All religion is opinion.

[vlyons]

16. Actually I consider myself a sketic

Epistomology is that branch of philosophy that deals with how we know what we know. And psychology is that science that deals with how the mind works. I adhere to the Buddhist teachings on the nature of mind and the creation of sense of self. It took me many years to understand Buddhist teachings on emptiness. But basically "emptiness" means that phenomena are void of existing in impossible ways. Yes there is phenomena, stuff, that exists "out there." Stump your toe, and you'll immediately discover that there's stuff "out there." The conventional way of thinking about phenomena is that stuff exists as independent and self-existent. But actually all phenomena arise from previous causes and conditions. Moreover all compound things are impermanent. The opinions (good, bad, pretty, ugly, big, little, etc etc) that we impute onto phenomena are not actually part of the phenomena. For example, which is long?

This: ======
or this ==========

Now which is long"

This: ======
or this ==========
or this ==============

I give you the example of the really good cake. A woman goes to the store and buys the ingredients to bake a cake. Comes home, pours the ingredients into a bowl, mixes it up, pours the batter into a baking pan, bakes it in the oven. When done, assembles and ices the layers. Then serves cake pieces to her guest, who exclaims that it's a really good cake. But actually there is no goodness in the cake. If there was "good" in the cake, it would have been as if the baker had bought a bottle of "good" at the store and pored it into the cake batter. The experience of good is not in the cake, it's in the person experiencing the cake.

If you want to understand Buddhist teachings on emptiness, that things are void of existing in impossible ways, you have to understand the 5 skandas: Form, feelings, perception, mental formations, and consciousness. We humans put the 5 skandas together and call them "I."

You don't have to agree with any of the above.