frelkins: There’s a story (which you may know) that Tibet held a debate between Indian Buddhists, who insisted that enlightenment can only be reached after many stages of analysis, and Chinese Buddhists, who said you could get there in one step. The Indians are said to have won the debate, but I was writing with the Chinese side in mind; I was trying to describe the path to nonduality in the most abbreviated way I could. I am aware of Nagarjuna and “codependent origination”, and it may be that it was misleading of me to pass over that aspect. I welcome discussion and correction, though here may not be the place. (There is an unofficial Overcoming Bias forum here. Also, I’ll mail you privately.) But, speaking mostly metaphorically, I favor Shankara over Nagarjuna. I believe in substances, essences, and a self. I think Buddhism is at the opposite extreme of error from the error of eliminative materialism—an all-negating subjectivity, rather than an all-negating objectivity—yet somehow complementary to it, as I suggested.
frelkins: There’s a story (which you may know) that Tibet held a debate between Indian Buddhists, who insisted that enlightenment can only be reached after many stages of analysis, and Chinese Buddhists, who said you could get there in one step. The Indians are said to have won the debate, but I was writing with the Chinese side in mind; I was trying to describe the path to nonduality in the most abbreviated way I could. I am aware of Nagarjuna and “codependent origination”, and it may be that it was misleading of me to pass over that aspect. I welcome discussion and correction, though here may not be the place. (There is an unofficial Overcoming Bias forum here. Also, I’ll mail you privately.) But, speaking mostly metaphorically, I favor Shankara over Nagarjuna. I believe in substances, essences, and a self. I think Buddhism is at the opposite extreme of error from the error of eliminative materialism—an all-negating subjectivity, rather than an all-negating objectivity—yet somehow complementary to it, as I suggested.