mu

plural mus

1. countableuncountableThe 12th letter of the Modern Greek alphabet.

1. Zen BuddhismNeither yes nor no.

   A monk once asked Master Joshu, 'Has a dog the Buddha Nature or not?' Joshu said, 'Mu!'

   2010, Joan Price, Sacred Scriptures of the World Religions, page 70

   4 more examples

   Mu means "no thing." Like "Quality" it points outside the process of dualistic discrimination. Mu simply says, "No class; not one, not zero, not yes, not no."[…]It's a great mistake, a kind of dishonesty, to sweep nature's mu answers under the carpet.

   1974, Robert M[aynard] Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values, New York, N.Y.: William Morrow & Company, →ISBN

   [p. 233] Achilles: Oh, but ‘MU’ is Jōshū’s answer. By saying ‘MU’, Jōshū let the other monk know that only by not asking such questions can one know the answer to them. Tortoise: Jōshū “unasked” the question. [p. 312] Achilles:[…]And the answer of “MU” here rejects the premises of the question, which are that one or the other must be chosen.

   1979, Douglas Hofstadter, Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, Basic Books, →ISBN, →OCLC

   "Mu," said Kelly Dahl. On one level mu means only yes, but on a deeper level of Zen it was often used by the master when the acolyte asked a stupid, unanswerable or wrongheaded question such as "Does a dog have the Buddha-nature?" The Master would answer only, "Mu," meaning—I say "yes" but mean "no," but the actual answer is: Unask the question.

   1996, Dan Simmons, “Looking for Kelly Dahl”, in The Year's Best Science Fiction, page 424

   The Fifth Patriarch's utterance You say mu [Buddha-nature] because Buddha-nature is emptiness articulates clearly and distinctly the truth that emptiness is not "no". In uttering Buddha-nature-emptiness one does not say "half a pound." One does not say "eight ounces." One says "mu."

   2002, Norman Waddell, Masao Abe, The Heart of Dōgen's Shōbōgenzō, page 72

1. uncountableZen BuddhismNothingness; nonexistence; the illusory nature of reality.

   If mu is mind, consciousness, it is nothing.

   2013, Maura O'Halloran, Pure Heart, Enlightened Mind, →ISBN

   3 more examples

   That being the case, we should naturally choose to contemplate mu from morning to night, forgetting everything.

   2012, Omori, Introduction To Zen Training, →ISBN, page 115

   Consequently, though mu is mindlike, the likeness to individual consciousness cannot be pushed very far.

   2012, Dr Robert Wilkinson, Nishida and Western Philosophy, →ISBN

   The monk posed to Chaoi-chou a question: Does a dog have a buddha nature or not?" Chao-chou, without a moment's hesitation, answered, “Mu." (Translated as "No.")

   2013, Sean Murphy, Natalie Goldberg, One Bird, One Stone: 108 Contemporary Zen Stories, →ISBN, page xvii

1. A unit of surface area, currently equivalent to two-thirtieths of a hectare.

   Of 114 village farming families, only ten had more than 30 mu of land and only five had more than 60 mu.

   2007, Chang Liu, Peasants and Revolution in Rural China: Rural Political Change in the North China Plain and the Yangzi Delta, 1850-1949, page 87

   3 more examples

   The Lucky Star Co-operative in Chuwo County on the plains of southern Shansi had, before the anti-Japanese war, 26 wells, 4 water-wheels and 166.1 mou of irrigated fields, 4.82 per cent of its total arable land.

   中国农业合作化的道路

   [1959 September, Tung Ta-lin [董大林], “The Inevitability of Quick Transition from Lower to Higher Stage of Agricultural Co-operation”, in Agricultural Co-operation in China [中国农业合作化的道路] (China Knowledge Series), 2nd edition, Peking: Foreign Languages Press, →OCLC, page 72

   Good news on the summer harvest prevailed in the countryside of Chienchiang County, Hupeh. The county reported remarkable increased in its 600,000 mou of summer food crops this year, surpassing the yield in 1962 which was considered as the best year.

   [1965 July 9 [1965 June 7], “Chienchiang County Reports Increase in Crops”, in Daily Report: Foreign Radio Broadcasts, number 131, Foreign Broadcast Information Service, sourced from Wuhan Domestic Service, →OCLC, page DDD 2

   Pengyang county was administered by Guyuan before 1988. In contrast to Guyuan, Pengyang is relatively wealthy. Farmers earn a considerable income through tobacco cultivation, which can yield an annual gross income of Rmb 1,500-2,000 per mu. In 1996, the cultivated area of tobacco in Pengyang was 11,000 mu.⁷

   2004, Peter Ho, “The Wasteland Auction Policy in Northwest China: Solving Environmental Degradation and Rural Poverty?”, in Rural Development in Transitional China: The New Agriculture, →ISBN, →ISSN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 125

1. A hypothetical or legendary continent that allegedly existed in the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean.

plural Mus

1. μ (a mu particle)

1. Mu (a river in Burma).

1. abbreviationinitialismInitialism of North Maluku: a province of Indonesia.
2. abbreviationbusinessAbbreviation of Micron Technology.

   Kishida told the executives, including those from Micron Technology Inc (MU), Intel Corp (INTC) and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSM) (TSMC), that stabilizing supply chains would be a topic of discussion at the G7 talks in the western city of Hiroshima.

   2023 May 18, Reuters, “Chipmakers look to Japan as worries about China grow”, in CNN Business

3. abbreviationinitialismInitialism of University of Missouri

   Synonyms: Mizzou

plural MUs

1. abbreviationinitialismInitialism of matchup.
2. abbreviationinitialismrail transportInitialism of multiple unit.
3. PhilippinesabbreviationinitialismslanguncountableInitialism of mutual understanding
4. PhilippinesslangA person engaged in a situationship