{"id":4620,"date":"2018-04-08T06:14:08","date_gmt":"2018-04-08T06:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2018\/04\/08\/buddhism\/"},"modified":"2018-04-08T06:14:08","modified_gmt":"2018-04-08T06:14:08","slug":"buddhism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2018\/04\/08\/buddhism\/","title":{"rendered":"Buddhism"},"content":{"rendered":"

We are told not to become attached to the usual objects of desire such as name and fame, pleasure and pelf, land and stand. Why not? Because they are impermanent (anicca<\/em>), insubstantial (anatta<\/em>), and do not ultimately satisfy (dukkha<\/em>).<\/span><\/p>\n

So there is<\/em> something permanent, substantial, and finally satisfying?<\/span><\/p>\n

No!  Nothing is!<\/span><\/p>\n

Well then, you have no basis to devalue ordinary objects of desire! If nothing is or can be permanent, then it is no argument against anything to point out its impermanence. And similarly for the other two marks.<\/span><\/p>\n

Buddhism in its root (radical) Pali form issues in nihilism.  If everything bears the three marks, then nothing is worthy of pursuit or avoidance. The quest for Transcendence voids itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

The mistake is to think that desire as such is the root of woe when it is misdirected<\/em> desire.<\/span><\/p>\n

These ideas are presented in rigorous and scholarly fashion in my No Self? A Look at a Buddhist Argument<\/em>, International Philosophical Quarterly<\/a><\/em> 42 (4):453-466 (2002). <\/span><\/p>\n

This here is but a bloggity-blog summary.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We are told not to become attached to the usual objects of desire such as name and fame, pleasure and pelf, land and stand. Why not? Because they are impermanent (anicca), insubstantial (anatta), and do not ultimately satisfy (dukkha). So there is something permanent, substantial, and finally satisfying? No!  Nothing is! Well then, you have … Continue reading “Buddhism”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[269,387],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-buddhism","category-desire"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4620\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}