Comments on: Environmental Green eco-Buddhism and the ethics of landscape architecture and garden design https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/ Gardenvisit.com Sat, 02 Mar 2013 02:37:31 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.5.8 By: Christine https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5076 Sat, 02 Mar 2013 02:37:31 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5076 Whether or not humans are part of the ‘animal kingdom’ depends on who you choose for your apexical ancestor (given that the missing link is still missing…[ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/evolution/7550033/Missing-link-between-man-and-apes-found.html ]) – the ape or Adam?

If you choose Adam and then look for an evolutionary link with the ape – ie. to have it both ways – well it is necessary to find the first non-furry one.
[ http://www.nytimes.com/2003/08/19/science/why-humans-and-their-fur-parted-ways.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm ]

This is one of the Fatima children’s [ http://www.catholicculture.org/news/features/index.cfm?recnum=35248 ] view on why God gave Adam and Eve clothes.
[ http://www.michaeljournal.org/dressadam.htm ] Here is how the events of Eden and their significance are described in the Jewish account. [ http://www.jewishpathways.com/chumash-themes/garden-eden ]

It is interesting that the account give the reverse transformation in the snake from almost human to animal.

]]> By: Tom Turner https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5075 Thu, 28 Feb 2013 04:47:03 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5075 In reply to Christine.

Ah Ha. Are humans part of the ‘animal kingdom’?
The horse ‘scandal’ has provided many opportunities for jokes and my favourite is the spelling ‘spagetti bolog-neigh-se’.

]]> By: Christine https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5074 Thu, 28 Feb 2013 04:24:44 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5074 Yes you did shock me with your penguin burger suggestion – but then it seems the UK has been eating all sorts of different animals unknowingly lately!

Penguins are very well dressed and very good fathers which is undoubtably part of their charm! You are right there is much to be considered aboout how things are done in the animal kingdom.

]]> By: Tom Turner https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5073 Mon, 25 Feb 2013 04:25:29 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5073 In reply to Christine.

The BBC is running a series on one of my favourite animals: penguins http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/life/Penguin and I am wondering if I could introduce them to Scotland (which I think would be ‘wrong’). Compared to humans, penguins are better at swimming and much more smartly ‘dressed’ – but not so good at walking. They also have a deep commitment to family life and completely shared responsibility for children. Does this make them more virtuous than other animal species where the father ‘neglects’ his offspring? Or is the penguins ‘ethical’ behaviour simply a matter of occupying an evolutionary niche? And would we be doing the same if we converted the coast of Antarctica into a penguin factory farm? – which must be a tempting proposition for non-Buddhists who enjoy penguin-burgers.

]]> By: Christine https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5072 Mon, 25 Feb 2013 00:32:09 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5072 It is interesting that Ninian Smart says;

“we have underplayed the idea that our moral and spiritual troubles have to do with a lack of clarity or insight because original sin has dominated so much of our thinking.”

It is possible that our lack of clarity or insight may be due to what is called Original Sin or sometimes The Human Condition!

]]> By: Tom Turner https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5071 Sun, 24 Feb 2013 11:37:13 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5071 There is an interesting interview with Ninian Smart here. He gave a week of lectures at the University of St Andrews in 1967-8. My interest in eastern religions dates from those lectures but I did not know anything about his personal life until finding this interview. He reports that the army taught him Chinese! I also like the comments that he saw himself as ‘a Buddhist-Episcopalian’ and that ‘the study of comparative religion can make one “comparatively religious”‘ and that ‘Buddhism is complementary to Christianity — it adds to it’. Then there is the insigtful remark from St. Francis of Xavier, when he reached in Japan in 1547: he wrote to the Pople that ‘It is unfortunate that the Lutherans were here before me.’ By this he meant that Pure Land Buddhism, which had the most influence on garden design, was so much like the Lutheran strain of Protestantism. In the mid-sixteenth Christianity had an influence on garden design which it has not had before or since.

]]> By: Christine https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5070 Sun, 24 Feb 2013 00:50:55 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5070 Yes. Buddhism is an amazing religion and is very different from Christianity in a number of respects while having a surprising number of similarities.

It is not at all unusual that their is no God concept as at the time Buddha lived only the Jews were Mono-theist and of course Christ was yet to be born so there were no Christians.

If the Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan was the time in history in which Heaven was again opened -after being closed at the Fall – then the destiny of the soul in Buddha’s time would also have been different.

Here are two key differences:

1. Without the sacrament of Baptism the full effects of the punishments of Original Sin in human nature would have been commonly felt by all.

2. And there was no access to an everlasting life after death! (Think the Beatles song Imagine there’s no Heaven…)

]]> By: jerry https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/environment-green-eco-buddhism-and-the-ethics-of-landscape-architecture-and-garden-design/#comment-5069 Sat, 23 Feb 2013 10:54:10 +0000 http://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/?p=9014#comment-5069 Tom, if you listened to me that do a research about the relationship between buddhism and garden design or landscape design or urban design. I think I would be much happier and have more use.

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