parlêtre

Response to Ingram #1

with 6 comments

I have given some thought about how to best reply to Daniel Ingram’s response to my first three blog posts [1] [2] [3]. Given that his reply is quite extensive, I have decided to respond to the points that, in my view, have the most philosophical relevance. Before I do that, let me make a couple of comments.

The reason I chose MCTB1/2 as the basis of my critique is that I found it to be compelling and to have a theoretical sophistication that most contemporary presentations of Theravada-style meditation lack. I certainly don’t regard his work as something to be discounted but, rather, as something to be constructively engaged with. Also, when I wrote my posts, I didn’t realize that I was stumbling into a debate that has a much larger context than I was aware of. I wasn’t, at the time, aware of the extent to which a critique of Mindfulness, as a general phenomenon, has already been mounted. My writing was mostly motivated by my own desire to achieve personal theoretical clarity about the material I have encountered under the umbrella of Pragmatic Dharma.

With that said, let’s proceed.

Daniel: MCTB adopts various theories of mind as needed for very specific technical purposes, holding none of them as absolutes, and explicitly and specifically compares and contrasts a wide range of theories of mind both as a functional demonstration of the utility of being able to utilize many even apparently contradictory theories of mind and also to maintain the meta-perspective that allows us to choose these based on our goals. It also explicitly refers people to works, techniques, books, and other resources that demonstrate and expound on the practical applications of theories of mind not explicitly explained in in MCTB so as to try to avoid these sorts of constraining boxes and thinking found in this critique of MCTB. Again, it is hard to express how frustrating this is without you seeing my actual face, my furrowed brow, my tight lips, and feeling my actual energy in the room.

I would make two points here. First, I think this is where the detail fetish (a term I gather originated from SNB materials) you mentioned may come into play. I am aware that your book presents multiple practices and that it acknowledges caveats throughout. That said, your ongoing appeal to exceptions, each citing specific textual details, does make it incredibly difficult to engage with the general thrust of the work itself. I would be curious to your impression of how the text itself tends to function within practice communities. My sense is that tends to generate subjects in search of stream entry, as defined in your book, through the practice of “moment-to-moment awareness of sensate experience.” I gather this both from my own reading of the book and from (relatively brief) observation of a few practitioners I know as well as from reddit and Dharma Overground forums. Whether I am correct or incorrect about this, that is the object of the critiques that I have written.

The second point is epistemological. What you are endorsing is epistemological relativism. You’re saying that you can put on and take off ‘epistemological lenses’, if I can use that term, as needed for different practices and purposes. While that sounds compelling, you can’t simply adopt a theory of mind “based on your goals” — on the contrary, you need a theory of mind that is true. To put this in philosophical language, if we believe that mind is intersubjectively constituted (i.e., that is our theory of mind), that must in fact still be the case when we are attending to sensate experience moment-by-moment in meditation. To pretend otherwise by adopting a denuded theory of mind simply because it serves our goals would be a mistake, for our sensate experience will be intersubjectively constituted whether we recognize it or not.

To descend from the philosophical clouds for a moment, why does this matter? The practice is often presented as follows: through moment-to-moment awareness of sensate experience, you will discover that all phenomena are marked by the Three Characteristics. That is a conclusion that is only possible if you have implicitly adopted a denuded theory of mind and within an intersubjective context that has already adopted this conclusion as an article of faith. If we adopt an intersubjective theory of mind, it would look more like this: With the Three Characteristics as articles of faith, we will find a specific practice through which to verify those articles of faith. To call that a Wisdom Training, or even Insight Practice, is, I believe, quite misleading. Perhaps it would be more truthful to say that this practice is a religious ritual. [1]

[1] As I was writing this post, Evan Thompson made a very helpful comment to my first point that states these ideas more succinctly and clearly than I have been able to do.

Written by parletre

June 22, 2019 at 3:37 pm

Posted in Uncategorized

6 Responses

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  1. Denuded theories of mind? Or denuded practices?

    Noting practice, for instance, results in a certain focusing of everyday experience that brings into relief the three characteristics. Likewise, the practice of psychoanalysis (one person bears all, whilst another discloses as little as possible and interprets) results in a certain focusing of everyday experience that brings into relief latent / unconscious meaning.

    The practices make “epistemological relativists” of us all, because no one sets forth with a theory of mind that is true, although there is always a discussion to be had about whose theory is more true. Practices create certain kinds of experiences. So if noting practice in this sense is “a religious ritual” (and I see nothing pejorative in that), then psychoanalysis has its own elements of ritual too. What is distinctive is the type of experiences these rituals create and where those lead. The effects of both are described as healing in certain ways. Both lead to an experience of truth, which are different in many respects, and this seems to me far more important than questions about respective theories of mind.

    Duncan

    June 23, 2019 at 10:54 am

  2. The Three Characteristics are not articles of faith. They are hypotheses to be used as tools for investigation.

    zooruins

    June 23, 2019 at 2:23 pm

  3. […] the process of symbolic elaboration that the practice can facilitate. (I have discussed in my previous post concerns about framing vipassana as providing ‘insight’ into reality.) If I […]

  4. Thank you for these posts. The response that they elicited from Daniel Ingram was fascinating.

    In this post, you are at once complaining (via Thompson) that heuristics e.g. 6 sense doors are over-simplifications and then alleging ‘detail fetish’ when a more discursive explanation is given.
    I’m also confused by your insistence on a complete and True Theory of Mind as a prerequisite for practice. Where does there exist a complete and True theory of anything we interested in in philosophy, particularly philosophy of mind (certainly one relying on intersubjectivity is not)?

    Edward

    June 23, 2019 at 5:38 pm

  5. Today, I visited the body of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) the founder of Utilitarianism in the formal philosophical sense (not that people hadn’t had lots of ideas that would clearly be considered Utilitarian before him). It is on display in a glass and wood case in the lobby of University College London. As those who are philosophically inclined will know, Utilitarianism is the philosophy that decisions should be based on what broadly creates the most pleasure and avoids the most pain. While often considered a synonym of Pragmatism in common usage, it is not in the philosophical sense. Pragmatism is concerned with “what works” in the real world regardless of broader ethical, epistemological, or ontological implications. It is not so much concerned with ethics as function. Utilitarianism similarly is not as concerned with epistemological or ontological issues.

    Visiting his tomb, I began to wonder if part of our debate was a Utilitarian vs Pragmatic in some way at its core.

    I get that, by reducing Pragmatic Dharma (note the name) to MCTB, and MCTB to Noting, you hope to then, by stating that Noting can cause some well-known, well-described side-effects that you in particular feel are detrimental to your Pragmatic concerns (might make psychoanalysis more difficult), this then gets extrapolated to a Utilitarian argument that Noting is bad, so MCTB is bad, so PD is bad, as it might have broad effects in society you feel increase the general pain and decrease the general pleasure, particularly filtered through the lens of a practicing psychoanalyst. Woven into that are a whole lot of epistemological and ontological debates, debates that both Pragmatism and Utilitarianism could typically couldn’t care less about, and often actively scoff at.

    Given that the book, nay, the movement, frames itself in Pragmatic terms, going so far as to include that in its name, and given that those who participate in these practices believe that the promised results (at least as promised in MCTB) which the techniques can actually deliver if done well (they can “work”), and, given that the side-effects are well-described (at least in MCTB), i.e the risks, costs and pain involved are all well-described, and, given that those engaging in these efficacious practices are able to make practical decisions about what they wish to do and not do, to criticize this explicitly Pragmatic endeavor in Utilitarian, Epistemological, or Ontological terms seems wildly off base and missing the whole frame, spirit, and ethos of the exercises proposed.

    That everyone should do these practices is also explicitly decried right in the first few pages. Might go back and read the Foreword and Warning, which I believe to be bordering on unique in the world of honest disclosure of how these practices can impact your lives and who should not do them, IMN-HO. I quote from MCTB2, Foreword and Warning:

    “This should be seen as another warning: this book and the path presented in it are not for those who at this time find that they are unstable spiritual seekers. Meditation at the levels I am about to describe requires a baseline mental and material stability; and with respect to the latter, not necessarily wealth or even a 401(k), but ethically acquired requisites such as food and a safe, conducive shelter. You must have your psychological trip very together to be able to handle and integrate the intense techniques, side effects, and results I am about to discuss. In this book, I will explain in detail what is meant by “have your psychological trip very together”, with the key requisite skills being an ability to identify difficult mind states when they arise and handle them with kindness and aplomb. Luckily these are learnable skill sets.

    There are plenty of gentle techniques and schools of practice available for people for whom it would be more skillful and constructive to apply those techniques. There are also many skillful healing modalities available today to help those who need to heal psychological trauma or clear up barriers to more intense practice. If you need those, you are highly encouraged to do that crucial work first. Many of the techniques and doses recommended in this book are for those who already have a solid platform of mental health and are willing to accept the risks inherent in intensive training.

    Stated much more explicitly: people who do strong and intensive practice can hurt themselves and freak out. Just as serious athletes can hurt their bodies when they take a misstep or push themselves beyond their limits, just so serious mental athletes can strain their minds, brains, and nervous systems, and strained brains can sometimes function in very strange ways. To rewrite the operating system rapidly while it is running doesn’t always go so well in the short term or occasionally in the long term. Thus, while I will include nearly endless exhortations to find the depths of power and clarity that you are capable of, I will also add numerous warnings about how to keep from frying yourself.

    By “frying yourself”, I mean explicitly severe mood instability and psychotic episodes, as well as other odd biological and energetic disturbances, with some practitioners occasionally ending up in inpatient psychiatric facilities for various periods of time. Exactly how much of this is nature (their own “inherent wiring” and potential for mental pathology), how much of it is nurture (practicing hardcore meditation techniques in high doses such as those presented here), and how much is related to other unidentified factors is a question that is still being worked out, just so that you are not in any way uninformed about the still-developing state of modern science as it applies to the art of intensive meditation.

    Some who have read this book apparently have only noticed the former message, that being to find the depths of power and resolution you are capable of (a message put in to counterbalance a culture full of people who are underutilizing or not recognizing their inherent potential), and they missed the parts that discuss how and when to back off, a message found in numerous places in this book, much to their chicken-fried detriment. Hopefully putting this here right up front will again help people to hear both messages and find the balance between the two that works, as I am a firm believer in people being informed not only of the benefits but also of the risks so that they can make informed decisions and practice accordingly. You wouldn’t want to do power lifting without proper training, spotting, and technique, nor run marathons without lots of careful training, stretching, hydration, great nutrition, and the like: same with hardcore meditation practice. You also would be naive to imagine that you can push your body to its limits without risk: same with your brain and hardcore meditation practice.”

    Seriously, isn’t that enough? How much more intense and up front should the warning be made? Name another dharma book that has gone this far and on some of the very first pages in the book. I am really not happy about the implications that consenting adults given such explicit warnings should be relieved of the responsibility of theory own choices and that you should try to blame this on me and these techniques.

    How about talk about people who apparently can’t read or understand words that straightforward who take these risks and run unfortunately into some of the likely and expected consequences? Are you willing to consider discussing something of what causes people who make decisions that I would also consider rash? If they are going to you for psychoanalysis, do you think they are the sort of people I think should be trying to gain stream entry and beyond?

    Are you also the type of person that would ban mountain climbing, repelling, sky diving, SCUBA diving (all of which I have done) and the like to protect adults from themselves and the lure of adventure? Or, would you blame people who write books about those topics for the injuries of people who explicitly fail to heed the warnings in those books?

    danielmingram

    June 28, 2019 at 8:09 pm

  6. I hardly think that anyone is likely to argue for mountain climbing, repelling, sky diving, and the like specifically in Utilitarian terms beyond the typical Utilitarian arguments for freedom and equality, but individuals may decide Pragmatically to engage in those sports as they personally value the experiences they give them and are willing to accept the risks and costs involved.

    danielmingram

    June 28, 2019 at 8:13 pm


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