Abstract

I thank Sean Smith and Monima Chadha for their reviews of Attention, Not Self and for their commentary. It has been rewarding to think through the issues they have raised, and I am grateful to both.Let me begin with the methodological principle that Sean Smith endorses at the beginning of his review. Smith says this: "My main argument is that Ganeri attributes views to Buddhaghosa that the latter does not hold. Embedded in this complaint is the assumption that we should try to get a thinker right and on their own terms as a precursor to seeing how their views interface with those of others. It is an assumption I will rely on throughout." Let me call this the Exegesis First assumption. The assumption takes the form...