[Buddha-l] Maybe I was wrong

[Richard Hayes]

On Jul 27, 2010, at 3:19 AM, Dan Lusthaus wrote:

> Nice to see you finally coming around.

If you read the blog post, you'll see I've only come partially around. I'd hate to prove wrong all those people who think I'm incorrigible.

> Tangential, but perhaps germane, is a long-standing dissatisfaction with the 
> presumed training that academics are receiving in order to study "Buddhism".
> Richard and I will probably agree that a major problem today is that in too 
> many Buddhist studies programs serious philosophical training not only is 
> not required or encouraged, it can be actively discouraged.

It has been so long since I've been involved in Buddhist studies that I'm quite out of touch with the field. Come to think of it, I've never had any training in Buddhist studies as such. I sort of backed into Buddhism through studying Sanskrit grammar and analytic philosophy and bumping into Dignāga by mistake. If what you say is true—that Buddhist studies programs are not encouraging serious philosophical training—then I would agree that that is a serious problem.

> Similarly -- and 
> perhaps Richard is coming around to this view (or has held it?) -- serious 
> training in psychology has NOT been part of the curriculum.

Yes, that has been one of my concerns since 1968 or so.

> By "psychology" 
> I don't mean a layman's familiarity with theorists like Freud and Jung 
> (though even that is often lacking), but nuts and bolts clinical and 
> experimental psychology -- on such things as psychology of perception, 
> hedonic studies, behavior modification, brain and neurological studies, etc.

Fortunately, there are some exceptions to that general rule. Dan Arnold is on the verge of publishing a very interesting new book called <title>Buddhas, Brains and Believing</title>, which looks at some Buddhist guy named Dharmakīrti (and his brother, Candra) through the lens of that branch of philosophy of mind that is informed by current research in neurology and psycholinguistics. It breathes new life into Dharmakīrti's discussion of the relationship between the "humors" in the body and various predispositions in the saṃskāra-skandha.

> Sadly, many attracted to Buddhism also buy into the anti-science rubbish 
> that floats around our culture.

The anti-scientific bias that has taken hold in the humanities (not to mention the political sphere) has been alarming me since I was an undergraduate. The anti-science trend, already apparent in the 1960s, has accelerated since then. How on earth can one come to grips with the reported fact that only 30% of Americans believe in evolution, and something like 55% of Americans deny that there is global warming (after all, we had a cold winter this year), and of those who do admit there is global warming, a majority deny that it has anything to do with human behavior such as the dramatic increases in our uses of fossil fuels and the cutting down of rain forests in South America to have a place to grow corn to feed cows on massive feed lots in California so that McDonald's will be able to sell cheap hamburgers in Romania. (I'd say more, but it's hard to speak through all the foam that has formed around my mouth.)   

> Richard has also argued in the past that he 
> finds the theory of the twelve links of conditioned co-arising 
> (pratitya-samutpada) irrational.

Did I argue that? I think that may be an oversimplification of the stance I have taken. My conviction that the theory of the twelve links of conditioned arising is puzzling and incoherent has increased over the years, but as you should know by now, I really have no quarrel with things that are puzzling and incoherent. Most of my best friends are puzzling and incoherent. I'm incoherent myself, although I do draw the line at being in any way puzzling.

> Perhaps some exposure to BF Skinner, et al. 
> would reveal not only its cogency, but its very observable and potent 
> factuality.

I cannot think of any psychologist who has been more thoroughly discredited than Skinner, but if you would allow me to substitute Pinker or Jackendoff for Skinner, I'll agree with you.

> One cannot profitably read much basic Buddhist doctrine, not to mention a 
> good deal of abhidharma, without a solid grounding in serious psychological 
> studies.

When I think about all the things that are necessary to get a passable grasp of Indian Buddhism, it makes me ashamed that I have ever published anything in the field. A minimal grasp of Indian Buddhism requires a pretty solid understanding of brahmanical culture (since all the Buddhist philosophers whose works we still have were brahmins), Pāṇini's explanations of the workings of Sanskrit, āyurveda and the main systems of brahmanical and Jain philosophy. Learning all that slows a person down. Then, if one wants to make any of that accessible to modern intellectuals, one has to have a decent grasp of both analytical and continental philosophy, clinical psychology, neurophysiology, quantum mechanics, and astrophysics. And if one wants to make any of it accessible to the average undergraduate, a thorough knowledge of rap music, computer games, tattoo parlors and poetry slams is indispensable. Face it, we're all charlatans, peddling our parochial obsessions while claiming to have a grasp of the big picture.

> The historiographical focus (even philology is on the wane) that has 
> overtaken many Buddhist studies programs is fine if one wants to enjoy the 
> city by the veneer of its buildings.

Hey! Veneer was one of my favorite Dutch painters. Don't knock him.

When I bailed out of religious studies, everybody was so busy talking about methodology and closing hermeneutical circles in a post-colonial post-structuralist milieu that nobody was actually looking at religious texts or beliefs or practices anymore. It's as if everyone had become so worried that they would contaminate, or be contaminated by, the specimens they were studying that they first had to don their latex gloves and hazmat suits and then look at everything through a plexiglas wall.

But don't mind me. I'm just a grumpy old fart—have been since I was around sixteen.

Richard