IMG71

Ernst Mach

action. Wc havc alrcady mcntioncd his conspicuous role in helping to prevent the construction of a “frcc Gatholic university” in Salzburg in 1902 and his front-page denunciation of the Popc’s new syllabus in 1907. In addition, he was the on!y Vicnna professor, albcit a “rc-tired” one, who signed the 1912 manifesto of an intcrnational “Non* Denominational Committcc" which had callcd on all Catholics to leavc their church.²⁵

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It is doubtful if any one explanation could answer why so many posi-tivists havc leaned toward or adopted Buddhism. Each casc has its own pcculiaritics and uniquc factors, its own history; nonethelcss, there werc at least a fcw common fcatures of both positivism and Buddhism which probably havc becn opcrativc in many of thesc “convcrsions.“

Both positivism and Buddhism rested on cpistcmological phenome-nalism; both rcduced the “sclf" or “ego” to a mcrc “grouping of sensa* tions”; and both rcjected the common sensc notion of "force” as a reality, as a causal determinant, and as an instrument for achicving human goals.²®

Ernst Maclfs rcjection of Christianity and partial acceptance of Buddhism werc logical conscquenccs of his stand on the question of “force,” and most likcly numerous other Buddhist “converts” havc reasoned or bcen influcnced in a similar way.²⁷

The Crusadcs, Reformation, and Counterreformation werc referred to by Mach as cvidencc that Christianity was not rcally opposcd to force itsclf but mcrcly to the misusc of force or to its employment by ■ the wrong people. This was not good cnough for him. Mach, as a ! Utopian, bclievcd that in 3n ontological sensc force was unrcal and that j in a practical sensc all violcr.cc could be climinated from human cxistence. Peacc could bccomc a natural human condition where policc-men and soldicrs werc superfluous, as if lions and wolvcs could be cducatcd to sec the advantagcs of cocxistcncc with sheep and lambs, even in the abscncc of shepherds.

Mach acccptcd the anarchist position of Buddhism on force, at least , in principle, but he denied its rcjection of scientific progress. Accord-ing to tradidonal Buddliist "lorę,” it was futilc to try to solvc human problcrns by acrive or scientific means. There would always be morę problcms, and there would always be morę unhappiness than happiness.

The only truć or “Eastern" solution was to climinatc conscious desires. "For he who ncvcr hopcs [or desires] can never despair.”²⁸ In spite o£ Mach’s rcjection of force hc still belicvcd that science could progress to the “Western" cxtcnt that happiness could he madę to prevail over unhappiness. Expresssed in “East-Wcst" terms, Mach’s phenomenalism and “internal" purposc of science werc "Oriental” and his Darwinism and “cxternar purpose of science “Occidental.” Regrcttably, the two hemispheres in Mach’s "world" did not fit together vcry well, and giving priority to his repudiation of “force" as it was normally under-stoocl by practical people, then Mach was logically a Buddhist and il-logically a bclicvcr in science.²⁰

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Richard Hónigswald in 1903 seems to havc bccn tiic first critic to point out the scveral rcsemblances bctwccn Mach’s philosophy and Buddhism. Nor was he gcntlc in referring to the inconsistencics in Machs point of vicw:

No less rich in relations is the practical sidc of his philosophy. Buddhist contempt for individual exi$tcncc and vigorous lifc affirraation, anti-occultist frcc thought and mystical will-mctaphysics all co<xist in pcaccful harmony and offer wclcomc points of association for the most diversc tcndcncics of his readers. . . . Machs Indian tcaching of rcnunciation, the Buddhist belief in the nothingness of individual cxistcnce, ineludes no cthical principle, for it contains no principlc of action.³⁰

Mach’s deatli year, 1916, saw a number of artides referring to Machs restoration of Buddhist doctrine on the “self" or “ego." An articlc by Hermann Bahr was critical, one by Carl Haas, neutral, but those by Kurt Schmidt and W. Fred were conspicuously pro-Mach and pro-Buddhist.³¹ The most enthusiastic observcr of Mach’s connection with the Oriental philosophy was Anton Lampa in Prague. His book Ernst Mach, published in 1918, ended as a pacan to Mach and Buddhism:

Alrcady at the age of $ixtccn to cightccn hc [Mach] had had an ex-pericncc . . . likc that of the youthful Buddha on his first journcy into the world whcrc hc saw the truth of suffering and discovcrcd the way to end it.⁸²

For Mach the morał order of the world is not the rcsult of theorctical spccuiation, but is a dcmand stemming out of the warm fccling of his hcart, from his ‘'Buddhist conscicnce.” ⁸⁸

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