Hiroshi Tasaka
Tokyo Journal columnist Hiroshi Tasaka is President of Think Tank SophiaBank, Former Special Advisor to Japan Prime Minister Naoto Kan, World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council Member and Tama University Professor. He graduated from the University of Tokyo with a Ph. D. in Nuclear Engineering in 1981. From 1987, he worked at the Battelle Memorial Institute and also at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratories in the USA. In 1990, he participated in founding the Japan Research Institute. In 2000, he became a Professor at Tama University in Tokyo and founded Think Tank SophiaBank. Dr. Tasaka is a philosopher who has put forward a wide range of ideas, theories and philosophies. He is the author of more than 60 books.
Two Stonecutters
Two Stonecutters
Zen Wind from Tasaka Juku
One day, a traveler stopped by a town
where a new church was being built.
There, two stonecutters were working.
Being Like a Rock in a Tea Garden
Being Like a Rock in a Tea Garden
Living “as” Nature not “with” it
Living “as” Nature not “with” it
Ilya Prigogine, a late Nobel Prize winner for chemistry, once wrote in a book of his: “Humans were created from nature but are still a part of it.”
Enishi in the Modern World
Destined Encounter of Enishi in the Modern World
"Every encounter in our lives has meaning"
IN Japan, people sometimes say, “This is enishi,” or “This is en,” when they meet someone for the first time. Enishi, known casually as en, means “a destined encounter.” The word holds a great deal of significance for the people of Japan. They believe that if two people never cross paths in life, there is no enishi between them. Certain life events thus take on a new meaning, each with a different implication. For example, a man and a woman may meet and eventually marry — this would be one form of positive enishi. Even a criminal and a victim can possess enishi, but in the form of a tragedy. As if to further validate this idea, there is another famous saying in Japan that states, “It is the result of enishi in the former life that someone meets a person in this life.” In fact, at this moment thereare more than 7.3billion people living on Earth, but in our short life we could have intimate and close relationships with less than 100 of them.
Buddhism
Buddhism
Interview with Philosopher Dr. Hiroshi Tasaka
TJ: How do you define Buddhism?
TASAKA: Buddhism is a kind of “cosmology” that can accept various value systems - not only religions but philosophies that exist around the world. Zen Buddhism, especially, is a “philosophy of contradiction” that can accept all the contradictions in our life, because contradiction is an essence of life. An important thing in Buddhism is the ability to keep the contradictions in mind, to keep gazing at them and think about the meaning of the contradictions.
Capitalist Societies in the Future
What Will Happen in Capitalist Societies in the Future?
Dialogue on the Future of Modern Civilization
Human Society is Developing Dialectically
TJ: What will happen in capitalist societies in the future?
TASAKA: This question is an extremely important one today at a moment when global capitalism is being confronted by some extremely serious obstacles. But because the question is historical in its dimensions, simply relying on a “technology to predict the future” will not provide the answers. What we need, instead, is to understand a “philosophy to foresee the future.” In other words, we need to understand a philosophy that talks about the laws that underlie change, development and evolution in our world.
NUCLEAR CRISIS: HIROSHI TASAKA
Fukushima: A Global Issue
Nuclear expert, philosopher, strategist, social entrepreneur and former advisor to Prime Minister Kan, Dr. Hiroshi Tasaka shares his views on Japan’s nuclear crisis.
Why should Japan stop relying so heavily on nuclear energy? The answer is simple. There is a backend problem in the nuclear fuel cycle that doesn’t allow for the final disposal of nuclear waste in the country.
The Science Council of Japan, the highest authority of academia in the country, submitted an official recommendation to the Japanese government on September 11, 2012 arguing that the geologic disposal of nuclear waste should not be carried out in Japan because current science cannot prove its long-term safety.
NUCLEAR CRISIS: HIROSHI TASAKA
INTERVIEW SERIES WITH PRIME MINISTER KAN’S SPECIAL ADVISOR & NUCLEAR EXPERT DR. HIROSHI TASAKA
Nuclear expert, philosopher, strategist, social entrepreneur and former advisor to Prime Minister Kan, Dr Hiroshi Tasaka shares his views on Japan.
TJ: What role have you played in serving as an Advisor to Prime Ministers?
Tasaka: On March 29, 2011, shortly after the March 11 Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant accident, I was appointed by the Prime Minister of Japan Naoto Kan as his Special Advisor to serve him as an expert of nuclear engineering in an effort to cope with the accident. My role as a Special Advisor to the Prime Minister shifted from devising a way to stop the accident to proposing ways to reform nuclear regulations and nuclear industries, as well as investigating ways to change national energy policy.
I resigned from the position on September 2, 2011, when the cabinet changed. I had served as an advisor for five months and five days during the most critical period after the accident.
