I have a highly specific question that's been on my mind. Hopefully someone here might have some interesting input. I am not a materialist and I am inclined to believe in the reality of rebirth, mind beyond death (or more pointedly, beyond the physical body). I am compelled to think this way based on both philosophical reasoning and personal experiences. But I've kind of got hung up on a certain question and thought experiment involving blindness. In short, blindness has physical causes. Beyond merely the eyes not working, people who are born blind do not have a functioning visual cortex, it seems, and are incapable of having visions, whether in dreams or within the experience of their third eye; since they never got a chance to physically see, they have not had the chance to know what seeing means.
This creates a potential puzzle for those of us who believe in having experiences beyond the physical body, of past lives, or of the opening of the third eye. These experiences often involve the sense of vision, whether one is talking about "the clear light" of awareness or of visions of past lives, etc. If this is true, why is it then that people with certain physical disabilities are unable to access or experience this? If the visions of the third eye are nonphysical, why is there no chance of a blind person experiencing visions within that level of consciousness? (Or is there?) One can generalize from this and ask about any sort of physical limitation of involving cognition, perception, or intuition.
I'm aware that this is a complex question to ask. There is perhaps no purely formal logical conundrum involved, but I hope the reader can get the gist of what I'm inquiring about.
Thanks for reading.
the brain and the bardos, or, blindness and the third eye
Re: the brain and the bardos, or, blindness and the third ey
I guess I can boil it down to this question, really. Why is it that physical limitations (like blindness) often turn out to also be "spiritual limitations" (as in not being able to have vision in one's third eye). Assuming that consciousness is not limited to whats going on in the brain or physical body, why this correlation?
Re: the brain and the bardos, or, blindness and the third ey
Imo, siddhis are generally not a mode of "pure" perception, wherein one just sees other realms directly as they are. Rather, it makes use of the tools already available to consciousness to help "fill in the blanks" so to speak (in much the same way it does so in everyday life really). A visually creative mind is thus more likely to have a more vivid and detailed visual experience than someone less so inclined. And if one has no visual frame of reference at all, I'd imagine the odds are against that person have visual experience of other realms as well.
"Even if my body should be burnt to death in the fires of hell
I would endure it for myriad lifetimes
As your companion in practice"
--- Gandavyuha Sutra
I would endure it for myriad lifetimes
As your companion in practice"
--- Gandavyuha Sutra
Re: the brain and the bardos, or, blindness and the third ey
First of all: How do you know this is the case?skarl wrote:Beyond merely the eyes not working, people who are born blind do not have a functioning visual cortex, it seems, and are incapable of having visions, whether in dreams or within the experience of their third eye;
Secondly: The third eye (in Buddhism) is the eye of wisdom, are you saying that blind people cannot display wisdom and insight because they cannot perceive visual objects?
I think you are also confounding the third eye with the siddhi of divine sight. This requires visual capacity, but not being visually impaired is not enough, you also need a certain level of realisation.
PS Are you aware of the teaching on the precious human rebirth? One of the qualities of a precious human life, is that one has all their faculties intact.
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE
"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE
"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
Re: the brain and the bardos, or, blindness and the third ey
If you're looking for evidence that the physical body is not required for experience, then you probably won't find any. However, at a more subjective level you can examine your experiences and find that 'the physical body', is just another experience. It's anatta, meaning, it's made up from lot's of other smaller experiences that we interpret as a whole existing thing. Non-physical experiences as you call them; dreams, visions, oob, etc. you still have a body, and this body is also anatta.skarl wrote: This creates a potential puzzle for those of us who believe in having experiences beyond the physical body, of past lives, or of the opening of the third eye. These experiences often involve the sense of vision, whether one is talking about "the clear light" of awareness or of visions of past lives, etc. If this is true, why is it then that people with certain physical disabilities are unable to access or experience this? If the visions of the third eye are nonphysical, why is there no chance of a blind person experiencing visions within that level of consciousness? (Or is there?) One can generalize from this and ask about any sort of physical limitation of involving cognition, perception, or intuition.
To put it another way, experiences are like waves on an ocean. We are the ocean, but most of us believe we are the waves.
Thus shall ye think of all this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;
A flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.
- Konchok Namgyal
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Re: the brain and the bardos, or, blindness and the third ey
Thats funny, all of the blind people I know have the ablility to dream, sometime very vivid dreams.....and more than one have been blind since birth.....I think that nullifies your idea.
Recognize that your mind is the unity of being empty and cognizant, suffused with knowing. When your attention is extroverted, you fall under the sway of thoughts. Let your attention recognize itself. Recognize that it is empty. That which recognizes is the cognizance. You can trust at that moment that these two – emptiness and cognizance – are an original unity. Seeing this is called self-knowing wakefulness. ~ Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche