I highly recommend reading the works of Pyrrhonism.
I believe I was probably 13-15 years old when I first studied epistemology, and I encountered skepticism. It all made perfect sense, but it was just an idea to me. I didn’t read the whole book, I just understood the basic premise of there being no criterion of truth (Credit: Wikipedia)
For several years, I carried skepticism in a latent capacity. I‘d like to think that I never totally committed myself to any belief, but I fell prey to negative dogmatism.
I was/am a Humean. I went around everywhere and shook everybody’s foundation. The Problem of Induction is my favorite piece of philosophy because it made me understand that I’m an animal.
I was active on the Internet doubting a lot of what people believe. I was having fun, but I admit that I did not fully get it though.
I wasn’t what you’d call “Orange” because I actively fought scientism (in fact watching Leo’s newest videos I couldn’t help but think welcome to club?)
But, I was also anti-religion. I was anti-everything. Sort of like a self-amused Nihilist.
This worldview was somewhat liberating, but incomplete. A lot of casual things that bother other people haven’t bothered me. Reality is sort of unreal and groundless. But, I was/am bothered by ideas. Ideas are more real than physical reality.
I’ve been reading about Buddhism the past 3 months. But there are a lot of questions in Buddhism. Like is reincarnation real or is it a metaphor? Is it real or is it a metaphor? I grappled with the ideas, and reified them. There was a debate between one side and the other, but never a debate about the debate itself.
Last month it hit me, when I first read Nāgārjuna. It’s called The Middle Way. The whole point is that it is not “Yes” or “No”; there is no criterion (there’s an argument that The Middle Way and Pyrrhonism are essentially the same).
Let’s take Actualized.org. I actually followed the channel 4 years ago, it taught me meditation and it helped me get out of a depressive rut I was in.
But a year or so ago, I was watching it and kind of thought, Alright this is some New Age nonsense. He’s entertaining things that are clearly nonsense. Paranormal activity? “I am God”? What nonsense this?
I unsubscribed. But then I came back. After reading this philosophy, I started watching Actualized.org more. I just confronted it. Ok sure, I’ll watch Mr. God explain why we’re all God. I see what he’s saying, it’s panpsychism or pantheism, another philosophy, another idea.
Then I kind of had a realization. What if this like a giant Zen Koan?
Why are we entertaining the existence of ghosts and demons?
See, there’s a latent skepticism. So of course, maybe there are ghosts, but I see no evidence so I choose not to believe. So why entertain something with no evidence? Sadhguru talks about Yogis being able to sit in one position for months. There are the Breatharian movements.
A perspective: These are all trainings. We obviously don’t “really” know if these things are there or not. But how do we react to them?
These ideas defy common sense and what one would expect from Science. There’s no evidence.
Here’s what happens, you understand it this way and then you start arguing and attacking. When you argue and attack, you are perturbed. Not by “real things or circumstances” but by “ideas.”
I was getting mad about ideas! These are just ideas! Neither right nor wrong.
It’s a confrontation, by confronting what doesn’t make sense to you, you either choose to reject it and debate or you learn to live with it because you must realize that your reasons for choosing to reject it are equal to reasons to accept it. This is Pyrrhonism.
When you confront your fears, you grow. When you confront nonsense, you also grow in a different way.
Ever since I read Nāgārjuna, I become like a computer program.
I work in IT, do you what happens when you tell a computer to divide by zero?
The program crashes. There’s no answer. It is asymptotic.
How do we resolve this? We write a try-catch block.
Try: do this. Catch: If an infinite loop emerges, then stop. Do something else. You can’t divide by zero. You can’t make sense of nonsense. So don’t.
This is non-attachment to views. I had this to a degree ever since I learned about skepticism. But it’s actually a process and an ability. You develop it. There are huge holes in the realm of ideas that you choose to reject or you choose to affirm. This is a reifying of the “Yes” or “No.” This is the opposite of the Middle Way.
So now every time I encounter an idea I don’t like. I implement a sort of try catch block of code into my mind. Why am I bothered by this idea? It’s a self-examination and therefore it takes a long time.
Wordlessness is kind of an Eastern Idea. The Tao is nameless. You cannot discuss the Ultimate Truth because our Conventional words cannot access it this way.
This is another idea that bothered me a lot, because it sounds like irrationalism. You can’t just not think! You can’t not have words, that doesn’t make sense!
Well, Sextus Empiricus and the Pyrrhonists have cured this.
”Similarly with regard to the question of whether propositions exist, for the proposition is a lekton. Further, even if it should be granted for the sake of argument that lekta exist, it will be found that propositions do not, for they are composed of lekta that do not exist simultaneously with one another. In the case of "If it is day, it is light," when I say "It is day" the proposition "It is light" does not yet exist, and when I say "It is light" the "It is day" no longer exists. And since composite things cannot exist if their parts do not exist simultaneously, and the things of which propositions are composed do not exist simultaneously, propositions do not exist.”
It is a perfectly logical argument as to why propositions don’t exist and my logic was against wordlessness was flawed.
It is paradoxical because one must use a proposition to argue that propositions don’t exist. But in reality, they don’t exist for the reasons laid out.
The realization that all of these people had was the extent of our mental fabrications. The very nature of words is that they are reified. They are mentally built. In any instant of time it doesn’t exist. It’s a conglomeration, your memories become your reality. They’re only real in the sense that you hold them in your head and piece them together. This is also what “no-self” is. Your self is the conglomeration built up, but careful you might just reify the idea and turn it into a reality that can harm you.
This is Dependent Origination and Emptiness.
If you understand Hume, you already know this. Reading Nāgārjuna was like reading something I already knew, but in a much more powerful way.
Did you know that Pyrrho was a High Priest? Did he believe in a bearded sky God? Well if he did, he certainly didn’t know of one because he was a skeptic after all.
This is the liberating feeling. You can become anything. If I “practice this teaching” appropriately, I could live amongst religious zealots and it wouldn’t even bother me. It shouldn’t bother me. It’s just ideas, why get mad about an idea? This is the feeling of libertarian I get.
For what does it mean to be God? God is just a word. Don’t be perturbed by it. We could replace the word “God” with “Reality” or “The Universe.”
Try to rewatch some of Leo’s God videos and replace “God” with “The Universe.” Now it’s crazy, but in a good way. When he says “God” it’s only crazy “in a bad way” because you don’t like the idea of “God” or his view of “God” conflicts with your own.
If I say, “I am the Planet Earth” that is the most selfless thing a person could possibly say. You’re not simply an actor in the human rat race of making money and gaining fame, you’re also not simply a detached observer trying to figure what is going on? You are the Planet Earth. Literally! You are literally the Universe? Sure.
To say that The Universe is self-aware isn’t a crazy statement. If the Universe is Everything and you are a Thinking Thing, then the Universe has at least some self-aware components. But these self-aware components can only become aware of the Universe, it is indeed the Universe becoming aware of itself.
Just keep exploring, keep shifting perspectives and developing your craft. You are a process.
I met one guy who claimed to be God once. He said that what lived to do was poke people and make them want to upgrade their operating systems. Perhaps this is all an elaborate poking, aka “pointing” so that people untether themselves.
Of course, I must not be enlightened because I thought of this. I didn’t sit with my mind empty for 10 days straight. So therefore, don’t believe me. I’m lying, I don’t believe me. Take everything with a grain of salt all the time.
One final quote, because it sums it all up.
“The victorious ones have said that emptiness is the relinquishing of all views. For whomever emptiness is a view, that one will accomplish nothing.” -Nagarjuna
