Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The pivot point of this 61-minute talk is a quotation from child psychologist Jean Piaget: a child constructs a concept, projects it outward, then forgets the projection was ever hers. Ven Jampa Gendun uses this to ground the Prāsaṇgika — the Consequentialist Middle Way — school’s claim that all phenomena exist only in dependence on language and conceptuality, a subtler emptiness than the absence of a partless independent self. He positions this school at the top of the four Buddhist tenet systems, then unpacks “merely labeled” existence through frank examples: why desire for another’s body or hostility toward an enemy feels objectively given, and how advertising conditions desire by reshaping what appears beautiful. A lively Q&A presses the hardest objections — were electrons real before we named them? — and Gendun holds the line while acknowledging the argument is genuinely counterintuitive.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 04 EW 2011 03 05.mp3
UUID: d2b65f62-219d-4573-af8f-b6b85e051b86
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: Emptiness Weekend (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 2011-03-05
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 60.6 minutes
Words: ~7,990
So we’re gonna we’re gonna move on to talk about emptiness. That’s why we’re here for. That’s why we’ve been talking about in terms of the Buddhist doctrine of self selflessness. We’ve we’ve been discussing in terms of an absence. So the word absence is is important.
Whether we’re talking about selflessness or we’re talking about emptiness, we’re talking about an absence of something, a lack of something. We can talk about the absence of an elephant in this room, for example. That’s useful to talk about. Maybe not after going to tea. So something which which at a very deep level of of our being, we conceive of as being there, but which in fact is not there, an absence, a lack of something.
Thus, we’ve been talking about an absence, an absence of a partless, unchanging, independent self. Okay? Well, now we’re going to go little bit deeper, more subtle. We’re going to there are different you know, the the the Buddha didn’t teach philosophic systems. He just talked to people.
He, you know, he just had these dialogues. All his teachings are situational, dialogical. It’s quite interesting in a way. He was always interested in how can I help this person along their particular unique path? He didn’t give, he didn’t enunciate doctrines.
This is the way things are. He taught different things to different people. Sometimes they almost were contradictory. Sometimes they appeared to be contradictory. So these were later organ all his you know, he he taught for forty five years and probably, you know, four or five hours every day, every day, seven days a week.
So that’s a that’s a lot of teachings. And these teachings were later organized these various scholars and so forth, similarities in areas of particular ways of view of the same subject, they began to organize them. They began to notice that the Buddha taught on the whole, very roughly, in such a way that were four, coming to an understanding of emptiness, was a gradual unfolding, like steps on a ladder, and they formed what was called the tenet systems. Tenet systems are just, they began to develop philosophic schools around what the Buddha did. They emphasized certain areas of those teachings and de emphasized others, and what resonated with them at their particular level, and what seemed to have worked for them as opposed to what they couldn’t identify with.
It wasn’t seemed to be relevant to them at that particular time. So these tenet systems or philosophic schools which were later organized, and the Buddha didn’t teach these schools. They’re based on his teaching, but he didn’t say, Well, now I’m gonna teach this school. Now I’m gonna teach this. He didn’t he didn’t approach him that way.
He was a real teacher. And, you know, a real teacher teaches the student and not the subject. And, know, someone someone like me, I can only teach one thing, way I know, these notes that I’ve made. I can’t say where you’re particularly at. That’s why a Buddha becomes a Buddha, so they can know where people are at, and they can tailor the teachings exactly for this individual right where they’re at, at that particular karmic history, you know, so it fits, as opposed to one size fits all.
Maybe it helps some, maybe it doesn’t help others. You know, that’s the kind of situation we’re involved in to a large extent. So he taught these various systems. And there’s four main tenets or philosophic schools of Buddhism. And each have what at least the higher schools would say is a more subtle presentation.
Everybody says their school is the best, but anyway. There’s the Great Exposition School, the Sūtra School, the Mind Only School, and finally those who consider themselves the high school are the middle way school. Okay? And they say we have this is the final thought of the Buddha on the nature of reality. So that’s since you people are obviously up to that, that’s what I’m going to be talking about.
So I present it from particular point of view, a particular school. So in Sanskrit, it’s called Prāsaṇgika. So it’s Prāsaṇgika Mādhyamika. The Prāsaṇgika means consequentialist, the Prāsaṇgika Madhyamaka school, something like that. The word’s not so important.
They conceive of ignorance, so there are different levels of ignorance. So the level of ignorance that we’ve been talking about is terribly relevant. We have to work through that level of ignorance to come to a more subtle level of ignorance. So by all means it’s not as if we can skip that in this discussion in terms of ignorance grasping at a partless unchanging independent self. I think that’s most relevant to most of us.
I think that’s where we can work at. But anyway, showing the presentation at a more subtle level. The Prāsaṇgika or the Consequentialist Middle Way school goes further in your analysis of what it means to be dependently existent. Remember, qualified our previous discussion in terms of unchanging, partless, unchanging, independent. And there we took independent to mean independent of causes and conditions, independent of body and mind, something like that.
And here at this level of the Prāsaṇgika School, they’re going to interpret what they in addition to that, they add a more subtle level. And this is what we’re going to look at. We can look at things from various levels. We do this all the time. You know, depending upon our purposes, we can look at this table from the superficial level, which describes, you know, its shape, its size, its finish, how its material it’s made of, and so forth.
We can we can we can you know, a carpenter might look at the table and, you know, look want to know, well, how is it joined together? You know, how is how is it shaped and so forth. That kind of investigation would be useful for a carpenter. An antique dealer would say, well, you know, how old is it, what kind of condition is it, how rare is it. They might look at the table from that point of view.
A botanist might look at the table and say, Well, you know, this is made from a rare species of wood that comes from only the Amazon jungle and so forth, something like that. A particle physicist might look at, Well, this table is just a pattern of vibrating atoms in space. They might look at it from that point of view. We’re trying to understand the way that the table exists, not its composition, not what it’s made from, not how it’s produced. We’re looking at it from a particular point of view, the way it exists.
How does the table exist? How does it how what is it being? Remember I used this term yesterday ontology. If our if our analysis so that’s what we’re investigating. Just like a carpenter would investigate how how how is it joined together?
How was it shaped, botanist would investigate the type of species of wood it was made from. Now all these individuals are investigating from different points of view. We’re investigating too. How does the table exist? And if our analysis goes deep enough, what we’ll come to is what we call emptiness.
Table emptiness means lack, an absence. So question must come up, emptiness of what? What is what is lacking? What is not there? Okay.
That’s that’s, you know, that’s where our mind should go to when we hear empty. Empty of what? Not just emptiness. In and of itself. So what we say is in if we come to an we come to in in the course of our analysis is to understand the table’s emptiness of an independent existence, a lack of independent existence, an absence of independent existence.
That’s what we come to when we analyze the way the table exists. We find we find an absence of a particular fantasized way of existing. This fantasized way of existing is very has many different terms. I think they’re oh, I don’t know. There’s at least twelve different terms which are used.
This we’re talking about an emptiness, a lack, an absence of a fantasized way of existing, a hallucinated way of existing. We’re trying to understand how does that table exist. Well, we know when we analyze, we say, well, it doesn’t exist this way. There’s an absence of existing in this what I’m making up, this fantasized way of existing. That fantasized way of existing has different names.
We call it, for example, independent existence. The table lacks independent existence. Inherent existent there’s lots of different synonyms, but they’re all getting at the same notion. Independent existence, inherent existence, objective existence, existence from its own side, natural existence, self defining existence. They all have the same sense.
Some of them work better for us. You might be able to understand one term better than another. The terms are not when we talk about independent existence or inherent existence or natural existence, these aren’t concepts which are being imposed by philosophic systems. You know, it’s not we’re up something, we’re saying is there, and we say, well, it’s not really there. We’re not, you know, playing a kind of mental game with ourselves.
We are saying this is when we talk about independent existence or inherent existence, refers to our ordinary sense of the way things exist, as if they existed completely in and of themselves in their own right. You know, that’s that’s we naturally see things in that way in that way. Things appear to us that to exist that way. Okay? That which grasp, that which holds on to that appearance as if in fact that’s the way it exists, the table, and when this refers to all phenomena whatsoever or present discussion, not just to persons or selves or I’s, but to tables, to chairs, to universes, to this building, and so forth.
Everything at all times appears appears to exist as if it defines itself. It is inherently existent, objectively existent out there. Now we’re gonna have to refine what we mean by independent existence. This is what this is this is the the job that we have cut out for us today. You know, yesterday, you asked a question.
I haven’t forgot your question. Okay. Does this what what yeah. What’s the use of all this? This is just, you know, counting how many angels fit on the head of a pin or something like that.
You know, it’s a it’s just kind of a philosophic game we could play with ourselves. But in fact, it is relevant. Whenever strong emotions arise, for example, attachment or hatred, if we examine the experience of that emotion, we will see that underlying it is an assumption that there is something objective existing out there, something real, which we are which we are holding on to and on to which we we project desirable or undesirable qualities. You know, According to the kinds of qualities we project upon that externally that object of the real object, we will then go on to react with either aversion or attachment. So strong emotions are a response to assuming the experience of something as being independently existent.
Okay. You know, we have we have this saying in in the West, Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, don’t we? And when we think about it, that’s what we that’s normally what we would say, well, it makes a lot of sense. It makes a lot of sense. And that points to something, but it’s that that what it’s pointing to is often more than not lost sight of in in a day in our daily life.
You know, There’s something out there. It’s like, you know, the world is these tables, but when I’m talking about tables and vases and things like that, it’s not so it’s not it doesn’t have any much emotional value for ourselves. I find it a bit difficult, you know, if I talk about a woman’s body. That has emotional value for me. Tables and chairs and knives don’t affect me all that much.
But you could maybe talk about it, I don’t know, whatever you’re into. Man’s body. Man’s body, the piece of cake that I just had at the the break. Attached to. They don’t even have to be children.
So there’s a huge risk. So you see so I, you know, I I I’ve been going swimming a lot. You know? And I noticed women’s bodies. Okay.
Why you been swimming? We we won’t won’t go ahead. Motivation. And there’s something very and I think there’s something very alluring. You know, you see the little bikini clad bodies.
Oh, yeah. This is very embarrassing. We understand these. No. It’s okay.
We want this judgment to hear on because Yeah. So it looks like something, you know, there’s some kind of Draw. Something out there which is saying, you know, I can bring you bliss. I can bring you pleasure. It’s it’s kinda exuding from the object, coming from its own side.
Come take me. Touch me. I can bring you pleasure. Yeah? We just said beauty is in the eye of the beholder, didn’t ourselves as passive observers, and the world is kind of acting upon us and overwhelming us with its beauty or its ugliness, and we react in that way, pushing things away or drawing them toward us.
But in fact, it’s a co created reality. We’re involved in world making. You know, it’s like think in the Amazon, you know, some of the native women, they put plates in their lips, you know, and it’s a sign of beauty. You know, I can see other I don’t know if it’s true or not, I’m just projecting my own stuff on it. But, the natives, know, Wow, look at the lips on her.
As opposed to, know, you have to kiss me, you know, I get really turned off, you know, but that’s pretty revolting. Or, you know, some people, like, eat snails, you know, raw snails. And some people, oh, it’s delicious. Look at how delicious they are. Ascargos.
I’m completely revolted by that. So, you know, what it’s culturally defined, isn’t it, in a way? You know, that in the Amazon jungle, native finds beautiful or ugly and so forth. But but that’s when we rationally think about it, we we can come to, you know, fairly easily come to an object, well, it’s it’s not in the object itself, that beauty or ugliness. But when we react emotionally, it is as if that desirdesirability, that repulsiveness is kind of oozing out.
Get away from me. It’s out there. It has nothing to do with my mind. I’m not I’m not I’m not playing any part in creating the repulsive nature of that object. You have to have to think.
Well, that’s that’s but the part of our mind isn’t isn’t working that way. And therefore I react with aversion, anger, to have get away from it. Part of my mind sees that in the very nature of the object, if I can only possess that, make it mine, it’s going you know, I can snack from it from other you know? And I can bring it’ll bring me bliss eternally forever. There’s a kind of internal logic of ignorance, you know?
Ignorance isn’t stupid. There’s a we don’t see the role our own minds are playing in the creation of our reality. Things do not define themselves. We play a role in defining what they are. They’re not self defining.
They’re not objectively existing. Now I’ll read a quote which helped develop this idea. According to the child psychologist Jean Piaget Jean Piaget was a Swiss psychologist. Think at one time his wife said watch the kids and he watched them and he developed these huge theories around children and he was a leader in the field of child psychology and so forth, child development. A child first constructs a concept related to the world then projects it out into the world.
The concept is externalized so that it appears to be independent of the subject’s own mental activity. Okay? So we begin to develop ideas about the world. We project those ideas beauty, ugliness, good, bad, you know, all of these subjective qualities. We project them onto things themselves and then as if we forget that we projected them.
It’s as if they were the nature of the things themselves. You know, there’s yeah. Like that woman in the in the bikini. There’s a point when I my mind just is overwhelmed with I see that quality of ability to give bliss, of pleasurability, of desirability, of beauty, you know, all of these very extremely sensuous positive qualities. I’m not projecting that on these two mammary glands.
I’m seeing it coming from this very voluptuous breast of this woman, and I to partake of that, touch that, bring me bliss. Develop attachment, desire. The opposite is so we externalize what is in fact a conception. We’ve learned. I’ve learned.
I’ve been conditioned to see it in that way. We talk about independent existence. What what the existence of all phenomena depends upon causes and conditions. Well, all phenomena, I should say products, but there are there are some permanent phenomena which do not depend upon cause and condition, but the vast majority. So we will just say phenomena depend upon cause and conditions, they depend upon their parts, but most importantly, what we’re trying to understand here, and which is the most subtle aspect of this presentation, is they depend upon language and conceptuality on our thoughts.
All phenomena. And it doesn’t make much difference. I mean, it’s not it doesn’t have much impact when we talk about tables and vases. But if I talk about that woman’s voluptuous body, then I can more readily kind of get a sense of what they’re talking about. That voluptuous body is dependent upon my thinking of it as such, but it appears to exist independent of my thinking it as such.
That’s the problem. My thinking existing independent of as such is a fantasized way of existing. The voluptuousness of that body, the desirability of those breasts appearing to me to exist independent of my thinking of it as such is a fantasized way of existing. It really doesn’t exist that way. But ignorance says, Ah, it does too.
That’s the way it exists, and therefore it makes internal logic. If it appears to be out there, if I can only make it get it in here, I’m going to experience bliss. So I develop attachment, craving. I try to make it a permanent part of me, I, bring it in. I want to own it, control it.
This is there’s of there’s an internal logic here, you know, which is operating. If state this in a positive way, so we said all phenomena are empty, so empty is the fantasized way of existing. There’s an absence. An absence of what? Of independent existing.
Of independent existing. If we state that in a positive way, all phenomena are merely imputed or designated by language and conceptuality. All phenomena are merely this is it’s not easy to wrap our minds around, I I don’t think. All phenomena are merely designated, projected, imputed, lots of different words we could use by our language and conceptuality. We use language.
Come to know our world through language and conceptuality. We create our world through our language and conceptuality, through our ideals about it and so forth. Phenomena are empty of existing independent of that designating process. They don’t exist from their own side, independent of my own mind, what I think about them, my cultural conditioning, and so forth. They don’t exist independently.
So in in order to help us so what do we mean by being designated by language and conceptuality? That’s this is the opposite of independent existence is dependent existence. All phenomena are dependently existent. All phenomena are dependent arisings. They depend.
When we come to the arising, we’ll emphasize that. Here, when we’re talking about the fact that they depend upon language and conceptuality, thought process, the way we think about them. There is something that appears to our mind. There’s a basis. It triggers a thought consciousness which uses language to think about that projecting a name upon the dog.
So there’s a basis of imputation that appears to us. Triggers our mind to think in such a way that certain thought process are invoked, and we conceive of the object to be such and such. For example, a baby is born. Okay? Their parents had sexual intercourse.
There was, through that activity, sperm and ovum uniting through various causes conditions a baby is conceived. There’s a mind and body so there are parts. Now that appears so let’s say there’s the baby. What should we call the baby? Let’s call the baby John.
So in dependence upon being that the name John John is a person. It’s it’s not a word. But there but we use a name, language. We say, let’s call the baby John. It depends upon that language and subsequently being thought of as John, John comes into existence.
John is not name. He’s not a word, but John’s existence depends upon language. It’s it’s just not a figment of our imagination. There’s something out there. There’s an external there’s an external trigger.
There’s a there’s there’s a baby with a mind and body, you know, squirming around, crying. So let’s call the baby John. And subsequently, whenever that that appears, that it triggers a thought, John. And we think, well, John, here comes John. And this this this is the it it all works in this way.
And to to give you I’m not we’re gonna go through lots of examples, but to give you a sense of the quality, this is called labeling. All phenomena are dependent upon being labeled. And to give you a sense of the scope of this labeling process, we can go back to that example of the snake and the rope. Think of that rope as being a snake. Labeling that rope as a snake no.
That we have a woven piece of hemp. A woven piece of hemp. Okay? We call that a rope. We give that the name rope.
We can we can likewise call it a snake. There’s no difference in the labeling process between calling that that length of woven hemp a rope and calling it a snake. And you might think, you know, then we could call anything anything, you know, and that would make it so. But that’s not the case. I’m just at at this point, just there’s no difference in terms of how we’re labeling, how we’re using language and projecting it upon the the the basis of designation.
There’s something there. There’s a there’s a woven length of woven hemp. It triggers our thought process. It appears to us through an eye consciousness. It triggers a mental process thinking about the object.
Discriminates the object. This is a rope. This is a snake. Through certain conditions we might think it’s a snake. Through other conditions we might think it’s a rope.
There’s no difference in the fact of labeling. Now one is a correct label and one is an incorrect label. There is a difference. We just can’t call anything anything. And talk a little bit about the criteria.
This labeling process occurs, you know, but talking in this way, maybe it doesn’t we don’t see relevance of it. In our practical everyday life, when we talk about friend, enemy, and stranger, beauty and ugliness, all these subjective qualities, we likewise, and as trying to emphasize in terms of his voluptuous body, we are we likewise see don’t see the part of our labeling is coming is coming into play. We see we we project that label out there, and we don’t but we see it as extinct coming from the side of the object. There’s something out there. There’s a there’s a body.
I I label that voluptuous. Desire arises. Friend, enemy is danger. The enemy, god. You know, I took this person in the court, they’d say, yes, you’re right.
This guy’s a bastard. You know, it’s objectively by his very nature. You know? Everybody would have to would agree. It’s kinda the a negativity is kinda there for everybody to see.
I’m not creating it in any way. But that’s not the case, isn’t it? Your best your enemy can become your best friend, and your best friend can be it’s just the changing labels. The you know, and it depends upon variations on on the basis of that label. You know, one day he’s kind to you, label him a friend.
One day he’s not kind to you, label him an enemy. But it seems to be he’s a friend or enemy from his own side. People talk about finding their soulmates, as if they were by their very nature a perfect fit for who you are. That quality of being a soulmate is coming from their side. I found my soOmate at last.
So we’re using this there is this kind of practical relevance and at least become aware that I’m playing a part in what is appearing to me, especially when there’s a strong affective quality, an emotional quality involved. With tables and chairs, it’s the same process, but there’s not much effect, we don’t get very emotional about tables and chairs. We do it by friends, enemies, strangers, beauty and ugliness and so forth. That’s when these emotions start. We see the object existing objectively out there, we attribute qualities to it, then we attribute those qualities from our own side.
We see them existing from the side of the object, and then we react as if we’re coming from the side of the object with either aversion or attachment. Does that make sense? I mean, it’s it’s not it’s not I don’t think it’s easy to see this process happening, but it I think it is happening. The world that we come to know is is a learned world. You know?
We aren’t just plucked down here in a in a world which is given to communicated to us. It’s a learned reality. We learn it at our mother’s knee. This is this. This is good.
This is bad. This is beautiful. This is ugly. This is a chair. This is a voluptuous body.
Mom didn’t tell me that, but I learned about it in magazines and so forth. And cultural conditioning. Right. Yeah. I learned what in another culture, they wouldn’t it might seem horrible.
They learn differently. So and they react differently. So the the part that language plays in our lived experience. Know, language plays in our lived experience. Our world is a social construct.
The I is a social construct. Nothing more than that. in dependence upon this body and mind, I give the name I. I. I think that I is something more than that, but it’s just a name which has been given in dependence upon this particular body and mind.
Your body and mind, I call you. You’re you’re over there. I’m over here. It’s merely but it’s been merely labeled by language and conceptuality, but we take it for something much more than that. So in the the Dhammapada, which is a collection of sayings of the Buddha, he said, you know, we are what we think, although we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts, we make the world. So our thoughts make a difference in our lived experience. We we share this is very this we share a common world with others. Your your version of the world is slightly different than mine. You know, I’m looking at this table from this side.
You’re looking at from this side. So but we we we agree that there’s a table here. So we we more or less a common version of our world. We’ve been acculturated. We all think very similarly.
Why? Because we all have very similar karmas. karma is one way of looking at it is simply the way our mind has been conditioned. Given certain stimulus, we all react to that stimulus in similar ways. We all think it triggers the same types of thoughts, reactions in a very similar way.
When we see a wooden rectangle with four legs on it, we all react with the thought table. An Eskimo wouldn’t react that way. We have the karma. Our mind is conditioned as such to react that way. Any questions about I just it was Yeah.
I’ve got a thank you. Yeah. Please. The way the way I’m hearing the discussion, and I’ve heard it a few times, it sounds to me that the labeling is like the process where I apply an adjective to things. So I have a basis.
Have a basis. And and I and I somehow recognize it by by adding qualities to a thing. There’s a there’s a wooden rectangle with four legs Yeah. That triggers the thought table. And table and depends upon that table comes in existence.
That that table is dependent upon being labeled as such. So that doesn’t make all that much difference to us, even though it might be philosophically correct. But when I talk about when I see this rapturous body, I label that as desirable, and then it makes a difference. You wouldn’t like to label it as desirable, would you? No.
You won’t get personal. But well, okay. The part that I have trouble with is that it comes into an existence after the labeling. I find that odd. The labeling and the coming into existence are simultaneous.
Yeah. Mean, it’s that whole it’s that whole thing that says that existence is is dependent upon the labeling that I find quite odd. Kinda it’s a semantic argument. It’s an argument that says semantic existence. It doesn’t meant its existence as an It’s argument.
Argument. It’s an It’s an nobody’s questioning the fact that there’s a wooden object there. That might not be called a table, depending on where you come from. So, you know, I usually go back to John. So there’s a baby there.
It depends upon being called John, subsequent baby being thought of John comes into existence. But we can go beneath that. Well, what is the basis of that labeling? The baby. Well, that baby is also merely labeled.
There was a mind and body we call baby, and it depends upon that label baby, the baby can exist. Well, we can go beneath that. We can go to the body. Well, body and it depends upon arms, legs, trunk, head appearing to us. We label body.
We can go with that. Can go to the arm. And if you keep going down, you won’t find anything. But I think the question is a bit like if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around it fall? It really fall?
Did it really exist if no one’s there to hear it? This is an existential question. I think that’s what you’re asking. It’s one of those in there. Yeah.
Like, the object. You you you the discussion recognizes that a basis for something. A basis so the basis out there. Okay. So And then what’s the basis?
The basis is the the basis of designation? Or give me take any example. What’s the basis of labeling? To do it, I’m just gonna have to use all the other words we use for everything else, labels that we use everywhere. But don’t don’t things exist before they’re labeled?
That’s what I’m kind of getting at. Then they would exist independent of the labeling process. Before we knew there were electrons and protons in existence, they still existed. That’s a good question. Maybe we can talk about that after we go up this The problem is if accept the stuff about labeling, then you come back to the problem with the rope and the rope and the snake.
Okay. And if labeling is what made it what it is, then how can that be wrong? How can that how could I realize that it’s not a snake if I if the label is made by investigation? Okay. So this is we’re we’re inaccurate label.
We’re jumping a little bit ahead, but we can talk about about it. The just because we we say something is such doesn’t make it such. Okay? So there there are three qualifications in making something to to certify the existence of an object. And if I can think of these three, we’ll be doing very well.
The first off, it has to be there has to be generally known as that. It has to be consensus about the name. If I call a four legged animal that barks, I call that a cat. That doesn’t make it a cat. It’s not commonly known as a cat.
Okay? It can’t be contradicted by what is called a valid cognition. For example, let us say by a valid cognition that invested would if were to investigate the nature of that object, if it contradicted what I’m seeing it as, then I cannot properly label it as such. For example, let’s say we were walking out in the field and they’re and I say, oh, let’s let’s and they say, let’s cross over this field, you know, take a shortcut. And we’re walking across the field.
Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Let’s go. There’s there’s a there’s a person over there standing over there. And my friend says, no, no, no.
That’s not a person. That’s a scarecrow. So we have two conflicting to me, it appears to be a man. To to this person, it appears to be a scarecrow. I’m thinking a man.
I’m thinking a scarecrow. He’s thinking of a a of a man, of a scarecrow. Okay? What we would have so we have conflicting there’s two different appearances. What is it in fact?
Would require us to move closer? And then as we the the truth of something becomes more obvious the the closer we get to it. The falsity becomes less becomes more and more more transparent until it actually dissolves. If we were to move closer, or if this person I understood had better eyesight than I did, then I would say I would have to say, that would be valid, the the fact that this is a scare crow. As we move closer, the what that that object is a proper basis of labeling it would become obvious to ourselves.
Ah, you’re right. It’s not a man. It is a scare crow. So merely appearance does not certify the existence of an object. Just because a snake appears to me doesn’t mean there’s a snake there.
That’s that that appearance is not able to function as a snake. It doesn’t crawl. It doesn’t bite. You know? It it would it would be it would contradicted by a conscious sense in which understand the actual nature of that object.
So snakes do not perform the function of snakes, though they might appear that way. They might appear as a snake. So we can’t properly call a rope a snake. So there are certain criteria that we have to use. What was the third one?
Couldn’t say it. Third one is not contradicted by a valid cognition of the ultimate. You know that everything appears at all times to exist independent of our own minds, independent of cause and conditions, parts, and labeling process. That’s the way this table appears, but that contradicts a valid cognition of the ultimate. So that’s that’s kind of a technicality.
It’s like a tricky game. Alright. Yeah. We we won’t get that. Very confusing.
Yeah. Okay. So what the first, it has it has to be it’s a matter of renown. It has to be commonly known as that. You know, I can’t call, you know, a dog and a cat, and that makes it a cat.
This four legged animal which barks is commonly known as a dog. But in Portuguese, it’s a cão. Okay. It’s a cow. Okay.
So it’s a matter of I’m really confused. Within this linguistic community. Yeah. Okay. It is it is is to that’s a good word.
You know, when we talk about conventional reality, convention. Convention means an agreement. We’ve all we’ve we’ve all agreed. We’ll call this a table. It makes if I call this an elephant, I say, Put my book on the elephant.
People look at me strangely. If you do that enough, they put you away. We’re forced into thinking this But if people like the word for it, which happens as people invent new things, then we accept it and it becomes part of our Okay. Then let’s see. Yeah.
The the language evolves over time. But that would only happen if everybody agrees to do that. So there’s there’s you can sense it. Yeah. Because it otherwise, like, they called it an elephant, and I called it a tell him that someone else called it a cat, none of us would be able to communicate.
We wouldn’t know what I would do. Yeah. Conventional chaos. So the first of these criteria is that the object must be known as such, is it by popular renown, by is renowned as such. Within a particular linguistic community, it is known as such.
The second is it is not contradicted by a conventional valid cognition, you know, that that knows the actual nature of the Though I might call that length of woven hemp, I might call it a snake, that would be contradicted. That would be contradicted by a valid cognition which understands the nature of that object. Doesn’t that that object is not able to perform the function of a snake. It can it performs the function of rope. It would be improper to call it a snake.
Yeah. Something triggers. You know, this is this is, you know, this is the way emptiness and karma begin to fit together. This world that we live in is a product of our karma. The Buddha said that the three realms are merely mind.
That is to say, they’re merely a product of our karma. What is karma? karma, in one sense, is merely the way our minds have been conditioned. What way are they conditions that due to that they they are conditioned to think, to to conceive of things as in certain particular fashions. You know, like like if, you know, like, you have a puppy that’s been abused, and you you know, someone gives you this puppy, and you go to you’re you’re going to go pet the puppy, and you have the kindness of intentions.
And you you you you’re moving very gently, the puppy jumps away from you, cringes in pain, whips. That’s his karmic reaction. From your side, you had no unharmful intention at all. But it was interpreting, this hand coming from it, in terms of its conditioning. Due to its previous abuse, its mind has been conditioned in such a way that it interprets its reality as if that hand moving toward it was going to cause it pain.
That’s the way our mind is conditioned. It triggers ways of thinking. Our minds are triggered to think this is a table, this is beautiful, this is desirable. The fashion industry spends billions of dollars every year to condition our mind to think that this is desirable. Last year’s fashions are no longer desirable.
They don’t they’re not they’re not quite up to scratch. When you see them, it’s okay, but that’s this stuff is really hipper. This this color is it it really appears. There’s something special about it. Well, that’s because we through conditioning of our minds through the advertising.
It appears that way. We can’t deny it. You know? We can buy into it or not, but that’s another question. But it appears that way.
You might say, oh, it appears great, but I’m satisfied with this. You know, those breasts appear great, but I don’t have to buy into that. You’re not going to stay that way. Now you tell me. So can you ask about the characteristics which lead to The basis, publicity, the characteristics arise that then lead to a label.
Something that I mean, we don’t necessarily need to conventionally agree this object there beforehand, but karma leads to that. So so language that still recognizes objects before it agrees on language. So there’s a basis upon which So you have a you have a rectangular, rectangular, flat piece of wood with four legs. That appears to you. What’s the basis of that?
He’s asking what really exists from its own side. Nothing exists from its own side. So then we’d have to we can go on and analyze each of its parts. We can analyze we could take that as the basis of analysis and take well, there’s this this long piece of wood which has been turned a lathe and so forth. But if the third characteristic is it can’t be analyzed by an ultimate It can’t be contradicted?
It can’t be contradicted by an ultimate. You’ve just contradicted the table by saying that it’s Adams and it’s not really a table anymore. The ultimate view of the table is not that it’s a table. No, would be the view. The ultimate would see the table as dependently existent, independently existent.
Yeah. So that would yeah. That that’s kind of technicality. We can go into that later. But I I I I don’t know.
It’s counterintuitive what we’re talking about. Yeah. So this is what can I ask for you? Oh, here. Oh, no.
I don’t want Well, it’s doesn’t have language. Yeah. But it still knows a teddy bear is a teddy bear or a street. It doesn’t. I’m sorry.
It’s object. Without language, you can still, like, separate an object. Yeah. Can still find a basis for a label. It’s not dependent on language or labels of language.
What what what is this something that you’re describing? Well, if baby saw a tablet, it wouldn’t think a tablet. That’s right. So for that baby, that table doesn’t exist. Something exists.
Something Something exists. That something is also labeled on for that baby, something doesn’t exist. Listen. Language, we shouldn’t restrict it just to word language. We also have symbols.
But for a blind person, colors don’t exist. That’s not to say they don’t exist at all. For something to exist, it doesn’t have to exist for me. That would be really self centered. If it doesn’t exist for me, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
The world doesn’t depend upon my knowing. Yeah. It’s the it is common knowledge. It might not exist for me, but it still could exist. Like like like up to up to twenty or thirty years ago, the other side of the let’s see.
The other side of the moon, the dark side of the moon. No one had ever seen it. Maybe they did. I don’t know. Yeah.
They couldn’t see. Yeah. Until until they got to the moon sixty nine Yeah. It wasn’t possible for So is it but it’s not this to see. Yeah.
But we thought it was probably So for something to exist, it doesn’t have to exist for me. It has to exist for one valid consciousness. So a star that we haven’t seen in the distant universe. Pardon? Say a star that we haven’t seen Yeah.
An example. So how do you know how do you know that example exists? I think it’s fairly fairly safe to assume that we don’t know all the stars that exist, so it’s quite possible that there would be one that we haven’t Yeah, this is the getting language. Yeah. What’s the upshot of that?
This would be that we know it exists because someone who’s smarter than us has told us it exists because they got their telescope and they’ve been able to explore and we trust what they’re saying. That’s another way of knowing something exists. You trust somebody else who knows more than you. Like we’re trusting you know more than we do about this eye business. Know, that this is a But would I be right in saying then that the star that we discover then is a basis upon which we discover it.
So, and that is the problem is only thinking that that’s permanent and independent, not that there isn’t a basis upon which to label. There isn’t necessarily, first there’s a basis of labelling, and then comes the label which is applied to that. And so what is the basis? What’s that word? So in the basis of labeling is, in the case of a table, is the rectangular piece of wood and four legs.
But that’s a label. So how we deal with No. No. A rectangular piece of wood and four legs is not a label. No.
You’re not a label. You’re dependent upon a label, but you’re not a label. You’re not a language, you’re not a word, you’re not a sound, but you’re dependent upon those. Your existence is dependent upon those, but you’re flesh and blood. You’re a human being.
There is a reality, but it does depend on its name. It does depend on how other things have brought you to biological cognition. So there is something there. There definitely is something there, but that something is its existence is dependent upon language and conceptuality. It’s dependent upon that.
I don’t know, sir. So does nothing exist Independent of cause and conditions, parts, and language and conceptuality. Nothing exists. It’s a molecule of an atom. It doesn’t exist because it’s not dependent on anything, an atom or or whatever.
It’s dependent upon cause and conditions, its parts and language. It’s dependent upon It’s like the Greeks who tried to discover the smallest possible particle that couldn’t be divided. Well, we we we it it depends upon being called molecule that came into existence. It exists for a particular scientist at one time, and then it became well known. He gave it a name.
What should we call this? Let’s call it molecule. This particle. But that particle, there’s no, there’s no, it’s turtles all the way down. No, there’s It has smaller and smaller particles.
That’s why the Greeks with their atoms fell down because then they were able to find all their electrons and protons and now their quarks and god knows what all. There is no indivisible particle. Yeah, there’s nothing which doesn’t have parts. That’s right. Everything depends upon parts.
It’s parts. But it also depends upon cause and condition. But here we’re trying to emphasize the labeling process language and we’re trying to emphasize it in terms of effective quality, it generates, how it because of this mistaken notion that we have, we end up reacting emotionally with this attachment and hatred we with due to ignorance which consists of those undesirable qualities existing inherent in the objects themselves and not as a product of being projected from our own consciousness by language and concepts and thought. Let’s go to lunch. What is lunch?
Is lunch is real. We’ll go over that again.