HELENA, Montana—The University of Utah held a conference titled “Buddhism’s Engagement with the World” On 21–22 April, supported by the university’s Asia Center, the Department of Philosophy, the Tanner Humanities Center, the Religious Studies Program, and the Environmental Humanities Program.
The purpose of the event was, in part, to “show the value of Buddhist studies to an audience not familiar with the field, in the hopes of spurring enough interest that the university might eventually be able to make a faculty hire in the area,” according to Amod Lele, educational technologist at Boston University and a presenter at the conference. Co-organizer Pierre-Julien Harter, a research fellow at the University of Utah, noted that the campus did not currently have a specialist in Buddhist studies, and that the conference would serve to highlight the many cross-disciplinary opportunities for such a position. Attendees at the event included representatives from the fields of history, environmental studies, and philosophy, as well as specialists in Buddhism in several Asian regions.
The conference was small but did not lack in depth or breadth. Papers presented included Laura Guerrero’s "Buddhist Fictionalism Reconsidered," Amod Lele’s "Disengaged Buddhism: Why South Asian Buddhists Rejected Engagement with Systemic Institutions," Charles Goodman’s "Two-Level Consequentialism, Shantideva's Ethics, and the Justification of Punishment,” Dale Wright’s "Buddhist Atheism as a Challenge to the Philosophy of Religion," William Edelglass’s "Nature and Buddha-Nature: Poetry, Place, and the Transmission of Buddhism," Pierce Salguero’s "Beyond Mindfulness: Buddhism and Health in Historical Perspective," and John Dunne’s "Phenomenological Reduction as Therapeutic Technique: The Buddhist Theory and Practice of Dereification.”
Amod Lele. From bu.edu
Asked about stand-out papers, both Lele and Goodman noted that Guerrero’s work, which “showed us conceptual difficulties with the interpretation of samvrti satya as ‘pan-fictionalism,’ — that is, the idea that all conventional truth should be understood in the way that we understand works of fiction (with their internal forms of truth); it seems like making sense of it likely needs to rely on some ineffable elements,” said Lele. Goodman continued: “The issue of explaining how there can be definite content to our thoughts, and how the world is not just something we make up, even in the absence of any ultimate ground, may be the most difficult problem for Madhyamaka thought today.”
Turning from this very abstract yet important topic in Buddhist epistemology, Lele next brought up Goodman’s paper, which connected the thought of the 8th century Indian Philosopher Śāntideva with contemporary psychology on a timely topic. For both Śāntideva and psychology, “anger tends to mislead us and get us into demonstrable error.” As Lele continued, this paper, along with Dunne’s, followed on a “theme of systemic psychological error,” linking the topic of anger and its ethical ramifications to Buddhist epistemology.
Speaking of Dunne’s paper, Goodman stated that it offered Buddhist insight into contemporary ills, “patients suffering from anxiety and related issues may be able to alleviate their distress by combining mindfulness practice with efforts to ‘dereify’: that is, to understand their thoughts as thoughts, not facts or real things.”
On the topic of mindfulness, Goodman continued, Salguero’s examination found, “that claims that mindfulness can promote physical health, such as those often highlighted in the media today, have no support within the Pāli literature of early Buddhism. On the other hand, a number of Chinese Buddhist texts do say that mindfulness can be a path to physical wellness.”
When asked about themes emerging from the conference and their importance to Buddhism in North America today, both Lele and Goodman cited the ongoing politicization of Buddhism in North America. “Many of us are interested in exploring the possibilities for Buddhist political thought; I think Amod is right to argue that philosophers interested in a Buddhist political theory need to reflect deeply on the doctrinal reasons why such theories did not emerge in premodern times in India and in other regions influenced by Buddhism,” said Goodman. Lele, in addition to his remarks in his paper on Buddhism’s historical disengagement in politics, noted that, “North American Buddhism has been too ready to assimilate Buddhism to its existing values, basically the values of activistic left-wing boomer and post-boomer hippies.”
Eric Hutton. From sfu.ca
Alongside these political aspects, Goodman relayed enthusiasm about the intellectual and philosophical depth that Buddhism offers to scholars and practitioners today:
“North American Buddhism is undergoing a dynamic process of highly productive intellectual engagement both with science and with Western philosophy. Recognizing that Buddhism includes within its diversity a highly sophisticated, non-theistic philosophical tradition that developed largely independently of Western thought, many contemporary intellectuals of the highest caliber have become interested both in learning from Buddhism and in contributing to the development of world philosophies that engage respectfully and critically with Buddhist thought. All this makes Buddhist philosophy a very exciting area to work in at this historical moment.”
Co-organizer Eric Hutton, director of graduate studies in the Department of Philosophy, summarized the conference: “Overall, I would call the conference a success. The presenters had productive exchanges with each other and with the audience. Professors, students, and members of the general public who attended the conference also made comments to me indicating that they found the presentations to be interesting and enlightening. My hope is that the University of Utah will be able to host similar events in the future, and that scholarship on Buddhism will eventually have a larger role in the research and teaching done at the university than it currently does.”