A Skillful Morality

I say it is impossible for society to come to a consensus on the behaviors they want to label wrong, because the concept of wrong is a mental fabrication, is thus conditional, a changes every time the conditions change. Since everybody's individual conditions are different, everybody has a different opinion of wrong => consensus impossible.
Besides, punishment doesn't work. All that leads to is everybody trying to cheat the system. And you define stealing as wrong based on what?Anyways, I repeat, punishment doesn't work. Just look at alcohol prohibition and Al Capone, or currently, drug traffickers for quick easy examples. Yep, it is. That is why monks live only on what people decide to offer them in alms rounds every morning.
But you don't have to avoid immorality at all costs.
I wouldn't beat myself over it, or feel bad about it. Nobody is judging me, and because the action doesn't delay my release from suffering that much, I refuse to be that hard on myself.
So I would go on and take the orange and eat it (assuming of course the intention is nourishment and not gluttony). Right. Sorry and thanks for clarifying. It is written 'inmoral' in spanish, my native tongue, so I overlooked it. I agree that it is inmoral. I still masturbate and have lots of sex, and do many other immoral things. I don't avoid immorality at all costs. This is why this morality requieres skill. You have to determine if the immoral act is worth the consequences or not.
I didn't get the 'ultimate' part though. I was clear on this. I said: 'Almost everything we experience in this life is a fabrication of our mind....
Not everything in the world is mind created obviously. For example, we did not create the physical objects (stars, planets, other beings and their actions, etc.).I described a way to end mental suffering, not physical pain. The pain is just a sensation. Parting from this sensation the mind compounds the suffering by determining: "'I' am suffering, poor me, the guy that hit me is an asshole, I am now going to hit him harder in revenge, etc.,etc."
Buddhism claims to know how to end even physical suffering. See message 30 to Prototypical for more on this, and my view on it. Don't worry, I know the suffering created in this case is difficult to understand. It took me a lot of practice, time and patience. The "whole lot of explaining stuff" by me is probably fruitless. I lack the ability to explain it clearly. You must see for yourself.
Its like I said, this only applies IF you are interested in attaining deep happiness. IF you are interested in deep happiness, then you will have to do the practice which leads to you understanding how suffering is a byproduct. IQ and conceptual thought only get you so far.
I know everybody is interested in a deeper happiness. But, I also know that the intensity of that interest is not strong enough to motivate most people out of their laziness and into the practice.

And yet we still have laws against stealing. By the way, a consensus doesn't require every single individual to agree. It doesn't need to be based on anything if its simply defined as such. I said it doesn't matter if it really is truely wrong or not, through a consensus society has decided to label stealing as wrong and make laws against it. No it doesn't. Everybody isn't trying to steal from Wal*Mart. Hell, they'll even let you do your own check-out. That one punishment fails does not mean that none of them will work. Don't you think that if stealing was decriminalized, then there would be an increase in the amount of theft from Wal*Mart? Doesn't that prove that the laws against it do prevent some of it?Obviously not everyone is going to follow the laws, but to say they don't do anything isn't correct. Yeah, then I wholly reject this system as a way of determining morality. There is nothing wrong with grabbing an orange from your tree and eating it. Then there's no way it should be considered immoral. If your system defines this as immoral, then that a problem with the system. Meh, it just doesn't seem worth it to me. The monk might claim that I'll be so much happier if I don't eat that orange, but I don't believe it. Besides, I'm hungry. You not being able to explain it and me having to see it for myself have an aweful lot in common with things that are wrong and don't exist. But I don'thave any reason to believe that.

I never said we should not have laws. And yes, I misinterpreted the meaning of consensus, pardon me. I never said laws don't do anything, nor that we should not have them. I said that we can't determine what right and wrong really are, and therefore no law or moral system based on these will ever be perfect, and suggested a different moral system. I have no problem with this and neither does the moral system in question. You can do as you wish, as always. You define what you think is wrong.
BUT you are denying yourself a greater deeper happiness. The fact that you are not familiar with this type of happiness does not mean it does not exist. Or maybe you are familiar with deep happiness, but you associate it with a god concept? (your name suggests you believe in god) I don't see the problem with the system. Can you make it clear please? I have no problem with this either. If it is not worth it to you, then so be it. It is up to you. Your abilities (skill) to understand our world and the consequences of your actions are guiding your decision that 'it is not worth it'. Whether you are wrong or right about this, it only affects you. You don't have to believe the monk or anybody, in fact I encourage this type of reasoning. Don't take anybody's word for it, or the word of any book or prophet, find out for yourself!
YOU are the one that experiences your suffering, not the monk.
I'm skeptical by nature. I was raised a catholic, but I rejected all teachings that I could not prove for myself, or that at least made any sense. At first I didn't believe eating the orange led to suffering either, just like you. But I gave the practice a try, and confirmed that what the monk said was true.
By the way, I know nothing of buddhist tradition, what the images or rites mean, nothing. I only know that ending our mental suffering is possible, that it requires you to understand morality and that you don't have to die to find out how.
But I repeat, don't take anybody's word for it, prove it with your own experience! Don't deny yourself supreme happiness! Your actions are irrelevant to me. They don't affect my suffering. So, go ahead and eat the orange, and do anything else you want. I have seen people murder because they were hungry, and I have no problem with them either. I am not judging, patronizing or telling other people what they should and should not do. I just said there is no right and wrong if you are not interested in ending your suffering. I don't see the wrong part.
Me not being able to explain it, is due to my ineptitude, I am sorry.
I understand the semblance with things that don't exist, as in: there is a god, you just have to see for yourself!But that is the only similitude. There are bounteous differences. I only need to mention one:
In the case of understanding the origin of suffering, you can prove it with your experience, and you can prove it using the scientific method of obtaining knowledge (I hope the scientific part of your name is enticed by this). You can design repeatable experiments, define your dependent and independent variables, change and adjust the controllable factors ALL you like, observe their influence on the non-controllable factors, observe the results, draw conclusions. And you can repeat the experience an infinite amount of times and compare results. You can even apply some statistical principles. I agree.
I consider that believing anything out of blind faith for an indefinite interval is a waste of time, I do not encourage it. I encourage investigation.Hey, maybe next time instead of stealing, we can consider telling a white lie. I don't know if that one is moral or not!I hope I have been skillfull in helping you see suffering. Edited by Sombra, : No reason given.

This also has a lot in common with things like math as well. You could likely make the same claim to me if you were trying to explain some element of quantum mechanics.I may be off the mark but I think Leonard Cohen said something like what Sombra is saying when he said,'You are locked into your suffering and your pleasures are the seal.'

Great analogy, I love it. Edited by Sombra, : No reason given.

The glutton who is stuffing his face full of KripyKreme doughnuts is not hurting anybody, he thinks he is not hurting himself. Even if he doesn't understand how he is getting fat and hurting himself, the fact remains that he is hurting himself.
I don't know what you moral system is, but I suppose you consider gluttony immoral?How is this different from the orange tree example? Just because you don't understand how, does not mean that you aren't creating suffering for yourself.

All of the suffering takes place in the mind. What is the essential difference between hitting my thumb with a hammer and weeping for the loss of a loved one? I don't understand what it means to say that I have a body because of my actions. Why do you separate the two? Without the body there is no stimuli. There is no useful distinction, in this context, between my ear and the auditory processing center in my brain.

The mind is not a place. Can you tell me where the mind is? Is it in the brain? Or in the heart?
What you mean is suffering occurs through the mind. And if you consider physical pain a type of suffering (which I do) then I disagree that all suffering takes place through the mind. Physical pain occurs through the body, not the mind. The mind is aware or conscious of the physical pain, but it does not occur through the mind. Not an essential difference. It is an operational difference. They use different 'mechanisms' or processes to produce their corresponding effect of suffering.
We only separate them into different types for the purpose of studying and understanding them. I don't fully understand it either. I am currently investigating what it means.
I said that buddhism claims that this is so, it is not my claim. I merely tried to give my current understanding/opinion of it. I separate body and mind because they are governed by different processes, for study, for understanding and doing something about suffering.
The 'laws' under which body and mind operate are different. For example, the body works under the influence of time and gravity, the mind is not affected by gravity and experiences time in a different manner..
In medicine the body is separated into different systems for the same reason. The nervous system is different from the circulatory system so we separate the two for the purpose of study, understanding and doing something about pain.
You can consider them separately as 'systems', or you can consider them as one and interpret it as a 'person'. It is also possible to not separate the body from the rest of planet Earth, and study it under these conditions, for example. Are you sure about this?
There are many examples where you receiving stimuli without the body is evident. Coma, meditation and near death experiences are some.
But it is easier to consider dreams. You are not receiving stimuli through the body. You are receiving them through the mind, no body necessary. You receive stimuli, and there is also a response. For evidence of this, check your trousers after a wet dream.Edited by Sombra, : No reason given.

It seems to me you have an aversion to suffering, if this is true it is most unskillful.Who is greedy the man who provides all he needs or the one who does not and looks for the help of others? When did you become a sentient Being?
Can you tell me 50 things that happened to you in the first four years of your life and how they affected you?
Can you tell me of your birth, what was it like being born?
Can you tell me about the last time you died?Who is ignorant and who is wise, the man who can answer the above questions or the one who can not? Being ignorant is most unskillful. The answer you seek is in your own subconscious mind/memory. It is part of this universe, why don't you look there? And, you are not the Universe and you are not God...but you can know about them.Edited by petrophysics1, : typo

Hi petrophysics1 Yes I do, and it is most unskillful. I currently work to end this condition. If you have any suggestions as to how to do so, I'm all ears.
I have found most other humans beings suffer this same condition, and they have no idea how to solve it. I know because I have asked them. Both or neither, it depends on the prevailing conditions and your frame of reference. I don't know. Maybe, but it would take a lot of time and work to find out. I have other things to do right now. I have a 'normal' life (job, wife, etc.) which takes time, and I also work on solving the problem of suffering. I see no benefit in finding out 50 things from infancy at this present moment. No, I don't remember. I assume you mean the last time my physical body stopped funtioning.
First, I don't know if that even happened.
Second, no I can't tell you, because if it did, I don't remember.By the way, what was the purpose of the previous four questions? Did you think I'm all-knowing or something? My opinion is that if someone can answer the previous questions he is probably wise, but not necessarily.
The person who cannot answer them is ignorant of the answers to these specific questions, but I have no grounds to call him an ignorant person. I am definitely looking there, and will continue to do so. Thanks for the encouragement. I completely agree.

quote:

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'You are locked into your suffering and your pleasures are the seal.'

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HallllllahhhhhhluuuuuuuuuuuYYYYYyyyyaaa!!!!
Halll-Leeeeahhh-LoooooOOoYaah!!
Halll-Lay-LooOoo-OhhooooYyyah! Love me some Leonard Cohen

Yeah, you have. Don't get me wrong; I may be coming off as particularly combative, but that's because this is a debate site and we come here to argue.

Sounds like some new-age hippy bullshit to me, but what do i know...

I called serious B.S. too, first time I heard buddhism say "the end of all suffering".
Second time, I looked closer and stretching my imagination it kinda made sense.
By the way, its not 'new-age' hippy, buddhism is almost 2600 years old, older than christianity and islam for example, and much older than hippies. No worries, I came here to argue too!
I just got sidetracked explaining some opinions and buddhist concepts that became relevant to the discussion.What I wanted to argue was the following:We know the origin of suffering.
But we don't know the origin of the physical universe, or the mechanisms by which it operates. We don't know the origin of the mechanisms of thought processes that give rise to our mental experience, either.I cannot completely discard the option of a creator god. But the ones that hold that a creator god is the origin of the physical universe say that this same god is the origin of everything.
I disagree, of course, because said god is not the origin of our mental experience, nor suffering, our deluded mind is.
Besides, the ones that hold to views of creator gods don't know the origin of suffering, which makes the possibility of them knowing the origin of the physical universe highly unlikely.Also, this all started because I had a question for creationists:Who created the creator?

No I mean in the mind which I would not distinguish from the brain in this context. It is the mind that perceives the suffering. The suffering occurs there, in that place or in that machine. The pain only exists because the mind is aware of it. The pain is a tool or mechanism that the mind uses to protect itself. Suffering is the mind's response to stimuli that it has evolved to avoid. Without the mind there is no pain. Dreams are like echoes and without the original input from the body there would be no echo.As far as I know, the brain can only receive information from the senses. As we grow and learn the information is categorized and patterns are developed. From there we begin to make predictions and we verify those predictions with more sensory input. So we can predict the existence of new information in the mind by the process of inference and deduction but it is all built on the original sensory input and must be verified by the senses.I guess that my point with all of this is that our awareness is wholly dependant on our body/brain system and that there is no awareness without it.So how does all this impact morality and the determination of skilful and unskilful actions or thoughts?I think that it shines a light on what our motivations are and where they come from. The realization that too much pleasure will generate suffering is similar to realizing that by giving to others we actually gain something. Perhaps counter intuitive but verified by the senses to be true.My real interest is in the idea of suppressing the ego or the 'me' and how far to take the idea. One of the foundational elements of survival is the notion of 'me' and that I deserve to exist. In a world of scarcity this requires that I assert myself and that I fight against others who would use the same resources. This seems to be a natural state and suppressing the ego is somewhat unnatural. However, I can certainly see how the ego can bring lots of unnecessary suffering and that more is not always better.In the end though, everything is based on the idea of 'me'. Right or wrong, skillful or not. Good and bad. It is all determined by your concept of you. Society and morality only work because what is good for me is also probably good for you.