[Buddha-l] RE: Article of possible interest--correction

[Bob Zeuschner]

Christopher Fynn wrote:
> 
> I've heard some Tibetan lamas state that we should accept the teaching
> on karma, - the idea of which is fairly easy to grasp but impossible to
> fathom - because the Buddha taught other things such as emptiness of
> self and phenomena, which they maintain are difficult to understand but
> can be proven by means of logic. In other words their view seems to be
> if the Buddha was correct about those things which can be determined by
> logic it is reasonable to accept his teachings about those things which
> cannot be determined one way or the other - at least as a working
> hypothesis - until one is enlightened enough to directly perceive their
> truth (or otherwise).

 From the perspective of philosophy, the Tibetan lamas have committed a 
common fallacy.

If I write a book of 300 pages, with every single fact completely 
checked and completely correct, but on page 283 I add this sentence "and 
Bob Zeuschner was raised from the dead," the conclusion would be that 
this too must be correct because everything else was correct.

In fact, no. Each claim stands or falls on justification, not on the 
claims surrounding it in the book.

However, if we do not adopt the perspective of critical thinking, but 
instead adopt the religious perspective of an omniscient deva named 
Siddhartha, then we are back to having blind faith in the divine teacher 
(which was not recommended for the Kalamas).

I suspect that blind faith is what the Tibetan lamas would encourage.

Bob
Dept. of Philosophy