Thanks Sender Spike, I’m trying to get my head around the Buddhist idea of emptiness but obviously struggling. If I have a common misperception it is understandable that it is common because the books I used to gain my perceptions were by the Fourteenth Dalai Lama and Sogyal Rinpoche, a highly regarded teacher of Buddhism. Perceived forms are empty of separate, independent existence? When I see the word form I tend to think of Plato’s Ideas and for Plato these had a more real existence than the particulars of those forms that we experience. It’s hard to imagine how forms can be forms (plural) without some distinction between them. Perhaps you can enlighten me on that.

Also, suchness. Same issue. How can something be such and not be independent from some other such thing? Maybe you can explain.

Regarding us having animal minds. I just submitted a post on another publication on Ten Philosophical Mistakes by Mortimer Adler. Perhaps you have read it. The conclusion you draw about us having animal minds (brains is another subject) is a natural and very common consequence of the mistake made about our minds by Hobbes, Hume, Berkeley and Locke. Adler points out a crucial difference in the philosophy of Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Kant and Hegel and points out the consequence of one small difference in understanding the human mind. Hopefully that post will be published soon and I would hope for your insight on that.