[Buddha-l] karma or kamma

[Joy Vriens]

Piya,
>The European Enlightenment was evidently a great age, but I think most of us 
>in 
>urban Asia missed that. We started only with the Industrial Revolution and 
>have 
>become cog and wheels of a massive global system whose main nut is in the 
>USA. 

And the main nut and lubricant of that is greed. :-)

>On a more serious note: 
>In early Buddhist psychology, we can say that sa.nkhaara (formations) refers 
>to our 
>habit for filtering, reconstructng, and interpreting what we hear from 
>others. Indeed, 
>we do this to the "all" (sabba), that is, whatever is experienced through 
>our senses. 

Yes
 
>I read somewhere (including Eleanor Rosch of Berkeley) that many psychology 
>specialists today (esp those with Buddhist leanings) no more regard our 
>sense 
>experiences as being "representationalist" (like a camera obscura) but 
>rather "constructionalist" (like putting things together with our own mental 
>identikit). We 
>live in a virtual reality we have created. 

Yes, and which are creating anew every moment. 
But even in the view that sensory experience is rather passive (camera obscura) and representational (aakaara?), the memories of past sensory experiences are stored together with feelings and judgements, so the pictures of the camera obscura are already subjective ones or "construed" if you like. 
 
>I think the early stages of being a Buddhist saint is that these virtual 
>realities 
>coincide more and more with other like saints, and at arhathood, we see 
>other 
>arhats like two mirrors facing one another. Others apparently only see 
>through 
>coloured lenses darkly--or speak through the Darth Vader voice synthesiser 
>silly. (Which reminds me, mine needs a battery change.) 

:-)
I don't know anything about what arhats see, I know the theory though, but I would expect they are not that different from us. They have the same functioning, the same information but treat it differently. I don't want to sound too mechanically, but just for the sake of an attempted explanation, I would expected exactly the same information (direct sensory input + screening of the memory of past input) to be stored with a skilfull reaction or skillful lack of a reaction to it. Sorry for this kitchen Yogacara-like approach. What I mean to say is that I don't see the arhats as *empty* mirrors. Or how empty is empty? 
 
>So Derrida & co were ahead of their times. 

I wouldn't say they were ahead of their time. As a professional translator, I tend to see anything said and written as a translation, interpretation, reformulation, revisitation etc. I don't believe there is that much new under the sun. 
 
>The other interesting Buddhist term is "mental proliferation" (papa~nca): 
>our 
>tendency to use a thousand words and thoughts, when one is bad enough. 

As long as mental proliferation isn't taken too seriously, it can't be too harmful, apart from diverting us from what is essential. But then, is there anything essential or that is not a construction or a proliferation?
 
>Oh yes, I have just begun reading Cole's "Father as Text" (it came 
>serendipitiously, 
>with a double dust jacket!), and yes he tends to be a bit prolix.

I found the titles of the chapters a bit of a give away and offputting. But I am such a snob... 

 Also 
>curiously, 
>I notice he begins a sentence with "Too,..." at least twice (pages 5 & 50). 
>Too, 
>apparently, he is not aware of Joel Tatelman's "The Glorious Deeds of Purna: 
>A 
>translation and study of the Purnavadana" (2000) which is of the same genre: 
> 
>Buddhist texts as literature. The book is not in his biblio. 

It's not in mine either. Where I am living it is hard to get hold of English Buddhist litterature, unless I buy it myself. A lot of people on this list are living of my money ;-)

Joy

 
>Metta, 
> 
>Piya Tan 
> 
> 
>On 10/21/07, Joy Vriens wrote: 
>> 
>> Piya wrote: 
>> 
>> >This is the well known debate as regards who defines the words we use: 
>> >the dictionary or the speaker. 
>> 
>> Montaigne said that words are defined for half by the one speaking and for 
>> half by the one hearing them. No rules will change that reality. Appealing 
>> to dictionaries, conventions or other expressions of authority is a 
>> different matter. They dont apply to what happens but to what ought to 
>> happen or is conventionally expected to happen. 
>> 
>> Joy 
>> 
>> 
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