《为什么佛教是真实的》一书深入探讨了佛教的核心思想，作者罗伯特·赖特认为，进化让我们充满幻觉，这些幻觉导致了痛苦和不道德的行为。他主张正念冥想是摆脱这些幻觉的红药丸，帮助我们认识到“无我”和“空性”的真相，最终实现解脱。

🤔 **进化让我们充满幻觉：** 作者认为，进化让我们充满了各种幻觉，这些幻觉不仅不准确，而且会导致痛苦和不道德的行为。例如，我们认为“糖粉甜甜圈对我有益”，或者“我拥有一个自我”。这些误解让我们陷入“快乐的跑步机”中，无法获得真正的快乐，也容易滋生部落主义等不道德行为。

🧘 **正念冥想是红药丸：** 作者将正念冥想比作《黑客帝国》中的红药丸，它可以帮助我们摆脱这些幻觉，看到世界的真相。通过正念冥想，我们可以体验到“无我”和“空性”的真实性，从而获得解脱。

💡 **佛教与心理学之间的融合：** 作者试图将佛教与心理学结合起来，证明佛教的“无我”和“空性”理论是合理的。他认为，心理学可以解释为什么我们会有“自我”的幻觉，以及为什么世界是“空”的。

🙏 **最终目标：** 作者认为，通过正念冥想，我们可以最终实现解脱，摆脱进化带来的束缚，获得真正的自由和幸福。

🧠 **觉醒：** 正念冥想可以帮助我们摆脱对自我和世界的错误认知，从而获得真正的觉醒，看到世界的真相。

🧘 **解脱：** 通过正念冥想，我们可以从进化带来的束缚中解脱出来，获得真正的自由和幸福。

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/your-book-review-why-buddhism-is

 

[This is the fifth of many finalists in the book review contest. It’s not by me - it’s by an ACX reader who will remain anonymous until after voting is done, to prevent their identity from influencing your decisions. I’ll be posting about two of these a week for several months. When you’ve read all of them, I’ll ask you to vote for your favorite, so remember which ones you liked. - SA]

The dark side of enlightenment

The main character of The Matrix, Neo, gets to choose whether to take the red or blue pill: whether to escape his dream world or remain inside it. Unlike Neo, we're (probably) not trapped in a virtual reality. Nevertheless, we may be living in something of a dream world. At least, that's what Robert Wright claims in Why Buddhism Is True.

According to Wright, evolution has packed us full of illusions. They range from the relatively harmless falsehood “powdered sugar donuts are good for me” to the sweeping distortion “I have a self." These misperceptions are not only inaccurate; they are dangerous. They cause unhappiness by trapping us on the hedonic treadmill and immorality by (among other things) fanning the flames of tribalism.

Wright thinks that mindfulness meditation is the real-world equivalent of the red pill. The book attempts to justify this claim, aiming for a grand synthesis of Buddhism and psychology. Wright argues that psychology vindicates two venerable Buddhist theses: not-self (our experience of an “I" is in some sense an illusion) and emptiness (the world is in some sense “empty" or devoid of “essence”). Furthermore, mindfulness meditation allows us to see the truth of these theses in an experiential way which frees us of our evolutionary bondage. Enlightenment, the end-goal of meditation, is the state of full liberation from this bondage.