My impression of Buddhists' impression of enlightenment

[Rising Spirit]

Yes, Hyperspace Fool, you're quite a scholar in your own right. You've a gift for elucidation. A cool breeze of clarity and in-depth specification. Rock on, brother!!!

 

[hixidom]

There can be no such thing as synthetic-a priori knowledge for instance...it´s just impossible. If knowledge is synthetic it just can not be a-priori.

I disagree. What Kant was trying to show was that some of the most predominant structures of reality originate within the mind.

So they cannot reveal knowledge of the outside world..wich is synthetic.

I would say there is no outside world that we can know of. What we call the "outside world" is based on perceptions that occurs within the mind. Whether such perceptions are actually triggered by events on the "outside" is another story. Differentiation between the "inside" and the "outside" may in fact be fallacious.

 

[polytrip]

There can be no such thing as synthetic-a priori knowledge for instance...it´s just impossible. If knowledge is synthetic it just can not be a-priori.

I disagree. What Kant was trying to show was that some of the most predominant structures of reality originate within the mind.

So they cannot reveal knowledge of the outside world..wich is synthetic.

I would say there is no outside world that we can know of.

Well, synthetic knowledge is empirical knowledge. It is ofcourse possible that all empirical knowledge stams from another part of the mind instead of an outside world.

The point is.... empirical knowledge can not be intuitive knowledge at the same time, unless you would argue that synthetic a-priori knowledge isn´t knowledge but a primary response of the brain on impulses, that neither falls into the category of knowledge or reason.

I personally believe that this is indeed the way knowledge originates, but then we would have to admit that the difference between empirical knowledge and knowledge based on logical reasoning occurs at some later stage of the mental growth proces, and that basically all of our classic ideas about knowledge that categorize knowledge into either sensory data or logical facts, are wrong.

 

[AlbertKLloyd]

The Lankavatara Sutra. A Mahayana Text

The Buddha

All the Buddhist teachings unfold themselves around the conception of Buddhahood. When this is adequately grasped, Buddhist philosophy with all its complications and superadditions will become luminous. What is the Buddha?
According to Mahamati the Bodhisattva-Mahasattva, who is the interlocutor of the Buddha in the Lanka, the Buddha is endowed with transcendental knowledge (prajna) and a great compassionate heart (karuna). With the former he realises that this world of particulars has no reality, is devoid of an ego-substance (anatman) and that in this sense it resembles Maya or a visionary flower in the air. As thus it is above the category of being and non-being, it is declared to be pure (visuddha) and absolute (vivikta) and free from conditions (animitta). But the Buddha's transcendental wisdom is not always abiding in this high altitude, because being instigated by an irresistible power which innerly pushes him back into a region of birth and death, he comes down among us and lives with us, who are ignorant and lost in the darkness of the passions (klesa). Nirvana is not the ultimate abode of Buddhahood, nor is enlightenment. Love and compassion is what essentially constitutes the self-nature of the All-knowing One (sarvajna).

Really good work about the teachings.