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I have stopped publishing articles here and moved to a new site Clarke Scott's website

Clarke Scott is a fully ordained Buddhist monk trained in the Tibetan tradition. A student of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Clarke has received personal instructions—direct one-to-one instructions—on Madhyamaka philosophy and meditation from His Holiness. Recently Clarke moved to Tasmania to pursue a Ph.D in Buddhist philosophy from the University of Tasmania.

Thesis Topic Change

I’ve changed the topic of my thesis because (1) I believe it is a more contemporary field of research, (2) Tsong Khapa had a lot to say about this topic, and (3) I am very interested in this field. Below is my preliminary research plan.

Thesis Title:
Domain of the Illusory: Non-Egological Approach to Phenomenal Personhood.

Literature Review:
This study of the non-egological approach to personhood focuses on the five main philosophical works by the 14th CE Tibetan philosopher Tsong Khapa. The primary source material for this study is the following (Tibetan versions): (1) Special Insight section of “Great Exposition of the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment”, (2) An Ocean of Reasoning: A Thorough Exposition of Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, (3) Essence of Eloquence: A Treatise Distinguishing Between the Provisional and the Definitive Meanings, (4) Special Insight section of “Middle Exposition of the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment” and (5) Elucidation of the Intention: A Thorough Exposition of Madhyamakāvatarā.

In this study, I will claim that an implicit thread of a two-tiered non-egological exegesis of persons begins with Tsong Khapa, and ends in the Indian Madhyamaka philosophical tradition founded by Nāgārjuna in the 2nd CE. In his canonical Madhyamaka treatise Mūlamadhyamakakārikā Nāgārjuna lays out a formulation for the nature of reality that consists of all phenomena having two natures. This doctrine of the Two Truths (satyadvaya, bden gnyis) – a Conventional Truth (saṃvṛtisatya, kun rdzob bden pa) and an Ultimate Truth (paramārthasatya, don dam bden pa) – which are two natures of the same entity, is the conceptual framework for which Tsong Khapa lays out his approach to metaphysics. I too shall adopt this two-tiered approach in order to resolve the on-going tension between the egological and non-egological approaches to personal identity and first-person experience, by placing the discussion within the framework of a conventional discourse and an ultimate discourse, thereby making sense of the theory of anātman or non-self and obvious worldly first person experiences.

Tsong Khapa interests me as a philosopher because I think he understood Candrakīrti analysis of Nāgārjuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā correctly, took the soteriological significance of first-person experience seriously, and paid particular attention to its articulation. While Tsong Khapa himself would say he put forward no new thesis of persons, his reading of Candrakīrti’s gloss of Nāgārjuna’s Two Truths doctrine is unique. I therefore hope to show the cogency of Tsong Khapa’s exegesis of persons by tracing his enterprise back into the Indian Madhyamaka tradition of Nāgārjuna via Candrakīrti. I will do this by investigating Candrakīrti’s Supplement to the ‘Middle Way’ (Madhyamakāvatāra) along with his Auto-Commentary on the Supplement to the ‘Middle Way’ (Madhyamakāvatārabhāṣya).

However, Tsong Khapa was not without his critics. Foremost on this list from a rival school of Tibetan Buddhism was another philosopher by the name of Gorampa bSod nams Seng ge (1429-1489). Gorampa had sharply apposed views to Tsong Khapa and I will therefore analyse his critique of Tsong Khapa’s hermeneutics by investigating his polemical philosophical work entitled Distinguishing between Views (lta ba’I shan ‘byed). I will also investigate another contemporary of Tsong Khapa from the same school of Tibetan Buddhism as Gorampa, namely Shakya Chokden shakya mchog ldan(1428-1507). Shakya Chokden‘s Madhyamaka texts included in this study will be: Drop of Nectar of Definitive Meaning: Entering the Gate to the Essential points of the Two Truths (bden pa gnyis kyi gnas la ‘jug pa nges don bdud rtsi things pa) and Great Ship of Discrimination that Sails into the Ocean of Definitive Meaning: A Treatise Differentiating the Systems of Prasañgika and Svātantrika Madhyamaka (dbu ma thal rang gi grub mtha’I rnam par dbye ba’I bstan bcos nges don gyi rgya mtshor ‘jug pa’i rnam dpyod kyi gru chen).

Moreover, this study will include analysis of the contemporary views both from Buddhologists and analytic philosophers. In particular I will look at the work of: Professor Mark Siderits: Personal Identity and Buddhist Philosophy. Dr. Miri Albahri’s Analytical Buddhism: The Two-Tiered Illusion of Self. As well as the work of the contemporary phenomenologists Dan Zahari and Evan Thompson.

Research Questions:

The objective of this study is to research the cogency of a non-egological approach to self and phenomenal personhood.

My claim is that “self” or “persons” do not possess any kind of absolute ontological status, that is, the appearance of an objective referent of a self, person or “I” are non-existent imaginaries. Moreover, any notion that an invariant property of any kind is that which binds diachronic and synchronic first-person experience is an incoherent thesis, and like-wise a non-existent imaginary.

However, I will claim that despite this it is still possible to posit self, persons and I, existing, in a sense truly, as mere contingent phenomena within the framework of a kind of dynamic system. I will do this by arguing that what is being rejected here is not the existence of self or persons, but rather the existence of (1) a non-fabricated objective agent of experience, (2) any notion of an invariant or variant property of any kind, at any level of discourse which is the “self” or is acting as a “self” and (3) intrinsic identity at any level. I will thereby show that from within the framework of conventional discourse, phenomena such as persons are merely contingent, and that this schema leaves intact functional first-person experience.

Thus the non-egological exegesis of personhood when couched in a Two Truths discourse as first laid out by Nāgārjuna 2nd CE, further clarified by Candrakīrti 7th CE and developed by Tsong Khapa 14th CE is cogent.

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