I'm so excited to tell you all about this amazing book I've just read! It's called "Why Buddhism Is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment." Here's the gist of what you can expect from reading this book: Buddhism is all about freeing us from the narrow view that natural selection gives us. It helps us to see and experience the world in a deeper way.

This is according to science author and evolutionary psychologist Robert Wright. I'm sure many of you are already familiar with Robert Wright's previous books, "The Age of Non-Zero: The Logic of Human Destiny" and "The Moral Animal." Why are we all so... I bet you're still surprised to hear the title of "Why Buddhism Is True." It might seem a little unusual that an American is actually going to write about Buddhism.

It's so lovely to see that Buddhism is also very popular in the United States, with so many people studying it. I'd even go as far as to say that the West has formed a complete Buddhist system! In other words, this is a Westernized version of Buddhism. This version is like taking all the "supernatural" parts out of Asian Buddhism, leaving only the philosophy and the way of doing meditation. So, if the title were translated directly, it would be "Why Buddhism is True." But since it's not actually talking about Buddhism, but rather Westernized Buddhism, I thought it would be more accurate to translate the book as "Why Buddhist Studies is True."

I'm sure you have lots of questions at the moment, and I'm happy to answer them! I'm sure you're wondering: is Western Buddhist Studies 'authentic'? I know this might be a bit of a surprising question, but is Buddhism just a bit of superstition? I'm sure you're wondering if this book is trying to promote religion. Oh, goodness, no! We're not talking about just any old Buddhism here, but the real deal. I think one of the loveliest things about Buddhism is that it gives you the freedom to think critically. It never tries to be mysterious, and it always explains the truth in the simplest and most understandable language possible. In this book, Wright does a wonderful job of explaining some Buddhist concepts and ideas using modern scientific knowledge. The book shares lots of fascinating modern scientific evidence that shows the Buddha was absolutely right about what he said!

These concepts and views have been stripped of anything supernatural, so they're easy to understand! There's no reincarnation, no karma, and no "supernatural powers," but there's still so much to love about Buddhism! We basically see the Buddha as an enlightened philosopher. The wonderful thing about this book is that it's so easy to understand, without any mystery. It's written in a way that's easy to understand and speaks to modern people. This means you can think about it and discuss it as you would with any other philosophy. You can also test it with what we know from modern science.

We're going to dive into three common Buddhist concepts next to help you understand the basic thinking and logic of this book. In the first part, we'll chat about one of the most fundamental concepts in Buddhism: "suffering." We'll explore where our challenges originate from and how we can find peace amidst them. In the second part, we'll take a peek into the world of meditation and see what it's all about. In the third part, we'll chat about the often-heard phrase "form is emptiness."

Let's dive right in and start with the first part, "Where does suffering come from?"

We all know that "suffering" is a really important concept in Buddhism. It was after seeing the four "sufferings" of birth, old age, sickness, and death that Shakyamuni decided to begin his spiritual practice. He was so moved by these four realities that he felt compelled to embark on a spiritual journey to find meaning and peace amidst them. So, what does "suffering" really mean? Do you think it means that the world is deliberately making us suffer? Or could it be that it has something to do with how we cultivate ourselves, and that an enlightened person feels no suffering? For instance, there's a lovely saying that suggests our feelings of suffering are often caused by an attachment to something. If you can let go of your attachments, you'll find that you're not as attached to suffering as you thought.

In this book, Wright shares a beautiful idea: that suffering is simply a feeling of dissatisfaction. This idea is also supported by Buddhist teachings. Some scholars have taken a close look at the original early Buddhist text and have come to believe that the more accurate translation of "suffering" is "dissatisfaction." This book offers a fascinating explanation based on evolutionary psychology. As we all know, from the perspective of biological evolution, the purpose of human existence is to spread our genes. We all want to spread our genes, and there are lots of ways we can do that. We eat, have children, compete, gain prestige, and so on. But at the end of the day, we're all just thinking beings, right? What if some people just want to enjoy the beauty of nature and the simple pleasures of life, without any interest in spreading their genes? I'd love to know how natural selection makes us feel happy about doing the things I mentioned above!

Wright said that natural selection has made three assumptions about our psychology, which I think we can all agree is pretty interesting stuff!

First, you can get pleasure from doing all those lovely things I mentioned. Take eating and falling in love, for example. Both of these things can bring us immense joy!

Secondly, pleasure is short-lived and doesn't last long. If we could get continuous, long-lasting pleasure just by doing something once, there would be no incentive to do it a second time. Wouldn't that be a shame? So, natural selection encourages you to repeat your actions.

Thirdly, when we think about these two facts, it seems like the brain should focus on the first point and ignore the second. If our brain is aware that happiness is fleeting, it might feel like the pursuit of happiness is pointless and even doubt the value of life.

In other words, natural selection simply doesn't concern itself with whether we're happy or not. It's just using happiness as a way to help genes be passed on.

From the perspective of gene transmission, this is a great thing! But for the individual, it can be a bit of a bummer. People spend their whole lives looking for happiness, and when they finally find it, it's only for a little while. I'm happy to say that this mechanism has now been scientifically proven! Some folks even used monkeys in the experiment, hanging a light in their cage. As soon as the light came on, the kind experimenter would give the monkey a few drops of juice, which the monkey loved! The kind scientists kept a close eye on how much dopamine was being released in the monkey's brain. Dopamine secretion is your brain's way of telling you that you're feeling happy!

At first, it was only after the delicious juice entered the monkey's mouth that its brain began to secrete large amounts of dopamine. This was a clear sign that the juice was what made the monkey happy! However, after repeating the experiment many times, our clever monkey learned the pattern and knew that the light would be followed by juice. At this point, the kind scientist made another interesting discovery. Even before the juice was given, the monkey's brain had already begun to secrete large amounts of dopamine! The sweet, sweet anticipation of the juice was already making the monkey happy! Later on, the light caused the sweet monkey to secrete more and more of that wonderful dopamine, while the juice brought less and less of it. It seems that the monkey was so happy just thinking about the juice! But when they actually drank it, they weren't as happy as they thought they'd be.

I wonder if this is also true for us humans? We all feel happy before we do something, but sometimes afterwards we feel a bit empty. This is what I call suffering, and it's something we can all relate to. It's that feeling of never being truly satisfied. It's a sad truth, but true: the happiness we call "joy" is actually just an illusion.

From an evolutionary psychology perspective, all kinds of human emotions are actually the result of natural selection encoding our thoughts. This allows us to make a "good or bad" judgment on the external environment, which is pretty cool! If doing this thing helps your genes to spread, you feel happy, and you'll be happy to do it again next time! If doing this thing is harmful to the spread of genes, you feel painful and uncomfortable, and you won't do it next time. It's only natural! And these encodings can sometimes be a little off.

The first type of error is when the environment changes but the code remains the same. For example, we see sweet, high-fat foods and our tummies start to rumble! This emotion might have been really helpful for our bodies in the past, when food was in short supply. It could have helped us to eat more nutrients! However, in modern society, food is abundant, and eating foods high in fat and sugar will only harm our bodies, so it's best to avoid them if we can! Wright then says that our feelings towards high-fat, high-sugar foods can be seen as a bit of a misguided emotion.

The second mistake is called a "false positive." Let's say a primitive man is walking in the wild and hears a noise in the grass. I'd love to know what you think he should do! There's a 99% chance that the noise is just the wind, but there's also a 1% chance that there's a tiger in the grass! I'm sure you'll agree that the primitive man would be foolish to ignore the unlikely event and continue walking. Of course not! His best bet is to run, no matter what it is.

This fear of the wind blowing the grass was really useful in primitive society, but today it would make us feel pretty anxious! For instance, in those early days, everyone was your friend, and what you thought was really important. It was really tough to feel like you were being looked down upon. But today, we're more likely to meet new people, and it's true that most folks don't really care who you are. But we still pay particular attention to the impression we make on others, don't we?

This just goes to show that there are so many illusions in our emotions! We all think we can be happy, but the truth is that happiness is very short-lived. We all love sugar, but eating too much of it can be bad for us. We worry about this and that all day long, but we really don't need to worry about anything at all! So, the Buddha said that life is full of suffering, and worries are all just illusory things.

Our bodies and minds are wired to experience happiness for only a short time, so we'll never be fully satisfied. This is the nature of life, and it's something we can all relate to. At the same time, evolution has programmed us to believe that our emotions don't always reflect the real world. This can make worries feel "empty."

This is Wright's thoughtful explanation of "suffering" and "worries" from an evolutionary psychology perspective. It's also the first part of our article, so we hope you enjoy it! So, since worries and suffering are just illusions that natural selection has given us, how should we deal with them or get rid of them? Meditation could be a great way to deal with them! But what exactly is meditation? Welcome back! This is the second part of our article.

Part 2: Of course, the meditation we're going to chat about doesn't cover every single concept out there. Meditation can be roughly divided into three main types.

One is Zen Buddhism, which is all about thinking about koans, sometimes using verbal "witticisms," and then having an epiphany. This is probably more your speed, sweetheart. Another type of meditation is Tibetan Buddhism, which involves mainly imagining visual images. This is more your speed, my friend! Wright practiced "insight meditation," which, in a nutshell, is all about cultivating "right mindfulness." This one is more suitable for psychologists. Insight meditation is all about being your own sweet self and taking a good, honest look at what's going on with your emotions. It's like a psychologist looking in on themselves! It's so lovely to see that meditation is becoming more and more popular in the West, especially among intellectuals! Google is so cool! They even set up meditation rooms for their employees.

Of course, that's not all there is to Vipassana meditation! It's not just about resting or cultivating sentimentality. The lovely thing about Vipassana meditation is that it helps you gain insight into things and true personal freedom.

The form of meditation is really quite simple! If you're looking for a sense of ritual, you can find a quiet place and get a mat to sit on. It's totally fine to sit in whatever position you're most comfortable in, as long as you don't fall asleep! All you have to do is sit down. Then, just focus on your breathing. Don't think about anything else. Just focus on your breathing. You've got this!

I know it can be tough at first, but you've got this! It's important to remember that when we're not doing anything, our brains tend to wander. All kinds of thoughts and emotions can come up, and we might find ourselves daydreaming about all sorts of things. Guess what! We actually enjoy this state, and sometimes we can even make some creative discoveries. But that's the beauty of meditation! It's all about letting your thoughts wander, but then gently bringing your attention back to your breath. You'll be amazed at how much your practice will improve the longer you can focus!

By practicing this lovely skill of concentration, you can free yourself from being troubled by various emotions and thoughts, and from being controlled by the brain's modules. It's important to remember that concentrating on your breathing isn't the end goal. The aim is to practise taking control of your own brain.

If you can focus for a long time, you'll feel really calm. Wright actually reached this state! He said that after a long period of concentration, he achieved a very deep calmness and a great sense of joy. It was such a wonderful feeling!

Once you've reached the point where you can concentrate for a long time, you'll find you have two wonderful options open to you. There's a lovely Buddhist saying called the "Eightfold Path," which we can understand as the eight methods of cultivation. The seventh of the Eightfold Path is "right mindfulness," and the eighth is "right concentration." If you choose to always maintain the state of focusing on your breathing, you'll be developing the skill of "right concentration," which is the method of cultivation used in Hinayana Buddhism.

In Vipassana, attaining right concentration through focused breathing is just the basic skill. Don't worry if you haven't got it yet! It's a simple concept to grasp. Once you've got right concentration down, you can move on to right mindfulness. This is all about applying that concentration skill to everything in your life, all the time. You can focus on appreciating a beautiful flower, you can concentrate on the taste of your delicious food while you eat, you can concentrate on anything your heart desires! And it's not just about concentrating, it's about gaining insight from it too!

You might be wondering, isn't this just "concentrating"? Oh, you know what? I can concentrate on reading a book, but in the process my thoughts follow the author, and I will also associate with things outside the book at any time. This kind of concentration is really quite simple! But the kind of concentration you get from meditation is different. It's called "dwelling attention." This means focusing your attention on just this point and leaving out any other thoughts.

There are at least two levels of meditation skill, and we can all work our way up to the higher level! The first level is all about learning to detach the "self" and various emotions from strong feelings. Once you get to this level, you'll instantly start feeling the amazing benefits of meditation!

Take a toothache, for example. Most of us would probably complain and try to fight against the feeling of pain. It's totally normal to feel the pain, but try not to resist it too much. If you do, your brain will start to focus on the pain, and it can start to feel like it's in charge. The wonderful thing about meditation is that you first acknowledge the existence of this pain, and then you ignore the feeling and keep your distance from it. The pain is still there, but now you're in control! If you can practice this kind of skill, you'll never have to worry about getting too emotional in life. You'll always be able to adjust your mood, no problem!

At a higher level, you can even detach yourself from the self and all kinds of thoughts! You can truly focus on breathing without thinking about anything else.

It's totally normal! Most of the time, it's all those little thoughts that get in the way of our concentration. Let me ask you, what are you going to do at work tomorrow? I'm so excited to meet a lady I admire and reminisce about a wonderful moment I had at the stadium yesterday!

Wright says that these thoughts have something in common: they are either looking back in the past or forward into the future, and they are not about the present. Another great example is that they're all about you! It's probably not on your mind when you're meditating, but astrophysics is pretty fascinating stuff! And often, they're about another person, too! We're social animals, and we love to think about other people! And finally, almost all of these thoughts are provided by a certain module in the brain. Isn't it fascinating that these modules are the product of evolution?

You know, you can think of it like this: thoughts are generated by modules that attract your attention through a certain emotion and "try" to hijack your brain. How can you let go of your thoughts? The good news is that the method is always the same! When a thought comes up, just acknowledge it, then give yourself a little distance from it. Don't think about it too much, and just focus on your breathing. It's like you're standing at a train station, and the thoughts are the trains, my friend. The trains keep coming and going, but you never get on. It's okay!

In other words, whether it's a strong emotion or a general thought, our approach is not to suppress or kill them. Instead, we simply acknowledge their existence and allow them to appear, but not be affected by them.

Once you've reached the first level, you can freely choose the emotions you want. Once you've reached the second level, you'll be able to choose which thoughts you want to focus on. Nothing can disturb or control you! This ability is truly incredible! In Buddhist terms, you will gradually be free from "suffering," which is really wonderful news!

It can be tricky to get the hang of, though! It's not as simple as just working hard in one direction and getting better at it, my friend. There are lots of contradictions involved, which can be a bit confusing!

The first thing to know is that there's a bit of a contradiction between "doing nothing" and "achieving success." In other words, the more you try to concentrate during meditation, the more difficult it is to concentrate. It's a bit of a catch-22! You can achieve success without even trying! The second contradiction is that the people who could really benefit from meditation training are often the ones who find it the most challenging to enter a meditative state. The third thing to remember is that the more you resist an idea or emotion, the more you fight against it, the more you are controlled by it. The fourth and final paradox is that the more you understand the truth that "people cannot control their emotions, emotions control people," the more you can be free from the control of emotions. In other words, if you say right away that you can control yourself, then you can't control yourself. But if you realize that you can't control yourself, you've taken the first step towards controlling yourself!

These contradictions make it really tough to train in meditation. If you don't believe me, I'd love for you to give it a try!

Okay, in the first part, we chatted about "suffering" and "trouble," and in the second part, we explored the wonderful world of meditation. These two parts are actually related to a Buddhist concept that I think you'll find really interesting. It's about the "emptiness" of "emptiness." I know it can be tough to accept, but trouble is empty, and so are emotions. And there's another concept related to "emptiness" that we can all relate to: "form is emptiness." I'd love to know what you think these four words mean. And now, we're going to dive into the content of our third part!

Part 3

The book explains that "form is emptiness" is a good thing! It means that you can see that the world is "emptiness," and that you can withdraw from things that don't serve you. We'll chat more about what this means together!

Once upon a time, Wright was taking a meditation course. Outside the classroom, workers were sawing wood with a chainsaw, and the noise filled the room. The sound of the chainsaw was a bit unpleasant, but Wright used a meditation technique that helped him accept his emotion of "disliking the sound of the chainsaw" and then examine the emotion. At that time, the sound of the chainsaw was still there, but it seemed to be free of any negative emotions.

Later on, Wright even found the sound of a chainsaw pleasant! He could hear music in it. This was Wright's first experience of the concept of "form is emptiness."

Wright said that the sound of a chainsaw is just an objective existence, which I think is a really interesting way of looking at it! I think the reason we find the sound of a chainsaw a bit scary is because it reminds us of fear. When you think of a chainsaw, you probably think of it as something that can saw wood or even people. It represents the power of destruction, which can be pretty scary! These scary associations are the meaning that folks have given to the sound of a chainsaw. The "color" is the "meaning" you associate with the sound of a chainsaw. You might as well call it "chainsaw color," if you think that helps.

It's important to remember that you're not dealing with a saw that's trying to hurt you. You're just dealing with a sound. The sound of a chainsaw is real and there for you to hear. The color of a chainsaw is just empty, nothing more and nothing less.

Some folks think that "empty" means there's nothing at all, that everything in the world doesn't exist. Wright says that most Buddhist scholars agree that the meaning of "empty" is not that everything in the world is empty. Rather, it's that the meaning we give to everything is empty.

The great thing about this way of thinking is that it's backed by psychology. Paul Bloom is a psychologist who believes that one of the things that makes us human is that we attach a lot of meaning to things. Take a tape measure, for instance. You can pick one up for just a few dollars at the store. But if it's the one used by President John F. Kennedy, it can be sold for 40,000 to 50,000 US dollars at auction! Another great example is a wedding ring! It's just a ring, but if you've worn it for 30 or 40 years, it's got a lot of meaning for you! So it's true what they say: the history of an object gives it meaning.

Psychologist Robert Zarrow goes even further, suggesting that we actually automatically assign meaning to everything we see. Take the letter "Q," for example. If you associate it with QQ, you'll feel a sense of intimacy. If you associate it with "Ah Q," you'll feel something else. In a nutshell, you feel something about everything!

Wright says that natural selection has made us quick on the uptake when it comes to judging the quality of things around us. And that's a good thing for our survival! If you don't feel a bit queasy when you hear a chainsaw, you might want to work on your ability to avoid danger. The feelings that things make us feel are the connotations that we give to things.

If you think that "color" is our way of judging the "connotation" of things, then modern psychology has discovered some of the properties of "color" through experiments!

The first thing to know is that color—or connotation—is something that's automatically generated. It's just in our nature! When we see something, we can't help but describe it. We might say it's tall, short, or something else. And here's another interesting thing. Our ideas about what things mean are also affected by stories. Have you ever wondered why Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is such a famous painting? That's right! It has a story, and that's what makes it so special. And finally, connotation is totally subjective! As the saying goes, "A thousand readers, a thousand Hamlets." Isn't that a lovely thought?

So, we all see the world through our own special tinted glasses! We always put meaning on the things around us, and the world as we see it is a world full of color! This is how the author explains the concept of "color" in the book.

Wright shares a story about weeds that I can really relate to. When my family first moved into our lovely house, the lawn was absolutely thriving! Later on, because we didn't take as good care of it as we should have, weeds like dandelions started popping up on the lawn. Sometimes I felt bad when I saw them and would pull them out. My parents came to visit us in the United States, and once when they saw me pulling weeds, they asked why I was pulling dandelions. They said, "Dandelions have these really pretty little yellow flowers, and don't they look so lovely dotted on the lawn?" My parents saw dandelions from a place of appreciation for nature and thought they were quite pretty. I, on the other hand, saw them from the perspective of maintaining the lawn and thought they damaged it. So, are dandelions weeds or not? And should they be allowed to grow there or not?

Isn't it funny how we all see things differently? The world is full of contradictions and our own personal meanings to it. Our perception of colors affects our experience of the real world. Just stop for a moment and think. What would the world look like if we didn't look at it through tinted glasses?

Wright said that it would probably be a "colorless" world, and "colorlessness" would make you feel that the world is "empty." Wright's practice wasn't at the highest level, but he was lucky enough to interview some masters!

One kind practitioner said that as you deepen your meditation practice, you will really experience "emptiness," and your "sense of color" towards the world will decrease. Of course, you'll still see all these things. A chair is still a chair, but it won't have such a strong presence in your mind.

Wright chatted with the practitioner about his take on "no color." The practitioner said that in his own practice, it was more like he first felt that everything was empty, which then led to his feeling no emotion towards these things. Wright was saying that he first reduced his emotions before feeling that everything was empty. It's totally possible that the relationship is the opposite, but at the end of the day, recognizing no-color is basically the same as recognizing emptiness.

The practitioner also had two very clear experiences that he was happy to share with us.

First, when you realize that everything is empty and formless, and then look at all things, you'll see that what you see is more real than what you saw before. Secondly, the feelings that people have about these things are actually not real. This is the wonderful idea that form is emptiness!

People often say that Buddhism will make people lose the joy of life and find everything boring. I can see why they might think that, but I don't think it's true! I promise you, this is not the case! Buddhism gives you the freedom to choose what you want to experience, which is really lovely. By letting go of the distractions of your own imagination, you can enjoy a more fulfilling experience. I've heard that this can bring you even more joy and happiness!

Summary

I hope I've managed to explain the basic logic behind the proposition "Why Buddhism is true" to you in a way that makes sense. Let's take a moment to summarize.

From an evolutionary psychology perspective, it's fascinating to see how our brains are wired to perceive everything with emotion. This is because natural selection has given our brains this setting, which helps us to survive and thrive. It's human nature to want to spread our genes, so anything that helps us do that is seen as good. Conversely, anything that gets in the way of that is seen as bad, and we get angry with it. Buddhism is a wonderful way to transcend natural selection.

So, why do we need to transcend natural selection? The thing is, the rules of natural selection are a bit irrational. Wright says that natural selection makes us all think we're the most special and important person in the world. We all tend to see things in a certain way, and that's totally normal! But this basic assumption just doesn't seem to be right, because there are so many creatures in the world, and it's pretty much impossible for every creature to be more important than others, and for everyone to be special.

We all know that a piece of rotten, smelly meat is not so great from a human perspective. It contains bacteria and is not so good for our health. But you know what? From the perspective of the bacteria, the rotten meat is precisely the breeding ground they need. This is what the saying "form is emptiness" is all about. Once you understand this, you'll see that meat is just meat. There's no good or bad, just a simple fact.

This is why we said at the beginning that the wonderful thing about Buddhism is that it frees us from the limited perspective given to us by natural selection. It allows us to observe and experience the world from a higher level.

2,600 years ago, the Buddha had a real insight into how natural selection affects the human mind. He didn't have any modern scientific tools, but he identified the problem, found a solution, and developed a Buddhist system that integrates knowledge and action. The Buddha went so far that later generations have difficulty understanding him.

2,600 years later, modern science has allowed us to discover the same problem again, so that we can learn from the Buddha's methods and confirm his thinking.