Mason Riggle

@Inliytened1 well.. 'duality of self/other' was part of the OP.. when that duality collapses.. it's all love baby.

This isn't what I said. I said being compassionate is selfish when all there is, is self. When I am you and Leo and Tim and me.. I can be compassionate towards all of 'you' and this is the same as me being selfish for Me!!

@Tim R ding ding ding

There is no boundary. It's an 'imaginary and arbitrary' distinction, like the boundary between a knife and a sword.. or the boundary between heads and tails on a coin. When a bird chirps, and I hear it.. I am aware that the bird is 'external to me'.. but when I hear my thoughts, or see my hand, these things also appear 'external to me' (this is an illusion of course.. there is no 'external to me', because whatever there 'seems to be' is what you really are.)

@Someone here

@Tim R If all I see is me, and I want to be selfish for me, aren't I being compassionate towards myself?

This is true for all of experience.

@Tim R Selfishness and Compassion are the same thing if all there is, is you. When ego is selfish (essentially, whenever there is ego.. or when the illusion of a 'separate self' is), there is imaginary separation between 'ego' and 'that which is not ego', which creates suffering. It's not that 'all others are illusion'.. it's that there is no 'self/other' duality.. that's the illusion. It's all you.

@nistake nice..

Do I always do what I want to, or can I do 'other than I want to(what I don't want)' if I want to?

Where is reality? Am I 'doing' anything, or am I something that occurs, or both, or neither? What would a reality 'be like' without anyone or anything for whom it 'seems like Something'?

"Everything will be okay in the end, so if everything's not okay, don't worry, that means it's not the end." - unknown

@Gesundheit2 beyond appearances? What does that mean? If something isn't 'experienced' in some way it's not part of reality. Reality 'appears' to me. I might be mistaken about the nature of it, but I'm absolutely certain something SEEMS to be happening. It's obvious. Self evident. If anything's Real, it's the seeming. The rest, well, it seems real to me.

We disagree. The word 'reality' is a metaphor. So is the word 'imaginary'. They are 'maps', but not the territory. Ultimately they are maps of the same territory. How do you know what is real?? Well.. because it 'seems real'. Notice that SEEMING REAL is 'good enough' for you to say that something IS REAL. Ask yourself.. what does 'real' mean? When you say the word 'reality'.. what is that pointing to?? Well.. it's just whatever 'seems real' to you. Notice that the 'seeming' is prior to 'being'. A Universe that 'exists' but doesn't 'seem like it' is exactly the same as a Universe that doesn't exist.

@Gesundheit2 not so.. both words are metaphors. The word 'reality' is not what reality is. If you really got down to brass tacks about what you mean by 'imaginary', you'd find you mean the same thing as when you say 'real'.

^this is more language that's being hated on. It implies duality between 'you' and 'what you imagine' which are not 2 different things. There isn't even a 'you' who imagines separate from 'what is being imagined'.

@mandyjw ?

@mandyjw it just all seems so silly to me.. it's like having a dream about 'realizing I'm dreaming and still worrying that the other people in my dream haven't realized they are just my dream'. How much time should I spend convincing the characters in my dream that I'm dreaming them up? Well, I suppose a lot if I'm still lost in the dream convinced they're not my dream.

@mandyjw and whoever else cares to read along, If I were to have a dream tonight about a friend who is deeply troubled with the idea of Solipsism, and in my dream this troubles me.. When I awaken to the fact that it was 'all a dream', I discover that the 'me who was suffering over my Solipsist friend's suffering' wasn't the problem it seemed to be.

@mandyjw don't stress it. There's nothing to do. no one to do it. And there are no problems. It just seems that way... which isn't a problem.

@mandyjw I don't think you can make a youtube video.. there is no 'separate Mandy' to do it.

Exactly... so who is [this way of discussing Solipsism] hugely problematic for?

@mandyjw how could anyone think anything if no one has a mind?

you mean.. people with minds?

If no one has a mind.. who is this 'hugely problematic' for?