University of Chicago Workshop on the Philosophy of Religions

University of Chicago Workshop on the Philosophy of Religions

Amy Levine, Authenticity as Inner Freedom

Ryan Simonelli, Against Conceptual Svabhāva

Ryan Simonelli

Teaching Fellow in the Humanities, UChicago

“Against Conceptual Svabhāva”
According to the Madhyamaka tradition in Indian Buddhist Philosophy, all things are empty of “svabhāva,” a term generally translated as “inherent existence” or “own-being.”  One of the basic arguments meant to establish this claim is an argument against the coherence of inherently existing things standing in causal relations to one another.   In this paper, I consider an objection against this view, put forward by Nāgārjuna’s interlocutor in the Vigrahavyāvartanī, according to which an argument of just the same form can be applied to the thesis of emptiness itself.  Though the particular version of this objection presented in the Vigrahavyāvartanī is straightforwardly dealt with by NāgārjunaI argue that there is a stronger version of this objection according to which an an argument of the same form can rule out not just events standing in causal relations to other events, but theses standing in inferential relations to other theses, for instance, the thesis of dependent origination ruling out the claim that things have svabhāva.  I argue that the Madhyamika should accept this extended application of the argument, and I articulate an account of conceptual emptiness in response.
 
The workshop will consist of a presentation from Ryan with handouts and a discussion afterward. There is no need to read anything in advance. We hope to see you there!

TUESDAY, May 7th, 5 PM, Swift 207

Hosted by the Philosophy of Religions Workshop at the University of Chicago.

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The Workshop on the Philosophy of Religions is committed to being a fully accessible and inclusive workshop. Please contact Workshop Coordinators Danica Cao (ddcao@uchicago.edu) or Taryn Sue (tarynsue@uchicago.edu) in order to make any arrangements necessary to facilitate your participation in workshop events.

Jessica Zu, Just Awakening: A Yogācāra Research Paradigm in Modern China

Professor Jessica Zu
Assistant Professor, Religion & EALC, University of Southern California, Dornsife
 
Respondent: Danica Cao
PhD Student, Philosophy of Religions, UChicago Divinity
 
Just Awakening: A Yogācāra Research Paradigm in Modern China
THURSDAY, April 11th, 5PM, Swift 200
 
The workshop will focus on the pre-circulated material selected from Jessica’s book manuscript. It will consist of a short presentation, followed by Danica’s response and general discussion and Q&A. Please find the reading material here (please email us for password).
 
 

Abstract:

This study takes a closer look at the life and work of a key player in the Yogācāra revival in modern China, Lü Cheng (1896–1989). The evidence reveals that, rather than positioning Lü’s Yogācāra in the epistemic silo of ontology or science, Lü’s scholarship is best understood as a new research paradigm. As incisively argued by Egan and Lincoln in 1994, a research paradigm, as a disciplinary construct, interweaves together four main areas of human inquiry: ontology (what things are), epistemology (how do we know), methodology (how to find out), and axiology (what is worth knowing). The book project, Just Awakening: Yogācāra Social Philosophy in Modern China, argues that Lü’s Yogācāra research paradigm systematically accentuated Buddhist processual ontology, reformulated imported positivism into a nondualistic transformative epistemology, systemized diffractive analysis into a new methodology, and refashioned Yogācāra karmic theory into an experience-informed, action-oriented moral reasoning. The workshop will closely examine Lü’s transformative epistemology.

Hosted by the Philosophy of Religions Workshop at the University of Chicago.

_____________

The Workshop on the Philosophy of Religions is committed to being a fully accessible and inclusive workshop. Please contact Workshop Coordinators Danica Cao (ddcao@uchicago.edu) or Taryn Sue (tarynsue@uchicago.edu) in order to make any arrangements necessary to facilitate your participation in workshop events.

Xing Hao Wang, Aesthetics as Ethics: Music as Paradigm in Early China

Xing Hao Wang

MA Student, UChicago Divinity

Respondent: Tyler Neenan

PhD Candidate, Philosophy of Religions, UChicago Divinity

 Aesthetics as Ethics: Music as Paradigm in Early China

 
The workshop will consist of a presentation from Xing Hao and a response from Tyler, after which we will have a discussion. The paper to be read in advance can be accessed here (please email us for password). We hope to see you there!

TUESDAY, February 20th, 5 PM, Swift 207

Hosted by the Philosophy of Religions Workshop at the University of Chicago.

_____________

The Workshop on the Philosophy of Religions is committed to being a fully accessible and inclusive workshop. Please contact Workshop Coordinators Danica Cao (ddcao@uchicago.edu) or Taryn Sue (tarynsue@uchicago.edu) in order to make any arrangements necessary to facilitate your participation in workshop events.

Abolfazl Ahangari, “A Return to Self: Notes on Ali Shariati’s Philosophy of Religion”

Abolfazl Ahangari

PhD Candidate, Comparative Literature, Hong Kong University

Respondent: Arwa Awan

PhD Candidate, Political Science, UChicago

 

A Return to Self: Notes on Ali Shariati’s Philosophy of Religion

The workshop will consist of a presentation from Abolfazl and a response from Arwa, after which we will have a discussion. There chapter to be read in advance can be accessed here (please contact us for password). We hope to see you there!

TUESDAY, February 13th, 5 PM, ZOOM 

(https://uchicago.zoom.us/j/99446784241?pwd=eC9MTzViYStKWVJ0d1VEUC9CVkVGUT09)

Hosted by the Philosophy of Religions Workshop at the University of Chicago.

_____________

The Workshop on the Philosophy of Religions is committed to being a fully accessible and inclusive workshop. Please contact Workshop Coordinators Danica Cao (ddcao@uchicago.edu) or Taryn Sue (tarynsue@uchicago.edu) in order to make any arrangements necessary to facilitate your participation in workshop events.

Richard Nance, Learning to Read: Lessons from the Vyākhyāyukti Literature

Professor Richard Nance
Associate Professor of Religious Studies,
Indiana University Bloomington
        Learning to Read: Lessons from the Vyākhyāyukti Literature
TUESDAY, January 30th, 5:00 PM, Swift 201
 
The workshop will consist of a presentation by Professor Nance followed by time for discussion. 
 
Abstract:
 
Attributed to the great Sarvāstivādin thinker Vasubandhu, the fifth-century Buddhist text The Logic of Explication (Vyākhyāyukti) is perhaps best known today for the philosophical arguments it offers against dismissing Mahāyāna traditions as insufficiently Buddhist. But to narrowly focus on these arguments is to risk missing both the text’s broader agenda and its imbrication with two additional texts that make up what has sometimes been called “the Vyākhyāyukti literature.” The effort to read these three texts together generates intriguing philological and hermeneutic puzzles. I will present a few of these puzzles, offer tentative suggestions as to how each might be (dis)solved, and highlight some implications that such work carries for how we might think about these texts, their authors, their transmission across the centuries, and our own roles as interpreters.

Hosted by the Philosophy of Religions Workshop at the University of Chicago.

_____________

The Workshop on the Philosophy of Religions is committed to being a fully accessible and inclusive workshop. Please contact Workshop Coordinators Danica Cao (ddcao@uchicago.edu) or Taryn Sue (tarynsue@uchicago.edu) in order to make any arrangements necessary to facilitate your participation in workshop events.