Why Buddhism Matters to Philosophy

A religion professor seeks to expose Western audiences to Buddhist teachings with the aim of fostering unity and cooperation. “Mindfulness” has become a pop-culture phenomenon in the West. Google, Target, General Mills, and other corporations have established programs supporting employee mindfulness practices. Celebrities including Hugh Jackman and Emma Watson have spoken publicly about their meditation routines. Headspace, a company that has developed a mindfulness meditation app, was valued at $250 million in early 2017. While mindfulness is a feature of Buddhist thought, most Westerners have adopted it without any awareness of its spiritual roots. Many practice mindfulness with the aim of fostering…

A University of Michigan-based project investigates connections among religion, spirituality, and health through an ambitious, multi-year national survey. The significant existing body of research into the connections between religion, spirituality, and health presents a problem. While it hints at a correlation between religious or spiritual practices and positive health outcomes, the underlying causal mechanisms have proven elusive. A project led by Neal Krause, a professor of public health at the University of Michigan and a renowned expert on the intersection of religion and health, seeks to answer those questions with a new approach: Whereas earlier studies focused on either religious and spiritual…