A group blog of scholars exploring Indian philosophy
Buddhist texts frequently stress the liberating power of prajñā or paññā, metaphysical insight. It is one of the three major components of the path in early texts, one of the six perfections in Mahāyāna. To know the truth about existence Continue reading Unconscious illusions
What is the current thought on the nature, scope, and reach of Indian philosophy? Handbooks and histories of a given area, subfield, or tradition in philosophy are always good places to start when trying to gauge the current state of Continue reading Indian Philosophy in the Global Cosmopolis
On Nov. 14-16, 2017 I attended a workshop called “Buddhism and Scepticism: Historical, Philosophical, and Comparative Approaches” held at the University of Hamburg. It was sponsored by the Numata Center for Buddhist Studies and the Maimonides Center for Advanced Studies Continue reading Reflections on the Hamburg “Buddhism and Scepticism” Workshop
J. L. Shaw is an important figure in the contemporary movement to understand India’s śāstric traditions through analytic philosophy. Unfortunately (like other figures, including Kishor Chakrabarti), his influence is sometimes underappreciated given the preeminence of Matilal, Mohanty, Potter, and their followers. It is refreshing Continue reading NDPR review of The Collected Writings of Jaysankar Lal Shaw: Indian Analytic and Anglophone Philosophy
I am excited to be taking part in the following workshop next week in Hamburg. If I have time, maybe I’ll write a blog post about how it goes, so stay tuned for that. In the meantime, here is the Continue reading Workshop: Buddhism and Scepticism: Historical, Philosophical, and Comparative Approaches
Regular blog readers may remember my earlier posts that I was co-editing, along with Prasanta Bandyopadhyay, the Fall 2017 edition of the APA Newsletter on Asian and Asian-American Philosophers and Philosophies. The theme of the issue is “B. K. Matilal: The Continue reading APA Newsletter on B. K. Matilal Now Available!
As many of you may have seen on Daily Nous, Edouard Machery (Pittsburgh) and Stephen Stich (Rutgers), along with anthropologist H. Clark Barrett (UCLA) have just been awarded a US$2.5 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation. It will fund Continue reading The Geography of Philosophy
For a lucky coincidence, two long term projects of mine reached completion almost at the same time. You can therefore read on the 2017 issue of the Journal of World Philosophies the (Open Access) papers on philosophy of language which Continue reading Open access papers on philosophy of language etc.
Why is the topic of omniscience relevant in Indian philosophy? Because of at least two concurring reasons. On the one hand, for schools like Buddhism and Jainism, it is a question of religious authority. Ascribing omniscience to the founders of Continue reading Again on omniscience: Why talking about it, God’s omniscience and some reasons to refute it
As I noted last time, I think the disregard of ethics by Indian-philosophy scholars like Dan Arnold is a problem in itself: it’s a misconception of what philosophy is, and one that harmfully shrinks the field of the study of Continue reading The significance of ethics to Candrakīrti’s metaphysics