And while I’m at it, allow me to pause over Grayling’s comment, too.

An equally bad thing about the Dalai Lama’s article is that he calls Buddhism a religion‚ and indeed in the superstitious demon-ridden polytheistic Tibetan version of it that he leads, that is what it is. But original Buddhism is a philosophy, without gods or supernatural beings—all such explicitly rejected by Siddhartha Gautama in offering a quietist ethical teaching; but he has of course been subjected to the Brian’s Sandal phenomenon in the usual stupid way of time and the masses.

Sad, isn’t it. Time and the masses can’t leave a very good and interesting ethical teaching alone, no, they have to stuff superstition and demons into … Read the rest

Here’s a useful item lifted from a comment on Jerry Coyne’s post on Anthony Grayling on the Dalai Lama. The comment is by Michael Kingsford Gray, who has been making sweeping and wrong generalizations about philosophers at Jerry’s, but all due credit to him for the useful item:

1) Who told a press conference in 1997 that men to men sex and woman to woman sex is sexual misconduct?
The Pope, or the Dalai Lama?

2) Who told a Swiss magazine in 2001, that sexual organs were created for the reproduction of the male element and the female element, and anything that deviates from this is not acceptable?
The Pope, or the Dalai Lama?

3) An anti-abortion lobby group … Read the rest