05.29.11
More on Harris on buddhism
http://www.samharris.org/site/full_text/killing-the-buddha/
I am struck by the massive stupidity in Harris’ attack on Buddhism. I had originally thought, based on his statements in The End of Faith, that he was a closet New Ager, with an interest in issues of, viz. Vedanta.
But this attack on Buddhism shows that Harris has either changed his tune, or was always confused about New Age religious issues (who isn’t).
This article is beyond belief. I am not a buddhist, have been very critical of buddhism, and Tibetan buddhism, but nothing in that critique changes the reality (which can be restated in terms of the ‘Indic tradition’, Jainism, some branches of Hinduism, and/or ‘santana dharma’. The core legacy there is something of vital importance to mankind and human evolution, and the attempt by Harris to twist the Zen teaching of ‘killing the buddha’ to attack this essential content is puzzling for someone giving the appearance of inttelligence.
When a science dogmatist starts to negate the question of buddhist enlightenment in the name of reductionist neuroscience and/or the perspective of scientism, we should sound the alarm against ‘science gone stupid’.
The sad fact is that, however miuch we may love science, it goes haywire in this area, for good Kantian reasons.
The number of wrong ideas in this essay is staggering. Violence in religion? Fine. But recall that Jainism/Buddhism invented non-violence as a doctrine, vegetarianism as a spiritual diet, and world renunciation as a tactic against worldly involvement and its violence.
This kind of charge should be turned on science itself: what field has killed and tortured more animals and on the scale of science since the scientific revolution. Science is a desperately violent methodology. Etc,…
Two can play this game.
The question of violence in religion has to be put in the context of civilization as a whole. Do the accusers here renounce war? If not, then their acceptance of violence in civilization is on a par with violence in religion. I fail to see how these new atheists can think it logical to pursue this vein in all seriousness.
I should note that Harris’ purloined phrase ‘killing the buddha’ is itself skirting the violent, and there are plenty of communists who will be glad for this thinking as they exterminate buddhists in Tibet (with nary a protest from the new atheists).
Harris does a dangerous thing here: he makes science look stupid. Is it? I am getting worried.
The Gurdjieff Con » More on Harris on buddhism said,
May 29, 2011 at 10:58 am
[...] http://darwiniana.com/2011/05/29/more-on-harris-on-buddhism/ [...]
Archon de Raul said,
June 2, 2011 at 2:05 pm
Harris also advocates torture and has made statements that are irrational and violent in intent. He may or may not be a Buddhist – he is definitely an irrationalist, isolated and confused on the extremes of the far-right.
He’s always been this way actually but now it is a persona that is slipping out of fashion so it is becoming more visible.
I wouldn’t worry about him too much. He is not significant.