[Buddha-l] Five moral objections to karma

[Erik Hoogcarspel]

Wong Weng Fai schreef:

>In
>
>	W.R.P. Kaufman, "Karma, Rebirth, and the Problem of Evil,"
>        Philosophy East and West, 55(1), pp. 15-32.
>
>the author raised five moral objections to karma:
>
>   1. The problem of memory
>      "Justice demands that one who is being made to suffer for a past
>       crime be made aware of his crime and understand why he is being
>       punished for it." "Moreover, the memory problem renders the karmic
>       process essentially useless as a means of moral education."
>  
>
This doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

>   2. The problem of proportionality
>      "Given the kinds and degrees of suffering we see in this life, it
>       is hard to see what sort of sins the sufferers could have committed
>       to deserve such horrible punishment."
>  
>
So life and therefore karma are not just, it doesn't proof that karma 
doesn't happen.

>   3. Infinite regress
>      Quotes Wendy O'Flaherty: "Karma 'solves' the problem of the origin
>      of evil by saying that there is no origin... But this ignores rather
>      than solves the problem."
>
>  
>
Since samsaara has no beginning, karma hasn't either.

>   4. The problem of explaining death
>      "death seems not to be presented as punishment for wrong, but rather
>       is presupposed as the mechanism by which karma operates."
>  
>
We don't have to explain death, we die anyway.

>   5. The free will problem
>      "can karma be squared at all with the existence of free moral
>      agents?"
>
>  
>
Kant would say 'No', because karma reduces morality to prudence. A karma 
believer acts morally in order to save his ass and not for the sake of 
goodness or out of respect for rules and duty. But not everybody has to 
be a Kantian.

erik