Humanism Versus Buddhism

The very fact that there is a distinction to be made between, “Humanism” and “Buddhism” tells volumes. No ideology with pretensions to goodness should stand distinct from humanism. Because that means, contradicting human ethology. And Buddhism contradicts human ethology, big time. Arguably, it’s way worse than Abrahamism: even the disguised cannibalism of Abrahamism is more naturally anchored in human nature.

What’s the problem in not been occurred in human nature? Well, the more so, arguably, the more of a superstition: standing (“stare”) above (“super”) reality.

Another problem with Buddhism is that it was instigated by a Prince, Gautama Buddha. I am not a Prince, nor do I know any, but I suspect that any Prince would be partial to making the Commons into sheep. So that they can be directed where the shepherds of men when men to be led (to slaughter, or, at the very least, to be shorn and milked, as needed). The fact is, Buddhism instills passivity: passivity is perfect for Princes. Passivity is not a good propellant for evolution. Individuals are created as children, it’s very hard for them to quit their mental geometry later.

The next problem with Buddhism, as with Islamism and Christianism, is that there are many variants of this superstition. In particular, they are more or less superstitious. Tibetan Buddhism, which is extremely superstitious, is pretty far from Zen Buddhism, which is pretty secular. 

Tibetan Buddhists believe that if they rotate around unclimbed Mount Kailash, good things will happen. The PRC gave famed alpinist Reinhold Messner the authorization to climb it, but he declined… Good boy.

Variants of Buddhism are just as far from each other as Wahhabism/Salafism is far from Sufism (the latter having itself drastically different variants). The Mahāyāna (“Great Vehicle) Buddhism is the largest major tradition of Buddhism existing today, with 53.2% of practitioners, compared to 35.8% for Theravada and 5.7% for Vajrayana. The Great Vehicle is more altruistic: it may have been Christianized (personal opinion), as Christian missions reached Sri Lanka as early as the Third Century, and India by the 100s, Common era (just when Mahāyāna surfaced). (I have lots of idiosyncratic opinions…)

Just to give an example, Tibetan Buddhism comprises four lineages. Temperaments can run high: top associates of the Dalai Lama killed each other for reasons of great theological import, in the obscure spiritual caves they roam.  (Interestingly, I made a Google Search of this fact I know to be true; however, Google informed me that, under European Privacy Law, this search was omitted:I’m now in Europe…It took me a huge amount of time to find the link above, and I had to be crafty. This shows European law to be friendly to the Elite, AKA plutocracy…)  

The fundamental problem with Buddhism is its very secular foundation. The deepest intuition of Buddhism, that pain has to be avoided, at the cost of perception. It is as inhuman as it gets.

Some may object to this description. And the objection may be valid, depending upon the variant of Buddhism considered. Some Buddhists will say:”Pain has to be avoided, at the cost of most human emotion”. That’s still inhuman.

Why? The brain thinks, not just with strict implications, but also with emotions. This is even true at the level of pure logic. Emotions can’t be avoided, even if one restricts oneself to logic itself.

Even the parodic character in Star Trek, Mr. Spock, depends very heavily on emotions: after all, one has to have FAITH in the axioms of logic. Besides logics can be anything, by changing the axioms. One choses axioms of logic from emotion, not logic. Logic does not select logic. Logic is; volition, volition from emotion, does the rest.

Emotional computers are coming, make no mistake. Serious Quantum Computers will be emotional… (Yes, I know, that could be a problem…)

By then, when it becomes obvious that, for achieving true Artificial Intelligence, one needs emotions, Buddhism will suffer an irretrievable blow.

Many Buddhists say:”Wait, meditation is good, it changes the brain”. Right. No need to be a Buddhist to meditate, though. I meditate several hours a day, I am a meditation machine, but I usually never mention it, it’s a s natural to me as breathing, and I know the of the impudence of telling other people to “meditate”, as if they were such fools that they never meditate. Basically, if one never meditates, one is just a mechanical parrot. Because one has no indigenous thinking.

Moreover, to deflate further the Buddhist bandwagon, Buddhist meditation is only one type of meditation. However admirable. There are other types of meditation, fully incompatible with Buddhist meditation, and which give excellent results Buddhism can’t get at. An example is Taoist meditation.

Make no mistake: I welcome individuals with dubious behavior to engage in so-called secular Buddhism, if they didn’t gather such a level of wisdom yet, that they still insist to engage in road rage, drug abuse, drinking alcohol, smoking tobacco or THC, insulting their friends thoughtlessly, betraying their loving ones, clutching guns, potentially lethal behaviors, abusing the innocent, in being self-destructive, or in total incapacity to meditate in any way, etc.

I will just say that philosophy, full force, is vastly superior to Buddhism and other isms. Philosophy itself has its own isms, many of them. To quote a few: Stoicism, Cynicism, Existentialism, Marxism, Nominalism, Epicureanism, Positivism, Platonism, Neo-Platonism, Hedonism, Realism, Pragmatism, Materialism, etc.

Allright, the Politically Correct pseudo-left which rules, or, more exactly, ruins the West loves the Dalai Lama certainly the most famous incarnation of Buddhism known worldwide. I am cool with some of what Dalai says, but I have been known to agree even with Lamas in the high Andes. However, my harsh criticism of Buddhism, and other eastern religions (I barely got started here) was pleased to see that, last time my friend Obama received the DL at the White House, His Holiness had to skirt the garbage of the backside…

However interesting the debate, “Secular Buddhism” is pretty much an oxymoron. The mood of passivity Buddhism and its derivatives generated made East Asia fall behind West Asia (Europe). Now, of course, Buddhism and its derivatives or antecedents (Confucianism) has been wiped out as a leading mood, in places such as Japan, Korea, China and Vietnam. It has been replaced by the mood which enabled Western Europe to forcefully industrialize in the Nineteenth Century (If Czar Peter The Great read this, he would be outraged and point out that, three centuries ago, he did exactly what Mao, Chou En Lai and Deng Tsiao Ping did, in the last few decades… Right, I present my excuses…) The point is that PROGRESSIVISM is not compatible with Buddhism. All leaders in the East have concluded it’s not, and they have chosen the philosophical path forged by Europe (and now idiotically second-guessed there!)

Too many superstitious religions around, for this small planet. Respecting them, amounts to procreating them. We need hard-core secularism, and the religion of the planetary Republic.

Patrice Ayme’

Tags: Buddhism