Madhyamaka

Madhyamaka (Sanskrit: मध्यमक, Madhyamaka, Chinese: 中觀派; pinyin: Zhōngguān Pài; also known as Śūnyavāda) refers primarily to a Mahāyāna Buddhist school of philosophy founded by Nāgārjuna. According to Madhyamaka all phenomena (dharmas) are empty (śūnya) of "nature," a "substance" or "essence" (svabhāva) which gives them "solid and independent existence," because they are dependently co-arisen. But this "emptiness" itself is also "empty": it does not have an existence on its own, nor does it refer to a transcendental reality beyond or above phenomenal reality.

Etymology

The school of thought and its subsidiaries are called "Madhyamaka"; those who follow it are called "Mādhyamikas". "Madya" means "middle", as the Teaching of the Buddha is called "The Middle Way". "Madhyamaka" means "middlemost". A "Madyamika" is a "middlemoster", because he takes the middlemost way in philosophy.

Emptiness

Central to Madhyamaka philosophy is sunyata, "emptiness." The term refers to the "emptiness" of inherent existence: all phenomena are empty of "substance" or "essence" (Sanskrit: svabhāva) or inherent existence, because they are dependently co-arisen. At a conventional level, "things" do exist, but ultimately they are "empty" of inherent existence. But this "emptiness" itself is also "empty": it does not have an existence on its own, nor does it refer to a transcendental reality beyond or above phenomenal reality.

Encyclopedia of Philosophy

The Encyclopedia of Philosophy is one of the major English encyclopedias of philosophy.

The first edition of the encyclopedia was in eight volumes, edited by Paul Edwards, and published in 1967 by Macmillan; it was reprinted in four volumes in 1972.

A "Supplement" volume, edited by Donald M. Borchert, was added to the reprinted first edition in 1996, containing articles on developments in philosophy since 1967, covering new subjects and scholarship updates or new articles on those written about in the first edition.

A second edition, also edited by Borchert, was published in ten volumes in 2006 by Thomson Gale. Volumes 1–9 contain alphabetically ordered articles. Volume 10 consists of:

Its ISBNs are 0-02-865780-2 as a hardcover set, and 0-02-866072-2 as an e-book.

See also

Pratītyasamutpāda

Pratītyasamutpāda (Sanskrit: प्रतीत्यसमुत्पाद; Pali: पटिच्चसमुप्पाद paṭiccasamuppāda), commonly translated as dependent origination or dependent arising, states that all dharmas ("things") arise in dependence upon other dharmas: "if this exists, that exists; if this ceases to exist, that also ceases to exist." It is a pragmatic teaching, which is applied to dukkha (suffering) and the cessation of dukkha.

The term is also used to refer to the twelve links of dependent origination, which describes the chain of causes which result in rebirth. By reverting the chain, liberation from rebirth can be attained.

Etymology

Pratityasamutpada (Sanskrit: प्रतीत्यसमुत्पाद) consists of two terms:

The term has been translated into English variously as dependent origination, dependent arising, interdependent co-arising, conditioned arising, and conditioned genesis. The term could be translated somewhat more literally as arising in dependence upon conditions.

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP) combines an online encyclopedia of philosophy with peer reviewed publication of original papers in philosophy, freely accessible to Internet users. It is maintained by Stanford University. Each entry is written and maintained by an expert in the field, including professors from many academic institutions worldwide. Authors contributing to the encyclopedia give Stanford University the permission to publish the articles but retain the copyright to those articles. The SEP has 1,502 published entries. Apart from its online status, the encyclopedia uses the traditional academic approach of most encyclopedias and academic journals to achieve quality by means of specialist authors selected by an editor or an editorial committee which is competent (though not necessarily a specialist) in the field covered by the encyclopedia and peer review.

The encyclopedia was created in 1995 by Edward N. Zalta, with the explicit aim of providing a dynamic encyclopedia which is updated regularly, and so does not become dated in the manner of conventional print encyclopedias. The charter for the encyclopedia allows for rival articles on a single topic to reflect reasoned disagreements among scholars. The SEP was initially developed with U.S. public funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Science Foundation. A long-term fundraising plan to preserve open access to the Encyclopedia is supported by many university libraries and library consortia. These institutions contribute under a plan devised by the SEP in collaboration with the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, the International Coalition of Library Consortia and the Southeastern Library Network, with matching funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP) is a free online encyclopedia on philosophical topics and philosophers founded by James Fieser in 1995. The current general editors are James Fieser (Professor of Philosophy at the University of Tennessee at Martin) and Bradley Dowden (Professor of Philosophy at California State University, Sacramento). The staff also includes numerous area editors as well as volunteers.

About the IEP

The IEP is a non-profit organization that receives no funding. The mission statement of the IEP is as follows:

The entire website was redesigned in the summer of 2009, moving from static HTML pages to the open-source publishing platform WordPress.

Scholarly standards

According to the IEP, the quality of its articles is "at the same level as that of the best multi-volume encyclopedias of philosophy which appear in print." This is achieved primarily by recruiting well-qualified contributors and using a peer review process that is "rigorous and meets high academic standards". The encyclopedia uses a traditional, closed procedure for commissioning and refereeing its permanent articles (comparable to that of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: see peer review), but sometimes uses material from public domain resources to create temporary stop-gap articles until permanent articles are completed.