Hellenistic philosophy - Ajñāna scepticism - Buddhism

#type/note #topic/classics #topic/classics/Buddhism #topic/classics/Indo-Greek

Diogenes
↓
Onesicritus ─────→ Indian gymnosophists
↓ ↑
Alexander's expedition ────┘
↑
Pyrrho + Anaxarchus
↓
Indian gymnosophists
↓
Pyrrhonism

Onesicritus ( a disciple of Diogenes ) and Pyrrho were both in the Alexander expedition at approximately the same time and in the same geographical Gandhara theatre

	Cynicism→	Pyrrhonism→	Stoicism	Early Buddhism

Fundamental problem	Artificial needs	Dogmatic judgment	Misvaluation	Craving / attachment
What enslaves us?	Convention	Belief	False value judgments	Attachment
Ideal	Self-sufficiency	Tranquility	Virtuous rational life	Liberation
Key concept	Autarkeia	Epochē	Apatheia	Nirvāṇa
Method	Radical simplicity	Suspend judgment	Rational discipline	Ethical/meditative discipline
Attitude to externals	Reject them	Suspend judgment about them	Indifferent to moral worth	Non-attachment
Social convention	Attack it	Don't dogmatize about it	Accept selectively	See through its impermanence
Metaphysics	Minimal	Suspended	Strongly developed	Complex but non-theistic in distinctive ways