[Buddha-l] Different criticisms for different folks (was: a seemingly endless thread on veganism)

[Richard Hayes]

On Tuesday 15 May 2007 02:40, Joy Vriens 

> I was thinking of a more critical attitude within Buddhism itself or among
> specialists of Buddhism. A couple of years ago I watched a very interesting
> documentary on the origins of Christianity ("Corpus Christi"), mainly
> consisting of a critical reading of the sources by both Christian and
> Jewish experts. It was absolutely fascinating.

While I fully agree that a critical attitude is important, if only because 
good Buddhist practice requires it, I would also point out that the kinds of 
criticism that are needed are very different for different traditions. 
Buddhism makes few historical claims of the sort that, if challenged, would 
in any way undermine the most important elements of theory and practice. In 
contrast, I have heard Christians say that if even one sentence of the Bible 
were shown to be false, they would lose faith in the entire edifice of 
Christianity. It is difficult to imagine any Buddhist practitioner saying 
that about her confidence in Buddhism. So while historical and textual 
criticism may be important defenses against the excesses of Christian 
zealotry, historical and textual criticism makes no difference at all to the 
excesses of Buddhist enthusiasm.

The role of critical thinking that is necessary to ward off the excesses of 
Buddhist piety are, I would say, more in the realm of psychology, ethics and 
metaphysics. While a Christian might be unnerved by a discovery that 
disproved that Jesus was actually crucified, a Buddhist might be more 
unnerved by neurophysiological discoveries that made rebirth seem highly 
unlikely or that made the possibility of eradicating all greed, hatred and 
delusion seem unlikely. A Buddhist might also be unnerved by discoveries that 
being negligent of the needs of others leads to one's own happiness and sense 
of wellbeing.

Some neurophysiological studies have suggested that the brain is hard-wired to 
give preferential treatment to beings deemed to be like oneself. In other 
words, the pain of those who are deemed like oneself is much more disturbing 
than the pain of people who speak different languages, have different 
beliefs, live in different environments, not to mention the pain of beings 
who belong to other species. So it is no surprise, given such studies, that 
while most Americans were deeply shocked and overwhelmed with grief when 33 
students were killed by a deranged gunman at Virginia Tech, far fewer 
Americans were shocked that on the very same day more than 190 Iraqis died in 
suicide bombing attacks. Almost six times as many awful deaths caused about 
one-tenth as much psychological agony. It turns out that in this oblivion of 
the suffering of others, Americans are not so unique. Human beings, and 
indeed all primates, seem to be built in pretty much the same way, a way that 
results in the filtering out of a great deal of potentially disturbing 
stimuli.

Some studies suggest that it may be impossible to override this tendency of 
the central nervous system to immunize itself against reacting to the pain of 
beings considered others or outsiders. If it were to turn out that it really 
IS impossible to care for outsiders, foreigners, insects and aliens from 
other galaxies who land in Roswell as a mother cares for her only child, then 
the implications for Buddhist practices aimed at cultivating Great Compassion 
would be rather dire. And this might lead some Buddhists to reject the 
findings of science as vehemently as some Christians have rejected the 
findings of textual and historical criticism. 

-- 
Richard Hayes