[Buddha-l] Bangladesh Muslim lovefest

[Richard Hayes]

On Oct 2, 2012, at 9:28 AM, Erik Hoogcarspel <jehms at xs4all.nl> wrote:

>> It will be interesting to see whether the Buddhist Taliban declares a fatwa on Professor Flanagan.
> 
> When I met him a few years ago I read some parts, But to be honest I was not very much impressed because naturalizing things seems to be a U.S.A. hobby and it means to explain something as causal effects of physical events.

I read the book with two graduate students interested in philosophy of mind, and they both found Flanagan rather opinionated and not very convincing. (Maybe we should invite him to buddha-l; he would fit right in.)

> So legitimizing Buddhism as basically a kind of neuroscience.

I don't think that is his aim. I don't think he wants to legitimize Buddhism at all. Rather, I think he wants to claim that Buddhism has something valuable to contribute to a scientific age, despite its being filled with pre-scientific dogmas that don't bear up well under close scrutiny.

I think I misrepresented his answer to the question "Is naturalized Buddhism still Buddhism?" a better way of stating his position is that it really makes no difference what we call it. Buddhists do not have exclusive property rights on the teachings of Buddhism, and anyone who finds any of the teachings of Buddhism helpful in some way has every right to use them and to acknowledge their source. One can say "I got this idea from Buddhism, and I think it's very useful" without having to subscribe to Buddhism. That's not a very controversial claim. Indeed, it is so bland that it probably goes without saying.

A problem I see with Flanagan's work is that I don't see how naturalized Buddhism differs from, say, naturalized Stoicism or naturalized Quakerism. (A naturalized Quaker says "There is no need for scripture, because we all have direct access to the mind of God. Oh, and by the way, there is no God other than your own mind.")

> I would like to see Buddhism getting a lot wilder, but please less serious.

I'm content to leave Buddhism just as it is. Wilderness appeals to me, so long as one has access to the Internet. Being serious has never appealed to me at all. Like you, I avoid people who actually believe what they say like the plague.

Richard Hayes