All Episodes
Previous Next
July 13, 2019 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
26:28
Criticism: The Truth About Dalai Lama
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
Tracy wrote in and said, given the truth about the Dalai Lama show, is it just the one so-called Buddhist, the Dalai Lama, or other specific Buddhists that Stefan finds fault with?
Or is it Buddhism in general?
If he has objections to Buddhism generally, restricting the discussion to the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path, which he mentioned in the podcast, and is the heart of Buddhism, what specifically does he object to?
Hello, Tracy.
Hello, Stefan.
How are you doing?
I'm well.
How are you doing?
Good.
I just wanted to mention that no one told me that it was the old abused gifted guy show tonight.
Oh dear.
Tell me more.
No, I'm good with that.
So we can answer the question then.
All right.
Let's assume that you are okay with that and we're not going to come back to it.
Your question is, do I have any specific objections, or what are my specific objections to Buddhism?
Well, are there objections to Buddhism, or is it just the Dalai Lama that you're, you know, basically upset with or criticizing?
You have a pretty manipulative use of language, if you don't mind me saying so.
I could be wrong.
Okay, I'm willing to hear that.
Go ahead.
Yeah, just because you're sort of personalizing my objections.
You know, you have a problem with, or you have a criticism of, or it's just this individual you basically don't like and all that.
But this is a show about philosophy, right?
So, it's not a question of what I like or don't like.
The question is, are the metaphysical, epistemological, ethical propositions put forward in a rational, testable, empirical manner?
Okay, fair enough.
Can I change my question a little bit then?
Yeah.
So, correct me if I'm wrong, it seemed to me that the show about the Dalai Lama was pointing out failures in his morality.
Would that be a fair statement?
Well, it was a show on many layers.
Okay.
I certainly did talk about the challenges of Buddhism.
Buddhism is not a philosophy.
A philosophy isn't just things that work for you in your life or larger principles that you can subjugate yourself to or self-mastery or even self-knowledge.
This is not philosophical principles.
You know, a beaver can build a dam that stands.
That doesn't make the beaver an engineer or a scientist, right?
So it's not, you know, structures that things live in.
It's a bird's nest.
It doesn't mean that you're an architect.
I actually agree with you on that point.
principles, the fact that there are arguments that are put forward and so on, there's nothing to do with philosophy.
So my major criticism is that people think that it's a philosophy, but it's not.
I actually agree with you on that point.
It is a practice or it is a methodology.
No, it's not a methodology.
It's a series of irrational assertions.
Okay, which one is it?
With positive sounding adjectives that are put forward to make people feel warm and cozy and subjugate themselves to a priestly class that fastens itself like a vampire bat on the jugular of the hard-working people of Tibet and other places.
So it's not a methodology.
A methodology is something that is falsifiable and reproducible and like scientific method, that's a methodology.
But I don't see how making assertions like for instance that there's an essence of life that survives birth and is reincarnated.
I mean that is an astounding assertion to make and there's no proof for it whatsoever and no evidence for it whatsoever and it's made with the utmost confidence.
And that's why it is not in the Four Noble Truths or the Eightfold Path, which is the heart of Buddhism.
And I think that you could pretty much ignore the whole reincarnation thing because it's not a present moment sort of thing you can do anything about.
It's just speculative and not really very useful in order to try to make your mind happier.
So let's do the Four Noble Truths.
Okay.
Okay.
The truth of suffering.
So is that the argument that everything which is alive experiences suffering?
Well, I think it's a little... Let me put my take on this.
Suffering is... Wait, wait.
No, no.
Already, we're not in the realm of philosophy anymore.
Your take on it?
What does that mean?
Well, I wouldn't describe it the way you did.
I would say that suffering is something that you can see directly in your own mind if it exists at this moment.
So it's not something you have to speculate about.
So like the soul, for example, would be something that you would need to speculate about.
But at this very moment, we can look in our own minds and we can determine if there is suffering and how much there is, or what is the cause of it as well.
Okay, so I'm not sure how the fact that human beings suffer is a noble truth.
I mean, I think it's factual, sure.
I stub my toe, I'm suffering.
I mean, I'm anxious, I'm suffering and so on, right?
Okay, but you would agree then that that first noble truth is certainly a truth.
Yes, it is a true statement to say that human beings can suffer and do suffer.
Probably animals, but we can also look at it directly.
It's a directly observable empirical fact, as opposed to a soul, for example, which is not.
It's really an observation, because it's a principle.
It's like saying human beings are mammals, and that's the essence of my philosophy.
It's like, well, it may be true, but it's not a principle.
It's not a universalization thing, right?
Human beings don't all suffer all the time, and certainly don't all suffer all the time for the same reasons, right?
Yes, they do.
That's the second novel truth.
Everyone suffers because of craving and clinging.
That is the cause of suffering.
All right.
So if I stub my toe, I'm suffering.
And I don't mean to trivialize it.
I'm just trying to understand the bounds of the theory.
So if I stub my toe, I'm suffering.
Is it not the damage to my toe and my nerve endings that are causing my suffering?
Well, that's excellent.
I'm actually glad you went to that one because that's one of the harder questions to answer in terms of this particular concept.
Let me just sort of describe it this way.
A significant component of pain, I think you could probably say 80% of pain is emotional.
The physical sensation that we experience is not really all that difficult.
The problem is that there's actually a fear reaction because there's a fear of damage to the body.
And it's very deep.
It's a very, very deep reaction.
And it's based on fear.
It's a clinging to not wanting to lose functionality in the body.
Okay, but I mean, if somebody has a migraine, we don't imagine that the migraine is going to cause the head to explode, but it is extraordinary suffering, right?
Well, a migraine, I would say, is also a signal from your body that's saying that there's something wrong in the body, and then the mind reacts by, you know, being upset about that because we don't want to lose, you know, we think there's something wrong with our brain, our head, or whatever.
I mean, it's usually vascular, I think, in terms of migraines.
I'm not a doctor, but there's something that the body is signaling that is wrong, that is a potential loss of our consciousness.
How about arthritis?
I think that's the same thing.
So there's a signal from the body.
Are you saying that arthritis is psychological in origin?
It's somatic?
No, no, no.
I'm sorry.
It's difficult to explain.
You get a pain signal, right?
So you get a pain signal in your brain from either arthritis or you get it from, you know, vascular problems, which I think are the cause of migraines.
Or if you stub your toe because there's, you know, some pain receptor in your toe that's saying something has gone wrong.
All of those things are the same in that regard.
And the reason that you have a reaction to that is because you don't want to experience the loss of damage, right?
No, no, no, no, no.
The reason that you experience that is because the pain centers in your brain are activated by the nervous system.
Because even animals that we would not imagine have any kind of consciousness avoid that which is unpleasant and pursue that which is pleasant, right?
Sure.
Maybe I could describe something a little... I don't think I'm getting this across well.
No, no, no.
I don't think that's the problem.
I don't think that's the problem, because we're having a debate here, right?
And if when I put something back, which is a counter to your point, saying that you're not explaining it well is kind of annoying and a little condescending, in fact.
I assume that you're trying to explain it the best way that you can, which either means that you're not good at explaining it, or I'm not very smart.
I don't mean to be confrontational, I'm just sort of pointing it out.
I find it annoying, and this happens more with Buddhists than with other people, I find it annoying when a Buddhist puts forward an argument, I put forward a counter-argument, and then they say, well, it's tough to explain, and I'm maybe not explaining it very well.
It's like, shouldn't you know how to do this if you're a Buddhist?
How to explain these things?
And just because I'm putting something back that's a counter-argument, I don't think you get to fog me with, well, it's hard to understand, right?
Okay, fair enough.
When I was saying that I wasn't explaining it well, I was putting the onus on me that I wasn't doing a very good job of explaining it.
But if you don't know how to explain it well, then you need to go and practice about how to explain it well, and we'll have the conversation another time.
Well, I guess I can't argue with that.
Yeah, and listen, I'm very happy to have the conversation, but You know, if someone comes up with, like if I'm arguing UPB and someone comes up with an objection, and it happens a lot, right?
If someone comes up with an objection to UPB or something, if I just say, well, I guess I'm not explaining it that well or it's really hard to understand or whatever, but I don't actually deal with their objection, you understand that would be kind of evasive, right?
Did I not deal with your objection?
No.
You've said a couple of times now, well it's hard to explain and I may not be doing a great job of explaining it.
In other words, somehow my objection can be overcome with a different explanation.
But that's not actually listening to my objection and processing it, right?
Like if you say well the cause of suffering is your thoughts in the mind and I say well in terms of that's certainly true sometimes and cognitive behavioral therapy would be very much along those lines if I understand it correctly that it is irrational negative destructive thoughts that will produce things like anxiety and stress and irrational anger and so on.
So there certainly is reality to the argument that suffering within the mind can be caused by our perspectives within the mind but that's not the case for all suffering.
Alright, I'm actually going to say that it is, and the reason I'm going to say that I wasn't actually going to bring this up, it is possible to turn off pain, and I can do that.
So, it is possible to literally not experience pain.
So, when I went in for neck surgery, the anesthesia was kind of like a scam, right?
I wouldn't say it's a scam.
It's a difficult ability to develop.
It takes a lot of practice.
It's very difficult to do.
I'm just trying to understand it.
Your claim is that you could have something like unanesthetized adult circumcision?
And there would be no elevation in your heart rate, no release of adrenaline or cortisol or anything like that.
It would be as if you were having a nap.
Well, there are different degrees of ability to do this.
I have had my teeth drilled without Novocaine.
I would say that there was probably – I don't know.
I wasn't hooked up to any machinery.
There was probably an elevated response to that.
And that's because basically pain is – it's a very attention-grabbing thing.
And the more intense the pain is, the more it grabs your attention.
So I can – I think that's the point.
That's the point of pain is to tell you to do something different than what you're doing.
If your hand is in the fire, your point of pain is to take it out.
Sure, I agree with that, but in the sense when you're undergoing, you know, like I'm getting my teeth drilled, I'm voluntarily doing that because, you know, I see some other gain from that.
So, I don't necessarily want to experience the pain, but I don't want to not be in the situation that's causing the pain.
Okay, so is your argument then that all suffering is a choice?
I wouldn't say it's a choice completely because it requires Like I said it requires a certain amount of practice and training.
It's like it's not a choice to be able to To be able to run a marathon right now, right?
I would have to train in order to be able to do that so I can't choose right now to run a marathon I can choose to ignore certain levels of pain and So, you know, I can sit for two or three hours without pain, and that's normally excruciating.
And, you know, the way that I mean, I can go into the mechanism by which I do that.
But the point is, is that I can move my perception to something other than the pain, stick it on something that keep my perception on something that is other than the pain.
It's usually a meditation object.
I'm sorry to interrupt you.
The reason I have to interrupt you is that, look, I mean, I just don't have any verification for what you're saying.
If there are scientific studies, if there are scientific studies that show that people who study Buddhism can be hooked up to machines and, you know, if they're getting dental work done or something like that and they're drilling right through the nerve and they show no elevated pain responses, I mean, please send them in.
I would be fascinated to read That sort of stuff.
But it's confusing to me because the Dalai Lama was trained by being whipped.
Yeah, you know, I think that... How would I say this?
Whipping certainly is not a part of the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path, right?
I mean, obviously there's something wrong.
So they would be anti-Buddhists then?
It seems that way to me.
You know, I know that would cause a lot of consternation, but it seems to me, you know, if you say you're a weightlifter and you don't lift weights, you're not a weightlifter.
Right?
Right.
So if you're not following the Buddhist path, you're... I'm sorry.
No?
Right.
Okay.
Well, listen, because we're kind of stuck at the beginning here, and I certainly would be fascinated if there was a way of being able to control all pain using only Mental discipline I would be honestly fascinated to read about that So let's you know put a bookmark on the conversation if you can send in the studies that show this kind of stuff But because this is an empirical claim that's being made.
It's not a philosophical claim so it cannot be evaluated rationally But if you could send in the studies to us I would love to talk more about it and to learn more about how this has occurred because of course I mean if people are making extraordinary claims they should be very keen to submit themselves to the evidence and of course I think I would imagine We wouldn't want to be inflicting suffering on people needlessly to test their pain responses.
But there are situations wherein people, as you say, they're going to go get their teeth drilled.
And if there is a way, and the people who make these claims, of course, would want to prove it as clearly and as openly and as scientifically as possible.
So if you could send those studies in, I would be beyond fascinated to read about them.
And maybe we could pick this up after the empirical challenges of your claims are dealt with.
Okay, so I I'm going to put forward the like what evidence would count I mean So the problem that I see with this is that it is possible that the body could have a physical response to pain in other words there'd be elevated cortisol levels or whatever would be measurable and that doesn't necessarily mean that it would be experienced and Well, you know, but at some point you have to have some proof for something, right?
And if people can say anything they want, right?
I mean, if the physiological response to pain is identical to a Buddhist and a non-Buddhist, and if the pain centers are lighting up and this and that and the other, yeah, people can say whatever they want.
But if there's no physiological change, like if I say, oh, mental discipline can have you eat nothing but candy and you'll never get any cavities, And then I get what can show up in the x-rays as lots of cavities and I can say, well, they aren't cavities to me.
Well, it doesn't really like my perception then becomes a little bit dubious.
And I certainly wouldn't want to hang an entire empirical foundation to the first or the second, I guess, of the Noble Truths of Buddhism on someone's claim rather than something that could be empirically proven.
But of course, if they could, not have and look I'm not saying that that mental attitudes have nothing to do with physical pain I mean I get that there's things that people can do to manage pain that is not directly medication-based but it would be a pretty key thing to to establish because that is you know the idea that all pain is in a sense a choice is it's a it's a wild claim to hear and wild claims to
Not bad, right?
Could be perfectly fine.
I mean, it's not like this is the only wild claim this show has ever entertained or even made.
But, you know, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and subjective reporting in defiance of physiological responses would be pretty dubious to me.
But if you could look those up and pass those along, I'd be thrilled to look into it more.
But I don't think we can go much further if the foundation of the philosophy is empirical and we don't have any empirical evidence on hand to To establish that, then we can't really go much further until that's dealt with.
Well, I think that the only proof that can come from that is actually the proof that comes from doing it.
So unfortunately, these things are basically like, let's provide an analogy.
So if I'm passing you going, walking on a road, we're going in opposite directions, and I say to you that there is a barn two miles down the road, I can't prove that to you.
You're going to have to go down there and look and see, right?
So what I'm saying is... No, no, but what we're talking about here is subject to empirical verification.
Yes, and if you were to sit and meditate and do these things, you could yourself find this out.
No, no, no, no, no, come on, come on.
I think so.
You don't say to people, oh yeah, I know it's really complex, it's really tough to do, you've got to spend years of study and then you'll understand.
That's not how things work when you're facing a skeptic.
Believe and act as if it's true and you'll know, right?
I mean, that's not how things work.
If you're making a claim that certain people have the capacity to not experience physical pain, no matter what the duress, or all pain is a choice, saying, well, I'm not going to test any of that, but if you study in this monastery for five years, you'll get it.
People were like, who's got time?
Right?
I mean, everybody's claim could be made about everything.
You know, maybe if you cut your balls off, you do go and join that comet.
I mean, but I'm going to keep my fellows close to my pockets, right?
So, everybody could make any kind of claim that they want, and then if you say, I'm skeptical about it, they say, well, if you spend five years studying, you know, 12 hours a day, then you'll learn it.
It's like, no, that's not how these things work, right?
Yeah, but Stefan, you picked the very hardest thing.
You know, I mean, that's a very hard thing to do, but you can still see some benefits, as you were saying.
Wait, wait, wait.
I'm sorry to interrupt you again.
What do you mean I picked the very hardest thing?
Well, physical pain is very hard.
That is a very difficult thing to be able to ignore.
We started going through the Four Noble Truths, right?
Yes.
And all people suffer, and the cause of suffering is in the mind.
I didn't go to the index and start at the back.
This is the two basic things.
How am I picking these things?
No, no, no.
I mean picking pain.
There's simpler forms.
There's easier forms of suffering than physical pain.
Well, I mean, as you were mentioning, you know, there are things in your mind that you can change in order to reduce your suffering that are not the physical pain.
Those are easier things to deal with than physical.
Physical pain takes a lot of training to do something about.
No, no, I get that.
I get that.
But why, if you're skeptical about a belief system, why wouldn't you start with the hardest example?
Because it's very, well, because, I mean, you wouldn't start, you know, running a marathon right off the bat either.
This is not a matter of training.
This is a show about philosophy.
This is not a sports show.
So if people come to me and they say, if I put forward this theory of ethics, universally preferable behavior, am I going to ask people to just give me the easy examples?
No, I want the toughest examples, right?
Yeah, and this is, like I said, this is something that's training, and I think you were also saying that it was not a philosophy, and I was saying it was more of a practice.
So, it is something you have to train for, and there are easier things, like it's easier to see evidence of this going on in terms of a reduction of suffering for things that are not physical pain, because physical pain is very hard.
It takes a lot of training to be able to deal with that.
There's an example of a young boy named Isaac who was born with a congenital insensitivity to pain.
Yes.
The disorder means he almost never feels pain even if he breaks a bone.
And this happens of course with people who have, this is my Thomas Covenant, Stephen R. Donaldson medical knowledge, but if you have leprosy of course you go numb and you have to do what's called a VSE, a visual search of extremities to make sure you haven't injured yourself.
Yes.
Because he doesn't feel injuries.
His parents are teaching him how to identify them to stay healthy.
He said the toddler years were an absolute nightmare.
He would just drop to the ground and smack his face on the table.
He thought the fall was fun.
He's dunked his hand in hot coffee without flinching.
He once placed his palm on a working oven burner without shedding a tear and we don't consider that an ideal, right?
Oh, completely agree.
It would not be something that you'd want.
You would not want to be in a state where you could never experience physical pain.
That would definitely be a problem.
So you'd want to feel it and then stop it?
Yes.
Maybe or maybe not.
But yes, to have a choice to do that obviously would be better than not.
Well, I don't know.
I mean, I think that the accumulated wisdom of the body with regards to self-protection is the result of billions of years of evolution and pain is designed to have you not do stuff that is bad for you.
I think of the… I agree.
That's true.
Well, we just have to interfere with the natural processes of the body and will away pain is… It's sort of like antibody in a way.
I mean, I'm glad that my body gives me indications of discomfort or, you know, if I'm feeling nauseous, I don't like if I've eaten something bad many, many years ago, I had a pierogies.
But basically I think I've been scraped out of the back of someone's bin lining in a fridge.
I had these pierogies and I ate them and like 20 minutes later I'm feeling nauseous and throwing up.
I wouldn't want to overcome that suffering.
I'd want to throw it up to get the scrap out of my body.
Anyway, I mean, look, we're way off in terms of what philosophy would mean, but I've got to move on to the next caller.
I do appreciate the call, and I don't want this to be the end of the conversation, but I would like some, you know, empirical claims of extraordinary nature are going to require some proof.
I can't just go on the say-so of people who's, not you, but the people whose self-interest is quite considerable.
Like, we can master pain and we can teach you to it, just give us, you know, your children and some money.
So, if you could dig some of that stuff up and pass it forward, I'd appreciate that, but I will have to move on.
At one point, I'm going to get to the end of these callers, but I really do appreciate the call.
Okay, sure.
Thanks, Tracy.
▲
Export Selection