text:
What is *vitakkavicārānaṃ*? And what about day-dreaming?
In MN 8 for example there's this:

Ṭhānaṃ kho panetaṃ, cunda, vijjati yaṃ idhekacco bhikkhu vitakkavicārānaṃ vūpasamā ajjhattaṃ sampasādanaṃ cetaso ekodibhāvaṃ avitakkaṃ avicāraṃ samādhijaṃ pītisukhaṃ dutiyaṃ jhānaṃ upasampajja vihareyya.

Here's Ven Sujato's translation:

It’s possible that some mendicant, as the placing of the mind and keeping it connected are stilled, might enter and remain in the second absorption, which has the rapture and bliss born of immersion, with internal clarity and confidence, and unified mind, without placing the mind and keeping it connected.

Here is Nyanaponika Thera's

It may be that after the stilling of thought conception and discursive thinking, he gains the inner tranquillity and harmony of the second absorption that is free of thought-conception and discursive thinking, born of concentration and filled with rapture and joy

And Piya Tan's

It is possible, too, Cunda, that
with the stilling of initial application and sustained application,
by gaining inner tranquillity and oneness of mind,
he attains and dwells in the 2nd dhyana,
free from initial application and sustained application,
with zest and joy born of stillness [samadhi].108

108The 2nd dhyana is known as “the noble silence” (ariya,tuṇhī,bhāva) because within it initial application and sustained application (thinking and discursion, vitakka,vicāra) cease, and with their cessation, speech cannot occur. (S
2:273); cf Kāma,bhū S 2 (S 41.6) where vitakka and vicāra are called verbal formation (vacī,saṅkhāra), the mental
factors responsible for speech (S 41.6/4:293), SD 48.7. In Ariya Pariyesanā S (M 1:161), the Buddha exhorts the
monks when assembled to “either speak on the Dharma or observe the noble silence” (ie, either talk Dharma or
meditate).

So what is it that is stilled -- and how (by what method) is it stilled -- does the doctrine say only, "first, think of something which causes joy; then secondly, rest in joy without that thinking"?
Is vitakka just "thought"? I get the impression that Buddhism classifies thought as another type of sense-object, perceived by the 6th sense i.e. by the mind -- is that right? And is a way to still thought meant to be to focus on a specific thought (perhaps an object or focus of meditation), and/or on other senses (e.g. bodily sensations)?  And isn't that just fighting fire with fire? :-)
Or is the way meant to be, perhaps, to focus on a different khandha (e.g. focus on a sensation or perception or formation of joy, instead of on any of the six sense consciousnesses)?

Piya Tan suggests (n the footnote quoted above) that it's especially the type of thought associated with speech: discursion. What about day-dreaming though, imagining sights and situations -- imagining seeing someone or being somewhere, a memory of the past, usually speechless? Night dreams seem pretty random and mostly especially visual (unrelated to speech), they just bubble up from somewhere. Is that phenomenon simply a fact, i.e. the way things are, or is that indicative of some kind of problem?
It -- i.e. undirected/involuntary imagination -- seems harmless enough, sometimes pleasant or entertaining (or a bit surprising, the endless variety of fleetings imaginings), ending, restarting, morphing, kind of empty.
In primary school, teachers complained I was moony ...

dreamy and unaware of one's surroundings, for example because one is in love.

... or dans la lune in French which means, "to be absent-minded; to be distracted".
I take it that's a bad thing, is it? Like "heedless"? It doesn't seem especially immoral -- it's not like I'm spending my time plotting to murder someone. The worst that might be said about it is perhaps that it (i.e. daydreaming or non-applied thought) is a waste of time (or of "precious human life") -- is that even so, and/or is that only the restless of ego of a type A personality:

The hypothesis describes Type A individuals as outgoing, ambitious, rigidly organized, highly status-conscious, impatient, anxious, proactive, and concerned with time management. People with Type A personalities are often high-achieving "workaholics". They push themselves with deadlines, and hate both delays and ambivalence. People with Type A personalities experience more job-related stress and less job satisfaction.

I think I've read -- from non-Buddhist modern popular science -- that dreaming is the mind's attempt or mechanism for integrating recent experience with long-term memory, and/or rehearsing for (simulating) potential future events.
This kind of topic or mental activity seems quite large or time-consuming in life but I don't really know what Buddhism says about it -- whether it's good, bad, or normal, how to avoid it, how to use it properly -- I don't even know which words (of Pali, Tibetan, or other) might be used to describe the phenomena.
How about papanca for example, is that an apt description? My problem with that word is, I recognise it as pejorative (i.e. that "one should avoid that") -- but I don't know how it's prescriptive (i.e. "what one should do to stop that"). And/or is that restlessness, uddhacca?
Dreaming -- a stream of images -- seems to me an automatic process. Like a heart-beat, one might be conscious of it or not but seems to be always happening either way. Like it happens continuously, in a room inside my brain/mind -- and I can shut the door on that room, by paying attention to something else, especially to waking sense-impressions like what I'm currently seeing or hearing, or to some "intentional" or "concentrated" mental task (e.g. reading or writing, or driving, data-processing) -- but the room with its stream of bubbling dreams is always there and becomes apparent again when "sense-impressions" and "directed thought" stop, when the (little) "door" opens.

This question is more or less a continuation of the question about Mahayana doctrine about dreams and illusions
I think I understand those answers, the difference is that this time I'm hoping for answers that are are little more prescriptive and less descriptive.
I think (I hope) that I have no strong emotional reactions to dreams, I'm not aware of fighting (e.g. as described in Andrei's answer) or nightmares (as mentioned in Yeshe Tenley's answer).
It's just that I'm aware of kind of dreaming and even day dreaming, sometimes speech-based (imagining or rehearsing or repeating speech), sometimes only visually imaginative (similar to dreaming). Should I try to stop it and of so how? Replace it with something else, another mode of thought? Continuing to dream seems like getting lost in sensuality (especially the consciousness of the sixth sense) -- thinking I ought to do something else sounds like it might be "desire for becoming" or "for existence" -- so I'm not sure I understand what Buddhist doctrine is on this subject, what practice it recommends.

It's amusing how you inquire about the meaning of an expression and go on to use it extensively :) as to '"does the doctrine say only, "first, think of something which causes joy; then secondly, rest in joy without that thinking"?' Is this a question you might want answered? i am a bit confused by the "only" and the formatting.

I realise there are a lot of question marks, I was hoping that answers to any or all of them, or something along those lines, might be helpful? The "only" means, "I think that this, is literally what it's saying in MN 8 -- is there more to it than that, more detail elsewhere, would you explain it any further ... or is that (little) instruction supposed to be enough/sufficient for anyone?"

The formatting (horizontal rules) was meant to indicate three themes, each broader than before: 1) the definition or explanation of that word (there are three different translations). 2) the definition of explanation of the mental processes which happen and or stop, and how (in practice) some processes cease, and (referring to the first part) exactly which process is meant to stop and what (if anything) it's replaced with or remains. 3) The difference if any between discursive (speech-associated) and imaginative (image-associated) thought, and the difference between directed thought and ...

... undirected? Is "undirected" thought associated with "letting go", or not exactly? Is it a bit like dreaming, or is like dreaming the opposite of how one should be thinking?

It's quite clear, thanks for the questions.

@ChrisW Have you seen this answer?

excellent question, and inclusion of the actual Passage is appreciated

It would be better to ask only the first question first. As it is, I don't feel like answering.

@KumāraBhikkhu Sorry I think it's too late to make that edit -- the edit would "invalidate" existing answers, which attempt to answer the second or third parts. You are welcome to answer only the first part if you can (or not to if you don't feel like it).

Chris,
I've done a detailed comprehensive study of vitakka and vicara here:
http://lucid24.org/sted/8aam/8samadhi/vitakka/index.html
Including looking at every. single. occurrence. of those words in all the suttas here:
http://lucid24.org/sted/8aam/8samadhi/vitakka/all/index.html
In your OP, 2 out of the 3 references you quoted (B. Sujato and P. Tan) have wrong understanding of vitakka and vicara in the 4 jhanas (from the perspective of EBT early buddhist texts - my detailed study is loaded with evidence).
P. Tan's uses fallacious "reasoning" to explain why speech "ceases" in noble silence of second jhana. I explain the fallacy here, in this critique of B. Analayo's understanding of vitakka:
http://lucid24.org/sted/8aam/8samadhi/vitakka/analayo/index.html
In short, SN 36.11 states that in first jhana , "vaca nirodha" (speech ceases), and in second jhana, "vitakka vicara nirodha" (thinking ceases). This doesn't mean you can't think in second jhana, and you can't vocalize/speak in first jhana.  It means if you engage in those activities, then you've ceased those respective jhanas, not that it's "impossible to" start those activities.

As to whether doctrine teaches to use thinking to overcome thinking i think there is this discourse;

Here, Ananda, a monk abides contemplating body as body[ ] — ardent, fully aware, mindful — leading away the unhappiness that comes from wanting the things of the world. And for one who is abiding contemplating body as body,[ ] a bodily object arises, or bodily distress, or mental sluggishness, that scatters his mind outward. Then the monk should direct his mind to some satisfactory image. When the mind is directed to some satisfactory image, happiness is born. From this happiness, joy is then born. With a joyful mind, the body relaxes. A relaxed body feels content, and the mind of one content becomes concentrated. He then reflects: "The purpose for which I directed my my mind has been accomplished. So now I shall withdraw [directed attention from the image]." He withdraws, and no longer thinks upon or thinks about [the image]. He understands: "I am not thinking upon or thinking about [anything]. Inwardly mindful, I am content." This is directed meditation.

I think the satisfactory image, it's probably from the word nimitta, pali is; Tenānanda, bhikkhunā kismiñcideva pasādanīye nimitte cittaṃ paṇidahitabbaṃ https://suttacentral.net/sn47.10/en/sujato

And what is undirected meditation? Not directing his mind outward, a monk understands: "My mind is not directed outward." He understands: "Not focused on before or after; free; undirected." And he understands: "I abide observing body as body — ardent, fully aware, mindful — I am content." This is undirected meditation. https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn47/sn47.010.olen.html

Nimitta here is usually translated as a theme/foundation or a sign. Here is another relevant sutta passage describing eventuality analogical (according to me) to the directed development;

Take a mendicant who is focusing on some foundation of meditation that gives rise to bad, unskillful thoughts connected with desire, hate, and delusion. That mendicant should focus on some other foundation of meditation connected with the skillful.
Idha, bhikkhave, bhikkhuno yaṃ nimittaṃ āgamma yaṃ nimittaṃ manasikaroto uppajjanti pāpakā akusalā vitakkā chandūpasaṃhitāpi dosūpasaṃhitāpi mohūpasaṃhitāpi, tena, bhikkhave, bhikkhunā tamhā nimittā aññaṃ nimittaṃ manasi kātabbaṃ kusalūpasaṃhitaṃ.
As they do so, those bad thoughts are given up and come to an end.
Tassa tamhā nimittā aññaṃ nimittaṃ manasikaroto kusalūpasaṃhitaṃ ye pāpakā akusalā vitakkā chandūpasaṃhitāpi dosūpasaṃhitāpi mohūpasaṃhitāpi te pahīyanti te abbhatthaṃ gacchanti.
Their mind becomes stilled internally; it settles, unifies, and becomes immersed in samādhi.
Tesaṃ pahānā ajjhattameva cittaṃ santiṭṭhati sannisīdati ekodi hoti samādhiyati. https://suttacentral.net/mn20/en/sujato

In regards to externally scattered this expression is explained in the excerpt below;

"And how is consciousness said not to be externally scattered & diffused? There is the case where a form is seen with the eye, and consciousness does not follow the drift of the theme of the form, is not tied to... chained to... fettered, or joined to the attraction of the theme of the form: Consciousness is said not to be externally scattered & diffused.
[...] https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.138.than.html

As to the daydreaming part, i just take note of the content and make necessary adjustments. Ie is it tied to past or future; gain, honor or fame; sensuality; delight in another world; cruelty; jealosy; lazyness; listlessness; ill-will; anger etc etc. Then you can know what perception to focus on or what it is that needs giving attention ie; inconstancy, unattractiveness in regard to food; unattractiveness in regard to body (ie graveyard contemplations); metta; compassion; sympathy; non-delight in all worlds; death etc etc
This problem doesn't really occur when training all day because one is then engaged in either prevention or removal of arisen distracting thoughts and is otherwise in some jhana [good state] or is doing some necessary work and is then mindful of their arising due to lack of development.
As to dreams, the sutta say that dreams can among other things be influenced externally and that one who develops metta well does not have evil dreams.
I myself notice that as long as i develop perceptions my dreams are either wholesome, neutral or non-occuring, that as long as i just sleep for rest.
If i wake up and due to laziness go back to sleep i will usually have disturbing dreams or nightmares.
If i train a lot i get a lot of good dreams.
So there is as far as i can tell a more or less direct correlation between dream content and the intensity of development much like there is a correlation between daydreaming and the intensity of developmemt.

When I asked bhante PaAuk Tawya Sayadaw what is VitakkaVicāra, he teach me "You should meditate Jhana". Bhante told me lik that although bhante knew I am abhidhammist for 10 years without concentration meditation (so I know the definition of VitakkaVicāra already, when asking), and bhante is the AbhidhammaPitakka Memorizer.
So, why bhante PaAuk Tawya Sayadaw didn't just answer me the description which I want to know? Why bhante told me "You should meditate Jhana?"
I ignored his answer for 2 years. This 2 years lost, although I very trust  bhante PaAuk Tawya Sayadaw, but I didn't go to sit in his monastery. I still think "I going to do it", but I didn't know how start. Then 2 years later, this is the answer after I have worked harder on sitting meditation myself this year. If you do the sitting concentration meditation, you can see 3 stats first...

Thinking of worldly objects
It's included Dhamma which not associated with the current meditation. This comes with words such as " I will do..., he should do..., I shouldn't do..., this think is...,This is Vitakka because...", etc. This appear automatically and speedy in the meditation starter because he are sitting. He can't act, so the way he do is speak with himself. And this is why the practitioner should practice VitakkaVicāra first. Vitakka is carrying a mind and mental factors to do their duty on the object. Vicāra is keeping a mind and mental factors to do their duty on the object. The practitioner can't meditate anything if VitakkaVicāra still do the past behave automatically and speedy. And this is why Vitakka (SammāSaṅkappa) is the second of the eight noble path because you can't do follow SammāDiṭṭhi, if you still Vitakka of the same, KāmaSaṅkappa ByāpādaSaṅkāpa, VihiṅsāSaṅkappa.

No meditation's object
It's sleeping either just a millisecond or a nodding. It's sleeping and no object of your current meditation.

Thinking of only one meditation's object
Vitakka is carrying a mind and mental factors to do their duty on only meditation's object. Vicāra is keeping a mind and mental factors to do their duty on only meditation's object. The practitioner may go to do some virtues, eating, sleeping, peeing, etc. but he keep to go back to his  meditation's object as fast as he can. This is why in KN.Paṭisambhidāmagga SaṭipaṭṭhānaKathā described Viharati in DN22 as "doing 4 gestures, keeping, staying, ..."  And this is why the Buddha put the Gesture Meditation Part and Sub-Gesture Meditation Part following Ānāpānassati Part in DN22. Another, This is why the Buddha used "Pajānāti" in Ānāpānassati Part  and the Gesture Meditation Part, but used "SamPajānaKārī" of DN22. And this is why the commentary commented many things which someone , although some Abhidhammist or Commentaryist who never meditate Jhana and memorized Sutta in pali, doubt "why the commentary commented like this?" (Yes, the commentary  is right, but it is too very over deep for them to know).

I often say "I memorized and understood Vitakka for long time, but I never have an experience in understanding of Vitakka very clear like when I start the concentration meditation before." And if I found PaAuk Tawya 17 years ago, I will not lost the time like now.
Some of PaAuk masters answer me like a Tipitaka Memorizer, but some such as PaAuk Tawya Sayadaw and U. Vimala answer me only "You shoud meditate Jhāna to understand the answer" even they memorized many Sutta already because they are co-working on practice me like a real master should do.
Tell me if someone want the link to the reference in the canon.

Dreaming is just a low power thinking. It's like when you awake, but it's low power. When you awake fully, you can act everything you want. When you dream, you don't act or act more lite version. The scientist describes dream like that because dream is low power thinking, so you lose control of it.

Day-dreaming is associative. A sense object appears and we follow the associations wherever they lead. With first jhana, we "place the mind and keep it connected". In doing so, our intent is focused on unifying the mind with the object of meditation, and not with the endless associations. Intention involves effort and stress. It takes work to not day-dream.
The work of first jhana becomes easier the more we do it. Just like lifting a weight makes us stronger, we no longer need so much intent to relinquish day-dreaming. In particular, we are NOT pushing for the second absorption.

AN9.35:4.3: Without charging at the second absorption, as the placing of the mind and keeping it connected are stilled, they enter and remain in the second absorption.

Our intent stills itself with skilled practice. Skill reduces effort. And with the stilling of intention, we would have:

SN40.2:1.4: ‘As the placing of the mind and keeping it connected are stilled, a mendicant enters and remains in the second absorption, which has the rapture and bliss born of immersion, with internal clarity and confidence, and unified mind, without placing the mind and keeping it connected.

But the focus of meditation remains. Only the "placing" and "connecting" has stilled.

Vitakka - is the initial attention one has on an object
Vicara - is the continued attention on the initial object, in the context of meditation one tries to retain the same object for a prolonged period of time

Vitakka-vicara arises in the same process behind the speech. When we think we generally think in words and those words we compose in our mind is what becomes speech when talking. If it breaks out as speech this is just thinking. When vitakka-vicara is dropped we cannot think or talk in that state, viz., 2+ Jhana.
There 2 types of meditation, Samatha and Vipassana. In Vipassana, the focus is on ultimate realities (citta, cetasika, rupa, nibbana) like the 4 Satipattana which intern corresponds the 5 aggregates and 6 sense bases and their respective objects. In Samatha meditation the focus in on imaginary objects or mind-made (pannatti) which does not conform to the ultimate realities like imaginary or mind-projected images of disks in Kasina.
E.g. in the context of Earth Kasina one looks in detail as a disk made of clay. One tries to remember its details. The one closes one's eyes and try to recall the details, which is vitakka. But the memory imitatedly fades away. To retain the image one thinks about it again and again until one continuously sees the metal image as one is looking at the physical object itself. This continuous recollection or trying to retain the focus is vicara. In the Earth Kasian on may repeat the word "Earth, earth, ..." as an aid or trigger to recall the mental image of the earth disk, but the focus is the mental image but not the word. Ultimately on should be able to recall the image without the word in very quick succession (faster than one can repeat the words). In Samatha is it OK to use words through nama pannatti as the object of ones focus is also imaginary or mind-made (pannatti). When one is continuously recalling the image one starts seeing it as if one is seeking the real thing continuously. In doing so, i.e. continuously recollecting a single object and trying to retain focus, the result is Piti and Sukha. It is not necessarily thinking about something thing which is blissful or happy. Similarly in other medications also, fist one focuses and tries to retain focus, on ultimate realities in Vipassana and on an imaginary or mind-made object in Samatha.

In the blog entry "Why vitakka doesn’t mean ‘thinking’ in jhana", Ven. Sujato first talks about how the term vitakka means thinking in some contexts of the suttas.

The primary source work is the Dvedhavitakka Sutta (MN 19). This
is where the Buddha talks in most detail about vitakka specifically,
and describes how he discovered and developed it as part of the ‘right
thought’ (sammasankappa) of the eightfold path. Note that the terms
sankappa and vitakka are often, as here, synonyms.
The Buddha describes how he noticed that thinking unwholesome thoughts
leads to suffering, while thinking wholesome thoughts leads to
happiness. And he further realized that he could think wholesome
thoughts nonstop all day and night, which would not lead to anything
bad; but by so doing he could not make his mind still in samadhi. So
by abandoning even wholesome thoughts he was able to enter on the four
jhanas.
A similar situation is described in AN 3.101. There, the Buddha
speaks of a meditator who abandons successively more refined forms of
thought, until all that is left are ‘thoughts on the Dhamma’
(dhammavitakka). Even these most subtle of thoughts prevent one from
realizing the true peace of samadhi, so they must be abandoned.
Clearly, then, the right thought of the eightfold path, even thoughts
of the Dhamma itself, must be abandoned before one can enter jhana.

And so some people define vitakka as thinking in the context of jhana, carrying forward this meaning from other contexts.
Why would the Buddha use this term in the jhana context, if in the jhana context, it means something else?

If vitakka does not mean thinking, then why did the Buddha use such
a misleading word? The answer is simple: it was the best he had. Why
this is so, and how such situations can arise, is a fascinating
question that takes us into areas of linguistic philosophy,
specifically, how we develop words for speaking of refined topics.

Although the Buddha used everyday words to describe jhana, he redefined those terms to become technical terms in the jhana context, that has close as possible meanings to the original meanings, but are not the same.

The Buddha, in what must have been a striking innovation, used only
simple, empirical terms to describe jhana and other states of higher
consciousness. In common with his typical empiricist approach, this
means that he used words that remained as close as possible to their
ordinary meanings. He wanted people to understand these states, to
refer to their ordinary consciousness, and to see how that can be
developed and transformed to become something wonderful. ....
If we look closely at the terms in the jhana formula, then, we find
that they are words that have a more coarse physical or psychological
meaning in everyday language. They are common words that everyone can
understand, and can relate to their own experience. And in every
single case, they clearly have a more subtle, abstract, evolved
meaning in the context of jhana. We have moved from the ordinary mind
to the ‘higher mind’, and everything about the experience is
transformed.

It doesn't make sense that vitakka and vicara means the same thing in the jhana context as in their everyday meanings, as claimed by some people. It must have a changed meaning in the jhana context.

Now we can
look again at the claim that vitakka must mean thinking in jhana,
because that’s what it means in everyday discourse. And I trust that
this claim now appears a lot less plausible than it might have
earlier.
If this is true, then vitakka (& vicara) are the sole exceptions.
Every other term in the jhana formula takes everyday words and
transforms them, in what the Buddha emphasizes at every turn is a
special, exalted, and refined context. Only vitakka is exempt from
this, and means exactly the same thing in higher consciousness as it
does in lower consciousness.
This argument is not merely implausible, it is totally impossible.
Words just don’t do that. And they specially don’t do that in a
context like jhana, where the very point of the state of mind is that
it is integrated and whole. How can such a coarse, ragged, disturbing
thing as ‘thought’ continue, while everything else has become so
refined?

And finally, Ven. Sujato explains what vitakka and vicara means in the jhana context, from his experience.

Sit again for a couple of minutes. This time, don’t be quiet: have a
think. Look at what thinking is like. Raise a question: what is the
nature of thought? Then stop: be silent: look at the space that
reverberates after the words have ended.
When you think, the most obvious aspect, the coarsest aspect, is the
verbalizations. But they don’t happen alone. There is a kind of
lifting of the mind onto an object. This is normally quite subtle, and
we don’t notice it because we are interested in the words. It becomes
more obvious sometimes when you try to think about something, but your
mind is not really interested. It’s as if you keep moving the mind
towards that topic, but nothing much happens. You can also feel it
when the words stop. The ‘thought’ in some sense is there, apart from
the verbalizations. It’s a subverbal thought, a placing or hovering of
the mind in a certain way.
This is what vitakka refers to in jhana. This is the subtle aspect
of ‘thought’ that is carried over into jhana, when the coarse
aspect, the verbalization, is left behind.
And as with vitakka, so with vicara. Vicara is the ‘exploring’
of something, and in ordinary language refers to wandering about a
place on foot. Psychologically, it normally means a more sustained
reflection or examination of a thought, a keeping in mind of the topic
that vitakka has brought to mind. In jhana, it follows the same
process. The coarse verbal reflection is long gone, and in its place
is the gentle holding or pressing of the mind with its object.

Later, Ven. Sujato states the traditional definitions of vitakka and vicara from the Abhidhamma and also from alternative interpretations, and comments further about linguistics.
What about day dreaming?
Well, day dreaming follows the everyday meaning of vitakka and vicara i.e. thinking - thoughts and their verbalization. This answer by Suminda explains that very well.


text:
Is the goal of mindfulness to develop ultimate dissociation?
I came across this interpretation of Buddha's teaching that suggests that the Buddha ultimately sought a dissociative state, rather than one of freedom.

the buddhistic mindfulness meditation does not ... (a) stress genuine freedom, peace and happiness ... and (b) does not eliminate the genetically-encoded instinctual passions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire (the root cause of human bondage, malice and sorrow) ... and (c) does promise a mythical ‘freedom’ in an imaginary life-after-death (‘Parinirvana’) ... and (d) is not a new, non-spiritual method ... and (e) does not produce an actual freedom from the instinctual animal passions, here and now, on earth, in this lifetime ... and (f) does not offer a step by step, down-to-earth, practical progression to becoming actually free of the human condition of malice and sorrow ... to be both happy and harmless.
More to your point, however, Mr. Gotama the Sakyan’s mindfulness meditation is primarily about detachment/ dissociation from life – all existence is Dukkha due to Anicca (impermanence) and Dukkha comes from Tanha (craving) for Samsara (phenomenal existence) – and any meditation technique which stresses involvement with such is anything but what Mr. Gotama the Sakyan taught.

So my question is: is anyone that practices mindfulness, as advised by Buddhist teachers, heading towards developing a sort of dissociation from their feelings?
If not, how can anyone explain the fact of enlightened Buddhists still getting angry without referencing psychological dissociation?
Clarification 1
Some people expressed confusion over that question at the end. My clarification follows.
We can agree that Buddhist enlightenment does not guarantee extirpation of emotions (like anger). Thus, feeling angry (for example) does not invalidate someone's enlightenment. Enlightened beings can feel angry. Now, Richard says -- and this has been confirmed by the actually free people -- "I" am "my" feelings, and "my" feelings are "me" (i.e., emotions and self are the same thing). So if enlightened Buddhists claim to be free from illusion of self, and if emotions still remain and occur, how can that be explained as anything but dissociation (i.e., dissociation of a covert part of self from the overt rest of the self)? Hope that is clear enough.

I'm not sure I understand the last sentence. Is it saying, "It's a fact that enlightened Buddhists still get angry, how can you explain that fact except by referencing (i.e. by explaining that in terms of or as being a result of) psychological dissociation, what other possible explanation is there?"

A different way to ask this question might be, quoting from the second reference -- "This reference explains vippayutta as "dissociation" -- is that a good translation, does it correspond well to the modern understanding of that word?"

I doubt whether everyone has the same understanding of the word "dissociation" (I guess it's psychiatric/psychological jargon).Perhaps the current question boils down to, "Do you agree with how this Richard is using the word 'dissociation' to describe the goal of Buddhism?"

Also, welcome to the site. Is this meant to be an elementary "I hardly know anything about Buddhism, can you tell me something?" kind of introductory question, or is it meant to be a question which only an expert in psychology could answer? That's sometimes hard to know, when a new user asks a first question...

I guess a way to answer this would be to read the two pages which the OP linked, i.e. On Disidentification and Dissociation, and, On Buddhism --  and start by quoting some of the author's own explanations of what Buddhism and Dissociation are -- and from that, explain whether you agree with the author's description of Buddhist doctrine and practice, and whether Buddhism matches the author's description of Dissociation.

Re the suggestion in the immediately above comment: Doing that would be very polite to that one somewhat anonymous writer & even help them distribute their antiBuddhist & antiAsian/racist material, yet at the same time would be very impolite & disservice to the more than 1 Billion Buddhists & 4 Billion Asians & Billions more Nonracists on the planet, as well as be against the instructions of , and disserving conscientious professionals in the mocked field. That is weighed and indicated, even if by inference & implication, when trying to help the asker with a good answer.

Could the question be improved if the mocking & pejorative naming used was modified to be nondisrespectful? But doing so might change an asker's intended meaning, if the question is intended to be pejorative. And, it's within an included quote. The guidelines seem unclear on that sort of tradeoff.

@ruben2020 IMO it's based on this quote from the author -- "as enlightened beings are demonstratively known to still have anger and anguish from time to time" -- in what appears to be some debate between 'Richard' and 'Respondent'. The topics of their argument isn't clear to me. :-) The meaning of the statement depends on what they refer to as "enlightened", Richard uses a non-Buddhist characterisation of what "enlightenment" is: "‘contracted ego’ (or ‘self’) has transmogrified into a fully expanded soul".

@ChrisW Oh... OK. I think that applies more to Hinduism, where the Avatars can be warriors, and display anger and fight in battles like Rama or Krishna. It doesn't apply to Buddhas.

@ruben2020 Yes something like that might have been the Respondents view or doctrine in that dialog, also Richard talking about Gurus etc. I haven't read their full (10 email) dialog, but it seems to end with their arguing at cross purposes, with Richard putting words into the other's mouth. Another of Richard's arguments seems to be, that if any traditional religion were effective then the modern world wouldn't be in the state it's in now, with its wars and suicides. That was on the "Dissociation" page, I don't know why the OP rewrote that as explicitly "enlightened Buddhists" getting angry.

If it were a serious question perhaps topics like this might be relevant -- What is a wrathful Buddha? -- Pretty tame, but then that's to be expected -- topics I'm not especially certain about by the way. But at first I didn't read it as a serious question, it seemed to be begging the question, "assuming facts not in evidence" -- or situational/topical e.g. referencing the case where Richard and Respondent argued about being 'enlightened'.

@ChrisW Also reminds me of this - Was the Buddha harsh? and the Kesi Sutta.

@ChrisW I've clarified by editing the question.

the correct answer probably links to 'arupas' as well as 'detachment' etc

@SridharRatnakumar I appended to my answer, to try to answer your edit.

In Iti 109 (quoted below), the Buddha indeed taught man to swim against his nature to become free from suffering. Renunciation (nekkhamma - subject to the middle way) is against the flow i.e. it's not natural to man. Craving is natural to man.

This was said by the Blessed One, said by the Arahant, so I have
heard: "Suppose a man was being carried along by the flow of a river,
lovely & alluring. And then another man with good eyesight, standing
on the bank, on seeing him would say: 'My good man, even though you
are being carried along by the flow of a river, lovely & alluring,
further down from here is a pool with waves & whirlpools, with
monsters & demons. On reaching that pool you will suffer death or
death-like pain.' Then the first man, on hearing the words of the
second man, would make an effort with his hands & feet to go against
the flow.
"I have given you this simile to illustrate a meaning. The meaning is
this: the flow of the river stands for craving. Lovely & alluring
stands for the six internal sense-media. The pool further down stands
for the five lower fetters. The waves stand for anger & distress. The
whirlpools stand for the five strings of sensuality. The monsters &
demons stand for the opposite sex. Against the flow stands for
renunciation. Making an effort with hands & feet stands for the
arousing of persistence. The man with good eyesight standing on the
bank stands for the Tathagata, worthy & rightly self-awakened."

The author (Richard) quoted by the OP portrays Buddhism in a negative way, probably in an attempt to peddle his own teachings (called "actual freedom"?) - at least I guess, from some contents on the website.
From this page (quoted below), we can see Richard's teachings, from which I gather that "actual freedom" is the freedom to enjoy life fully (i.e. indulge in sensual pleasures without limitation):

Taken to its extreme, as Hindu and Buddhist philosophy does, one
denies that this planet earth and the space that it hangs in – and the
universe itself – are actual. To them it is all an illusion, a dream.
For them, the ‘Dreamer’ – their god – is who ‘I’ really am and all
their effort is predicated upon realising that this is who one really
is. Westerners have foolishly allowed themselves to be taken in by the
apparent wisdom coming from the eastern mystical states of being
because of the paucity of experiential wisdom in their own culture. It
all started growing exponentially after the sixties generation trekked
to the Himalayas, and to other exotic places, to find the permanent
drug experience ...
One arrives in the actual by becoming involved, totally involved in
being here ... not by practicing detachment. Being here is to put your
money where your mouth is, as it were. All other actions are methods,
devices, techniques ... in other words: delaying tactics. In being
here one is completely immersed. Being here is total inclusion. One
demonstrates one’s appreciation of life by partaking fully in
existence ... by letting this moment live one. One dedicates oneself
to the challenge of being here as the universe’s experience of itself.
...
Meanwhile people thoughtlessly pursue the elusive chimera of Eastern
Enlightenment.

The Buddha realized that modern day hedonists like Richard, who delight in attachment, is excited by attachment and enjoys attachment, would not be able to understand the Dhamma (teachings of the Buddha) as we can see from SN 6.1 (quoted below):

"This Dhamma that I have attained is deep, hard to see, hard to
realize, peaceful, refined, beyond the scope of conjecture, subtle,
to-be-experienced by the wise. But this generation delights in
attachment, is excited by attachment, enjoys attachment. For a
generation delighting in attachment, excited by attachment, enjoying
attachment, this/that conditionality and dependent co-arising are hard
to see. This state, too, is hard to see: the resolution of all
fabrications, the relinquishment of all acquisitions, the ending of
craving; dispassion; cessation; Unbinding. And if I were to teach the
Dhamma and if others would not understand me, that would be tiresome
for me, troublesome for me."

The Buddha felt it was too troublesome to teach the Dhamma to people like Richard, but he was persuaded otherwise. And we are fortunate and blessed because of that.
If people like Richard feel that practitioners of Buddhism are gloomy, "anti-life" (quoted verbatim) and do not have "genuine freedom, peace and happiness", the answer to this comes from Dhammapada 197 - 200 (quoted below):

Happy indeed we live, friendly amidst the hostile. Amidst hostile men we dwell free from hatred.

Happy indeed we live, friendly amidst the afflicted (by craving). Amidst afflicted men we dwell free from affliction.

Happy indeed we live, free from avarice amidst the avaricious. Amidst the avaricious men we dwell free from avarice.

Happy indeed we live, we who possess nothing. Feeders on joy we shall be, like the Radiant Gods.

Sridhar, unfortunately there are Buddhists who seek a dissociative state. It's unfortunate that this happens often enough though, and some teachers do teach it.
As a meditation teacher myself, I don't teach people to developed such a state; I warn them against it.
Is the goal of mindfulness to develop ultimate dissociation? No. It's for freedom from suffering. I think this is a Buddhist teaching too basic to require any reference.

Bhante, the author of the quoted material stated that Buddhism leads to a dissociative state based on AN 10.81 -
“Freed, dissociated, & released from ten things, Bahuna, the Tathagata dwells with unrestricted awareness. Which ten? Freed, dissociated, & released from form, the Tathagata dwells with unrestricted awareness. Freed, dissociated, & released from feeling… Freed, dissociated, & released from perception… Freed, dissociated, & released from fabrications… "

mindfulness meditation is primarily about detachment/ dissociation from life

Mindfulness one should observe in a detached manner without attachment to the pleasant or aversion to the unpleasant, also having wisdom towards the neutral experiences which can be classified as mental states (citta), mental content (cetasika) or corporeal body (rupa), 5 aggregates or 6 sense bases and their associated objects, 4 foundations of mindfulness, 4 foods, etc.

heading towards developing a sort of dissociation from their feelings?

As mentioned above this is the mental non reaction to pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral feelings. If one gets attached to the pleasant, if one gets averse to the unpleasant or ignorant to the neutral, this all leads to negative mental states.
This might not be the same as detachment/ dissociation from life. One should do what needs to be done in life within moral and ethical bounds and constraints. (The moral constraints here is to conducive metal a karmic environment to further develop concentration and wisdom.)

Is the goal of mindfulness to develop ultimate dissociation?
In this essay, Ven. Thanissaro begins to explain that the goal is to develop "appropriate attention":

If, for example, you're a doctor in an emergency room [...] If you frame the symptoms in the wrong light, you can do more harm than good. If you frame them in the right light, you can save lives.
The same principle applies in solving the problem of suffering, which is why the Buddha gave prime importance to the ability to frame the issue of suffering in the proper way. He called this ability yoniso manasikara — appropriate attention — and taught that no other inner quality was more helpful for untangling suffering and gaining release

I came across this interpretation of Buddha's teaching that suggests that the Buddha ultimately sought a dissociative state, rather than one of freedom.
Reviewing the two pages you referenced...

key words such as ‘mindful’/ ‘mindfulness’, for sati (instead of ‘rememorative’, ‘rememoration’);

From this I get the impression that 'Richard' has learned about the vocabulary used in the Pali suttas.

For thousands of years, human beings have searched for genuine freedom, peace and happiness. Now, for the first time, a proven method has been devised to eliminate the genetically-encoded instinctual passions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire that are the root cause of human bondage, malice and sorrow. Actual Freedom has nothing to do with the traditional spiritual path of transcendence and avoidance – the promise of a mythical ‘freedom’ in an imaginary life-after-death. This new, non-spiritual method produces an actual freedom from our instinctual animal passions, here and now, on earth, in this lifetime. Actual Freedom offers a step by step, down-to-earth, practical progression to becoming actually free of the Human Condition of malice and sorrow – to be both happy and harmless

This was the description of "Actual Freedom" which the author seems to be promoting (advertising, describing) on that web site.

First of all, the buddhistic mindfulness meditation does not ... (a) stress genuine freedom, peace and happiness ... and (b) does not eliminate the genetically-encoded instinctual passions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire (the root cause of human bondage, malice and sorrow) ... and (c) does promise a mythical ‘freedom’ in an imaginary life-after-death (‘Parinirvana’) ... and (d) is not a new, non-spiritual method ... and (e) does not produce an actual freedom from the instinctual animal passions, here and now, on earth, in this lifetime ... and (f) does not offer a step by step, down-to-earth, practical progression to becoming actually free of the human condition of malice and sorrow ... to be both happy and harmless.

This is to contrast with the previous paragraph, intended to show that "the buddhistic mindfulness meditation" does not have the effects described.
That seems to be an accusation but I'm not sure how to answer it.

Buddhism clearly and explicitly does stress freedom (vimutti), peace (upasama) and happiness (sukha).
So I guess he must be saying it isn't "genuine".
But that's a "no true scotsman" argument -- so it's hard to know what he's arguing or why and therefore difficult to answer.

Other statements like, "does not eliminate the genetically-encoded instinctual" are odd.
They sound as if they're meant to be true by definition, or unarguable -- "after all you're still genetically human!"
And it seems to ignore people training or conditioning of themselves (i.e. it's not all to do with genetics).

As for "does not offer a step by step, down-to-earth, practical progression", suttas do say that Buddhism should be taught step by step and gradually and practiced.
So again it's hard to know what his complaint is.
There's a hint at the end of this page -- perhaps part of what he's complaining about are modern interpretations of Buddhism, summaries and extracts -- but I don't think it's useful to try to explore that further here, in the context of this question.

More to your point, however, Mr. Gotama the Sakyan’s mindfulness meditation is primarily about detachment/ dissociation from life – all existence is Dukkha due to Anicca (impermanence) and Dukkha comes from Tanha (craving) for Samsara (phenomenal existence) – and any meditation technique which stresses involvement with such is anything but what Mr. Gotama the Sakyan taught.

There's more to Buddhism than "mindfulness meditation".
It's described as a Threefold Training, a training in "virtue" (including social ethics), and in "wisdom", as well as in "mind" (i.e. effort, mindfulness, and concentration, in other words meditation).

Mr. Gotama the Sakyan’s advice was to dissociate from all of the above

‘Freed, dissociated, and released from ten things the Tathagata dwells with unrestricted awareness. Which ten? Freed, dissociated, and released from form (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from feeling (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from perception (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from fabrications (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from consciousness (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from birth (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from aging (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from death (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from stress (...) Freed, dissociated, and released from defilement (...) the Tathagata – freed, dissociated, and released from these ten things – dwells with unrestricted awareness.

That's quoting AN 10.81. What he calls "dissociated", Ven. Sujato translates as "detached" (visaṃyutta).
And the author's saying tat "Mr. Gotama the Sakyan’s advice is" seems to imply that that was all that the Buddha advised -- but, there is a lot of Buddhist doctrine -- and the sutta above is some of that doctrine, but not all he taught.
If you want to know more, you could try Chronological or other sequence for beginners and/or perhaps an introduction by a modern author, possibly one of these books -- or perhaps a teacher.

In other words: a total withdrawal from the physical world and the physical body

I think it's ceasing to identify -- "Woe is me! I am dying! etc."
There are a lot of posts about anatta on this site, that topic must be hard to understand or to explain -- abandoning "identity view' is one of the stages of enlightenment.

He clearly indicates that life as this flesh and blood body, on this verdant and azure planet, in this immeasurably vast universe, is the pits

See Did the Buddha really say that "life is suffering"?

the main problem in life is that peoples everywhere are already separate from the actual world and to practice detachment is to be twice-removed from actuality. Vis.:

Actual freedom: By being born a separative ‘self’ one lives in a painful reality (being detached from actuality) and sensuousness ends this detachment with the resultant apperception revealing the actual world.
Spiritual freedom: By becoming detached from the separative ‘self’ (and thus being twice-removed from actuality) dissociation from painful reality manifests a metaphysical greater reality in the psyche rendering the physical world a nightmarish dream.

I think that's saying that "Actual Freedom" (which he promotes) involves sensuousness as an antidote to "detachment" or "a separative self" (possibly "alienation") -- possibly as a way to reintegrate with the world.
And that so-called "Spiritual freedom" (including Buddhism, which he deprecates) involves becoming detached from the separate self (so "twice-removed from actuality").
I think that's wrong for at least three reasons.
Buddhism too teaches people to be aware of sensuality -- there are Buddhist practices like "guarding the senses", understanding "dependent origination", "scanning" and vipassana.
Buddhism emphasises living in the world -- within (lay or monastic) society -- ethics, self-control, and so on.
And Buddhism teaches the Middle Way -- avoiding extremes -- neither hedonism (pursuing sensuality for its own sake) nor e.g. asceticism (extremes of self-mortification).
So my question is: is anyone that practices mindfulness, as advised by Buddhist teachers, heading towards developing a sort of dissociation from their feelings?
I think it's meant to be understanding the causes of suffering, and undoing (unbinding from) those causes so that suffering ceases and doesn't arise again.
If not, how can anyone explain the fact of enlightened Buddhists still getting angry without referencing psychological dissociation?
I still don't understand this question. I find "enlightened" and "getting angry" kind of difficult to reconcile:

Akkosa Sutta: Insult -- SN 7.2
Anger
Getting the Message

@ChrisW I've clarified by editing the question.
To answer the last part of the question, I think that says, as a syllogism:

It's axiomatic (because Richard says so) that "emotions and self are the same thing" and "my feelings are me" etc.
Buddhists claim to be enlightened and free from illusion of self, yet they feel emotions like anger
Therefore all they're doing is dissociating from their self (their feelings), isn't that so?

IMO the Buddhist doctrine on the subject is more or less:

Feelings are non-self

Doctrines of self, or self-views (e.g. "this is myself") are wrong in the sense they tend to make things worse e.g. they increase suffering either now or in the future

Feelings come and go, arise and cease (which is one reason why they're not worth regarding as "self")

Attaching to or grasping unskilful feelings (e.g. hatred) will prolong or worsen them -- more so when combined with an unskilful sense of self, for example:

"He abused me, he ill-treated me, he got the better of me, he stole my belongings;"... the enmity of those harbouring such thoughts cannot be appeased.

"He abused me, he ill-treated me, he got the better of me, he stole my belongings;"... the enmity of those not harbouring such thoughts can be appeased.

Also consider the feelings of others, they're universal:

All tremble at violence; all fear death. Putting oneself in the place of another, one should not kill nor cause another to kill.
All tremble at violence; life is dear to all. Putting oneself in the place of another, one should not kill nor cause another to kill.
One who, while himself seeking happiness, oppresses with violence other beings who also desire happiness, will not attain happiness hereafter.
One who, while himself seeking happiness, does not oppress with violence other beings who also desire happiness, will find happiness hereafter.
Speak not harshly to anyone, for those thus spoken to might retort. Indeed, angry speech hurts, and retaliation may overtake you.
If, like a broken gong, you silence yourself, you have approached Nibbana, for vindictiveness is no longer in you.

Irrigators regulate the waters, fletchers straighten arrow shafts, carpenters shape wood, and the good control themselves.

To give a different, non-Buddhist example -- if you're a preschool teacher (in Ontario) you might be trained to never say, "You're a bad boy!"
Because "I am a bad boy" is not the lesson you want the children to be learning.
So instead you teach things about good and bad behaviour -- e.g. "Don't bite, use your words", or, "Thank you for putting the toys away" -- so that children learn what behaviour and reactions are socially appropriate, without developing and attaching to "self-views" (e.g. "I am bad" or "you are bad").
This isn't what I'd call "dissociating", in the pathological sense of that word.
I think that Buddhism also involves an interest in what's nowadays called "emotional intelligence". With young children (again, in a non-Buddhist context) I think think the doctrine for preschool teachers is that you're supposed to help them recognise and label emotion (e.g. "I can see you're angry about that. What are you going to do?"). Perhaps Buddhist are meant to recognise emotions -- e.g. "this is anger" -- not dissociate from them. And having seen or felt that an emotion exists, investigate what's causing it -- the purpose being to reconsider or undo the cause.
Buddhist monks, for example -- I get the impression that they reckon there are a lot of reasons or causes for suffering, for example financial greed (wanting more), fear (never having enough to be safe), interpersonal conflicts (zero-sum relationship problems between selfish people), and so on ... and train themselves to do without, so those problems don't arise.
That's not exactly dissociating (having a problem but being unaware of it), it's doing something (training and discipline and choosing wisely) to avoid the condition in which the situation arises.
And Buddhist laypeople are meant to at least try to be a bit generous, happy that they can be generous -- IMO that's not dissociating but is enlightened -- and perhaps to recognise wisdom (e.g. Buddhist doctrine), even though the rules of discipline they abide by isn't as strict as monks'.
Another thing is that Buddhism is a Middle Way i.e. neither extreme -- for example:

A Western monk at WatBa Pong became frustrated by the difficulties of practice and the detailed and seemingly arbitrary rules of conduct the monks had to follow. He began to criticize other monks for sloppy practice and to doubt the wisdom of Achaan Chah's teaching. At one point, he went to Achaan Chah and complained, noting that even Achaan Chah himself was inconsistent and seemed often to contradict him self in an unenlightened way.
Achaan Chah just laughed and pointed out how much the monk was suffering by trying to judge others around him. Then he explained that his way of teaching is very simple: "It is as though I see people walking down a road I know well. To them the way may be unclear. I look up and see someone about to fall into a ditch on the right-hand side of the road, so I call out to him, 'Go left, go left' Similarly, if I see another person about to fall into a ditch on the left, I call out, 'Go right, go right!' That is the extent of my teaching. Whatever extreme you get caught in, whatever you get attached to, I say, 'Let go of that too.' Let go on the left, let go on the right. Come back to the center, and you will arrive at the true Dharma."

So I think it's misleading to quote a single piece of Buddhist doctrine, for example AN 10.81 which is the basis of Richard's quote -- I think that's like saying, "Buddhist teaches 'Go left, go left' which is clearly not the way straight forward".
Another thing is that AN 10.81 is a description of Jhana practice which isn't easy -- or not the first thing -- to explain. Ultimately it may be unexplainable (see e.g. "jhana-range" here and here) though I think Buddhists are taught how to practice, to "see for themselves". I think that's true of a lot of human expertise though -- it's difficult to teach a language (Chinese or Pali), or Maths, or Medicine, or any other "advanced" topic, especially to people who don't have the training, the interest, or a receptive attitude -- plus it's a matter of practice (training, acquired skill).

There's some truth to the dissociation idea though -- this "Zen story" might be an example of dissociation:

Nothing Exists
Yamaoka Tesshu, as a young student of Zen, visited one master after
another. He called upon Dokuon of Shokoku.
Desiring to show his attainment, he said: "The mind, Buddha, and
sentient beings, after all, do not exist. The true nature of phenomena
is emptiness. There is no realisation, no delusion, no sage, no
mediocrity. There is no giving and nothing to be received."
Dokuon, who was smoking quietly, said nothing. Suddenly he whacked
Yamaoka with his bamboo pipe. This made the youth quite angry.
"If nothing exists," inquired Dokuon, "where did this anger come
from?"

In that story though, IMO, the youth might be dissociating and not meant as example of "enlightened" -- he is "desiring to show his attainment" etc.
And Dokuon's intervention is meant to contradict or undo that dissociation.

So the answer is: no.
So the answer to the followup request is: the attempted premise assertion within the followup request is not a fact, and is nonappropriate with respect to the context, and so the followup request would need to be repaired in order to be a meaningful followup request. (also, anger etc is an illusion; &, eg, cf 'can anyone please explain why the Sun ..(technical sounding words)...always rises ..(technical sounding words)... in the West', etc: 'compass is apparently wrong',   a good reply, might be misconstrued because of its brevity, as merely a flippant reply).
The quotation & citation musings attempt to assert a misleading contrived context/ premise to try support that writer's nonappropriate allegation(s).
*No, caNNotagr., as that's Contrary to the definition & usage of the term in Buddhism! Perhaps it would be helpful & useful to note that the appended assertion re enlightened persons engaging in illusion based behavior is contrary to Buddhism Concepts & Definitions of Enlightenment: enlightened persons don'tdo those sorts of things; enlightenment is an English word with specialised meaning re Buddhism

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text:
Do Buddhas have any awareness at all?
I am asking moreso the mahayana/Vajrayana view as I know the theravada one.
do buddhas have any functional kind of awareness at all,or are they inert like rocks?a mahayanika told me that Buddhas have no awareness at all and no contact.yet another told me they have limited awareness.a Vajrayanika said they have jnana but not vijnana,wich would mean theyre inert and percieve nothing at all.

How is this different from https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/39710/do-beings-go-into-total-unconsciousness-before-attaining-buddhahood?r=SearchResults ?

it's not the same question, that question asks about BEFORE enlightenment @AndreiVolkov

I can read too :) however please read the question body not just the title

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text:
Bodhisattva Śvetaketu and Gautama
The Buddha taught that he was the Bodhisattva Śvetaketu who resided in the Tushita heavans, before being born as the human Prince Gautama.
where is this passage coming from?

Śvetaketu and Bodhisattva in Sanskrit are Setaketu and Bodhisatta in Pali.
There was one person called Setaketu in the Setaketu Jataka, but this is the story of a human on Earth, but I'm not sure if this is the same as Śvetaketu of the Chandogya Upanishad. In any case, this Setaketu is not a Bodhisatta.
From this page, we find this story:

And, having ended his life span in the human abode, the future Buddha
was reborn as a deva by the name of Setaketu in the abode of Tusitā.
....
In this way, after making the five great investigations, the
Bodhisatta Deva Setaketu resolved: “I will descend to the human abode
and become a Buddha.” Having so resolved, to the devas and Brahmās
from the ten thousand world-systems who had assembled to request him,
the Bodhisatta gave his consent thus: “O devas and Brahmās, now is the
time for me to become a Buddha as requested by you. You may now take
leave as you please, I will go down to the human abode to attain
Buddhahood.”

That story of Bodhisatta Setaketu appears to be from the Buddhavamsa.
From the wikipedia page on Buddhavamsa:

The Buddhavaṃsa (also known as the Chronicle of Buddhas) is a
hagiographical Buddhist text which describes the life of Gautama
Buddha and of the twenty-four Buddhas who preceded him and prophesied
his attainment of Buddhahood. It is the fourteenth book of the
Khuddaka Nikāya, which in turn is the fifth and last division of the
Sutta Piṭaka. The Sutta Piṭaka is one of three pitakas (main sections)
which together constitute the Tripiṭaka, or Pāli Canon of Theravāda
Buddhism.
Along with the Apadāna and the Cariyāpiṭaka, the Buddhavaṃsa is
considered by most scholars to have been written during the 1st and
2nd century BCE, and is therefore a late addition to the Pāli Canon.

Apparently the Buddha spoke to Sariputta and the contents of this is recorded in the Buddhavamsa.
The Buddhavamsa, Cariyāpiṭaka, Apadāna and Jataka Tales are later additions to the Pali Canon, a few centuries after the Buddha's passing. I believe it was not recited by Ananda at the First Buddhist Council right after the Buddha's passing.
Furthermore, I could not find the Buddha ever mentioning Bodhisatta Setaketu in the main nikayas of the Sutta Pitaka (by searching AccessToInsight and SuttaCentral).
So, it is hard to concretely state that it was the historical Buddha who first spoke about Setaketu.
As such, in my opinion, this can be considered an unverifiable, though inspiring, legend.

After writing this answer, I discovered that the Acchariyaabbhuta Sutta (MN 123) has Ven. Ananda talking about the Bodhisatta before his birth, in the presence of the Buddha, apparently recalling something the Buddha told him before, but he does not explicitly mention the name "Setaketu". Tusita heaven (host of Joyful Gods) is mentioned.
From Acchariyaabbhuta Sutta (MN 123):

“Sir, I have heard and learned this in the presence of the Buddha:
‘Mindful and aware, the being intent on awakening was reborn in the
host of Joyful Gods.’ This I remember as an incredible quality of the
Buddha.
I have learned this in the presence of the Buddha: ‘Mindful and aware,
the being intent on awakening remained in the host of Joyful Gods.’
This too I remember as an incredible quality of the Buddha.
I have learned this in the presence of the Buddha: ‘For the whole of
that life, the being intent on awakening remained in the host of
Joyful Gods.’ This too I remember as an incredible quality of the
Buddha.
I have learned this in the presence of the Buddha: ‘Mindful and aware,
the being intent on awakening passed away from the host of Joyful Gods
and was conceived in his mother’s womb.’ This too I remember as an
incredible quality of the Buddha.

If you're interested in topics surrounding Bodhisattva-hood, you can read the book "The Genesis of the Bodhisattva Ideal" by Ven. Anālayo.

Very interesting, thank you.


text:
Does 'karma' mean that everything that happens to us is under our control, or only that we are responsible for it?
Does 'karma' mean that everything that happens to us is under our control, or only that we are responsible for it? I thought that only substantial beings could be completely in control of everything that happens to them, and not just because things are impermanent.
Also, conditioned things are a result of past karma, which is often said to be an unconscious process of seeds becoming ripe. So surely it would only be under out control over the course of very many lives, at least?
The Points of Controversy -- theravada -- refute the claim that everything is from karma, including karma, of the rajagirikas and siddhatthikas. But it does not show that for anything but new karma. The sautrantikas taught that there is no life faculty sustaining events between life and death, because karma alone is "sufficient" to account for all destinies.

this is accepted by all Buddhists... theravada or mahayana

The Lioness in Bloom, p33
Further, Bodhidharma exhorted

the practice of following conditions, sentient beings  lack a self and
are all whirled around by conditions and karma; suffering  and joy are
to be equally accepted, for both arise from conditions. If I
encounter excellent karmic recompense, such as honor and so forth, it
is  in response to causes in my past lives. Even if I should encounter
such  recompense in the present, the necessary conditions for it will
exhaust  themselves, and it will again cease to exist. What is there
to be joyful  about in its existence? Gain and loss follow conditions.
Mind has neither increase nor decrease. Unmoved by the winds of joy,
one is mysteriously in accordance with the path. Therefore, it is
called the practice of  following conditions.

Bodhidharnma, Two Entrances

Not everything is caused by karma. Some things are caused by other reasons, like the weather. The Sivaka Sutta talks about this. There's a summary at the bottom:

Bile, phlegm, and also wind,
Imbalance and climate too,
Carelessness and assault,
With kamma result as the eighth.

To quote the sutta in detail:

“Some feelings, Sīvaka, arise here originating from phlegm disorders …
originating from wind disorders … originating from an imbalance of the
three … produced by change of climate … produced by careless behaviour
… caused by assault … produced as the result of kamma: that some
feelings arise here produced as the result of kamma one can know for
oneself, and that is considered to be true in the world. Now when
those ascetics and brahmins hold such a doctrine and view as this,
‘Whatever a person experiences, whether it be pleasant or painful or
neither-painful-nor-pleasant, all that is caused by what was done in
the past,’ they overshoot what one knows by oneself and they
overshoot what is considered to be true in the world. Therefore I say
that this is wrong on the part of those ascetics and brahmins.”

The Acintita Sutta states that you can't work out karma and its results precisely:

"The [precise working out of the] results of kamma is an
unconjecturable that is not to be conjectured about, that would bring
madness & vexation to anyone who conjectured about it.

What's more skillful is to develop one's virtue (sila), concentration (samadhi) and wisdom (pañña) as stated in the Lonaphala Sutta. That will mitigate the ill effects of past karma (actions).
As for future karma (actions), to avoid accumulating karma debts, it is skillful to adopt the following skillful thinking from the Themes Sutta:

“And for the sake of what benefit should a woman or a man, a
householder or one gone forth, often reflect thus: ‘I am the owner of
my kamma, the heir of my kamma; I have kamma as my origin, kamma as my
relative, kamma as my resort; I will be the heir of whatever kamma,
good or bad, that I do’? People engage in misconduct by body, speech,
and mind. But when one often reflects upon this theme, such misconduct
is either completely abandoned or diminished. It is for the sake of
this benefit that a woman or a man, a householder or one gone forth,
should often reflect thus: ‘I am the owner of my kamma, the heir of my
kamma; I have kamma as my origin, kamma as my relative, kamma as my
resort; I will be the heir of whatever kamma, good or bad, that I do.’

so something can't be caused by bile AND phlegm?

@sorta_buddhist The Sivaka Sutta states eight possible causes of why things happen to you: bile, phlegm, wind (in your body), imbalance, climate, carelessness, assault or harm by others and karma result. But I think we should not take this too strictly. It just means things happen to you because of your past karma, but things also happen to you due to other causes. Whether there are 8 or 80 such causes is not important.

yes, but there is a question here... is everything a result of karma? is it a sufficient condition for everything that occurs to us? much like the wind is for the movement of clouds?

@sorta_buddhist No. That's what it means. I will quote more of the sutta then it will become clearer.

ok, make sure of it ha

anyway, is everything under our control, or not?

@sorta_buddhist No, not everything is under our control. But also, it's not that everything is not under our control. Some things are under our control - our present and future conduct.

yep you're right see e.g. p68 of the selfless mind -- there are, a few, "functional", mental states that are not caused by karma

@sorta_buddhist From the book The Selfless Mind by Peter Harvey?

yes, that' right... i'm unsure if that is the case for everyone, but it' fine anyway

There are 24 controllers in Patthāna, Karma is just a controller in 24.
Some controllers can arise without Karma, such as a tree or water, because  there are many controllers can create effects together without Karma-controller. Even Karma's effects require many other controllers, Ie. Arahanta's past Karma (which never effect) can't create new life for Arahanta because there are no Tanha-controller and Avijjā-controller in Arahanta.
See AbhidhammaPitaka Patthāna.

can you quote it?

https://www.wisdomlib.org/buddhism/book/patthana-dhamma

can you quote it?

I quoted it in the answer.

Karma is intention / volition. It is the only thing under your control as a human. Your intension to know, to learn, and to be liberated is all Karma.
What is volition?


text:
Why didn't the Buddha write a book outlining his teaching?
Perhaps with the exception of Laozi, most sages, founders of religion, & great thinkers from virtuous tradition do not leave us books authored directly by them. In most cases what we have is books written by their followers or commentators.
Some did say why they don't want to write. Did the Buddha say why he prefers oral transmission?

Thank you for the responses and historical references, it's hard to believe that the cause for not writing a book to be lack of written script or writing material, India wasn't that lacking, they even had some intriguing advanced mathematics compare to other civilization and writing did exist by the end of the Vedic period which aligns with Buddha time... But perhaps, as @Andrei noted the oral tradition was more advanced and the preferred method.
I asked because I thought maybe the Buddha, the same as other thinkers, saw writing as an incorrect way to transmit his message. For example, Socrates compared writing to dead painting as quoted below, but his view is not directly applicable to Buddhism and in a wider sense to Vedic oral transmission, because the method (i.e the oral transmission) is not about dialectic rather repeating the exact word and phrase. So, for an external observer is an excellent candidate for writing.

The painter’s products stand before us as though they were alive. But
if you question them, they maintain a most majestic silence. It is the
same with written words. They seem to talk to you as though they were
intelligent, but if you ask them anything about what they say from a
desire to be instructed they go on telling just the same thing forever

.

you could try this, but i don't have access https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007%2F978-94-024-0852-2_18

The Buddha responded to the questions of others. Writing a book to present a position is a ‘modern’ undertaking. The Buddha’s oral teachings were memorized (thus all the enumerations that exist in Buddhist doctrines because it made memorization easier) because his was predominately an oral culture, but also because the teachings were not a static doctrine, but were transmitted/crafted by the Buddha and later teachers to meet the context of the questioner and audience.

The four nikayas do not mention "writing". However they do mention "reciting" many times. One mention, in particular is quite interesting:

AN8.20:6.4: It’s impossible, mendicants, it can’t happen that a Realized One could recite the monastic code in an impure assembly.

In another sutta, the Buddha instructs:

DN29:17.1: So, Cunda, you should all come together and recite in concert, without disputing, those things I have taught you from my direct knowledge, comparing meaning with meaning and phrasing with phrasing, so that this spiritual path may last for a long time. That would be for the welfare and happiness of the people, for the benefit, welfare, and happiness of gods and humans.

What is notable about these and many other quotes is the amount of care mandated in transmitting the Dhamma. The transmission of the Dhamma goes beyond mere written duplication via Gutenberg printing press or mindless scribe. The transmission of the Dhamma requires transmission of pure understanding, with care taken to ensure the meaning and phrasing of what is spoken and heard. Specifically, what is required is:

AN2.126:1.3: The words of another and proper attention.

In my own experience, I have found that hearing, reciting and discussing the Dhamma to be far more powerful and effective than mere reading. I have found the eye to be fickle in its grasping as it flits from here to there seeing what it wants to see as it skims the written word. In contrast, hearing and reciting and discussing demand far more attentiveness. And although the Dhamma is available for reading, I myself study the Dhamma by listening, reciting and discussing. The difference in understanding is remarkable. I cannot say what the Buddha intended. All I can say is that reading is too superficial for me. Instead, I rely on hearing, memorizing and speaking the Dhamma in concert. And that oral tradition does indeed work for me. The oral tradition facilitates proper attention.

We can get a glimpse from Wikipedia article on Vedas:

The Vedas were written down only after 500 BCE,[101][66][20] but only the orally transmitted texts are regarded as authoritative, given the emphasis on the exact pronunciation of the sounds.[68] Witzel suggests that attempts to write down the Vedic texts towards the end of 1st millennium BCE were unsuccesfull, resulting in smriti rules explicitly forbidding the writing down of the Vedas.[66] Due to the ephemeral nature of the manuscript material (birch bark or palm leaves), surviving manuscripts rarely surpass an age of a few hundred years.

so sounds like writing was considered unreliable back then.
We can get another hint from Buddha's prohibition to use Sanskrit as the official language of transmission. He wanted the Dharma to be spoken in a language of the audience, to make it more accessible1.
If you write it, you have to write it in one language but which one? Not everyone understood Sanskrit. Not all local languages had a written form back then, and I suspect not many people could read.
1
(BTW this also supports Mahayana rephrasing the teaching in the way most accessible to each audience, instead of passing down the same exact words. This is how I answer questions here, explaining in new words every time as much as I can.)

It appears that your position is supported by the suttas. From Kinti Sutta (MN 103):  "The venerable ones agree about the meaning but differ about the phrasing. The venerable ones should know that it is for this reason that there is agreement about the meaning but difference about the phrasing. But the phrasing is a mere trifle. Let the venerable ones not fall into a dispute over a mere trifle." I guess it is also for this reason that many Pali suttas have repeated standard phrases to make memorization easier.

I guess Buddha's teaching was pretty smart and simple and your question looks like "Why didn't P.Fermat write a book outlining his teaching about Fermat's Last Theorem". Seems in both cases Buddha and P.Fermat gave a lot of hints about Buddhism and Fermat's Last Theorem and those hints can be written in several pages (maybe few lines), therefore they didn't write books.

Because oral transmission was the only available transmission media at that time. Any form of documented paper printing didn't exist until a couple centuries later.

No, that is incorrect................ True, paper is a later Chinese invention, but Palm leaf manuscript has been in use in South Asia since 5th Century BCE.  (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palm-leaf_manuscript)

@user19475, please provide any exact source that confirms the Buddhist Canon written in Palm leaves carbon-dated to the Buddha's time.

the Pali Canon was written in BCE prior to paper introduction from China. But that is beside the point, your assertion that the Buddha didn't write because a writing material didn't exist in his time is untrue!!

@user19475, then you'll have to prove your point by answering my quesiton. I'll repeat the question, please provide any exact source that confirms the Buddhist Canon written in Palm leaves carbon-dated to the Buddha's time. That's the only way to back up your claim that writing material existed in the Buddha's time.

I don't think @user19475 is saying that palm leaves were used early on for the Buddhist canon, nor that these survive to be carbon-dated now -- only saying that writing in general (on palm leaves) existed that early -- though as you say, "publishing" and "on paper" might very well be later. The earliest still-existing-today writing seems to be the Pillars of Ashoka from the 3rd century BCE -- my guess is that's not the first thing ever written, but unusually durable (stone not palm-leaf).

@ChrisW, I only use his own link against him, and nowhere did it back up his claim that writing in whatever medium existed during the Buddha's time: Nandinagari script: 7th AD; Odia script: > 1000 yrs; Shaivism text: 9th AD; Kizil: 2nd CE, etc. That's why I only asked a simple question: provide evidence of Pali documents written on whatever medium during the Buddha's stime.

yes, and also some Brahmi and Karashthi writing c.550BC on pottery, and Brahmi on coinage, & cotton cloth, & copper etc: and variation in the syllabaries of the Ashoka Pillars may indicate a possibly earlier creation of the characters carved in them cf all done from one character set; and cd can be unprecise

Why didn't the Buddha write a book?
Well, he needed writing material and he needed a written script.
Now, a written script has to be one that many people can read and comprehend, otherwise it's useless.
How do languages and written scripts get standardized, taught widely and made official? Through the ruler or government of a country of course.
The following article proves that during the Buddha's lifetime (c. 563 BCE to 483 BCE), there was no official or ubiquitous written script in the region where the Buddha lived, till Emperor Asoka over two centuries later, who had inscriptions carved on stone pillars in the Brahmi script.
Earlier versions of the Brahmi script may have existed in Tamil Nadu (south India) and Sri Lanka at the time of the Buddha, but certainly not in the region where the Buddha lived.
From "The Story of India’s Many Scripts" by Akhilesh Pillalamarri in The Diplomat:

India has a long history of writing. While India has been a literate
culture for millennia, it has also greatly valued oral knowledge. The
ancient Hindu scriptures, the Vedas, the oldest of which dated to
around 1500 BCE were memorized verbatim for at least a thousand years,
if not more, before being committed to writing. The oldest writing
found in the subcontinent is the as yet undeciphered script of the
Indus Valley Civilization (IVC), which seems to have been somewhat
logo-syllabic in nature. The script fell out of use by 1500 BCE.
The linguistic landscape of the subcontinent changed dramatically
during the 2nd millennium BCE, so that is is impossible to determine
if there is a connection between the IVC script and the next clearly
attested script in India, the Brahmi script found in the inscriptions
of the Mauryan Emperor Ashoka (ruled 268-232 BCE), especially since
they probably represented vastly different, unrelated languages.
The sudden appearance of the Brahmi writing system is one of the great
mysteries of writing in India, as there is no evidence of inscriptions
beforehand. Another script, the (extinct, childless)  Kharosthi of
northwest Pakistan and Afghanistan seems to be clearly derived from
the imperial Aramaic script used by the Persians who ruled over parts
of the Indus Valley for two centuries until the arrival of Alexander
the Great. It is unclear if the fully developed Brahmi script was
invented by the Mauryan Empire as a result of exposure to Aramaic, but
this seems unlikely, particularly since there were advanced states in
the Ganges valley and a corpus of Vedic literature dating from before
the Mauryan period.
It is more likely that pre-Mauryan inscriptions may still be
discovered, and in fact, some Brahmi inscriptions have been found in
Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka dating to the 6th century BCE. Is it possible
then, that writing spread from the south to the north, countervening
the traditional notion that the Indic scripts originate in the Ganges
valley? This may quite possibly be the case, especially since the
coasts of southern India were more exposed to foreign trade from the
Middle East than northern India, and scripts from traders could have
been brought to India this way (the same way the Phoenicians brought
their script to Greece). This long gestation period and overland route
from southern to northern India may explain why the Brahmi script,
even if it is vaguely derived from Middle Eastern alphabets, is so
different and nativized, especially relative to the more obviously
Middle Eastern-inspired Kharosthi.
Once the Brahmi script was spread throughout India by the
subcontinent-wide Mauryan Empire, it was used by the subcontinent’s
elites. However, unlike imperial China with its unified central
government and bureaucratic exam system, and Christian and Muslim
societies that were united by a written scripture, oral culture and
regional differences in India led to the Brahmi script differentiating
and evolving into different scripts in various regions of India, a
phenomenon that was already occurring by the end of the Mauryan period
in the 2nd century BCE. This phenomenon—each literary language having
a particular and unique script — is not actually that unique to India,
as the various languages of the ancient Near East and Mediterranean
also evolved their own scripts from a common source.

The article above continues with a commentary on writing material.
The following paper excerpt shows that Emperor Asoka's stone pillar inscriptions referred to suttas by name, from the oral tradition.
From Wynne, A. (2004), "The Oral Transmission of Early Buddhist Literature", Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies, Volume 27,  Number 1, p. 97:

In his Calcutta-Bairat edict, Asoka names some texts, the study of
which he considers advantageous. The general consensus seems to be
that what Asoka calls Munigatha correspond  to  the  Munisutta (Sn
207-21), Moneyasute is probably the second half  of the Nalakasutta
(Sn 699-723), and Upatisapasine may correspond to the Sariputtasutta
(Sn 955-975). The identification of most of the other titles is less
certain, but Schmithausen, following Oldenberg before him, identifies
what Asoka calls  the  Laghulovada with part of a prose text in the
Majjhima Nikaya, the Ambalatthika-Rahulovada Sutta (M no.61). It is
hardly likely that Asoka knew these texts in exactly the same form as
they are found in the extant Suttapitaka, but this does not matter.
What matters is that Asoka was able to name texts, and this surely
means that their  content was more or less fixed.

As a side topic, while a common written script was not available, spoken dialects were ubiquitous and subject to the phenomena of dialect continuums. This is the reason why there was no one single language or dialect called Pali, but it was formalized later, based on the dialects of the Buddha's time and region, plus later partial Sanskritization. So, the other thing to note is that there was no formal Pali language at the time. Please also see this answer.
Some kind of formal Sanskrit (pre-Panini) may have been present at the time, but not available to the common folk, so the Buddha had forbidden its use for transmission of his teachings - please see this question.

it's hard to believe that the cause for not writing a book to be lack of written script or writing material
There seems to be circumstantial evidence that the Brahmi script existed:

Brahmi script (Wikipedia)
Pāṇini (Wikipedia)
Lipi (Wikipedia

It's hard to date exactly or with certainty without physical (e.g. archaeological) evidence, therefore perhaps it's arguable. The earliest surviving evidence of writing are the Pillars of Ashoka from the 3rd century BCE -- and also surviving, possibly as much writing as would fit on some coins (i.e. not very much) -- as you say though I'm not certain that the Mauryan Empire was the first time writing was used in India, even if that's the oldest surviving archaeological evidence.
Inks and Palm leaves and so on aren't especially durable!
I read though that Pali was a spoken language and not a literary language -- I've no reason to believe that isn't true, if the literary or written language at the time was Sanskrit.
Being of noble birth I think it's even possible that Gautama might have been one of the (perhaps few) people who might have learned to read and write, as a youth.
That's not to imply that he wanted to, though -- i.e. I suppose he didn't think that writing was the best way to communicate and to share what he'd discovered.
because the method (i.e the oral transmission) is not about dialectic rather repeating the exact word and phrase
I think the Buddha's doctrine was absolutely about dialectic, dialogue.
If you read (or hear recited) any of the suttas, they are someone's asking the Buddha a question to which he replies, or the Buddha's correcting someone's wrong view (or more rarely the Buddha's giving a talk to an assembly).
The Buddha's dialectic often even sounds like the 'Socratic' method, asking "what do you think" as a kind of rhetorical question.
That's true not only in the suttas but in the origin stories for the vinaya rules, i.e. they result from the Buddha's interacting with things people say or do.
And the Buddha's first question after becoming enlightened was, "Who can I explain this to -- who can understand?"
So it seems to me very much in-person, person-to-person -- not writing and publishing in the modern sense, broadcasting via some medium in the hope than some audience might pick it up.
"Repeating the exact word and phrase" comes afterwards, i.e. that (memorising word for word) is how the monks chose to preserve the doctrine. Or rather, I should say, it's one of the ways: because they also tried to memorialise it in practice; translate it into other languages; write summaries and commentary; and give "dhamma talks" in their own words.

You're 100% correct, i was carried away a bit there. Of course most, if not all of the Sutras are in a dialog format, the Buddha conversing with a learner or a critique as an interlocutor. It's his disciples who followed with memorizing.


text:
How to nullify the expectations?
Buddhist teachers say things like

Do not expect anything from anyone,

and also:

Do everything with good heart and expect nothing in return and you
will never be disappointed.

Such a wonderful lines to get peace and never get disappointed. But as a human, it becomes very tough for us to follow this. Can someone throw light on this please? How we can remove the greedy nature?
When we do a lot for someone, we at least expect basic thing in return. It is hard to accept disagreements or carelessness in return from whom where you have done/thought a lot for him in past.

When you expect something, it's because it seems to you that you know that something is supposed to happen that way. For example you know that if you help someone they should be nice to you. It seems like you know for sure this is how it works, and based on this knowledge you set your expectation. But this knowledge may be wrong. Maybe the person has different goals, or he has some other problems that keep him distracted. Because of being distracted he doesn't notice that he is not being nice. If your knowledge is incomplete then your expectations can be wrong. So before you expect something you should say to yourself: "my knowledge about this may be wrong. Maybe it will happen this way and maybe it won't". If you think like this, your expectation will remain flexible. And when it doesn't go the way you wanted, you can adjust quickly.
In general every one of us only sees part of the picture. The other person sees a different part. Based on the part that you see each of you create your expectations, your actions, and your judgements. Then these expectations, actions, and judgments clash against each other. It's not your fault or his fault, it is the nature of the world, each person only sees one small part and acts based on that.
But what you can do when you know this principle, you can talk to each other and combine your parts, get them together and create one common picture, then you will be on the same page and there will be no conflict of mismatched expectations anymore.
The second problem is greedy nature, like you said. Sometimes when we are helping someone we begin to imagine the nice things we will get in return. As we keep thinking about these nice things, our mind gets excited. It wants to get something nice and it gets used to that imaginary future in which it already has those nice things. Again the problem is, the mind imagines something (in this case getting nice things in the future) and then it gets attached to that idea.
In general, the mind creates all kinds of pictures based on some information, but these pictures are only guesses. What you should learn is to never confuse these pictures as actual reality. Mind-made models are only models, and reality is reality.
If you are always aware that everything in your mind is a model, and that troubles and suffering arises when this model is wrong (and it is often wrong because it is simplified or partial) - then you can keep your mind open for new information, and when something different happens that is not in your model, you can re-adjust and get in sync with reality quickly without getting upset or angry.
If you learn to stay open (keep all your models open without conclusively completing them based on guesses) and learn to adjust your model within several milliseconds of receiving new information, then you will never be out of sync with reality - and never in trouble.

In short,
helping others is about your own karma;
how others react is about their own karma.
For example,
if you feed a hungry dog in the street,
it may shake its tail and appreciate you.
But, it is possible that it barks or even bites you after eating your food.
You feed it and it accepts. That's enough. Then, forget what you've just done.
You feed it and it refuses. You've already done your own work.
Same here, forget what you've just done.
Your work is to improve your own karma only.

Simple and effective!! Thanks

You're welcome.

There are several things going on in your nice question, & can also be so when people suggest such things: more than one concept may be being addressed.
The thing about 'dont expect anything from anyone' etc may sound a bit stark/harsh if taken out from context, which it sometimes is. Expectations of others may involve some amount of evaluation, which is reasonable, but it may also be about having preconceptions about activities or behaviours etc of others, and hence having a less than completely open mind about things, people, environment, many things: which although maybe very pleasant and nice, if done attachedly could perhaps be a small fetter in some way etc. So that may be what such a statement might sometimes be having to do with, rather than being an admonition to cynicism etc.
And yes that is true in a worldly existence where there is uncertainty and difficulty. But by trying to follow The Noble Eightfold Path, Beings may gradually more see Reality, and become less fettered, gradually clingingness dissipating, and gradually realising that there isNo greedynature, and that illusions such as greed etc simply are no longer mistaken for reality!
Receiving poor treatment or observing it being received by others isn't good. And being notnice is dismeritorious. Such things arenot easy. some things are very difficult. But try be kindly, and to notlose hope, and try do the best one can! Sort of like the Anecdote of the Scorpion and the Monk!, but hopefully more painless.

The following may be helpful, from the essay "Giving in the Pali Canon" by Lily de Silva. Although it's about donations, the same principle applies to non-material donations like helping or teaching, based on Iti 100.
The meaning of "adorning the mind" can be found in this answer. It simply means "making the mind virtuous".

The Motivation for Giving
The suttas record various motives for exercising generosity. The
Anguttara Nikaya (A.iv,236) enumerates the following eight motives:

Asajja danam deti: one gives with annoyance, or as a way of offending the recipient, or with the idea of insulting him.
Bhaya danam deti: fear also can motivate a person to make an offering.
Adasi me ti danam deti: one gives in return for a favor done to oneself in the past.
Dassati me ti danam deti: one also may give with the hope of getting a similar favor for oneself in the future.
Sadhu danan ti danam deti: one gives because giving is considered good.
Aham pacami, ime ne pacanti, na arahami pacanto apacantanam adatun ti danam deti: "I cook, they do not cook. It is not proper for
me who cooks not to give to those who do not cook." Some give urged by
such altruistic motives.
Imam me danam dadato kalyano kittisaddo abbhuggacchati ti danam deti: some give alms to gain a good reputation.
Cittalankara-cittaparikkarattham danam deti: still others give alms to adorn and beautify the mind.

Favoritism (chanda), ill will (dosa) and delusion (moha) are
also listed as motives for giving. Sometimes alms are given for the
sake of maintaining a long-standing family tradition. Desire to be
reborn in heaven after death is another dominant motive. Giving
pleases some and they give with the idea of winning a happy frame of
mind (A.iv, 236).
But it is maintained in the suttas (A.iv,62) that alms should be given
without any expectations (na sapekho danam deti). Nor should alms be
given with attachment to the recipient. If one gives with the idea of
accumulating things for later use, that is an inferior act of giving.
If one gives with the hope of enjoying the result thereof after death,
that is also an inferior act of giving. The only valid motive for
giving should be the motive of adorning the mind, to rid the mind of
the ugliness of greed and selfishness.


text:
There is a conventional self, so is anything conventionally permanent?
There is a conventional self, so is anything conventionally permanent? Answer from any reputable tradition.

The manifestation of illusory appearances.

Whether or not there is the arising of Tathagatas, this property stands — this regularity of the Dhamma, this orderliness of the Dhamma, this this/that conditionality.

The Buddha mentions three eternalist doctrines that exemplify conventional permanence. Let's skip the first two since they are weaker variations of this third one:

DN28:15.18: Furthermore, some ascetic or brahmin—by dint of keen, resolute, committed, and diligent effort, and right focus—experiences an immersion of the heart of such a kind that they recollect their past lives for as many as forty eons of the expansion and contraction of the cosmos, with features and details. They say, ‘I know that in the past the cosmos expanded or contracted.  I don’t know whether in the future the cosmos will expand or contract.

This third conventional doctrine leaps to the following conclusion:

DN28:15.25:The self and the cosmos are eternal, barren, steady as a mountain peak, standing firm like a pillar.  They remain the same for all eternity, while these sentient beings wander and transmigrate and pass away and rearise.’ This is the third eternalist doctrine. This is unsurpassable when it comes to eternalist doctrines.

In DN1, the Buddha explains the limitations of these very impressive conventional views:

DN1:1.36.1: The Realized One understands this:  ‘If you hold on to and attach to these grounds for views it leads to such and such a destiny in the next life.’

And then the Buddha turns away from convention and goes beyond:

DN1:1.36.3: He understands this, and what goes beyond this. Yet since he does not misapprehend that understanding, he has realized extinguishment within himself. Having truly understood the origin, ending, gratification, drawback, and escape from feelings, the Realized One is freed through not grasping.

To paraphrase, "you can come back as much as you like, but why?"
Arahants and non-returners do not return and are not seen by humans or devas after their body breaks up. Conventional permanence seeks return. That is why it is bound to suffering. Because a vital condition for suffering is rebirth.

SN12.23:4.3: I say that suffering has a vital condition.  And what is it?  You should say: ‘Rebirth.’

interesting answer, thanks you can you clarify the last statement?

Thank you. I've added the SN12.23 clarification.

There is nothing one should take as self as whatever you take as a self it will case unsatisfactoriness and is not permanent and not in one's control.
A normal worldling will consider conventionally that here is a self and it is permanent and it is satisfactory and it is in one's control. But it is not permanent and not in one's control and is not satisfactory.

i don't mean self in the substantial sense. i think, ha

Suffering or unsatisfactoriness is conventionally permanent for the conventional self.
Impermanence is conventionally permanent for the conventional self.

this is the sort of thing i had in mind, but you need references