Changing Discourses of Perception & Knowledge in Buddhist Philsophy - Avinash Jha

Why perception?

I am going to present some preliminary results of my attempt to understand the continuities and discontinuities in Buddhist philosophy of perception in the course of its development over a millennium or so. This study of Buddhist philosophy is in the context of my study of perception and its role in shaping the horizon of all knowledge.

An inquiry into perception is likely to be classed as a specialized inquiry which no doubt would be interesting in itself for those who care to be quizzed by mysteries of seeing, hearing, touching etc. But why worry about perception, when what one is really interested in is the questions of knowing, being, suffering, for example. A table is table, paper is paper, and the marks on the paper that we write are marks. The really interesting stuff begins, it might seem, when we begin to ponder over the ‘meanings’ that are being created, reproduced, and so on.

If we look at Plato's dialogue 'Theaetetus' where the argument is going on whether perception is knowledge, we find a formulation that continues to shape the understanding of knowledge till date. In the middle of the dialogue a point is reached where it has been shown that perception is not knowledge.

“SOCRATES: Then perception, Theaetetus, can never be the same as knowledge or science?

THEAETETUS: Clearly not, Socrates; and knowledge has now been most distinctly proved to be different from perception.

SOCRATES: But the original aim of our discussion was to find out rather what knowledge is than what it is not; at the same time we have made some progress, for we no longer seek for knowledge in perception at all, but in that other process, however called, in which the mind is alone and engaged with being.”

Even the contemporary cognitive science continues to attempt laying bare the processes where “mind is alone and engaged with being”. Perception has the function of making available the bare beings, to draw beings into the horizon of reflection so that the process of knowledge can begin. Such ‘framing’ of perception has resulted in two mutually opposed understanding of perception.

One approach leads to a thorough ‘naturalisation’ of perception. Perception is just a natural phenomenon among other natural phenomena. The opposite approach which Merleau-Ponty has called ‘intellectualism’, seeks to reduce perception to a primarily mental phenomenon. In both these approaches, perception turns out to be something that is ‘given’, whether it is determined by ‘nature’ or ‘culture’. We are seeking an approach which does not try to explain perception either by recourse to nature or culture. We take perception as the process through which we bring the realm of nature and culture together. It makes knowledge possible, but also sets limits to it.

The Process of Perception in Buddha’s Discourses

The following formula from Madhupindika Sutra, may be regarded as the ‘locus-classicus’ for insight into the process of perception:

Visual conciousness (cakkhuvinnanam), brethren, arises because of eye and material shapes; the meeting of the three is sensory impingement (phasso); because of sensory impingement arises feeling (vedana); what one feels, one perceives; what one perceives, one reasons about; what one reasons about, one turns into papanch; what one turns into papanch, due to that ‘papancha-sanna-sankha’ assail him in regard to material shapes cognizable by the eye, belonging to the past, the future and the present.

And bretheren, auditory conciousness arises because of ear and sounds…

…

…

Mental consciousness arises because of mind and mental objects…

[The story of the magician and the lion].

We notice that till we reach ‘feeling’ the language is impersonal and objective: visual conciousness ‘arises’, and so on. From then on, the language is personal: what one feels, one perceives. Towards the end, the language becomes impersonal again: ‘’papancha-sanna-sankha’ assail him in regard to material shapes…’ The process of perception contains within itself the roots of the processes by which the “I” or the subject is constructed. As we know, Buddhism is also known as ‘anatmavad’, i.e., the doctrine of no-self. ‘Papanch’ plays an important role in understanding how this happens. Papanch and papanch-sanna-sankha articulate the nature of concepts in their dynamic and static aspects respectively. Papanch points to proliferation or spread of concepts drawing from ‘panch’ which signifies 5 (or 10) owing to its association with the stretched palm(s) with its five fingers spread out. Papanch is used widely in the language with meanings of ‘spreading out’, expansion, diffuseness and manifoldness. It is used metaphorically also in the sense of ‘illusion’ and metaphysically in the sense of the manifest world. In the context of this Buddhist Sutra, it characterizes the tendency toward proliferation in the realm of concepts. ‘Papanch-sanna-sankha’ in contrast points to the congealing character of the concepts, its hardening, its stability. It is understood to mean concepts, reckonings, designations or linguistic conventions.

The role of papanch and papanch-sanna-sankha has been interpreted by Bhikku Nnanananda as:

The vicious proliferating tendency of the worldling’s consciousness weaves for him a labyrinthine network of concepts connecting the three periods of time through the processes of recognition, retrospection and speculation.

The formula that we started with is actually stated by Mahakaccana in order to elucidate a brief discourse of the Buddha in the same Madhupindika Sutta:

If, O monk, one neither delights in, nor asserts, nor clings to, that which makes one subject to papanch-sanna-sankha, then that itself is the end of the proclivities to attachment, views, pride, ignorance and attachment to becoming. That itself is the end of taking the stick, of taking the weapon, of quarreling, contending, disputing, accusation, slander and lying speech. Here it is that all these evil unskilled states cease without residue.

What we are being asked to not delight in, nor assert, nor cling to is the process of perception which in its natural conditioning leads to the proliferation of concepts which condition the perpetuation of the fruitless search for fulfilling of self. ‘Delighting in’ ( ‘tanha’ or craving), ‘asserting’ (‘mana’ or conceit), and clinging to (ditthi or views) mark the intrusion of self or “I” in the process of perception. Viewed from one angle, the notion of “I” with the accompanying notions of ‘my’ and ‘mine’, leads towards craving (tanha). Viewed from another angle, it is bound up with the notion of “not-I”, or ‘thou’ and ‘thine’, it is a form of measuring or value judgment leading to conceit (mana). Viewed from a third angle, “I” occasions the dogmatic adherence to the concept of a self as a theoretical formulation, to a ‘view’. This exemplifies the triple-nature of the conditionally arisen self – ‘this is mine’, ‘this am I’, and ‘this is my self’. The self, ego, or “I” arises as a result of various factors, avidya or ignorance among them. Because of Avidya, this complex interdependently arisen process resolves itself into subject and object, “I” and the world. As Nnanananda notes:

The label ‘I’ thus superimposed on the complex contingent process, serves as a convenient fiction of thought or a short-hand device, and is in fact one of the shortest words in many a language.

But avidya is no first cause. There is no first cause, because these processes are beginning-less. The principle of ‘patitya sammutpad’ or ‘conditioned (or interdependent) co-arising’ is considered to be a foundational teaching of Buddhism. It elucidates the ‘bhava chakra’, the cycle of becoming, which is samsara. The ‘cycle’ here does not imply a return in time to where we started, but points to the recursive feature of causation. The ‘formula’ that we started with:

Visual conciousness (cakkhuvinnanam), brethren, arises because of eye and material shapes; the meeting of the three is sensory impingement (phasso)…This is not meant to convey that the process has terminals in time, that the process starts with eye and material shapes and terminates with ‘papanch-sanna-sankha’. Papanch-sanna-sankha may condition the arising of another episode of perception. Patitya

sammutpad is implied in all such ‘formulae’, but the following discourse of Buddha is often used for explicating the principle of patitya sammutpad.

Because of eye and material objects, brethren, arises visual consciousness; the meeting of the three is sensory impingement, because of sensory impingement arises feeling; because of feeling, craving; because of craving, grasping; because of grasping, becoming; because of becoming, birth; and because of birth, decay and death, grief, lamentation, suffering and despair arise. This is the arising of the world.

[From Nidana Samyutta of the Samyutta Nikaya]

“Ayam lokassa samudaya”. Thus arises the world. But there is no permanence. The world arises and gets dissolved. With a doctrine of ksana-bhang-vad or ‘momentariness’, Abhidhamma took up this thread.

Abhidhamma or Thoughts without a thinker

The above discussion is based on the ‘Sutta Pitaka’, the body of literature which consists of the sayings and discourses of the Buddha as they were recorded. This process of recording and the development of a fairly ‘standard’ body of ‘words of Buddha’ was done 2-3 hundred years after his time. Monks were memorizing and passing on these discourses, and over a period of time several ‘collections’ were produced. In several large assemblies of monks, sometimes mutually opposed, a large body of such collections became accepted by all as genuine discourses of Buddha and they were written down. These discourses were given on different occasions, with diverse people, and in response to various queries, questions, and dilemmas. But there is not a systematic exposition of the ‘dhamma’ (i.e. the ‘teaching’ of Buddhism). Attempts at systematic rendering of the ‘teaching’ might have begun during Buddha’s time, but certainly by the time Buddha’s discourses were written down, there is already of body of specialized literature.It went by the name of ‘Abhidhamma’, translated variously as ‘higher doctrine’, ‘special doctrine’, etc. Abhidhamma literature grew a great deal in the following period. It came to be known as the ‘third basket’ of Buddhist literature – the Abhidhamma pitaka. It exists both in Pali and Sanskrit. Around this time, Buddhist doctrine was divided into several schools (18, by traditional accounts).

In Abhidhamma, the human being is conceived as ‘stream of consciousness’ – citta santati. ‘Santati’ signifies a series of moments, a discrete ‘line’ or ‘pankti’. The human existence is analysed as a series of cittas.

The formal character of this series, or discrete line, is similar to speech, which is a discrete line of sounds. The conception of speech as a discrete series of sounds is articulated in association with the methodology of exact oral recounting of Vedas in particular, but also more generally in the oral culture of that time. This is the time when the whole transmission was dependent on orality. The times when Upanishads were

composed, Buddhism, Jainism and several other philosophical schools and sampradayas were thriving, this happened in without a culture of writing.

Abhidhamma introduces a doctrine of momentariness in the discrete line. Citta santati is characterized by a break, ksana bhang, which makes it discreet. Cettas are momentary, following one after another. The theory of ksana bhang conceives a complete break between two moments. A moment arises, stays and is dissolved. Then another moment of citta arises, stays and dissolves. These moments admit further granularity, provided bhang is found at any level of granules. What this means is that a moment can be further resolved into a series of moments. This process of analysis and discernment can go on till we reach the discrete events called ‘dhammas’. There are four fundamental or parmarthic dhammas; these can be called ‘irreducible units of experience’. Citta, a moment of consciousness, is the first of these parmarthic dhammas. In Theravad Abhidhamma, there is a bhawang-citta, a base consciousness, which is also momentary. It is sometimes envisaged as vibration. We can think of it as the clock of life ticking in each life form. But it has been ticking since beginning-less time, through rebirths. It has no origin in time. Each of these series of cittas is on a journey to nirvana.

Besides cittas, there are three parmarthic dhammas – chetasik, rupa and nibbana. A cotemporary Thai manual of Abhidhamma glosses these dhammas thus:

Citta, or consciousness, is the dhamma that is the leader in knowing what appears, such as seeing or hearing. (89 or 121 types)

Cetasika, or mental factor, is another type of dhamma which arises together with citta, experiences the same object as citta, falls away together with citta, and arises at the same base as citta. Cetasiks have each their own characterstics and perform each their own functions. (52 types)

Rupa, or physical phenomena, is the dhamma that does not know or experience anything, such as colour, sound, odour or flavor. (28 types)

Nibbana is the dhamma that is the end of defilements and the ceasing of dukkha. Nibbana does not have conditions which could cause its arising, it does not arise and fall away.

(A Survey of Paramattha Dhammas by Acharn Sujin Boriharnwanaket, available on the Internet.)

Further,

Phenomena such as anger, love, happiness or unhappiness are dhammas [cetasik dhammas] which are real, they are not self, not a being, not a person. They are dhammas that must arise together with cittas.

Any moment of experience can be ultimately resolved through analysis or discernment in terms of parmatthic dhammas. On the one hand, dhammas are discrete events that carry

their own mark (sva lakshanas) and arise in conjunction with cognitive awareness. They are irreducible units of experience which can not be simplified and analysed any further. On the other hand, dhammas are also objects of thought and reflection in as much as they too impinge upon the ‘stream of consciousness’. Therefore, the Abhidhamma enterprise is characterized by reflexivity concerning its own enterprise, prompting some commentators to call it a metapsychology. Insight into experience transforms the experience, and transforming experience means transforming everything. When we ‘see’ experience in terms of parmarthic dhammas, we are closest to what can be called seeing things as they are (yathabhutam).

Abhidhamma literature consists mainly of listings of different types of these dhammas and analyzing phenomena in terms of their embedding in the ‘stream of consciousness’. Centerpiece of such analysis is the analysis of the 17 moments process of clear perception or ‘tadalamban’. The claim is that any process of clear perception can be analysed into a maximum of 17 moments.

These 17 moments are characterized as follows:

1. Atita Bhavanga (past)2. Bhavanga chalan (disturbed)3. Bhavangupaccheda (arrested)4. Panch dwar vajjana(five sense-doors consciousness)5. Panch Vinnana (sense object apprehension)6. Sampatichanna (object focus citta)7. Santirana (investigating)

[These seven moments together are the passive part of the perception process.]

8. Votthapana (determinative, judgment)

9 to 15. Javana (impulsive)

16 to 17. Alambana (Impressive or Object-holding)In the Buddhist tradition, this analysis is explained through an example:

“A man is found sleeping soundly at the foot of a mango tree with his head covered with sheet. A wind blows and moves the branches of the tree causing a ripe mango to fall by his side. He is aroused from his sleep by this sound. He sees the fallen mango. He picks it up and examines it. Finding it to be desirable fruit he eats it, and after swallowing the last morsels, he replaces his head covering and resumes his sleep.”

The sleep of the man represents the unconscious bhavanga stream flowing undisturbed. The striking of the wind against the tree represents atita bhavanga or past unconscious. The sleeper is not disturbed and the sleep continues. So does the bhavanga. The moving of the branches represents the vibration of the bhavanga. The sleep is disturbed. So is bhavanga. The falling of the mango represents the arrest of the bhavanga. The awakening

of the man represents pancadvaravajjana or arousing of attention through the five-door channels of sense. The removal of the head covering and use of his eyes to observe the mango is chakku vinnana, or visual consciousness, which is one of the five types of consciousness together known as panch vinnana. The picking up of the fruit represents sampabicchanna or reception, and the examination of it represents sanirana or investigation. The finding of the fruit as a desirable mango is votthapana or decision. The eating of the fruit represents the apperceptive acts of the seven javana thought-moments. The swallowing of the last morsels left in the mouth represents tadalambana or registration of the impression. The man’s resumption of this sleep after replacing his head covering represents the bhavanga citta resuming to flow smoothly and undisturbed.

Waldron in his book ‘The Buddhist Uncouncious’ sums up:

…Abhidhammic discourse expressed in terms of dharmas has several distinct and interrelated characterstics:

(1) it depends upon a phenomenological analysis of experience in descriptive terms;

(2) it is metapsychological;

(3) it is a comprehensive description of experience in “systemic” terms, that is, in which all of its items are mutually defined and distinguished from each other;

(4) finally, Abhidharma thinkers considered an analysis of experience in terms of the dharmas as the only ultimate account of “how things really are” (yathabhutam)

This ‘dharmic discourse’ was the shared language among many differing schools during a whole era of Buddhist thinking. Its spread was across the divisions between Mahayana and Theravada.

Ultimate Reality and Conventional Reality

The Abhidhamma analysis opens a theoretical division between our ordinary experience and the ‘dhammic’ description of experience. These is conceptualized as the distinction between parmatthic sat and samvritti sat, which are usually translated as ultimate reality and conventional reality. It is also known as the doctrine of ‘two truths’ – the ultimate and the conventional. The role that views (ditthi), language and concepts play in the perpetuation of dukkha makes Buddhists circumspect regarding the role of language and concepts. Buddha uses the analogy of a boat to characterize his own teaching. We make a boat to cross the river. Having crossed the river on the boat, if we feel gratitude and attachment to this boat and decide to carry it on our head for the onward journey on land, it is nothing but foolishness. Same is true of all ‘views’. There was a line of interpretation in Theravada which modified this attitude to ‘views’ by stating that ditthi or ‘views’ mean false views. Then certain ‘views’ become the true ‘views’. The ‘teaching’ or the

dhamma itself, is the true view and therefore is to be regarded as not subject to all that is said regarding ‘views’ in the discourses.

Such an interpretation makes the distinction between parmarthic sat and samvrtti sat into a firm duality of opposition. They are no longer seen as the two ends of a continuum. It would seem that the two major schools of Buddhist thought that arose later were responding at least partly to this problematic. Madhyamaka, founded by Nagarjuna and Yogachar, founded by Asanga are those two schools. These two are also the two major philosophical articulations of the Mahayana Buddhism, or the Great Vehicle Buddhism, in this period.

In a series of works, Nagarjuna took various categories of thought, including the categories of Buddhism and of Abhidhamma in particular, and showed the basic inconsistencies that we get trapped in, once we invest them with substantive meaning. His conclusion was that all the concepts that we use are ultimately ‘empty’ and lest one imbue even emptiness with a substantial meaning, he claimed that emptiness was empty. By arguments using reductio ad absurdum to the hilt, he first destroyed all key concepts. But then he restored them as samvrtti sat or conventional truth. He argued that ultimately, the distinction between parmartha sat and samvrtti sat should itself be not taken as absolute, but as conventional. Nagarjuna is perhaps the most studied Buddhist philosopher in modern times.

Asanga’s philosophy is supposed to mark the third turning of the wheel of dhamma within the Mahayana Buddhism. In the first turning, ‘things’ are at the centre. In the second turning in the Madhyamaka, it is ‘sunya’ or void, which is at the centre. Third turning of Asanga shows the non-two nature of the ‘thing’ and ‘void’. In the works of Asanga and his illustrious and prolific brother, Vasubandhu, we see the attempt to reconcile Abhidhamma with its Madhyamaka critique. Both have written major works of Abhidhamma, but have advanced the distinct Yogachar re-articulation of the Buddhist viewpoint in their numerous other works in a textual philosophical style which was common to Indian philosophical discourse at the time. It must be remembered, though, that these philosophical articulations were also associated with meditational practices specific to each school. It would be interesting to explore whether this bond between systematic articulations and meditational practices was progressively growing weaker.

Asanga recasts the traditional distinction between parmaartha sat and samvrtti sat. In the “Tattvartha” chapter of his work “Bodhisattvabhumi”, Asanga advances a theory of three-fold nature of phenomena.

1. a mentally constructed and therefore imaginary nature (parikalpita)2. a dependent or relative nature (partantra), and3. a perfected or absolute nature (parinispanna)

Robert Thurman in his article “Buddhist Hermeneutics” tries to establish the relation between these three ‘natures’ (svabhava). “When all things are said to be empty of intrinsic substance, this only applies to them in their mentally constructed nature – they

continue to exist as relative things, and their ineffable relativity devoid of conceptual differentiation is their absolute nature.”

Asanga interprets Abhidhammic dharmas with the help of two principles: dharma nairatmya (dharmas have no independent self) and nirabhilapya svabhaavata (inexpressible nature of dharmas). All designations for individual characterstics of dharmas, e.g., rupa, vedana, nirvana etc., should be understood to be only a designation. This does not mean that names and dharmas do not exist in any way whatsoever. For Asanga, both are existent knowables, and may be known directly.

The problem arises because we are caught in the duality of being and non-being.

“… it should be understood that the correctly determined characteristic of reality is its non-two (advaya) nature, or constitution. The two are said to be being (bhaava) and non-being (abhaava).

With regard to those two, “being” is whatever is determined to have essential nature solely by virtue of verbal designation and as such is clung to by the worldly for a long time…

…when the basis of verbal designation, with recourse to which verbal designation operates, is insubstantial, non-ascertainable, non-existent, or non-present in any way whatsoever. This is said to be “non-being”.

The middle path is defined by Asanga as avoiding the two extremes of ‘being’ and ‘non-being’ with regard to any given thing. Such extremes lead to the belief that what can not be designated does not exist. ‘Parinispanna’, the perfected nature of phenomena can not be designated, yet it exists and can be known, can be known so directly, and this is the knowledge that the Buddhist seeker is after. The highest form of knowledge is known directly and fulfills the two conditions for such knowledge: knowing things as they are (bhutataa) and knowing in totality (sarvataa). But the highest form of knowledge (knowledge free of all obscurations to the knowable, free of jyeya-aavaran) also consists in knowing that the essential nature of designations, or name, and the essential nature of dharmas are the same. In stead of denying the existence of something or asserting its existence, what is to be understood is how each thing exists. Asanga goes on to critique the two assumptions: ‘Names impart essential nature to the things named’ and ‘things themselves dictate what names should be applied to them’. He argues instead that ‘names’ and ‘things’ arise in mutual interdependence. ‘Names’ and ‘things’ thus arising in mutual interdependence, constitute the relative existence (partantra) of the conventional realm.

‘Conventional’ has acquired an edge of arbitrariness in modern discourse perhaps on account of the theories of meaning. In the Saussurean context, convention is understood as arbitrary. In Asanga’s formulation, the connection between names and things is neither essential nor arbitrary, but conditionally arisen.

The “Logical” School and Dignaaga’s Discourse of Pramanas

We will only be able to brush through this, which is unfortunate. Actually it is not a school at all like Madhyamaka and Yogachaar. Dignaaga is a major figure not only Buddhism but for the whole of Indian philosophy. Dignaga initiated a Buddhist discourse of Pramanas which saw the production of several important works in following centuries. He also transformed the discourse of pramanas.

Pramanas are traditionally understood as ‘means of knowledge’. Though it also has the supplementary but equally important meanings of ‘evidence’ and ‘justification’. Pramana and other cognate words like prama (knowledge or truth), prameya (object of knowledge) etc. are employed when knowledge itself is under discussion. More accurately, the subject of discussion is ‘right knowledge’. The question is not so much ‘what is knowledge’ but ‘what is true knowledge’. Knowledge otherwise is referred by ‘jnana’, vidya, and so on. Pramana etc. come from the root verb ‘ma’ which means ‘to know’ but also ‘to measure’. We can say that in pramana discourse, we are taking a measure of knowledge.

Unlike Nagarjuna, Dignaga does not argue that the very idea of pramana is afflicted by ‘an-avastha’, i.e., infinite regress and therefore is untenable. He rather argues that characterizing pramana as ‘means of knowing’ is only a metaphorical usage in analogy with acts like cutting a tree with an axe where axe is a means for cutting tree. In fact, no distinction can be made between ‘knowledge’ and ‘means of knowledge’, or in other words between the ‘process’ of knowledge and the ‘product’ of knowledge. Dignaga proceeds by saying that there are two pramanas: pratyaksa (perception, direct knowledge) and anumaana (inferred knowledge). Knowledge from words, sabda pramana, is claimed to be another kind of knowledge through inference, but not an independent pramana.

There are two modes of knowledge, perception and inference, each with their own objects. Percpetion is knowledge without constructions (devoid of ‘kalpana’) - Nirvikalpa. The ‘nirvikalpa’ which is also the characterstic of highest form of knowledge (for example, in Asanga) is also the beginning of all knowledge. The first moment of all perceptions is nirvikalpa pratyaksa, a direct knowledge. This moment of nirvikalpa perception is followed by constructions of kalpana or imagination. Kalpana is attaching a name, a universal and so forth. “Name, universal, a thing specified by a quality, a thing specified by an action in case of verbs, a thing specified by a substance eg. Staffed or horned etc.” It is the knowledge that is given in experience, but it is not the ‘object’ which is given in experience. ‘The object ‘given’ in experience is in fact a conceptual construction itself. But there is ‘right knowledge’ in the realm of constructions as well which is ‘Anumana’ or inference.

How to understand Nirvikalpa pratyaksa: On the one hand, it is indubitable, unillusory knowledge, and the foundation of all knowledge. On the other, it is indeterminate, cannot be characterised even by 'this', it is characterized only by itself, svalakshana, it is devoid

of any ‘–tva’ (or ‘-ness’, chairness, redness, fairness etc.). So what assurance is given with one hand, is taken away by the other. Perception or pratyaksa could have served as a ‘foundation’ of knowledge in the traditional sense, it there could be a necessary connection between what is perceived and what is constructed, whether logical or ontological. But there is no such connection. Knowledge which is in the realm of conceptual constructions can never seek an epistemological justification on the basis of the knowledge that is given in experience, that is, in nirvikalpa perception. Nor can it seek ontological justification on the basis of an object given in experience. The identity of being and knowing no longer holds.

But, contra Plato in Theaetetus, Dignaga does claim that nirvikalpa perception is indubitable, true knowledge. This claim has been challenged in Indian philosophy too. For example, Nyaya thinkers argued that knowledge implies the possibility of error. If ptratyaksa is always, by definition, free of error, then it is not appropriate to call it knowledge. The category of nirvikalpa, or the distinction between savikalp and nirvikalp, was accepted by most subsequent thinkers. But they introduce some kind of determinations at the stage of nirvikalpa pratyaksa itself. In other words, they build a bridge between nirvikalpa and savikalpa. In Dignaga’s conception, nirvikalpa conditions the arising of savikalpa, in association with other condtions. Beyond that there is no other connection.

Dignaga wouldn’t really mind Socrates’ formulation, if Socrates insists that what is knowledge comes after perception, and knowledge is where ‘the mind is alone and engaged with being’. In that case, he would argue, ‘knowledge’ (i.e. conceptual knowledge) is actually a result of ignorance. Conditioned by ignorance, knowledge arises. If it was not for this ‘primordial ignorance’, the process of becoming itself will not take off, and the process of conceptual thought along with it. Two kinds of ignorance should be distinguished here – ‘ignorance of a particular object’ and ‘primordial ignorance’. Ordinary ignorance, or ignorance of a particular object presupposes some framework of knowledge in which one fails to cognize a particular object. Without such a framework, one can not talk of ‘a particular object’ in the first place. What makes knowledge and all frameworks of knowledge possible is ‘primordial ignorance’.

The human being is error prone on account of the very condition of its own arising. But it is not condemned to error and illusion. There is a way, a path to truth and enlightenment. The conceptual constructions are double-edged, whether they cut through the ignorance or merely reinforce it, is conditional. The act of knowing itself is double-edged. It is not possible to simply withdraw into the first moment of nirvikalpa, but there is possibility of a return to it and to know things as they are and to know things in totality.

My projected work is to look at ordinary perceptions (savikalpa) – perception which is shot through with constructs of kalpana, but each with a first moment of nirvikalpa. Theoretical context has become too much caught up in the duality of the conceptual and the real, between pure experience and pure thought. While admitting that there is such a duality implicit in the very phenomenon of ‘knowledge’, we can argue that this duality is also a result of ignorance. Savikalpa perception is a series of moments where the closure

is in the form of a judgment. Perception enacts within itself the movement between experience and thought, or concept and reality and finally commits itself to a judgment, which in turn conditions future judgments. My project as currently understood is to elucidate movement from perception to deeper perception, using the philosophical apparatus of Buddhism. In this way, we argue for the possibility of cultivating perception. And further, we argue that in fact practices of art, science, and just ordinary living, are characterized by cultivation of perception.

Contemporary context

One way of characterizing the contemporary context of philosophy of knowledge is in terms of the two Copernican revolutions. First is of course the Copernican revolution which displaced the human being and its earth from the centre of the universe. ‘The Copernican ‘imperative’ can be seen from Freud’s statement to the effect that Copernicus displaced man from the centre of universe, Darwin displaced man from the centre of life, and Freud himself was responsible for the displacement of man from his own centre. This anti-anthropomorphic trend can be seen continuing in French philosophy and in sciences of the mind. Alberto Gualandi writes that “… French philosophy … anticipated a tendency internal to many contemporary philosophical and scientific approaches whose stated goal is the naturalization of the human and cognitive sciences – at work in a number of disciplines, from neuroscience to human ethology, via cybernetics and evolutionary psychology. According to French philosophers, man and his thought would be but finite forms among others, all engendered on the basis of an obscure and infinite ground, which one might call Being or Nature. Even the mechanistic and deterministic features of the naturalizing sciences would be considered by them to be remainders of anthropomorphism.” ‘The disappearance of man’ is after all a common theme in contemporary French thought.

The epistemic dimension of this Copernican revolution consists in a movement away from what we may call ‘the human viewpoint’. As ‘man’ is no longer at the centre of the universe, man’s viewpoint can no longer serve as a privileged viewpoint. We need a ‘vision’ of the world from a centre which lies at the position of the sun, or from ‘nowhere’. ‘Man’ is prisoner of the perceptual world. A chasm opens between the perceptual world and the world revealed by science.

But the ‘man’ or the human being is thrust back by Kant’s second Copernican revolution. Kant was ‘forced out of his slumber’ by Hume because the ground under the first Copernican revolution was destroyed by Hume. The specificity of the human being and his cognitive apparatus has now to be called upon in order to state how any knowledge of nature can be possible – the conditions of possibility of knowledge.

My project is to explore this Copernican problematic from a Buddhist standpoint. On the one hand we see Buddhism analyse human beings as a composite of five different types of aggregates and devoid of ‘self’ which brings it in parallel to anti-anthropomorphic trends of contemporary thought. On the other, Buddhism is eminently a discourse of the human.

Bibliography:

Asanga, On Knowing Reality: “Tattvartha” chapter of Asanga’s “Bodhisattvabhumi” by Janice Dean Willis, Motilal Banarsidas.

Anirudha, Abhidhamma Sangaho, Pali with Hindi translation by Shastry.

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