Ways of Knowing

Understanding the difference between affirmation phenomena, which are known simply by affirming the presence or existence of something, and negation phenomena, known by negating the presence or existence of something, enables us to understand nonstaticness and voidness.

An overview of objects that are not decisively cognized within the context of conceptual and nonconceptual cognition.

With non-determining cognition, the involved object of the cognition appears clearly and accurately, but without a decisive determination of it.

Apprehension is an accurate, decisive cognition of its own object. Of the seven ways of knowing, bare cognition, inferential cognition and subsequent cognition are apprehensions.

According to the Sautrantika tenet system, there are seven ways of knowing an object. To understand the seven in more detail, we first need to know what a way of knowing (“lorig” in Tibetan) is.

An overview of the ways of knowing within the context and point of view of the different Indian Buddhist philosophical tenet systems.

Presumptive cognition is an invalid cognition that conceptually takes its object correctly and freshly but presumes it to be true either for no reason, a wrong one, or even a right one but without understanding why it is correct.

Conceptual cognition is a deceptive cognition, because it confuses a category and generic representation of a member of a category with a specific item. Western languages call such conceptual labeling “projection.”

Examples illustrating the seven ways of knowing, and how to identify and apply them in our daily lives.

A summary of the main assertions unique to the Gelug tradition, concerning cognition theory, the Indian Buddhist tenet systems, karma, the three times, and many more.