STUDY QUESTIONS FOR YOUR MID-TERM EXAM
Do questions 1, 2, 3, and one of your own choosing. The first and third questions are worth 15 pts. and the others are worth 10 pts. each. (The total will be doubled to give 100 pts.) You must stay within three hours writing time. You are on your honor to stay within the time limit and also not collaborate with any other person. PLEASE CHECK THE QUESTIONS FOR LAST MINUTE ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS.
1. Why is early Buddhist philosophy sometimes called a "process" philosophy? Show how this process philosophy impacts basic questions about the self, ethics, the reality of the world, knowledge, and causality. Do you detect any problems with the process solution to basic philosophical problems?
2. Choose one argument from Questions of Milinda (94-104)that you think succeeds and one argument that you believe does not. (Please don't choose those that are clearly off the wall--e.g., the one about the denizens of hell.) Give good reasons for both your decisions. Most of these arguments are analogies. Double click here to read more about analogies and how to assess them.
3. Read the selection from Plato's Theaetetus at this website. You will find some striking similarities to King Milinda's image of the doors of perception. Both Socrates and Theaetetus agree that, in addition to the sense organs, an independent soul is needed for knowledge to be possible. Nagasena of course disagrees. Is there anything in Socrates' argument that can be used to answer Nagasena?
4. The mind-body problem is a universal phenomenon in philosophy. Analyze those passages in your texts which address the question of nama (name, i.e. "mind") and (form, i.e., physical body). Buddhists boast that they solve the mind-body problem by insisting that nama-rupa is always a psycho-physical unity. How are we to reconcile this claim with Buddhist claims of form-less gods (Stryk, p. 113), presumably mind-less inanimate objects, and the form-less jhanas?
5. Assess the strengths and weaknesses of the respective arguments of Kalupahana and the transcendentalists about the nature of the higher Jhanas.
6. "He who perceives causality [interdependent coorigination] knows the Dharma." What is the meaning of this famous statement? What are the moral implications of this view? Why might it lead to the interesting results given below? Does this passage trouble you in any way?
A certain person has not properly cultivated his body, behavior, thought, and intelligence; [he] is inferior and insignificant and his life is short and miserable; of such a person. . . even a trifling evil deed done leads him to hell. In the case of a person who has proper culture of the body, behavior, thought, and intelligence, who is superior and not insignificant, and who is endowed with long life, the consequences of a similar evil deed are to be experienced in this very life, and sometimes may not appear at all (quoted in Kalupahana, Buddhist Philosophy, p. 48).
7. "Action (karma) is the field, consciousness the seed, and craving the moisture that leads to the rebirth of a being" (Kalup (1), p. 51). How would one forestall the conclusion that it is always best to have a fallow field? (This is would be far too ascetic for the Buddha's Middle Way.) How does the Buddha's view of causality relate to this statement? Refer back to the passage from Kalupahana in #6 and use it to explain the difference between Buddhist conditionality and linear causality.
8. What do you think is the best way to conceive of the transition from one life to the other and how the five skandhas must function during this crucial time? Do you see any problems with Kalupahana's discussion of this issue on p. 31 (Buddhist Philosophy)? How do you understand Sati's heresy?
9. Review "The Buddha and the Brahmans" (Stryk, pp. 224-231) and summarize the main points of the Buddha's argument. Please note that union with Brahma could mean union with the creator god not the Godhead Brahman. ("Brahma World" is Brahma's Heaven.) It could mean the latter only if the experience described here is complete union with Atman-Brahman. In short does the Buddha here imply a mystical union that we found little evidence for in the Buddha's Enlightenment?
10. In Questions of Milinda (pp., 109-124) Nagasena defines Nirvana in a number of ways that initially appear contradictory. Is there any way to reconcile these accounts? What kinds of dialectic are used in the discussion? What is the purpose of the highly metaphorical description (pp., 114-117)?