From Buddha to Peter Singer
By: Tim Aaron Gashiz
Tags: Utilitarianism, Buddhism, Karma, Peter Singer, Religion

From Buddha to Peter Singer

Is Karma a form of utilitarianism?

About six years ago, I had a chance encounter with a smart, successful entrepreneur. We met in a co-working space from where she was remotely monitoring her business empire. Within minutes, she poked holes in my own business plans and impressed me with her wit and ambition.

Later in the evening, we joined friends for dinner, and she declined to drink alcohol. Abstinence from alcohol is not something I usually question. But she must have been used to justifying herself, cause she explained: “I am not drinking because I am a Buddhist.”

I was not yet aware that Buddhists couldn’t drink and inquired further. She explained, “drinking intoxicants would be punished in the next cycle of re-birth. If I drink alcohol, I will be re-born with only one arm”.

I looked at her, wondering whether she was joking. She wasn’t.

At the time, I was shocked that such a brilliant mind could subscribe to such a literal interpretation of reincarnation. Reincarnation was for me an allegory, as was the creation myth of Adam and Eve. It took me aback that someone I admired would take it at face value.

Many years later, I came to a more moderate point of view. I now feel the concept of karma fits within my worldview. Karma actually relates to a philosophy I wholeheartedly embrace: utilitarianism.

What is Karma?

Karma is the Sanskrit word for “action”. More accurately, it expresses “wilful action”, an action done with clear intent.

Karma is the accounting system for one of the primary Buddhist laws: actions have consequences.

Or in the words of the Buddha:

“Beings are owners of their actions, heirs of their actions; they originate from their actions, are bound to their actions, have their actions as their refuge. It is action that distinguishes beings as inferior and superior.”

Pali Canon — Sutra on the Law of Karma

If you suffer in the present life, it is the consequence of bad karma accumulated from previous lives (you gathered “karma debt”). But if you act wisely in this life, you may improve your condition in the next life (by earning some “karma credit”).

Karma thus pulls people in either a vicious or a virtuous circle. If you accumulated good karma in the past, it would be easier for you to live a righteous life today and move forward toward enlightenment.

Here, monks, someone generates a non-afflictive volitional formation of body, speech, or mind. Having done so, he is reborn in a non-afflictive world. When he is reborn in a non-afflictive world, non-afflictive contacts touch him. Being touched by non-afflictive contacts, he experiences a non-afflictive feeling, extremely pleasant […]. This is called bright karma with bright results.

Pali Canon — Sutra on the Law of Karma

This is the reason why my new friend was concerned about drinking. Her accumulating bad karma in this life would have negative consequences in her next life and keep her from achieving enlightenment.

At first sight, the law of karma looks like a cosmic talion law. “An eye for an eye”: if you hurt someone, you will be hurt back in a similar fashion.

There is, however, a more subtle reading of the karma law. To understand it, we will dive into a philosophy that appeared more than 2,000 years after the teaching of the Buddha.

Let’s talk about utilitarianism.

What is utilitarianism?

Utilitarianism can sound like a barbarous name (undoubtedly challenging to pronounce for non-native speakers), but it reflects a simple idea. It is a theory that recommends maximizing the well-being of the majority of the population.

The term was coined by Jon Stuart Mill, a 19th-century British philosopher. Mill put his philosophy in simple terms:

[The] standard is not the agent’s own greatest happiness, but the greatest amount of happiness altogether;

Jon Stuart Mill — Utilitarianism

The idea may seem common sense, but it has far-reaching consequences. A modern utilitarian, Peter Singer, illustrates it in a provoking thought experiment in his book “The life you can save”.

You’re on your way to work, wearing brand new clothes. You pass by a pond and see a young child drowning. There is no one else around. You can move on and get to work on time or save the child, ruin your clothes, and get to work late. What do you do?

Most people would answer “I’d save the child, of course”.

But Peter Singer is a tricky philosopher. He then suggests that we are, in fact, always in a position to save a child at a minor expense.

Saving or dramatically improving someone’s life would only cost a few hundred bucks. It might cost less than the clothes you would have ruined in his hypothetical pond. Peter Singer goes on affirming that we have a moral duty to make such donations and to make them in the way which would be the most efficient for society at large. This utilitarian movement is called “effective altruism”.

This is not the only application of utilitarianism to modern-day life. Self-driving cars can also be required to make utilitarian decisions when on the road. If a self-driving car gets caught in an accident, programming the car to hit the least number of people could be considered a utilitarian choice.

It is now time to connect the dots. What does utilitarianism have to do with karma?

Is karma a Buddhist form of utilitarianism?

According to Buddhist law, karma means that negative action has negative consequences. One will be punished in a future life for evil actions in the present life.

There is, however, one flaw in this logic: according to Buddhism, the self is also an illusion. All beings and things are all part of a whole. Our feeling of separation from other people and objects is a trick played by our mind. We are all one.

But if the self is an illusion, how can the self be punished through karma? This question is a contradiction only on the surface. In fact, it is an explanation for karma. Because we are one with the rest of the universe, when we are hurting others, we are always hurting ourselves.

Karma is not a divine retribution law. It is, once again, an accounting tool. Through karma, I can keep track of the damage I am doing to the universe (and therefore to myself) while still under the delusion of a separate self.

Because we are one with the rest of the universe, when we are hurting others, we are always hurting ourselves.

Because we are one with the universe, we should strive for its well-being. Which reminds us of… utilitarianism.

Karma and utilitarianism share the same goal: they encourage us to strive for the happiness of all beings around us. They both help us to consider every living creature as connected. More importantly: both concepts invite us to be more aware of the consequences of our actions.

Jon Stuart Mill already saw this connexion between utilitarianism and spirituality back in the 19th century.

If it be a true belief that God desires, above all things, the happiness of his creatures, and that this was his purpose in their creation, utility is not only not a godless doctrine, but more profoundly religious than any other.

Jon Stuart Mill — Utilitarianism

Mill also connects utilitarianism with Jesus’s words:

In the golden rule of Jesus of Nazareth, we read the complete spirit of the ethics of utility. To do as one would be done by, and to love one’s neighbour as oneself, constitute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality.

Jon Stuart Mill — Utilitarianism

Under this perspective, karma is no longer a “tit for tat”, punitive belief, meant to scare people into acting morally. It becomes a profoundly aware philosophy. Karma makes us mindful of the consequences of our actions on a universe we are deeply intertwined with.

How far does the analogy go?

Karma is, however, not identical to utilitarianism.

One simple reason might be that there are many kinds of interpretations of karma, and many different types of utilitarian theory (some utilitarians will want to maximize the average happiness of society, others will want to maximize the total happiness, etc.)

There are also some more striking differences between karma and utilitarianism. Many utilitarians focus on the consequences of actions, while Buddhism is more focused on intent. For instance, negative thoughts would produce bad karma (while they wouldn’t necessarily be relevant for a utilitarian if they aren’t followed by action)

But beyond these differences, connecting karma with utilitarianism remains deeply satisfying. It enables us to reconcile ancient wisdom about the illusion of the self with a very modern desire for action. And it shows us that, from Buddha to Peter Singer, the thought leaders of old and recent times all shared a deep concern for a more caring world.