Buddhist Ethics as Moral Phenomenology

2021 ◽  
pp. 29-42
Author(s):  
Jay L. Garfield
Keyword(s):  
Moral Experience ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Moral Self ◽  
Moral Phenomenology ◽  
Buddhist Practice ◽  
The World ◽  
The Way

This chapter explains Buddhist ethics as moral phenomenology, that is, as a theory of the transformation of our moral experience of ourselves, others, and the world. It compares Buddhist “input ethics” to Western “output ethics” and explains how Buddhist practice aims at developing a less pathological, less egocentric view of our place in the world by cultivating a sense of interdependence. The discussion is grounded in Śāntideva’s Bodhicāryāvatāra, and explores his insights on anger, aversion, vice, and generosity. Śāntideva argues for the importance of developing our moral self-awareness, and changing the way we view suffering, both of ourselves and others.

scholarly journals The concept of "conscience" as an ethical category

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (3D) ◽  
pp. 43-49
Author(s):  
Darya Kapustina ◽  
Irina Gennadievna Churilova ◽  
Dmitriy Aleksandrovich Singilevich ◽  
Elena Viktorovna Aralova ◽  
Yameng Wang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Discourse ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Associative Model ◽  
Moral Self ◽  
Central Factor ◽  
The World ◽  
The Individual

The concept of “conscience” is one of the oldest components in the axiosphere and the central factor in the moral self-awareness of the individual. This phenomenon is closely related to the features of a person’s existential position in the world. The study presents an associative model of the concept of “conscience” in the biblical cultural discourse. The semantic components of the concept are determined and its biblical meanings are considered.

Crucified Wisdom

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Mark Heim
Keyword(s):  
Direct Instruction ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Comparative Theology ◽  
Classic Work ◽  
Notable Feature ◽  
Buddhist Practice ◽  
The World ◽  
Background Material ◽  
Mahāyāna Buddhism ◽  
The Way

This book is the first systematic discussion of the bodhisattva path in Māhayāna Buddhism from the perspective of Christian comparative theology. With the increasing interest and participation of Christians in Buddhist practice, many are seeking a deeper exploration of this topic, and of the way the two traditions and their teachings might interface. Crucified Wisdom provides important scholarly background material for this discussion, as well as a constructive proposal for Christian engagement. The text combines a rich exposition of the bodhisattva path with detailed reflection on it in connection with specific Christian convictions. The description of bodhisattva teachings centers on Śāntideva’s classic work the Bodicaryāvatāra and its interpretation by Tibetan commentators. The book argues that Christian theology can take direct instruction from Buddhism in three respects: developing an understanding of a “no-self” dimension in all creatures, recognizing an unvarying nondual dimension of divine immanence in the world, and appreciating that both of these are constituent dimensions in Christ’s incarnation and human redemption. The writer argues that Christians rightly remain committed to the value of novelty in history, the enduring significance of human persons, and the Trinitarian reality of God. A notable feature of the book is its exploration of the tensions around the crucifixion of Jesus in Buddhist-Christian interpretation. This work will be of particular value for those interested in “dual belonging” in connection to these traditions.

Pride, Virtue, and Self-Hood: A Reconstruction of Hume1

1992 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pauline Chazan
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Moral Self ◽  
Moral Domain ◽  
Self Knowledge ◽  
The Way

Hume’s account of how the self enters the moral domain and comes to a consciousness of itself as a moral being is one which he superimposes upon his Treatise account of the constitution of the non-metaphysical self. This primordial self is for Hume constructed out of the passions of pride and humility which are themselves in tum constructed out of certain feelings of pain and pleasure, these feelings being worked on by memory and imagination, and converted back and forth into series of ideas and impressions. In presenting this account of the way in which we achieve a coherent self-awareness and self-knowledge such that we ‘know our own force’ (T 597), Hurne in fact employs a radical psychology which he must discard once the moral self comes into view. The use Hume makes of this psychology has gone unnoticed in the literature, but once we understand its implications we will be able to dispel the confusion that some have found in his story.

A Dance Between the Reduction and Reflexivity: Explicating the "Phenomenological Psychological Attitude"

2008 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-32 ◽  
Author(s):  
Linda Finlay
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Research ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Phenomenological Reduction ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
The World ◽  
Research Interviews ◽  
Psychological Attitude ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Way

AbstractThis article explores the nature of "the phenomenological attitude," which is understood as the process of retaining a wonder and openness to the world while reflexively restraining pre-understandings, as it applies to psychological research. A brief history identifies key philosphical ideas outlining Husserl's formulation of the reductions and subsequent existential-hermeneutic elaborations, and how these have been applied in empirical psychological research. Then three concrete descriptions of engaging the phenomenological attitude are offered, highlighting the way the epoché of the natural sciences, the psychological phenomenological reduction and the eidetic reduction can be applied during research interviews. Reflections on the impact and value of the researcher's stance show that these reductions can be intertwined with reflexivity and that, in this process, something of a dance occurs—a tango in which the researcher twists and glides through a series of improvised steps. In a context of tension and contradictory motions, the researcher slides between striving for reductive focus and reflexive self-awareness; between bracketing pre-understandings and exploiting them as a source of insight. Caught up in the dance, researchers must wage a continuous, iterative struggle to become aware of, and then manage, pre-understandings and habitualities that inevitably linger. Persistance will reward the researcher with special, if fleeting, moments of disclosure in which the phenomenon reveals something of itself in a fresh way.

The Broad Structure of Buddhist Ethics

2021 ◽  
pp. 18-28
Author(s):  
Jay L. Garfield
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Theory ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Moral Phenomenology ◽  
Deontological Theory ◽  
Consequentialist Theory ◽  
Broad Structure ◽  
The Way

This chapter argues that Buddhist ethics does not fit into any of the standard Western metaethical theories. It is neither an instance of a virtue theory, nor of a deontological theory, nor of a consequentialist theory. It is closer to a sentimentalist theory, but different from those as well. Instead, it defends a reading of Buddhist ethics as a moral phenomenology and as particularist, utilizing casuistic reasoning. That is, Buddhist ethics is concerned primarily with the transformation of experience, of the way we perceive ourselves and other moral agents and patients. This chapter also argues that the metaphor of path structures Buddhist ethical thought.

Buddhist Ethics

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jay L. Garfield
Keyword(s):  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Ethical Reflection ◽  
Buddhist Ethics ◽  
Ethical Thought ◽  
Buddhist Literature ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Moral Phenomenology ◽  
Distinct Approach ◽  
The Way

This volume is one of a series of monographs on Buddhist philosophy for philosophers. It presents an outline of Buddhist ethical thought, presenting Buddhist ethical reflection as a distinct approach, or rather set of approaches, to moral philosophy. The book draws on a range of Buddhist philosophers to exhibit the internal diversity of the tradition as well as the lineaments that demonstrate its overarching integrity. This includes early Pāli texts, medieval Indian commentarial literature and philosophical treatises, Tibetan commentaries and treatises, and contemporary Buddhist literature. It argues that Buddhist ethics is best understood not as a species of any Western ethical tradition, but instead as a kind of moral phenomenology, and that it is particularist in its orientation. The book addresses both methodological and doctrinal issues and concludes with a study of the way that Buddhist ethical thought is relevant in the contemporary world.

The Development of Moral Self-Awareness

2020 ◽  
pp. 70-91
Author(s):  
Ross A. Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Moral Identity ◽  
Moral Emotions ◽  
Emotion Understanding ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Developmental Origins ◽  
Moral Self ◽  
Psychological Understanding ◽  
The World ◽  
Shame And Guilt ◽  
Parent Child Relationships

Moral self-awareness concerns how people perceive themselves as moral actors in the world. Its developmental origins begin early with the growth of empathy and emotion understanding and young children’s sensitivity to the effects of people’s actions on another’s feelings, goals, and intentions. Moral self-awareness continues to unfold with the development of conscience, moral emotions such as shame and guilt, and the emergence of the “moral self” in the preschool years. This chapter discusses these achievements, their developmental origins in parent–child relationships and in the growth of psychological understanding, and their connections to later advances in moral self-awareness, including moral identity in adolescence.

Becoming Politicized

2017 ◽  
Vol 225 (4) ◽  
pp. 324-335 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dimitrios Barkas ◽  
Xenia Chryssochoou
Keyword(s):  
Collective Identity ◽  
Political Socialization ◽  
Greek Society ◽  
Economic Vulnerability ◽  
The World ◽  
The Future ◽  
Identity Model ◽  
Beliefs About The Future ◽  
Of Greece ◽  
The Way

Abstract. This research took place just after the end of the protests following the killing of a 16-year-old boy by a policeman in Greece in December 2008. Participants (N = 224) were 16-year-olds in different schools in Attiki. Informed by the Politicized Collective Identity Model ( Simon & Klandermans, 2001 ), a questionnaire measuring grievances, adversarial attributions, emotions, vulnerability, identifications with students and activists, and questions about justice and Greek society in the future, as well as about youngsters’ participation in different actions, was completed. Four profiles of the participants emerged from a cluster analysis using representations of the conflict, emotions, and identifications with activists and students. These profiles differed on beliefs about the future of Greece, participants’ economic vulnerability, and forms of participation. Importantly, the clusters corresponded to students from schools of different socioeconomic areas. The results indicate that the way young people interpret the events and the context, their levels of identification, and the way they represent society are important factors of their political socialization that impacts on their forms of participation. Political socialization seems to be related to youngsters’ position in society which probably constitutes an important anchoring point of their interpretation of the world.

Restrained Airs: The Diegetic Surface and Nondiegetic Depth of British Film Music

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 429-443
Author(s):  
Paul Mazey
Keyword(s):  
Film Music ◽  
The World ◽  
British Cinema ◽  
Film Making ◽  
The Way

This article considers how pre-existing music has been employed in British cinema, paying particular attention to the diegetic/nondiegetic boundary and notions of restraint. It explores the significance of the distinction between diegetic music, which exists in the world of the narrative, and nondiegetic music, which does not. It analyses the use of pre-existing operatic music in two British films of the same era and genre: Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1952), and demonstrates how seemingly subtle variations in the way music is used in these films produce markedly different effects. Specifically, it investigates the meaning of the music in its original context and finds that only when this bears a narrative relevance to the film does it cross from the diegetic to the nondiegetic plane. This reveals that whereas music restricted to the diegetic plane may express the outward projection of the characters' emotions, music also heard on the nondiegetic track may reveal a deeper truth about their feelings. In this way, the meaning of the music varies depending upon how it is used. While these two films may differ in whether or not their pre-existing music occupies a nondiegetic or diegetic position in relation to the narrative, both are characteristic of this era of British film-making in using music in an understated manner which expresses a sense of emotional restraint and which marks the films with a particularly British inflection.

Profilometry. Using Corneo-scleral topography for scleral lens fitting

The Eye ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (128) ◽  
pp. 19-22
Author(s):  
Gregory DeNaeyer
Keyword(s):  
Ocular Surface ◽  
World Wide ◽  
Contact Lenses ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Way

The world-wide use of scleral contact lenses has dramatically increased over the past 10 year and has changed the way that we manage patients with corneal irregularity. Successfully fitting them can be challenging especially for eyes that have significant asymmetries of the cornea or sclera. The future of scleral lens fitting is utilizing corneo-scleral topography to accurately measure the anterior ocular surface and then using software to design lenses that identically match the scleral surface and evenly vault the cornea. This process allows the practitioner to efficiently fit a customized scleral lens that successfully provides the patient with comfortable wear and improved vision.

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