Mason Riggle

@Leo Gura I like you Leo. Jerks are fine in my book. “There is beauty in truth, even if it's painful. Those who lie, twist life so that it looks tasty to the lazy, brilliant to the ignorant, and powerful to the weak. But lies only strengthen our defects. They don't teach anything, help anything, fix anything or cure anything. Nor do they develop one's character, one's mind, one's heart or one's soul.” ― José N. Harris

From your perspective, the only one you have, your current experience (all that you are experiencing) is the only thing you can say for sure exists. Where do I exist for you? Only in your experience of me. This is where people tend to get lost.. they think that what this means is that if 'others' only exist as 'my experience of them', that they don't really exist.. but this is false. Everything that we can say 'exists', only 'exists' as 'my experience of it'. Well.. guess what.. that's good enough. There is no meaningful difference between 'what I am REALLY experiencing' and 'what I SEEM to be experiencing'.

Not currently.

Of course. What if I killed 20 people, and then you found out I had a massive tumor in my brain pressing on my amygdala, which distorted my perception of threats and danger... would you think I was a bad person, or an unfortunate one?

Recognize that 'what I do' and 'what I am' are the same thing. This is like saying you wouldn't judge a volcano for being a volcano, but if it erupted and destroyed a village, you would judge it for that. Perhaps what you really mean is, even though you wouldn't judge me for being how I am (in the sense that you find me ultimately responsible for being how I am, and therefor responsible for changing how I am), you will retain your ability to behave pragmatically (what you deem to be 'useful' for you, whether 'you' is defined as a human organism or the entire Universe) towards me.

@Tim R perhaps my relatively unique perspective causes me to be a Zen Devil, but then again, I'm not really sure what that means. If I was a Zen Devil, would you be inclined to judge me for being how I am? Would you look at me with an aversive expression of disgust and pity? Would you be inclined to help me? I do not really know how to interfere with the way the world is, because it doesn't seem there is a way to interfere with the way the world is. Any attempt to change what is occurring, is just more 'what is already occurring'.

Maybe- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Once upon a time, there was a Chinese farmer whose horse ran away. That evening, all of his neighbours came around to commiserate. They said, “We are so sorry to hear your horse has run away. This is most unfortunate.” The farmer said, “Maybe.” The next day the horse came back bringing seven wild horses with it, and in the evening everybody came back and said, “Oh, isn’t that lucky. What a great turn of events. You now have eight horses!” The farmer again said, “Maybe.” The following day his son tried to break one of the horses, and while riding it, he was thrown and broke his leg. The neighbours then said, “Oh dear, that’s too bad,” and the farmer responded, “Maybe.” The next day the conscription officers came around to conscript people into the army, and they rejected his son because he had a broken leg. Again all the neighbours came around and said, “Isn’t that great!” Again, he said, “Maybe.” The whole process of nature is an integrated process of immense complexity, and it’s really impossible to tell whether anything that happens in it is good or bad — because you never know what will be the consequence of the misfortune; or, you never know what will be the consequences of good fortune." - Alan Watts ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ “The reason you want to be better is the reason why you aren’t, shall I put it like that? We aren’t better because we want to be. Because the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Because all the do-gooders in the world whether they’re doing good for others or doing it for themselves are troublemakers: on the basis of “kindly let me help you or you will drown,” said the monkey putting the fish safely up a tree. Sometimes doing good to others and even doing good to oneself is amazingly destructive because it’s full of conceit. How do you know what’s good for other people? How do you know what’s good for you? If you say you want to improve then you ought to know what’s good for you, but obviously you don’t because if you did then you would be improved. So, we don’t know. We do not really know how to interfere with the way the world is.” —Alan Watts

Solipsism(1) - I (the self) am alone and separate from that which is not me (other). 'Other' is something external to me, different from me, experienced by 'me'.- Dual Solipsism(2) - I am alone because there is only 1 thing, Everything, and I'm it. There is no 'self/other' distinction. - Non-Dual

If you can not know anything, you can not know that you can not know anything. There is one thing you can know.. and that thing is yourself, which is everything there is.

@Tim R and the 'Do you even exist, bro' comment was tongue in cheek.. a play on 'do you even lift, bro'.. I would never call anyone 'bro' in earnest. I like your posts.. you seem to know what you're talking about most of the time.

@Tim R I have no other self than the totality of that which I am aware. The only thing I know exists for sure is experience itself... I may be totally confused about the content of experience, but I know that something seems to be happening right now, which is how I define 'myself'.

The solipsist understands that any 'enlightened teacher' and any 'reaction' they might have can only be known to exist as subjective experience. This 'experiment' doesn't show the solipsist anything.

@Tim R "do you even exist, bro?" Where? ?

@Tim R

How can 'solipsism' be a word that denotes 'individual' vs 'other' if it also denotes that there is only 'individual'?

Not 'negated'.. included. I'm not sure this is an accurate description of solipsism. Recognize that it would be silly to think there is a 'Mason Riggle' but not a 'OneHandClap'. The solipsist view is that 'Mason Riggle' is just more 'content of experience' [mind].. "Solipsism is the philosophical idea that only one's mind is sure to exist. As an epistemological position, solipsism holds that knowledge of anything outside one's own mind is unsure; the external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist outside the mind." - Wikipedia Notice the language here... 'one's mind' is sure to exist... it doesn't say anything about 'physical beings' (a Mason Riggle, for example) being sure to exist... in fact, 'the external world' can not be known to exist [outside the mind].

This is not 'real' solipsism.. When it's realized that 'YOU' are not 'the individual'.. that 'YOU are everything, then it's obvious that the self (everything that there IS) is all that can be known to exist.

Who is the 'we' that you are referring to here who might call this the egoic or materialistic state of consciousness? You and I?

It's 'beware' or 'be wary'.. But then I suppose we must ask, 'who is it that should beware?' The idea that things can 'beware' is ego.

@BipolarGrowth hehe... sneaky.

@tuckerwphotography great insight! A chicken and an egg are the same thing.. a chicken/egg. This is the basis for transcending all dualities.

There are no aliens. You are imagining them. You are imagining all of science too. It's pure fiction.

Brains don't exist, but Aliens in UFO's totally do, because evidence.

Once they are identified, can we start just calling them FO's?

@Tetcher maybe the UFO's are just blurry... "I think Bigfoot is blurry, that's the problem. It's not the photographer's fault. Bigfoot is blurry, and that's extra scary to me. There's a large, out-of-focus monster roaming the countryside. Run, he's fuzzy, get out of here." - Mitch Hedberg