Reduction of Greenhouse-Gas Emissions by Chinese Buddhists with Vegetarian Diets: A Quantitative Assessment

The equivalent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (GHGEs) by Chinese Buddhists with vegetarian diets is quantitatively evaluated. By analysing data obtained from a national study, correlation analyses are performed to obtain appropriate formulas to predict the dietary GHGE by using meat consumption as the only input. To demonstrate its reliability, the prediction from the formulas developed is first compared with the results of a food-production study using a difference approach. Then the quantitative study of equivalent GHGE reduction due to Chinese Buddhists with vegetarian diets is presented. An assessment of the vegetarian population amongst Chinese Buddhists is also included in this study. The results indicate that Chinese Buddhists with vegetarian diets account for the equivalent GHGE reduction of 39.68 million metric tons of CO₂ equivalent, which is a sizable amount and is equal to 7.2 and 9.2% of the GHGEs from United Kingdom and France in 2012, respectively. In modern times, the vegetarian practice of Chinese Buddhism should attract more Buddhists or lay people to follow, if the additional environmental and health benefits of vegetarianism could be emphasised. The resultant impact for the equivalent reduction of GHGEs could be even larger and the human-induced global warming problem could be further alleviated.     

Who are these Buddhists and How Many of Them are There? Theoretical and Methodological Challenges in Counting Immigrant Buddhists: A Danish Case Study

Religious demography is generally a challenging endeavor and counting and defining religions and religious identities in an Asian context is notoriously difficult. Buddhists in both Asia and the West have a long tradition of gray-zone religiosity, which means that membership and mono-identity is less common than syncretic engagement and hybrid identity. The immigrant Buddhists in the West are generally far more numerous than the convert and new age Buddhists. Their numbers are, however, extremely difficult to ascertain. This article discusses the methodological and theoretical problems in quantifying immigrant religion and the challenges of operationalizing such constraints into concrete methods. The empirical data derive from the author’s engagement in research on Buddhism in Denmark, in which traditions from both Theravada and Mahayana groups are represented. While concrete figures are suggested, it is also concluded that further empirical research as well as comparison with more contexts are necessary for the continued refinement of usable methods in counting immigrant religion.     

Three Boys on a Great Vehicle: ‘Mahayana Buddhism’ and a Trans-National Network

From 1915–1916 there was in Kyoto a trans-national group of Buddhists named the Mahayana Association, which published an English Buddhist periodical, Mahayanist. Two members of the Mahayana Association, William Montgomery McGovern and M. T. Kirby, were among the earliest cases of Westerners ordained in the tradition of Mahayana Buddhism in Japan. Kirby explored the temples of Jōdo Shinshū and the monastic life of Rinzai Zen and Theravada Buddhism in search of salvation. McGovern, on the other hand, had been searching for an alternative to Christianity, which he found unscientific and dissatisfying. He finally found Jōdo Shinshū, which he held to be the essence of Mahayana Buddhism. His understanding of Buddhism was influenced by D. T. Suzuki's version of Mahayana Buddhism. Utsuki Nishu, who helped McGovern and Kirby run the Association, joined the Theosophical Society (Adyar, India) while he was studying at Hollywood High School in Los Angeles and later helped Beatrice Suzuki run the Mahayana Lodge of the Theosophical Society. Drawing on forgotten documents discovered only recently in a Japanese temple, this paper offers a progress report on research into these documents and explores a significant but hitherto unknown side of the history of modern Japanese Buddhism.     

Subjective Well-Being and Adaptation. The Case of Uruguay

We assess the recent evolution of the quality of life in Uruguay, analysing whether current subjective well-being levels are conditioned by the objective well-being trajectory of each individual. We explore subjective well-being in 3 domains: life, economic situation and housing satisfaction. Although adaptation has been addressed in the empirical literature for developed countries, there is scarce evidence for developing countries due to the lack of suitable panel datasets. In this article, we provide an econometric test of the adaptation hypothesis based on longitudinal data from Uruguay for the years 2004, 2006 and 2011/12 (Estudio Longitudinal de Bienestar en Uruguay). Our main findings show that present levels of life, economic and housing satisfaction are each positively correlated with the corresponding contemporary and lagged objective variable of interest. Thus, we reject the adaptation hypothesis in all the dimensions considered. We also explore the role of social interactions in the 3 subjective well-being dimensions, finding out that average objective well-being of the reference group (either income or crowding) is not associated with individual subjective well-being levels.

     

Data Trimming, Nuclear Emissions, and Climate Change

Ethics requires good science. Many scientists, government leaders, and industry representatives support tripling of global-nuclear-energy capacity on the grounds that nuclear fission is “carbon free” and “releases no greenhouse gases.” However, such claims are scientifically questionable (and thus likely to lead to ethically questionable energy choices) for at least 3 reasons. (i) They rely on trimming the data on nuclear greenhouse-gas emissions (GHGE), perhaps in part because flawed Kyoto Protocol conventions require no full nuclear-fuel-cycle assessment of carbon content. (ii) They underestimate nuclear-fuel-cycle releases by erroneously assuming that mostly high-grade uranium ore, with much lower emissions, is used. (iii) They inconsistently compare nuclear-related GHGE only to those from fossil fuels, rather than to those from the best GHG-avoiding energy technologies. Once scientists take account of (i)–(iii), it is possible to show that although the nuclear fuel cycle releases (per kWh) much fewer GHG than coal and oil, nevertheless it releases far more GHG than wind and solar-photovoltaic. Although there may be other, ethical, reasons to support nuclear tripling, reducing or avoiding GHG does not appear to be one of them.     

Note on the sampling error of the difference between correlated proportions or percentages

Two formulas are presented for judging the significance of the difference between correlated proportions. The chi square equivalent of one of the developed formulas is pointed out.     

The Role of the Ego in Jungian Individuation and Yogacara Buddhism’s Enlightenment

This article explores the Buddhist and Jungian approaches to the role of the ego in overcoming the limited (for Jung) or illusive (for Buddhists) sense of self rooted in ego-consciousness. Even though both Buddhists and Jung turn to the unconscious (for Jung) or the subliminal consciousness (for Buddhists) to overcome the limitations of the ego, their approaches are radically different. The Jungian ego seems to work diligently in order to transcend itself, whereas Buddhists believe that we can bypass the ego’s participation, namely, its rational analysis and interpretation, and can directly access the subliminal consciousness, alaya. In other words, Buddhists see the ego itself as the problem, or obstacle, in the path to Enlightenment whereas Jung ends up relying upon the active ego’s intervention to become the full Self via individuation. Understanding this substantial difference will lead us to reappraise the reciprocal relationship between the ego and the subliminal mind in both the Jungian theory of individuation and Buddhist enlightenment.     

The Satisfaction with Life Scale in Adolescent Samples: Measurement Invariance across 24 Countries and Regions,Age, and Gender

Measurement of adolescent life satisfaction across cultures has not received much attention in previous empirical research. The present study evaluated measurement invariance of the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) among adolescents in 24 countries and regions (N = 22,710; age range = 13–19 years; 53% female). A single-factor model with residual covariance between a pair of items tapping past life satisfaction fitted well in 19 countries and regions and showed a partial metric invariance. In a subset of nine countries and regions, partial scalar invariance was supported. Partial metric invariance across all 24 countries and regions was achieved when custom model modifications in five countries and regions were included. Three SWLS items showed evidence of noninvariance across cultures. The measurement model was found to operate similarly across gender and age. Our findings suggest that caution is needed when using the SWLS for measuring life satisfaction among adolescents from different cultures.

     

No-Self and the phenomenology of agency

The Buddhists philosophers put forward a revisionary metaphysics which lacks a “self” in order to provide an intellectually and morally preferred picture of the world. The first task in the paper is to answer the question: what is the “self” that the Buddhists are denying? To answer this question, I look at the Abhidharma arguments (as presented in Chapter 9 of Vasubandhu’s Abhidharmako?a-bhāsya) for the No-Self doctrine and then work back to an interpretation of the self that is the target of such a doctrine. I argue that Buddhists are not just denying the diachronically unified, extended, narrative self but also minimal selfhood insofar as it associated with sense of ownership and sense of agency. The view is deeply counterintuitive and the Buddhists are acutely aware of this fact. Accordingly, the Abhidharma-Buddhist writings are replete with attempts to explain the phenomenology of experience in a no-self world. The second part of the paper reconstructs the Buddhist explanation using resources from contemporary discussions about the sense (or lack thereof) of agency.     

A Review of Carolyn Chen’s <Emphasis Type="Italic">Getting Saved in America: Taiwanese Immigration and Religious Experience</Emphasis>

Carolyn Chen’ Getting Saved in America: Taiwanese Immigration and Religious Experience examines the impact of immigration on the religious practices of Taiwanese American Christians and Buddhists. In particular, the author studies how recent immigrants from Taiwan either convert to evangelical forms of Christianity or identify as explicit Buddhists as a way to remake the self in a particularly American context. By offering a dual tradition focus, the author provides significant insight into the relationship between gender, religious, and ethnic identities for Taiwanese Americans. Reviewing the centrality of religion in the lives of Taiwanese American Christians and Buddhists and its similar function in the lives of Korean American Buddhists, this review essay addresses how Asian American forms of religion and spirituality are reinterpreted to address the complex renegotiation of identities that take place for recent immigrants. This review essay also examines the process of religious conversion by questioning whether the move from one religious tradition to another can be understood as an additive process rather than a complete transition and addressing the impact of conversion on later generations.     

A scale to measure wisdom

Abstract

The present study's purpose was to refine and test a newly developed self‐report instrument to assess wisdom. The empirical study was based on a sample of undergraduates recruited at two universities and Buddhists recruited at two temples. This sample filled out 23 items of the wisdom scale and, in addition, several other psychological self‐report scales. Items from the wisdom scale were factor analyzed and the following seven factors emerged: Balance/Harmony, Flow, Spirituality, Warmth, Care for Environment, Appreciation, and Intelligence. These dimensions were statistically significantly related to various outcome measures such as depression, perceived stress, and optimism scales. Statistically significant differences were found between various religious and socio‐demographic groups on the different factor scores. This study suggests that wisdom is a multidimensional and complex construct worthy of scientific investigation.     

Money Consciousness and the Tendency to Violate the Five Precepts Among Thai Buddhists

Abstract

This study developed a money consciousness scale to test Thai Buddhists' tendency to violate the Buddhist Five Precepts. Eight hundred Thai Buddhists were asked if they would, for one million Baht, accept jobs that require them to violate the Buddhist Five Precepts. Money consciousness was found to influence their tendency to violate all Buddhist Five Precepts. Men were inclined to violate the precepts against killing and intoxicant consumption. Low-income respondents were more money conscious than high-income individuals. Money consciousness was a valid indicator of the tendency to commit unethical behavior.     

Buddhists and Buddhism in the United States: The Scope of Influence

Researchers have speculated about the growing influence of Buddhists and Buddhism in the United States, but little has been done to estimate the scope of this influence or to consider alternative ways of understanding it. We present data collected from a large, nationally representative survey completed in 2003. The data show that one American in seven claims to have had a fair amount of contact with Buddhists and that one person in eight believes Buddhist teachings or practices have had an important influence on his or her religion or spirituality. We describe three perspectives from which variations in exposure to Buddhists and being influenced by Buddhism may be understood: two versions of the "strictness hypothesis" from the religious economies literature and a broader argument about institutional embeddedness. We find empirical support for each of the three perspectives.     

The cost of closure: logical realism,anti-exceptionalism,and theoretical equivalence

Philosophers of science often assume that logically equivalent theories are theoretically equivalent. I argue that two theses, anti-exceptionalism about logic (which says, roughly, that logic is not a priori, that it is revisable, and that it is not special or set apart from other human inquiry) and logical realism (which says, roughly, that differences in logic reflect genuine metaphysical differences in the world) make trouble for this commitment, as well as a closely related commitment to theories being closed under logical consequence. I provide three arguments. The first two show that anti-exceptionalism about logic provides an epistemic challenge to both the closure and the equivalence claims; the third shows that logical realism provides a metaphysical challenge to both the closure and the equivalence claims. Along the way, I show that there are important methodological upshots for metaphysicians and philosophers of logic, in particular, lessons about certain conceptions of naturalism as constraining the possibilities for metaphysics and the philosophy of logic.

     

Vegetarians and their Children

abstract There are estimated to be five million vegetarians in the United Kingdom and another four million in the United States. There are numerous vegetarians elsewhere in the world: around fifteen million, for instance, in India. Some of these vegetarians are parents. And some of the vegetarian parents will bring up their children to be vegetarian, too. Is this a permissible course of action? Or should vegetarian parents raise omnivorous offspring? In this article, I consider three arguments that aim to show that a parent should not raise a child on a vegetarian diet. None of these arguments are convincing and I know of no better ones — so I conclude that it is permissible for a parent to raise her child as a vegetarian.     

Beyond the logic of Lemma: the oneness of life and its environment,the oneness of within and without

In this paper the ‘analyst as a citizen in the world’ is understood as the analyst interconnecting and harmonising with his or her environment, including not only society, but also nature and the universe. In this sense, Buddhism teaches the Oneness of Life and its Environment, and links are made between Mahayana Buddhism and Jung's understanding of the Self and individuation. The Logic of Lemma in the Flower Ornament Sutra indicates that all phenomena in the world can merge with each other without losing individuality; ten stages are described from the Lotus Sutra and links are made with the development in respect to the ego; Kenji Miyazawa and his work are given as examples to illustrate this. Causality and synchronicity are explored in terms of the interaction between the individual and the environment, and three examples are given where sometimes individual, egoic, causality is more of a feature and sometimes synchronicity has a greater prominence. The paper ends with an examination of tree drawings, made over a period of 50 years by junior high school students, which indicates the way that these individuals have portrayed themselves and their relation to their environment.