When you speak of eliminative materialism, I am thinking that you are thinking of the perspective of Daniel Dennett, or possibly the behaviourist, BF Skinner. These see the mind as being an illusory concept. The self can be seen as an interface between body and mind, and, to a large extent, I see it as a phenomenological construct. Like the concept of mind itself it can be seen as bound up with the material world but different thinkers vary in the understanding of whether it can be reduced to the brain/body.stevie wrote: ↑August 24th, 2022, 3:55 pmWell, as far as I am concerned (note the funny expression "I am" ) I take refuge to my working hypothesis of eliminative materialism:JackDaydream wrote: ↑August 24th, 2022, 3:21 pmMy understanding of Buddhism, is that many question the idea of the existence of self, seeing it as fluid and an arbitrary construct. However, there are many variations in schools of Buddhism and individual viewpoints. As far as the issue of whether the 'true' self can be found within or outside is complex, involving subjectivity, intersubjectivity and objectivity and the vantage point of perception. As human beings we may exist in all at the same time, juggling these categories of understanding.stevie wrote: ↑August 24th, 2022, 12:49 pmProvided there is a "true self", if you seek your "true self". Do you seek it internally or externally? It appears that seeking it externally is nonsense. So seeking your "true self" in philosophical texts and their ideas seems to be ignorance. But seeking it internally would amount to introspection which is beyond philosophical discussion because what appears to you internally doesn't appear to others because it appears internally and not externally.
Therefore the idea "true self" is a nonsensical idea in a philosophical forum but it wouldn't be a nonsensical idea in a zen buddhist forum (zen buddhism appears to be the only buddhist tradition that has sub-traditions which affirm the idea of "true self").
One book which has bearing on this is Martin Buber's, 'I and Thou'. He looks at the sense of self and how it develops in response to the 'thou' depending on how it is located or perceived. In religious thinking, the thou is seen as subjective identity in relation to God, or the divine. In contrast, he suggests that when people withdraw their projection onto a perceived other, as God, or the divine, the idea of self identity is thrown back into the social sphere and, especially, onto the opinions of other people.stevie wrote: ↑July 6th, 2022, 11:10 am Eliminative materialism appears as appropriate working hypothesis to me which entails that all of mentality (mental phenomena like "consciousness", "mind", "feelings", "volition", "intention", an appearing sense of "self" but also all concepts and ideas) are - best case - illusory but useful artifices created by the brain or - worst case - illusory and harmful by-products of the brains outstanding computational capacities which entail temporary or pathological imbalances in the system of regulating neurological circuits.
It's important that this working hypothesis needs to be applied to itself, i.e. to the thoughts I am expressing here, too, so I am neither speculating about a "reality" nor am I trying to find a "true reality" but - as per working hypothesis - the brain makes me express what I am expressing and creates my sense of "self" which supports the useful illusion that it would be me who decides about what I am thinking, affirming and negating and intending to express and do. But all this is - as per working hypothesis - only an artifice of the brain's system of self regulating circuits which is completely in line with what humans understand as "everyday life".
It would be problematic to see the self as disembodied, like a 'ghost in the machine', but on the other hand, it is questionable whether it is simply a product of the body because it is connected to the nature of intersubjective experience on a social level, bound up with cultural values and social meanings, which is along the lines of what Hegel meant by the idea of 'spirit'. Of course, Hegel could be seen as an idealist, so it partly depends how this idea of 'spirit' is viewed and how significant it is seen to be in an ultimate way.