Medicines that are non addictive and non-habit forming should not be made illegal by governments or prohibited by religious doctrine. Per Dr. Gabor Mate's in the Realm of the Hungry Ghosts book, addiction is a behaviour, it's not about the substance at all (e.g. how many people get morphine in hosp...

Sounds like your own ideas. It appears a practicing Buddhist or "lay follower" takes the precepts. What would it mean for a lay follower to take the Triple Refuge but not follow the 5 precepts, particularly the Dhamma refuge? Why would a Buddhist lay follower follow a course of action that leads to...

Addiction is rife in spiritual circles (as in all walks of life) it is possible to be very wise and insightful yet still have a big unresolved area of life. With a bit of spiritual bypassing and a bit of your poison of choice you find an equilibrium and the unresolved stuff follows you into the next...

We cannot know. But we do know for sure is the Buddha prohibited taking such substances. Such karma is far worse than killing a terrorist bee. He prohibited it for monks. For lay people buddhism does not contain commandments, just optional practice instructions. You can take the precepts, or not. T...

My sympathies to your friend. I have a skin disorder, nowhere near as debilitating as what his sounds, and know what an effect it can have on one's life. Has he considered alternative medicine? Or is he more looking for ways to cope with it mentally? Steroids for skin conditions can also lead to wor...

JamesTheGiant wrote: ↑Sun Jan 03, 2021 7:08 am I think that's worth discussing. It's not often someone declares their own enlightenment, and is willing to talk about it at length.

Plenty of them online!

Chownah raises an important issue; a lot of volunteer opportunities abroad are designed to meet the needs of the volunteer rather than the community they are supposedly serving. They can do more harm than good, for instance by denying local people paid work, by having inexperienced and unfamiliar pe...

...There are many puthujannas who are incapable of attaining right view, and are forever hopeless, these people are best dealt with by being permanently ignored and removed from the community... Ouch! (especially in the family life and relationships subforum) Aside: Are many of us in a position to ...

There are also accounts of the donor heart recipient experiencing changes, for instance in personality and tastes. Amd there are stories of intense connections between the recipient and the donor's loved ones. So a little of the donor's heart base remnants may well be transplanted too, sometimes. "C...

lostitude wrote: ↑Sun Dec 06, 2020 2:12 pm Because it seems closest to what the Buddha actually taught, and because in general it seems to be the branch of Buddhism that attaches the least importance to mythology and focuses instead on the cure-disease approach through individual responsibility.

Same!

I think this is a matter of social contract and if you believe it or recognize it. Ah good point! Well summarized :twothumbsup: So are social contract questions outside the territory of Buddhist ethics? A lot of my own little moral quandaries are of this nature and thinking 'well, there's no dark k...

If you resolutely refuse to pay for goods and services unless you know that the recipient of your money will definitely pay tax on the grounds that you are otherwise contributing towards theft, then you might also consider what the government will use the money for. Is it better that a peaceable tr...

It's a hypthetical that helps me decide whether I consider my choices ethical or not, which is what I am sharing with you. It works for my peace of mind, YMMV.

Both. If I pay for services or goods, I haven't broken the law, my kamma is good, and I can rest easy. What the new owner of that money does with it is their concern. the OP's question seems to be about knowingly paying someone black Nobody has ever said to me "Cash please, as I don't want to pay t...

Someone sells you a service or an item and you pay them for it. What is the problem? chownah If you pay them the agreed price, then for you there is no problem. You can even ask them for a receipt as proof of that, if you pay in cash. If they are paid in cash and don't record that on their tax retu...