Sujung Kim
DePauw University
The emphasis on Western empiricism and individualism has generated renewed fascination for Buddhist meditation. With the growing interest in meditation and scientific findings on its practical benefits, Buddhist meditation has been promoted in the mass media as a key to happiness. However, in this embrace of what effectively is a form of the American pursuit of happiness, the complex tradition of Buddhism is reduced to a “tool” for becoming happy, while Buddhism struggles to redefine its identity in the modern world where the power of science is dominant.
This paper examines the recent discourse on the relationship between Buddhism and neuroscience. While understanding Buddhist thinking on happiness is the form that a modernized Buddhism has taken in the West, in this paper I argue that the idea of happiness is not universal, but reflects a culturally and historically specific experience. I further argue that a more critical examination of suffering as fundamental to human experience is essential to achieving sustainable happiness.
(Presented in the 2015 Chulalongkorn Asian Heritage Forum: Understanding Happiness, 16-17 July 2015, Le Meridien Bangkok Hotel, Bangkok, organized by Institute of Thai Studies and Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University)