ABSTRACT
The doctrine of Emptiness, which simultaneously denies and affirms both existence and non-existence is central to the Madhyamaka or "Middle School" of Buddhism that Nagarjuna founded in the second century. Sunyata (Sanskrit) is most commonly translated as "emptiness". Emptiness, rather than designating a lack of substance, signifies a type of relationship, that of inter-dependent-origination or codependent-origination. In Glass's work on interpreting Emptiness in light of Deleuzian philosophy, a clear ethics of desire is articulated, one in which the choice of 'pleasure' is defined as unethical, and the apprehension of the ethical relies on the cultivation of perception and sensation. The discussion of Glass' examination of the relations between Deleuzian desire and Buddhism will now be taken up with specific regard to Tibetan Buddhism and ghosts, the latter being understood as an 'embodiment' of concurrent presence, absence. "Buddhist emptiness might then be that state achieved when the field of defiled love or desire gives way to the field of selfless compassion".
