The above is the title of a new essay at Integral World. I’ve provided some key excerpts below, while editing Desilet’s comments about the Open Integral discussion on the topic to the end. Desilet’s characterization is interesting in light of my posts making several of the same points. It is also interesting that he does not make one reference to anything specific said in our dialogs on the topic.
In this article Desilet compares Derrida with Sankara’s monist Vedanta. I have done the same at OI and also introduced the “nondual” of Nagarjuna. The latter would most certainly agree with Desilet that even the nondual itself is “neither dual nor nondual or both dual and nondual.” So I’d like to invite Desilet to a dialog here on these points of similarity and difference (and differance) in the comments. I will add my comments also in that section forthcoming. For now the excerpts, from the Integral World essay:
For Derrida, the difference between any oppositional pair derives from différance and he uses this new term to suggest a new way of understanding not only the relationship between opposites but also the ground of being from which oppositional tensions spring.
The “trace†is that which both marks and erases itself in the same stroke.
Derrida finds the trace structure as not only applicable to understanding language but also consciousness and every form of being and presence.
The ultimate purpose of the via negativa of neti, neti resides in removing blocks in the path toward attainment of the “pure consciousness†of Atman-Brahman, also called the Witness.
…for Sankara the only way out is to transcend language altogether, so that all the opposites, and indeed all conceptualizing, are canceled by the direct intuition (anubhava) of the real.
By contrast, Derrida thinks this trap may be escaped by staying within language but on the middle path between the pairs of opposites. When the opposites of language are maintained in dynamic tension, through a continual deconstruction of first one opposite and then the other, the real is experienced. For the moment the real is spoken, it is tending to swing the pendulum of language toward either one or the other of the opposites. Only by a continual deconstructing and reversing of each pendulum swing may we experience the real.
For Derrida, the constant change and challenge that this deconstruction requires is not a cause for lamentâ€â€it is rather the recognition that such a process, with its ongoing need for deconstruction, is itself the real . . . . Thus the impossibility of the everpresent desire to experience the real as pure presence.
Both language and consciousness share the structure of the trace as the effect of différance. The two are always and everywhere woven together such that one never occurs without the other and both open upon and reflect the structure of the real. Language and ordinary consciousness cannot be essentially separated from the real.
This reference to spiritual realization transitions into a discussion of themes relevant to the question of nonduality where Coward goes on to say that for Derrida “the dynamic tension in the becoming of language is itself the whole. . . . The language we are deconstructing is our own thinking and speakingâ€â€our own consciousness. We ourselves are the text we are deconstructing. This is why, for Derrida, there is nothing outside of texts. Deconstruction is the process of becoming self-aware, of self-realization†(216).
The transcendentalism implicit in monist metaphysical positions induces a focus on various programs of self perfection as improved self-awareness, higher consciousness, self-actualization, and ultimately self-transcendence into the ultimate oneness of pure consciousness or pure being.
By contrast the deconstructive approach advocated by Derrida moves the emphasis away from becoming a pure or highest self or consciousness toward becoming a better partner. For Derrida, the self/other relation, regarded as irreducible and inescapable, is already a divided or shared quest. Each side remains essential to the otherâ€â€not as an ethical imperative but as an ontological condition. This view structures life ontologically as relation (tension) exposed to rupture and everpresent mystery or difference. In this approach to life, every state of being involves relation (to the other) and life thereby becomes relation: on the upside, as the art of love (cooperation) and, on the downside, as the art of negotiation.
Although evoking the strategy of negative theology, this approach is neither dual nor nondual or both dual and nondual, but in a way that differs importantly from the qualities and implications of the tradition of negative theology.
When adding this information to the mix of recent postings on the topic of nonduality on Open Integral (under the heading “Integral Metatheory†and dated around March 20th and forward), many may want to throw up their hands in exasperation. How do such subtle theoretical discussions differ from the famous theological problem of determining how many angels fit on the head of a pin? How or why does it matter in deciding what nuances of nonduality or duality may lie at the core of “reality�
Ok, so here are some recent comments I’ve made on nonduality, Nagarjuna and Derrida at OI. We can compare them to Desilet’s article and his points after that.
From the Epistemological Indeterminacy thread: http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=158
Edward Berge Says:
August 9th, 2006 at 6:22 am e
Just a quickie for now, but the above ultimate (inter)subjectivity seems to me to be participating in the phenomenological myth of the given. As does the notion of involution and involutionary givens, and pure absolute experience outside of relativity. These notions seem part and parcel of the metaphysical assumptions of the perenniel traditions. Granted Ken tries to pare them down to a bare minimum, but it seems to me the later pomo enactments recognized the “ultimate†realm but intepreted it in a more accurate postmetaphysical way. The absolute is always deferred, never present, always a possibility and not an actuality. The latter view acknowledges the possibility of ultimate existence but also the impossiblity of knowing it directly. It eliminates all of the metaphysical baggage Ken talks about, while Ken has to retain at least some of it to get his universe going, i.e., the metaphysical Spirit or Consciousness.
Edward Berge Says:
March 23rd, 2007 at 10:28 am
Let me state what I think is going on here. Ken no longer puts the states of consciousness above the stages in the Wilber-Combs matrix because they are distinct. States and stages are the supposed “raw†ontological experiences on the one hand and the interpretative epistemology on the other hand. However, in IS Ken notes that both always arise together, so that a “direct†perception is also always already an interpretation, i.e. they co-arise simultaneously. Therefore there is no perception without interpretation, and vice versa. It’s both/and. And this both/and dialectic is represented by (one of) Ken’s definitions of nondual realization.
The myth of the given comes in when we posit a “pure†experience (or “rawâ€Â, to my understanding) that can exist apart from an immediate and co-arising interpretative framework. Hence we get Ken’s critique of Aurobindo’s separate ontological realms, and Alan’s defense of them as being outside the “mental†or “interpretation.†If Ken is right on this, and I think he might be, his postmetaphyical insight finds such an integration (to a point) between ontology and epistemology (nondually), whereas Alan and the Aurobindians can only see it as a mental abstraction because there is “pure†consciousness without relativity.
But of course Ken then back-tracks on this when using the “causal†level interpretation, that there “really†is a “pure,†“ultimate†consciousness free of form and relatively. And it is this “pure†consciousness that is united with, or integrated with, the relative realm in the nondual.(1) But that version of the nondual interpretation is not the same as the Nargarjuana or zen intepretations of nonduality, which does NOT posit such an “absolute†distinct from the relative.(2) Hence this “causal†nonduality is more akin to what Alan and the Aurobindians are saying. Ken wants it both ways here, where it’s NOT a both/and situation. Yes, if we contextualize each type of nonduality we can say they are both/and correct given the context, but IF the non-dual non-dual trumps the causal non-dual (and it does, according to Ken), then one is relatively better than the other, absolutely.
Put that in your integral pipe and smoke it.
1. And also the source of some â€Âultimate†measure of altitude via consciousness per se.
2. And it is here where I think Derrida comes in, with the same type of distinction AND realization.
Nonduality revisited thread: http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=159
Edward Berge Says:
March 25th, 2007 at 4:52 pm
So if you use the causal state emptiness as an altitude marker instead of the nondual ground what do you get? I maintain a hegemonic system or model fueled by warped delusions of grandeur and power. Sound at all familar to you, either in the causal state or differentiated nondual “traditions†or Adi Da or Ken, etc.?
But by using the nondual ground to, well, ground our relative altitudes, by seeing that there is no “absolute†apart from our relativity, by removing that power drive we can still compassionately embrace all just as they are while even giving them relative addresses of altitude. Just not some “kosmic†address that relegates them to eternal damnation, so to speak.
Edward Berge Says:
March 26th, 2007 at 9:55 am
Yes Mark, and this is precisely the difference in a TOE and a TFA. With the latter we can maintain the holonic/AQAL model without the hegemonic metapysical underpinnings, both of CPS and absolutism. Just mix in a little Derrida, steep for 3 minutes and serve in attractively decorated porcelin cups.
Edward Berge Says:
March 27th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
Derrida refers to Plato’s notion of (the) khora…[which] is the space that ‘gives place.’
Here we return to the articulation of the ‘space-in-between’…. But khora is a concept at once non-identical with itself in its very intention ‘as if there were two, the one and its double’, for it opens ‘an apparently empty space’ but is not ‘emptiness’.
For Derrida, by contrast, what is indeconstructable is rather the formless, structureless space in-between, the abyss or chasm ‘in’ which the cleavages between sensible and intelligible, body and soul, can have a place and take place.
Originally quoted from http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=107
Edward Berge Says:
March 28th, 2007 at 7:27 am
It is clear that Ken uses Vedanta and Vajrayana as the main sources of his conversation about states. And per kela (and the sources of his research, which are the “authorities†in this field, not Ken) their view of the nondual is not the same as Nagarjuna’s Madhyamika. In fact they were and are quite opposed at the most fundamental level. To just mix and match the language of both at will is NOT an integration of both nor does it automatically become a both/and situation just because of Ken’s gifted and “spiritual†sounding rhetoric. Ken’s sources are most definitely of the “consciousness only†variety, where Nagarjuna’s (and Derrida’s) are of the variety that says not even consciousness is IT. (It is NOT a “state†of consciousness.*) Note that Ken’s sources were furious with Nagarjuna back in the day and accused him of nihilism much as Ken now does with Derrida. (In fact Vajrayana considers itself the “next level†beyond Nagarjuna.) Although Ken talks a good game to those that don’t know the difference.
And there really is not need to get our panties in a bunch because neither Nagarjuna’s nor Derrida’s “emptiness†negates all the relative formulations of AQAL. It just puts them in “perspective,†which is fine for Ken to do with everyone else’s perspective with his on the top. But when his perspective is recontextualized, look out, you’re a green pluralist. Hence my criticism of CPS as the measure of altitude, as it depends on how you define this “nondual†basis wherein altitude arises. By using CPS we’re getting the Vendanta and Vajrayana bias of “consciousness†as this basis, which of course has its practical consequences in Ken being king of the world at the top of the holarchy. I’m reminded of James Cagney in White Heat when he’s going out in a blaze of glory: “I’m on top of the world ma!†But we can’t really blame Ken, this is inherent in the “consciousness†paradigm-enactment of his chosen “practice.†This type of nonduality is a “compassionate conservatism†I can do without, even though it’s for “my own good.â€Â
*And of course this has everything to do with how states and stages are “related,†another story for another day.
Edward Berge Says:
March 29th, 2007 at 6:27 am
This also applies to “emptiness†when we reify it as an essence or view. See the previous blog section “No views is good viewsâ€Â:
“To hold emptiness as a view – to reify it or think of it as the essence of things – is to misunderstand it entirely. As the goal of the MMK is to show how absurd it is to hold any view whatsoever, one may with confidence conflate sunyata with Nagarjuna’s position. Therefore, whoever takes Nagarjuna’s work as proposing a view has done something wrong.â€Â
How then do we talk about it? How can it be “useful†if it ain’t nothin’? How did Nagarjuna and Derrida do it and did they succeed?
Originally from http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=107
Edward Berge Says:
March 29th, 2007 at 7:37 am
As stated previously at http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=107:
Recall from Braitsten above that both Nagarjuna and Derrida emphasize that emptiness is beyond views or perspectives and is itself not a view or perspective. But neither is it a “consciousness†without a perspective or a “pure perception†as Ken defines it. Hence the former places perspectives in an indeterminate context whereas the latter has a determinate and absolute consciousness at its root, a la vedanta, vajrayana and yogacara. There is a big difference here (or is that differance?) with practical implications and consequences.
Edward Berge Says:
April 3rd, 2007 at 7:57 am
These “exlusionary forms of metaphysics†are apparent to anyone outside I-I and/or it’s parochial meme. Just look at how I-I is set up, all the complaints about refusal to accept valid criticism, it’s exclusionary and self-proclaimed superiority over other worldviews based on what? Degrees of “consciousness†which are developed how? Certain forms of meditation, themselves embedded in rather metaphysical assumptions about its special relevance in the cosmic scheme of things.
So no, I’m not saying throw out meditation and states of consciousness, just contextualize it in a postmetaphysical framework that doesn’t give it “absolute†preference to all other levels, lines, etc. THAT is the problem with Ken’s system. Take that out and it can be highly and effectively practical without the fricking presumption of omnipotence and self-serving, hegemonic superiority. Otherwise history is likely to throw the AQAL baby out with the bathwater of this religious* pretention.
*And yes, “spiritual†is just as bad as “religious,†just at a “higher†level of egocentricm and dysfuntion. I’m starting to wonder it the whole spiritual line isn’t in fact a dysfunctional way we humans intepret things we dont’ understand. We can still have mystery and posit the unconditional and undeconstructable, but without God attached in his various guises up to and including CPS.
Just a couple more quickies from the Performative contradiction thread: http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=170
Edward Berge Says:
April 8th, 2007 at 9:18 am e
“Most dramatically, Nagarjuna demonstrates that the emptiness of emptiness permits the ‘collapse’ of the distinction between the two truths, revealing the empty to be simply the everyday, and so saves his ontology from a simple-minded dualism.â€Â
This is to me the difference that makes a differance, where the twain shall meet, both of the two truths and of Nagarjuna and Derrida. And when Ken continues to dualize the ultimate and relative realms to me this is his last metaphysical stand, one that neither N or D make. Like Custer Ken has been ambushed and his own performative contradiction must now fall to the overwhelming force of the emptiness of emptiness. AND he gets to keep his AQAL/holonic aperspectival model via empty and dependent co-arising, just sans the “ultimate†basis in nondual “consciousness.â€Â
Edward Berge Says:
April 10th, 2007 at 7:32 am e
Yes Joe, please check out the comments, where the meat ususally resides in my inquiries. I just use the main topic as an introduction and then explore it in the comments with continued research and inquiry. For me blogging is a process. The initial statement is not a finished product but acts more like posing the questions to explore later. That’s just my approach to blogging, as an open process of inquiry.
You’re right, Ken does maintain what he calls the bare essentials of metaphysical givens, which is explored either above or elsewhere via footnote 26 to Excerpt A, for one reference. And what I’m saying is that we can even undo these givens in Nagarjuna’s dependent co-arising via emptiness and still have a postmetaphyical base of holonic AQAL. AND that this is not necessarily of a “pluralist†level of altitude (however you define it) or we’d have to put Nagarjuna in that category too, which Ken most certainly does not. At least that I can tell.
AND that Derrida was on to the same notions with differance and the undeconstructable, but we know that Ken thinks he’s gone mad with pluralist aperspectival madness. And quite frankly Ken is wrong about that. AND I think that stems from his last vestige of a metaphysical conectpion of “consciousness†at the heart of his so-called nondual spirituality, which is still “dual†in Nagarjuna’s sense.
Also for other reference the same topic and discussion is going on at the Lightmind Forum. A link is on the main page blog references.
Since I’ve provided so many dots that even the most mentally challenged can connect, and since the readers of this blog tend toward being quite a bit beyond such challenge, I won’t insult them with making the obvious connections. (Or waste my time, for that matter.) Perhaps if Mr. Desilet would care to comment on how I have missed his points in my utter irrelevance I could respond to something more specific and substantial?
It’s more than a bit strange since I’ve often agreed with Desilet. How about you readers weighing in? What do you think is up?
I don’t think that Shankara’s thought serves as suitable grist for a comparison with Derrida. A comparison with Prasangika Madhyamika would be more interesting. The problem is finding someone who knows their stuff well enough to do so, meaning, the question presupposes knowing what Derrida and the Madhyamika are on about in the first place.
And of course this is the comparison I’ve tried to make here at OI in several threads, between Derrida and Nagarjuna.* One can certainly question my effectiveness of such a comparison, but to make the statements Desilet made, especially in light of my use of him to elucidate such a comparison, is beyond me. And especially in light of my continued agreement with him on Ken’s “metaphysical” version of not only the nondual but of Derrida’s critique. Hence I’ll ask him and everyone else for feedback.
*The above excerpts are likely less than 10% of my total questions and ruminations on the topic here at OI. One can also peruse the following thread:
Postmetaphysical Thinking 4: Enter the Dragon
http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=107
To be fair to Desilet he admitted from the start he was not an expert on eastern religion. To say the least or he’d know something about nonduality beyond the one cited article. Or about the differences between Vedanta and Madhyamika. Concerning OI he apparently is not only not an expert but not a careful reader either. But again, I still appreciate his work and agree with much of his critique of Ken.
Ok, I received some email feedback that this person is not able to connect the dots, so I will do so from my perspective. It will take more than one comment, as my time is limited at the moment. But I’ll make a start.
Let’s beging with the first 2 excerpts from Desilet above:
“For Derrida, the difference between any oppositional pair derives from différance and he uses this new term to suggest a new way of understanding not only the relationship between opposites but also the ground of being from which oppositional tensions spring.
“The ‘trace’ is that which both marks and erases itself in the same stroke. ”
Desilet is himself positing a “ground of being from which the oppositional tensions spring.” But this ground of being, as it were, is not the same as the metaphysical ground used by Vedanta, for this “trace” “both marks and erases itself in the same stroke.” This is exactly the connection I’ve been making about Derrida’s association with Nagarjuna on the “emptiness” of nonduality, that even this nondual emptiness is not a reified “ground of being.” It also “both marks and erases itself in the same stroke.”
And with the above excerpts of my own quotes throughout OI, I’ve made this same argument in light of Ken’s metaphysical use of the nondual in promoting some “consciousness” gradient for an overall altitude. So if one were to read this I find it difficult to see how they would 1) not only see how it is not antithetical with what Desilet said, especially since I’ve used Desilet as a source to confirm my opinion, but 2) if I’m engaging in an irrelevant quest for the number of angels on the head of a pin then what is Desilet doing?
I can only guess that Desilet is indicating that I’m engaging in mere armchair philosophy, that I’m not “helping the world” but merely blowing farts in the wind. But what is he doing with his mere words? What is Derrida doing with his mere words? These words affect how people interpret “reality” and how they act in the world. For all of us. And I’ve more than once criticized Ken and I-I for only “taking care of their own” with their insular in-bred clique and that a truly integrally informed person, like a Buddhist, helps the person in the street to the person in the ivory tower to the person in the corporate headquarters as a Bodhisavta, with compassion and care for all. Again, the same point Desilet makes in how we treat each other.
So all I’m basically asking is for Desliet to explain himself, to dialog here to defend his critique that OI is just blowing smoke up one’s ass. He asks:
“How or why does it matter in deciding what nuances of nonduality or duality may lie at the core of ‘reality’?”
It matters a great deal, even to him, in how we treat each other. And ironically he himself engages in exactly what he is criticizing me for.
Edward,
I can’t and won’t speak for Desilet, but to your point about Derrida and Nagarjuna, post-metaphysics, etc.
From my pov, the fundamental mistake you make is not in recognizing that Nagarjuna’s dialectic is not just about the dialectic itself but rather is a “positive” consciousness experience (nonduality). It’s actually describing the enlightened state through the mental mind, as I see it.
We’ve argued about this before, but that is why I (more or less) can agree with what Wilber has done. Namely used Vedanta and Vajrayana (Ati) schools of Nonduality as metaphors building on Nagarjuna.
In that sense I completely agree with Derrida that his (Derrida’s) work is not mystical. I also agree with Desilet’s reading of Derrida and his distinction between the Derridian way and the traditional nondual way.
I just happen to think Derrida is (partially) wrong on this account.
Nagarjuna’s ground/essence is neither presence nor absence nor neither nor both.
This is also why Derrida is right not to equate his work with negative apophatic theology. Because again negative theology is the actually the “positive” experience of God/transcendence.
The question I think gets back to the question of awareness. (Again as metaphor for whatever what-ness is). There is a presence to Derrida’s description of the mixing of trace/presence. There is one aware of being unaware specifically and living with the mixing as Derrida so eloquently describes.
But again I think you are barking up a tree that has no end. There may be a discussion to be had about whether the Witness, as it were, exists in Intersubjectivity. Witness-es or something. But I think that is different than throwing it out, which is what Derrida has done. Which whatever contorted arguments in any directions we make does not add up with the facts.
One may might be to the use the metaphors of distinction/relationship for the Nondual as opposed to Presence/Consciousness.
Adi Da has done this with the notion of “unconditional relationality,” Or Absolute Relation. I happen to prefer that metaphor (again metaphor) over Ati/Presence usually.
Thanks for the feedback Chris. I might be making a mistake, I might be wrong. I am not an expert on this topic. Or on anything for that matter. I’m just a student struggling to understand this stuff. I am not in Ken’s or Derrida’s or Nagarjuna’s league in the least. I posit hypotheses and then try to take argue them out for the sake of my own learning. I’m not making pronouncements from on high. And I hope that in this process of collaborative inquiry that I will indeed learn.
Plus this blog format allow me to admit such personal “weakness,” if you will. It seems in the world of academy we must write in the third person, from a sense of authority, from confidence in defending our position. Well fuck that. That’s not what I am and I really don’t want to write from that place anymore. I like being able to be me in this format, to be all those things I am, from smart to stupid, from articulate to a blathering fool, from here to eternity.
Oh, a personal tangent. That’s not allowed. We were talking about x,y, z. We have to focus, be academic, impersonal. Bollocks. It is allowed.
“I’m not aware of too many things
I know what I know, you know what I mean?”
To get back on track Chris…
So you think that I’m mistaken in that Nagarjuna does posit a “positive consciousness experience†in nonduality? If that’s what you’re saying please point me to any authoritative reference, as I don’t think I’ve seen that one. Perhaps you’re saying Nagarjuna doesn’t do this and this is his “lack†that Vedanta and Varjayana “make up for?†Then I can see that point, as the latter both seem to have this “transcendental consciousness†at root. Well, Vedanta perhaps but I’m not so sure about Vajrayana. I think kela might make some finer disctictions about that, yes?
Now I can agree with Desilet that Derrida is not in the least “mystical.†And that Desilet does make this distinction with the Advaita “nondual†tradition. But Nagarjuna is also not “mystical†from my understanding, if we define it by the criteria in my first paragraph. And it seems Desilet, in his admitted ignorance of the various “nondual” traditions, assumes they’re all like Vedanta in positing this transcendental consciousness.
I’d disagree with you that Derrida throws out the Witness. He, like all humans (whether they meditate or not) cannot but help but notice this thing we call the Witness. I just dont’ think he reifies it into the “ultimate†arbiter of a “transcendent consciousness.†In fact I think he, like Nagarjuna, also criticize our inclination to do this very thing. As do I and apparently Desilet.
Now I like you description of the nondual as distinction/relation instead of presence/consciousness, which seems to be getting at the distinctions I’m making. Would you clarify more on that please?
Here are a couple of relevant kela quotes from a discussion on this at the Lightmind forum. Please excuse us Mr. Desilet for counting the angels here, but one must if they are to make statements about this topic:
http://lightgate.net/boards/viewtopic.php?t=6424&postdays=0&postorder=asc&topic_view=&start=30
Posted: 03/25/07, 9:20 pm Post subject: Highest State or Ultimate Ground?
I have exploited the problem in another context, that involving the Witness. In traditional Advaita, the Witness is the transcendental condition of all acts of knowing. For Shankara, it cannot be an object of knowledge, since it is the condition for knowledge (in a manner analogous to Kant’s transcendental subject). At times, Ken speaks of the Witness in this manner. At other times, however, he speaks of “witnessing” as a kind “experience” or meditative practice. This leads to various absurdities, such as the idea of “carrying the mirror mind (which Ken identifies with the Witness) into deep dreamless sleep.” Now according to Shankara, the Witness is deep dreamless sleep. In deep dreamless sleep, there is no object of consciousness; there is only the pure Seer (drastr), shining away. Even apart from the problematic notion that one could become “lucid” in deep dreamless sleep — which would mean that consciousness takes on an object (in the form of its own reflexivity) in violation of the contention that in deep dreamless there is no object — we still find the odd notion that we are somehow or other bringing the “witness-consciousness” into deep dreamless sleep (as if it could be slung onto one’s back like a backpack), when deep dreamless sleep is itself defined as the Witness. (?) Ken may be influenced by Tibetan Buddhist conceptions of consciouness here, which are based on the conception of consciousness in Yogachara thought. These conceptions of consciousness are fundamentally at odds with Shankara’s. In contrast to Shankara’s conception, for the Yogachara, consciousness is always self-reflexive, that is, it is able to become its own object; this is called the doctrine of svasamvedana. For Shankara this is a monstrosity, analogous to a tumbler standing on his own shoulders, or as the Brhadaranyaka says, an eye seeing itself; Chandrakirti also rejects it. The idea that consciousness can become its own object allows the Yogachara to argue that consciousness is able to “generate” its own obejct.
Posted: 03/25/07, 9:45 pm Post subject: On Transcendental Essence in Madhyamika and Vedanta
We are now at a position to consider more specific differences between the Prasangika approach and Shankara’s advaita. In Meditation on Emptiness, Jeffery Hopkins brings out the basic difference between the two approaches. He acknowledges that there are similarities between the two (though it is not clear, due to the odd manner in which this work is written, whether this similarity was recognized by the Prasangikas themselves or whether Hopkins is entertaining a question that has entered his mind on its own). Following the Prasangikas, Hopkins characterizes the difference thus: the approach of Advaita Vedanta can be described as aiming at the “emptiness of other,” or “parata-shunyata.” Given our description of Shankara’s advaita above and Shankara’s own comments on the shunyavada, this would appear to be an appropriate description. Following the lead of the Brhadaranyaka Up, Shankara’s advaita aims at the discrimination of what is “other” than Brahman, or the highest Self, and at the negation of this “other” as “an-artha”, worthless (Brhad Up 1.1.1), and “an-rta”, false (Brhadaranyaka Up 3.5.1; Brahma Sutra Bhashya 2.1.14). At the same time, the “neti, neti” leaves the highest Self, or formless brahman, untouched, as Shankara says.
In contradistinction to Advaita, the Prasangika path teaches, in addition to the emptiness of other, “the emptiness of self,” or “svatah-shunyata”. Now, we should not assume that this simply refers to the emptiness of a personal self (pudgala-nairatmya), of a subject in opposition to objects, as if this were simply a restatement of the an-atma doctrine. The term “self” here also, and perhaps more importantly, refers to the idea of a metaphysical essence. So it refers not only to our personal selves, but to the nature of things and reality in general. In a way then, the two paths could not be more diametrically opposed. One seeks by means of its negative dialectic to unearth a metaphysically ideal reality beneath or beyond appearances. The other also seeks to dissolve the veil of appearance but, at the same time, it is also designed to undermine the very search for such metaphysical idealities.
As Shankara admits, the shunyavada does not leave the highest Self or formless brahman untouched in its negative dialectic. Similarly, though Gaudapada accepts Nagarjuna’s definitions of svabhava, he insists that there is at least one being that is not empty of svabhava: the non-dual Self, which for Gaudapada is self-existence itself. For the Madhyamikas, though, the non-dual Self is also empty of all sva-bhava or “own being.” Given that Advaita Vedanta defines the highest Self and formless brahman with every manner of reflexive term — “self-luminous” (svayam-jyotih), self-established (svatah-siddha), self-reliant (sva-tantra), self-existent (svayam-bhu), self-abiding (sva-stha), and so on — the Madhyamika approach of “emptiness of self” is tantamount to the denial of the Vedantin’s very conception of reality.
Thus, the Madhyamaka’s conception of reality and the Advaitin’s conception of reality are diametrically opposed to one another. For the Advaitin, reality is ultimately that which is the self-existent, while for the Madhyamaka, reality is ultimately empty of such self-existence. While both indeed refer to the ultimate truth as “signless” (animitta), the similarity stops there as their conceptions of reality are completely contrary to one another.
There is another manner in which the Madhyamika and the Advaita Vedanta are fundamentally opposed in their conceptions of reality. As noted above, part of the point of Nagarjuna’s analysis is to undermine the way in which language and conceptualization serve to reify “things” in the world. Although Nagarjuna does not specify in his analysis any theory as to how words are related to reality, other than to say that they are conventional and relational, it may be possible to abstract certain assumptions from the Prasangikas’ presentation that are suggestive as to how they might be related for them. To begin, for the Prasangikas, words do not obtain their meaning by referring to “objects” in the world. Nor do they obtain their meaning due to the effect of some transcendental essence. In other words, the Prasangikas accept neither an extensionalist nor an intensionalist theory of meaning. Rather, words have meaning, and are able to predicate objects, primarily by virtue of their use (prayojana) and imputation (aropita). In this sense, words are mere nominal signifiers (prajnapti) and their application is merely conventional (vyavahara). This line is in general keeping with the Buddhist tendency toward nominalism. Drawing upon this analysis, later Buddhist thinkers will articulate a theory of meaning something like Saussure’s: words refer to objects by virtue of the exclusion (apoha) of their counter-positives.
There are parallels here with the thoughts of Wittgenstein on such matters, though it is important not to emphasize such similarities beyond the point of their being mere heuristic devices for understanding the Madhyamika. Wittgenstein, for example, also held that words do not obtain meaning by reference to objects. For him, the primary determinant in meaning is how words are used. The Madhyamakas, however, go further than Wittgenstein by insisting that, in reality there is no “thing” as such to which words refer, and that all such “things” are but conceptual constructs that are logically dependent upon their conceptually constructed counter-positives. At this point, a better analog for Prasangika thought might be the Derridean analysis of the Husserlian conception of “essence.” According to Derrida, there is no unchanging self-same “essence” that fixes the denotation of signifiers — no “transcendent referent” that anchors meaning. This is because “essence” is as much determined by its own iterations as it determines those iterations. Like the Prasangikas, Derrida argues that “meaning” is determined by a series of oppositional relations — signifier/signified, universal/particular, substance/attribute, essence/iteration, concept/thing, scheme/content, map/territory — in which both poles are mutually determinate, and in which no priority can be granted to one of the poles. Similarly, for the Prasangikas, there is no independent thing or essence that determines meaning. Thus, for the Prasangikas, there is no transcendent referent that determines and has priority over the term “emptiness”. As Chandrakirti says, “emptiness” is itself empty of any essential nature. There is, then, no ultimate “thing” to which the term “emptiness” refers.
As a Vedantin, the Advaitin sees things differently. He does not reject both poles of the dichotomy between the absolute and relative, the transcendental and contingent. As we noted above, the Advaitin is only concerned with the emptiness of “other.” But he does not negate the essence, the “self”, the transcendent referent.
With respect to this difference between Advaita and Madhyamika, T.R.V. Murti has written in an article, “Samvriti and Paramartha in Madhyamika and Advaita Vedanta”:
“The Vedantist will not reject both terms as relative; he accepts one as the reality or basis of the other. For the Madhyamika, substance and attribute are equally unreal, as neither of them can be had apart from the other. The Vedantist would say that… substance or the universal is inherently real…; it has a transcendent nature without the relation. The general formula applicable to the Vedanta is: the terms sustaining a relation are not of the same order, one is higher and the other lower; the terms are not mutually dependent…. One term, the higher, is not exhausted in the relationship; it has a transcendent… existence which is its intrinsic nature.”
The upshot here is that to suggest that the terms “emptiness” and the “formless brahman” both refer to the same unconditioned reality begs the question as to the nature of the relation between designators and their referents, and prejudices the Vedantin’s position by presupposing an account of the relation between language and reality that the Madhyamika rejects.
Two quick points in relation to the thrust of this thread:
1) You can see that Derrida might agree with Nagarujuna in some ways here, and;
2) There are some significant differences in the way that Vedanta and Vajrayana intepret “consciousness.” I will try to dig up other kela quotes on this distinction unless he steps in here to help us out in person.
So as Desilet asks: What’s the point of all this nondual talk. so many angels on the head of a pin? Shouldn’t we be more concerned with how we treat each other instead of lost in the lofty world of speculative philosophy?
Here’s how Sonam Gyaltsen sees the relationship between the nondual and compassion. From Buddhist Himalaya, A Journal of Nagarjuna Institute of Exact Methods, 1:1, 1998:
http://www.nagarjunainstitute.com/buddhisthim/backissues/vol1_no1/3love_com.htm
Now if we discuss a little about its relation to insight, the Bodhisattva’s compassion, very much like his wisdom, shares in both the transcended realms of surpramundane contemplative and the practical, sphere of the Bodhisattva’s activities. The essence of his compassion identification with others is sustained and developed by higher wisdom where all distinctions are dissolved, as it were. What needs to be born in mind is that the spirit of unprecedented altruism breathed buy all these passage in the outcome not simply of mundane pity, not even of spiritual compassion alone, but of compassion conjoined with the insight. The Bodhisattva lives simultaneously in two worlds, the world of appearance and the world of reality, Samsara and nirvana, wisdom and compassion. The Mahayana Buddhism stresses the simultaneous cultivation of both tendencies is not only extremely important but indispensble. Haribhardra in his Abhisamay Alamkar Aloka. says, “Sunyata and karuna are the two principle features of the Bodhicitta.” sunyata is prajna, intellectual intuition, and is indentical with the absolute. Karuna is the active principle of compassion that gives concrete expression to sunyata in phenomena. If the first is transcendent and looks to the absolute the second is fully immanent and looks down towards phenomena. Sunyata is beyond the duality of good and evil, love and hatred, virtue and vice: second [Karuna] is goodness, love and pure act: Sunyata [wisdom] is potential, and karuna is the actualised state.
Here, we will find in many texts that compassion is born from the perception of emptiness [sunyata]. It is found in a Dharma Sangiti passage quoted by Santi Deva:
“He who has a concentrated minds attains to the vision of things as they truly are. The Bodhisattva who sees things as they truly are, develops great compassion towards living beings.”
It is same with tantric text that ‘Compassion is conceived as arising from the vision of emptiness’. Service to others and it are the fruits of the perfect vision of sunyata, compared by Saraha to a tree:
“This magnificent tree of emptiness
is covered with flowers:
The most varied acts of compassion,
And fruits for others appear simultaneous.”
It may be that the tantric approach to the cultivation of compassion is a little bit different from the other Mahayanic text. Mahayana distinguish compassion into three kinds:
[1] compassion that observes being only.
[2] compassion that observes phenomena, and
[3] compassion of objectlessness.
It implies that compassion can be found not merely a form of higher gnosis [jnana] but also that the perfection of compassion is one with insight of non-duality. Compassion like the highest dhyanic perception of emptiness, must be beyond the reach of dualities, oppositions, and disputes. According to the ‘Rantnavali [iv, 94-96] of Nagarjuna, compassion and emptiness together form the crown of Buddhist teaching well beyond duality and non-duality. Therefore, compassion in Budddhist context can not be interpreted as simple pity. For an essential element of compassion in the Mahayana, is the perception of non-duality. This perception may take different forms and may be had at varying degrees of depth, but as a Buddhist virtue, compassion is characterised by its contemplative [dhyana] and gnostic [jnana]dimensions.
Thus in short, it is one secure foundation for the happiness of all beings and the one remedy for their suffering, We should not think that it is a preparation for some unworldly ideal having no relevance to the problems of our present world. It being a basis of all altruism, can make a great influence to our present day life and can make our society in solidarity and will bring a true happy human relationship.
More grist for the nondual mill. I will connect this to Derrdia forthcoming. Some excerpts from:
“Nagarjuna and the Limits of Thought,” Jay L. Garfield and Graham Priest,
Philosophy East & West, Volume 53, Number 1, January 2003, 1-21
http://www.thezensite.com/ZenEssays/Nagarjuna/NagarjunaTheLimitsOfThought.pdf
We will argue that while Nagarjuna’s contradictions are structurally similar to those we find in the West, Nagarjuna delivers to us a paradox as yet unknown in the West. This paradox, we will argue, brings us a new insight into ontology and into our cognitive access to the world.
It is a quite general feature of theories that try to characterize the limits of our cognitive abilities to think, describe, grasp, that they end up implying that they themselves cannot be thought, described or grasped. Yet it would appear that they can be thought, described and grasped. Otherwise, what on earth is the theory doing?
For Western philosophers, it is very tempting to adopt a Kantian understanding of Nagarjuna (as is offered, e.g., by Murti 1955). Identify conventional reality with the phenomenal realm, and ultimate reality with the noumenal, and there you have it. But this is not Nagarjuna’s view. The emptiness of emptiness means that ultimate reality cannot be thought of as a Kantian noumenal realm. For ultimate reality is just as empty as conventional reality. Ultimate reality is hence only conventionally real! The distinct realities are therefore identical. As the Vimilakırtinirdesa-sÃ’tra puts it, “To say this is conventional and this is ultimate is dualistic. To realize that there is no difference between the conventional and the ultimate is to enter the Dharma-door of nonduality,” or as the Heart Sutra puts it more famously, “Form is empty; emptiness is form; form is not different from emptiness; emptiness is not different from form.” The identity of the two truths has profound soteriological implications for Nagarjuna, such as the identity of nirvana and samsra.
The Ultimate Truth Is That There Is No Ultimate Truth
We are now in a position to examine Nagarjuna’s first limit contradiction. The centerpiece of Nagarjuna’s Madhyamaka or “middle way” philosophy is the thesis that everything is empty. This thesis has a profound consequence. Ultimate truths are those about ultimate reality. But since everything is empty, there is no ultimate reality. There are, therefore, no ultimate truths.
Nagarjuna’s enterprise is one of fundamental ontology, and the conclusion he comes to is that fundamental ontology is impossible. But that is a fundamentally ontological conclusion -and that is the paradox. There is no way that things are ultimately, not even that way. The Indo-Tibetan tradition, following the Vimalakıtri-nirdesa sutra, hence repeatedly advises one to learn to “tolerate the groundlessness of things.” The emptiness of emptiness is the fact that not even emptiness exists ultimately, that it is also dependent, conventional, nominal, and in the end, it is just the everydayness of the everyday. Penetrating to the depths of being, we find ourselves back on the surface of things, and so discover that there is nothing, after all, beneath those deceptive surfaces. Moreover, what is deceptive about them is simply the fact that we take there to be ontological depths lurking just beneath.
We think that the ontological insight of Nagarjuna’s is distinctive of the Madhyamaka; it is hard to find a parallel in the West prior to the work of Heidegger. But even Heidegger does not follow Nagarjuna all the way the dramatic insistence on the identity of the two realities and the recovery of the authority of the conventional. This extirpation of the myth of the deep may be Nagarjuna’s greatest contribution to Western Philosophy.
Central to Nagarjuna’s understanding of emptiness as immanent in the conventional world is his doctrine of the emptiness of emptiness. That, we have seen, is what prevents the two truths from collapsing into an appearance/reality or phenomenon/noumenon distinction.
The ontological paradox, on the other hand-which we hereby name “Nagarjuna’s Paradox”-though, as we have seen, intimately connected with a paradox of expressibility, is quite distinctive, and to our knowledge is found nowhere else. If Nagarjuna is correct in his critique of essence, and if it hence turns out that all things lack fundamental natures, it turns out that they all have the same nature, that is, emptiness, and hence both have and lack that very nature. This is a direct consequence of the purely negative character of the property of emptiness, a property Nagarjuna first fully characterizes, and the centrality of which to philosophy he first demonstrates. Most dramatically, Nagarjuna demonstrates that the emptiness of emptiness permits the “collapse” of the distinction between the two truths, revealing the empty to be simply the everyday, and so saves his ontology from a simple-minded dualism. Nagarjuna demonstrates that the profound limit contradiction he discovers sits harmlessly at the heart of all things. In traversing the limits of the conventional world, there is a twist, like that in a Möbius strip, and we find ourselves to have returned to it, now fully aware of the contradiction on which it rests.
Regarding Chris’s contention that I’m making a mistake in not positing a positive to nonduality, this debate is literally as old as nondual philosophy. For example see the following:
“An appraisal of the Svaatantrika-Prasangika debates” By Nathan Katz, Philosophy East and West, Vol.26, no.3 (July 1976), P 253-267:
http://ccbs.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-PHIL/nathan.htm
Poussin’s observation is formal: that whereas the Prasangikas content themselves with the negation of all views as their modality for the cognition of suunyataa, the Svaatantrikas want to demonstrate suunyataa by positive argumentation.
The question of the relationship between the two levels of truth, samvrtti and paramaartha, is of utmost importance in understanding Maadhyamaka philosophy in general and the Svaatantrika-Prasangika debates in particular. Two key verses of Naagaarjuna underscore the vitality of the question:
Those who do not know the distinction between the two truths cannot understand the profound nature of the Buddha’s teaching.
Without relying on everyday common practices (that is, relative truths), the absolute truth cannot be expressed. Without approaching the absolute truth, nirvaana cannot be attained.(15)
The point which we wish to make in citing these two verses is that apparently the Prasangika school concentrates on the former, while the Svaantantrika school relies more heavily on the latter. For the Prasangikas, paramaartha is utterly beyond constructed thought; they “…stress the contradictions between absolute reality and the human attitude of understanding, which constitutes the ground of logic.”(16) Because of this assumption, they claim that paramaartha is the absolute negation of samvrtti. (`Absolute negation’ means negation without counter thesis, or, the negation of A does not imply B. ‘Relative negation’, on the other hand, means negation from a position, that not A implies B.)
The Svaatantrikas, on the other hand, follow more closely verse 10 above, the charge that paramaartha cannot be expressed without samvrtti. Due to their understanding of the contiguity of the relationship between paramaartha and samvrtti, the Svaatantrikas seek to establish paramaartha not only by the negation of samvrtti, as do the Prasa^ngikas, but also by positive argumentation of the syllogistic form. As Herbert V. Guenther observes: “What the Maadhyamika Svaatantrikas wanted to emphasize was that all human experience, inasmuch as it is experience and not mere propositions or the like, is an insight into reality, an awareness of coherence which is not its own authentication of reality, but reality itself.”(17) This validity of all human experience of which Guenther speaks is a way of expressing the contiguity of paramaartha and samvrtti, a way of reminding us that paramaartha is not something above and beyond our experience, but a way of experiencing reality directly (yathaabhutadar’sana), insofar as it is not ‘mere proposition’ (drsti).
***
Since that old article above a much more current reference has been written called The Svatantrika-Prasangika Distinction: What Difference Does a Difference Make?, Georges B.J. Dreyfus, Editor,
Sara L. McClintock, Editor, Wisdom Publications (December 2002). If anyone is familiar with it and thinks there might be some relevance to the current discussion please bring it in. I don’t have a copy.
In more general terms, an excerpt from the wikipedia article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prasa%E1%B9%85gika
The Prasangika point of view originally developed in opposition to the Svatantrika school, founded by Bhavaviveka with his commentary and criticism of Buddhapalita’s earlier work. It was Candrakirti’s response to this criticism that became the foundation for Prasangika doctrine.
The Prasangika-Svatantrika debate included both a technical component and a set of metaphysical implications. On one level, the disagreement centered around the role of prasanga in formal debate. While the Prasangika held it to be the only valid method of demonstrating the Two Truths to the unenlightened, the Svatantrika felt that the Buddhist logician must not only use prasanga to show how an opponent’s position leads to false conclusions, but that the Buddhist must also put forward a concrete thesis of his own.
The Prasangika rejection of the Svatantrika position was based on the belief that any Buddhist making positive assertions about the conventional world was committed to the existence of an illusion. The Svatantrika countered by arguing that there were different levels of existence, and that a conventional thing could self-exist, exist from its own side, and have inherent existence, but that it still would not exist absolutely, ultimately, or really.
Hello. I have just now had the opportunity to sit down and check the activity here at open integral and was stunned to find all the comments. I apologize for the delay in the invitation to respond (the free time I have is somewhat sporadic). There is much here for me to digest and I’m sure I can’t do it all justice in this short response. In that regard let me just say that I have great respect for all the contributors and find the comments very interesting and, for me, a little overwhelming. I’m sure all of you possess knowledge of Eastern traditions that exceeds mine. Nevertheless, I enjoy the philosophical/theological discussion of nonduality. Even in the limited context of Derrida’s views duality/nonduality and the differences between is a difficult issue.
To Edward Berge I must say that you are correct in suggesting (I believe) a compatibility between your postings here and my interpretations of Derrida and if what I said in the most recent article seemed to suggest something like a critique of some aspect of what you had said that would not have been my intent. However, I think you did misunderstand my “angels on the head of a pin” comment. By this I meant to suggest that if some readers found the metaphysical discussion abstract and difficult (Frank had indicated to me that some readers–not among the group here–found the first article to be that way) that I did not think such discussion was irrelevant to everyday life and would proceed to suggest why. Far from thinking these discussions irrelevant, I think they are extremely important and relevant to every aspect of how we orient to lived experience.
Also for Berge, I find myself in agreement with much of the substance of your take on Wilber and his nonduality, especially in the following:
“But of course Ken then back-tracks on this when using the “causal†level interpretation, that there “really†is a “pure,†“ultimate†consciousness free of form and relatively. And it is this “pure†consciousness that is united with, or integrated with, the relative realm in the nondual.(1) But that version of the nondual interpretation is not the same as the Nargarjuana or zen intepretations of nonduality, which does NOT posit such an “absolute†distinct from the relative.(2) Hence this “causal†nonduality is more akin to what Alan and the Aurobindians are saying. Ken wants it both ways here, where it’s NOT a both/and situation. Yes, if we contextualize each type of nonduality we can say they are both/and correct given the context, but IF the non-dual non-dual trumps the causal non-dual (and it does, according to Ken), then one is relatively better than the other, absolutely.”
However, with respect to what you say here and in other postings about Nagarjuna, I am uncertain whether to agree or not. The book I have focused on recently, Harold Coward’s “Derrida and Indian Philosophy” contains a chapter on Derrida and Nagarjuna where Coward claims that the differences between Derrida and Nagarjuna exceed the similarities, especially concerning the role of language. Here’s Coward’s summary:
“The constrast between Nagarjuna and Derrida is clear. For Nagarjuna language is empty of reality and must be transcended for reality to be realized. By contrast, Derrida sees language to be rooted in reality.”
And further:
“To go from inscribed trace (writing) to spoken word and the arche-writing that prefigures and predisposes both, only to be thrown back again, in a continual deconstructive reverse, would seem to be Derrida’s use of language as a means for spiritual realization. Although this may look like the Buddhist prescription of Nagarjuna, it is not. The deconstructive reverse does not result in the silence (sunya) of language, but rather in the realization that the dynamic tension in the becoming of language is itself the whole.”
For me, Derrida (in contrast to Wilber and perhaps Nagarjuna) seems to emphasize the duality in nonduality for the purpose of countering the tendency to transcend (or want to transcend) the other. For Derrida the other is irreducible in the self/other tension and this preserved duality insures that the other remains ontologically necessary. This necessity reduces the sometimes all too human tendency to think of some other as essentially not part of the economy of reality and therefore ultimately worthy of elimination in a kind of transcendence that can manifest itself in both malign and benign forms of “violence.”
But I understand that Nagarjuna may be much more subtle than Coward claims above (and Coward acknowledges this possibility). And it may well be, as Berge suggests, that Nagarjuna and Derrida are very close metaphysical cousins. However, I still have my doubts and need to study this more. It may be that Madhyamika may offer more transcendentalism (collapse of dualistic tensions) than Derrida would subscribe to.
I appreciate all that has been said in others’ posts and must continue trying to absorb it. Again, sorry for the delay in offering some kind of response/clarification. I’m sure I’ve overlooked some important points already made in this discussion. But I take criticism well, so feel free to have at it. I will continue to stay tuned in, but may sometimes be slow in responding due to time constraints.
Thanks for responding. It is my understanding of Madhyamika that the dualistic tensions are maintained via their inherent complimentarity, not collapsed into some form of indistinct or transcendent “nonduality.†This is indicated by the “ultimate†truth (of emptiness) not being separate from, but expressing as, the relative realm of complementarity. It is in fact (one of) the delusion(s) that one can separate the complements that is “samsara.â€Â
To make a broad comparion with the tao, when the opposities are dynamically balanced then it is “nirvana.†When they are imbalanced (or separated) then it is “samsara.†So in that sense all this two truths business is similar to the tao in balance between the poles, not negating either pole.
For example, see Magliola, Robert (2004), “Nagarjuana and Chi-Tsang on the value of this world,†Journal of Chinese Philosophy 31:4 505–516 at http://www.thezensite.com/ZenEssays/Nagarjuna/Nagarjuna_and_ChiaTsang.pdf
Some excerpts:
This paper aims to show that classical Indian and Chinese Madhyamika Buddhism, when properly understood, are not ‘worldnegating’ in any sense that precludes the positive fullness of mundane life.
…whereas he should know (at least if he chooses to comment on Derrida at all) that Derrida treasures hermeneutics in large part because the ‘remainder’ of ‘objectivity-as-deconstructed’, far from being a failure, is a precious clue to ‘what really goes on’.
This paper shall demonstrate to the contrary, that especially in its founding document, Nagarjuna’s Mulamadhyamakakarikas (“Verses on the Middle Doctrine,†usually called the “Middle Stanzasâ€Â), and in Chi-tsang’s copious commentaries and other references (which in Chinese Madhyamaka faithfully reflect Nagarjuna’s teaching), Madhyamika Buddhism (1) appreciates the concreteness of mundane life; (2) understands nirvana as inseparable from samsara; and (3) takes the tetralemma not as a ladder to Nothingness but rather as a means conductive to a supreme awareness of the ‘world’.
Greg, I have welcomed your articles at IW. I have been waiting a long time for some serious criticism of Wilber from an academic philosopher. But I have a question about Derrida’s rationale for the view of nonduality you claim he holds. You say:
“For me, Derrida (in contrast to Wilber and perhaps Nagarjuna) seems to emphasize the duality in nonduality for the purpose of countering the tendency to transcend (or want to transcend) the other. For Derrida the other is irreducible in the self/other tension and this preserved duality insures that the other remains ontologically necessary. This necessity reduces the sometimes all too human tendency to think of some other as essentially not part of the economy of reality and therefore ultimately worthy of elimination in a kind of transcendence that can manifest itself in both malign and benign forms of “violence.â€Â
This may be an accurate description of a major difference between Derrida and Wilber, Nagarjuna and other proponents of what you have called nondual spirituality. It’s certainly an interesting point which has helped me understand Derrida better. But I am a little suspicious of arguments that depend, in essence, on believing things “should†be a certain way. Derrida’s view of nonduality, it seems to me, is rationalized not because of strong evidence (in some sense of that word) for it, but because it is more consistent with the way we (many of us) feel the world ought to be. You make the same point in your most recent article at IW: “this metaphysical approach to opposition provides, on the one hand, momentum for varieties of colonialism (understood broadly) and, on the other hand, incentive for scapegoating.†That may well be true, and it may help us understand why Derrida came to the view that he did–but is that a valid reason for favoring that view?
Wilber has used the same kind of argument on occasion. One of the reasons he advances for his view that societies are not hierarchically higher than individuals is that to understand them as higher provides support for authoritarian governments. There are several flaws in this view, such as a misunderstanding of the nature of higher/lower relationships, and a conflation of society with government. But even if that were not the case, this kind of argument should be irrelevant to evaluating the nature of the social/individual relationship. We don’t shirk from conclusions just because in the hands of people who may not understand them well they can provide support for values that we don’t agree with. Many have thought that Darwinism provides support for an extremely libertarian view of human relationships, in which government is under no obligation to help the less fortunate among us, but even if that is so, does it make Darwinism less true?
Many have thought that Darwinism provides support for an extremely libertarian view of human relationships, in which government is under no obligation to help the less fortunate among us, but even if that is so, does it make Darwinism less true?
That’s social darwinism. Ever since the 19th century, Darwin’s ideas have often been hijacked and misinterpreted. Darwin taught the selection of favorable traits through environmental factors. Thus the organism that has those traits would produce more offspring. Steven Jay Gould has criticised racist misinterpretations of Darwinism (The Mismeasure of Man, etc) and I am sure similar arguments can be used against small govt, economic rationalism etc
From “Dzogchen, Chinese Buddhism and Universal Mind†by John Reynolds at http://www.vajranatha.com/teaching/DzogchenChinese.htm
The Yogachara School and the Doctrine of “Mind-Only” As for the assertion that mind alone is real, this is the view that was traditionally associated with the Yogacharin or Vijnanavadin school of Mahayana philosophy in China. This school was principally characterized by its view of Chittamatra or “mind-only” (sems-tsam). The adherents of this school asserted that, even though the objects of perception, the world which is external to us, are empty and devoid of any intrinsic reality, the states of consciousness that cognize them, which perceive them as objects, are indeed real. The doctrines of the Yogachara system were first outlined in the extensive writings of the two brothers, Asanga and Vasubandhu, in the third century of our era. The views presented by the Yogacharins were in turn refuted by the masters of the Madhyamika school, especially by Chandrakirti. In the form of Prasangika Madhyamaka, which employs the critical dialectical methods perfected by Chandrakirti, this became the official philosophical position among all five Tibetan schools including the Nyingmapa and the Bonpo. Basing themselves on the brilliant commentaries by the great master Nagarjuna to the Prajnaparamita Sutras, the Prasangika Madhyamikas point out that we cannot properly make the assertion that “Mind alone is real!” because this view, if examined critically and carried to its logical conclusion, will only lead to absurdity or self-contradiction. In fact, according to the Prasangikas, this will be the case with any metaphysical statement regarding the ultimate nature of reality because the nature of reality (Dharmata) exceeds and goes beyond the conceptual limitations imposed by the categories and rational processes of the finite human intellect. The human intellect is just too small and provincial to encompass the vast variety of the universe. It is modern arrogance to think otherwise. Reality transcends all logical and ontological categories we may construct with the rational intellect.
However, even though we cannot make such definitive statements, whether affirmative or negative, regarding the ultimate nature of things, this in no way negates the path to liberation or the goal of Nirvana. Academic philosophers in their class rooms may expound very profound theories and many abstruse metaphysical systems, but beyond the classroom there is still everyday life and ordinary language and these must be dealt with in concrete terms. Thus, for a school which asserts that we cannot say anything affirmative or negative definitively, the Madhyamikas actually have a great deal to say about the spiritual path. This is because Madhyamaka is not really a philosophical school that asserts certain well-defined positions, but a kind of philosophical analysis of the meaning of language and a kind of intellectual therapy that purges the human mind of its unwarranted assumptions about the nature of reality, which create for the individual a false and limited image of reality and block or impede progress on the spiritual path. Madhyamaka is a method of philosophical analysis, but it is not nihilism, the asserting that nothing exists and it does not deny nor negate the path indicated by the Buddhas.
Moreover, in terms of content, it is quite clear that the early Dzogchen Movement of the eighth and ninth centuries did not teach the Chittamatra doctrine of the Yogacharins, even though it borrowed some of the terminology of the earlier school. But it understood these terms in a different manner than did the Yogacharins. The precepts of Dzogchen are found in the Dzogchen Tantras of Atiyoga and not in the Mahayana Sutras of the Third Turning of the Wheel of the Dharma, although later Lama scholars in Tibet noticed the existence of certain similarities in terminology between Dzogchen and Chittamatra. This may be due to the activities of the scholar Manjusrhimitra who wrote a book on Garab Dorje’s teaching from the Yogachara perspective.
Nevertheless, in the bSam-gtan mig-sgron of Nubchen Sangye Yeshe (gNubs-chen Sangs-rgyas ye-shes, 9th century), the special viewpoints of both Dzogchen and the Sutra system of the Mahayana are set out and clearly distinguished. Dzogchen does not assert that everything is only mind, but rather, it asserts that everything, all phenomena, appears as a manifestation of mind (kun la sems kyi snang-ba yin). We only know the so-called objective world, which we naively take to be substantial and real, through the mind, through its symbolic and culturally conditioned processes of perception and imagination. Needless to say, both Dzogchen and Chittamatra texts are speaking of individual mind-streams. Certainly neither Dzogchen nor any other Tibetan Buddhist school ever taught that “the One Cosmic Mind alone is real.” The Madhyamake dialectic of Nagarjuna and Chandrakirti soon makes short work such metaphysical assertions and speculations.
I’ve posted some of this before but I think it bears repeating here. From kela at Lightmind Forum:
http://www.lightgate.net/boards/viewtopic.php?t=6424
In this paper by Edward Conze, in subsection “C,” Conze distinguishes various sense of the term “non-dual” (advaya) in the Prajnaparamita texts. The first two need not interest us as they refer to two senses of the term that can be understood historically; they are associated with the Yogachara and Madhyamika schools, respectively. It is the third sense that we are interested in here; it refers to a sense that needs to be understood structurally. This is the non-duality between the absolute and the relative.
This form of non-duality, it should be noted, is of a different order than the ones we have been discussing so far. Its structural relation can be understood as follows. The first two kinds of non-duality can be understood in horizontal terms. For example, we can think of a constrast or duality between two relative terms, say left and right, male and female, light and dark, etc. We can then think of their “resolution,” a kind of “coincidence of opposites,” as their “non-duality.” But then we have generated another duality, a duality between, on the one hand, the two terms understood as a constrasting pair, and on the other hand, their resolution understood as a unity. This duality I refer to as a vertical duality. The important point to note is that this is a duality of another order. It is in fact a kind of ultimate duality, and it is expressed by the contrast between Brahman and Maya, Shiva and Shakti, Nirvana and Samsara, etc. It is the duality between the absolute and the relative.
What the traditions of “immanentism” attempt to do is “resolve” this final duality. According to them, pure transcendentalism seeks to maintain this final duality, and it does this by laying stress on the absolute term. But this “absolute” is, according to them, but a mere relative absolute since it remains in conflict with, in duality with, conditioned existence (maya, samsara, etc.) Da appropriates this tradition and makes it his own. Hence he begins to speak of “open eyes” (a term taken from Kashmiri Shaivism) samadhi, or “sahaja samadhi,” a kind of “continuous samadhi” in which transcendence is resolved with everyday waking consciousness. Ken refers to this state by means of various metaphysical equations: Emptiness is Form, “nirvana and samsara are the same,” etc.
A Critique of Radical Immanentism
One way of putting this “final resolution” is to say that “everyday consciousness” IS the enlightened condition, that there is no difference, really, between the two: “the enlightened condition is to be found here and now,” etc. The attempt here is to dissolve the “problem” at is very root; in practical terms, thinking that there is a “problem” that needs to be resolved by “sadhana” or some other means, is as much a part of the “problem,” since it implies a dualism between means and goal, seeker/sought, etc., and thus sadhana simply reinforces our conditioned existence by propogating yet more duality. Now we can attempt to do away with “duality” in this manner until it no longer exists. But then the entirety of tradition will come to be called into question, as there will be no distinction between the enlightened and the unenlightened state. This itself is a problem, or at least a grand paradox. My point here is NOT that this is all mere “talking school” and that in fact we need to “practice” because “practice” is “good” and necessary — that is yet another rhetorical bifurcation designed to make people feel good about the fact they put so much effort into their “sadhana” (the Protestant work ethic at work). My point here is merely that at some point, some sort of distinction between the “enlightened” and “unenlightened” state will need to be drawn, and this will mean that a strict adherence to “non-dualism” will need to be abandoned. Either that, or the entirety of tradition will have to be abandoned.
And here:
http://www.lightgate.net/boards/viewtopic.php?t=6424&postdays=0&postorder=asc&topic_view=&start=30
I have exploited the problem in another context, that involving the Witness. In traditional Advaita, the Witness is the transcendental condition of all acts of knowing. For Shankara, it cannot be an object of knowledge, since it is the condition for knowledge (in a manner analogous to Kant’s transcendental subject). At times, Ken speaks of the Witness in this manner. At other times, however, he speaks of “witnessing” as a kind “experience” or meditative practice. This leads to various absurdities, such as the idea of “carrying the mirror mind (which Ken identifies with the Witness) into deep dreamless sleep.” Now according to Shankara, the Witness is deep dreamless sleep. In deep dreamless sleep, there is no object of consciousness; there is only the pure Seer (drastr), shining away. Even apart from the problematic notion that one could become “lucid” in deep dreamless sleep — which would mean that consciousness takes on an object (in the form of its own reflexivity) in violation of the contention that in deep dreamless there is no object — we still find the odd notion that we are somehow or other bringing the “witness-consciousness” into deep dreamless sleep (as if it could be slung onto one’s back like a backpack), when deep dreamless sleep is itself defined as the Witness. (?) Ken may be influenced by Tibetan Buddhist conceptions of consciouness here, which are based on the conception of consciousness in Yogachara thought. These conceptions of consciousness are fundamentally at odds with Shankara’s. In contrast to Shankara’s conception, for the Yogachara, consciousness is always self-reflexive, that is, it is able to become its own object; this is called the doctrine of svasamvedana. For Shankara this is a monstrosity, analogous to a tumbler standing on his own shoulders, or as the Brhadaranyaka says, an eye seeing itself; Chandrakirti also rejects it. The idea that consciousness can become its own object allows the Yogachara to argue that consciousness is able to “generate” its own obejct.
Good. I think you have discovered that it is not easy to reconcile Shankara’s conception of consciousness with that of the Yogachara when the two are so at odds with each other.
And here:
http://www.lightgate.net/boards/viewtopic.php?t=6424&postdays=0&postorder=asc&topic_view=&start=60
Traditionally, Buddhism in general considers itself Rangtong while heretical schools such as Advaita Vedanta and Samkhya are considered Shentong.
However, there is a sub-school of the Kalachakra Tantra “school” in Tibet, the Jonang-pa, that consider themselves Shentong. They are the only Buddhists that understand themselves as Shentong (as far as I know; this is a burgeoning field).
I think we need to be careful with the Wikipedia article. Occasionally, the polemical charge is made that some school of Buddhism, or some text, is Shentong. This is tantamount to calling someone a heretic, a turncoat, an atma-vadin, a Vedantin (horror of horrors).
There were two sub-schools of Yogachara. One, the less mainstream one in India, was associated with the doctrine of the “tathagata-garbha,” the “matrix of the buddha,” as well as with the doctrine that consciousness (vijnana) “creates” the world. For some Buddhists, the “buddha-matrix” doctrine sounded very much the Vedantins’ doctrine of the absolute brahman, and they occasionally made the charge of “heresy,” of “atma-vada,” against those that held the teaching of the “buddha-matrix.” So, saying that the Yogachara was occasionally called a “Shentong” school is tantamount to saying that some Yogacharins were occasionally considered heretical. Though this interpretation of Yogachara died out in India, it was strong in China, where ideas of the “inherent buddha-nature” caught on more easily, due to the presence of theories concerning the “innate human goodness” among Confucians and of the “naturalness” (tzu-jan) of the Tao among Taoists.
The debate between the Madhyamika and Yogachara did not involve the above charge explicitly as much as it served as a kind of limiting condition for the debate; this is to say that the Yogachara insisted that they were not Shentong, while the Madhyamika suggested that they were in danger of compromising with this position.
We need to also be careful concerning the how we understand the “neti-neti” in Advaita Vedanta. According to Shankara, the neti neti negates everything except the formless brahman and pure self. Here is an extract from the same essay at my site on the subject:
Turning to Shankara’s later views on the question of the relation of brahman and emptiness we find some rather interesting comments made by him in his commentary on Brahma Sutra 3.2.22. There, the question arises as to whether or not brahman as such is negated by the “neti, neti,” or whether it is only the two forms of brahman that are negated. His interlocutor suggests that not only are the two forms of brahman to be negated, but brahman itself is to be negated. Either that, or brahman alone is negated, for if brahman transcends speech and the mind, then its existence is doubtful. To this Shankara replies:”
Quote:
“It is not possible that the ‘neti, neti’ negates both brahman as such and all form since this would result in the undesirable consequence (prasanga) of accepting the shunya-vada (i.e., the teaching of the Madhyamika).”
He then says something else quite interesting for our present purposes:
Quote:
“For whenever we negate something unreal (aparamartha), like the (illusory) snake, we always do so with reference to something real (paramartha), like the rope. And this is only possible if there is some really existing entity. If everything is negated, and nothing is left, it will not be possible to negate any other thing, which will mean that something that is actually unreal will have to be accepted as real.”
In other words, accepting the shunya-vada will mean the abandonment of the distinction between the real and the unreal. This kind of reductio ad absurdum is characteristic of how the other schools responded to the Madhyamika teaching of emptiness, including the Yogacharins who accused them of straying from the middle and indulging in excessive negation (apavada).
Shankara continues that, just as the passage from the Taittiriya Up, “beyond speech and mind,” does not mean that brahman as such does not exist, so too the “neti, neti” of the Brhadaranyaka Up does not negate brahman as such. It means, he says, that brahman transcends speech and mind, and that it is not an object of knowledge, and this means that it can only be the unconditioned subject, the Self, which is pure consciousness. The “neti, neti,” he says, denies all “discursive proliferation” (prapanca) and all form (rupa), but leaves the pure brahman as such untouched. He suggests that the repetition can be taken to mean that it denies gross form in the first instance, and all subtle form in the second, but he says that he prefers the interpretation that takes the second “neti” as added for effect, emphasizing that whatever can be thought (utpreksha) is not brahman. He concludes: “therefore, the ‘neti, neti’ negates all that is ‘prapanca,’ but leaves brahman itself untouched.”
Before waxing philosophicalâ€â€I noted Edward’s post of April 26 6:25pm and liked it. I would like to be perceived as approaching these discussions with a similar kind of attitude and, it seems, that attitude is shared by everyone I’ve read on this blog.
In response to Edward’s post of May 1 1:05pm: I like your interpretation of Madhyamika and Nagarjuna. The “doubts†I expressed above come primarily from Loy’s writings on Derrida and Nagarjuna (see reference section in my article for the citation). Consider two excerpts (for a larger excerpt from this text see http://nyaya.darsana.org/post191.html ):
“For Derrida, what is problematic is the relationship between name and concept; so it is not surprising that he concludes with an endless recirculation of concepts. But notice what is signifier and what is signified, for Candrakirti: the non-functioning of perceptions as signs for named things is nirvana. The problem is not merely that language acts as a filter, obscuring the nature of things. Rather, names are used to objectify perceptions into the “self-existing” things we perceive as books, tables, trees, you and me. In other words, the “objective” world of material things, which interact causally “in” space and time, is metaphysical through-and-through. It is this metaphysics that most needs to be deconstructed, according to Buddhism, because this is the metaphysics, disguising itself as commonsense reality, which makes me suffer …â€Â
And further:
“If there are only traces of traces, what happens if we stop trying to arrest those elusive traces into a self-presence? If we do not take perceptions as signs of named things, the most fundamental and problematic dualism of all — that between my fragile sense of being and the nothingness that threatens it — is conflated; if we do not need to fixate ourselves, we unfind ourselves “in” the dream-like world that the Diamond Sutra describes …. In order for this to occur, however, another strategy is necessary: a discontinuous, irruptive one that does not constitute a different philosophical approach but a non-philosophical one because it lets-go of thoughts.â€Â
This view of Buddhism, Loy’s view of Nagarjuna, is problematic from a Derridean point of view. For Derrida there is no form of consciousness or awareness that may count as being outside the structure of the trace. This is consistent with his insistence that there is no escape from metaphysics. Forms of transcendentalism that seek to go beyond metaphysics into a “post-metaphysics†are simply delusional because in one way or another they only re-inscribe all the problems of traditional metaphysics or return us to the structure of the trace from another direction.
And in the type of Buddhism expressed above there also seems to be, from a Derridean (and also neo-Nietzschean) vantage point and critique, an implicit depreciation of life, as the phenomenal/existential realm of daily lived experience. That is, there is an implicit depreciation of the life of “commonsense reality†because any metaphysics associated with that reality “makes me suffer.†For Derrida, a world or consciousness in which there is no suffering is a world and consciousness beyond any form of life or existence whatever. Everything we see in the “commonsense†kosmos such as flux, movement, change, energy, force, creation, destruction, etc. is made possible by difference (differance)â€â€and entails suffering and also makes life possible. Why find fault with this and the metaphysics that affirms it? Instead, why not affirm “this world†and negotiate a life in it with a metaphysics that does not turn from it as if it were not worthy because of its potential for suffering?
I prefer Edward’s view of Madhyamika but I would be interested in any response to Loy’s interpretation and his distinction between Derrida and Nagarjuna.
Hi Andy. You raise a good question when you suggest being “suspicious of arguments that depend, in essence, on believing things ‘should’ be a certain way.†But I think you slightly misunderstand the thrust of what I say (following Derrida) in the text you cite. That could well be because I didn’t say it well enough. But here is a rough sketch of how I think Derrida might size up the situation.
For Derrida, there is no escape from metaphysics (differance and the structure of the trace). But we can (and will by default) choose which metaphysics. Metaphysics as the question of “the real†appears, for Derrida, to involve an assessment of the nature of the structure between oppositional tensions. Derrida’s investigations continually return him to the presence/absence structure of the trace. This structure appears to him to be rock bottom. He thinks it may be the best “fit†for reality but he also understands that this reality does not compel us to arrive at an answer that can be clearly understood to be certain.
As with most questions and “texts,†reality offers a measure of irreducible undecidability. Therefore, believing that something is true need not be the only reason for believing it, while nevertheless being among the most important reasons. Something else needs to be added in order for the metaphysical choice to gain in persuasiveness over competing alternatives. This “something else†is value. Every metaphysical judgment is a kind of “choice,†and promotes or advances one way of seeing over another and, of necessity, one value or set of values over another.
Derrida claims that his choice (deconstruction), because of what it entails with regard to the essential status of the other, presents a metaphysical option that effectively promotes less violence than other alternatives. All other things being equal then, his view offers the best complement of truth and valueâ€â€among those who value less “violenceâ€Ââ€â€or, to use another of his words, more “justiceâ€Ââ€â€in community. This reflects one of Derrida’s most unusual and provocative statements: “deconstruction is justice.†For Derrida, it’s important not only to understand the adequacy of a metaphysical position in relation to “reality†but also to understand its implications with regard to the values it promotes and its probable consequences for individual and communal life.
But, in keeping with the concern you raise, I don’t believe Derrida would have us believe a particular way solely or primarily on the basis of the values it appears to promote. The interesting thing about his position is that it seems to provide ontological ground apart from merely ethical ground for holding to a version of the golden rule (i.e., the other is essential so he/she/it must be negotiated with rather than destroyed).
In the process of excerpting the below quotes from the above referenced Garfield and Priest article I got so mixed up and confused about ultimate and relative that I don’t know which way is up. It’s been like a zen koan where there is no answer and the harder I try to understand it the further I get from an “answer.” Therefore I don’t know that these quotes “answer” anything or just act as a koan, or both, or neither. It’s time to just go watch the Suns hopefully beat the Lakers and put all this chasing after my tail to bed for the night.
Garfield & Priest:
The centerpiece of his Madhyamaka or ‘‘middle way’’ philosophy is the thesis that everything is empty. This thesis has a profound consequence. Ultimate truths are those about ultimate reality. But since everything is empty, there is no ultimate reality. There are, therefore, no ultimate truths. We can get at the same conclusion another way. To express anything in language is to express truth that depends on language, and so this cannot be an expression of the way things are ultimately. All truths, then, are merely conventional.
Nagarjuna is not saying here that one must be reduced to total silence. He himself certainly was not! The views that one must relinquish are views about the ultimate nature of reality. And there is no such thing as the ultimate nature of reality. That is what it is for all phenomena to be empty.
It might be thought that the rest is simply ineffable. Indeed, Nagarjuna is sometimes interpreted in this way, too (Gorampa 1990). But this, also, would be too simplistic a reading. There are ultimate truths. The MMK is full of them.
Indeed, that there is no ultimate reality is itself a truth about ultimate reality and is therefore an ultimate truth!
There are just too many important passages in the MMK in which Nagarjuna is not simply denying what his opponents say, or saying things that will cause his opponents to retract, but where he is stating positive views of his own.
Nagarjuna’s reply does not deny that he is asserting anything. How could he deny that? Rather he asserts that his use of words does not commit him to the existence of any convention-independent phenomena (such as emptiness) to which those words refer. What he denies is a particular semantic theory, one he regards as incompatible with his doctrine of the emptiness of all things precisely because it is committed to the claim that things have natures (Garfield 1996).
Nagarjuna’s enterprise is one of fundamental ontology, and the conclusion he comes to is that fundamental ontology is impossible. But that is a fundamentally ontological conclusionâ€â€and that is the paradox. There is no way that things are ultimately, not even that way.
The emptiness of emptiness is the fact that not even emptiness exists
ultimately, that it is also dependent, conventional, nominal, and, in the end, that it is just the everydayness of the everyday. Penetrating to the depths of being, we find ourselves back on the surface of things, and so discover that there is nothing, after all, beneath these deceptive surfaces. Moreover, what is deceptive about them is simply the fact that we take there to be ontological depths lurking just beneath.
But Nagarjuna’s system provides an ontological explanation and a very
different attitude toward these paradoxes, and, hence, to language. Reality has no nature. Ultimately, it is not in any way at all. So nothing can be said about it. Essencelessness thus induces non-characterizability. But, on the other side of the street, emptiness is an ultimate character of things. And this fact can ground the (ultimate) truth of what we have just said. The paradoxical linguistic utterances are therefore grounded in the contradictory nature of reality.
We think that the ontological insight of Nagarjuna’s is distinctive of the Madhyamaka; it is hard to find a parallel in the West prior to the work of Heidegger. But even Heidegger does not follow Nagarjuna all the way in the dramatic insistence on the identity of the two realities and the recovery of the authority of the conventional. This extirpation of the myth of the deep may be Nagarjuna’s greatest contribution to Western philosophy.
Hi, Greg:
OK, so the implied values of Derrida’s approach are not the only rationale for it, and maybe not the most important rationaleâ€â€but they still are a rationale. As a scientist, I still have a problem with this. Scientists, too, often confront “undecidabilityâ€Â, but they don’t turn to value implications as a sort of tie-breaker.
Maybe the scientific approach is not quite appropriate here. Scientists, I suppose you could argue, don’t ever really believe undecidability is permanent or irreducible. They assume that one view will eventually win out on the basis of evidence. Therefore, they consider only that evidence. Derrida, if I understand this argument correctly, is claiming that we can never have this certainty wrt metaphysics, so there really is no disadvantage in not bringing in values. Still, doesn’t that encourage other choices of metaphysics because they fit someone’s values? How do we decide how much of the choice is to depend on values, and how much on “truth�
“For Derrida, there is no escape from metaphysics (differance and the structure of the trace). But we can (and will by default) choose which metaphysics.â€Â
I agree here with Alan (and many others) that simply by entering the verbal/intellectual arena, traditional spiritual views put themselves at a disadvantage. The very use of words like “we†(implying separate but intersubjectively interacting individuals) and “choose†(implying that those individuals have some control over what they think) presupposes a perspective that is different from the spiritual one.
People who have had experience with higher consciousness may for various reasons enter the arena of public discourse, but they always do so with both hands tied behind their back. As soon as one starts using language, all these problems of metaphysics crop up. They are not there in the state beyond words.
As you can see, even when nonduality is “empty†there is a performative contradiction at its base. To make any assertion that there is no ultimate truth is itself a contradictory ultimate truth. The same goes for Andy’s question to Greg, in that Greg is making a similar foundational (metaphysical) assertion that there is no ultimate foundation. So this requires us to define “post†metaphysical depending on the context. That is, postmetaphysical on the one hand means we can no longer make foundational statements about the nature of either language or reality. But when we make such a statement we are assuming our own metaphysical ultimate reality, so we are in that context ourselves not postmetaphysical.
And of course this is Ken’s charge against the evil relative pluralists, which of course Ken now turns around and commits the same contradiction by claiming there is no “given.†He’s making an absolute claim that there are no absolute givens. Ken of course uses his own back-door out by positing the “absolute consciousness†beyond the relative, but neither Nagarjuna or Derrida need such a thing. The latter are comfortable within the contingency and ambivalence inherent in “reality†itself. So in that sense the final “duality†of ultimate and relative is not “resolved,†per kela’s above comments, because there really is a “right understanding†that is nirvana and a “wrong understanding†that is samsara, i.e., “there is no ultimate reality.â€Â
We also discussed this in the “performative contradiction†thread at http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=170.
Now Andy says above that such problems “are not there in the state beyond words.” I’m certain that both Nagarjuna and Derrida disagree, that this uncertain undecidability is inherent in the nature of reality itself, not just in language. And this is of course one limitation of Loy’s interpretation of both Derrida, that he thinks D’s critique is limited to language. The whole point is that this is not just “at the limits of thought” but at the limits of the so-called “unlimited reality.” This then goes into how D describes the undecontructable, that which is beyond deconstruction and the “limit.” I’ve gone into this before in previous threads which I may cut-and-paste here again later.
For now I link you to the “Enter the Dragon” thread: http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=107
“Any proposition, and indeed any experience, will at the same time globalize (make into a whole) and destroy itself, in such a way that these two are one and the same….To be thus is to be otherwise.â€Â
From the Being and Ambiguity thread at http://www.openintegral.net/blog/?p=157
Kela also asks these questions in that thread:
Why must “enlightenment†be timeless? Why must it denote radical transcendence? Why was timelessness and transcendence important?
Certainly states such as “samadhi†and “satori†may be possible. But why the need for the metaphysical dross, such as the “24/7 sahaja samadhi†which, with its insistence on permanence, is clearly a leftover from the archaic wish for immortality. If the description of some sort of semi-permanent state is required, but perspectivalism must be retained, why cannot “enlightenment†simply designate a change of perspective, a new way of looking at things? Why is the unconditioned, aperspectival knowledge of the superman always invoked as the necessary interpretation of “enlightenment�
Interesting points, Andy. But let me start with what you say at the end. “As soon as one starts using language, all these problems of metaphysics crop up. They are not there in the state beyond words.†This is precisely what Derrida’s philosophy argues against. When he says there is no escape from metaphysics he also means there is no escape from language. Here “language†must be understood broadly as in his use of the term “arche-writing.†This “writing†manifests the structure of the trace as the mark that, as it emerges, erases itself. Like the burning flame, it is dying/renewing movement. This “writing,†according to Derrida, is also the structure of consciousnessâ€â€any state of consciousness. As a dying/renewing movement, consciousness (whether “witness self†or “normal selfâ€Â) is never fully “present†to itself as something that remains fully the same from moment to moment. Thus, for Derrida, any form of consciousness is split as presence/absence and in this sense there is “no state beyond words,†no state beyond the trace.
“Pure presence,†if it were to be achieved, would result not in a superessential abundance of being but rather an absolute annihilation of being. (Although, as Derrida suggests in later works, the idea of “pure presence†can, in certain contexts, serve as an “impossible†towards which one can aim in an effort to restore a balance that has been disturbed by an excess of absence or emptinessâ€â€analogous to the application of yin/yang principles in Asian healing practices).
Regarding choice, because Derrida believes there are alternative metaphysics, there is “choice†by default, since choice is never fully conscious or controlled (nor fully unconscious and uncontrolled). But each one of us can attempt to increase awareness of these choices and their consequences.
As for issues of undecidability, value, and truthâ€â€yikes! That’s a big topic. I can’t do it justice here. But if you are interested and have the time you could see my attempt to make sense of all thisâ€â€and from the point of view of science. This text is titled “Physics and Languageâ€â€Science and Rhetoric†and can be found in downloadable PDF format under the “essays†link on my web site (www.gregorydesilet.com).
Greg,
You can contact Dr. Loy at the following email. Perhaps he will answer your questions regarding his position above? If so please share it with us.
loyd at xavier.edu
Use the proper address protocol, i.e, @ insteasd of \”at\” above with no spaces. Apparently one cannot list an email address online with the proper protocol without spam bots attacking.
Edward: “that this uncertain undecidability is inherent in the nature of reality itself, not just in language.â€Â
Since in the ordinary consciousness we are captive to language, how can one possibly say that? How can one make such a certain statement about reality?
Greg: “This is precisely what Derrida’s philosophy argues against. When he says there is no escape from metaphysics he also means there is no escape from language.â€Â
But how does he know this? If he has never experienced higher consciousness, how can he say anything about this? Seems to me he is being atheist when he should be agnostic.
I would say there is no escape from language in the ordinary level of consciousness. Period.
Another good question Andy. How can I know with certainty that nothing is certain? I cannot. And that’s the point. It’s much like the inherent contradiction I’ve been talking about above, that to state there is no ultimate truth is itself an ultimate truth. And it is in that very uncertain undecidability that “states itself,” so to speak. And I could very well be wrong.
On the other hand, your argument by “experience” doesn’t solve the riddle either. Alan uses this same gambit in that if one has never had the personal experience of “higher consciousness” then how can they make such statements? But how do you know that one hasn’t had that experience? Simply by the way they intepret it as not “ultimate” and “undecidable?” If one had such experiences they just wouldn’t describe it that way? Again we are caught in the endless circle of undecidabillity, so it just seems that is the “ultimate truth that there is no ultimate truth.”
Then you should take yourself out of the discussion. To say that nothing is certain is an absolute statement (according to you) as much as to say that there can be certainty. You could just say you don’t know, just as I suggested Derrida should say he doesn’t know. I suppose you could make some kind of argument that to say you don’t know is an absolute position of some sort, but it sure sounds to me closer to the truth than to say there can be no certainty. At least you are confining your certainty to your own experience rather than to the world at large.
How do I know that Derrida never experienced higher consciousness? I’m not an authority on him, but I’m pretty sure he never said he did, and if he did experience it, I find it very hard to believe he wouldn’t have discussed, let alone simply mentioned it, in his writings–if only to defuse arguments like mine!
As many people have pointed out, there are many, many accounts of a state beyond language. I suppose all of these people could be deluded, but that doesn’t seem very likely to me.
Hi, Greg:
I did read your article “Physics and Language…” and enjoyed it immensely. Though you didn’t really get into the question of the role of values in science till the very end, the parallels between language and physics from Aristotle to Newton to Einstein I found very interesting. As you probably know, there are other parallels between views in science and the humanities. Fritjof Capra’s The Turning Point was an early attempt at this, more comprehensive but I would say much less sophisticated than yours. A case could also be made in the life sciences, though the correlations I would say are not as close as with physics.
If we accept your general thesis, we might ask, why? Why is there this parallel, and also why do these changes in our understanding of difference occur when they do? Is it just that as time passes, insight advances, helped by standing on the shoulders of previous generations? That’s surely part of it, but I suggest that another factor involved is simply increasing population. As societies become more densely populated, interactions among people become more numerous as well as more complex, and I think under those conditions people become more aware of context. One might almost say (I’m exaggerating a little here to make a point) that the postmodern understanding of language is truer for us than it was for Aristotle. We live in a much more heavily contextualized society than was the case in ancient Greece. Words have broader, fuzzier and more rapidly changing meanings, because language occurs at a more frenetic pace.
If we accept this idea, that raises the issue of where our understanding will go as the world evolves further. I am not going to get into a detailed discussion of holarchy here, but a broad evolutionary view indicates that life develops through levels, and that these levels themselves each develop from a unitary (atom, cell, organism) to a social (molecules, tissues, societies) phase, back to a new unity when the next level appears. From this point of view, we are at a highly social, intersubjective phase, and are acutely aware of how we are embedded in contexts. But if a new, higher level appears, I believe that would again be a unifying one.
Keep in mind that there is plenty of evidence for such unity beyond reports of a higher level of consciousness. The state we are in at birth approaches this kind of unity (not the same unity of higher consciousness, because it is at a lower level, but analogously unified). Even at birth a human being may not be totally removed from language, but pretty close. We can also see this unity in lower levels of existence, in organisms that do not have social organizations.
So my point here is that societies, and the perception they bring, are only one particular stage in one particular level of existence. Other forms of perception accompany other stages on our own and other levels of existence. The kinds of conclusions that Derrida makes may be appropriate for humans as most of us exist now. I would not say that they close off all possibilites for the future.
Ok Andy, I don’t know. And yes, perhaps I “project” my own uncertainty and ignorance unto the world at large, saying “it” is uncertain. But to return to previous discussions we’ve had here, it seems that at least human perception and cognition cannot know with certainty that any experience we have of the objective world is “pure” or “given.”
Which takes me to your last response to Greg. I’m with you on hoping that there is an increasing telos to our understanding and being-in-the-world, that it’s like Ken says ever-expanding holons of increasing complexity. So in that sense maybe this pomo critique of the “myth of the given” is an advance? It seems so, but it also seems the same critique has been around since Buddha and Nagarjuna (and before?)
Derrida offers a view of reality/being. From that view an ultimate stepping out experience beyond language (understood broadly as arche-writing, trace), beyond presence/absence into full presence, is not theorized as possible. But Derrida’s view of reality/being could be wrong!
A statement like “the truth is there is no truth” or “it’s certain there is no certainty” re-inscribes the notion of truth in the very act of dismantling it. This shows how there is no escape from truth and this coincides with Derrida’s claim that there is no escape from metaphysics. And this still leaves open the question of the nature of truth, whether it is relative or absolute, or some paradoxical combination of the two (depending on how you want to theorize context). From here it’s difficult to sort out. Too difficult for me! Like trying to see thirty moves into a chess game.
Edward–thanks for the email on Dr. Loy. I’ll see what I can do.
Greg said: “And this still leaves open the question of the nature of truth…” Which is my point, it’s undecidable and unknowable, or as Derrida says, impossible. IF “it” can be described as “open” and/or “infinite” then we can never arrive, as we are finite. Which is also why Derrida says it’s nature is “to come” but it “never arrives.” Hence in my finitude I can say with certainty that due to my “condition” I cannot know infinitude personally.
Now I also know from personal experience such states of consciousness described as “consciousness without an object,” so I’m not denying such states. I am saying though that when I have such experiences it “seems” like it’s without an object, unlimited and infinite. But is it even possible, given my finitude? If not, then what is it that I’m experiencing in those states? I don’t know.
And if it really is a sort of black worm-hole into infinitude beyond understanding, language and words (and physics, by the way) then I’m willing to be wrong about that, as that’s pretty cool! And I want that to be true, to know that I can directly connect to that infinite “God” or “Self” or whatever. It’s much more comforting than this uncertain, existential mortality. In fact I think that’s one reason I meditate, to get out of thoughts and into a zone of peace and quiet and “simple being.” But as I’ve said here before, that could also very well be our pre-rational primoridal awarenss that is before we “fell” into the dichotomy of rationality.
Andyâ€â€thanks for your comments on my article. You say, “From this point of view, we are at a highly social, intersubjective phase, and are acutely aware of how we are embedded in contexts. But if a new, higher level appears, I believe that would again be a unifying one.†Perhaps, although I think Derrida would disagree regarding “unifying.†For him I think “unity†is too close to “stasis†or absolute zero rather than the “fullness†that is often associated with “unity.†But then, who is Derrida? He doesn’t know everything!
And further: “The kinds of conclusions that Derrida makes may be appropriate for humans as most of us exist now. I would not say that they close off all possibilites for the future.†In this regard, you might be interested in Derrida’s later works where he discusses notions of perfectibility, the pure, and the impossible and, in his own way, embraces them. His understandings of these must be carefully weighed because they are subtle and difficult (and I don’t pretend to understand them fully!) and they are not inconsistent with his earlier work that deconstructs notions of “the pure.†Nevertheless, his views here might speak to you in a way. For a great introduction to this side of his work I suggest Penelope Deutscher’s book “How to Read Derrida†and her last chapter in the book. I’d like to go into it more but it’s just too difficult and I don’t have enough time now.
Edwardâ€â€I’ve been pouring over some of your previous posts above and there is some great material there. Thanks for airing these thoughts again (apparently much of this you have posted previously).
Here’s an example of one part I especially liked:
One way of putting this “final resolution†is to say that “everyday consciousness†IS the enlightened condition, that there is no difference, really, between the two: “the enlightened condition is to be found here and now,†etc… Now we can attempt to do away with “duality†in this manner until it no longer exists. But then the entirety of tradition will come to be called into question, as there will be no distinction between the enlightened and the unenlightened state. This itself is a problem, or at least a grand paradox. My point here is NOT that this is all mere “talking school†and that in fact we need to “practice†because “practice†is “good†and necessary  that is yet another rhetorical bifurcation designed to make people feel good about the fact they put so much effort into their “sadhana†(the Protestant work ethic at work). My point here is merely that at some point, some sort of distinction between the “enlightened†and “unenlightened†state will need to be drawn, and this will mean that a strict adherence to “non-dualism†will need to be abandoned. Either that, or the entirety of tradition will have to be abandoned.
There other points I could cite and pursue but, sadly, time does not permit. I intend to continue looking through this material, though. It seems to me that you and I are on a very similar philosophical wavelength. But you definitely go deeper into the Eastern tradition than I have, and that’s helpful to me and my continued evaluation of Derrida’s thought.
Give kela credit for that one; I was quoting here there. He’s the resident scholar on eastern religion.
Can we request Kela to come out with his assessment of Sri Aurobindo?