The Centrality of Compassion in Human Life and Society

Stanford University has announced a visit by His Holiness the Dalai Lama scheduled for October 14-15, 2010 during which he will give a public lecture titled, The Centrality of Compassion in Human Life and Society. Following the public lecture there will be a scientific symposium on October 15th titled, Scientific Explorations of Compassion and Altruism.

The invitation was extended by dean of the Stanford School of Medicine, Philip Pizzo and James Doty, founder and director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University.

Interest in the neurosciences by the Dalai Lama has spanned over two decades, says Doty. It is this interest that stimulated his involvement in the research that Doty initially began in an informal way with a number of Stanford scientists and ultimately led His Holiness to make the largest personal contribution he has ever made to scientific research to CCARE.

The scientific symposium will include a dialogue between His Holiness and Stanford researchers and collaborators in which the results of a number of scientific studies sponsored by CCARE focused on compassion and altruism will be presented. This meeting will also present, for the first time, the results from studies utilizing a compassion training protocol developed at Stanford.

His Holiness through his writing and speeches has always maintained that the core of a happy life is compassion and altruism, we hope through the groundbreaking work that we are doing at CCARE that we can provide the science that confirms the truth to these statements, says Doty. Doty has demonstrated his own deep commitment to compassion not only through his work as a neurosurgeon but also through his philanthropic efforts which fund a number of initiatives improving healthcare throughout the world.

CCARE is an initiative within the Stanford Institute of Neuro-Innovation and Translational Neurosciences bringing together a multi-disciplinary team that includes psychologists, social scientists, neuroscientists and contemplatives from a number of traditions to rigorously examine the social, moral and neural bases of compassion and altruism and methods to cultivate such behaviors.