Matt8800

@Serotoninluv He may have used concepts of morality and good/bad but isnt that any ideologue? I am not familiar with all his beliefs because I am not an ideologue. Regardless, making claims of good and evil is not what green people are reacting against because they do it themselves. They are reacting because green has different claims of good and evil. Epistemology and critical thinking does not resonate with relativism. If you make a claim that the earth is flat because your culture and religion tells you that, that does not mean it is factual. If the Mormon church tells you that certain underwear has magical protective powers or Christianity tells you that human sacrifice (Jesus') is sometimes effective, that does not mean those claims are true just because you believe them. If you think green people are relativistic, try telling them that social justice ideology is just their subjective opinion that does not need to be accepted by everyone and see what happens. Wouldnt that fall in the category of hypocrisy? What Im saying is that I have never heard him make a factual claim that is false. Can you point a claim by JP, by quoting him directly, that is false?

@Emerald I agree that 95% is good advice for living and 5% is poor advice but isnt that pretty much true of anyone that espouses ideology? Is stating that men and women are generally different a false statement? Rather than making claims about what he wants or what his motives are, what claim exactly has he made that are false? I have never seen a direct argument against the claims he has made; they seem to always be against the assumed shoulds and shouldnts those claims are interpreted to imply. Can you point a claim by JP, by quoting him directly, that is false?

@Leo Gura Regarding video 1 - The claims that I hear him making are: 1. Females can do things to their appearance which makes them more sexually attractive to males. 2. Males pursue females more aggressively if they are sexually attracted. The implication to that is that if women are less sexually attractive, they will be less aggressively pursued. If we ignore the shoulds and shouldnts of whether women should be able to dress however they want, is the statement correct? Males that belong to other ape species pursue females more aggressively if they find them more desirable. Is there any reason to believe that is not true with humans? Regarding your statement of men trimming their nose hair - if men would be more aggressively pursued sexually by women because their nose hairs are trimmed, I think more men would trim their nose hair because being aggressively pursued means something different to most men than most women. (Another unpopular claim by JP seems to be that men and women are different.) Regarding video 2 - His main points are that a) universities lean to the radical left side and b) that social justice ideology and radical left intolerance tends to influence students that attend the school. 1. Is it a true statement that ideology tends to be contagious within the in-group of institutions? Conversely, wouldnt it be true to say that someone would be more likely to be radical right if their in-group were evangelicals from Mississippi? 2. Wouldnt it be fair to state that the extreme social justice ideology of green is undesirable without necessarily justifying the regressive ideology of orange?

@Serotoninluv To "demonize" is to attribute motivation. Lets go beyond our assumptions about his motivations. Im not saying he has not made factually incorrect claims. What Im saying is that all Ive seen is a strong green ideological reaction against his claims based on shoulds and shouldnts and Ive never heard him make a false claim. My question is this - what claims exactly has he made that are factually incorrect?

@Elton Porn can have serious ramifications on ones sexual health in the way you described. Stop porn and limit masturbation to only once every 2-3 days and you'll be fine.

Side note on Peterson - Green stage people dont like Peterson but I have never seen/heard anyone actually point out a specific claim that they dont like. Its always something like, "He is a misogynist", etc. It seems people dont like things like men and women are different pointed out. I have never heard him say anything specific that I thought was unreasonable. Can someone that doesnt agree with Peterson identify something specific that is unreasonable? I would self identify with yellow or turquoise so I can see pros and cons with both orange and green.

@Ingit Who says they're "bad" and what evidence would you use to support the claim that they bring about negative consequences? Nietzsche talked about master morality and slave morality. One of the hallmarks of slave morality is that one is told what to think is "bad" or "good" by the culture they grow up in without any basis for the claims. When people take psychedelics, it opens their mind and they think for themselves. Cultural and religious conditioning lose their power. Why would your society want to get rid of that?

@Seed The reason we meditate is to train ourselves to be present without the filter of the ego. You cannot be totally present in the moment and still worry and feel bad. Live your life in the present moment and focus on love and beauty as your highest values.

@herghly If they were real, why isnt there empirical evidence? It would be very easy to test it. Here is a "psychic" that explains how he tricked a bunch of scientists in the lab into believing he had real powers -

Humans are hardwired to produce certain thoughts and emotions from external stimuli. Similar to Chimpanzees and many other apes, humans are wired for "mate guarding", which leads to old fashioned jealousy. If you are going to tell your potential mate things which would trigger those responses, why would you do that? That is like dumping a pile of shit on their plate and telling them that they now have to figure out how to clean it up for themselves. There is a time to be proactively honest and there is a time to let it go and wisdom to know the difference. What would disclosure have to do with the present moment? Would telling them cause them suffering? Would not telling them cause them suffering? I think this is where radical honesty is used in irresponsible and destructive ways. Forget about shoulds and should nots and watch Leo's video on moralizing.

@MM1988 Why would you have low "self" esteem? The answer is always an analysis of the self vs others. This comparison, in itself, is low consciousness. Low self esteem is caused by not accepting (aversion) the totality of the strengths and weaknesses of yourself. Not accepting is another way of saying aversion. Grasping and aversion are the two sources of suffering. Developing higher consciousness is about letting go of grasping and aversion.

@Ampresus If he is happy all the time for no reason, he may be closer to enlightenment than most of the people in this forum. Remember, enlightenment is not about what you gain, it is about what you lose. He may have less mental constructs of self vs other than what most "normal" people have.

"I thought this path was to train your brain to be able to live in uncertainty and not to seek answers. Even in Dark Night I try not go after thoughts and settle in the moment as an observer." @SoonHei Specifically, you need to see through the illusion related to impermanence, nothing satisfies and no self. This is done with Vipassana meditation to produce insight to see through the illusions. Concentration meditation/Samatha will not produce insight to see through the illusions. Seeing through some of the illusions while not seeing that there is no self to actually suffer causes more disturbing emotions and feelings than if you had never seen through any of the illusions. You have part of the paradigm. You need the rest of the paradigm so you arent stuck in no mans land.

@Buba Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha is a book that talks about how to get through the dark night. There are insights that are needed to get to the next stage, which takes more meditating and contemplating. I went through my first dark night stage about a year ago. I finally realized if nothing objectively matters, my own suffering didnt matter. I completely accepted my suffering and applied equanimity to negative thoughts/emotions that arose. When I did this, a freedom and peace blossomed in me that was far beyond anything I had ever experienced. Who is suffering? Why does it matter? Contemplate that very carefully. What is the purpose of life? To embody love, beauty, truth and to be present. Accept your "suffering" and focus on chasing those 4 things. How can you just reverse out of the dark night and forget the whole thing? You cant because once you see the truth, you cant unsee it. The only path to peace is forward once you have had an initial awakening. That is why people should be careful about the choice to start meditating. Once you make it past the dark night though, you would never want to go back to "normal". Saying that you dont want to progress because you dont want to lose the ego is like a 5 year old saying they dont want to grow up because they cant play with their legos anymore. You can still play with your legos as an adult....you just may be interested in other things more. Also, see - https://alohadharma.com/2011/06/12/the-dark-night/

@8Ball Porn isnt "bad" but too much can have the effect you describe. This is why I dont masturbate/watch porn within 1-2 days of me going out with a female. If it was still a problem, I would take a longer break. If you watch a lot of porn, you may take a longer break to re sensitize you to non-porn sexual stimuli. Take a break from porn and masturbation for awhile and try the brothel again. Dont listen to people that tell you that you should wait for a woman you love. Right now, you've made it a big deal in your mind so it will be awkward. Get your virginity out of the way. It will make it so its not such a big deal in your mind and will go smoother when you finally find a girl you like. If you are still nervous after having success at a brothel, go once or twice more and it will be much easier and smoother after that.

@riplo My GF really likes Kyle Cease. Also, Adyashanti is one of my favorite spiritual teachers. He focuses on the awakening of the heart as well as an awakening of the intellect. My background was as a successful businessman with the typical hardness/coldness that comes with that. The awakening of the heart was critical for me. I had already had an awakening of the intellect several years ago but I found the awakening had a "dry" aspect to it that left it wanting as Adyashanti describes in his talks.

Yes, a brain was bleeding and was not working to form memories of awareness. I didnt dispute that. Please explain what the proves and explain your how you arrived at that conclusion epistemologically.

In your worldview, Aristotle and the rest of the so called "experts" that disagree with you are fools and your epistemology is above debate. Sounds like you have it all figured out

“The greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor; it is the one thing that cannot be learnt from others; and it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive perception of the similarity in the dissimilar.” - Aristotle I guess you and Aristotle will have to agree to disagree Also, you keep wanting to refer back to the original thought experiment when people are pointing out gaps in your epistemology. Its similar to conspiracy theorists touting "evidence" to support their claims. Some people would say that the fact that Hillary Clinton knew people that didnt like her that also died is proof she is a mass murderer. The epistemology is the problem. Also, it would seem that you dont like a paradox. That would be a problem if paradoxes exist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_paradoxes

@Emanyalpsid "Who" is unconscious? Please define what you mean by "I" very carefully. Dont just gloss over it like it is an obvious assumption that needs no substantiation. When you are in a deep sleep, sometimes you remember a dream...sometimes you dont. You keep equating memory with consciousness by assuming if there is no memory, consciousness ceases to exist. This is built on the foundational assumption/belief that consciousness is created by the physical brain. It is also built upon belief that every distinct creation of an illusory self is associated with a distinct and separate consciousness. If you could prove that was true, I would believe you

@Emanyalpsid You are assuming I dont understand your perspective so you keep repeating your arguments. I understand your perspective very well since it was my perspective for 46 years. You are insistent that anyone that doesnt agree with you is simply forming beliefs based on what they are told. That claim, like many of the others you make, cannot be substantiated. You do not know how I formed my beliefs (because you cannot know) yet it is still a belief you hold in your mind. You are drawing your conclusions because they reconcile with the foundational assumptions you have about how the world works. Those assumptions, which I used to have, I found to be incorrect. Until you look at those assumptions more carefully, your conclusions will always be the same and you will view anyone that disagrees as being incorrect.

@Emanyalpsid Saying you can measure the "energy" in ones head to quantify consciousness is like saying you can study the electricity powering a TV to quantify the signal the TV receives. If you unplug the TV, does the TV signal still exist? Your argument that you cannot remember being conscious during a coma, therefore consciousness no longer existed, is equating memory with consciousness and is attempting to give consciousness attributes with no foundation to support the claim. I understand that your perspective makes sense in terms of dualism. Investigate dualism further and you'll see it collapses.

@seeking_brilliance That is a question of epistemology. How do you know anything? How do you know China exists? Have you been there? How do you know there are other galaxies? How do you know the elements form molecules? How do you know that a Mormon's magic underwear doesnt actually protect them? How do you know human sacrifice isnt effective (Jesus'). How do you know cannibalism doesnt have some spiritual benefit (catholic sacrament turning into human flesh and blood)? You cant know anything for sure other than you are having a conscious subjective experience. Other than that, consider Russell's teapot and Occam's Razor and think in terms of probability. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam's_razor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell's_teapot

When you use the word "you", what are you referring to? You have to define "you" before you can determine if the "you" is bounded or not. Can you name anything your consciousness creates? Consciousness doesnt do anything...it is simply aware of the images, symbols and thoughts produced and interpreted by the physical brain. You also creating boundaries in your claim that the chicken created the egg. Is there a precise moment in which it went from non-egg to egg? Isnt whatever is responsible for creating the chicken also responsible for creating the egg? You have infinite regress. I see where you are trying to take the argument but it is built on dualistic assumptions. If those assumptions where objectively correct, your argument would be correct. The foundation upon which those assumptions are built is where this debate lies. These questions are similar to Zen Koans where the only correct answer is a paradox that cannot be logically understood within a dualistic perspective.

@Emanyalpsid Did "you" touch the egg? Is your hand "you"? If your hand isnt "you", how did "you" touch the egg? Is your body separate and distinct from the environment it is in? Are your lungs separate and distinct from your body? Are the cells in your lungs separate and distinct from your lungs? Molecules/cells? Atoms/molecules? There is no such thing as boundaries other than where you want to subjectively and arbitrarily draw them. Are you separate from the egg? Who determines the boundaries? If this seems like mere semantics, it is because assumptions can run deep.