[Buddha-l] Prominent Neobuddhist proposes religion based blacklisting for government jobs

[Richard Hayes]

On Jul 29, 2009, at 6:16 PM, Katherine Masis wrote:

> Karen Armstrong's words are right on target:  It doesn't matter what  
> you believe, but how you behave.

All the forms of Christianity that have rejected formal creeds say  
this. William James generalized this in his lectures on Pragmatism and  
in Varieties of Religious Experience. (In James's work we find him  
saying not only that, but also that one's behavior are, in effect,  
one's beliefs.)

>   Frankly, Sam Harris is making too much of a fuss over what other  
> folks believe.

I don't believe that for a second. But that's only because I try not  
to have any beliefs at all that can't be manifested somehow in  
behavior. How does one ACT if one believes Sam Harris is making too  
much of a fuss? Well, one way would be to ignore him.

Of course, if buddha-l denizens ignored everyone who deserves to be  
ignored, there would be no messages here. Then we could all do  
something useful with out time. (Were it not for akrasia, I would do  
something useful with my time.)


Richard Hayes
Department of Philosophy
University of New Mexico
http://www.unm.edu/~rhayes
rhayes at unm.edu