[MD] Reifying carrots

[MarshaV]

     "Western scientific research has led to a number of theoretical conclusions similar to the tenets of the Buddhist centrist view.  For example, there is now a widespread belief among contemporary psychologists that refutes the existence of a homunculus, a little person in the mind/brain that controls all conscious mental functions.  Much insight has also been gained concerning the pervasive role of language and concept in our experience.  And scientists in various fields have begun to seriously ponder the possible relation between conceptual designation and reality itself.

     "Such insights, however, usually remain abstracted from daily life.  They often remain on the level of an intellectual conviction without making a profound impact on the individual's personal experience.  For example, one may be intellectually certain that an individual is not endowed with a substantial, autonomous personal identity; yet one may still strongly _feel_ that one exists with such an ego.  Especially in moments of strong ambition, passion or arrogance this sense of personal identity may arise forcefully.  Similarly, one's theories about the role of conceptualization in human experience and the nature of reality may be very acute, and yet one's dad-to-day experience may be virtually untouched by those theories.  

      "In the previous chapter we investigated methods of realizing personal identitylessness.... "

 (Wallace, B. Alan, 'Choosing Reality, : A Buddhist View of Physics and the Mind',2003,p.191)



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