it seems to be that there is a distinction between being 'ethical' and being 'caring' here - from the Buddha's perspective (though not from the scientific-materialist POV that you outline here) the universe is ethical inasmuch as good deeds are rewarded and bad deeds punished (though this is complicated by the fact that the aim is to step completely outside of this ethical system - not, of course, in the sense that one's deeds are no longer ethically judgeable, so to speak), but it's not 'caring' or 'uncaring' - in the Indian context this 'caring universe' seems more like a later Brahmanical development coinciding with the rise/growing popularity of atman/brahman and bhakti beliefs & practices.
In Buddhism I do wonder whether, as has sometimes been commented upon, the development of a pantheon of 'present' bodhisattvas and Buddhas in Mahayana, and its self-representation as compassionate where so-called 'Hinayana' is not, came about because of the desire for the kind of 'caring parent' figures that you mention.
Also, I would question yor assumption about non-human animal behaviour - what evidence do we have that animals never behave in ways which are altruistic or compassionate, and how do we define 'rising beyond circumstances'?
Even if we limit the emotions in question only to love, caring & emotional warmth, I would say that some types of animal - and likely many more than we think, if not all - certainly possess these characteristics, and that (short of taking an extreme 'anti-anthropomorphism' position) they can and have been observed not only in experimental settings (settings which already premise a lack of care for animal freedom) but also in our own interactions with them.
With metta,
Rowan
Monday, January 31, 2011
gruff said...
That bit about the universe not caring reminds me of the description of the animal realm in the Canon: "In that realm there is no doing of good deeds; there is only mutual devouring, and the slaughter of the weak." Somewhere in the SN, but I don't have the reference to hand, sorry.
Taking your last point first, I totally agree that our abilities are not of a unique kind. I fully accept that animals are conscious, and probably emotional in the same kind of way that we are. But the scale is entirely different - animals don't respond, can't respond, on the scale that we do.
How we define "rising above circumstances" may be difficult, but where for instance is the animal equivalent of the hospital built for healing, staffed by doctors and nurses who train for years, and paid for by tax dollars (in the UK and NZ anyway)? This is not just one or two orders of magnitude different from animal altruism. An Animal may be sad when its infant is born prematurely, but it cannot organise an antenatal unit to ensure that it lives.
So yes we are only recently risen beyond our animal ancestors, but we have done so. To argue that we are in no way different from animals is not sustainable. Though again I agree that this is not an argument for exploitation - I would argue that with power comes responsibility; with the ability to care comes the duty to do so.
Coming back to your first point. Apart from the fact that it is Buddhist doctrine, what makes you think that good deeds are rewarded and bad deeds are punished. You seem to suggest that the universe has agency! How does the universe decide which is good and which is bad? After all sometimes it's very difficult for us to know the difference. And doesn't the universe seem to make mistakes sometimes - as though if it does have agency it's getting a bit doddery after 13.7 billion years? Don't obviously good people seem to be punished; don't bad people seem to be rewarded?
When I say 'care' I mean that it matters to us, whereas it doesn't matter to the universe. I don't mean care as in 'to care for'. Since there is no consciousness for our plight to register in, there is no agency, no decision making, no emotion. Though we project all of these out because we are programmed by evolution to see others as having a mind - which is why we find the idea of death so difficult to accept. But the only rules are things like thermodynamics.
It is interesting that the historical buddha is never, as far as I know, referred to 'father' or even 'a father'. He is a doctor sometimes - other kinds of epithets that might be interesting to dig out. Later, quite early on I believe, Prajñāpāramitā becomes the mother of all the buddhas. But I don't recall the masculine bodhisattvas being fathers either.
BTW There's every evidence that our first Indo-European ancestors thought that the universe not only manifested lawfulness, but also cosmic law enforcement officers (especially Mitra and Varuṇa), and lawyers. A law-maker on the other hand is a later idea - I think.
I'm aware that there is a certain vagueness in this kind of discussion - I can't avoid using terminology that is ambiguous not to say anthropocentric, and seem to draw sharp distinctions that don't hold. I'm trying to do too much in a short essay and so can't spend a chapter defining my terms and anticipating objections. It can be a bit frustrating, but at least some people read the essay, and think about the issue. What more could I hope for under the circumstances? :-)
Thanks for your reply - to take up the point about kamma, I certainly wouldn't argue that the universe has any agency or can be considered an entity! No-one or entity is judging or deciding.
What I would say, rather, is that 'reality,' defined ontologically or phenomenologically, is entirely governed by causality. So when we say that 'good' is 'rewarded' and 'bad' is 'punished,' those are only convenient labels, not absolutes according to any impartial ethico-moral judge - what we're actually saying then is that certain kinds of actions have corollary consequences in a way which is stable, though individual cases are not predictable in their exact specifics.
What I would say about observing the good being punished and the bad rewarded is that we can only ever tell what occurs materially. Do bad people get richer and the good get poorer? Well yes, obviously. But this tells us nothing about their state of happiness and suffering. Such success may feed certain desires, but is living in a world of amorality, competition, anger, frustration, cruelty and so forth actually pleasant, even if one is reaping great material rewards? I find it difficult to believe that it's so. And while I believe in rebirth, I think that this makes the argument that rebirth/kamma must exist because obviously the good are unhappy and the bad are happy, to be unconvincing.
As far as 'law' and 'lawmaking' is concerned, I generally disagree when 'Dhamma' is translated as 'Law,' but I can see where that translation is coming from, in the above sense - that there is a way in which things operate. I wouldn't call this 'scientific' in the way that the 'laws' of science are considered as such - I have issues with the Buddhism and Science discourse, because, as Donald Lopez points out (despite various other issues with his work), what science proclaims as truth (and though in theory science may not proclaim that it finds truth, but a best current theory, in practice I find that 'truth' is very much how it is actually taken both by scientists and non-scientists alike) changes all the time, but since the inception of modernity there have always been those who will claim that this (most recent) truth is in line with Buddhist teachings. But I'll pick this point up elsewhere.
With regard to 'caring,' as Richard Gombrich pointed out recently in an address brought to my attention by Bhante Sujato (I post as 'Chromatics' on his blog) what many people want from religion is comfort, whereas the Buddha's vision, though ultimately providing the best of hopes, was radically uncomforting to anyone who believed in a caring universe or a caring creator (your point about the Buddha as non-father figure is well taken and I'd like to see it expanded - I wonder whether there's more material on this in Powers' 'A Bull of A Man,' which I haven't yet read?) - I'd suggest this is one reason why his teachings 'go against the stream.' We are completely responsible for ourselves! (individually and collectively)
And incidentally, as someone who's just finished cutting an article from 17000 to 7000 words, I appreciate the problematics of restrictions of length :)
I take your points about the difficulty of observing karma at work. But does this not raise serious problem of generalising the proposition? On what then is the theory of moral consequences based?
I'm very wary of ontology and phenomenology and reality in the same sentence. I've looked and I don't see the Buddha ever discussing ontology, or the ontological implications of some of his doctrines. I see him discussing the phenomenology of the mind mostly. Tiny bits about how earth is the experience of resistance etc., but even this is couched in terms of experience. Reality doesn't enter into it, and as far as I know there is no Pāli word which could reasonably be translated as 'reality'.
I believe every human culture has an afterlife belief, all on more or less the same evidence. How do we decide which one to believe?
Scientific truth changes progressively though, not at random. Although there are paradigm changes, they are responses to new observations. So relativism or idealism as a reaction against science is irrational.
Of course Dhamma seldom means Law in a Buddhist context (though often in a Hindu context). 'Foundation' is a better general translation. I think 'phenomena' is misleading as well. I quite like 'qualia' but haven't looked into the background of that term enough to be confident of adopting it.
What are you going to do with the other 10,000 words?
Hi Jayarava, thanks for the post raising many interesting points.
I especially liked the part on the opposition between myth (descriptive) and religion (prescriptive) –although myths seem to assume a prescriptive value in societies with no "overruling" religion apart from myths.
This leads me to my main point: I am inclined to think that your use of "religion", "god" and "atheism" is not unambiguous. You seem to imply that a theistic belief is something suitable for people who need to be soothed and conforted. More mature people, like Dawkin's scientists, are more emotionally grown up and stop pretend from god to give sense to the universe.
Although I really appreciate your point about *our* ability to care, I wonder whether you should not mention explicitly that the kind of theistic religion referred to above is not the only possible one. For instance, Kierkegaard does not seem to look for a confort in his terrific Lord. Would not it be more accurate to distinguish a pampering-religion from a challenging one? (Personally, I have nothing against the first one and nothing in favour of the latter one).
Yes. I over-simplify religion and unfairly criticise my over-simplification. It would be good to flesh out my ideas - but that would be a book! (Which I may yet write)
You are right about myth becoming prescriptive, and I suppose religion could well be descriptive without prescription. I think my idea works on the level of generalisation and allows for exceptions, but these exceptions do not invalidate the generalisation.
I suppose I see my criticism as representative enough to provide a contrast for my ideas about humans being the source of love. We don't simply project our need for comfort but all of our values and needs, of which I provided just one example that I though most people would understand if not relate to.
So I accept your criticism, and seek to mitigate my culpability by pointing to the limitations of my medium (i.e. blaming my tools) :-)
If I write the book I will have to credit my blog readers for helping me to clarify my arguments and tighten up my reasoning!
You are right, blogging seems to require some generalisations and I tend to prefer generalisations over too punctual posts just dealing with a single point (say, a Tibetan line) and neglecting its general import. Hence, the (more general) question arises:
How can we comunicate with a relatively broad public without being superficial (you usually suceed in doing it, so you seem utterly qualified in offering your answer)?
The funny thing is that I have no intention of reaching a broad audience - and my stats suggest that I don't anyway! I just write about what interests me in the moment, as simply as much as possible but not more so ( - Einstein). Often I'm either writing about something which has just become clear to me, or writing is part of the process of clarification.
I take it as a given that context is important, as the deeper I go down the rabbit hole study the more it seems to help explain things.
I'm kind of a generalist - a maven in Malcolm Gladwell's scheme - who likes to know a little about a lot, and to see how things fit together. So my isolated facts usually contribute to a bigger picture I'm trying to construct for myself. I've always wanted to try to figure out what is going on - probably because I've never felt I understood the world or people or myself.
There is a problem with communicating specialist information outside of our specialist area. I've realised for instance that many of the scientists who know about evolution are very poor communicators with an apparent lack of empathy or interest in other people. So the cause of promoting evolution is set back because they don't get the message across. They don't connect with the people, in fact they are repelled by people and seem to do their best to repel their audience in turn. What a waste.
I think if you can consciously connect your own enthusiasm for your subject with what your values are, then you can translate that easily for someone who shares your values. Communicating to those who don't share your values requires you to imaginatively identify with the other person, empathise with their values, and then put your message in terms they can appreciate. But if you at least manifest your own values consistently and clearly then you give someone with an open mind a clear invitation to participate in communication with you. It's always a two-way process. Those who reach wide audiences are able to connect or appear to be open to be connected with, and they aren't always very intelligent (Bush, Palin, Burlusconi, etc). Intelligence plays very little part in our social interactions I think, whereas emotions are central.
Anyway there are some thoughts about, if not an answer to, your question.
Best Wishes Jayarava
Wednesday, February 02, 2011
[Image]The idea that the universe is non-random, above all that the universe follows rules analogous to human social rules that we can understand and follow in order to get along, is one of the most pervasive human myths and an important idea in most religions. Indeed we could define myth in this sense as a story or narrative which conveys the sense of an ordered universe, and in what way the universe is ordered (i.e. myth is descriptive); and religion as attempts to ensure we follow the laws implied by an ordered universe (i.e. religion is prescriptive). In ancient India this order was called first ṛta and then dharma.. In some tellings of Greek myth first there was khaos - an unordered, unstructured void - and then the ordered universe, the kosmos, was brought into being.
Since the European Enlightenment it has been discovered that mathematical models can describe aspects of the world very accurately. Simple equations such as F=ma or E=mc2 tell us a great deal about how matter behaves, and what to expect from it in the future - matter appears to 'obey' these 'Laws'. In the course of my education I studied these physical laws in great detail, and personally demonstrated many of them. But along the way I began to see that my education in science consisted in being presented with a series of increasingly sophisticated models, none of which was true in any absolute sense, and none of which did much for my angst. The Laws of physics are useful and accurate descriptions of matter under most circumstances, but they do not meet every need.
Just because we perceive order, does not mean that there is order. Hopefully readers will recall the movie A Beautiful Mind. It no doubt romanticised the experience of madness, and yet it highlighted something about the human mind. Our mind sees patterns - we are pattern recognition sensors of the highest sensitivity. In fact we tend to see order where there is none. Give a human being a random array of points of light (like, say, the stars) and we fill it with a bestiary and a pantheon that reflects everything that we care about. Given random events we will see connections. In the movie John Nash becomes obsesses with and delusional about patterns, but this was a natural faculty gone haywire, not simply a product of madness.
One could also say that religion is simply our collective hopes and fears writ large and projected out onto the universe: our worst fear is that the universe is devoid of rules, or else utterly determined by rules; the hope is that there are enough rules to make life predictable, not too many as to make it stultifying. We want to be free to act, to choose, to experience novelty; but not too much. We want to know that the sun will rise each day, that the seasons will appear in due course, that the crops will grow and ripen; that we will have enough food and water, that predators will not carry us or our loved ones away etc. Most of these are not very sophisticated and reflect our evolved biological needs rather than our intellectual longings. Our societies overlay this with a veneer of sophistication, but our actual needs haven't changed in millennia, just the strategies for meeting those needs. As social primates it's important for us to establish social rules and hierarchies and for everyone to keep to them in order to fulfil our social needs. Hence we see the personified forces of nature as a celestial society, or as in ancient China as a celestial empire. The gods of course are not observed to obey the same social rules as humans, but never the less we discern order amongst them and do what we can to facilitate that order through sacrifice and prayer (all gods are similar in needing to be propitiated in order to behave - rather like over-sized toddlers). Many gods are effectively alpha-male primates in the sky - demanding submission and the best food. It seems irrational until you look at, say, chimp behaviour (I highly recommend reading Jane Goodall's In the Shadow of Man[Image] for instance). Part of the reason that apparently irrational religion is so very popular is that it speaks directly to deep human needs.
I wonder if this mismatch between our basic biology and intellect may be behind the mismatch between ordinary people and intellectuals? Recently I watched TED video of Richard Dawkins exhorting his audience to militant atheism. One of the points he makes is that amongst members of the American Academy of Science less that 10% believe in a god. When you compare that to members of the public it's more like 75% of people believe in a god. Dawkins quotes (ex)president Bush as saying an atheist could not be a patriot. Atheism is, however, the largest category of religious belief in the USA after Christianity - outnumbering Judaism, Hinduism and all other religions put together. But atheists have no political voice in the USA. I thought that was a very interesting point.
Intellectuals can generally see that the idea of a creator god is not credible, and it is interesting that Christian intellectuals back off from anthropomorphic versions of god even when they cannot give up the idea altogether. Ordinary people are harder to convince because they still project their hopes and fears onto the universe. And they want the universe to care. A caring universe is often personified as a loving mother or father (I don't recall any culture describing the universe/nature as a favourite aunt or uncle for instance).
The universe described by scientists seems not to care about us. I had an important realisation about this some years back when I used to surf on the rugged West Coast beaches near Auckland, New Zealand (especially Piha). These beaches are potentially dangerous and every year several people drown there, though with care they provide excellent surfing and swimming. The waves just roll in to their own rhythm, and they do not hesitate to drown the incautious. The sea does not glory in killing people, or regret one getting away. The sea is completely and utterly indifferent to us. When you float around on it for hours at a time, several days a week for a couple of years this becomes apparent. The ocean is magnificent, beautiful, fascinating, and thrilling, but it is not alive, not sentient. The ocean does not care, because it cannot. Caring is something that humans do.
I believe the universe is like this also. The universe does not care about us. It is not an ethical universe (i.e. it has no bias towards 'good') but one which is not aware at all, let alone aware of us and our needs: the universe is largely inanimate and driven by physics and chemistry. This might sound bleak or hard, scientists are often accused of being cold, but I'm not finished. Because the wonder is that self-aware beings can and do care. Sure, other animals experience consciousness and emotions so some extent. I don't deny that. But humans have this ability to rise above circumstances that no other animal possesses. We have an ability to be altruistic not possessed by other beings - for instance we help strangers, and can turn enemies into friends. In effect it is humans that provide the love, the caring, and the emotional warmth in the universe because they are products of consciousness, especially self-consciousness.
In response to one group of Brahmins who were concerned about the afterlife (Tevijja Sutta DN 13), the Buddha described a series of meditations in which one radiates positive emotions for all beings. One first of all radiates general goodwill, friendliness, love. One makes no distinctions between any beings, but imagines all beings everywhere being happy and well. Then we imagine that all people in need getting what they need, all the ill and unhappy beings becoming well and happy. Then we imagine ourselves celebrating along with everyone who has good fortune. And finally we radiate equanimity - a pure positivity not dependent on circumstances, but which arises out of our identification with all beings everywhere. What finer use of the imagination is there? It is no coincidence that the Buddha named this group of practices brahmavihāra (dwelling with god) and said of them that dwelling on the meditations was like dwelling with, or perhaps as, Brahmā (the creator god - usually depicted with four faces looking in the cardinal directions). The name was probably aimed at Brahmanical theists whose religious goal was brahmasahavyata 'companionship with Brahmā'. In response to concerns about the afterlife the Buddha simply teaches us to love without bounds in the here and now (as the Karaṇīya Mettā Sutta says).
The Buddha's point is much the same as I have been saying. The universe, god if you will, is not the source of friendliness, love, caring, compassion. We are. Love is a human quality that emerges from our consciousness. It is up to us to provide this quality. It's a big job, and so we must set about it systematically, and collectively. Else we may fail, and we all know what that failure looks like. Fortunately we have ways of developing these qualities, and we have exemplars to inspire us. All we need do really is allow ourselves to be inspired, and have a go at the practices.
9 Comments
Close this window Jump to comment formHi Jayarava,
it seems to be that there is a distinction between being 'ethical' and being 'caring' here - from the Buddha's perspective (though not from the scientific-materialist POV that you outline here) the universe is ethical inasmuch as good deeds are rewarded and bad deeds punished (though this is complicated by the fact that the aim is to step completely outside of this ethical system - not, of course, in the sense that one's deeds are no longer ethically judgeable, so to speak), but it's not 'caring' or 'uncaring' - in the Indian context this 'caring universe' seems more like a later Brahmanical development coinciding with the rise/growing popularity of atman/brahman and bhakti beliefs & practices.
In Buddhism I do wonder whether, as has sometimes been commented upon, the development of a pantheon of 'present' bodhisattvas and Buddhas in Mahayana, and its self-representation as compassionate where so-called 'Hinayana' is not, came about because of the desire for the kind of 'caring parent' figures that you mention.
Also, I would question yor assumption about non-human animal behaviour - what evidence do we have that animals never behave in ways which are altruistic or compassionate, and how do we define 'rising beyond circumstances'?
Even if we limit the emotions in question only to love, caring & emotional warmth, I would say that some types of animal - and likely many more than we think, if not all - certainly possess these characteristics, and that (short of taking an extreme 'anti-anthropomorphism' position) they can and have been observed not only in experimental settings (settings which already premise a lack of care for animal freedom) but also in our own interactions with them.
With metta,
Rowan
Monday, January 31, 2011
That bit about the universe not caring reminds me of the description of the animal realm in the Canon: "In that realm there is no doing of good deeds; there is only mutual devouring, and the slaughter of the weak." Somewhere in the SN, but I don't have the reference to hand, sorry.
Monday, January 31, 2011
@Rowan
Taking your last point first, I totally agree that our abilities are not of a unique kind. I fully accept that animals are conscious, and probably emotional in the same kind of way that we are. But the scale is entirely different - animals don't respond, can't respond, on the scale that we do.
How we define "rising above circumstances" may be difficult, but where for instance is the animal equivalent of the hospital built for healing, staffed by doctors and nurses who train for years, and paid for by tax dollars (in the UK and NZ anyway)? This is not just one or two orders of magnitude different from animal altruism. An Animal may be sad when its infant is born prematurely, but it cannot organise an antenatal unit to ensure that it lives.
So yes we are only recently risen beyond our animal ancestors, but we have done so. To argue that we are in no way different from animals is not sustainable. Though again I agree that this is not an argument for exploitation - I would argue that with power comes responsibility; with the ability to care comes the duty to do so.
Coming back to your first point. Apart from the fact that it is Buddhist doctrine, what makes you think that good deeds are rewarded and bad deeds are punished. You seem to suggest that the universe has agency! How does the universe decide which is good and which is bad? After all sometimes it's very difficult for us to know the difference. And doesn't the universe seem to make mistakes sometimes - as though if it does have agency it's getting a bit doddery after 13.7 billion years? Don't obviously good people seem to be punished; don't bad people seem to be rewarded?
When I say 'care' I mean that it matters to us, whereas it doesn't matter to the universe. I don't mean care as in 'to care for'. Since there is no consciousness for our plight to register in, there is no agency, no decision making, no emotion. Though we project all of these out because we are programmed by evolution to see others as having a mind - which is why we find the idea of death so difficult to accept. But the only rules are things like thermodynamics.
It is interesting that the historical buddha is never, as far as I know, referred to 'father' or even 'a father'. He is a doctor sometimes - other kinds of epithets that might be interesting to dig out. Later, quite early on I believe, Prajñāpāramitā becomes the mother of all the buddhas. But I don't recall the masculine bodhisattvas being fathers either.
BTW There's every evidence that our first Indo-European ancestors thought that the universe not only manifested lawfulness, but also cosmic law enforcement officers (especially Mitra and Varuṇa), and lawyers. A law-maker on the other hand is a later idea - I think.
I'm aware that there is a certain vagueness in this kind of discussion - I can't avoid using terminology that is ambiguous not to say anthropocentric, and seem to draw sharp distinctions that don't hold. I'm trying to do too much in a short essay and so can't spend a chapter defining my terms and anticipating objections. It can be a bit frustrating, but at least some people read the essay, and think about the issue. What more could I hope for under the circumstances? :-)
Monday, January 31, 2011
Thanks for your reply - to take up the point about kamma, I certainly wouldn't argue that the universe has any agency or can be considered an entity! No-one or entity is judging or deciding.
What I would say, rather, is that 'reality,' defined ontologically or phenomenologically, is entirely governed by causality. So when we say that 'good' is 'rewarded' and 'bad' is 'punished,' those are only convenient labels, not absolutes according to any impartial ethico-moral judge - what we're actually saying then is that certain kinds of actions have corollary consequences in a way which is stable, though individual cases are not predictable in their exact specifics.
What I would say about observing the good being punished and the bad rewarded is that we can only ever tell what occurs materially. Do bad people get richer and the good get poorer? Well yes, obviously. But this tells us nothing about their state of happiness and suffering. Such success may feed certain desires, but is living in a world of amorality, competition, anger, frustration, cruelty and so forth actually pleasant, even if one is reaping great material rewards? I find it difficult to believe that it's so. And while I believe in rebirth, I think that this makes the argument that rebirth/kamma must exist because obviously the good are unhappy and the bad are happy, to be unconvincing.
As far as 'law' and 'lawmaking' is concerned, I generally disagree when 'Dhamma' is translated as 'Law,' but I can see where that translation is coming from, in the above sense - that there is a way in which things operate. I wouldn't call this 'scientific' in the way that the 'laws' of science are considered as such - I have issues with the Buddhism and Science discourse, because, as Donald Lopez points out (despite various other issues with his work), what science proclaims as truth (and though in theory science may not proclaim that it finds truth, but a best current theory, in practice I find that 'truth' is very much how it is actually taken both by scientists and non-scientists alike) changes all the time, but since the inception of modernity there have always been those who will claim that this (most recent) truth is in line with Buddhist teachings. But I'll pick this point up elsewhere.
With regard to 'caring,' as Richard Gombrich pointed out recently in an address brought to my attention by Bhante Sujato (I post as 'Chromatics' on his blog) what many people want from religion is comfort, whereas the Buddha's vision, though ultimately providing the best of hopes, was radically uncomforting to anyone who believed in a caring universe or a caring creator (your point about the Buddha as non-father figure is well taken and I'd like to see it expanded - I wonder whether there's more material on this in Powers' 'A Bull of A Man,' which I haven't yet read?) - I'd suggest this is one reason why his teachings 'go against the stream.' We are completely responsible for ourselves! (individually and collectively)
And incidentally, as someone who's just finished cutting an article from 17000 to 7000 words, I appreciate the problematics of restrictions of length :)
With metta, Rowan.
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
Hi Rowan
I take your points about the difficulty of observing karma at work. But does this not raise serious problem of generalising the proposition? On what then is the theory of moral consequences based?
I'm very wary of ontology and phenomenology and reality in the same sentence. I've looked and I don't see the Buddha ever discussing ontology, or the ontological implications of some of his doctrines. I see him discussing the phenomenology of the mind mostly. Tiny bits about how earth is the experience of resistance etc., but even this is couched in terms of experience. Reality doesn't enter into it, and as far as I know there is no Pāli word which could reasonably be translated as 'reality'.
I believe every human culture has an afterlife belief, all on more or less the same evidence. How do we decide which one to believe?
Scientific truth changes progressively though, not at random. Although there are paradigm changes, they are responses to new observations. So relativism or idealism as a reaction against science is irrational.
Of course Dhamma seldom means Law in a Buddhist context (though often in a Hindu context). 'Foundation' is a better general translation. I think 'phenomena' is misleading as well. I quite like 'qualia' but haven't looked into the background of that term enough to be confident of adopting it.
What are you going to do with the other 10,000 words?
Best Wishes
Jayarava
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
Hi Jayarava, thanks for the post raising many interesting points.
I especially liked the part on the opposition between myth (descriptive) and religion (prescriptive) –although myths seem to assume a prescriptive value in societies with no "overruling" religion apart from myths.
This leads me to my main point: I am inclined to think that your use of "religion", "god" and "atheism" is not unambiguous. You seem to imply that a theistic belief is something suitable for people who need to be soothed and conforted. More mature people, like Dawkin's scientists, are more emotionally grown up and stop pretend from god to give sense to the universe.
Although I really appreciate your point about *our* ability to care, I wonder whether you should not mention explicitly that the kind of theistic religion referred to above is not the only possible one. For instance, Kierkegaard does not seem to look for a confort in his terrific Lord. Would not it be more accurate to distinguish a pampering-religion from a challenging one? (Personally, I have nothing against the first one and nothing in favour of the latter one).
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
Hi Elisa
Yes. I over-simplify religion and unfairly criticise my over-simplification. It would be good to flesh out my ideas - but that would be a book! (Which I may yet write)
You are right about myth becoming prescriptive, and I suppose religion could well be descriptive without prescription. I think my idea works on the level of generalisation and allows for exceptions, but these exceptions do not invalidate the generalisation.
I suppose I see my criticism as representative enough to provide a contrast for my ideas about humans being the source of love. We don't simply project our need for comfort but all of our values and needs, of which I provided just one example that I though most people would understand if not relate to.
So I accept your criticism, and seek to mitigate my culpability by pointing to the limitations of my medium (i.e. blaming my tools) :-)
If I write the book I will have to credit my blog readers for helping me to clarify my arguments and tighten up my reasoning!
Best Wishes
Jayarava
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
Thanks for your reply.
You are right, blogging seems to require some generalisations and I tend to prefer generalisations over too punctual posts just dealing with a single point (say, a Tibetan line) and neglecting its general import.
Hence, the (more general) question arises:
How can we comunicate with a relatively broad public without being superficial (you usually suceed in doing it, so you seem utterly qualified in offering your answer)?
P.s.
I look forward to read your book.
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
Hi Elisa
The funny thing is that I have no intention of reaching a broad audience - and my stats suggest that I don't anyway! I just write about what interests me in the moment, as simply as much as possible but not more so ( - Einstein). Often I'm either writing about something which has just become clear to me, or writing is part of the process of clarification.
I take it as a given that context is important, as the deeper I go down the rabbit hole study the more it seems to help explain things.
I'm kind of a generalist - a maven in Malcolm Gladwell's scheme - who likes to know a little about a lot, and to see how things fit together. So my isolated facts usually contribute to a bigger picture I'm trying to construct for myself. I've always wanted to try to figure out what is going on - probably because I've never felt I understood the world or people or myself.
There is a problem with communicating specialist information outside of our specialist area. I've realised for instance that many of the scientists who know about evolution are very poor communicators with an apparent lack of empathy or interest in other people. So the cause of promoting evolution is set back because they don't get the message across. They don't connect with the people, in fact they are repelled by people and seem to do their best to repel their audience in turn. What a waste.
I think if you can consciously connect your own enthusiasm for your subject with what your values are, then you can translate that easily for someone who shares your values. Communicating to those who don't share your values requires you to imaginatively identify with the other person, empathise with their values, and then put your message in terms they can appreciate. But if you at least manifest your own values consistently and clearly then you give someone with an open mind a clear invitation to participate in communication with you. It's always a two-way process. Those who reach wide audiences are able to connect or appear to be open to be connected with, and they aren't always very intelligent (Bush, Palin, Burlusconi, etc). Intelligence plays very little part in our social interactions I think, whereas emotions are central.
Anyway there are some thoughts about, if not an answer to, your question.
Best Wishes
Jayarava
Wednesday, February 02, 2011