Nishida on Well-Being: Reflections from Medieval Buddhist Philosophy

Nishida is one of the most influential twentieth-century Japanese philosophers. Influenced by Fichte and Hegel, Nishida's work is often compared with Lebensphilosophie [philosophy of life], the philosophical trend that arise around the turn of the 20thcentury. His main works include An Inquiry into the
Good(1911), Intuition and Reflection in Self-Consciousness (1917), Place(1926),
and The Logic of Place and the Religious Worldview (1945).

This workshop will discuss Nishida's ideas of well-being, which is closely related to his philosophy of life and the environment. There are two seemingly contradictory ideas of well-being in his thought, unity and self-negation (or "dialectics"). According to Nishida, although well-being is defined by the unity of experience, it is more fundamentally characterized as self-negation. Drawing upon Medieval Buddhist philosophy, the speaker will discuss these notions in Nishida's early essay from An Inquiry into the Good (1911), and his late essay Logic and Life (1936).

The Center for Comparative Philosophy will provide a light lunch for the workshop. The room will open from 12:00 for people to serve themselves and take a seat.