The term āśraya is used in manifold ways in the Abhidharmakośa and its bhāṣya. This comes from the fact that its basic meaning, indicating anything on which something else depends or rests, is quite generic. Despite the plasticity of its usage, we can find some recurring and distinct technical applications of the term in the AK, which I explore in my paper. First, I look at its usage of characterising a member of various asymmetric dependence relationships on which the arising (...) and sometimes also the persistence of the other relatum depends. Through examining the nature of various āśraya-āśrita dependence relations the AK discusses, I show that āśraya stands for an entity that determines the fundamental nature of the thing it supports. In the second half of the paper, I move on to those occurrences of the term where āśraya has a specific referent. While āśraya can refer to the six sense faculties individually, it can also stand for them collectively pointing towards its widespread meaning as ‘psychophysical basis’. In this context, the focus often shifts either to the material or the mental elements that make up a sentient being. I will dedicate special attention to the discussion of the transformation of the basis, where, on my reading, it is more natural to interpret āśraya as referring primarily to the mind, with its bodily connotations being marginal. (shrink)

The representation of a rose varies considerably across philosophical, religious, and scientific schools of thought. While many would suggest that a rose exists objectively, as a physical object in geometric space reducible to fundamental particles such as atoms or quarks, others propose that a rose is an emergent whole that exists meaningfully when experienced subjectively for its sweet fragrance and red hue, its soft petals and thorny stem. Some might even maintain that a rose is “consciousness-only,” having no existence apart (...) from conscious perception. Thus, we find a spectrum of realist to idealist perspectives. Even in Dharma studies, with a common basis in Indian thought, the Vaiśeṣikas, Vaibhāṣikas, and the vijñaptimātra doctrine of the Yogācārin-Vijñānavādins entertain diverging perspectives. On one hand, the Vaiśeṣikas, a school of Vedic philosophy, propounded a theory of reality in the form of indivisible, eternal atoms, a metaphysical approach counter to the doctrine of not-self (anātman) in Buddhism. The Vaibhāṣikas, a school of early Buddhist atomism, on the other hand, denied the existence of a true self or eternal soul (ātman) as substratum for reality but maintained their own theory of atomism. For the Vaibhāṣikas, the flow of consciousness may be segmented into discrete moments, yet unlike many of their Buddhist contemporaries from other schools, they asserted that all cognizable phenomena are truly existent insofar as they consist of physically irreducible atoms. Among their objectors were the Yogācārin-Vijñānavādins who proposed the theory of consciousness-only (vijñaptimātra), rejecting the independent existence of indivisible atoms and discrete moments of time. This paper introduces the dialectic that formed between these schools through Vasubandhu’s fourth century C.E. text Twenty Verses on Consciousness-Only (Viṃśikāvijñaptimātratāsiddhi). While the gulf between the realist and idealist positions may seem, at times, irreconcilable, we integrate findings from the field of physics, particularly quantum mechanics (and several philosophical interpretations thereof) within the realm of modern science as a possible bridge between these otherwise seemingly disparate systems of Dharma. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Do Buddhist philosophical commitments support a particular theory of well-being? Most authors who have examined this question argue that Buddhist ideas are compatible with multiple theories of well-being. In this paper, I contend that one tradition of Buddhist philosophy—Abhidharma—does imply a specific theory of welfare. In particular, Abhidharma supports hedonism. Most Ābhidharmikas claim that only property-particulars called dharmas ultimately exist and I argue that an Abhidharmic theory of well-being should only refer to these properties. Yet the only dharmas that (...) could plausibly be intrinsically good are phenomenal properties that are good in virtue of how they feel. Thus, the only intrinsically good things are pleasures. I defend this surprising conclusion from various interpretative objections and show that my argument can also inform contemporary philosophical debates about welfare. (shrink)

Buddhist philosophers draw a distinction between two kinds of entities: ultimately real entities and conventionally real entities. Among Abhidharma Buddhist philosophers, who accept the fundamental existence of ultimately real entities, there is a debate over the existential status of conventionally real entities. The most prevalent interpretation of the general Abhidharma position is an anti-realist one: conventionally real entities do not exist. Here, however, I will argue that there is at least one Abhidharma philosopher who is not an anti-realist about conventionally (...) real entities. Saṅghabhadra, a fifth-century CE Indian Buddhist philosopher belonging to the Vaibhāṣika-Sarvāstivāda tradition of Abhidharma Buddhism, offers an account of conventionally real entities that takes them to be real. According to him, conventional entities exist, although in a derivative and degenerate way—a way that is supervenient on and grounded in what is ultimately real. Saṅghabhadra’s view substantiates, in his specific case, Kris McDaniel’s argument that Abhidharma accounts of conventional reality are profitably interpreted as the view that conventional entities exist but enjoy a mode of being that is distinct from the fundamental mode of being enjoyed by ultimately real entities. In what follows, I will argue that the pluralist framework that McDaniel lays out for understanding the mode of being that non-fundamental entities enjoy fits well with and makes the most sense of, the account of conventional entities offered by Saṅghabhadra. (shrink)

This article clarifies the Buddhist position on freedom and responsibility, while arguing for three central claims. The first is that it is an open question whether Buddhists endorse causal determinism or causal indeterminism. The second claim is that the most promising contemporary interpretations of the Buddhist view fail in important respects. The final claim is that the best interpretation of the Buddhist position on freedom and responsibility is Buddhist Perspectivalism, the view that we should view ourselves as genuinely free and (...) responsible, while viewing others as neither free nor responsible. (shrink)

In contrast to Buddhist Reductionists who deny the ultimate existence of the persons, Buddhist Personalists claim that persons are ultimately real in some important sense. Recently, some philosophers have offered philosophical reconstructions of Buddhist Personalism. In this paper, I critically evaluate one philosophical reconstruction of Buddhist Personalism according to which persons are irreducible to the parts that constitute them. Instead, persons are emergent entities and have novel properties that are distinct from the properties of their constituents. While this emergentist interpretation (...) is an interesting and well-motivated reconstruction of the Personalist position, I ultimately reject it on substantive grounds. I distinguish between different kinds of emergentism in the contemporary philosophical literature and show that they fail to support Buddhist Personalism. I thus conclude that Buddhist Personalism is untenable if it’s committed to emergentism about persons. This paper also indirectly defends Buddhist Reductionism by showing that it has crucial advantages over Buddhist Personalism. (shrink)