Dhamma Wheel Buddhist Forum

Saengnapha wrote: ↑Fri Jan 12, 2018 3:31 pm
I think in human terms, it is the point for the vast majority of folks who wish to be fully human and have a semblance of sanity. Only then, is there a possibility of going further and contemplating our own experience in the way the Buddha taught.

I don't disagree with you, I just hesitate to reduce the dhamma to those things (I'm not saying you are). Also, I find appeals to the brain out of place, but if they help modern people connect that's fine with me. Its probably because I've removed, handled, autopsied and microscopically examined thousands. And having seen the insides of the sausage factory that is neurologic and medical science, I can guarantee you our ideas of what neocortex and amygdala do will change with time, especially if it facilitates someones professorial tenure or publication quota. I prefer to focus on more stable principles. Its just a style thing I guess!

aflatun wrote: ↑Sat Jan 13, 2018 3:31 am

Saengnapha wrote: ↑Fri Jan 12, 2018 3:31 pm
I think in human terms, it is the point for the vast majority of folks who wish to be fully human and have a semblance of sanity. Only then, is there a possibility of going further and contemplating our own experience in the way the Buddha taught.

I don't disagree with you, I just hesitate to reduce the dhamma to those things (I'm not saying you are). Also, I find appeals to the brain out of place, but if they help modern people connect that's fine with me. Its probably because I've removed, handled, autopsied and microscopically examined thousands. And having seen the insides of the sausage factory that is neurologic and medical science, I can guarantee you our ideas of what neocortex and amygdala do will change with time, especially if it facilitates someones professorial tenure or publication quota. I prefer to focus on more stable principles. Its just a style thing I guess!

No doubt that science is a work in progress, but we shouldn't disregard the brain and how it processes information. It's the tool that we have and it needs to be used in light of the Dhamma. No reduction going on here. Brain and body are part of the whole organism. Science is adding valuable information that we can corroborate through the teachings of men like the Buddha.

I have been in analysis for nine months now with a therapist who has partly a Kleinian approach. While it was challenging to begin with I have found it very helpful and plan to continue.

Saengnapha wrote: ↑Sat Jan 13, 2018 2:55 am

binocular wrote: ↑Fri Jan 12, 2018 4:09 pmDo you believe that one first needs to be normal on worldly terms before one can go further and contemplate our own experience in the way the Buddha taught?

Yes. Otherwise their neuroses cannot allow them to relax and be present.

Becoming normal on worldly terms seems to take one only in the opposite direction of what the Buddha taught.

binocular wrote: ↑Sat Jan 13, 2018 1:31 pm

Saengnapha wrote: ↑Sat Jan 13, 2018 2:55 am

binocular wrote: ↑Fri Jan 12, 2018 4:09 pmDo you believe that one first needs to be normal on worldly terms before one can go further and contemplate our own experience in the way the Buddha taught?

Yes. Otherwise their neuroses cannot allow them to relax and be present.

Becoming normal on worldly terms seems to take one only in the opposite direction of what the Buddha taught.

Perhaps I misunderstood your use of the word normal. For me, normal is the ending of neuroses. Certainly, the Buddha would be in favor of that. But it seems that this kind of normal is just the beginning of the path. The worldly normal would not have anything to do with the path. So, I would agree with what you said. (I also don't like to use the word path as it is not a linear one as the word would suggest.)

i am schizophrenic and through metta and vipassana sila and Dana I have pulled myself out of the muck of mental illness. I function better than most non mentally ill people. I have good friends can hold an interesting conversation and volunteer one day a week. I study the nikayas and meditate and have have experienced vipassana insights into Annica Dukkha and Anatta my eyes aren't dusty at all. Most schizophrenics are religious and highly intelligent. Bi polar type also have a component of hyper religiosity.

DooDoot wrote: ↑Fri Jan 12, 2018 7:58 pmYou sound like a professional here.

Still have a long way to go ...

retrofuturist wrote: ↑Fri Jan 12, 2018 10:00 pmIt would just be useful, and informative in "focusing on the task at hand", given that the execution of some of my tasks extend beyond the domain of my nearest and dearest.

So you'd like to know what goes on in the mind of a virtue-signaller, for example?

Greetings binocular,

I'm comfortable with my understanding of the key processes and motivations going on in that particular instance... but yes, there's other behaviour types that it would be helpful to have a comparable understanding of.

Metta,
Paul.

It doesn't matter, it's like the man who was shot with an arrow and asks who shot me with this arrow, just follow the path and get it out. Buddha said all beings except enlightened ones are insane to some degree modern psychology does not know where schizoid paranoid personality types comes from or how to cure it. The medicine is simply goodness.

retrofuturist wrote: ↑Thu Jan 11, 2018 10:23 pm Does anyone have thoughts on how and whether:

- Some people never outgrow the paranoid-schizoid position?
- Some people regress back to the paranoid-schizoid position?
- A biological adult might function or behave, if operating exclusively from the paranoid-schizoid position?

Hi Paul,

One reason for Klein's word choice of "position" is to distinguish from clearcut developmental "stages" (i.e., Freud's psychosexual stages of development, etc.).

Klein “adopted the term ‘position’…to get away from the idea of stages or phases of development, which she had shown were not clear-cut but overlapping and fluctuating” (from R.D. Hinselwood's Dictionary of Kleinian Thought)

When I was studying this stuff, I preferred Thomas Ogden's spin. Ogden is a contemporary psychoanalyst. From an unpublished paper I wrote (but I can share it if you'd like):

Ogden is somewhat (but not entirely) unique in his understanding of each position, including the new one he proposes, “as a developing and ongoing mode of generating experience as opposed to a phase of development…[and each position] as contributing equally powerfully to the dialectic constituting human experience” (p. 127). Thus as discussed previously in other ways, Ogden does not necessarily see the positions as indicative of sequential development, from some “primitive” state to a secondary (and then tertiary) one. Rather, he (Ogden) views the various positions as continuously contributing to “human experience” (1989, p. 127) throughout the course of one’s life.

The book to read for Thomas Ogden is This Art of Psychoanalysis.

Otto Kernberg is another contemporary psychoanalyst heavily influenced by Klein (and also influenced by Margaret Mahler and Freud), who writes about splitting, etc. Kernberg tends to be much more diagnostic and you could say authoritarian in tone; Ogden is much more a humanist who writes beautifully. Both are brillant. For secondary explanations of Klein, you might also check out Hanna Segal, who you could say was Klein's protege, and brings great deal of clarity to her writing.

Hope that helps!

One will in general need to go on interdisciplinary knowledge to attempt to make supposedly comperhensive evaluations. Here are some interesting lectures on various brackets of science that are rather complementary ;
Lecture Collection | Human Behavioral Biology