| dc.description.abstract | Much of the way we respond to the climate change crisis today repeats
our routinized old habits. For example, most people (including me) may
respond to the crisis by repeating established consumption patterns, such as
the use of reusable bags. While these provide relief, our basic way of life
as consumers, and indeed the entire economic structure, has not changed.
In other words, we are still collectively responding to an unprecedented
large-scale climate crisis in a manner that is familiar to us without radically
changing our cognition and our way of life. This is an interesting but
unfortunate problem that humanity faces over and over. That is: when
humanity is met with uncertainties in time of crisis, the response strategy is
regressive. Instead of taking a radical move to revamp our way of life, we
instinctively shrink back into our familiar (techno-capitalist) comfort zone
of inertia and convenience, and use the easiest, low-cost ways to “save the
planet” by doing token changes. What this suggests is a gap between our
knowledge and action: when our human civilization is aware of its own
crisis and must make changes immediately, we are caught and constrained
by habitual (inert) thinking and behavior. Whether it is cultural (e.g., the
scapegoat mechanism), subconscious (e.g., denial or repetitive obsessivecompulsive
disorder), biological (e.g., forces like species reproduction,
expansion, and maximization of resource), or karmic imprints (Skt. vāsanā;Ch. xiqi). These habits are the basis of what I call, “the practice of the same.”
Such practice prevents us from taking innovative measures to respond to the
current crisis. Since these deeply ingrained habits have seriously affected
our ability to respond to disasters, how then do we combat them? After
articulating the array of “the practice of the same” that dictates every corner
of our civilization, this paper proposes to turn to gong’an (Jp. kōan) to
dismantle that dysfunctional habit of repetition. The soteriological practice
aiming at realizing one’s Buddha nature provides a way to think about what
I call “critical Chan liminality,” which deconditions us from the practice of
the same. Here I use “Baizhang’s Wild Fox” (Ch. Baizhang yehu) as a case in
point to illustrate how gong’an narrative. | en_US |
