Enduring Self?
The search for an enduring self continues just as it did in ancient times. The fight between philosophers and sects about it continues unabated. Some testify about a self while others say that any such target is an illusion. And yet others say that there is a self which is a non-self ultimately. Who is correct?
As for the self being a physical body, that idea is verification that the physical body self is non-enduring, short range, perishable. The most we may get from regarding the self as a physical system is that it is recycled but only through the process of decomposition. That means that if any new self which is constructed biologically cannot be the identical with an old self whose decomposed parts were composted in the manufacture of the new self.
- Consider this:
One should first determine if the enduring self has to be perpetually objective. Does it?
Can it be an enduring self which is sometimes objective and sometimes subjective without itself controlling the length of those opposing phases of consciousness?
How would an enduring self which is objective/subjective verify itself as being a perpetual reality?
Does something have to be perpetually self-objective to be real?
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There exists relative reality for the assessing apparatus of said reality.
That aspect of this compounded self is not perpetual,
But it is the platform for the concerned and enduring self to be in and out of self-objectivity, as another form of experience.
The degree, extend and possibility of the transitioning into or accessing of such state relies on the grade of self, itself.
Then, I would say that the enduring self needs to develop self-awareness
Or accesse pre and readily available levels of awareness of self.
This capacity is normally elusive, evasive until pointed to from expertise.
Still the self is undeniable as long as it is in existence.
This would be the case whether the selves are in experiential connection with a relative reality or the ultimate reality or not.
Hello Michael. . .The question of the existence of a Self becomes philosophical, is a mental musing, to those who have not experienced the Absence of Objectivity.
All Objectivity is phenomenal, is illusion. illusion and appearance are all objective and are nothing more than thought-forms. The prime thought is the "I"-thought, without which other thoughts cannot exist for IT is their Source and raison-d'etre.
When one seeks the reality of this "I"-thought (Self, Ego, "I"-Concept, Subject, etc.) through invoking Self-Enquiry, he notices that such an "I"-thought resolves into its Source, which is called, "Universal Consciousness" and which is cognized as the non-verbal sense of Presence or "Pure" Being, "Pure" because bereft of Objectivity, and unfortunately called, "Subjectivity." It is this condition, here and now, that is referred to as "Self."
Sadly though, if this state of Consciousness is called "Subjectivity," it loses its subjective quality because "Subjectivity" is a noun and therefore does not describe its non-objective character. So, it would be happier, one muses, if "Non-Objectivity" is used in lieu of "Subjectivity?" And "Non-Objectivity" cannot cognize "Non-Objectivity."