Date and time：2023-03-23 17:30 EDT / 2023-03-23 21:30 UTC / 2023-03-24 05:30 Taiwan
Organizer：Harvard University

Over the past three decades, since the creation of the Mind and Life Institute in the 80s, a series of conferences have introduced the idea of a convergence between Buddhism and neuroscience. Neuroscientists have been particularly interested in the possible neural correlates of Buddhist meditation, and their experiments have contributed to the current popularity of Mindfulness and derived techniques, such as “Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction.”

Apart from meditation, a number of important issues, such as notions of self and non-self, or Buddhist ethics and neuroethics, have been discussed. Yet, because of the media attention and a desire to reach consensus, problems and disagreements between the two fields have sometimes been ignored or downplayed, and the conversation has been limited to certain forms of Buddhist thought and practice. The time has come to move “beyond the hype” and to engage in a broader and more critical discussion.

Date and time：2023／02／18  14:00 Peking/Taipei (06:00 UTC)
Organizer：Peking University

Although increasing lay involvement is considered a common feature of Buddhist modernism, a revolution was also taking place in twentieth-century Chinese monastic education. Reforms to tradition proposed by the likes of Taixu were touted as being a future standard requirement for Saṅghins. While developments in mainland China were disrupted for a generation, in Taiwan continued uninterrupted growth in fertile soil.

Several educational models were established by monastic orders in the latter half of the twentieth century, both during and after the period of BAROC leadership. These typically operated with two levels, in conformity with modern undergrad and graduate studies, yet remained unaccredited by secular authorities, despite most such institutions being open to both ordained Saṅghins and lay students. In the early twenty-first century, changes to secular tertiary educational law allowed accreditation for tertiary Buddhist studies departments.

Several larger Buddhist organizations seized open this opportunity, but also retained their unaccredited institutions, leading to a duplication of monastic education systems. Throughout all these developments, the far older system of ‘triple platform ordination’ continued, relatively unchanged. While Vinaya reformers refined elements of the ordination system, it still serves as a deeper layer of renunciant monastic education distinct from modern educational institutions and lay participation.

Between the multiple layers of ordination, unaccredited and accredited institutions, Taiwanese monastic traditions formulated multiple responses and continue to negotiate the relationship between traditional and modern educational systems. These negotiations should give pause to our theorizing of Buddhist modernity.