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Category Archives: Philosophy
On the absence of ethics in Indian philosophy
a small addendum
Every year, when I introduce Indian philosophy to my students, I deal with the problem of the alleged absence of ethics from it. I basically deal with this absence in multiple ways:
- First, and more important, I point out that “philosophy” is not a natural type. There is no binding reason why something should a priori belong to philosophy and, in fact, historically, different texts have been considered philosophically relevant or not (from the Suttanikāya to the Presocratics, from St. Augustin to Levinas, from Nietzsche to Th. Bernhard and G. Leopardi). Hence, there is nothing intrinsically wrong with a philosophical tradition developing more, say, philosophy of language and less, say, ethics, or vice versa. That we think that there are “core” disciplines within philosophy is only the result of specific historical circumstances.
bādha: What is it? Why did Mīmāṃsā authors spend so much time elaborating on it? Why is it interesting for us?
What is bādha?: bādha is a way of dealing with contrasting Vedic rules, so as to know what to do when they seem to clash. E.g., what shall we do when we encounter a prescription telling us to do X and then one telling us not to do X?
Atheism in Europe? Blame it on theism!
Hyman's analysis and some interesting Indian parallels
Gavin Hyman explains in his 2007 contribution to Martin’s Cambdride Companion to Atheism as well as in his 2010 A Short History of Atheism that atheism is always the refusal of a given form of theism. In particular, in European history, atheism is the refusal of theism as conceived in modern times, with God as one “thing” among others. This claim might raise the eyebrows of readers of Julian Baggini, who in his 2003 Atheism. A very short introduction maintained that atheism is independent of theism, since it is tantamount to naturalism. The two claims are, however, less far than it might look like.
Who invented atheism? UPDATED
Contemporary atheists usually claim that atheism is a product of modernity, connect it to naturalism and to progress in general (see Baggini 2003). Scholars who are more sensitive to history add that atheism might have originated in ancient Greece. Jan N. Bremmer belongs to them and writes:
Positive and negative atheism
Michael Martin elaborates on positive atheism vs negative atheism and explains that the former is the positive belief that there are no god(s), whereas the latter is just the absence of belief in any god(s). He then adds:
These categories should not be allowed to mask the complexity and variety of positions that atheists can hold, for a given individual can take different atheistic positions with respect to different concepts of God. Thus, a person might maintain that there is good reason to suppose that anthropomorphic gods such as Zeus do not exist and therefore be a positive atheist with respect to Zeus and similar gods. However, he or she could, for example, be only a negative atheist with respect to Paul Tillich’s God. In addition, people can and often do hold different atheistic positions with respect to different conceptions of a theistic God. For example, someone could be a positive atheist with respect to Aquinas’ God and only a negative atheist with repsect to St. Teresa’s God. (Martin 2007, p. 2)
Martin does not discuss the case of a person convinced that there is, for instance, no Zeus while they believe in the Christian God, possibly because he considers this just a case of inner-antagonism among theists. The phenomenon might be, however, more interesting than that, since it might have rather to do with a belief in a completely different kind of god. This is particularly evident in the case of Indian atheists who might be positive atheists regarding Īśvara or devatās, but then believe in brahman or in a personal god.
Defending Atheism?
Julian Baggini is certainly right that being an atheist does not necessarily mean being an associate of the holocaust. Still, in order to defend atheism from the accusation of having been the cause of mass murders in the 20th century, Baggini seems to go very far:
[R]eligion is by nature not only divisive, but divisive in a way which elevates some people above others. It is not too fancicul, I think, to see how the centuries of religious tradition in Western society made possible the kind of distinction between the superior Aryans and the inferior others which Nazism required. (Baggini, Atheism, 2003, p. 86)
If Baggini is right, any thought implying distinctions (such as Plato’s utopian Republic) would lead to this kind of effect. And supporters of Christianity could claim that they were the ones who said that we are all children of God… Again, I am led to think that putting the history of atheism in a wider context, e.g., taking India and China into the picture would help enhancing the debate.
6 ys post doc position in intercultural philosophy (Vienna)
I apologise for the late posting and hope it might be interesting for some readers.
University Assistant (post doc)
at the Department of Philosophy
Reference number: 8994
The advertised position is located at the Department of Philosophy which is part of the Faculty of Philosophy and Education. The Department of Philosophy at the University of Vienna is large in international comparison and its members are active within a considerable variety of research areas. The department furthermore offers a range of courses reflecting the breadth of the fields of philosophy while upholding the highest standards within each specialized subject area. Special focus is placed on gaining insight and developing competences in order to contribute to the discussion of current philosophical problems. This intention to acknowledge new philosophical developments and tasks is reflected in a number of co-operations and research fields of the department.
Maṇḍana on fixed sacrifices
The eight century philosopher Maṇḍana tried to streamline the distinction among various types of sacrifices he inherited from the Mīmāṃsā school. The Mīmāṃsā distinguishes between:
- fixed sacrifices one has to perform throughout one’s life
- occasional sacrifices one performs when the occasion arises (e.g., the birth of a son)
- elective sacrifices one performs in order to obtain a coveted result
It is also noteworthy that the auxiliary acts of fixed and occasional sacrifices can be performed “as much as one can”, whereas auxiliaries of elective sacrifices need to be performed exactly as prescribed.
The motivator of the former two groups seems to be the fact that the Veda prescribes them, whereas the motivator of the latter group seems to be the fact that one desires their result. But this is weird, given that they are enjoined by prescriptions which have a comparable form. Maṇḍana tried to find a way to have the same motivator for all. This is how he develops his argument:
- Prima facie view: The motivator can only be the fact that one desires a given result. In the case of fixed sacrifices, the result needs to be something one desires fixedly, like happiness.
- This hypothesis does not stand to reason, because the following three aspects of fixed sacrifices remain irreconcilable, namely their being fixed, their having a result and the fact that their auxiliaries needs only to be performed as much as possible. In fact, if they need to have a result, they cannot be fixed, since one would cease performing them as soon as one’s desire for them were appeased.
- Hence, the desire for the result can be the motivator for the actively undertaking of sacrifices, whereas the fear for a sanction needs to be the motivator for the not-ceasing to perform them.
- Final view: No, the above contradiction can be avoided because the fixedness is not just something one arrives at pragmatically, due to the fact that one happens to desire happiness all the time. Rather, their fixedness is prescribed in the Veda, hence it is surely not the case that it ceases. Consequently, one just needs to correctly identify a desire which never ceases, and this is the desire to eliminate accumulated bad karman. People who are currently suffering will be keen in eliminating bad karman in order to eliminate the cause of their sufferings. And people who want to achieve new goals will also want to eliminate bad karman, since they know that this could hinder them.
- Thus, it is true that all sacrifices are motivated by desire. The desire motivating fixed sacrifices never ceases and needs to be identified as the destruction of bad karman, because its fixed nature is itself prescribed by the Veda.
As often the case, the pars destruens is almost more interesting than the pars construens.
What is the target of Kumārila’s atheist arguments?
Kumārila’s attacks certainly target the belief in supernatural beings who should be able to grant boons to human beings (the devatās), insofar as they show that this belief is inherently self-contradictory. For instance, these deities should be the actual recipients of ritual offerings. However, how could they receive offerings at the same time from different sacrificers in different places?
Kumārila also targets the belief in a Lord akin to the one defended by rational theology, both in Europe and in South Asia, again because this leads to contradictions. Kumārila explains that there is no need of such a Lord in order to explain the creation of the world, since there is no need to adduce further evidence in order to justify the world as it is now (i.e., existing), whereas one would need to adduce a strong external evidence to justify everything contradicting the world as we know it. Therefore, the continuous presence of the world becomes the default status and the theist has the burden of the proof and needs to be able to establish independently of his religious belief that there has been a time when the world did not exist. Similarly, Kumārila shows that the idea of a Lord who is at the same time all-mighty and benevolent is self-contradictory, since if the Lord where really all-might, he would avoid evil, and if he tolerates it, then he is cruel. If one says that evil is due to karman or other causes, Kumārila continues, then this shows that there is no need to add the Lord at all as a further cause and that everything can be explained just on the basis of karman or any other cause.
Are Kumārila’s criticisms also targeted at the idea of an impersonal and non-dual brahman? Kumārila does not explicitly address the issue of the possible distinction between one and the other target. However, a few scant hints may help readers. In a fragment from his lost Bṛhaṭṭīkā preserved in the work of a Buddhist opponent (the Tattvasaṅgraha), Kumārila speaks of deities as being vedadeha, i.e., ‘embodied in the Veda’ (so Yoshimizu 2008, fn. 78). In a verse of the TV, he says that they are ṛgvedādisamūheṣu […] pratiṣṭhitāḥ, i.e., ‘who reside in the Ṛgveda and all other [Vedic scriptures]’ (Yoshimizu 2007b, p. 221). Does this mean that Kumārila was accepting a conception of deities inhabiting the Vedas? I discussed the idea with a colleague who just said that the verses must be interpolated.
What do readers think? Was there local atheism in ancient India?
See also Yoshimizu’s comment to my post on Bhavanātha.