I hope by posting in this part of the forum I'm not risking offending anyone as those who would be offended would not read this part of the forum.
MCBT has been very influential is asking what I'm really looking for. It is a bit circular in some ways as someone who is not awakened cannot understand what being awakened is like but they will decide to try and become awakened based on some idea of what awakening is like. I guess in the end we have some fuzzy half baked ideas about enlightenment and that is the best we can do to either be motivated to pursue it or not.
I suspect that the ego is a huge part of why many people get onto the spiritual path. There is something deep inside of use that wants to be unique, outstanding, hold some secret. Some cults are an example of tapping into those needs very effectively.
If we all had a non-dual view of the world and someone found a way of uncovering a dual view of the world and it was difficult to rach that understanding then I suspect a minority of people would invest to discover the "truth" of the dual view.
I'm not saying that there is no value in the pursuit of a different perception of the world - there clearly is. I'm just wondering if it is reasonable to make any claim that a non-dual view is more real or truthful than a dual view. I think there is an underlying assumption by many people that the non-dual view is the "truth". It does not seem to help explain things like quantum effects - which would indicate there are other more complete views out there.
Without a non-dual view we can make very good claims as to why morality is a wise choice. We can assume many peole who led a very "good life" did not have a non-dual view of the world.
One of the key insights of the non-dual view seems to be a deep realization that there is no object named self. I've really struggled with this as I just don't see how the dual view of the world can coherently claim there is an object named self either. In the dual view of the world the self is clealry not independent. Ken Wilber's Theory of Everything with four quadrants representing various perspectives seems relevant. The non-dual view seems like a thorough explanation of the individual subjective, the dual view an individual objective view. This still leaves out two quadrants from Wilber's model. It seems both the non-dual and dual can be used to reason similar conclusions as to those other quadrants - I've not heard of insights into those quadrants by those who would be enlightened.
I can see this thread risks to go in random directions

I'd be interested in focusing on a central issue - the notion of self. We all use the term "I" and those who are enlightened still use that term too - can I have another scoop of ice-cream etc. From a non-dual perspective it might be tempting to think that anyone else who uses the term self is referring to an object that exists. If that is the case they should ask the dualist to point out the self. Certainly many people have not been asked to point it out or have not thought about it so they may reply "my body, my brain etc" but I suspect most dualists who have thought through the question would answer that there is no object named self, that self is a concept useful for functioning in the world. For example there is no object called time either but we use the concept.
From a dualist point of view we are all interconnected - simple concepts like the "butterfly effect" claim that. From a dualist point of view the self concept includes genetics, environment, education, society, technology, subjective experience etc. Of course there are dualists who may not have that notion of self but I suspect more due to a lack of education than a lack of insight from the dualist view point.
I can see the non-dualist may say ah yes but you have not experienced non-self and that is true if it means experiencing the world as non-dual. But if it means behaving in the world as if there is only non-self then I think many dualists do that - though not all the time. Then again the experiences shared on this forum would indicate that an enlightened one does not behave in accordance with non-self all the time either.
So I'm wondering if the benefits of enlightenment are more associated with the progress along the path rather than the end point when what has to be done is done.
I can see how someone who is not enlightened wants that secret - a bit like behaving well before christmas day. I can see how someone with a strong calling to "find the truth" may pursue the spiritual path - until it's end I hope for them. I can also see why someone who is not worried about it does not need to start worrying. It is more confusing being somewhere in the middle.
This line of thinking got me more interested in the practices in regards to morality. By starting this topic I hope someone will point out the problems in my reasoninng - using right speech if I'm really lucky