How can a supposed expert on Buddhism not bring up the Lotus Sutra, the wisest and most profound of them all, as per Shakyamuni Buddha. If you want to bring up compariaons to eastern and western cultures, how do you not speak of the lay Buddhist organization, and largest Buddhist sect out of any, the Soka Gakkai International? Nichiren Buddhism is the only true Buddhism that can relate to everyday life, whether it be in Eastern or Western society and give people the strength to become happy in their own lives and help others achieve the same, without having to give up anything in their life except bad habits.
To not bring up Nichiren Buddhism and what an amazing influence it has in society is a discredit to the Buddha and the world. This article just reinforces the thought that Buddhism is about self-sacrifice, solitude, monks, robes, and shaved heads. That "type" of Buddhism is a bastardization of what Shakyamuni wished people to practice. True Buddhism is about compassion, perseverance, inner-fortitude, self-improvement, happiness, and bettering society. That is what the Buddha taught in the Lotus Sutra. All other sutras are provisional teachings that were grasped at by people who wanted their own followers and became priests for power and self-aggrandizement. In Nichiren Buddhism, no person is above the next. We are all equal - women, men, everyone. And we all work towards one overarching goal: world peace.
16
From a NYT article of 10-24-17: "Buddhist monks, moral arbiters in a pious land [Myanmar], have been in the forefront of a campaign to dehumanize the Rohingya. In popular videos, extremist monks refer to the Rohingya as 'snakes' and 'worse than dogs'."
Of course, if suffering Rohingya selves lack ontological substantiality, then "their" pain might turn out to be illusory as well. "We" ought not to worry so much about their plight, perhaps.
As the great theologian and Jedi master Yoda put it: "Much to learn you still have."
13
Buddhism anticipated science? The author mentions a psychological experiment which has been widely criticized as being about "free whim" (we have some sort of random number generator in our minds; seems obvious to me) rather than "free will." Actually, an example of free will is when one agrees to participate in an experiment which claims to deny free will.
Or we could mention Capra's Tao of Physics. Capra actually was a theoretical physicist, yet the book just missed a revolution in physics with the widespread acceptance of quantum field theory and The Standard Model. It now seems dated and hopelessly confused.
Science continues to adopt new and/or more accurate models of reality while religion--any religion--is always stuck with its dogmas.
10
Yoga and Sankhya schools of philosophy of the Indian tradition are similar to Buddhist way in this regard. Yoga holds that body and mind (as generally perceived in the west ) BOTH are products of matter; western philosophy has always made a distinction between the two. And that there IS Pure Consciousness which is entangled with the body mind complex. The process of Yoga is to disentangle our true reality (pure consciousness) from our observed reality (body mind) - through specific steps (8-fold, traditionally) that create clarity/lucidity about this reality. The very beginning of the great Yoga Sutra says, Yoga is the cessation or control of the ripples of this body/matter based mind. Vedanta school of India equates this pure consciousness with Atman (individual Self) and
10
I read a book years ago called "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him" or some such. Its premise was that there is no one truth humans can hope to find. After all, we are animals slowly evolving, changing, in response to our environment which includes our philosophical or religious environment. There are upwards of 7 billion of us, all perceiving "reality" to varying degrees of difference from each other. Science tells us there are trillions of galaxies, even all the stars we can see are burning suns like ours, let alone other planets. It is possible our very existence is a complete and unlikely "accident". After all apart from the conditions for life appearing on Earth, there was a random meteor strike that killed the dinosaurs otherwise we wouldn't even have evolved! Most of us manage to live a peaceful, meaningful life, loving our friends and family. I search for answers more and more since losing my beloved adult son last year. Meditation, just staring at a beautiful flower and marvelling at its existence, calms me and gives me peace. I accept my intellect will never "understand". I am consoled by accepting paradox: I can never know, and the not knowing is the answer.
30
"In the province of the mind what one believes to be true, either is true or becomes true within certain limits. These limits are to be found experimentally and experientially. When so found these limits turn out to be further beliefs to be transcended. In the province of the mind there are no limits. However, in the province of the body there are definite limits not to be transcended."
Dr. John Lilly
3
"Most things I worry about
...never happen anyway."
- Tom Petty
12
Before getting to far into this topic, it's really worth reading David McMahan's Buddhist Modernism (Oxford U Press), along with several books by Donald S. Lopez Jr. on the topic, which make it clear how much the West (Robert Wright included) is working with a version of Buddhism that was largely constructed in the 20th century, and, not incidentally, designed to satisfy Western tastes and expectations. It's not uplifting to figure this out, but it saves one a lot of trouble later.
https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-making-of-buddhist-modernism...
7
Looking for still further parallels, the conception of self associated with American pragmatists like Cooley, Mead, James, and Dewey, are remarkably similar to those associated with Buddhism. It’s also only recently assumed that science is somehow opposed or antagonistic to religion—an idea thoroughly naive and historically ignorant. It seems truths are not only discovered, they have to be re-discovered.
10
You let Mr. Gopnik get under your skin more than seems appropriate for an expert on Buddhism.
22
seeing the world as it really is - may be confusing to the unenlightened - but I suspect it's more about removing the busy-mind screen of the mind - one thought pulling the next into view - so people can walk down the street muttering to themselves and not noticing all that is going on around them.
I like Magritte's La Clef des Champs (Liberation) - there seems to be many - https://goo.gl/npH1XA - 'what we saw through the window was not a real outside landscape, but rather an image painted on the glass, albeit identical to the landscape outside' - 'illusion and reality are one and the same' - 'the broken window ... an invitation for the spectator to enter ... the path to freedom' - http://www.mattesonart.com/part-2-magrittes-window-paintings.aspx
I suspect Magritte was enlightened - he painted 'reality' - but in a thought-provoking way.
With an empty no-mind I just see many things others do not notice - a fallen leaf, a child's smile, a tender interaction, a shadow of leaves rustling in a gentle breeze - some have asked me 'what are you thinking?' - and when I've replied 'nothing' - they've said 'impossible' - I guess for them.
Self - as reality and illusion - we feel real, but when we die, that self will probably no longer exist - poof !
7
I agree with authors view that Buddhism is true & valid and more Western than you think. But it is only one window to reality. Buddhism mediation techniques are based on working of mind. It is for this reason it appeals to Western intellectual mind. According Indian Vedanta traditions there are multiple layers/sheaths of one's existence. Buddhism is primarily based on intellectual sheath but as per Vedanta tradition ultimate reality is beyond this. It is experience of ultimate reality that gives one knowledge of existence and also experience of our nature that gives one positive meaning & values. Vedanta calls this experience as Sat-Chida-Ananda representing "existence, consciousness, and bliss". Meditation techniques of Vedanta traditions are different from Buddhism's meditation techniques.
9
Wright argues nicely that selected aspects of the Buddha Dharma are generally useful and, arguably, true in a conventional sense. Like yoga for the mind with penetrating insights. One can practice these techniques while being an atheist, agnostic, Christian or any other kind of religious believer or disbeliever and still profit. Just like doing yoga, going for walks, exercising, working math problems, singing, talking to a good friend . . . you name it . . . offers benefits and can change how we see things, regardless of religious belief of disbelief. Buddhism offers a form of virtue ethic. It offers powerful arguments as to why that ethic is essentially true. My hope is that these arguments proving a virtue ethic lend a hand to similar arguments made by Greco-Roman philosophers and their Christian (and Jewish and Muslim and secular) descendants. Check out the very American Ben Franklin for example! The Irish philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre makes interesting and worthy contributions to this issue from a Western philosophic perspective . . .
8
After all, Buddhism is in a sense suspicious of “stories” And, Gopnik says, science is just “competitive storytelling”
Actually, science is suspicious of stories as in adaptive just-so-stories that posit that if one adaptationist story begins to fail, then there are many more where that came from, instead of considering non-adaptive explanations. Such a mindset disqualifies the adaptationist program because if everything is an adaptation, then how can one falsify or disprove a position which is not clearly admitted.
One way to confront this bias is to try to blow up the predictions of the hypothesis in question and not fall into storytelling. Many times reality is far more remarkable. Other times you are just plain wrong. That is the real gift. Instead of thinking you have just wasted 10 years on an avenue of exploration that ends in a dry well, you actually just learned something. Your explanation for reality was wrong. Answers stop the inquiry. Being wrong opens them back up.
5
That Buddhism offers insights into human psychology goes without saying, but this is not to say that it has the same epistemic reach as cognitive science. You might as well say that great novelists are scientists. There is folk psychology and then there are the behavioral sciences. Also, why does the author repeatedly use the word 'science' in some all-encompassing sense when he means psychology? If Buddhism is so linked with science, then where is its theory of evolution or of relativity? How many medical doctors has it produced? What can it tell us about global warming? I'm not putting down Buddhism, only the author's poor argument and poor use of terms.
3
According to Prof. Wright, "A sutra attributed to the Buddha says that a “mind object” — a category that includes thoughts — is just like a taste or a smell ...: the person 'lusts after it if it is pleasing' and 'dislikes it if it is unpleasing.' "
I don't have first-hand knowledge of the Pali language in which the original sutras were written. However, recent scholarship on Buddhism cautions that the Pali term first translated into English as "lust" or "desire" is more accurately rendered as "attachment," and the mistranslation has misled generations of Westerners into thinking that Buddhism is against pleasures or desires.
11
Buddhist thought becomes clear with practice, as does Hinduism and Christianity (not the Paulian interpretation practiced by most Christian churches, but the teachings of Christ alone).
The Indian concepts are not difficult, just unfamiliar to many.
Hinduism teaches us to reach a state of improvement, and escape from life/death cycle by focusing on Brahmin (think of it as the source of all life and consciousness). Buddha removed that layer of Brahmin and so Buddhists focus on mindfulness (Atman/Mind interchange) with the same goal of escaping samsara. Jesus simplified it so that we can be “reborn” in this lifetime and, if we live right afterwards, escape samsara by entering “Heaven”. But recall Jesus said the kingdom of God is within us. Not an external place. This also conforms to Indian thought.
What Jesus taught is not far different from Buddhism or Hinduism.
Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness fighting with illusion, AKA “Mara” in Buddhism and “Maya” in Vedanta Hinduism. The “devil” of the New Testament is Maya. Maya masks truth and leads us astray by dangling carrots and sticks (Jesus was offered the world as his kingdom, which he saw through and rejected).
All three paths, at their un-bastardized core lead to the same end. I wish more people recognized this.
32
I expected Wright and Gopnick both to eventually start talking about quantum mechanics, and its implications for - e.g. - our ideas about causality. It didn't happen. I think both of these gentlemen are missing a bet.
2
Now that the West has discovered Buddhism, they are the discoverers. They own the patent. The East is just a mythical bunch of mystics who practiced it for eons and eons by simple people of great understanding. Columbus discovered America not by the people already living there. Ever think of the real discoverer of one of the greatest number - 0? Ever think of how real great civilizations existed in the East way before the Western civilization was even born? Edmund Hillary was the first to conquer Mount Everest and made famous and rich. But do you hear of Sherpa Tensing who made it all possible who died in ignominy and poverty? Westerners have taken eastern ideas and patented it for themselves. But I think there is now a kind of retribution - like the Easterners reverse engineering drugs and producing them cheap. Yoga is the craze now but how distorted it has become.Buddhism IS eastern and only now the West is even beginning to understand a little. A big difference than what your headline suggests.
7
"It may be wrong"...
To quote from another non-westerner, "I am the way, the truth and the life. Nobody comes to the Father except through me." Jesus shows us that while right understanding is critical, the key thing is how we relate to God the creator, who is other. We are not God, and if we try to exclude Him by focussing on our own thoughts, however we describe them, we are lost. Philosophies that tell us to rely on ourselves will always fall short. Bootstrapping only gets us so far.
See, the Father is standing and waiting with open arms. But we must die to self, not simply redirect it.
4
I couldn't help but find it troubling that in order to prove the value of Buddhism, Wright has to describe it as "Western." Can't it be a powerful philosophy in its own way without westernizing (or exoticizing) it?
4
Buddhist arguments are tremendously persuasive in translation. Not only do they dovetail with modern psychology, but they resonate with Christian and other teachings. Only when draped in its "Orientalism" does Buddhism obfuscate, yet too often that mystery is what attracts Westerners.
5
This man is not a true Buddhist. He is just another Atheist hiding behind some miss translations of the teachings of Siddhartha. He really needs to study a lot deeper, before offering a book to show why Buddhism is true, when he, himself, has a weak grasp of many of it's concepts.
3
Even before the storyteller begins, the finger is reaching to press the button; the story comes second. The little conjurer who tells that story assumes -- Ozlike -- that s/he's in charge. The finger knows better.
Reading Kanehman's Thinking Fast and Slow gives me a sense of the way boundaries between us and the world dissolve as we act, which is to say, as we live.
4
Not mentioned in this article is how research has shown that our memories, which are at the very center of our sense of self, are completely unreliable. We remember things as we wish to remember them, we distort them as we recall and then reintegrate them, reform them on the basis of limited inputs of information, and are even subject to forming false memories. Buddhism teaches us try to see past the many veils that obscure our true perception of reality, even including the memories that give us our sense of self.
12
It goes without saying that there are a lot of things that everybody knows without being told. Westerners just think they can own everything so long as they buy the rights to and control all the words. Stupidly they tell themselves that and stupidly they believe it. Self-fulfilling prophecy and it works, much to the relief of everyone outside of the West who joyfully watch us struggle in the web we spun.
3
The problem with trying to lose one's self into a "non-self" with "no abiding core", and no real essence, who is it that has awareness of this non-self / non-essence?
That thing, the non-self, apparently has a reason to want to be a non-self, right? That's the Buddhist project, I assume, to see the world more clearly. It may not want anything else, but it wants *that*. The Cognito is there, wanting to not be there, because it isn't a thing or a filter, it's an ongoing activity - but even in its efforts to be disinterested give it a motivation, an interest.
For a non-self to even make sense implies a self. If the non-self is the "truer" more "seeing" self, it really is just another way of being a self.
I believe in the truth of Buddhist practice but I think Buddhist metaphysics is indefensible and needs to change. The man said “Things exist but they are not real.” Not "the self" but "things" in general. The Buddhist line says that the world we live in is an illusion that we need to transcend. This is where Western thought is superior to Buddhism. We believe in the possibility of historical progress, and many of us believe that what we do to improve the world is the main reason we are here.
It may well be that the world we perceive is largely an illusion because we see only the surface of things and we miss what is going on beneath. But science shows there is an objective reality which guides our perceptions. Science is not "competitive storytelling". It is the description of the world by mathematics, and continually testing it. It is a great mystery that the world is describable by a small number of simple equations, but so far it has held up pretty well. I think our science is hugely incomplete, but to an extent it really describes reality.
The idea that things aren't real may be true in the pragmatic sense that it helps people to make spiritual progress, but it is contrary to the scientific worldview that almost everyone subscribes to now. Buddhist philosophy not only misses the point of our reason for existing, in my opinion, but it causes the faithful to go through mental contortions that are certainly holding them back. It is obsolete and it needs to change.
2
Your biggest mistake is to assume a theological claim for existence—”Existence has a Reason”. Is this claim defensible?
2
I could tell without a large philosophical discussion. The first and last time I went to lecture in a Buddhist temple a distinguished Lama told the audience that having money when you die is an indicator that you don’t live your life to its fullest potential and to avoid it you should donate to his order. What is more western than this?
1
When the British invaders entered India and China
they weren't looking for Nirvana. But contact flows
both ways. Buddhism isn't west or east. It's human!
3
"but if we can’t say clearly what Buddhists mean by “the world as it really is,” then how can we examine it?"
Having cultivated mindfulness, the aware calm relaxed minds indeed starts to see the world as it is. Everything conditioned is impermanent. Everything connected to disturbing emotions causes pain. Things arise out of nowhere and fall away, disappearing. Thoughts, wars, daily events, everything. And egolessness of course, a huge topic..We are in a great womb of potentiality where the world unfolds. The awakened mind, what so many search for, is already here. Of course in order to understand any of this a meditation practice needs to become established, going beyond the rational, narrative creating mind.
2
As usual, some of the responses in this forum are really, really unfortunate given what the thesis of this piece actually alludes to. Buddhist teaching, in fact, would suggest that we're reading in this case with eyes wide shut. Re-read this leaving attachment to concepts (stories) behind about what Buddhism is or isn't. In fact, The Buddha in his time would have rejected the title of this piece, as "Buddhism" suggests a static, unchanging concept embedded in a universe where EVERYTHING is in constant flux and motion including human experience. Knowledge can only be attained by awareness in any given moment. Anything outside of that are useless, artificial concepts fluttering in the wind. In this way, science and the Buddha's teachings of awareness enhance each other nicely, as science has no problem with "substantiated" theories being falsifiable down the road....
9
Why did empirical science that has led to great technological inventions not start in the East, especially under Buddhism, but rather in the West with the Judeo-Christian world view being the motivator (all major scientific breakthroughs came from people like Newton, Maxwell, Faraday, Planck.... and NONE from the Buddhists)
One interesting quetions was presented by G. Bateson : Is a blind man’s cane part of the man? Explaining a litte : we believe our body "finishes" at the point of the fingers, but obviously, the blind man use his cane for sensing his environment and moving accordingly. Considering that our body extends to any extremities where our senses (view, touching etc.) and feelings (like, dislike, love, understand etc.) may go, and that all external things "felt" in such a way are part of our body, is a very interesting and enlightening point of view.
1
If gods exist their favorite game is hide and seek or cartoon morning cat and mouse.
This as one commentater said is my 0.2 cents worth.
As some one once said, soon enough we'll all know if all of this is squishy jello, ending in oblivion, or a winding, curving up and down mountain highway that actually goes some where. (Some will not know if it is oblivion at the end if they happen to die in their sleep.)
1
Ask the Rohingya what they think about Buddhists. I guess genocide is yet one more parallel to western thought.
1
David Smith, why don’t you read that article and try to understand it. The Rohingya political issue has nothing do with the merits of the article or Buddhist Philosophy/Psychology or Phenomenology. I suspect, you are merely jealous that most Western intelligentsia find Buddhism to some extent compatible with Science than your own religious traditions.
3
Buddhism Is More ‘Western’ Than You Think... Yes, since it is about the culture of a mind characterized by an intimate union of Lucidity and Benevolence (in Buddhist parlance: Wisdom and Compassion) - so intimate that it is often represented by a sexual union (Yab-Yum). And what is more "Western" than the parallel union of Science and Judeo-Christianity? They are two complementary forms of government, with the difference lying in in their respective emphasis - cultural/political in the West, individual in Buddhism.
3
Buddism is very clear, logical and simple. Its purpose is to end mental suffering. The Budda knew he could not stop physical suffering but mental suffering was a different story. Look at all the people in our country lost and suffering in alcohol, opiods hurting one another with bombs and guns and angry words. Do you think the goal of ending mental suffering/ mental illness is unworthy or not ambitious? Christ did not think so. You know something is a teaching of the Budda if it reduces suffering, encourages diligent mindfulness which is a form of meditation/ truth seeking, encourages being content with little, being humble, developing simplicity in one's life, reducing defilements (hurt/Kill/sexual misconduct/lie/steal), encourages aloofness which provides time to meditate and encourages reducing sensuality which means constant bombardment of our brains with TV/Internet/Phones/etc. It is totally based on logic and truth and science (impermanence, uncertainty, and the illusions of self). Action/ reaction, cause effect, identify the causes of suffering and then the solutions and then engage in right thinking mindfulness and proper behavior to end the suffering. Don't get wrapped around the axle with intellectual foo foo and forget what Buddisms goal really is: mental health elimination of mental suffering. To do so does a disservice to people who would really benefit from it but are turned away by misinformation.
4
While I'm not a student of Buddhism per se, i.e. the noble truths, I am a practitioner of mindfulness mediation in the tradition of Jon Kabat Zinn. In that sense, I find mindfulness practice is an experiential phenomena. As a westerner, who sits, breathes, and observes how my own mental clutter can distract me from paying attention to what's in front of me, or from responding to stimuli in mindful ways, I found this article resonated with me. There is a YouTube video of Dr Jeffery Swartz called You are Not Your Brain. It reminded me that much of what prevents me from being "present" is simply my nervous system regurgitating old, and new, stuff. To me, mindfulness practice helps to be aware of the clutter and develop the ability to pay attention to something else.
3
Ah, arguments about opinions about stories about thoughts. The stories we tell ourselves about buddhism or anything else do not make the arguments or "facts" in these stories real. The judgements, arguments, emotions; we make things up out of thoughts moment by moment. This is the "relative" reality that we live every day. Science is a great example of thoughts that turn into stories whose "reality" is tested by experiment. But are the results real? Is there a "bigger" reality that the results live in? Viruses? When did we uncover them? X-rays? Infrared? Radio Waves? Quantum mechanics? These thing didn't "exist" in the past till our thoughts made up question stories about reality. One of the stories that we tell ourselves is that we know everything right this minute. No, we don't. We don't have to... it might be useful to, and we can discover helpful things. We might just want to entertain ourselves, we can do endless mental masturbation, so that our thoughts seem important and we feel entertained. Or, we could experiment and sit down and watch these thoughts...do nothing with them or about them. Experience them without believing them. See what the motivation is for a thought. Is there a thought that might benefit someone besides oneself? In this reality that we make up moment by moment, it might be better to create a skillful, courageous and compassionate story.
1
Of course the B and P converge as everything does....
But an interesting project for you would be to live in a "Buddhist country" as I have done and see what B is on the streets in a cross section of society. Beyond inscrutable texts, your will see the concept of compassion so embraced in the West as the main lesson of B actually existing as codependency and enabling in the East. Now that is B and P to a T.
Your commentary and the those of others you refer to including Lord Buddha's are best sensed and understood in a BALANCE which is the main tenet of Buddha's real teaching no matter what "scholars" or "devotees" have added with idol worship and excessive meditation leading to the point of denying the possibility of mindfulness of where you are, who you are, and the beauty around you.
Lord Buddha, Jesus Christ and Muhammad all had great ideas but all of those have been taken to illogical and extreme ends not on their merit but used as a means of control and guilt. Too bad.
There you go again, another person missed the point of the article. I recommend you read and understand.
2
Western culture seems obsessed with promoting loyalty, reliability, stability, fidelity, and to that end attacks any kind of inquiry that leads to change, such as science or reflective thought. That's why Descartes's works were on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum for four hundred years: they tended to promote doubt in matters of faith and morals. We Westerners want certainty, not truth.
2
Given the limitations of our senses and our brains which also censor what we see, hear and feel without our input, it is unlikely that we will ever know what is true. Perhaps there are multiple truths. Perhaps there is no truth but as Nietzsche said only interpretations. We are so limited and also arrogant to think we of all the animals will know the truth. When sailing and watching dolphins swim around us and jump and play and come close enough for us to rub their bellies, I suspect they know the truth: rejoice in life and play and live joyfully.
1
I enjoyed this article. If anything, what are we, other than the fluid, ever changing totality of our experiences and then only to the extent that they "exist" in our own imaginations. There can't be any permanent, immutable "I." This is perhaps the only plausible answer to the question, who am I ?
Moreover, both the Buddhist exploration of the human psyche and the notion that a clear view of the world requires transcending the sense filled realm of likes and dislikes to, presumably, the higher more enlightened, intelligible realm of autonomous choice, seem very Kantian to me.
Of course, considering my philo grades at Rutgers 50 years ago, I strongly recommend disregarding this comment.
4
Good point! Thanks!
Or, as my high school World History teacher used to put it - "Relax and Swing with the Universe".
1
"Even though the fool were to associate with the wise man his entire life, he will never gain wisdom......just as the spoon cannot taste the soup"....Guatama Buddha
1
For those readers who want a good understanding of the intriguing similarities between Robert Wright's thoughts on Buddhism and some of the latest scientific thinking like Quantum Field Theory and the Core Theory of particle physics (all of it very understandable), I highly suggest reading the book by Sean Carroll, The Big Picture.
Some things contemplated by humans thousands of years ago have a great deal to teach us. Plus the mere fact that the Dalai Lama encourages scientific scrutiny of Buddhist thinking and listens with enthusiasm to what science has to say about reality without threat and rejection says a great deal about this fascinating metaphysical philosophy. Compare that with religions most dominant in the West and elsewhere.
Read “The Shape of Ancient Thought” by Thomas McEvilley for insights into the extensive, and deep, connections between eastern and western religious thought, which are far more ancient and important than is generally appreciated. The west had a strong tradition of mindful inquiry in medieval monastic practice long before the age of “enlightenment” extinguished it. One need only turn to Meister Eckhart’s extraordinary sermons to understand just how rich this tradition used to be.
1
Tense? Angry? Preoccupied with real or imagined worries?
There is a far easier and more accessible means of seeing the world the way it really is.
Listen to the late German organist Helmut Walcha play the Prelude and Fugue in B minor, BWV 893, from Book II of the Well Tempered Clavier by JS Bach. I guarantee you will feel better in just a few minutes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ailHWxt0ZxA
2
There are problems with this exposition of Buddhism. It tries to show that it is consonant with the latest ideas of Westerm psychology and cognitive science. But it portrays Buddhism as static, as if hasn't changed in a thousand or more years. Western science and philosophy are changing continuously. There is a rich literature on the self from John Locke to the late, much lamented philosopher, Derek Parfit. The ideas and techniques of psychoanalysis--free association--can put you in touch with your deepest feelings and emotions, including anger, with understanding and mitigation.
Finally, how would one explain the genocidal treatment of the Rohinga, natives of Myamar, who are being slaughtered by their Buddhist compatriots. Those actions are not caused by calm, composed meditative minds.
1
Please stop using “than you think” in headlines especially. It’s arrogant to assume what the reader already thinks.
2
Many of the young, self called Buddhists that I know today are as smug as they come. In their smuggly universe they seem to think they are above the fray or know some sort of 'secret'. As if there is a golden key and they've opened some mystical door. You can find many of these people's books in the Self-Help section.
Harsh reality lays ahead for the many seekers of any religion.
The "My God is better than your God" crowd are self delusional all.
1
Much of western societies' understanding of Buddhism is superficial and attached to lifestyle choices and related status. Buddha statues are placed in interior design or garden magazine spreads as a point of decoration or even 'whimsy'. Meditation and yoga practices are largely the territory of the urban and the not-poor. Somewhere I heard definition of different Buddhists; the one I remember is the 'night table' Buddhist, who reads about Buddhist concepts in their comfy bed at the end of their work day. The very fervent worship of the Dalai Lama in some circles seems more related to pop culture and celebrity, rather than religion. Part of this is the reality that Buddhism doesn't tell people how to live or behave, which is a big attraction to those of us who have shed the strict and narrow doctrines of other self stated religions.
1
The Buddha’s ideas do not defy articulation. More impressively, every single human being who sits down to follow the practice laid out by the Buddha, has the identical experience of the nature of mind. There is no I.
The fact that one can sit down for two weeks of breath meditation, practicing the method taught by the Buddha 2500 years ago, and that at the end of that two weeks everyone who was there with you will have experienced the same essence of mind-- that there is no executive self, that "no one is in control", that awareness comes and goes flitting from pain to pleasure to memory to hope, fear and anger--- as described by the Buddha himself... is an awe inspiring fact. Belief is not involved.
2
Haven't read the piece yet, but will respectfully take issue with the title. Wouldn't a less egocentric culture than ours have said, "'Western" is more Buddhist . . ."
We would all hope, even against daily evidence to the contrary, that homo sapiens are trending more toward the enlightened than the other direction. Although, we all know, deep down inside, that the developmental stage of our species is still woefully primitive and has a long road to go.
1
For those who wonder what is meant by seeing “the world as it really is,” and what “ultimate truths” are – I suggest reading the article: “Theoretical Foundations to Guide Mindfulness Meditation: A Path to Wisdom,” published in the journal ‘Current psychology.’ [The article is available as a MindRxiv archive at this link: https://mindrxiv.org/mfs63/ ]
I highly recommend this book if you care to read a first person account (and everyone just loves those regardless of how trumped up they may be) of a guy who went on several meditation retreats -- with the upfront intention of writing a book about it -- and had a huge blow-out moment when he realized that if he put his attention on his tight jaw muscles they relaxed.
So if you feel that approaching any sort of Buddhist lifestyle seems daunting and reaching Nirvana not worth shooting for, console yourself because you may relax your jaw muscles sitting in meditation and apparently that counts as some sort of revelatory peek into higher states of consciousness these days.
I have had a Buddha statue for forty years, ever since I first became interested in Buddhism reading Christmas Humphrey, Alan Watts and DT Suzuki.
Recently a stranger in Yoga Pants entered my house, looked at my faded old buddy, and exclaimed "Wow you do Yoga! I teach Zumba, you should come to one of my classes!"
When she had departed I took the statue out to the dumpster in my alley and pitched it in allowing the hatch to slam back onto the steel container. And, that my friends is the sound of one hand clapping.
7
Socrates observed that each man could discover the truth by unaided reason alone. Now, the fact that men may think alike all over the world, and come up with some of the same conclusions, is no reason to conclude that Greek Philosophy is more “Eastern” than we may think, or that Buddhism is more “Western” than we may think, or that Conficianism is more “African” than we make think. Such logic just makes one wonder what purpose someone may have in making such specious claims. The East is entitled to own Buddhism just as the West is entitled to own Christianity, just as the Arabs are entitled to own Islam. That such religions may, in some ways resemble one another is only because they all come from the kinds of men who all, more or less, may come to similar conclusions.
As another way of expressing this, Buddism is a superstition, just as Christianity, Islam, or various African beliefs. So, are all more “Eastern” because Buddism is a superstition? Does this mean genocide committed by Weatern or African peoples are actually More “Eastern” than we may think because Buddhists are doing the same to the Rohingya?
Sorry to say, therefore, that this particular writers thinking is kind of ridiculous. The Chinese see the sun rises in the east, so that idea is more “Western” than we may think - or vice-versa if someone in France comes to the same conclusion?
1
Wright's article is not easy to get thru. I took it apart in my usually way and got to the gist of it. The world of stuff going on- planes flying, computer computing, minds thinking - is not all the important, perhaps not important at all. And Wright says there is much commonality between science and Buddhism. This is not new stuff. Go back to tons of material published last century. Wright should include physics and math with this science.
Some physicists today thank that particles dont exists between observations, one example. And the mind or computer stuck in paradigm can not arrive at all math truths (Incompleteness Theorem).
2
That Westerners should be patronizing to "orientalism" is beyond ironic.
First of all, there are a whole bunch of Westerners who cling to a cartoonish anthropomorphic god who walks on water and rises, bodily, from the dead.
Second, those Westerners who reject such foolishness (and I'm sure Gopnik is one) nonetheless often cling to their own religion of material reductionism where, despite what the author argues (and I agree), they actually believe that eventually, eventually, our new priests (i.e., scientists like themselves) will arrive at a "Theory of Everything."
As but one powerful proof that this will never happen is that our measuring instruments, which are fundamental to scientific method, are trapped within space/time. And without measurement, that other fundament to science -- i.e., math --- is blind. And the proof of that is that the current, favored mathematical formulation to provide that theory -- i.e., string theory -- has, according to its most preeminent practitioner, Ed Witten, possibly an INFINITE number of solutions (or, to paraphrase a wise fisher-woman, its strings 'all the way down').
And as anyone who can reason knows, an infinite number of solutions is no solution at all. Or the same as saying godidit.
No, rather than patronizing, we should, as Robert Wright urges, delve deeply into Buddhist philosophy as a partner with Western science and philosophy as that's far more likely to provide 'answers' than any other current practice.
4
An intelligent reflection on the article, unlike most on this forum.
2
The question is do one's thoughts, words and or deeds lead to suffering or the end of suffering, and then what to do about it.
Buddha gave us a roadmap for the journey and the way to take the trip is to find a good teacher and put your time in on the cushion and take a good look at your actions and their consequences.
It's not complicated.
The problem is that very few people want to do this.
3
Thank you Mr. Wright for your efforts--and, I would say (for me) success--at bringing clarity to the teaching (Dharma) and the practice (meditation) of "Buddhism." As a "Westerner" I am open to what is helpful (i.e., not hurting myself or others, and perhaps even being of some help) and not so interested in getting caught up in the stridency of competing dogmas (e.g., God Vs No God). I go to church sometimes and I pray and always get a lot out of it. I meditate, go to Sangha, and mindfulness retreats and always get a lot out of it. There is a lot to be said for doing "what works--what's helpful." As they say in the Recovery movement, "take what you need and leave the rest." I appreciate your open spirit of inquiry. I have gotten a lot out of reading your book on Buddhism and listening to your youtube interviews. I appreciate your open non-dogmatic approach. It's refreshing.
1
Richard Feynman used to teach that what separated a physicist from a non-physicist is that the physicist has analyzed a physical phenomenon mathematically at least once. That experience separates him from others. Just so, what separates someone who knows something about religion and others is that the real student of religion has understood at least one major religious text. Someone who wants to understand the relation of religion to modern science must have completed both prerequisites.
For those with a basic understanding of mathematical physics, the Heart Sutra is an excellent text. Ancient Buddhism taught its adherents to analyze the world into discrete particles or atoms. This freed the mind from sensual attachment. This is similar to what a person who has mastered basic modern physics experiences.
But then a newer form of Buddhist wisdom as presented in texts such as the Heart Sutra taught its adherents that the discrete particles were not real but merely useful tools. And just as that new wisdom destroys the atomism of old Buddhism, it can also destroy the conceptions of modern mathematical physics. This destruction or criticism of mere ideas, be they ancient or modern, leads to an intuition of absolute truth or reality.
Both early Buddhism and modern mathematical physics analyze the world. The later Buddhism teaches us to criticize the tools of analysis. This criticism opens up the mind to an experience of absolute truth.
1
To the extent that the physical processes govern all activities of mind, and mind is a product of the mechanics of matter & physics, should we not have some even intuition of this 'Truth' if there were one which we had the capacity to comprehend?
Perhaps Truth is just another flaw of mind, a crutch, just another rationalization that the mind cooks up in the 'God Part of the Brain'?
What seems more within our reach is honesty, rather than Truth.
Just a thought from one who gags on religious texts & can hardly remember long division let alone analyze any physics mathematically...
3
The Buddhism that Wright describes is a tamed, psychologized version. Or perhaps he is identifying the first steps of the process with the entire unfolding of the Dharma.
Buddhism can be profoundly ontological, not in the sense of presenting a metaphysical picture or system, but in the sense of revealing reality beyond the veil of conventional appearances. There are insights about time, causality, subject and object, being and nothing. I just used some very familiar (and possibly inappropriate) concepts to make a point, but these concepts are just pointers.
In any case, there are a plethora of teachings (particularly in Mahayana and Vajrayana developments) that simply cannot be ignored or reduced to complex means of calming the mind and ceasing identification with the "CEO-self."
1
The question that has kept me engaged with Buddhism and meditation practice for more than 40 years now is, how do I want to BE as I live my life? Do I want to be open, kind, gentle, fearless? Or do I want to be swept along by habit, by grasping, aversion and indifference? A secondary question is, is meditation by itself sufficient to allow one to live from a point of openness? The teachers I have studied with have spoken of hearing, contemplating and meditating. One hears the teachings, then contemplates what they are saying, and then one meditates to test one's understanding -- how is what I experience in meditation influenced by the assumptions i bring to the practice, and can this iterative process (of hearing, contemplating and meditating) change those assumptions or reduce our dependence upon them? This three-fold process, which as I said is iterative -- most people can't do it just once or twice and truly understand the Buddha's teachings, simple as they appear on the page -- can be found in all of the contemplative traditions within Buddhism. I have no doubt that most people can benefit from mindfulness practice, but am holding an open question about the long term growth possible without the hearing and contemplating -- without hearing and contemplating the Buddha's teachings.
1
Let's be honest: the West has invented experimental natural science, and the East has invented psychology.
Of course observing the mind isn't comparable to observing external natural phenomena. But that doesn't mean that you can't experiment with observing the mind.
Western psychology exists for less than two centuries, and basically tries to apply methods that work in the field of the natural sciences (= the object of scientific study exists outside of the human mind), on the human mind. Let's admit it: it largely failed to obtain any useful "knowledge".
As Robert Wright is pointing out here, it's for instance based on a clear distinction between emotions and thought, or feeling and reason. That distinction has been invented by Western 18th century philosophy, and was inconceivable even in the West until then (Descartes' famous "cogito ergo sum" immediately explains that by "cogitare" (usually translated as "thinking") he means all kinds of affections such as loving, hating etc.). Later on, even Spinoza maintains the same kind of definitions.
Buddhism has developed a way of observing the mind and transforming it in order to become happier all while being able to help other people more frequently and in a more competent way, and Western psychology still is nowhere when it comes to those two basic goals. That's because it's using the wrong methodology.
Psychotherapy existed long before the West tried to invent it, in the 19th century. Time for us to catch up!
1
I agree with most of what Prof Wright says. I have two comments. First, Buddhism includes many beliefs and teachings that are categorized into different schools. In the broadest sense we have the Theravada Buddhist tradition practiced by Buddhist countries like Thailand, Sri Lanka, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, etc. The Mahayana tradition is practiced in China, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Tibet, etc. Within these large traditions there are many philosophical schools, particularly in the Mahayana tradition such as those centered on the Avatamsaka Sutra, Lotus Sutra, the Consciousness Only School of Vasubandhu Bodhisattva, and the Madhyamika School of Nagarjuna Bodhisattva. My point is that Professor Wright is only writing about a small (though important) part of Buddhism. Secondly, Buddhism has always been a teaching focused more on practice and realization rather than on philosophical conjecture as in Western philosophy. Many of the experiences described in the meditation practice of true Buddhist adepts are outside the range of scientific investigation. And there are supernormal states, that the Western mind has trouble accepting. "Knowledge of past lives" which results from a profound meditation practice is one obvious example of this. The ultimate goal itself, Nirvana, is an ineffable state not subject to scientific proof. Kant said that the ultimate reality is not knowable. Buddhism teaches that it can be realized but cannot be expressed in words or thought.
1
Mr. Wright's description of "Buddhist" philosophy is actually only partially true. The concept of no self which he describes (in other words the notion that you and I simply do not exist Beyond a random constellation of thoughts and feelings) is actually the interpretation of Buddhism promulgated by the Theravadin School. In the Mahayana school, of which Tibetan Buddhism is a part, A distinction is made between the conventional egoic self and a deeper changeless Buddha nature, which is The very nature of consciousness itself. His interpretation of a "causeless" reality completely flies in the face of both Theravadin and Mahayana Buddhist understanding, which accepts that the conventional or relative world is organized according to the laws of cause and effect known as "karma." I recommend exploring other interpretations of Buddhism beyond Mr. Wright's, in particular Tibetan Buddhism.
3
I view Buddhism as more a philosophy of life, or an approach to perceiving ourselves and others, rather than a religion. When post-modernism (along with existentialism) finally emerged as the predominant western philosophy in the mid-20th century, many important western beliefs began to align with core Buddhist beliefs: the acknowledgement that our reality is only illusion; that all existence is fleeting; that individuals need to live passionately and "in the moment". Buddhism preceded much of post-modernism by centuries!
1
I am both amused and appalled by some critiques from readers who base their views exclusively on this article, but who obviously haven't read Wright's book, "Why Buddhism is True." If you haven't read the book, and are not very knowledgeable about the subject already, I encourage you to do so. A central theme of the book is how evolution has pre-disposed us to behave and think in ways that increase the probability that we could survive long enough to pass our genes on the next generation, but that also give rise to behaviors that cause personal suffering. In his book, Wright describes insights into the fundamental contributors to human suffering that Buddhist philosophy illuminates, and how practices like meditation can help mitigate their effects.
4
Buddhism, as one knowledgeable author on the subject put it, is a way of life and thought. It is irrelevant, in some sense if it is "true" or not. This itself is a bit of a western concept.
On the surface, Buddhism is a way of approaching life to minimize unhappiness, and to maximize your capacity to do "good". If desired, one can delve much deeper into the metaphysical/philosophical underpinnings of the multiple schools of Buddhism to understand the concepts on a more complex level.
There is no inherent need for Buddhism to be scientific in any way, although it tends to be related to psychology fairly strongly, as the emphasis is human happiness, and human happiness is a psychological concept.
The world could use a much bigger dose of Buddhism.
2
Perhaps it's the difference between a belief system & a technique or cognitive skill.
Perceived reality is nothing remotely like the way things turned out to be once science began 'unpacking' matter & the physics & electrochemistry of perception.
If there's one thing to learn from the revelations of science, it's that absolutely everything people believed with such utter conviction, was utterly wrong.
We weren't just wrong, we were so incredibly far off, the germ theory of disease for example, was never remotely anticipated in pre-science mythology of vapors, humors, curses, gods & leaches.
Belief-systems, even a belief in the denial of belief seems itself a flawed certitude.
Perhaps our greatest human failing is in succumbing to this trap, a flaw in the mind, an addiction to belief & certitude, when in fact the more we learn the less we know, & any 'enlightenment' requires a shedding of 'belief' and an acceptance of the Mysterious.
Anyway, it makes sense to unpack the neurochemistry of Buddhism, we never stop seeking to make sense of things & thinking, even if 'cogito ergo sum' turns out to be a complete illusion.
If we didn't ponder we'd be, maybe like trees. Trees comprise among the most magnificent expressions of life on earth, and aren't (it would seem) beset with thoughts.
But alas, we may have to accept our thoughts, not being plants. But we don't have to have to believe them.
3
I am currently in the process of looking for a publisher for a book manuscript on "Buddha and Nietzsche: Different Lives, Same Ideas - How Nietzsche May Yet Become the West's Own Buddha." My argument is too complex to summarize here, other than to say that, in my very close reading of Nietzsche's texts, there are stunningly clear, irrefutable, and detailed parallels between the Buddha's teachings of the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path and Nietzsche's very coherent philosophy and psychology. This approach of looking at Buddhism and Nietzsche side by side and in detail has a lot more going for it than the limited and limiting interest in Buddhism of contemporary psychology (I write this as a Nietzsche scholar, a serious student and practitioner of Buddhist meditation, and a psychologist with a thirty plus year dual background in theoretical/philosophical psychology and clinical psychologist). Perhaps, when my book comes out, I can find a way to get back to this here. It would be worth the trouble, not for my sake but for the sake of what is at stake -- which is nothing less than our understanding and experience of the reality of our Western way of being and living.
3
I wonder if the at least part of the difference between Eastern and Western thinking in this area may have something to do with the power distance being greater in the East than the West. So the West is more willing to be critical of authority figures like Buddha and would like to question the teachings of Buddha with science which may be anathema to people from a more Eastern cultural background?
1
Just to set the record straight. The Buddha himself recommended to his followers not to believe him or any other authority. So questioning authority is an integral part of Buddhist philosophy.
4
But questioning authority is not part of Eastern culture. So perhaps the Western approach is more Buddhist. As the headline to the article says.
As mentioned for instance in the article below which seems to say that in the East there appears to be an attitude along the lines that the boss must be right even if he is wrong. Whereas it is perhaps not so true in the West. Essentially, because Hofstede's power distance measure is a lot higher.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesleadershipforum/2014/09/25/power-dist...
Buddhism is a vast tradition, spanning more thatn 2500 years. It has almost every genre any literature can have. I translated a Buddhist text for my dissertation: The Interpretation of the Buddha Land (Buddhabhūmiupadeśa) which is a rigorously rational as any western theology, always questioning, offering opinions, and arguing for its favored. Its style resembles St. Thomas Aquinas. Buddhism is much more than Zen paradoxes. It classical philosophies of Mādhyamika and Yogācāra are throughly reasoned traditons.
5
I am reminded of the Hindu story of Trotaka Acharya, a simple minded disciple of the first Shankara, ridiculed by the other disciples, but who expressed unwavering devotion to the Master. It was Trotaka who first reached enlightenment well ahead of the sharp intellects that debated each day with the Master.
Eastern traditions have always emphasized the intellect and the heart, scientific rationality and transcendental experience. With the rise of Western scientific inquiry and rational thought, many Vedic scholars came to welcome the rigor of scientific inquiry. They also came to believe that as western science further explores the quantum level of existence, it and eastern philosophical thought will come to engage in an increasingly productive conversation.
Yes, Prof. Wright, by all means outline the rational, logic of Buddhist thought. Only a Edward Said Orientalist --and that seems to be the best description of the New Yorker’s Mr. Gopnik -- would somehow think that Buddhist thought is beyond understanding. The clearer the better. Buddha would be the first to applaud your efforts Prof. Wright.
2
Nevertheless, it has been hard to find meditation groups here in NE with a practical approach that combines East and West. One group here still uses the 'stick' for chanting and stuff, as someone who got hit a lot as a child I found this very unsettling (especially when guests get the stick and get carried away with the license to wack it). Another teacher at a different group often speaks about 'demons coming off the mountain' and the like, which just isn't relevant.
The best groups I have attended were led by mental health professionals who understood how to interpret Buddhist meditation ideas for a modern audience. But clearly some people practice more for religious reasons, not directly for mental health and well being. We sorely need more groups with a focus on the latter.
1
You might try Shinzen Young--a meditation teacher headquartered in Burlington Vermont who teaches secular meditation using a rigorously scientific approach. His most recent book is The Science of Enlightenment.
1
It has long been a truism that Western thinkers "discover" what Buddhists have theorized for years. In contemporary philosophy, the turn towards object-oriented philosophy and the return to the processual philosophy of Whitehead is just the latest example.
However, the author makes a mistake by arguing that "Buddhism is true." There is no one kind of Buddhism, and different schools of Buddhism hold opposing opinions. I assume, as well, that the author is referring to what he terms as "the science and philosophy" of Buddhism, rather than deity worship. Most Buddhists believe in deities, ghosts, and demons - such belief has always been an integral part of Theravada Buddhism, for instance. Even if such beliefs predate Buddhism, scholars have noted for decades such beings are only understandable in such regions through Buddhism (i.e. they are conceived of via Buddhist concepts like karma).
So yes, Westerners discover ideas Buddhists have long thought about. But let's not think Buddhism is one thing, or that it is defined solely as a "philosophy." That itself is a hallmark of orientalist thought about Buddhism. For a good work on this, see the book "Buddhism Transformed" by Gananath Obeyesekere and Richard Gombrich.
1
The absence of a core self in Buddhism raises a major question about enlightenment. Who is it who experiences Nirvana if there's "no one" there? By denying that the self both exists or ceases to exist in Nirvana, Buddha sidestepped Eternalism and Nihilism, preferring always a noble silence and a sagacious smile. When pressed, however, for a statement, he used descriptive language to address the freedom of "someone" in the enlightened state: "That one is profound, unfathomable, without boundaries like the wide expanse of the
Sea."
3
Joseph, over time I have reached the same conclusion as you, but I cannot locate the source of your quote. Can you help? Unfortunately, the quote sounds like it might refer to nirvana itself and not to an 'experiencer'.
There are different aspects to Buddhism at work here which can be reduced to one central tenet, which is that the only reality is in the present moment and meditation is a practice the aim of which is to learn to be as much in the present moment as possible, the rest is conjecture: what was, what will be, what could be and what might have been, don't exist in the present at all. The more you meditate, the better you are able to detach from the workings of the mind (not latch onto them) in order to see and feel the present in "real time".
18
I'm quite sure that in Buddhism, there's not even a present --now how are we going talk about that?!
Once you see the impossibility of even a present "moment," Wright's arguments become harder to take since, sure, on one level he's got reasonable perspectives on parallels between science and Buddhism/s, but on another level, many Buddhist schools _do_ insist on the complete ineffability of experience/reality/truth/mind -- and that makes comparisons and logical statements a good bit trickier!
Dear Professor Wright,
Your book was calmly illuminating, and if I possessed a self I would say I enjoyed it immensely. As the saying goes, Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakens. Thanks for further awakening my understanding of a philosophy the stuff of which dreams are made of.
Contemplatively,
S.A. Traina
13
Maybe the problem is talking about "Buddhism" as if it were one thing, or a solid thing, or a recognizable thing. I haven't read the book, so it's possible the author makes all sorts of distinctions there, but it seems to me that buddhism is practiced very differently in different places, and thus much of the West's modern understanding of buddhism has come to us through the double process of orientalism in the West, followed by a re-adaptation in the East of the orientalizing notions of buddhism created in the West. Do all buddhist texts have the same philosophy? Can a brain scan that tells us that our understandings are biased and varied, even our sensory ones, (which is something we already know) also tell us that the "truth" that buddhism wants us to see is in fact the Truth? The argument in the book may be better, but it's not convincing here.
2
Osho/Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh said that religions all have different exoteric (external) appearances - but esoterically (in essence - at the heart) they're all the same - Golden Rule, treat others as you would like to be treated - be compassionate, help others, don't be rude/nasty/cruel/selfish, look out for karma, etc.
Yes I have seen in South East Asia where people pray to Buddha and put money in the offering box - but AFAIK he was all about personal exploration and 'don't believe anything you can't prove for yourself' - but I guess people with the God Spot in the brain - who Just Want to Believe - will always be looking for something to worship - help me Jesus/Buddha/Mohamed !
1
I am currently reading Wright’s book “Why Buddhism is True.” And, while I don’t know the full context of Gopnik’s “too clear” statement, I might reference a saying cited in the book: (paraphrased) Vipassana Buddhism is for psychologists; Vajrayana Buddhism is for artists; Zen Buddhism is for poets. There are different kinds of clarity. There is the clarity that comes from scientific precision and clarity that comes in poetry. Wright’s heavy emphasis on Vipassana and employment of evolutionary biology and other research tends toward toward the scientific side of clarification. Perhaps that is what is meant by ‘too clear.’ The West and East have found places for the clarity of poetry and science. I like both.
24
wow - so I'm a poet but don't know it - I also don't know what the other two types are - don't need - haven't bothered to check
This makes sense. I left analytic philosophy 40 years ago convinced explanation was cheaper than understanding and, if there was proof a formal symbolic axiomatic system could not be both complete and consistent, it was unlikely language could encompass reality.
I’d thought a lot about analogies because the associative process seems to play a big role in how we reason, so we must evaluate our analogies. I couldn’t get traction with fellow students: write down the relevant ways you think A is like B and evaluate. So what? But I applied the method for years, and if you do that you’ll spend time thinking about how thought and emotion intertwine.
Analytic philosophy did not provide me with a way to calm my mind or relax my body. But when I began thinking of myself as having a body with thinking, feeling, and moving centers, it was easy to think of the mind-body problem as an artifact of the way some people talk.
The intelligentsia thinks “Science is putting names on things and telling stories about them”? Hmm. The theoretical bases for male bashing and Newton’s laws differ. Read Joan Didion on how narrative distorts and flattens character and narrative resolution is not a way to determine fact. A good scientific theory is elegant, fits the facts, has great predictive and explanatory power, and isn’t ad hoc.
7
I have great respect for Buddhism but to state that they know the Ultimate Truth is arrogant in my opinion, similar to evangelical Christians stating that Jesus is the only way to salvation. I believe that the ultimate truth is a mystery to human beings. Of course, most religions profess that they know the ultimate truth to life and existence. Who are they? Just another human being with their own opinion on the matter. They don't know they just believe, but just believing doesn't make if a fact or truth. Humans, especially religious one's generally detest to live with the unknown, the mystery, ambiguity, uncertainty. No, they have the utltimate truth in their hip pocket.
27
I don't recall Wright saying anything about Buddhism claiming to "know the Ultimate Truth."
1
Isn't truth "arrogant" then? It stands opposed to error. Surely some things must be right or wrong? To suggest otherwise is to abdicate our responsibilities. How can people say Trump lies if there is no truth, if there are no facts? Should we all just give up?
Of course, we do not see everything, but that does not mean that we can see nothing. Taste and see how gracious the Lord is. If you seek Him, you will find Him, if you search for Him with all your heart (Jeremiah 29:13). If you call to Him, he will answer you.
I once had the patience to read hundreds and hundreds of pages of Eastern thought - now I can't get through the first paragraph here. Here are parts of a letter I wrote this to the Times in October: Your article on the destruction and murder of the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar had disturbing revelations hidden beneath this story of inexcusable, ignorant carnage. It is a wake-up call for those, like myself, who study religious texts, art and history as an intellectual pursuit akin to philosophy, to hear the Abbots of Buddhist monasteries vigorously promoting and defending the violence. I’ve held Buddhism in some ways above the historical and contemporary record of violence extolled by other major religions... Buddhism was once described to me by an art historian as not an institution or establishment with rules, but more a way of life, a system of thinking about existence. The truth, I realize, is that any religion centered around an all-knowing God or Savior, and other so-called “perfect” Beings has no end game that does not lead to exclusivity, unfounded suspicions, and hatreds for others outside their own practices. The excuses to practice religion as tradition or to believe in them “on faith” have always been and always will be a kind of “get out of jail free” card for inappropriate and destructive behavior...Religion is good as just an abstract avenue of thought, as just another clue to our purpose in life, and offers nothing in terms of certainty...
56
Very strong point. The failure of some Buddhist culture to achieve some civilization of compassion founded in the "middle way" is the proof,of the pudding. Human nature wills out. Individuals may benefit from various life experiences from Christian evangelism to psychotherapy. But no systematic way of thought has yet "cured" the human tendencies to dominate and exploit which has made Western Capitalism so successful. And even as to individuals, Mr. Wright's instinct to react to Adam Gopnik's thoughtful and generous piece as an attack demonstrates that whether or not his belief in mindfulness is "true," Mr. Wright has far to go to master it.
2
Agreed Carlen Day, about much of what you write beginning with the note that Robert Wright's article is mostly a nervous defense of his incoherent positions, a public argument with Adam Gopnik and Edward Said, with little or no import on its own. It is not well written, argued or metered. That said, I wonder why this piece is here at all and not in the letters section of The New Yorker. I know what you do when you meet the Buddha on the road, but what about an encounter in The New York Times?
With regards to your remarks on religion in general, I am very much in agreement. I find myself surrounded by several religious friends and often hold my tongue (as Dawkins would not) when they claim that this person is holy or that person is not. Or give in to some kind of one size fits all excuse for how terrible life can be. The notions of an "endgame" and "exclusivity" are spot on, and I will take them with me. Thank you.
Eastern, like Western, religions, help cast people into categories of "we" and "they" - people who worship like us, speak the same language, or look like us, and at the closest level, share a common ancestry. Modern myths and symbols like nations and race do the same. For those in the in-group. religions preach acceptance, tolerance, charity, generosity; for those in "out-groups" the outlook is usually grim, whether it's the slaughter of Canaanites in the Old Testament, of heretics by St. Augustine in North Africa, or of innocent civilians by terrorists today. Anthropologists suggest that a religion may give a competitive edge to a group: If a Crusader or a terrorist believes he will go to heaven, he will be readier to die for the group. As for persecutions and carnage by Buddhists, apart from the horrors today of expulsions and massacres in Myanmar, terrible acts of ethnic cleansing were carried out by the majority Buddhists of Sri Lanka against the Tamils, who in turn committed atrocities through the militant Tamil Tigers.
It makes for a bad headline but this should have been titled "Western Buddhist Philosophy is More Western...". Secular mindfulness meditation is not the same as Buddhism in practice. I understand the author wishes to demystify and de-orientalize the idea of the exotic East.
In doing so, he perhaps overcompensates and strips out the cultural practice of Buddhism as a religion in Asia. Most adherents in Sri Lanka for ex, don't have firsthand knowledge of Abbhidhamma (they may hear about it in sermons), and indeed most don't have regular Vipassana/mindfulness meditation practices. Most do go to temples, and practice other forms of worshipful mindfulness, and prayer. In erasing this from the author's definition of Buddhism, he erases the lived cultural experience of Buddhists in order to prioritize the philosophical/psychological distillation that is most marketable to Western Buddhists and spiritualists.
In my experience as an Asian American practicing Western secular Buddhism in the US, there's less a need in the last couple of decades to demystify Buddhism. Mindfulness is well known both in clinical psychology and popular wellness & health literature. What in my mind is needed is a decoupling of science and cultural practice. The two can continue to learn from each other, but it's a dangerous game to selectively misuse science to justify cultural relious practice.
52
One half of reality is formless-spaciousness. Science cannot study it because it is without form. Yet it allows everything in form to exist. Think of the space that makes a room what it is. This dimension of reality is pretty much unrealized in the West. It’s the dimension we touch when we meditate. Real connectedness with this dimension could lead us to world peace since we realize the interconnectness of all things. Also inner spaciousness can help us diminish the enormity of the human ego which leads us to tribalism and war.
10
Like the Bible, Buddhism covers a lot of territory and many practitioners of different periods. So perhaps Prof. Wright is himself guilty of setting up a straw man.
Within Buddhism, we have the Theravada v. Mahayana, The esoteric v. exoteric, and even the Tantric traditions, there are the Tibetan v. the Japanese Shingon. And of course, mondo and kung an are really skillful means (method), just as free association is not really human psychology but a way to get at one's psychology. Or Occam Razor can equally use in scientific endeavor and philosophical argument (think Ptolemaic v. Copernican system)
Historically, the ancient greek is said to have crossed path with the Indians. Definitely, Leibniz wrote about Chinese mythology and Schopenhauer is a crypto buddhist of sort. Not sure about Hume but the Germans definitely.
I am surprised you are still arguing about this since a lot of works are done to compare Zen with Heidegger's Phenomenology. And most recently (last 20+ years), many scholars well trained in Tibetan Buddhism are expressing the difficult concepts by way of Wittgenstein.
Personally, I am about to start my lifetime work using Nelson Goldman's (my teacher's teacher) nominalism to contrast Prasangika Madhyamika.
And we are still debating if Buddhism is Western or Eastern?
6
To be clear, the above is about buddhist philosophy. Epistemology if not ontology. The picture accompany the column is another misleading point since it points to practicing buddhism. Finally, theologically, it is another ball of wax, considering the emphasis in the Tantric realm. But then, back to the first sentence in my previous comment, Buddhism is a big topic, from practice to doctrines.
But to reiterate, practice-wise, it is just skillful means, not to be confused with doctrinal differentiations, such as Yogacara v. Madhymika, which are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but certainly resemble Bishop Berkeley and Hume for the former and Kant for the latter
1
I am surprised that so many of the comments relate to Reality in the context of Buddhism. Also Western epistemology could be free nowadays from such a preoccupation, as Realism should be supplanted by Constructivism and completely abandoned. The Constructivist Evolutionary Epistemology offers quite satisfying an answer to the need of explaining how we can understand ourselves and our place in the world, while Realism imparts existence to things, independently on the perceiving agent and so giving a basis to (non)entities like God or Universe and relations like causality or laws of Nature.
2
"This condescension is unfounded. "
No, not really. Like all religions, Buddhism suffers from the all the limitations and prejudices of any dogma. Their position, and Buddha's pronouncements about it, on the relative spiritual inferiority of women is just one that fails the sniff test. It is as deeply flawed as any arbitrary system of belief, and not scientific.
If you're going to look at a religion, then you should look at the whole thing. Not just the parts you think you like for some reason.
11
@laguna greg: The problem with looking at the "whole" of Buddhism is that its practice varies widely among cultures, and that pre-Buddhist ethnic beliefs (and more recently Western influences) have colored that practice differently across the globe. The Pali Canon may come closest to communicating the Buddha's actual teachings (which do not, by the way, include reincarnation, among other thing). He saw himself as a physician trying to heal the suffering of the world by enabling people to free themselves from craving and fear -- certainly not as a religious leader, and certainly not as a commentator on gender or other social issues. The practice of Buddhism after his death is in large part a function of how each culture interprets it.
4
Very deep subject. You might be interested in my article "Cracking the Buddhist Code" in the current issue of Journal of Consciousness Studies. I also have a shorter version I can send to anyone interested ([email protected]).
The thought of paying $18.02 to download this article is creating uncontrolled inner speech from my symbolic processing system.
1
For the west mind is matter. In the east matter is mind.
Never the twain shall meet. Scientific reductionism doesn't even scratch the surface....
6
A great insight by Buddah was that attachment to
desires is the root cause of anxiety and unhappiness.
Humans spend enromous time and energy pursuing
their desires and get frustrated by lack of fulfillment.
Meditation, clearing the mind and ridding the illusion
was the way to find contentment. Buddha experimented
till he found the enlightement and advised his disciples
to adopt the "ways" he has discovered, if they don't
work then experiment themselves. His experimentation
is akin to scietific way( data excluded). In a materialistic
west, people are driven by desires, ambition and need
for achievement. Not everyone succeeds, producing
sense of failure( losers) which often leads to drug and
alcohol abuse, sexual escapdes and violence. Can a
capitalist system, with its focus on material posperity,
be reconciled with dettachment of desires? No.
By the way, pope John Paul in his book famously
said that Buddhism is not a religion because it has
no GOD atleast as Buddha never mentioned.
14
Agree. I don't believe Buddha is the founder of a religion, he was a philosopher and psychologist who came up with theories and practices that he believed will help others to achieve peace and contentment without having to resort to religious dogmas and mindless rituals. It is unfortunate that his followers later on made exactly what he asked them not to do i.e., invent another religion called Buddhism.
1
'Buddhism is not a religion'
agreed - I had an Indian Hindu work colleague who told me Hinduism is not a religion but more a series of practical ways of living - and so was Buddhism - both from the same country - India (not sure if Gautama was from Nepal - somewhere there).
The dialog between Wright and Gopnick is based on an error, namely that "Buddhist ideas defy clear articulation." Only one Buddhist idea defies clear articulation--the idea of fundamental emptiness. Unfortunately the unavailability of that one idea has led to an endless stream of useless language, much as the impossibility of trisecting the angle led to my filling high school notebooks with uselss geometry.
The significant thing about the Chan school is not emphasis on the inscrutable, but rather the shift in emphasis from philosophy to practice. Chan Buddhist practitioners are not encouraged to figure Buddhism out, but to pay close attention, which inevitably means paying close attention to the workings of one's own mind. Since, in the words of Daniel Kahneman, "What You Know Is All There Is," if you want to learn something about fundamental reality, the mind is the place to look.
9
Trust an academic to further confuse things. Buddhism is clear and simple when applied to how we live our lives. What has complicated our faith is focusing on the esoteric interests of academics. Forget the psychology and focus on the truths that make life easier.
8
I would never call or consider myself an expert on Buddhism. But I have spent a fair amount of time in Vipassana meditation retreats -- including a three-month silent retreat -- and have done a fair amount of reading in all three of the major traditions.
I've always thought of Buddhism as a school of pragmatic psychology more than anything else. To me there is one central testable hypothesis: you do not control your mind. (And by that I include thoughts, feelings, emotions.) Think you do? Try sitting on a mediation mat and concentrating on your breath. Even after three months of sustained effort, I went from 2 - 3 breaths to maybe 5 - 6 breaths. I'm pretty sure I'm not alone in that.
So if you cannot control your mind, why get attached to its activities? Your liver produces enzymes, your mind produces thoughts, feelings, and emotions. Not much you can do about either.
For me Buddhism tries to counter what I call the "Play It Again, Sam" syndrome. At the beginning of that movie, Woody Allen is so totally identified with the movie and the Humphrey Bogart character on the screen that he forgets who he is. When the lights come on, it takes him a moment to remember that it was only a movie, and that he is not Humphrey Bogart.
Just so, your mind is projecting a movie on your consciousness. The Buddhist imperative is to realize that not-you is simply the audience, not the character in the movie. And that's where meditation comes into play...
Just my $0.02 worth.
90
It is perhaps more helpful to cite Dewy than Said. There are things that fall out of the existing western framework just as there are things in the world that somehow "refuse" to stand clear and fixed for earnest scholars to compare their notes with. Reading this essay, I'd think Buddhism is western pop psychology.
2
When I was undergoing “confirmation classes” protestant church I asked the minister “Why is it that God will exclude people from entering heaven simply because of where they were born?” And he replied “You need to figure that out before you commit yourself to being a christian.” At 72 I not only have no answer but when I looked at “religions” around the world I heard people saying God was communicating with them and the common message was always a justification for killing others of a different religion.
When we took my father in law’s bones to be placed in Eiheiji it was a fee of $1500, in a group of 20, at three groups an hour, eight hours a day…
Before a gathering of monks the Buddha saId “Without relying upon words and letters, beyond all teaching, as a special transmission I pass this all on to Mahakasyapa.”
Centuries later Daruma is reported to have said “Buddhas don”t do good, Buddhas don’t do bad.”
And when I read the recent story of the woman who lost her job for giving trump the finger, I recalled Gutei’s finger.
10
The story about your confirmation classes is very sad. If that level of Biblical exegesis is widespread, it would explain why large parts are simply capitulating to culture across the whole political spectrum. We are told that God does not play favorites and that He does not want any to perish. It is not our place to judge God when we will never understand everything He does. He will do what is right and just. Most importantly, how will you respond to His call to you through Jesus? Have you ever come across anyone like Jesus anywhere else?
There is no consistent ancient philosophy like the one that we learn through Yahweh's revelations to His creation. Why go for new variations on philosophies that are not as old? This article contains lots of fine works pleasantly expressed, but no deep truths. What foundation can psychology provide for validating a worldview? The one thing we have learned about psychology is that yesterday's truths are today's outworn models. What about tomorrow?
Given the age of the two entities in this discussion, shouldn't the headline be reversed?
9
I am always amused, though not surprised, to read all the replies to a given article that have as their primary purpose to refute, tear down, attack, correct, critique, etc. When I read an article, my primary goal is to see what I can learn from it, and how I can use that knowledge to improve myself or, in some small way, the world around me. I don’t feel the need to engage in “Monday morning quarterbacking” of the author or his/her effort. If I am knowledgeable about the subject at hand, then I should write my own article, or treatise, or book. I don’t need to write a reply to prove to the world how smart or informed I am. And that is one of the lessons of Buddhism — to recognize and master our ego-driven impulses so as to make our lives, and those of the people with whom we interact, more pleasant and fruitful. With that in mind, to the author I say, thank you for your scholarship and for sharing your findings with us!
177
In Zen it seems that enlightenment always comes suddenly, epiphany-like. It is not the result of the long studies and disciplined activities, but really in opposition to them. My own explanation is that the "story telling" and the "living in the moment" are not polar opposites except intellectually. In experience, the enlightenment is that one suddenly experiences this "being in the moment" and thus forcefully realizes that one is in fact, ALWAYS in the moment and indeed CANNOT ESCAPE IT. So, even if you are spinning stories you can do it while "being in the moment".
3
@Ed, there are five sects of Zen (Ch'an), satori (samadhi) may be a quantum leap but it comes from a long (prolong) process. And such awakening doesn't mean one can then relax and stop practicing. As the usual (modern) story goes, "after awakening, do laundry." Being studious is one of the 6 Perfections. After all, a blind cat can stumble on to a dead mouse. It doesn't mean it is a good mouser. One of the classic stories about practicing Zazen is some monk worn out 7 cushions. Or Milarepa (Tibetan) practically turned green by sitting in meditation for so long
1
'satori (samadhi) may be a quantum leap but it comes from a long (prolong) process'
it took me about 2.5 months - I've since read that's about how long it took Gautama to reach enlightenment as well
Osho said it can happen anytime - so when I read comments saying 'it takes a looong time' I assume the writer has a vested interest in delivering looong courses.
Maybe one way to approach an understanding of the enlightened mind would be to consider its opposite.
For that we have a perfect specimen to study. Donald Trump. Here we have a very solid, very real ego that is focused completely on itself. He has erected a firewall against reality because just about everything out there is a threat to his wonderful opinion of himself. There's no introspection. There's no attempt to see things from another's point of view. No empathy. No compassion. Everyone else is a loser.
Unfortunately the worship of the self is a major driving force in our culture. Donald just takes it to an extreme.
You don't have to study Buddhism to figure out that egoism is not the way to go if you want a happy, peaceful, fulfilling life.
48
Practice Buddhism to understand it.
3
I'm with Robert Wright here. As I understand it , koans are designed to show the limitations and boundaries of rational thought - not its futility. It's always worth exploring boundaries - there's much to be learned by doing so.
So far as meditation goes - it's a tool for gaining control and direction over the mind. As a tool, it's morally transparent - you can train a sharpshooter/ assassin or a medic, to improve performance via the ability to direct focus. Plus, like anything else regularly practiced, it'll make you more aware of who, what - and yes, possibly if! - you are.
Buddhism, and the traditions that preceded it, are still a long way ahead of neuroscinece in some ways, so far as being aware of the great range of states of consciousness/awareness - 'waking' and 'sleeping' are embarrassingly short as a complete account.
No, various forms of traditional practice, plus neuroscience, are nicely complementary in allowing us increased understanding of ourselves and each other - from within, and without.
And the whole enterprise of meditative practice is eminently practical. As has been said, 'After enlightenment? The laundry.'
2
One has to smile at the paradox of Wright speaking of "self detachment " while mentioning Gopnick numerous times and so obviously
wanting to defend his book. Sounds like an Alan Watts joke.
2
Based on the author’s description of the mindfulness exercise, I suspect he hasn’t actually done it, but is simply describing something he read about. Professor try it!! You may find....
There is no Bodhi Tree
Nor stand a mirror bright
Since all is void
Where can dust alight.
3
I was always put off by the Zen variation, but I found myself drawn to the Tibetan form of Buddhism. My guide was a man of both East and West, Chongyam Trungpa, Rimpoche. A senior Tibetan priest, he was also trained in Western Philosophy. He felt that a westerner might get better results by meditating in a living room recliner than in the Lotus position. He also found spiritual possibilities in Scotch whisky.
Donald S Lopez has written extensively on the subject of how the West has transformed Buddhism to match it's scientific philosophy of the world. Lopez's work demonstrating the hijacking of Buddhism by the West is required reading to understand our ignorance masked as superiority towards "religion "which we deem is "dead" in our scientific atheistic echo chamber view of the world.
2
It is always so interesting to read the work of those who pursue unique paths of discovery. Each one of us who attempt such a journey, puts down a new brick in the path of understanding and Enlightenment.
But, here then is the paradox. It would seem that life, (this path we all travel), is a riddle, wrapped inside an enigma that is found within a maze that has no solution!
Does this mean the individual should stop and abandon the need for understanding. No.
But we must be prudent, and accept that whatever one learns, it is only one single brick in the path. It does not constitute the end of anyone's journey except your own. And that everything may in the end - have no real meaning at all.
1
Most of us receive our 'Cultural Download' without question. It is what informs us how we are supposed to think and feel, and we receive it without question because it comes from trusted authorities: Our Parents, Teachers and Ministers. For many of us that is sufficient, and we proceed with our lives. For others however, we spend the next decades questioning that download, and deciding for ourselves what is true.
Many of us will get to the point that most philosophies have reached, to paraphrase: Events are. We assign reality and meaning to them.
I get fired, you get promoted. Same event with two very different meanings. From Socrates - Shadows on a Cave Wall, to Buddhist - Maya; to our own understandings of how to maintain calm in a chaotic world, many traditions have come to the conclusion that reality is what we say it is, and our reactions to that reality is a choice. Schrodinger's Cat and Buddhism and not really strangers.
1
1. Most cultures admire their own histories, characteristics, and values--philosophies, if you will--and see other cultures as inferior in one way or another. Technology, military power, and economic might often translate to "superiority" in these comparisons. Yet, even when the less "powerful" culture confronts an outside culture, it often feels its own philosophies contain greater truths. Over time, cultures absorb ideas from each other and that sense of one being right, the other wrong becomes less acute.
2. Philosophy that addresses how we interact with each other is interesting and useful. Philosophy that tries to explain the nature of reality is interesting but not useful. Eastern, Western, Northern, or Southern. Science in 300 years has taught us more about the nature of reality, and our consciousness of that reality, than philosophy has in 3,000 years.
2
In my previous post I mentioned Schrödinger's Cat and Buddhism. The funny thing is Schrodinger took pages of math to prove something that a Buddhist would have laughed and said: "But of course!"
2
Buddhism, western philosophy and science struggle with understanding and categorizing what maybe "subjective" and what maybe "objective." In a Columbia Encyclopedia discussion of the philosophy of art (under the heading, "Aesthetics") there is a breakdown of aesthetics assigning the objective view to Plato and and the subjective view to Hume. But most importantly, the discussion points out that: "In his Critique of Judgment, Kant mediated between the two tendencies by showing that aesthetic judgment has universal validity despite its subjective nature." This mediation of opposites seems applicable to the issue discussed here. The twain of Buddhism, western philosophy and science can reach a universal validity despite an existing subjective nature.
Please could you provide some evidence to back this up? Just because quantum physics is weird and sometimes unintuitive doesn't make it Buddhism.
I grew-up a Lutheran in central Ohio, filled with anxiety. I went to a Lutheran college, Wittenberg, in Springfield,OH. I trained as a physician in Madison,WI and completed psychiatric training there as well. Then Uncle Sam sent me to direct a heroin treatment clinic in Bangkok, Thailand in 1974, as the Viet Nam war was winding down. This Lutheran physician was face to face with a Buddhist culture, with temples on nearly every corner. My best friend was a fellow psychiatrist, who had spent a year as a monk. He had something I wanted: deep respect for nature and inner peace. Doug Burns took me around to most of the temples in Bangkok. They are the true sanctuaries that Christian churches, mostly locked except for Sunday services, have ceased to be: meditation and prayer centers, open 24/7 to all comers. The giant gold covered Buddhas within carried one message: slow down, reach within, let go of the material world's constant worries, and open your heart to the spiritual side. I loved it! I am still a Buddhist and have reverence for ALL life. I have learned how to separate myself from the cares and worries of this material world, as the Buddha demonstrated. God is everywhere, if we tune out the noise, and pay attention. Even Trump and his obscene materialism is just an illusion. He will need to return as a cockroach and start over. I go off with my angels everynight. Thank you, Lord Buddha!
15
Buddhism is about the heart, not the mind. This article, in very western fashion, misses that entirely.
Baa! Like a dog chasing its tail!
1
Very good. What a refreshing antidote to the mystical strain and evasiveness of so much discourse around Buddhism. Over the weekend I saw "Walk with Me," a documentary, and it's full of this kind of nonsense masquerading as profound--particularly in the scene where the honest inquirer asks what purpose sound serves. Robert Wright's work is very helpful in this regard. Not only is Buddhism anticipated, perhaps, in Hume, but even more so in early 20th century American philosophy that emphasizes experience per se--namely, the work of A. N. Whitehead, a philosopher I urge Wright to read for further connection to Western thought (see too the work of Steve Odin).
1
Forty years ago, as I was starting out as a young cop in San Francisco, I had the good fortune to stumble into Buddhist mediation practice through the back door of martial arts.
While far from perfect as a police officer, I know that the work of trying to focus my mind on each moment--free of a lot of mental and emotional baggage was hugely helpful in solving problems in the midst of a lot of jagged chaos.
As the mindfulness practice, encouraged me to look at other Buddhist tenets--such as generosity, compassion, and "right livelihood," I felt grateful for much of the simplicity that seemed to be Buddhism.
While you can find lots of opacity in Buddhist philosophy, I think you can also find basic practices that enable you to operate as a wise human.
29
Meditation should be mandatory at all station houses. Better yet, in the military too. There would no doubt be less brutality/fatalities and in the second example all war would probably cease.
If Buddhism is so great, why does the author not even address the treatment of the Rohingya muslims?
1
For further consideration, please refer to "Buddhism without Beliefs" by Stephen Batchelor. A trained monk, meditation teacher and honest intellectual, Mr. Batchelor lays out an intelligible and accessible discussion of Buddhism and the ideas that underlie the practices and philosophy.
8
Gopnik's equating the "stories" of science with the deceptive stories we unconsciously tell ourselves about ourselves (the interests of Buddhism/meditation) is verbal subterfuge. The word "story" is a poor metaphor for the descriptive accounts of science, which are always subject to revision and new knowledge, but it is a decent one for the illusory constructs of our view of our "self". These latter, of which most often we are completely unaware, are products of fantasy and defense, and have little to do with the real world or how we act in it. I wish Mr. Wright had commented on this verbal slight of hand by Gopnik.
5
"...human mind is incapable of comprehending all reality". All physical reality comes to us through senses. Human, and animal, senses have limits on their sensory capability; e.g, the human ear can hear only certain sound frequencies; the human eye can see only part of the electromagnetic spectrum, the visible light. Other animals have somewhat different sensory capabilities. Technology has given us an extension of the sensory capability; for example, infra red sensor can help us see in the dark; the microscope can magnify normally invisible objects and make them visible; the telescope can make us see very distant invisible objects, etc. etc.
Conceivable is that there are phenomena and objects such that not even the current state of technology is capable of properly handling them to 'make sense' for our senses. This should give us hesitation, and not confidence, that we know what the full reality is. But, to realize this, we need to accept limitations of our own sensory capability, even capability of being able to think. Such a realization existed in the Buddhist and Hindu philosophy long before modern science came to intersect with them. Experimental method is a rather new method to 'prove' things. So is the method of logic and the instrument of language. Intuitive methods of observation - 'seeing without observing'- is what the ancient seers like Buddha perfected. Inveterate in scientific methods, transition over to the old gives rise to skepticism as discussed here.
8
2 points of caution: the mind can not be turned completly off as a computer can be without loosing all its memory and; Second, it can be
challenging to realize that color and solid objects are varying wavelengths of energy generalized in a useful way. Primordial paramecia developed proteins that absorbed light energy that transfered to cilia proteins causing motion. They were not conscious. Eventually complex organisms developed protiens mediating an elarging repetoir of activity. It was then necessary to choose and co-ordinate action. Still not conscious. Hormones, eventually associated with emotions, like fear or hunger, mediated behavior in very complex creatures - then aware, mainly of the outer world. Now after birth when memories have sufficently filled mind generates a useful model of ourselves acting in our world - the self -
full human consciousness advanced another step by such stimulating essays as the Times and New Yorker presenting thought to the world wide public.
7
1- you don't know that,
2- you also don't know if so-called primitive organisms don't have consciousness, or mind, because you don't have any way of assessing whether or not they do. Heck, you can't even show objectively that you have a mind, and
3- you make the habitual mistake of all the tech-indoctrinated by thinking that memories and emotions define the psyche and its personality. They do not.
Most common misunderstandings about Buddhism: (1) Zen vs Early Indian Buddhism is comparable to Mormon vs pre-Paul Christianity. Zen (Ch'an) was invented in China loaded with inscrutable riddles & devoid of true linkage to Indian Buddhism roots. Forget about Zen. (2) Buddha rejected a "First-Cause" or "Creation" or "Creator God" - the "Law of Causality" governs all time-space existence. (3) Classical Science is deficient because it left out "consciousness" - the observer changes outcome. "Biocentrism" is an attempt to address this defect and align more with Quantum Physics. Buddhism placed investigation of consciousness its core practice. That's meditation. (4) Contrary to so-called "secular Buddhism" - the Buddha affirmed "rebirths" -"consciousness" tends to seek continuing existence out of not-knowing, ignorance. (5) "Non-Self" teaching of the Buddha is unique. The "Self "concept is attached to delusional "Identity" that believe in some immutable fixed essence. But nothing is permanent. "Identity politics" is creating all kinds of hatred and terrorism in our world. The Buddha explained two causes alone generate all human misery: "self-interest" & "self-righteousness".
The earliest tenets of Buddhism is a rational, pragmatic, evidence-based approach to living; free of fantasy, speculation and useless rites-rituals. Unfortunately, few will be ready give up their attachment of a belief in something eternal and everlasting.
21
Quibbles and hair-splitting are intrinsic to any dogma after the leader disappears, and his acolytes find new leaders to argue over the fine points in order to establish their own ascendancy. So it's all still BUddhism because it found its roots in the belief set a priori.
That's one thing you can say about science. Scientific thinking, methods and inquiry about how to know the world have not changed since Classical times. Religions cannot claim that kind of through-line or self-correction. If Buddhism were so great as a method of logical inquiry, those schisms and sects you cite would never have sprung up in the first place.
2
Zen or Ch'an is derived from the Sanskrit (Indian) term Dhyana, and the South Indian monk, Bodhidharma (Daruma in Japan) is believed to have brought the Mahayana-derived practice to China. Buddhism didn't spring out of nothing in India, or flower only in China or Japan (or Tibet). It comes from the same Dharmic religious milieu that includes Vedic Hinduism and Jainism (both older than Buddhism), and it flowered and reached its intellectual heights under those trained in brahminical discourse like the South Indian Nagarjuna. In the West today it is fashionable to discount the Indian roots of Buddhism and its close relationship to the other Dharmic faiths, which is certainly is not akin to that between Mormonism and pre- (or for that matter post-) Paulian Christianity. If anything, it is Tibetan Buddhism than bears more of a resemblance to Mormonism in this flawed example.
1
Very much agree. What goes by as Buddhism I feel has little to do with what Buddha taught to self-analyze one's self in the quest to achieve mental peace and contentment. Buddhism today is a religion like any other with its own dogmas, cultural trappings and rituals which were very much anathema to Buddha and goes against his teachings and theories. It is ridiculous to build temples with the statue of a psychologist and pray to this statue as if it is a representation of a god or divine being. Buddha would be completely dismayed that he has been defeated in his quest to rid people of religious dogmas and cultural trappings.
Wright’s points, and more generally the secular Buddhists view, are easy to dismiss.
Buddhism has sold itself in the West for decades in largely a secular - often science-affiliated or “True” - way. His recent book could easily have appeared to similar (passing) effect 40 years ago (when coincidentally Roshi Philip Kapleau was in the New York Times Magazine). And in truth how much positive change - beginning with regular meditation practice - has come of it? For those who have witnessed it - very, very little.
If casual lay practice had anywhere near the claimed psychological efficacy that proponents like Wright claims, then it would have been self-evident long ago. Perhaps akin to an effective dieting routine. Are we witnessing an increasingly mindful society?
Another basic point is that you can start to make sense of the reincarnation perspective - and thus long term, religious view that motivated Buddhist practice. See arguments here,
http://mdpi.com/2077-1444/8/8/155
That paper also discusses the historically-established challenge of meditational practice and enlightenment.
Finally for readers who want to see the anti-thesis of Wright’s message you can look up the poignant New Yorker article “The Last Call”. There you find someone struggling with life’s deep challenges - not intellectual pretense - and coming upon via mediation (and suffering) a remarkable kensho/enlightenment experience (and of course more challenges).
4
What exactly is "pretentious" about intellectualism? In this article, the author is discussing precisely that: the intellectual foundations of Buddhism, not its practices (which vary extremely among sects and localities). If you're going to dismiss that subject as pretentious, then you might as well skip the discussion of the article altogether.
2
When I read what you wrote, Ted, I kept hearing bitter cynicism contending with naive optimism. The feelings continue to flow......
3
No. You were actually getting the skinny on what decades worth of trendy - usually science-pretending - Western Buddhism has actually accomplished.
I had just finished writing about that history and bumped into Wright's latest work. It fit the critique perfectly.
Training to be a scientist is training your mind to understand “the world as it really is.” It's a process of un-learning what you know (received wisdom) and seeing something for the first time. Mostly it's personal, but great scientists can allow the world to see "for the first time". Not a coincidence that it's called "scientific discovery".
Mathematics is especially difficult because mother nature is not there to provide any guidance. Learning to conceptualize "zero" (nothingness) and "infinity", or "multi-dimension space" are Koans in their own right. To many, "zero" is so troubling that they must invent "God".
To be a working scientist or mathematician you have to incorporate “non-attachment”, to have any success. Ask a great mathematician if math is hard, and he or she will answer, "not once you understand it".
63
It is nice to know that clever Eastern wordsmiths are as adept as western philosophers at using the resources of ordinary language to craft terms of art like “existence” and “essence” to lend scientific sense to statements like “Things exist but are not real” (assuming that Buddhist worthies actually do make such statements and Wright is not just having us on with a bit of creative translating) Modren readers in the east must regard so-called “Buddhist Philosophy” as pointless as we do Western Philosophy.
3
I find little solace in what is offered by the various theologies over the ages. They all strike me as arguments over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. A creeping fatalism accompanied by mystical awe about how much we don't "know" is a path that condones ignorance and superstition, the hallmarks of all religion. The world without religion could resemble a Hobbesian dystopia for all I know. In our species evolution, perhaps we'll have the chance to find out. Societies in the recent past that have banned religion don't have a very good track record, mainly because they devolved into autocracies. Secular democracies as in Europe fare better. I fear for the U.S. as it slides into warped religiosity and acceptance of authoritarianism. Providing the basics to our population would allow the space for many more people to engage in the kind of idle speculation on the meaning and purpose of life argued in the context of Buddhism here. Substitute any religion in its place and the arguments are equally meaningless, no matter how well written.
2
Gist is about executive override of pre-human behavior drivers some of which are now maladaptive such as the killer instinct of human males. Consciousness is a developmental overlay on top of still operating animal awareness and emotional drive. We really really need to get how our car drives and handles.
3
In other words, 'Religion is the opiate of the people'.
1
Oh yes I see the light now. This explains the ethno-religious violence in Myanmar !
2
A fine piece. Its focus reminded me of the book "The Philosopher and the Monk," essentially a dialogue between Jean-Francois Revel (French philosopher) and Matthieu Ricard (biologist turned Tibetan monk). father and son, coming at the world from both Western scientific and Buddhist thought. The questions and tension make for an interesting read.
7
Thanks for this piece. One reason I find Buddhism so intriguing is that, unlike other religions, it is largely empirical. To try out Buddhism, you do not need to adopt any beliefs. No deities are required. (Neither are deities banished.) Rather, my Buddhist friends say, try this practice, and see what happens. A scientific approach to spirituality!
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Just a quick note of appreciation for brining this clarity to the propagation of Buddhism in the West. As founder and guiding teacher for the Silent Thunder Order (STOrder.org) I just want to clarify that mindfulness meditation, as it is being promulgated, is not the meditation of Buddha, nor of Soto Zen, the branch that I represent. Mindfulness as usually interpreted means simply "being in the moment," which, while a necessary aspect of any effective use of meditation, is not the whole story. The question becomes "mindful of what?" In Zen, we feel that it is necessary, if not sufficient to develop the ability to remain aware in the moment, but if this is what Buddhism were about, it would not have lasted 2500 years. It is important to penetrate to the truth of Buddha's teaching of the true causes and conditions of our existence. In other words, to become mindful of the truth of the Four Noble Truths, etc. How this is accomplished is very simply by sitting still enough, for long enough, for the process of deep sensory adaptation and unlearning of preconceptions to set in. This is why Zen meditation (zazen) takes so long - the monkey mind is like a 600-pound gorilla.
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There is no "Truth". There are only facts and points of view.
The points of view here are interesting, but not my view of Buddhism, or Western thought. Both lines of thoughts are quite a bit broader than described here, encompassing many ideas not discussed here. I consider myself a Unitarian.
As for me, I find Buddhist thought most comforting and relatable to my view of reality (We are spiritual beings having a physical experience. Diversity is the rule of the universe). I find Western thought confusing, not in line with the world I live in (lots of absolutes and monolithic view of morality and humanity). But there are overlaps, such as certain Western writings that, to me, seem to mirror certain ideas of the East. There is a quote where the Dalai Lama calls the "Lilies of the Field" parable the work of an enlightened person.
Religion and philosophy are not absolutes. They are many ways of looking at our existence and finding something by which we can make sense and relate to this world. Each of us establishes our own relationship with the Universe, no two relationships are the same. Everything else is just a label.
Not having an axe to grind like the early commenters here, or my own who-knows-how-amateur "take" on Buddhism, let me merely thank you, Mr. Wright, for an admirably clear article that I will bookmark.
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One of the valuable aspects of Buddhism is it's teaching that you are not necessarily your feelings. Instead of, "Wow, I'm angry!", meditation can help us say, "Oh look, there's anger. How interesting. Why is it here?" That said, there's so much injustice in the world, especially in humanity's relationship with non-human animals, that I understand why I still enjoy the old 1970's tv series "Kung Fu," where David Carradine played a Buddhist monk who roamed the West preaching peace, while thrashing the tar out of the bad guys.
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Good heaven's -- a realistic, pragmatic view of Buddhism from the West.
Terrific! Very well done, sir.
There will, however, be no using "science as a legitimate way to test Buddhist ideas". Science, by definition and enforced tradition, denies all things spiritual -- therefore denies the very essence of Buddhism (and all other spirtiual ways of understanding the universe),
Today's physics is oh-so-proud to have a fair understanding of -- wait for it -- approximately 5% of the stuff in the known Universe. The other 95% of life, the Universe, and Everything is a total mystery to Science. It is that 95% that is what all religion is about -- the spiritual reality.
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I believe that in the first femtosecond the universe tried out every possible variation of existence, all less stable and lasting than this most stable default state of existence. You can theorize or experimentally recreate brief alternatives but this is it. What before, whither goest, how can infinity be or not be? Full employment for the philosophy department for a long time.
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Well, Kip, as an atheist, you have proven my point. You are correct about the percentages, but your religious belief screws up the facts. That 95% does not interact in any way with the known 5%. If god is there he is totally indifferent to us. As the smart guy said, "You are entitled to your own opinions, but you are NOT entitled to your own facts." Your statement is a perfect example of the nonsense of religion, the "theory?" of the god of the gaps. Science moves on, what will you believe in when dark matter and dark energy have explanations that are verifiable?
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Well, we'll have to wait and see, won't we? It is a matter of opinion whether or not the 85% interacts with the 5% -- Science refuses to acknowledge even the possibility of things Spiritual -- which is not a very scientific viewpoint. I posit that it is you who are indifferent to God, and not the other way around.
Millions of your fellow humans experience the spiritual in their lives, many every day. Those who do not do so are, at least temporarily, or intentionally, "spiritually blind" -- a state somewhat like color blindness. The existence of humans who are colorblind does not mean that colors don't exist.
What is Gopnik talking about? Budda thought everything he said was provable and rational and expected believers to test it out themselves. His goal as clarity not opacity.
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"To study the self is to forget the self, to forget the self is to be enlightened by all beings." Dogen Zenji.
Pretty simple.
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Unless of course that's not how it's done. Claims of enlightenment by a single individual don't mean a thing with out some independent corroboration.
1
"to forget the self is to be enlightened by all beings"
interesting - I forgot the self (meditated to satori over 40 years ago) - and now volunteer with childcare - often I don't say anything - I just watch and marvel at the learning, experimentation and sheer joy of the world seen through a child's eyes.
THE DALAI LAMA Is an avid student of science. He is self taught. In a documentary that showed him engaged in studying science, he was asked what would happen if scientific findings disproved some aspects of Buddhism. He replied without hesitation, Then Buddhism would have to change. I don't know that such beliefs can be tied to a single geographic location. But clearly the Dalai Lama welcomes scientific exploration and its discoveries.
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Buddhists must unite in defense of the Rhoniyga refugees in Myanmar. Until there is massive outcry by Buddhists worldwide over the atrocities in Myanamar Buddhism and its the high minded philosophy it teaches lose their stature as one of the world’s peaceful teachings.
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We can only hope. We watched the so called Buddhist militants (oxymoron) violently respond to Sri Lankan Tamils. For years.
2
Negative partisan identity politics. Project the sins of a few onto an entire group and use group-based suspicion, group-based guilt and group-based hatred to demean an entire class of people. This is a tired, well-worn script in this age.
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1. "Things exist but they are not real."
Not peculiar to Buddhism; not inscrutable.
Plato distinguished three levels of reality/being--apparent objects their underlying (hypo-thesis) physical reality, and their essences. His "Allegory of the cave" makes these analogous to shadows, objects blocking firelight, and those objects-in sunlight--which "lets them be and lets them be known."
CS Peirce called the latter "types vs tokens"; also distinguishing three levels of reality--"modal pluralism"--possibilities, actualities/existents and representations (aka monads, dyads, triads or subjects, objects, indirect objects.
2. "... “self,” as you intuitively conceive it, is actually an illusion."
Not peculiar to Buddhism; not inscrutable.
Hume's "self"-- is only meaningful as a abstract sequence of mental events. Can't step in rivers twice--except as water courses.
Even more basic "self" translates "auto". It is not a categoramic. There are no autos. The "I" of self reference is an indexical--like "here" and "now"--their referents determined by place/time tokens. "I" means the speaker.
Speakers are better conceived as psyches--translated as personalities--systems of mental states and relations.
3. The problem with Buddhism as a philosophy is not content but form. Enigma and oracle are not argument and explanation. Philosophy (opposed to sophistry and scripture) tries to solve puzzles--getting us out the Cave.
Reality is one modality; truths are meta-realities. No puzzle!.
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"Things exist but they are not real." Not peculiar to Buddhism, but inscrutable to some. Tell a westerner that you believe the passage of time and free will are illusions that we can't function without and they look at you like you've lost it. I've had better luck with "perceptions" than "illusions", but I still get funny looks and eye rolls.
2
Greatly enjoyed this column, and also your books. To me, Western philosophies center on ego, whereas from what I think I understand about Eastern philosophies, Buddhism chief among them, they do a much more thorough job of tamping down ego. In my experience that is a good thing, and very much reflects in our differing societies. Hopefully the West can learn from the East, if we can overcome our ego.
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any ego involved in your 2nd to last statement, that begins w/ "In my experience...."?
2
Not mentioned here is the philosophy of the Buddha's last writing - the Lotus Sutra. Believed to be his highest teaching it says that everyone, and importantly it specifically includes women,already posses the Buddha nature. The writer Clark Strand in his recent book " Waking the Buddha" tells the story of Nichiren Buddhism as practiced by the SGI-USA which is based on the Lotus Sutra. It is a lay Buddhist organization of incredible diversity and energy that teaches us to not just work for our own enlightenment but to work for the happiness and enlightenment of others as well. Something we must all achieve for humanity to truly embrace peace and justice.
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Unfortunately, it's when religion becomes political (my interpretation of peace & justice - when everyone agrees with me), it becomes oppressive, no matter how moral our intentions.
1
Thank you, Kathleen. Well put!
Excellent piece of work by Prof. Wright. However, I humbly submit that he has introduced a common misconception that the "self" is just a bundle of prejudices and "selfish" desires. If the environment in which the organism has to thrive is the object, the divining faculty of the organism creates a subject which apprehends the object for the benefit of the SUBJECT. Hence the self interest. The tunnel walls of the self are so transparent ( a phenomenal trick by the brain) that the organism completely believes that what it apprehends is the total reality. This is the ILLUSION ( Maya). Can an organism get past this by meditation? The answer to that question is the fundamental difference between "Eastern" and "Western" philosophies.
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Gautam Buddha was born into an existing system comprising of philosophies, ideas, practices, where debate between various schools of thoughts were encouraged. His self discovery was not a "Buddhist" idea. He was trained by masters who had been practicing multiple techniques, mindfulness being one such technique, for thousands of years. These known practices were unfortunately restricted to certain "privileged by birth" castes and Buddha's effort was to share these with the common man (and woman) breaking the caste barrier. Towards this goal, he walked day and night, addressing ordinary people, from kingdom to kingdom, village to village in Northern India, until the ripe age of 80.
7
And the various sects of Buddhism are as numerous as the various sects of Christianity. And among those sects, there is a wide diversity of how to practice the basic beliefs.
To me talking about the detailed thought of "Buddhism" makes as little sense as talking about "Christianity" or "Western thought".
20
Exactly, there is nothing in Buddhism that was not already expounded in the various Hindu texts notably the large number of philosophical treatises collectively known as the Upanishads.
The great service the Buddha did was to disseminate his take on this ancient and at time contradictory wisdom to the common folk, in direct opposition to the previous practice of "sacred" knowledge being limited to the higher castes.
Two important aspects might be added to this discussion. First, one may need to actually experience the non-self before fully grasping its essence. Second, what may well emerge is the inescapable luminous truth of the interconnections among all sentient beings.
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Zen was the first vector through which Buddhism came to the west. Characteristic of zen are the opaque quips which aren't meant to be opaque so much as they are meant to divert the mind from its linear thinking. Linear thinking is problematic in that it leads one away from a direct apprehension of the reality of the present moment to a narrative that can be canned into an orthodoxy.
We get tangled up because the mind searches for patterns in hopes of finding solid ground rather than appreciating the simplicity of being. Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer marvelously describes mindfulness as "the simple act of actively noticing things." Zen aphorisms point toward this simplicity but , we in our search for something more, try to think our way around it when we become frightened as we notice anger, fear and desire. The human conundrum.
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I don't honestly see why the "western-ness" of Buddhism is important or relevant, except insofar as the author is trying to make it more palatable to Western folks...
The real question is whether Buddhism is TRUE in any meaningful sense. The answer is "it depends." The relationship between Buddhism and Hinduism is much like that of Protestant sects to the Catholic Church. But they both rely on a set of foundational principles that are unjustified - mostly around the idea of Reincarnation. Unless the doctrine of reincarnation is true - REALLY true - then Buddhism doesn't make any sense as a propositional statement.
That aside, Buddhism has identified some truths about the human condition. Truths that in no way rely on believing the metaphysical claims made by Buddhism "the religion." It is possible to engage in meditation or other Buddhist practices and genuinely learn something about the nature of the human mind.
But is Buddhism true? Probably not.
13
Maybe so. But what is so widely called meditation works. You don't have to believe anything. The practice, the doing, the resting quietly in the breath for 20 minutes a day for three months has been shown change the brain. Let the mind wander, let it come back, just that period stillness, just being, becomes in rather quick order an establishment of tone for the day, and a place to return to for one breath or three in the middle of activity, simple, physical re-registration that over time adds up.
To be awhile as one teacher said, "without center, without edge, without aim" is for even a moment a visit of serenity. And the visits can become familiar. The religious beliefs are deeply valuable to some. For me, as many times as I can get off the freight train and simply breathe, however long, free in the awareness of that physical thing from the mind's constant obsession with reliving the past and rehearsing the future, that is a small widening to my availability to serenity. It's pretty simple. The only trick is to do it.
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Having heard the author talking about the book's title, he didn't mean it
as literally as you took it.
About the "western-ness" of Buddhism, you also took it wrong and too literally.
The only claim here is the claim presented in the body of the argument.
And it is possible to have a wrong proposition and have true ideas evolve under the umbrella of the same doctrine. Not everything in Buddhism directly stems from the idea of reincarnation.
7
Sorry, but you are vastly overemphasizing reincarnation as a foundational Buddhist concept, at least in the West. I would bet that the vast majority of Western Buddhists either don't believe in it or don't place it at the centerpiece of their practice. For many Westerners, Buddhism is neither a religion nor a philosophy but a way of life. And it is in no way antithetical to accepting scientific principles or thought. In fact, it encourages it, unlike religious doctrines.
9
I️ don’t see an argument. Buddhism or any philosophy tells a story by merging subjective observations with introspection. Science tells a story by merging objective observation with introspection. By introspection I️ mean neural data processing. In the end science will confirm a lot we have already anticipated through intuition but it will debunk even more. That’s why I️ rely at the end of the day rather on science than philosophy. We will never know real reality, that’s a true philosophical insight, but we will get a much closer picture of reality by using the scientific method.
14
So the question is is philosophy useless? you don't have time and maybe access, to inquire everything within scientific frameworks.
So you could say the argument is for other methods of inquiry when scientific ones aren't there yet. But actually the argument was a response for another article, that's pretty much it.
Buddhism?
I recollect getting some comprehension of Buddhism after having taken LSD around age 20. After the experience and stimulated to action by trying to comprehend it, I read Herrigel's "Method of Zen" and it made sense. It seems the "I" of a person, which is perhaps identical to consciousness, and which appears to differ from person to person in both type and elasticity (degree to which it can be broken down/enlarged), is somewhat like a cork on water of being and in life itself, and a person has to learn to trust wider and deeper self and world of experience much like bobbing up and down in water, not being afraid of instincts or madness or outside world of variety of stimuli...
Nowadays when I try to solve a problem of any type, the general strategy is of course to try to learn about it from various materials, but psychologically a person has to have patience and in form somewhat like prayer (and perhaps prayer emerged from similar realization) a person has to call to deeper self and world for solution, give up on "I" alone solving the problem, trust a deeper, more comprehensive solution, all we mean by seeing solution in a sudden, inspired realization.
Of late, this deep immersion has me more and more curious about unusual and startling coincidences between thoughts, books I read, etc. and outside events, startling synchronicities as if life is an algorithm or that mysterious communication processes occur between mind and events and vice-versa. We know little.
24
Sometimes concepts do not translate clearly across languages and cultures. In Buddhist thought "detachment" is about detaching from one's cravings and aversions. A period of distance from the world may be necessary to achieve this, but is not the ultimate goal.
1
I can accept that the ego-self, which is the person we usually identify with as "I", is unreal, and the recognition of this is indeed a life-changing, life-evolving experience. However, there are teachings in India that put forward the existence of a self that is beyond, or behind the ego, which is both abiding and real. In some of those teachings it is referred to as the soul, and in others it is referred to as Self, the "I-I". Personally, I am much more drawn to these teachings than to the Buddhist idea of simply a not-self. However, I do acknowledge that the insight that the ego-self is an illusion is of vital importance, and that it could also be the start of a search to discover whether there is indeed a self that is real.
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