abstract: The plateau pika (Ochotona curzoniae), a small burrowing lagomorph that occupies the high alpine grassland ecosystems of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau in western China, remains a controversial subject among policymakers and researchers. One line of evidence points to pikas being a pest, which has led to massive attempts to eradicate pika populations. Another point of view is that pikas are a keystone species and an ecosystem engineer in the grassland ecosystem of the QTP. The pika eradication program raises a difficult ethical and religious dilemma for local pastoralists, and is criticized for not being supported by scientific evidence. Complex interactions between pikas, livestock, and habitat condition are poorly understood. My dissertation research examines underpinning justifications of the pika poisoning program leading to these controversies. I investigated responses of pikas to habitat conditions with field experimental manipulations, and mechanisms of pika population recovery following pika removal. I present policy recommendations based on an environmental ethics framework and findings from the field experiments. After five years of a livestock grazing exclusion experiment and four years of pika monitoring, I found that grazing exclusion resulted in a decline of pika habitat use, which suggests that habitat conditions determine pika population density. I also found that pikas recolonized vacant burrow systems following removal of residents, but that distances travelled by dispersing pikas were extremely short (~50 m). Thus, current pika eradication programs, if allowed to continue, could potentially compromise local populations as well as biodiversity conservation on the QTP. Lethal management of pikas is a narrowly anthropocentric-based form of ecosystem management that has excluded value-pluralism, such as consideration of the intrinsic value of species and the important ecological role played by pikas. These conflicting approaches have led to controversies and policy gridlock. In response, I suggest that the on-going large-scale pika eradication program needs reconsideration. Moderation of stocking rates is required in degraded pika habitats, and Integrated Pest Management may be required when high stocking rate and high pika density coexist. A moderate level of livestock and pika density can be consistent with maintaining the integrity and sustainability of the QTP alpine steppe ecosystem. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Biology 2016

Submitted by Maike Costa (maiksebas@gmail.com) on 2017-02-20T12:20:24Z No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivo total.pdf: 2840810 bytes, checksum: e6466e083af7099d5f915d6aae95b390 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-02-20T12:20:24Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivo total.pdf: 2840810 bytes, checksum: e6466e083af7099d5f915d6aae95b390 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-06-20 / This study aims from a hermeneutic point of analysis, a comprehensive aproach about the development of the Bön religion, its interaction with Buddhism through Tibet, and from this meeting, its historical and philosophical developments, centered on the practice of Dzogchen as a possible bridge between Bön and the Nyingma tradition. A survey on the first studies focusing on the Bön religion in the Western academies shows a particular importance, in order to understand the nature of the first historical and philosophical conceptions regarding Bön. The classification of the historical development of Bön in three phases aims at a more pedagogical approach to the understanding of its history. A study of the first centuries from the spreading of Buddhism to Tibet, between VIII and XI centuries A.D., is thought to be particularly important for the understanding of the characteristics that Buddhism would acquire in Tibetan soil, due to the particular nature in which this process was taken. A synthesis of the teachings of the philosophical schools of Mahayana, together with a series of tantric practices, brought from India and Central Asia formed the basis of Tibetan Buddhism. During the first two centuries of the transmission of Buddhism in Tibet, two great masters had a decisive importance in this process, the monk Shantaraksita would be responsible for philosophical synthesis that would be adopted during this period as the basis for the monastic teachings and ordination of monks in Tibet. Next to this philosophical basis, tantric practices were brought, developed and disseminated by the master Padmasambhava, which formed the religious and philosophical basis of Tibetan Buddhism. During this process, the practice of Dzogchen appears as a bridge between the two traditions, Nyingma and Bön, and through a study of its central elements as the mind-base concepts, rigpa and nature-of-mind, we seek to understand the possible similarities and differences between the two traditions. / O presente estudo objetiva uma análise de natureza hermenêutica acerca do desenvolvimento da religião Bön, sua interação com o Budismo através do Tibete, e, a partir deste encontro, seus desdobramentos históricos e filosóficos, centrado na prática do Dzogchen como uma possível ponte entre o Bön e a escola Nyingma. Um levantamento acerca dos primeiros estudos tendo como foco as religiões Bön dentro das academias ocidentais se mostra importante, para podermos compreender a natureza das primeiras concepções históricas e filosóficas à respeito do Bön. A classificação do desenvolvimento histórico do Bön em três fases visa uma abordagem mais pedagógica para a compreensão do mesmo. Um estudo dos primeiros séculos da chegada do Budismo ao Tibete, entre os séculos VIII e XI d.C., se mostra particularmente importante para a compreensão das características próprias que o Budismo iria adquirir em solo tibetano, devido à particular natureza na qual se deu este processo. Uma síntese entre os ensinamentos das escolas filosóficas do Mahayana, aliada à uma série de práticas tântricas, trazidas da Índia e da Ásia Central formaram a base do Budismo tibetano. Durante os dois primeiros séculos da transmissão do Budismo no Tibete, dois grandes mestres tiveram importância decisiva no processo, o monge Shantaraksita seria o responsável pela síntese filosófica que seria adotada durante este período como a base para os ensinamentos monásticos e ordenação dos monges no Tibete. Junto à esta base filosófica, as práticas tântricas trazidas, desenvolvidas e difundidas pelo mestre Padmasambhava formam a base religiosa, e filosófica do Budismo no Tibete. Durante este processo, a prática do Dzogchen aparece como uma ponte entre as duas tradições, Nyingma e Bön, e através de um estudo de seus elementos centrais como os conceitos de mente-base, rigpa e natureza-da-mente, buscamos compreender as possíveis semelhanças e diferenças entre ambas as tradições.

This works seeks to examine a small selection of biographies of Padmasambhava, the figure who introduced and spread the Buddhist teachings in Tibet during the eighth century. These writings appear to have a function that goes beyond merely recounting the details of Padmasambhava’s life and works. Two of these functions – the transmission of various teachings and support for the Tibetan identity – have been the main focus for my investigation.

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The figure of the Tibetan Buddhist nun as a female monastic is situated within a matrix of complexities and contradictions that are constituted by textual and doctrinal sources, Tibetan social views on gender and female monasticism, and experiential realities. In order to understand the situation of nuns, one first must understand that monasticism, mainly the order of monks, has been a highly respected and financially supported institution in Tibetan society for centuries. However, because the histories of Tibetan nuns and female renunciants have gone primarily undocumented, their lineages and stories are much more opaque than those of Tibetan monks. Therefore, most of the scholarship on female Buddhist practitioners, with the exception of a few extraordinary yoginis, dates after the Chinese occupation of Tibet in the 1950s. Historically it is believed that there were a few great nunneries that existed centuries ago, but the majority of Tibetan nunneries have been smaller and lacking in the lay support and funding granted to monasteries. Currently, however, the landscape of Tibetan nuns is beginning to shift, as new resources and educational opportunities are beginning to be made available for Tibetan nuns in exile. It is on these nuns and nunneries in exile that this thesis will focus.

Popular literature on Tibetan Buddhism often overemphasizes the psychological dimension of the religion's beliefs and practices. This misrepresentative portrayal is largely traceable to the writings of the psychoanalyst C.G. Jung. By employing distinctly psychological terminology and interpretive strategies in his analyses of the Tibetan Book of the Dead and mandala symbolism, Jung helped to establish precedents that were adopted in subsequent analyses of the religion. Imposing a psychological lens on Tibetan Buddhism obscures other essential elements of the tradition, such as cosmology, physiology, and ritualism, thereby silencing the voices of Tibetans in analyses of their own practices. Jung's imposition of his own voice in place of that of Tibetans has commonly been criticized as an act of intellectually imperializing Orientalism that furthers Jung's personal aims of solidifying his system of analytical psychology. This thesis supports and demonstrates the validity of that critique through close analyses of Jung's commentaries on Tibetan Buddhism. However, Jung’s psychoanalytic perspective and qualifying comments found elsewhere in his corpus ultimately contextualize his commentaries and reveal that his writings on Tibetan Buddhism should not be treated as shedding light on the religion. Rather, they offer an additional lens for understanding analytical psychology. Furthermore, Jung's perspective as a psychoanalyst demonstrates the inherent instability of Orientalist epistemology that attempts to make sense of Eastern cultures on Western terms. Derridean deconstruction of Jung's commentaries reveals that the laws of psychoanalysis subvert those of Orientalism, thus allowing us to undermine the Orientalist episteme in which Jung writes and creates the possibility for appropriating foreign cultural content differently

The work deals with the issue of Tibetan Buddhism and is divided into two parts, the theoretical and practical. The first chapter is devoted to the creation and deve-lopment of Tibetan Buddhist, its teachings and the four main schools. The second chapter describes the spread of Tibetan Buddhism to the West. The chapter also contains a description of operating centers, schools and organizations in the Czech Republic. The third chapter focuses on description and explanation of meditation and meditation practices that are typical of Tibetan Buddhism. The practical part is devoted to meditation experiences and how they are perceived in everyday life. The practical part includes a transcript of several interviews with active Buddhists from various Buddhist centers in the Czech Republic. The end of the chapter is a commentary and assessment of interviews.

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This study traces the development of Tibetan 'treasure' texts and practices in contemporary times via the life-story and scriptural revelations of the Tibetan 'treasure revealer' (gter ston) Kun bzang bde chen gling pa (1928-2006). It examines how his revelations (gter ma) rooted in the historic spirituality of Tibet, continue and adapt into the twenty first century. The study is important in order to understand the ways this Asian religious concept develops and coalesces in North America. With the dramatic advances in communication through digital technology, it examines how gter ma texts and practices reach a modern audience. Also discussed are the implications of centuries old debates surrounding Buddhist lineage, transmission and ‘authenticity’ as well as concepts such as liberty, equality and authority. All of which are culture-specific constructions that differ radically when seen from a variety of perspectives. The main conclusion drawn from this research is that as a Western Vajrayāna ‘tradition’ emerges and intersects with older Tibetan forms, both must attempt to find a middle path between their differing applications and interpretations if they are to avoid drifting into an arena of extensive commercialisation, dilution and distortion.