3. Determinate Perception (Savikalpaka Pratyakṣa)

[Full title: Determinate Perception (savikalpaka-pratyakṣa): Arguments and Counter-Arguments]

The main Buddhist argument against determinate knowledge being regarded as a sense perception is that the determinate perception cannot be held to be true perception because the image (pratibhāsa) presented by it can be associated with a verbal expression. A cognition produced by the sense-object-contact which grasps a pure object can never be associated with a verbal expression, for neither there are words present in the object, nor are the words identical with the object.^[1] If it were so, a person ignorant of the meaning of words would also be capable of communicating through words like a person who knows their meaning. Neither could the verbal expression, which is in no way related to the real object, be explained as the attribute of cognition, because a verbal expression refers to the object and not to the cognition. And, therefore, a cognition produced by an object should present only the object and not the word denoting it. Never does a perception produced by colour present the cognition of colour along with that of taste. Therefore determinate knowledge, which is merely a mental construction, is erroneously held to be a true perception.^[2] Determinate knowledge presents an object as associated with a name (abhilāpa), although in reality the object is independent of any association with a name. Determinate knowledge is caused by impressions of the past determinate knowledge (vikalpavāsanā), and it grasps an uncertain (aniyata) object, and not a fixed one; it differs with every individual, because it is not a real object, and is caused by imagination. The function of imagination remains concealed in determinate knowledge, but because that knowledge follows in the wake of direct sense-experience (anubhava), it puts the function of the latter, i.e., sensation in the forefront and, therefore, determinate knowledge is supposed to be true sense perception (anubhava).

It may be said that words are associated with the objects which they denote, and that when the objects are cognized, the words denoting them are remembered; then there arises the knowledge of the objects as associated with the words. The Buddhist replies that even if it be so, only the objects which are associated with the words could call those words to memory, and what is associated with the words is the generalized universal which is not grasped by the sense. It is the unique particular (svalakṣaṇa), the ultimate real and the cause of cognition, which is grasped by the sense, and not the universal which, being devoid of all efficient function is unreal. Words, thus, do not denote what is grasped by the sense, and what they denote is not grasped by the sense. Moreover, if what is grasped by the sense could be denoted by words, i.e., the real object could be called forth by a word, then the fire expressed by a word should be felt hot like the real fire grasped by the sense. In that case, it should be capable of removing cold even when expressed by a word.^[3]

The Buddhist considers that when two objects are apprehended by one single cognition, one of them cannot be the attribute of the other; and that the particular and the universal which are grasped, according to the Nyāya-Vaiśesika, by a single cognition, cannot therefore stand in the relation of the qualifier and the qualified. The Buddhist continues, if attributes like universals, etc., are held to be real attributes of an object, then in the case of tree called (siṃsapā), all the universals existence (sattā), substanceness (dravyaatva), the universal of earth (pṛthivītva) the universal of the tree (vṛkṣatva), and the universal siṃsapātva will be real attributes of the same object. When therefore a tree is comprehended from a distance as qualified by one of the attributes (say existence), there will arise the comprehension of the tree as qualified by all the above-given attributes because its nature of having subsistence of one of the universals is the same as that of having the subsistence of the other universals.

Moreover, the relation of the container and the contained (ādhāra and ādheya) implies some kind of service; for instance, a badara fruit which is likely to fall, when placed in a basket is prevented from falling, and therefore the basket does service to the badara as its container. Similarly, in the other instance, the substance (i.e., the tree which is the container) must render some service to the universals which are contained in it. Nor can it be said that it renders service not by its very nature but by capacities which are different in the case of each universal and therefore all the universals are not comprehended simultaneously. In that case even for containing one such capacity, another capacity for containing that capacity will have to be assumed, and the process will go an ad infinitum. It will, therefore, have to be admitted that the very nature of the substance produced therein by its causes is such that the substance renders service to its various attributes by containing them in itself. When, therefore, a substance (tree) is being cognized as capable of rendering service to the universal “existence” (sattā), it has the same nature with reference to all other universals, e.g., substanceness, etc., and therefore, by the determination of the universal “existence” which relates to a real substance, all the attributes dravyatva, pṛthivītva, vṛkṣatva and śiṃśapātva, etc., conditioned by the nature of that object, will be comprehended, and there will be no need of separate determinations of other universals.

It has been declared by Dharmakīrti that when the object, which is identical with the power to render service of containing numerous attributes has been grasped in entirety (sarvātmanā), which one of the universals will remain uncomprehended? When one universal is comprehended, all the universals will be comprehended. When an object (the substance) rendering the service of containing attributes has been comprehended, there remains no other service to be rendered apart from the object. The object, therefore, being cognized, all the attributes (universals) will be cognized.

Now so far as Buddhists are concerned, whatever is cognized or whatever is determined by the ideas (vikalpas) recalled by the beginningless impressions of past experiences, both these (what is cognized and what is determined) being in the form of exclusion of others, are unreal, and do not in the least comprehend the object which is the ultimate real (svalakṣaṇa).^[4] Indirectly, of course, the determinate ideas, having concomitance with the real objects because determinate perception follows in the wake of senseperception, do lead people to the real objects, enable them to reach those objects, and thus do not delude them. Ideas (vikalpas) of numerous universals not being real, there is no question of their being repeated, because, according to the Buddhist, they are not separate realities, but mere ideas which are different from one another.^[5]

The Buddhist points out further that when an object has been grasped by a sensation, it cannot produce determinate perception, because the operation of the sense is interrupted by subsequent remembrance of the world. It has been said by Dharmakīrti that if perception requires, even when the object has been contacted, the association of a world recalled by memory, the object (in that case) would become interrupted.

Further, it cannot be maintained that the self-same sensation, which was produced by the sense, brings about the determinate perception when helped by remembrance. The Nyāya-Vaiśesika points out that the remembrance, being part of the act of perception, does not interrupt determinate perception because one’s own limb offers no interruption. The Buddhist replies that the position of the Nyāya-Vaiśesika is untenable because, as Dharmakīrti has stated, the object, which did not produce the determinate perception in the first instance, i.e., when it produced the indeterminate perception, will not produce it even afterwards, because the contact of the object with the sense is the same in both cases. Moreover, the past can never come within the range of the sense, and the sense cannot function even by thousand-fold efforts with reference to an object which is outside its range. Neither can memory, which grasps the past objects, grasp the present object which has not been experienced before. If memory could grasp past objects as present, there would arise the impossible situation that the blind would also perceive colour, and therefore it has been said by Dharmakīrti that in that case there would be a visual perception even when the visual sense has been lost.

Concluding his argument the Buddhist declares that it has thus been proved that knowledge which involves, as an attribute, a name, the universal, qualities and movements cannot be a sense-perception. Similar is the case with the knowledge which involves, as an attribute, a substance, as in the instance a man with a stick. It has been said by Dharmakīrti that the qualifier, the object to be qualified, the relation, all these factors are cognized and arranged by the intellect; and then alone there is comprehension, and not otherwise.

The entire series of operations which can be accomplished only by a thinking agent (intellect) cannot be sustained by the sense-perception which, being produced by the power of the present object is not a thinking agent. The Buddhist therefore concludes that determinate knowledge cannot be held to be a sense-perception.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

J. Sinha, op.cit., p.59.

[2]:

Ibid.

[3]:

Ibid., p.60.

[4]:

Ibid., p.61.

[5]:

S. Mookerjee, op.cit., p.344.