In his recent book, Why I Am Not a Buddhist, Evan Thompson ventures to examine Buddhist modernism, Buddhist exceptionalism, and neural Buddhism. Specifically, Thompson identifies as the goals of his book the desire to present a “philosophical critique of Buddhist modernism” (p. 19) and to argue “for cosmopolitanism, the idea that all human beings belong to a single human community” (p. 21). To Thompson, these two goals are intrinsically intertwined since Buddhist modernists seem to conflate science, especially neuroscience, with what is referred to as Buddhist mindfulness practices…
Tag: modernity
Review: Seeking Śākyamuni
Seeking Śākyamuni: South Asia in the Formation of Modern Japanese Buddhism. By Richard M. Jaffe. University of Chicago Press, 2019. 320 pages. $32.50 (paperback). ISBN 9780226391151. Hillary Langberg Bard College For readers familiar with the turmoil associated with the transition to modernity for both Japanese Buddhism and Japan as a nation-state, Richard Jaffe’s recent monograph provides a wealth of richly-detailed…