Buddhism as Philosophy,an Introduction by Mark Siderits. Chapter Four Buddhist Ethics The view of persons that we discussed in the last chapter is a form of reductionism. To be a reductionist about a certain kind of thing ia to hold that things of that kind do not exist in strict sense, that their exiatence just consists in the existence of other kinds of things. The Buddhist view of non-self, for instance, says that the existence of a person just consists in the occurrence of a complex causal series of impermanent, impersonal skandhas ခႏၵာ. But Buddhists are not the only ones to hold a reductionist view of persons. On some interpretations both Locke and Hume held such a view. More recently, Derek Parfit has given a siphisticated defense of reductionism about persons, which he explains as the denial that the continued existence of a person involves any further fact over and above the facts about a causal series of psychophysical elements. Here is what he says about the effects of coming to believe that the reductuonist view is true of oneself: Is the truth depressing? Some may find it so. But I find it liberating, and cinsoling. When I believed that my existence was such a further fact, I seemed imprisoned in myself. My life seemed like a glass tunnel, through which I was moving faster every year, and at the end of which there was darkness. When I changed my view, the walls if my glass tunnel disappeared. I now live in the open air. There is still a difference between my life and the lives of other people. But the difference is less. Other people are closer. I am less concerned about the rest of my life, and more concerned about the lives of other people. [1941: 281] Buddhists say something similar. They say that being enlightened, coming to know the truth of reductionism, relieves existential suffering. They also claim that makes us more concernd about the welfare of others. In this chapter we will explore how that might be. Ethics is concerned with questions cincerning how we should live our lives, and how we should act toward others. Buddhists are reductionists about persons: they claimed there is no self, and the person is only conventionally real. We will be investigating the ethical consequences of this claim.
Posted on: Thu, 20 Mar 2014 11:07:39 +0000
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