals will die all the same. No amount of care spent on them will change this. But this is kindness. This is compassion. When we talk about the Brahmavihara, this is Karuna. This is pervasive kindness and desire to reduce suffering towards the smallest of sentient beings. Systematic change means nothing if you forget the individual. And no effort to alleviate the suffering of individuals is pointless.
SerGregness said:
Can you two either take it down a notch or go to PM's? Look, I don't know Buddhism so I'm not going to weigh in on the merits of the points you two are making, but you two are being kind of insufferable about it and I can't see what linkyhyrule did to deserve it.
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Putting aside the multitude of Buddhism themes that people have pointed out in K6BD countless times in the thread, the point is that Buddhism is a living faith, with millions of adherents. You may levy critiques against it, but if you're going to do so at least treat it with respect. If you're going to debate or discuss the merits of Buddhism you should at lest be prepared to do with more than a pop-cultural level of understanding on the equivalent of what you would learn from the assigned textbook on an 'Introduction to World Religions 101' class. If we can agree that it is incredibly bad form to call Islam a religion of violence based on like 5 cherry picked lines from the Koran, surely we can say that it is at the very least pretty rude to say that Buddhism is a religion that advocates doing nothing based on whatever we can scrounge up from Wikipedia.
 
Jemnite said:
Putting aside the multitude of Buddhism themes that people have pointed out in K6BD countless times in the thread, the point is that Buddhism is a living faith, with millions of adherents. You may levy critiques against it, but if you're going to do so at least treat it with respect. If you're going to debate or discuss the merits of Buddhism you should at lest be prepared to do with more than a pop-cultural level of understanding on the equivalent of what you would learn from the assigned textbook on an 'Introduction to World Religions 101' class. If we can agree that it is incredibly bad form to call Islam a religion of violence based on like 5 cherry picked lines from the Koran, surely we can say that it is at the very least pretty rude to say that Buddhism is a religion that advocates doing nothing based on whatever we can scrounge up from Wikipedia.
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I hope you'll forgive me for not seeing how linkyhyrule saying 'you must instead work internally' is equivalent to him claiming that Buddhism advocates 'doing nothing whatsoever'.
 
SerGregness said:
I hope you'll forgive me for not seeing how linkyhyrule saying 'you must instead work internally' is equivalent to him claiming that Buddhism advocates 'doing nothing whatsoever'.
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linkhyrule5 said:
I know that sounds weird, given that Buddhism is so famously pacifistic, but... it also has, right down at its core as one of its central tenets, the bedrock belief that the world cannot be fixed, cannot be changed, cannot be meaningfully improved.
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:thonk:
 
SerGregness said:
I hope you'll forgive me for not seeing how linkyhyrule saying 'you must instead work internally' is equivalent to him claiming that Buddhism advocates 'doing nothing whatsoever'.
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Because he's wrong. The entire thing of preaching the pure Dharma or even being a Bodhisattva is about freeing everyone to become a Buddha before you take that final step. Amitabha Buddha, in particular, is noted for promising that all living beings can be reborn in his paradise if they chant his name just ten times. Just because they do it by freeing each individual instead of reprogramming Samsara or whatever doesn't deny their efforts.
 
Jemnite said:
:thonk:
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'You must instead work internally' comes immediately after the part you quoted. 'Working on yourself' is actually quite hard in most cases, so I'm still confused why you seem be claiming that this is 'doing nothing'.

I'm really not trying to be obtuse here, but the literal post of his that set all this off did not say 'the world cannot be changed, so give up and crawl into a corner'. I don't see how 'work internally' is 'doing nothing'.
 
You know we're talking about people missing the point and I completely got blind sided that Indra's solution was not following up his amazing one liner by bashing in the tyrants head.

Iiiiif I remember correctly there is also an interesting parallel between Buddhism and Royalty in that a person who has achieved enlightment is the exact sort of person who won't really care. If they did they wouldn't have reached it in the first place.

100% Obvious but I really like it anyways, and in this context I'm presuming that this is someone who has grasped the full meaning rather then just one word.
 
Gh055twr1t3r said:
Cio shouldn't feel too worried, Allison is just happy that everything's worked out so far. And she's probably laughing at the absurdity of Zaid asking her if she was okay like she couldn't snap him in half like a twig.


>Catholics
>Polytheists
>Calling the Christians polytheists

There's a story there and I want to hear it.
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I've seen some of the really anti-Catholic fundamentalist groups claim that the Catholics are fake christians who really worship the saints, unlike them who only worship God directly.

It's a stupid-ass argument that completely fails to understand the role saints play in Catholic theology, but why let being completely incorrect get in the way of justifying your prosecution complex and claiming that your denomination is the only real Christianity?
 
changeling said:
He has tendency to claim credentials when losing arguments. Last time I run into him he was making hash of basic experiment of quantum mechanics and after three post of being shown that he know pretty much nothing he bellowed that he is graduate student in QM *snort* *bahahaha* and who we are to question his wisdom *snort*.

I am trying to show him why it's bad idea and bad faith behavior.
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When you are genuinely trying to persuade someone of something... such as "This is a bad idea, please stop"... then probably it doesn't help to swoop in, jeer at them, and call them "averagely dim".

And its not like Linky mentioning credentials was exactly out of place. They had been told:
Jemnite said:
You clearly don't understand Buddhism at all.
Don't talk about it.
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Without having any SPECIFIC disagreement raised against them.
If Jemnite had raised a specific "you don't understand X", then there could have been an argument about X. If they had said "You claim X, but actually Y", that can also work. If someone just shows up and says "Stop talking, you don't know what you are talking about"... then ummm... what option does that leave beyond "Hey, so this is where I am getting my information, and this is why I think I know what I am talking about". (especially when the person you are talking to has done literally nothing to show any expertise or understanding of their own)

I ain't gonna argue Linky's correctness or whatever. I know crap all budhism. Just... like... if changleings *actual goal* is to convince someone that appeals to education or authority are inappropriate, then the approach of "Swoop in, call names" probably isn't going to get that result. It kinda just feels like bullying, and while Jemnite's explanations later on are actually helpful, starting the conversation with "You know nothing, stop talking", isn't exactly a great way to talk to people.

... *shrug*

Also: back with the comic,
Gawd I love Princess calling Vigilant gaze "Square angel".
Square angel is best angel.
 
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Stop: GO ELSEWHERE
  • Staff Post
    • go elsewhere
    changeling said:
    He has tendency to claim credentials when losing arguments. Last time I run into him he was making hash of basic experiment of quantum mechanics and after three post of being shown that he know pretty much nothing he bellowed that he is graduate student in QM *snort* *bahahaha* and who we are to question his wisdom *snort*.

    I am trying to show him why it's bad idea and bad faith behavior.
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    The argument about Buddhism is tangentially relevant to K6BD, but this post is pure sniping at linkhyrule's past posting and accusations of bad faith and basic falsehoods. Do not do this. 25 points and 3 days out of thread.

    For everyone else, the argument about Buddishm can probably stop unless you tie it much more closely to the comic. Tossing in Christianity likewise. If you really want to argue about religion otherwise, go elsewhere for it than the K6DB thread.
     
  • Staff Post
    • I'm just curious what Solomon would do if he had a run in with Aesma. Can you imagine the raw humiliation?

    Also, it occurs that Gog has likely been attending and hosting these tournaments waiting for this exact sort of occurrence. Better that she doesn't arrange it even, eventually Solomon would lose and she'd have the front row seat.
     
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