Fine Points about Categories
There was an interesting question Ulla brought up this morning that I thought about. That is, how do we know a double negative? We were speaking in terms of specifiers (ldog-pa). How do we know that something is not anything other than itself? Let’s say we wanted to know the negation of “not Alex.” Would we have to know everything that’s not Alex? No, I don’t think that’s true, because in order to know “not Alex,” all we had to know was Alex. Now, based on knowing Alex, we know “not Alex,” so to know “not not Alex,” all we need to know is the original Alex that was being negated. In order to know “not an apple,” we had to know what an apple was. Then, in order to know “nothing other than an apple,” all we had to know, actually, was the apple. In other words, to specify something, actually, all we really had to know was the thing itself. That, I think, is the solution; otherwise, it is impossible, but this is my guess. This is just my line of thinking.
But would this be an affirmation or a double negation?
No, that’s a negation. It’s based on a negation, on the original negation of knowing Alex. It does not matter how many times we further negate that, I think. This is my guess. That is how we specify something. That’s all that it is used for, how we specify categories and how we specify items; there are two things, two different types. Otherwise, a child couldn’t learn what an apple is. Also, it’s the same for categories. The child has to know all the possibilities of what’s an apple but doesn’t have to know all the possibilities of what’s not an apple. We’d have to know that there was such a thing as “not an apple.”
Can this be used in artificial intelligence?
Recognizing something, recognizing categories, this type of thing could be very difficult for artificial intelligence.
One could argue whether a category is subject to change over time.
Is a category subject to change? We could replace it with a different definition, but replacement…
I don’t mean nonstatic. Of course, a category is static.
A category is static, and here we have a good example of what I was explaining to you, a separation (bral-ba). Separate it from the old meaning, and we make a new meaning. Like we replace our less precise understanding of “not true existence” with a more precise understanding of “not true existence.”
Please remember that categories are defined in terms of words or concepts, and so that means that a category – or let’s speak in terms of categories defined by words – that words don’t have inherent in them, from their own side, a meaning. The meaning that any word (and therefore any category) has is something that is mentally labeled by a mind that is thinking with it and using it. Conceptual thought uses categories in order to be able to focus on individual items that it would include within that category. For instance, we think conceptually of a particular apple in terms of the category “apple.”
Let’s consider the case of the category “true existence.” The meaning of the term “true existence,” and therefore the meaning of that category, is something that is ascribed to it, or mentally labeled to it, conceptually by a mind that would have some understanding. That mind would use whatever understanding it has of what it thinks is true existence and mentally label it as the meaning of “true existence.” Now, no matter how many different meanings different minds are going to ascribe to the term “true existence,” or even the same mind ascribes to “true existence” as it develops along the spiritual path, that category itself – of “true existence,” that word – doesn’t change. Its having a different meaning, according to different minds that use it, and so on, isn’t something that is organically changing, moment to moment, affected by causes and conditions.
One meaning can be replaced by another meaning that’s mentally labeled, but that’s a very different process from our understanding ending and then changing into another understanding. That evolution of our understanding is an organic process; it’s non-static and affected by causes and conditions. When one understanding ends, and another arises, that’s a non-static process. That’s something that is changing and developing, moment to moment to moment. However, when a category itself is separated from one meaning, and another meaning is ascribed to it, that separation is not something that is organically growing from moment to moment and developing over time. It is just a “static separation,” we would call it. It occurs under the circumstance of a different meaning being mentally labeled to the category or the word. That separation is just a fact, and facts are things that are static; they’re not affected by causes and conditions.
Remember when we’re talking about a separation here, we’re talking about the state of being separated. We’re not talking about the action of separating something. A state of being separated from something is a static phenomenon. An action of actually separating it is, of course, non-static; it arises from causes and conditions. The state of being separated – although it is occasioned by, or begins with, that action of separation – it itself is non-static. We can’t say, technically, that it is organically caused by that action of separating something. For example, the state of an apple being separated from the table, parted from the table, or absent from the table, is something that doesn’t change from moment to moment. We can say that it is occasioned by somebody taking the apple off the table, but that state of being absent or parted from the table isn’t something that develops slowly, organically, from moment to moment.
Building up more and more positive force, collecting merit, as it were, will be the conditions that will bring about a change in our understanding. However, it doesn’t affect the object that we understand; it affects the mind.
Do you understand a meaning category? Whenever we use a word, for instance the word “voidness,” or every time that we remember it, or hear someone say it, or read it in a book, the meaning category is what we think it to mean.
This is also constantly replaced, isn’t it?
It all depends on how open-minded we are. If we are very stubborn and think, “I’ve got it and don’t want to hear anything more,” we are not going to replace it very quickly. The category itself, even if we don’t think about it for five years, doesn’t slowly die, although the power of our mindfulness of it again, remembering it, perhaps has weakened.
Further Points about “Not Tenzin” in Relation to Categories, Individual Items and Specifiers
Let’s go back to “not Tenzin.” What if my friend thought that the Tenzin I meant referred to some other person called Tenzin whom he knew? He looked at the photo in my album of either one of my “not Tenzins” – or even at the person who is not my “not Tenzin,” namely my Tenzin – and he thought, “not Tenzin.” The concept of “not Tenzin” that he thought was derived from having precluded his Tenzin, not mine.
That’s a good example, if we can follow it. I’m thinking of my Tenzin, and I want to show my friend the person in the book. He is thinking of another Tenzin that he knows. While he is looking through the book, he is looking for a picture of his Tenzin; maybe this Tenzin is also in my book. Regardless of whether he looks at a picture of somebody who is not my Tenzin, or he looks at a picture of somebody who is my Tenzin (which means somebody who is not “not my Tenzin”), and he thinks “not his Tenzin,” it is different, isn’t it? What he has precluded in order to derive his “not Tenzin” is a different Tenzin from the one that I precluded to get my idea of “not Tenzin.”
Both of these “not Tenzins” are items in the general category of “not Tenzin,” but they’re referring to two different items. This is very important to understand in order to be able to understand how we specify different items in a category. For example, we have the word category “not Tenzin.” Now, the person who uses that word category in order to think something may or may not ascribe a meaning category to that name category. If they don’t ascribe or label any meaning category onto that word category, then what they are thinking with that word category is merely an affirmation phenomenon; it’s merely the affirmation of the words “not” and “Tenzin.” However, if they mentally label a meaning category onto it, which is a preclusion of a particular person, a particular Tenzin, then the word category that they are thinking of and the meaning category that they are ascribing to it refer to the negation phenomenon, people who are not that particular Tenzin.
We could preclude various people who are called Tenzin and accurately specify, from that preclusion, a particular “not Tenzin,” and then we could label it onto various people. Of course, our labeling that “not Tenzin” onto different people could be either accurate or inaccurate, depending on whether or not that person actually is the “not Tenzin” that we had in mind. If I labeled my “not Tenzin” onto your specific Tenzin, then it would be an accurate labeling from the point of view of the specific Tenzin that I was precluding (to derive my “not Tenzin”), but obviously it wouldn’t be an accurate “not Tenzin” from the point of view of the specific Tenzin that you were precluding (in order to derive your “not Tenzin”). It’s a little bit complicated.
We have to be very precise here. In fact, we could even derive a “not Tenzin” by precluding somebody who isn’t even Tenzin. But that “not Tenzin” would not be an item that validly belonged to the category of “not Tenzin,” because if we went to corroborate the Tenzin that we precluded in order to derive that “not Tenzin,” we would find out that the person that we precluded was not a Tenzin. In other words, to derive “not Tenzin,” we have to preclude a specific Tenzin. If we preclude a Tashi in order to get a “non-Tenzin,” then that Tashi that we have precluded is not a Tenzin, so we haven’t actually gotten an accurately defined “non-Tenzin.”
If we could understand this explanation that I just gave, which I must admit is very difficult because there are so many negative words or negation words in the formulation, but if we can understand this, then we can start to understand how various items, like glasses, are included in the category of “glass.” The way that works is in terms of specifiers (ldog-pa), which are double negations, “nothing other than a glass.”
In such a situation, there are not enough words to have terms for every appearance or phenomenon. Our language contains only a few words, fewer than would be necessary to give a term to every phenomenon. In such a case, where there are two Tenzins in mind, it is necessary to develop a new term, for instance, “Alex’s Tenzin” and “Simon’s Tenzin,” or “the black-haired Tenzin,” or “the old Tenzin” and “the young Tenzin,” and so on.
Do we have to develop new words, or do we use specifiers? There are two Christians in the room. The specifier is that this Christian is “nothing other than this Christian,” and that Christian is “nothing other than that Christian.” Then, we have specified it.
You didn’t deliver any information there!
Ah, we didn’t deliver any information, but it has been specified without having to have a separate name for every single apple that exists, or a separate name for every single ant that exists.
It only worked because you pointed at the Christian. If you’d said, “This Christian is nothing other than this Christian,” I wouldn’t have had a clue which one you were talking about.
Right, but it would allow me to know this particular Christian and that particular Christian both by the same name “Christian,” and not confuse them.
The point is when you know the context.
When we have the context, we have to know the object. How do we specify it? I know many people who are called Tenzin; I know many people who are called Christian. How do I know the difference between all the people that I know who are called Tenzin when I call them by the same name? What is it that I am thinking of?
A special quality he has.
That gets into a big topic that is discussed in Prasangika (Skt. Prāsaṅgika) philosophy, which is, that there is nothing on the side of the object that is its special quality, or a special defining characteristic that makes it a unique item. That’s the thing; there’s no findable anything on the side of an object that establishes it as an object, as an individual item. Everything is specified in terms of these double negations; it’s nothing other than what it is, and that’s not something on the side of the object. That’s something that is established merely by the power of mental labeling, which is conceptual.
What we were thinking of, that specific Tenzin, that specific item Tenzin that I am thinking of when I use the word “Tenzin,” is specified by it being not anything other than this person. When I use the word “Tenzin” to mean him, I use it to mean him; I don’t use it to mean somebody else. That is how it works, isn’t it? That’s clearly just a process of mental labeling. The fact that he has the name “Tenzin” is also just a process of mental labeling; his parents gave him the name “Tenzin.” There’s nothing on his side that makes him Tenzin, is there, that we can find, that was there before he got the name “Tenzin.” Otherwise, how can we apply the word “apple” to many different apples?
You could associate the name with a special picture of this person, the appearance of this person, with his voice or with his shape.
That’s just what represents him. That represents him because, obviously, we can know the person when they were a baby, and we can know them when they are a young person, and we can know the person when they are an old person as well. The shape has changed. What happens when I see you after I haven’t seen you for many years? For example, I go to a high school class reunion after 40 years (which I did), and I saw many people that I didn’t know who they were. But then one of them told me that he was “Roger,” and I said, “Oh my goodness. I didn’t recognize you!” But I know who Roger is. Roger is nobody other than Roger, but the physical form has totally changed. I never would have recognized this person.
So, what’s the “Roger” that I am thinking of? This is very interesting because this is a negation that is non-static. There are actually two kinds of specifiers or isolators, a static one to specify an individual item in a conceptual cognition and a nonstatic one to specify an individual item in a non-conceptual cognition like a sensory cognition, but this is getting far too advanced. We need to go back to our level of discussion.
If the item is changing moment to moment, anything other than the object has to also be changing from moment to moment. Otherwise, we think that the phenomenon that is changing from moment to moment is always the same. It’s not static; otherwise, we would have to have a different name for the person every moment of their life. Now, we get into really mental labeling. The defining characteristics don’t exist on the side of the object.
For example, I look at the leftovers on the table from lunch, my leftovers, and I think “not edible.” My friend looks at it, who’s still hungry, and doesn’t apply “not edible” to it; “not edible” is the paper napkin. But certainly, the leftover food isn’t “not edible.” Is “not edible” from the side of the object? Certainly not. Do you follow?
It’s the same thing with the word. Is the meaning on the side of the word, inherent in the word? Certainly not. Is the definition inherent in the word? Certainly not. A word is just an acoustic pattern. As in the example that I like, when we listen to a language that we don’t know, we can’t even divide the sounds into words, into meaningful units. It gets even more far-out: how do we know the voice of somebody? I listen to an acoustic pattern, and I think “Simon’s voice,” and somebody else listens to it and doesn’t know that it’s Simon’s voice; they think it’s somebody else’s voice. That happens to us all the time on the telephone. Is there something inside it, inside that acoustic pattern, that makes it Simon’s voice, that indicates who produced it?
You have people who imitate other’s voices.
Right. This gets into the whole relation between cause and effect, but I am getting very far off-field.
The thing with language… You were talking about a language that you don’t know, where you can’t even make out the words. With the language that’s your mother tongue, you can’t stop.
We can’t stop making out words. That’s right. I mean, that’s very difficult. I know that experience very well. When we’re in a place where people are speaking a language that we don’t know, it is very easy to tune out and not be distracted by it at all. But if somebody is speaking a language that we do know, it’s almost impossible not to pay attention to it and listen to it and assign meaning to the words. However, all of that is coming from the side of the mind, not from the side of the words. As in the example of whose voice is it? How is it affected by the person who produced the voice, the sound? And now, after the person has stopped producing it, is no longer producing it, is that Christian no longer saying this? Where is that “no longer speaking?” Is that inside the sound? Inside Christian? Is it totally nonexistent? No. We can know perfectly well that Christian is no longer speaking. These negations are very, very important for understanding so many things.
Do you understand how a word is also a category? It doesn’t matter who says it, what kind of voice says it; it is the same word, a sound category, static. I mean, it’s really weird that a word can be represented both by a sound and a picture – a squiggly line – and that squiggly line, which is totally arbitrary, is a word and has a meaning no matter whose handwriting it’s in. That’s really very, very strange.
Okay, it’s important to understand the basics. If we don’t understand the basics, it’s hopeless. What I really want to convince you of… I want you to start thinking about all of this, and I want to convince you how important it is to really study and understand this in order to really understand on a deeper level almost everything in Buddhist teachings. If you come away with just that much – a sincere interest to work further with this – then the weekend is worthwhile.
Defining Things in Terms of Negations
When Nagarjuna spoke about voidness, didn’t he speak in terms of these negations like, for instance, “not one,” “not many,” “not both,” and “not neither?” What can we say about these types of negations?
Well, this gets us into a very complicated topic, namely the topic of voidness and what type of negation phenomenon voidness is. When we analyze whether or not there’s such a thing as true existence, then if there were such a thing as true existence, if we had two items that were truly existent – either they would have to be the same item, or they would have to be totally different items, or they would have to be either both the same and different or neither. There are only these four possibilities, so then we negate. We say they are neither one, nor are they many – in other words, nor are they different, two individual truly existent items – nor are they in some way both, nor are they neither. In this way, we say that there’s no such thing as true existence, and so we negate true existence.
Now, if we negate it in the manner of saying “there’s no such thing as true existence,” that’s based on the belief that there’s no other possibility. Having excluded all the possibilities, the only conclusion we can come to is that there’s no such thing. This is the position that the Gelug school follows in terms of voidness. However, there are others who say that, well, actually, all we’ve excluded are certain possibilities in the conceptual realm, but actually, voidness is not referring to just “no such thing as this.” What it’s referring to is a state that is beyond this, beyond these categories, and “beyond” is also, in a sense, a negation phenomenon; it’s “not all of these,” but it’s affirming something that is beyond. This is the position that we find in one of what are called the “other-voidness” views.
This gets into a very complicated topic, and I don’t think that it’s really appropriate for us to go into it in too much depth here, but I think perhaps that we can start to understand the complication here. Voidness is a negation phenomenon. Now how do we specify a negation phenomenon of “no such thing as true existence?” Just as when we specify an affirmation phenomenon, like an apple, by excluding everything that’s not “apple” – so it’s “nothing but the apple” – it’s a similar process when we try to specify a negation phenomenon; it is what we have when we exclude everything that is not the negation phenomenon. Then, that starts to get very complicated because have we, in specifying a negation phenomenon, actually ended up with an affirmation phenomenon or a negation phenomenon? As I say, this is incredibly complicated, so we will leave that for now. It is true that Buddhism explains the way that things exist in terms of a negation of impossible ways of existing in which things do not exist.
If you want to explain something very difficult, is it easier to understand if you explain it with negations than with affirmations?
In a sense, yes. It’s easier to understand something in terms of negations rather than affirmations. I think we have this even going back in the Upanishads, before Buddha. “Niti, niti. Not this, not that.”
In language, often you have a choice to make, whether to use a negation or an affirmation. If the Buddha says, “Healthy is not hatred,” he doesn’t say, “Healthy is love.” He says, “not hatred.” He had the choice to use the word “love” as the opposite.
Right. This was my introduction this morning, of why I said that in Buddhism almost everything is specified in terms of negations.
So, he was convinced that by expressing his teachings in negations, it makes sure that the pupil understands the meaning?
Right. When we look at the four noble truths, what Buddha actually taught, how he presented his teachings, he presented them with the main emphasis being on negating phenomena. We have the first two noble truths: true suffering and true causes of suffering. When we look more closely at them, in terms of true suffering, there’s the suffering of gross suffering. That type of suffering is a feeling which, when it occurs, we want to be separated from it; we don’t want it to continue, so there’s a negation there. When we speak about the suffering of change, this is our ordinary happiness, but how is it described? It’s described as a feeling that doesn’t last, which doesn’t bring satisfaction, about which there’s no certainty what’s going to follow it. These are all negations. These are ways of explaining ordinary happiness or describing it in terms of it not being this and not being that. Then, when we talk about the true cause of suffering, the ultimate true cause of suffering is unawareness. Lack of awareness of cause and effect and how things exist, so all of that too is a negation phenomenon.
What’s the aim? The aim is to achieve a true stopping of them. This is the third noble truth. That’s a negation. That’s a negating phenomenon. How do we achieve those true stoppings? We achieve them through true pathway minds, that’s true understandings – the fourth noble truth – which are delineated in terms of those understandings that will bring about a true stopping. Again, the emphasis is on negating, removing and separating, namely, bringing about a true parting, a true separation, a true stopping, or true cessation of the two obscurations from our mental continuums: the obscurations that are preventing liberation and the obscurations that are preventing omniscience.
When we speak about these true pathway minds (the fourth noble truth), we can speak about them in terms of the pathway level of them – the ones that will actually bring about these separations – and we can also speak of them in terms of the resultant level of what a Buddha actually achieves, which is the 32 qualities of a Buddha’s enlightening mind. Now those 32 qualities are described as separational results. They are the results of a separation; they’re not caused by the separation, but they are the understandings that are free forever of the two obscurations.
Even if we look at the Tibetan word “yon-tan,” the word for “good qualities,” what’s usually translated as “good qualities,” my teacher Serkong Rinpoche explained it as meaning “a correction of inadequacies.” This is very close to our specifier; it’s a double negation, isn’t it? These separational results – which are the qualities of a Buddha’s mind, of an omniscient Dharmakaya (Skt. Dharmakāya) mind – are explained in Uttaratantra. This is a text by Maitreya, The Sublime Continuum; it’s called Gyulama (rGyud bla-ma) in Tibetan. These qualities of mind are static phenomena, in the sense that they are unaffected by anything, they don’t decline, and they last forever. If we look at the list of these 32 qualities, they’re defined in terms of negations such as lack of fear; a Buddha has no fear to proclaim in front of everybody that he has separated himself from all the obscurations.
When we look at the qualities of the speech of a Buddha, these also are mostly explained in terms of negations: Buddha’s speech is without faltering, without unnecessary words, and so on. It’s specifically the 32 qualities of a Buddha’s body that are affirmation phenomena. These are known as ripening results. They have ripened from the network of positive force, the so-called “collection of merit,” but even these are corrections of the inadequacy of having a limited body. So, negation phenomena are totally crucial to the whole presentation that Buddha gave of his teachings.
Implicative and Non-Implicative Negations
Can you describe voidness in terms of affirmations?
No. To explain why not, we have to get into the divisions of negations. There are some negations that, after having excluded an object to be negated, the sound of the words with which it was spoken, tosses in its wake or footprint, or imply, as knowable to a conceptual cognition, both a negation phenomenon and an affirmation phenomenon, and some in which the sound tosses only a negation phenomenon. Voidness is the kind that tosses only a negation phenomenon.
When we think, “this is a table without a tablecloth,” the sound of the words negate “a table with a tablecloth” and leaves behind a table and the absence of a tablecloth on it. When we think, “There’s no tablecloth on the table,” the sound of the words negate “a tablecloth on the table” and leaves behind just the absence of a tablecloth on the table. It does not leave behind the table.
Voidness is the second kind, and that’s called a “non-implicative negation” (med-dgag). The first kind is an implicative negation (ma-yin dgag). Then, of course, there are four different ways in which the sound of the negating words can imply both negations and affirmations: explicitly, implicitly, both, or by an elimination of a choice where there can only be one or the other. We’ve specified that it can be only “this” and not “that,” so when we say, “it’s not that,” the sound of those words imply that it is “this,” as knowable in a conceptual cognition.
The technical term for what the sound of the negating words implies after it has negated the object to be negated means the “wake of a ship” (shul), what a ship leaves behind in the water after it’s gone on, sort of like footprints. Those are the words that are used, literally, “what it tosses in its wake?”
We are talking about the entire object that is being thought about and negated in the conceptual thought. The entire object constitutes the object being negated. We’re thinking of “a table without a tablecloth” or “no tablecloth on the table.” Knowing correctly the unit that constitutes the object to be negated is very important when we focus on “there is no such thing as the true existence of the table.”
Going back to Tenzin. Actually, what it is, is a page of photographs without Tenzin.
What is this thing? This is a page without a picture of Tenzin. “This is a page without a picture of Tenzin” is an implicative negation. After it has negated “this is a page with a picture of Tenzin,” it leaves in its wake or footprint both a page and the absence of a picture of Tenzin. This negation is different from “there is no picture of Tenzin on this page.”
The problem is that “not Tenzin” is something different than “without Tenzin.”
Right. There’s quite a difference between “a table without a tablecloth on it” and “there is no tablecloth on the table.” With the first, we were looking around the restaurant for a table with a tablecloth on it, and when we saw a table without a tablecloth on it, we thought, “This is a table with no tablecloth on it.” With the second, we were looking for a tablecloth, and when we saw no tablecloth on a certain table, we thought, “there is no tablecloth on this table.” These two thoughts are quite different. We have to know that difference in order to not confuse meditation on “a non-truly existent table,” “the non-true existence of the table,” and “there is no such thing as the true existence of a table.” These are three very different meditations.
That was what we’re not going to cover! Actually, this is good because we get a little dose of some of the topics that are involved. Obviously, we would need to go much more deeply into each of these.
The Four Ways That an Implicative Negation Can Imply Something
Please explain the four ways in which a negation, taken as a whole unit, can imply things. Or, to use the technical term, how it can toss things in its wake?
Let’s just stick to the standard examples, first thinking about “A fat man who does not eat during the day.” After excluding that the fat man eats during the day, the sound of those negating words explicitly tosses in its wake (1) the negation “not thin” because he is fat. It implicitly tosses (2) the affirmation “eats during the night,” because he is fat. This thought (3) tosses both explicitly and implicitly.
The classic example of the fourth type of implicative negation is we know that Siddhartha (Skt. Siddhārtha) Buddha was either a brahmin or a kshatriya, in terms of the two castes (there are obviously other castes). When we know that, and somebody says that Buddha Shakyamuni was not a brahmin, then we know by that situation of it being a choice, only one or the other, that (4) he was a kshatriya. The sound of the words, “Buddha is not a brahmin,” leaves in its wake or implies that he is a kshatriya. Here, it’s only by the situation that we know that Buddha could only have been a brahmin or a kshatriya, and when we find out that he was not a brahmin, we know from what’s tossed by that is that he was a kshatriya. If we didn’t know the possibilities of what caste Buddha could have been and someone tells us he was not a brahmin, our knowing that he was not a brahmin does not imply or toss in its wake the affirmation of what caste Buddha was.
The Two Meanings of “Unawareness”
What about unawareness? How do we understand that?
With unawareness, there are two ways of defining it; there are two different types of negation that are involved. Technically, both types of unawareness or ignorance are only about either selflessness or karmic cause and effect. But if we simplify the definitions of the two and apply them in a broader way, one is just simply not knowing something, and the other one is knowing it in an inverted way, not knowing it correctly, knowing it backward. When your name is Mary, there is a difference between not knowing your name and thinking it's Jane. The not knowing what your name is when I think it’s Jane, and the not knowing when I just don’t know your name at all are examples of the two quite different definitions of “not knowing.”
The tenet systems after Dharmakirti (Skt. Dharmakīrti) – Sautrantika (Skt. Sautrāntika) Followers of Logic, Chittamatra (Skt. Cittamātra) Followers of Logic, and Madhyamaka (Skt. Mādhyamaka) – take it to mean, like the example, “I didn’t actually know your name when I thought your name was Jane.” The tenet systems before Dharmakirti – Vaibhashika (Skt. Vaibhāṣika), Sautrantika Followers of Scripture and Chittamatra Followers of Scripture – take it as “I just don’t know your name.”
If we want to get more accurate about the meaning, but applied to this example of Mary’s name, unawareness is a mental factor that prevents knowing her name correctly. One way is that we are too shy to ask, so we don’t know her name. The other is we are sure her name is Jane and that prevents us from asking and knowing what it actually is.
There’s a big debate concerning which type of unawareness it is that we need to eliminate in order to attain a true stopping of suffering. This is a very important question. Do we have to get rid of just not knowing selflessness or voidness, or do we have to get rid of knowing it incorrectly?
The Two Ways of Focusing on Voidness: During Total Absorption and During Subsequent Attainment
There are several more points we need to clarify. “Me without my glasses” and “these glasses are not my glasses” are both implicative negations. In the case of “me without my glasses,” the affirmation phenomenon knowable in the wake of the negation is “me.” In this example, “me” is also the location or locus of the negation. In the case of “these glasses on the table are not my glasses,” the affirmation phenomenon knowable in the wake of the negation is “these glasses.” Here, the location of the negation is “the table.” Thus, the affirmation phenomenon tossed in an implicative negation may or may not also be the location of the negation.
On the other hand, “there are no glasses on the table” is a non-implicative negation. There is no affirmation phenomenon knowable in the wake of the negation. The locus of the negation, however, is “the table.”
Like these examples, “no such thing as a truly existent me” is a non-implicative negation, while “a me devoid of true existence” is an implicative negation. These are what we focus on, respectively, during the total absorption (mnyam-bzhag) on the space-like voidness of me and the subsequent attainment (rjes-thob) focus on the illusion-like voidness of me – the so-called “post-meditation,” but actually we are still meditating on voidness. These are two steps in voidness meditation. During total absorption on “no such thing as a truly existent me,” after a “truly existent me” has been precluded or cut off, the sound of those negating words leaves in its wake only the negation phenomenon “the total absence of a truly existent me because there is no such thing.” It does not toss the affirmation phenomenon “me,” and so we’re focusing only on that total absence and not on me. In other words, the total absence is explicitly apprehended and nothing is implicitly apprehended.
During the subsequent attainment period, our focus is “a me devoid of true existence.” Both the negation phenomenon “the absence of true existence” and the affirmation phenomenon “me” are tossed in the wake. Both are apprehended: “me” is explicitly apprehended and “the absence of true existence,” which is still a non-implicative negation, is implicitly apprehended. Only “me,” however, appears in the meditation.
The other Christian’s question was: what is the difference between focusing on the non-true existence of dependently arising phenomena and focusing on dependently arising phenomena that are not truly existent? It is the same as what I just explained regarding the selflessness of me: the first is focus on a non-implicative negation and the second on an implicative negation. In focusing on “the non-true existence of dependently arising things” during total absorption, we’re focusing on the negation phenomenon, “no such thing as the true existence of dependently arising things.” The negation phenomenon appears to the consciousness and is apprehended explicitly. “The dependently arising things that are devoid of true existence” do not appear to that cognition and are not apprehended at all, not even implicitly.
In focusing on “non-truly existent dependently arising things” during the subsequent attainment period, we’re focusing on the affirmation phenomenon, “dependently arising things that are devoid of true existence.” The affirmation phenomenon appears to the consciousness and is apprehended explicitly. Although the negation phenomenon, “no such thing as the true existence of dependently arising things,” does not appear to the consciousness, nevertheless it is apprehended implicitly. An implicit apprehension is one in which the cognition decisively and accurately cognizes an object, but that object doesn’t appear to that cognition.
If we ask, during the total absorption on voidness, is the basis for the voidness known at all at that time? Then, we have to distinguish between the conceptual cognition and the non-conceptual cognition of voidness. We also need to make a distinction in the two sets of explanations that we find in the Gelug tradition. As for conceptual total absorption on voidness:
- The Panchen textbooks, which are used in Drepung Loseling Monastery and Ganden Shartse Monastery, explain that during the conceptual total absorption on voidness, there is also a second cognition that is occurring simultaneously. In that second cognition, there is the explicit cognition of the basis for voidness. However, there is not terribly much attention paid to that second cognition; the attention is focused on the conceptual cognition of voidness, the conceptual absorption on voidness.
- According to the other set of textbooks, the Jetsunpa textbooks, which are used by Ganden Jangtse Monastery and Sera Je Monastery, at that time of the conceptual total absorption on voidness, there is a subliminal cognition of the basis of voidness. A subliminal cognition is one in which the object appears to that subliminal cognition and is known by that subliminal cognition, but the object does not appear and is not known by the person. The person is only aware of and cognizes the object of the manifest cognition, in this case, voidness.
- Many Gelugpa Geshes, when explaining in a simplified manner to a general audience, explain that, according to Prasangika, the basis for voidness is cognized implicitly during the conceptual total absorption on voidness.
In the case of the non-conceptual total absorption on voidness:
- The Panchen textbooks say that there is no second cognition occurring at the same time that would take as its object the basis for the voidness.
- The Jetsunpa textbooks say that there is no simultaneous subliminal cognition of the basis for voidness. Nevertheless, the Jetsunpa textbooks do assert that simultaneously with this non-conceptual total absorption on voidness there is a subliminal cognition of true existence, in this case, the true existence of voidness. We don’t have to get into the technical details of that.
It’s only in the case of the omniscient awareness of a Buddha that we can have the simultaneous non-conceptual cognition manifestly of the essential nature of the two truths, in which the essential natures of both truths are known explicitly. A Buddha does not have conceptual cognition or a distinction between total absorption and subsequent attainment. The essential nature of both truths is their voidness. With this non-conceptual total absorption, a Buddha is always totally absorbed simultaneously on the voidness of voidness (deepest truth) and the voidness of dependently arising phenomena (superficial, conventional truths), and both appear and are cognized explicitly. Before the attainment of enlightenment, the voidness (the essential nature) of superficial, conventionally true objects cannot appear when totally absorbed on the essential nature (the voidness) of deepest truth because these objects appear with the impure appearance of being truly existent.
The pure appearances of dependently arising phenomena that a Buddha also simultaneously explicitly cognizes when totally absorbed on the voidnesses of the two truths have no appearance of truly established existence seeming to arise from the side of the objects and no such appearance arising from the side of that Buddha’s mind. These pure appearances are not called superficial or conventional truths, they are called “mere conventionalities” (tha-snyad-tsam).
Prior to that, when we conceptually know manifestly and explicitly voidness, deepest truth, we can only know the conventional, superficial truth with either a second cognition that’s occurring at the same time, or subliminally, depending on which textbook explanation we follow. When we know voidness explicitly and non-conceptually, then we cannot be aware, at the same time, of the basis for that voidness.
In the case of conceptual subsequent attainment, when we know explicitly the conventional or superficial truth of phenomena – in other words, the appearance of dependently arising phenomena – at that time, we can only know implicitly, with that same cognition, simultaneously, the voidness of the dependently arising phenomena. This is because during the subsequent attainment, the appearance of dependently arising phenomena is with an appearance of true existence, so we can’t cognize explicitly the appearance of true existence and the absence of an appearance of true existence.
In the case of arhats, the pure appearance of dependently arising phenomena that they explicitly cognize do not appear to have truly established existence arising as if from the side of the objects, but they do appear to have truly established existence arising from the side of their own minds. Before we become arhats, the dependently arising objects appear with both types of appearances of truly established existence.
These points, although very subtle and not easy to understand, are very important to know so that we appreciate what it means to achieve Buddhahood and have the simultaneous cognition of the two truths. The simultaneous cognition of the two truths that we’re aiming for is to have, non-conceptually, the manifest explicit cognition of the essential nature, voidness, of the two truths simultaneously in one cognition.
When we talk about the levels of mind, which is the topic exclusively of anuttarayoga tantra (the highest class of tantra), then we speak about the subtlest level of mind, which is known as the clear light mind. It’s only that clear light mind that can have that simultaneous cognition non-conceptually of the two truths with both of them being manifest and explicitly known. This is because that subtlest level of mind, the clear light mind, does not make an appearance of true existence.
When all grosser levels of mind, which sutra (Skt. sūtra) limits itself to speaking about, make an appearance of the superficial, conventional truth or the appearance of phenomena, they can only make an appearance of them as being truly existent. Because of that, when one cognition explicitly cognizes the superficial, conventional truth of things – how they appear to us – it cannot simultaneously have explicit cognition of voidness. This is because the appearance of the conventional phenomena will be with true existence and voidness is the absence of true existence, so they preclude each other. Correspondingly, when there is the explicit cognition of voidness, the absence of true existence, we can’t have in that same cognition the explicit cognition of conventional phenomena, because they would appear truly existent.
Even if we can achieve the simultaneous cognition explicitly, manifestly, non-conceptually of the two truths with the clear light consciousness, in terms of our total absorption on voidness with the clear light mind, that is not something that we can sustain all the time before Buddhahood. It’s only with the attainment of Buddhahood that we can sustain it forever without any break. We have to be careful not to confuse these types of simultaneous cognition of the two truths with the type of simultaneous cognition of the two truths that a Buddha has, which is what we’re aiming for.
Now, let’s tie this back together with our discussion of implicative and non-implicative negations. When we have been describing the total absorption on voidness, whether it’s conceptually or non-conceptually cognized, in that case, we’re talking about a non-implicative negation – “no such thing as true existence,” in this case the true existence of dependently arising phenomena or any specific dependently arising phenomenon, a person, or something like a table. The sound of the words of the negation, after having negated what is to be negated, leaves in its wake only a negatingly known phenomenon, only a negation, as knowable by a conceptual thought. This does not mean, however, that voidness cannot be known non-conceptually.
The voidness cognized either conceptually or non-conceptually in the subsequent attainment phase of the meditation on voidness is also a non-implicative negation. It tosses in its wake only the negation phenomenon “no such thing as true existence,” but unlike during total absorption when this absence of true existence appears manifestly and is explicitly apprehended, now it does not appear and is only implicitly apprehended. The subsequent attainment, however, is focused on the implicative negation – dependently arising phenomena that are devoid of true existence. Dependently arising phenomena are an affirmation phenomenon tossed in the wake of the implicative negation.
How to Focus on an Absence of True Existence
Now you might ask, how do we focus on the absence of true existence? Let’s say the true existence of the table. According to Prasangika, the first moment we would have to focus on the table, which is the basis for voidness – and of course, whether we’re focusing on the table conceptually or non-conceptually – according to Gelugpa, that appearance of the table is going to be an appearance of the true existence of the table. If beforehand we have gained certainty through logical analysis that there is no such thing as true existence, then we have to apply that certitude about “no such thing as true existence” to that appearance of the truly existent table. When we apply it, what happens is that certitude cuts off or precludes or eliminates true existence, and because it does it in the manner of a non-implicative negation, then what happens next is that we have a cognition in which only the absence of true existence appears and is cognized explicitly. That cognition does not know even implicitly the basis for the voidness, the table.
In the case of this cognition of voidness being conceptual, then it explicitly knows that voidness, that absence of true existence, through the conceptual category of “voidness.” Because it is a conceptual cognition, it’s going to make that voidness that appears seem to have true existence established from its own side. If, on the other hand, it’s a non-conceptual cognition of voidness, then that voidness that explicitly appears, and is known, is not going to have any appearance of true existence. Furthermore, in the case of the conceptual cognition of voidness, then the basis for that voidness (the table) could still simultaneously appear either to a different cognition, a separate cognition that is occurring simultaneously, or to a subliminal cognition, depending on how we analyze this situation. However, it is certainly not appearing and cognized by that cognition of voidness itself, and we’re not paying terribly much attention to that other cognition of the basis for the voidness. As we’ve seen, in the case of a non-conceptual cognition of voidness, the table isn’t known even to either another simultaneous cognition or to subliminal cognition.
Now if we ask, when we are focusing explicitly on voidness, whether conceptually or non-conceptually, what does it look like, what is the appearance? Then, we have to turn to the explanation that we find in anuttarayoga tantra. There, that appearance is described as the absence of moonlight, the absence of sunlight, and the absence of total darkness. It would look like the very deep dark blue color of the sky when the white moonlight is gone, the sun hasn’t started to rise and turn the sky red, and there’s also not the absolute blackness of night. That very deep dark blue that occurs at that moment is what voidness would appear like.
In a conceptual cognition, this color would appear through the transparent filter of the category “voidness,” which would make this color appear to be truly existent; whereas if the cognition were non-conceptual, then there would just be the appearance of this color. Mind you, it isn’t that the appearance of this color is existing somewhere out there established on its own, by some characteristics on its own side, but rather this appearance is something that is the mental hologram that the mind gives rise to as what actually occurs when there is this cognition. The understanding of that appearance, of that mental hologram, is the understanding of “no such thing as true existence.”
We can see that we have to really answer these questions precisely in order to meditate correctly; otherwise, we really have no idea what in the world are we supposed to be focusing on when we’re focusing on voidness in our voidness meditation. It’s not so simple. The point is, how do we meditate on voidness in order to overcome the causes of suffering that are causing us samsara (Skt. saṃsāra) and causing us the inability to help others? How do we focus on it, even if we know what it means? What comes to our mind when we think “voidness?” We want to sit down and meditate, what do we do? We’ve read the meaning; we’ve heard what it is; we think we understand what it means. Now, we’re sitting down, and we want to meditate on it. What do we do? Do we just repeat the definition? What are we thinking about? How do we focus on voidness?
If we don’t know how to focus on it, it’s like having the medicine for some sickness we have and we know what the medicine is, but we have no idea how to take it. Are we supposed to inject it, are we supposed to drink it, are we supposed to make an enema out of it? What are we supposed to do with it? We have no idea, and we don’t know how much of it to take. We don’t know when to take it, how often to take it, all these things. We have to go to the doctor (have to go to the teacher) to find out. However, we know what it is, and we know that it will cure our sickness. This is a very good example.
There are many, many things that we have to know in order to meditate correctly on voidness. What are the stages? Well, like with taking medicine, for the first few days we take it every so many hours, then the next days we take it less. There are instructions along the way, aren’t there? That’s why this topic is very, very important. That’s the point of this whole discussion. We need to know this, despite it being difficult to understand. It doesn’t matter that it’s difficult to understand; it’s not impossible. Serkong Rinpoche always used a wonderful example. He loved to go to circuses. He said if a bear can learn how to ride a bicycle, then as a human being, we can learn a lot more.