User:Abe2008/Jim Eubanks

Jim Eubanks is the founder and abbot of the Order of Pragmatic Buddhists (OPB) and Director of Buddhist Studies at the Center for Pragmatic Buddhism (CPB), located in St. Louis, MO. He is also a chiropractic physician (DC) and is currently completing graduate studies at Logan University in St. Louis, MO in sports science and rehabilitation. In addition to his work in Pragmatic Buddhism, Dr. Eubanks is a student of Norman Kettner, DC, DACBR, the chair of radiology at Logan College of Chiropractic and major collaborator on fMRI research at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Eubanks and Dr. Kettner are working on research to examine the comprehensive body of scientific literature available on the neural correlates of meditation.

In 2007, Eubanks Sensei established a CPB Advisory Board with leading figures in Buddhism and pragmatic philosophy, including Roger Ames PhD (editor of Philosophy East and West), Stephen Batchelor (author of Buddhism Without Beliefs) and Tom Clark (director of the Center for Naturalism).

Pragmatic Buddhism
Pragmatic Buddhism is informally used to describe an approach to Buddhism that de-emphasizes traditional elements, and particularly rituals. Eubanks Sensei has promoted a very specific concept of Pragmatic Buddhism since 2006, which is the result of the synthesis of three major schools of Buddhism (Nikayan (early Indian), Chinese Chan and Japanese Zen) with the American pragmatist tradition. This philosophical view of Pragmatic Buddhism is explored in a quarterly e-publication, The Pragmatic Buddhist.