Buddhism and Science - Breaking New Ground

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"My brief remarks cannot do justice to the wide-ranging sweep of these papers and their thoughtful treatment of often difficult concepts. Wallace's volume is an important contribution to the emerging dialogue between Buddhism and science, and to the larger rapprochement between science and spirituality."

–Arthur Zajonc, Professor of Physics, Amherst College  Buddhadharma

 Buddhism and Science brings together distinguished philosophers, Buddhist scholars, physicists, and cognitive scientists to examine the contrasts and connections between the worlds of Western science and Eastern spirituality. This compilation was inspired by a suggestion made by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, himself one of the contributors, after one of a series of cross-cultural scientific dialogues in Dharamsala, India, sponsored by the Mind and Life Institute. Other contributors such as William L. Ames, Matthieu Ricard, and Stephen LaBerge assess not only the fruits of inquiry from East and West but also shed light on the underlying assumptions of these disparate worldviews. Their essays creatively address a broad range of topics: from quantum theory´s surprising affinities with the Buddhist concept of emptiness, to the increasing need in the West for a more contemplative science attuned to the first-person investigation of the mind, to the important ways in which the psychological study of "lucid dreaming" maps similar terrain to the cultivation of the Tibetan Buddhist discipline of dream yoga.

  Reflecting its wide variety of topics, Buddhism and Science is comprised of three sections. The first presents two historical overviews of the engagements between Buddhism and modern science or, rather, how Buddhism and modern science have defined, rivaled, or complemented one another. The second describes the ways Buddhism and the cognitive sciences inform each other; the third addresses points of intersection between Buddhism and the physical sciences. On the broadest level this work illuminates how different ways of exploring the nature of human identity, the mind, and the universe at large can enrich and enlighten one another.

 Contents

 Introduction: Buddhism and Science--Breaking Down the Barriers    B. Alan Wallace

Part 1 Historical Context   

Buddhism and Science: On the Nature of the Dialogue    Josc Ignacio Cabezon

Science As an Ally or a Rival Philosophy? Tibetan Buddhist Thinkers' Engagement with Modern Science    Thupten Jinpa

Part 2 Buddhism and the Cognitive Sciences   

Understanding and Transforming the Mind    His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama

The Concepts "Self", "Person'', and "I'' in Western Psychology and in Buddhism    David Galin

Common Ground, Common Cause: Buddhism and Science on the Afflictions of Identity    William S. Waldron

Imagining: Embodiment, Phenomenology, and Transformation    Francisco J. Varela and Natalie Depraz

Lucid Dreaming and the Yoga of the Dream State: A Psychophysiological Perspective    Stephen LaBerge

On the Relevance of a Contemplative Science    Matthieu Ricard

Part 3 Buddhism and the Physical Sciences    

Emptiness and Quantum Theory    William L. Ames

Time and Impermanence in Middle Way Buddhism and Modern Physics    Victor Mansfield

A Cure for Metaphysical Illusions: Kant Quantum Mechanics and Madhyamaka    Michel Bitbol

Emptiness and Relativity    David Ritz Finkelstein

Encounters Between Buddhist and Quantum Epistemologies    Anton Zeilinger

Conclusion: Life As a Laboratory    Piet Hut

Appendix: A History of the Mind and Life Institute   

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