Dr. Berzin: Can you please clarify this for me. In logic, when you use the Prasangika method to convince someone, it is not really a syllogism – not simply, “this is like that because of this,” followed by examples and counterexamples. How does the Prasangika method of using prasangas, absurd conclusions, actually prove anything?
For example, “Because something dependently arises, therefore it is devoid of being self-established; if it did not dependently arise, it could not function” – this type of reasoning appears in Nagarjuna’s Root Verses on Madhyamaka. How does the prasanga method establish the points it is seeking to prove?
Tsenshap Serkong Rinpoche II: Classic syllogisms are still there in the Prasangika tenet system when you really need to think about the points you want to prove in order to establish them. So, the real question is why is the method that Nagarjuna uses called the “prasanga method.” In other words, why is it sufficient to sometimes use a prasanga statement instead of a formal syllogism?
Dr. Berzin: Is the syllogism the same as in the Svatantrika approach, with the only difference being whether the elements of the syllogisms have self-established existence?
Rinpoche: Yes, the syllogisms are the same. With syllogisms, all the reasoning is presented explicitly in a structured way, as is usually explained. The prasanga method, by way of contrast, does not give a syllogism as an additional reason – an unnecessary reason – in order to establish something that is obvious.
For example, if you ask the Chittamatrins or the Yogachara Svatantrikas, “Why do you believe in a reflexive consciousness (rang-rig; reflexive awareness)?” they have to come up with some kind of answer, which is one that goes against what is just reality. They say that a consciousness does not have the ability to cognize itself so that you can later remember that it occurred. They say you have to introduce another type of consciousness, a reflexive one, to explain how you’re able to remember. But why do they have to say that? The Prasangika method does not need to assert this extra thing.
Dr. Berzin: You mean, Prasangika says you don’t have to posit a second type of consciousness?
Rinpoche: Right, because Prasangika gives a simpler answer: Just by correctly remembering an object, you establish or prove that an earlier consciousness occurred that must have cognized it [even if just subliminally]. It is obvious that the earlier cognition occurred, otherwise you wouldn’t have remembered, so you don’t need to add something extra, something unnecessary like a reflexive consciousness to account for that.
Dr. Berzin: So, how do you prove that a consciousness cannot be conscious of itself to someone who holds the Yogachara Svatantrika position? Doesn’t Shantideva uses the analogies of how a needle cannot pierce itself and a sword cannot cut itself? Aren’t those analogies arguing with logic?
Rinpoche: Those analogies are not logical proofs using syllogisms. It is obvious that a needle cannot pierce itself and a sword cannot cut itself. That doesn’t require a syllogism to prove it. That is why, in the ninth chapter of Engaging in Bodhisattva Behavior, Shantideva gives the example of a groundhog that wakes up from hibernation and, seeing a bite on its fur, knows that it was bitten. It “remembers” the bite in the sense that it knows correctly something obvious that happened before. It can see the bite as clear evidence. It doesn’t need to use a syllogism to prove it.
Dr. Berzin: But then that still is inference (rjes-dpag), isn’t it? If I wake up in the morning with a mosquito bite and I conclude that I must have been bitten in my sleep by a mosquito – that’s only logical – isn’t that inference?
Rinpoche: Inference is only when you use a syllogism to prove you were bitten by a mosquito if, when seeing the bite, you were uncertain what caused it. But if you are one hundred percent certain that the bite can only have been caused by a mosquito biting you – because that’s obvious – then knowing that you were bitten by a mosquito is not inference. It is remembering something that is obvious.
Dr. Berzin: But when you see the mosquito bite when you wake up in the morning, don’t you know that you were bitten by thinking, “If there is a mosquito bite, I must have been bitten; if there were no mosquito bite, I would not have been bitten.” How is that not inference?
Rinpoche: If you are not sure you were bitten, because maybe you scratched yourself, maybe something else, and you give many possible reasons to prove you were bitten, then you are using logic to gain certainty. You are not one hundred percent certain, and so you have to prove it with logic using a syllogism.
Dr. Berzin: But when you see you have a mosquito bite, what else could have caused a mosquito bite, besides having been bitten by a mosquito? It is logical that you were bitten by a mosquito and not by a bedbug, but if something is logical, doesn’t that mean you know it by inference?
Rinpoche: Suppose you slept alone in the room, all the windows and doors are closed, and you see a mosquito in the room, and it has a big belly filled with blood. You don’t need to get anything more, like the results of a scientific investigation of the DNA of the blood proving it is yours, to know with certainty that you have a mosquito bite because this mosquito bit you while you were sleeping. It is obvious just from seeing both the mosquito bite and this mosquito with a red, full belly that the bite was caused by this mosquito biting you. You do not need to reason it out with a syllogism.
Let’s look at another example. Suppose you live alone and you go out to the store and buy a new laptop. You bring it home, put it on your desk, and then go out again. When you come home, you find the door wide open and you see the laptop is gone. There is no doubt that you bought it, brought it home and put it on your desk. When you see the door was wide open and the laptop is gone, you do not need any further proof. You know for certain that someone stole it. There is no other explanation; it is obvious that you were robbed. But you have no certainty about who the thief was.
Dr. Berzin: But isn’t it the case that for straightforward cognition (mngon-sum), the object should appear straightforwardly to your mind? I would have to see someone stealing it.
Rinpoche: No, you do not need to see it visually like that. It is straightforward mental cognition, but not like extrasensory cognition – not clairvoyance.
Dr. Berzin: So, is this an example of the Prasangika assertion that straightforward cognition can be conceptual (rtog -bcas)?
Rinpoche: No. The confusion concerns what is meant by rtog-bcas and rtog-med. Prasangika accepts the difference between a conceptual cognition and a non-conceptual one the same as the other tenet systems do. They are two different ways of cognizing an object, and straightforward cognition is only non-conceptual. So, here in Prasangika, the terms “rtog-bcas” and “rtog-med” do not refer to with and without concepts. The Prasangika approach follows whatever the world conventionally accepts and speaks about, and so both terms concern an obvious object, something that the world accepts as obviously existent and as obviously the case. “Mngon-sum,” which you’re translating as “straightforward cognition,” is also the term of “obvious.”
[“rTog-med mngon-sum,” then, refers to cognizing something obvious with sense consciousness, like seeing the laptop. “rTog-bcas mngon-sum” refers to cognizing something obvious with mind consciousness, like knowing that you were bitten by a mosquito while you were sleeping.]
Dr. Berzin: I don’t know, then, the best way of translating rtog-bcas and rtog-med in Prasangika that would make their distinction clear. In any case, how do you put what you just explained together with dependent arising and voidness? If something is devoid – devoid of being self-established – then it must be dependent. And if it functions, then it is not self-established. So, how does stating that prove it? How does it actually convince someone?
Rinpoche: These two points about straightforward cognition and the prasanga method come together in the main debate that the Prasangika system has, and that debate is about deepest truth, not about conventional truth. Conventional truth is simply whatever people say exists – whatever obviously exists, whatever is validly cognized. Prasangika has no problem with that. But how things exist is a very different question.
Prasangika questions how it is that things can perform their functions. The world accepts that things do function, but they doubt how things can function if there isn’t something there that is functioning. They say that the conventional existence and functioning of things are self-established. They are established just by the way things naturally are (rang-bzhin-gyis grub-pa). They naturally exist and function by their own power, just by the fact that they naturally are like that. It is as if there is something findable inside them, their “self-nature,” that makes them exist and function.
Dr. Berzin: Right, things just automatically appear on their own and likewise appear to be functioning on their own, like when you open the door and see cars passing by on the street. They are just there and are moving by. Their existence outside is established or proven by their naturally existing and being there and doing that.
Rinpoche: If you hold such a position, the more you see things function, the less willing you are to give up your position because you think things really are established or proven to exist just by themselves naturally being like that.
Dr. Berzin: So, how do you convince them that they are mistaken?
Rinpoche: Their position is totally wrong because what does “naturally being like that” mean? It means that being like that is not something fabricated (bcos-ma). It is not fabricated or manufactured by something else. That means their existence and functioning do not depend on anything else. But how can you believe that? A laptop, for example, functions by depending on electricity, a power cord, a keyboard, a display and so on.
Dr. Berzin: Right, that’s obvious.
Rinpoche: Yes, it’s obvious that the laptop functions because it depends on those things. So, you don’t have to use anything further, like a syllogism, to prove that this is correct. It is obvious. That’s how using a prasanga works. Things function because it is obvious that they are devoid of being self-established; they function because their functioning arises dependently on other things.
Dr. Berzin: Thank you. I’ll have to think further about that.