William James and Pragmatic Philosophy
A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Chapters
Pragmatism and practical philosophical application
Today we were discussing the American philosopher William James. And his philosophy is called pragmatism, or that which can be practically applied. And the central
thesis of his philosophy is that the whole function of thought is to produce habits of action. In other words, he was tired of theoretical philosophy. He wanted to see that philosophy had practical application.
So philosophy without practical application is called mental speculation; it has no value. We agree to that. Philosophy must be practically applied in life. That is real pleasure.
So he says that there is a question: what difference would it make practically to anyone if this notion rather than that notion were true?
He said that the criterion for deciding that question is the practicality of something. If there are two questions, two notions, then the standard of judgment should be: which notion is applicable in practice?
Which notion will have the better result in practice, which is factual, not theoretical, that will have good effect in practice. What is his example? Huh? There's no example given. Yes.
But for instance, if there are two different theories involving a subject, then that theory which is better, which is more easily practiced, is more true. Which becomes part of our experience, that is true. He
says that anything that is meaningful or real must have some influence on practice, on our experience, and vice versa: anything that is practiced must be meaningful or real. So that is Krishna consciousness.
We have invited our students, and when they actually practice Krishna consciousness, the result is immediately there. Just like you all European, American boys, you were eating meat and other things were practice.
But since you have taken to Krishna consciousness, you have left it. So by practicing, we see the practical result; therefore this is most practical.
For instance, people who are practicing sense gratification and they find it very practical to gratify their senses. Does this mean that it is meaningful or real?
Yes, it is real, but by sense gratification, he'll gradually glide down to the hellish condition of life. Therefore, sense gratification should not be allowed unrestricted. If you eat more, you suffer from indigestion.
If you have more sex life, then you get tuberculosis. This is practical. If you, uh, indulge in intoxication, then gradually become a nonsense, crazy. The provider is saying that don't do this, and they respect it.
So it's a degree, it's a matter of degree, which is more practical than something else. For instance, sense gratification or communism or any other ism is practiced. It has effect.
But if it is a bad effect, then what is easy? It must have good effect. Effect must be there. But if the effect is bad, that is not practical. Effect must be good and continuous.
But that good result is relative, dependent upon who's deciding whether it's good; in other words, a Lenin or Mao, they feel that the practical result of their philosophy is good. That's all right.
But now Mao disagrees with the practical utility of Russian philosophy. So where is the stability? Similarly, the Russians don't recognize the Chinese. So what is practical for China is not practical for the Russians.
So which one is practical? That which is practical for both. That which is practical for both. That means both of them are not practical. It will be proved in due course of time.
He says that terms such as God and matter and absolute and so on, terms like that, must possess cash value, he says, or practical work. He says you must bring out of each word its practical cash value. Oh, yes.
Our Krishna Consciousness movement daily brings cash results. Without any business, without any labor. So our word "God"—what do you think? Yes. Brahmananda knows very well. So when we use our word "God," it has cash value.
Cash value. We are going to everyone. We are simply showing some books and taking money.
Somebody may say, "You are giving books worth two hundred, you are taking eleven hundred." I think this may be one reason why Krishna consciousness is thriving in America, because this is a typically American idea that everything must have a cash value.
Yeah. Or it is useless. Yes. So our Krishna consciousness movement has cash value.
Even in Los Angeles, outside, they are surprised how these people live in such a nice house, eat so nicely, and have so many cars, and they have no anxiety, and though they do not work, they have no business.
So what can be more cash value than this? So built for psychoanalysis. Yes. Everything is there, but still they do not work, and these other kids, they work whole day and night and still they are not happy.
So what more kind of value we can expect than Krishna consciousness? He says that theories must become instruments and not just answers to questions which we rest upon. They must become instruments. Theories.
Yes, theories, instruments. He says that about the nature of truth, that truth is more than just an agreement of idea with reality, but it also has a practical significance. That whatever is practical is true.
Developing faith and spiritual experience
Yes, practical. We can see from the Prabodhānanda Sarasvatī: that anyone who has got a slight merciful glance of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu, he thinks that Brahman liberation is as good as hell. Kaivalyaṁ narakāyate.
And the heavenly planets, they are ākāśa-puṣpāyate. And yoga-siddhi. So that is not a very important thing. And people are suffering in this material condition; for a devotee, it is simply pleasing.
Everywhere he goes, it is pleasing. While others are seeing full of anxiety, devotees, they're seeing everything pleasing.
So these things happen simply by a fragment of a merciful glance of Caitanya Mahāprabhu upon His devotees. Viśvaṁ pūrṇa-sukhāyate vidhi-mahendrādiś ca kīṭāyate.
And they do not care for any big scholar or any exalted personality. Just like we challenge anyone, we don't care for that, for other than Krishna. He's so much, uh, exalted.
So this is practical because as one has become Krishna conscious, therefore, these things happen. Oh, we can run. His idea of truth is that, uh, truth, it means experience.
And that is our bhāgavata: bhaktiḥ pareśānubhavo viraktir anyatra ca. Bhakti means one who advances in bhakti, he becomes— uh, he has no more any taste for material enjoyment.
The more one increases in bhakti-yoga, it decreases his tendency for material enjoyment. That is the test. Bhaktiḥ pareśānubhavo viraktir or not.
Unless one becomes detached from material things, it is to be understood that he is not making progress. This is practical.
The example is given: just like a hungry man, when he eats, he feels as, as he goes on eating, he proportionally, he feels satisfaction and strength of body.
Similarly, one who is advancing in Krishna consciousness, he feels spiritually strong and, uh, no more material. Well, his idea is that truth is created in the same manner as health and wealth are created.
No, truth is not created. Health can be created. But truth cannot—truth is existing, always, it is not created.
He sees the truth is developing in the same way as, uh—it is not developing, but you are, uh, gradually progressing towards truth. Hmm. Truth is not developed. Uh, you are just like the sun: he is not developing.
But as the clouds disappear, you are developing your sight to see the sun, that's all. Sun is not developing. Sun is there. And he calls truth a system of verification.
In other words, he calls truth a system of verification. In other words, a process whereby ideas become true and they are made true by events in our experience. Yes. As we get more experience, then truth is created.
Not exactly. Truth is that. Truth is... As you make progress, so the truth becomes revealed. Ye yathā māṁ prapadyante.
What Gītā is saying: as one makes his surrendering process complete, it becomes revealed to him at bottom. I see.
But if an idea works when it is applied to concrete facts of experience, then it becomes a true idea; then we accept it as a true idea.
So as we develop our experience, our life progresses, then we develop truth, because we see that this idea works in my experience, so then it becomes true. Is this not a process? That is not a process.
Just like one enters into Krishna consciousness in the beginning by faith; he has no practical experience. But suppose somebody sees that these people... as we appear to be very bright faces, just like in your country.
They have been known as "bright faces." So he gets a little interest. So that interest increases. First of all, he comes with his little faith and interest. But as he associates with us, the interest increases. That is true.
Otherwise, why are they sticking? His experience proves that the ideas are true. Yes. Otherwise, how you European, American boys, you are satisfied with a shirt only?
Where is your necktie, coat, and boot? Because that idea doesn't have practical value for us, to show it to God. You are practically realizing that the simple life is better than the artificial way of life.
So that is true. But to a businessman, a shirt, a coat, a tie, they have practical value.
The practical value... that is all right. When you go to do business, then you must satisfy me. Not that I require, but because I am going to get some business from a person, so I have to satisfy.
The Hindi word is: Apuchi khana, paruchi pahanna. When you go to meet somebody, so you must dress yourself so that your dress may attract.
So dress is not required for you, but because you are going to attract some person, then you may dress like a gentleman.
But when you eat yourself, Krishna prasāda, you don't require the concept whether he'll be pleased or not. That doesn't practice. This is practical. This is practical.
So the idea is that the suit and the coat are practical for the businessman and the business that is so sadly required. Yeah. It will, of course... In our Bengal it is called janapade pūjitaḥ dharman.
If a man is known as a brāhmaṇa, he doesn't require to show his sacred thread. I say, just like our Krishna consciousness, gradually people are understanding our philosophy. So even if we go in this dress, they honor us.
But ordinary thing, if you go in these days, it will not attract them.
Absolute truth versus mental speculation
So one thing that puzzles me: if what is practical for one person is not practical for another person, then where, what is the criterion of truth? Is truth relative?
This is true for me, but it is not true for you; this is true for him, but it's not true... Yeah, there are relative truths. But for the absolute truth, there is absolute truth and relative truth.
So first of all we have to see in which way you are interested: absolute truth or relative truth. That should be understood. There are two kinds of truth.
So if the result of one of the businessmen is to make some money for his use, and our purpose of doing business is also to make some money for another use, so then it's a question of what is the use.
What is the practical pushing on your Krishna consciousness movement, just like constructing this big building? He requires some money. Yes. So if you go somewhere to take that money, you, you must please him.
Otherwise you cannot get money. Yes. But his pleasing that man is not the ultimate goal. No. Ultimate goal is to please Krishna. But for pleasing Krishna, this is a temporary method I accepted just to please him.
What about the businessman who goes to please that man for his... When a businessman goes to please somebody, he wants the money for himself. That is the difference.
But when we go to please somebody to get some money, our ultimate aim is to please Krishna, The absolute truth. Therefore the means adopted, even if it is delusive truth, that becomes absolute truth.
Because the means is adoption, just like Krishna advises Arjuna, just go and tell Droṇācārya that his son is dead, although his son was not dead. So this is not truth.
But because by that action Krishna will be pleased, Krishna is absolute truth, therefore even that lying is also absolute. So practicality has to be judged on the result. What is the result of that practical?
The end justifies the means. Means is not very important. What is the end we have to see? For instance, James gives the example of God.
He says whether God exists depends on the extent to which a belief in God affects my life.
In other words, if it's practical, if it makes me feel happy, if I get some courage and strength by believing in God, then God is true, then God does exist. So one may not feel like that.
That means that God does not exist. Suppose one man does not feel very good talking about God. Does it mean God is melancholy? According to James's philosophy. That means he is an atheist.
He considers himself to be a religious man. He has no idea of God; what kind of religious man he is? We say he's a nonsense. In other words, truth is relative according to him. No. Truth is not relative.
Your position is relative. Oh. So long you are under the clutches of māyā, your understanding of God is relative. God is not relative. God is that you cannot understand God. Your position is relative.
Just like I give you a practical example: the man is deaf and is calling his wife, uh, Mrs. Satyavatī, Satyavatī. She is replying, "Yes, I am coming," but he himself is deaf. He cannot hear; the wife is replying.
So he's accusing his wife. Mrs. Satan says he's very deaf. He—she cannot hear. She does not exist. She is hearing. She is replying. This rascal cannot hear. And therefore, she becomes deaf. This is an example.
I cannot understand what is God, therefore there is no God. This is the most rascal position. I cannot see at night the sun, therefore there is no sun. He does not understand that I am in darkness at that night.
There is no possibility of my seeing. He has no such knowledge. But he concludes, "Oh, there is no such." That is asat-karma. I think he would say that a belief in God—believe. You believe or not believe. God is there.
But he would say that that word is another nonsense expression. You believe in God, you don't believe—the word, what does it matter for God?
But I think he would say that if everyone who believes in God gets some strength, some happiness, some courage, so that it would benefit everyone to believe in God. But he does not get any strength.
Does it mean God is not there? But doesn't everyone... Huh? Doesn't everyone derive strength? No. Somebody say, he thinks, "By drinking I get strength." There are many men in Bowbazar Street in this country.
So, just like why this drunkard, I'll give you a practical example. Well, long ago when Mahatma Gandhi came in Calcutta, so some of the Gauḍīya-math men went to invite Mahatma Gandhi, "Please come to our temple."
So at that time charkha was very prominent. What is that? Charkha. What is called spinning wheel. Spinning wheel. Spinning wheel, yes. Gandhi was himself devoting. Just like we chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, he thought that you spin.
So he first of all inquired whether in your temple you uh spin this takli. With the reply, "No," said, uh, "We are say Krishna God, we chant Hare Kṛṣṇa Mahā-mantra." This is our regular routine one.
Then Gandhi replied, "Oh, then I am not going to your temple. My charkha is my God." He said that. And actually for him, charkha was God in this sense: by introducing charkha, the whole Manchester closed.
You see, and the British Empire half broken. Simply by killing this Manchester industry. And so many mills they closed. But uh later on the Manchester came to Ahmedabad.
Now when we are taking supply from Manchester, we are getting cloth, one rupee eight annas a pair. Now we have to pay twenty-five rupees a pair.
In our childhood we have seen this Manchester-made cloth, third class, one dhoti was selling, lot of dhotis. That was selling like hawkers, imported by Raleigh Brothers.
Very nice cloth, one rupee eight annas a pair, two, two pieces. At the same dhoti you have to purchase for twenty-five rupees. So the consumer's money is now going to Ahmedabad.
He may say your money is saved in your country. But my pocket is empty. It is saved in my country, that's all right, in the State Bank. That's all right. But my pocket is empty. And Mafatlal's pocket is full.
So he says that a person's philosophical attitude will depend upon the individual's personality. The different personalities naturally have a different philosophy. The philosophy without any facts is mental speculation.
What is the value of such philosophy? It has no practical value. According to person, your your mentality, your personality may not agree with me. Then you have got different philosophy. Then what is the practical use?
This seems to have a similarity to the divisions of faith according to the three guṇas. No, the philosophy is not faith. Faith is different and fact is different. Philosophy must be on the fact, not on faith.
Faith may be blind faith. That is different. So he said that we seek a universe which is appropriate to our predispositions.
If we have a certain inclination, so we automatically seek to piece together the universe according to our—the way we see things, our perspective.
So that people—people who think differently about things, who have different inclinations, abilities, different perspectives—they will automatically see the world in a different manner, or the universe. Yeah.
They will have different philosophies. But that does not prove the fact. Different men have got different ideas of peace; that does not mean that is peace. Peace is a different thing. Peace
is that which applies to everyone. That is peace. Not that because I think by drinking I shall be peaceful, that drinking is peaceful. No. And somebody thinks, "By doing this thing I feel peaceful." No.
There must be a standard of peace which will be applicable to everyone. That is the idea. We are talking of that peace. He sees that there are two basic or fundamental philosophical temperaments.
The one he calls tender-mindedness, which is exemplified by the rationalists, the idealists, the optimists, the religionists, and the dogmatists; and tough-mindedness, or the empiricists, the materialists, the pessimists, the irreligious, the fatalists, and the skeptics.
They say that philosophers are of two types: tender-minded and tough-minded. So they depend on one's education. If one is educated in one way, he may become tender.
And another man, if he's educated in a different way, he may be hard. But our proposition is that originally the soul is good. This tenderness and hardness, they are developed later on. So they are not standard.
When you come to the platform of soul, there everything is good. In that platform, either tenderness or hardness, both of them end in the absolute.
So our philosophy is that, as we understand from Bhagavad-gītā, that every living entity is part and parcel of God. So God is good. Pavitra. Just like Arjuna says: paraṁ brahma paraṁ dhāma pavitram. Prabhupāda means pure.
But because we are part and parcel of God, therefore we are pure.
Material contamination and the perfect creation
The impurities are acquired by our contamination in this material world. So either you become tender or hard, that is impurity of this material world. So we don't give any credit to any person, either he is tender or hard.
These are all material qualities. When he is spiritually blessed, then we give him that he is now diverted either from tenderness or from hardness. These are all material qualities. One is hard, one is tender.
So that is all material quality. Just like a disease: one is suffering from headache, and one is suffering from indigestion, or one is suffering from fever.
So one who is suffering from headache, he is thinking, "Instead of having headache, if I would have suffered from the indigestion, it was better." Okay?
And the man who is suffering from indigestion, passing stool every three minutes, he is thinking that, "If I would have suffered from headache instead of this nasty disease, I would have."
So these rascal names of tenderness have the same thing. It is our mental concoction that we think this is better, this is not better. This is bad.
It is explained by Caitanya-caritāmṛta: 'dvaite' bhadrābhadra-jñāna, sab-i samāna; 'ei bhāla, ei manda'—saba manodharma. Dvaite, in the—when you are contaminated, diseased...
Uh, I'll give you one... I heard from one of my medical practitioner friends. So he told me that when he was a student in Calcutta, there was a big professor, Colonel Megaw, English professor.
He was lecturing, and within talking he said, "In our country, seventy-eight percent of the students are infected with syphilis." Yes. So the doctor said—actually he heard from Professor Megaw— he said, "Uh, horrible!"
The doctor says, "Why are you saying horrible? Your country, ninety-nine percent are suffering from malaria." So as a doctor, you should take the disease. Why you think this is horrible and this is not horrible?
You are thinking that malaria is not horrible, syphilis is horrible. In our country, we think syphilis is not horrible, malady of the clean.
So as a medical practitioner, you shall consider the disease, not the after-effects. After-effects of all disease is suffering. Either it is malaria or syphilis.
So we should be concerned that this whole pure soul is affected by this sattva-rajas-tama-guṇa material modes of nature and his suffering. So he should be given relief from this suffering.
Not that because one is contaminated by this sattva-guṇa, one is a brāhmaṇa, very nice brāhmaṇa.
Therefore, that is, uh, from material point of view a brāhmaṇa is better than a śūdra, but from, uh, spiritual platform either a brāhmaṇa or a śūdra, they are contaminated by this material nature. So they are suffering.
That is explained in the Bhagavad-gītā. Brāhmaṇa is thinking, "Oh, I am so pure, I am learned," so that is, I think I am so, I am so, I am so. He's not thinking that he is part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa, God.
Similarly, others also think it. So the fact is, so long one is, uh, affected by this material modes of nature, his position is the same. William James' position is, uh, he calls himself a radical empiricist.
He says that the unity of the universe and a neat set of interconnected relations in an absolute is false.
Because he says that, no, he says that that a unified pattern of things, the universe has a unified scheme, neat pattern of things, it is false because our direct experience informs us of a discontinuity of facts.
Our direct experience sees discontinuity of facts. So we must conclude that the universe is comprised of facts which are not perfect in unity. Yes, because you are seeing universe by your imperfect, uh, eyes.
So it is your imperfectness. Just like you are seeing the sun planet just like a disk. It is not a disk. But because you cannot see perfectly, you are thinking like that.
So your conception of universe is imperfect because you are imperfect. Otherwise, uh, everything is complete, just like Īśopaniṣad: pūrṇam adaḥ pūrṇam idam. It is complete. That is the first part of the Īśopaniṣad.
But because you are imperfect, you are saying the universe and everything is imperfect. Universe is, because it is made by God, it cannot be imperfect. God is perfect, and anything created by God is perfect.
Because you do not see through the eyes of God, you want to see through your imperfect eyes. Therefore, you... His idea, his exact quote is that order is gradually one and always in the making.
In other words, the universe is evolving toward ultimate unification, but it which is never fully achieved. That means he has no knowledge, poor point of knowledge. Uh, but he's not complete.
The same example: the deaf husband is considering the wife deaf, because he cannot hear the response given by his wife.
So because he has got an imperfect knowledge, he has no knowledge of God, he has, uh, no knowledge that the God has created this universe, and because it is created by the perfect being, it is also perfect.
Because his vision of the, uh, a unified universe is evolving, then he... but then he ascribes the universe... no, universe, universe, it's not evolving. It is perfect since it was created.
But because we have no perfect knowledge, you are thinking it is evolving.
Because, because he's, uh... because my observations of the universe are, uh, evolving toward the unified, so this is his criterion for truth: that only that which I can perceive is true.
Which I can experience, which applies. Yes. What you can perceive, that may be wrong thing also, because you are not perfect.
But because you have got one fund of knowledge, that what you are thinking, uh, that imperfect thing is also perfect.
He says that this is a quote... just like, uh, in the śāstra it is said that a human being, they are being controlled by the modes of passion. So they, they love to work very hard.
And that hard working, they think it is happiness. Actually, everyone is working hard day and night. And because he's getting some money in return, he's thinking, "I'm becoming happier."
In exchange of little money, he accepting the hard working is very good. But śāstra says that this hard working for some sense gratification is being done by the hogs and dogs.
They are also working hard and getting some remuneration for food and sense enjoyment. So that business is there already.
So that does it mean that, uh, a human being also works so hard as a hog, simply with great ease, food and sense? Suppose a big Birla is working hard and getting money, but what will be the result of his work? Huh?
A little food and sense gratification. A bear also is getting the little food and sense gratification. Then why is he working so hard? What is the use? That sense, it does not come to him.
He thinks, "I am happy. I am happier than the beggar." Because, "I have got so much money, I have got such a big, big building." But what is it in essence to you?
You are eating the same four chapatis and have your sex life with your wife, that's all. What better advantage are you getting than the hog and the poor man?
This is because he is in the modes of passion; he's thinking, "I'm happier than him." This is called māyā, illusion. Then he says that the viṣaya... Eating, sleeping, mating, and defending, this is called viṣaya.
That is available in every life. A dog is also enjoying. A hog is also enjoying. A poor man is also enjoying. A rich man is also enjoying.
If a rich man has no hunger, even very palatable dishes will not be very pleasing to him. But a poor man, if he has got hunger, even a rough foodstuff without any ghee or without any...
It is like nectar, anything, like nectar. So the happiness of this viṣaya — eating, sleeping, mating, and defending — they are equal everywhere. It does not mean that a rich man is enjoying eating more than a poor man. No.
When one eats, if one is hungry, the enjoyment is the same. There's no difference. Similarly, when the hog eats this stool with great eagerness, great eagerness... That man passed stool and the hog is waiting.
As soon as the man will... two, three hogs, you know, just like that. You see. So the happiness of eating stool and happiness of eating halwa are the same. You see. It depends on the different tongues.
There was a man drunk, uh, he is drinking liquor. He's tasting so nice. Uh, but uh, at least uh, for me, he may drop liquor. It is so pungent because I tasted rectified spirit when I was in medical practice, you see.
So pungent, so just like it burns the tongue, you see. So one man's food is another's poison, that is... But actually in this material world, uh, this standard of happiness is equal.
It is simply... this is called māyā, that he does not know that he is working so hard, but he's thinking that "I am becoming..."
But from the, perhaps from Darwin and the evolutionists, there's an idea that sometimes we see, uh, by some rich men in your country, uh, there also. They were, uh, run to... first of all, he becomes fatty by eating more.
Then again, he hasn't got to do in the office anything. So he runs four miles. You see? He does not think, "This is labor, this is anyavit."
Similarly, uh, the māyā, under the influence of māyā, everyone is working very hard, but he's thinking... I mean, there, there's this idea in, uh, in James's philosophy and other philosophers also.
If I say, "This is my portion," and if you are sitting in another portion, you say, "This is your portion," so by chance if I, uh, step in your portion, you become angry, or you step in my portion.
We forget that we have come here temporarily to sit down. Why shall I demarcate like this? "This is my portion, this is my portion." So the system is already there.
Divine resource distribution and bodily identity
Tena tyaktena bhuñjīthā. The Īśopaniṣad says that whatever is allotted to you, you be satisfied with that. But they are not satisfied in that way.
I am trying to encroach upon your, uh, I will say, portion, you are trying to encroach upon my portion. Or we are actually... we have forgotten that we are all sons of God. This planet is given to us to live.
So let us produce according to the, uh, method and eat and live peacefully and remember God. That we are not doing. Uh, the Americans, they have got... what is the area of your land? Yes, at least I can, I can measure.
It is about three thousand miles by three thousand miles.
Whereas, uh, India is one thousand miles... uh, what is the area of India? And maybe uh, one thousand miles by eight hundred miles, whereas in America, uh, three thousand miles by 3,000.
And the population is one-fourth of India. The land is four times than India. But the population is, uh, one-fourth of it. So they can produce enough. Actually, they are producing enough.
That can be distributed to the, uh, ports and where the good is scarcity. And that is element of God.
The land and the water given by God is sufficient for the whole population—not only human beings, all beasts, birds—and sufficient food. But we have, uh, I won't say mismanaged the whole thing.
Therefore, uh, we find, uh, that India is, uh, poverty- stricken and America is throwing grains in the, uh, water.
So actually, if we take the perfection made by God, that this planet belongs to us, we human beings, and it is God's property... So let us live peacefully. Well, no. That is māyā.
Therefore, the whole solution of the problems is Krishna consciousness. The people will understand that we are all sons of Krishna, this land belongs, belongs to Krishna.
So let us enjoy our father's property without fighting. And that they will not do. And they will accuse that God has not made him complete. That is māyā. Otherwise, from God's side, everything is complete.
Pūrṇam adaḥ, pūrṇam idaṃ, pūrṇāt pūrṇam udacyate. His, his very, uh, quotation in this regard is: "The world is a pluralism of which the unity is not fully experienced as yet."
The universe can be a good thing to understand through Krishna consciousness. That is fact, not as yet, because they do not know the verse in the Bhagavad-gītā that you are not this body.
Neither you are Chinese, neither you are Americans. This they have to know. That is Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. He does not identify himself with this, uh, tabernacle, uh, identification, this body. So...
So, so, uh, where, where we differ from James is that we say that truth exists, yes, and it is revealed to a person. As he becomes, as he experiences it. Yes. Or as he becomes wise. Yes. He's born food. Yes.
Either Mr. James and Mr. something else. They're all born fools. Whereas he says that the truth develops as I experience it. Yes. That experience you have to take from a man who is experienced.
Just like he, he wants to philosophize. He's trying to distribute his experience. But he does not like to take others' experience. That is the defect.
He says that the universe continually grows in quantity by new experiences that graft themselves upon the older mass. That older mass that we... But
he says that person's experience will be transcended by another person's experience. No, we reach a person whose experience cannot be transcended. Cannot be surpassed. We take experience from him, just like Krishna.
Nobody can become wiser than Krishna. Therefore, we take directly experience from Krishna. That is our standard. We don't accept any experience from a secondary man.
So perhaps due to Darwin, these men, they don't think that truth exists independently of man's experience. They think that truth is developing as man... Because he is imperfect, he does not know what is true.
The same experience that... because he cannot hear other who is hearing, he is answering, and he cannot hear him, he thinks that he is deaf. The difficulty is that everyone thinks others in his own standard.
If he is a fool, he thinks others fool. So that is not the fact. We have to take experience from a person whose experience nobody can surpass. Just like Krishna says, "vedāhaṁ samatītāni..." He
can say, "I know past, present, future, everything." Now, who knows past, present, future, everything? And that we have to take experience from Krishna.
Take that inquiry from Krishna, that "You taught this philosophy to Sun-god, how I want to believe this?" Because Arjuna thought that "Krishna is my friend, my cousin-brother, he's of my age, how is that?"
I can believe that he taught this philosophy to Vivasvān. This was not for Arjuna, but this question was for us.
Krishna replied that both you and me were present with too many times appearances, but you have forgotten, I do not forget. That is the difference between Arjuna and Krishna, or an ordinary living entity and God.
So his definition of reality: reality equals pure experience. He says that reality equals pure experience. Therefore we should go to the perfect experience personality. Then we can know reality.
From his definition, it is concluded that we must go to the perfect experience person and understand what is the entity. That is our process. The realized person. Yes. Then we can know what is the entity.
I cannot know what is reality. But if I go to the perfect experience personality, he can tell me what is reality.
Processes for gaining perfect knowledge
In the Teachings of Lord Caitanya, it mentions the Divine Grace, three processes: the transcendental process, the speculative philosophical process, and the materialistic process.
The devotees go to the transcendental process to get perfect knowledge. Yes. Yes. What Krishna says, that forty million thousands of years before I spoke this philosophy to Vivasvān, we accept it. Sir, he
says that there is an aspect of chance in nature. Nature means how it's changing. Chance. Huh? Chance. Accident. There's an aspect of accident. No, no. Oh, we always don't accept it.
If there would have been accident, with so many planets are rotating and so far there is no collision. There is no accident.
But in your motorcar there are so many accidents and people are dying. So this, he sees in our human conduct that we have the choice between to make certain decisions. Certain means decision means because you are imperfect.
Human beings are imperfect. So they are machine. This motocross, there are so many accidents, so many killings.
But because God is so perfect, although all the planets are rotating in their speed, just like, um, uh, this, um, uh, Earth is rotating, uh, and what is the speed that... but at least in twenty-four hours it is completing twenty-five thousand miles.
That means the speed is about one thousand miles at least. And similarly other planets are also moving. Similarly, the sun planet is moving at sixteen thousand miles per minute or second, calculate.
But all these planets are moving in this way, so much speed, but they're not colliding. The perfect arrangement is there and they're floating. How is it possible? This is accidental? Do you think this is accidental?
Well, he says it like this, that there are alternative courses of action. For every, for every possibility there's several other possibilities.
So that, for instance, the man can make a decision, a choice to take different alternative ways. So he says that nature works that way also. No. Nature is not working that way. Nature is working very perfectly. We can see.
Just after, uh, you... they're, they're, they're so perfect that there are astronomers that they're calculating, then certain such day there will be an eclipse and it will be seen in India, it will not be seen in Europe.
And exactly in this time the big eclipse will begin. How they're calculating, unless there is a rigid law? How is it possible? They are calculating mathematically. The delta mathematics, two plus two is always four.
Not that by accident it we can find. That is not possible. So the nature's law is working in that way. Otherwise, how one year before, we can calculate this solar eclipse and lunar eclipse so rightly?
And they can say that from this certain country it will be seen and this country it will not be seen.
That means the position of the sun, moon and everything, uh, at latitude, longitude, everything so nicely done, that we can make calculations very perfect. How you can say accident? There is no accident.
In the Bhagavad-gītā, even human behavior is predicted like that; in the later chapters it describes how people will act in different modes of nature. They all behave that way. Yeah.
Yeah, that's like in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam it is calculated that, uh, uh, lāvaṇyaṁ keśa-dhāraṇam. In the Kali-yuga, people will think by keeping long hair, uh, he has become beautiful. See all the hippies.
Now it is written in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam in India how it is happening in Europe. And now they are imitating; Indians also imitated.
So five thousand years, uh, uh, before this, this was written: lāvaṇyaṁ keśa-dhāraṇam. So, so... Would even, uh, accidents, say, between two automobiles, that would not really be an accident?
Because it is in part, therefore it is accident. Oh, it is accident. Yeah. That's not determined by any... It's not determined even by karma? Mm. It's not determined even by karma? Yes, in a broad sense it is also like that.
That means from God's eyes, even the so-called accident is also predestined. Nothing that can be outside of the law of God. Yeah. His definition of the world is that it is the stuff of pure experience.
The stuff of pure experience—that matter, mind, everything is made up of experience. Which is a neutral experience. Pure experience. It doesn't say whose experience. Just experience. What does it mean?
The experience then is different type experience. Your experience is different from my experience. Then you have to, uh, calculate.
He says the substance called experience sometimes manifests in mind, sometimes manifests as matter. So for instance, the substance of these flowers is made up of the experience gathered from previous flowers.
Whose experience? I'm asking whose experience. So a nice flower. You have not maybe... Presumably the flower's experience. Very definitely not the flower's experience. He just calls it pure experience.
He doesn't say whose experience. That means his knowledge is not perfect. He's speculating, that's all. But isn't everything we see a product of experience? Yeah. Whose experience? That is my question. He doesn't say.
So whose it is, he does not know. Who is experience?
Parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate svābhāvikī jñāna-bala-kriyā ca. Within the Vedic mantra, Supreme is so much equipped with different kinds of energies, that energy means experience.
You can apply your energy if you have got experience. You can apply your energy of drawing a figure, provided you have got experience. Yes.
Similarly, all this display of this anywhere or everything creation, past manifestation. This is designed by the Supreme, for us supreme, multi-intelligent. There's this flower. We have got experience.
If you paint a flower, it requires so much experience. We are handling the brush and the colors. Similarly, this is certainly proof of experience.
Supreme intelligence and stages of realization
But His energy is acting so nicely, we see the flower is coming automatically.
And the same example I've given so many, many times that nowadays in electronic that's like this, so many mechanical arrangements is within there. But I push on one button. One who does not know, you see, this is moving.
So one actually... No. Maybe that's really... And the Darwinists, for instance, would say that this flower through time had the experience that if it produced a nice odor that more bees would come to pollinate and continue
the species. So that the experience is passed on in the gene or the seed of the flower so that the next... Let's experience, but the flower's experience. The flower has got experience.
Don't all living things have experience? No. All the living things are experience. But ultimately they are put into certain conditions by the experience of the Supreme. And the flavor of power is treated in Bhagavad-gītā.
Puṇyo gandhaḥ pṛthivyāṁ ca. There are many flowers, but all of them have no flavor. It must be the arrangement of somebody else who has given flavor to some flower. He has given somebody beauty and somebody not.
Otherwise, who is denied beauty? It should have been done by his own experience, and everyone should have been beautiful, or every flower would have given flavor. What is that experience?
That means, like that you say flowers' experience, your experience, it is conducted by another superior experience. What is that?
Well, another conception: Krishna is not only the experience from time immemorial, He's also the experiencer now. Being the prime enjoyer, enjoyment means experience. And He knows nothing but enjoy.
All His experience is enjoyment. All His enjoyment is experience. That experience, we experience subordinate. That means that sometimes there is supreme, supremely experienced, past, present, and future.
Unless He's supremely experienced, how can He know the future? Past and present—past, present, future is for us because the time, the eternal time, I am a fragmental production of this time.
Therefore, there is a beginning of my appearance there. And when I disappear, there is a date of my disappearance. And within this date of appearance and disappearance, there is past, present, and future.
So my past and present and future. And then an ant's past, present, and future. And Brahmā's past, present, and future are with Him.
But your experience, after your body finishes, your experience is passed on, so that everything we see—doors, walls, bodies, minds, everything— is made up of previous experience.
So-and-so learned how to build a door in this way, and it was passed on. That previous experience of Krishna. Just like I was sometimes thinking, Africa, they made their houses almost like India.
I assume this is the Indian side. So how the Africans got my Indian experience, or the Indians got the African experience?
So actually, Indians did not take experience from Africa, nor the Africans took the experience from India. It is the experience of the Supersoul. Ah. So just like a man... Just like Krishna said.
Krishna said, "Sarvasya cāhaṁ hṛdi sanniviṣṭo." "I am sitting in everyone's heart." "Mattaḥ smṛtir jñānam apohanaṁ ca." "I am giving the experience."
So when the Africans are constructing a house or cottage like India, that is not that Africans came to India, or India is exclusive. Are the Indians acting just like Africans?
It does not mean that... Several times I told you that, so far as the pigeons are concerned, the stars and the... either America or India, they are of the same side and doing the same thing.
I think we've discussed this before under the categories of acquired knowledge and intuitive knowledge. Yeah. Some knowledge is acquired experience, some knowledge is intuitive.
Are the sparrows or the dogs doing the same thing in India, America? It does not mean these pigeons have flown to America from India. So it's intuitive.
But because Krishna, as Paramātmā, is there within the heart of the pigeon in India and America, they're acting through that. Your original experience comes from God.
And He says that "I know everything: past, present, and future." That is real experience. So, his definition of reality must be pure experience, or he cannot give any definition of reality. Because he has not experienced.
He's not perfectly experienced. Then how can he give the definition of reality? What definition he's giving, that is not reality. He has no experience. It's developing experience. How can you give a definition of reality?
Actually, he's defining a process. What is that process? The process to understand reality, but he's not describing reality. He says reality is a stream of consciousness or the flux of life.
One's consciousness, as it develops more and more conscious, then it becomes more and more aware of reality. That's all. But what is the guarantee that, yes, they will have consciousness fully? Yes.
What if a man develops into a madman? Does that make him more aware of reality?
And it's only when a man becomes Krishna conscious or actually reaches the reality that he can be sure that the process does lead to the reality.
He's speculating that this process will lead to the reality, but he doesn't know it for sure because it's not actually brought him to the point of reaching the reality. Of course, it leads to the platform.
The process is not man-made. No, the process is also God-made. Just like Krishna said: "man-manā bhava mad-bhakto mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru." This is not man-made, this is God-made.
Man-manā bhava mad-bhakto mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru. This is God-made. This is God. So to come to Krishna consciousness platform also, you have to follow the God- made method. Not your method. You cannot give any definition.
He has a nice—well, he has not at all it's nice, but he has a philosophy of religion. And he says that the believer in God has a greater chance than the doubter to discover truth and to gain the... vinaśyati.
Those who are doubtful, they vinaśyati, they are finished. Yeah. He says at least the believer has a greater chance to gain practical advantages by the belief.
Whereas the doubter doesn't stand any chance to gain very much. Doubt. That is good. Whether he's a believer or a doubter? He's a believer, but the extent of his belief we'll discuss in a few moments.
He says that one who disbelieves faces the added risk of losing any chance of discovering the truth. Yes. So it is better to believe even though one doesn't know for sure.
It is better to believe because it gives one more chance of discovering the truth. He says that we have the right to believe in God even in the absence of absolute proof.
Even though there is no absolute proof, he says, for the existence of God, still we have the right to believe in God because this helps us to get closer to the truth. It gives us a better chance.
That means if he has said God is still doubt, that is existence. Does he say like that? Yes, he says there is no absolute proof. But that is proof. By my belief, I should get more advantage.
He is saying that if somebody believes, he has got a good chance. And let's get back to there. Yeah. Simply by believing, how there is jñāna?
He says, "By this belief I get some strength, some happiness, some practical advantage." Therefore I have the right to believe, because I get a practical benefit. The practical benefits of all—you are getting some warmth.
So you believe there must be some fire. So why believe? Unless there is fire, how there is warmth? So the belief itself is the proof. Yes.
One thing about James that is the same from many other philosophers is that he felt a personal experience of God. So many got personal experience of that.
But he recognized that he reads—sometimes He does not reveal, He hides. Everyone has God. Everyone, a human being, every human being has God. No, no, the atheist simply artificially denies the power. Naturally he has belief.
Naturally he has belief. Even in, uh, this primitive state, as soon as there is something wonderful, natural phenomena, they offer respect.
The primitive man, the man in the jungle, as soon as he sees a big ocean, he offers his respect. As soon as he sees a big mountain, he offers his respect.
As soon as there is thunderbolt, this is called realization of the śakti. Parāsya brahmaṇaḥ śaktiḥ. So this is Śākta stage. Realization of God by seeing something wonderful. That is Śākta stage.
Then after this stage, uh, Śākta, Saura... Śākta stage: worshipping the energy of God. Everything is energy. Then Śākty-upāsanā, then Śākta, Saura, then Sūryopāsanā. Worship the big sun.
Because it is the reservoir of all energy according to the materialists. Śākta, Saura, then Gāṇapatya. Gāṇapatya means that is humanitarian. That, uh, energy is distributed.
Pantheism, humanity, Śākta, Saura, Gāṇapatya, then Śaiva, Śivo 'ham, then vaiṣṇava. Impersonal. And then personality. So there's also the demigod in charge of those different departments. Uh-huh. Different demigods.
Ganapati, Sūrya, Śiva, Ganeśa, Ganapati, Śakti, uh, Śakti, uh, Sūrya, Ganapati, Śiva, and then Viṣṇu. Pañcopāsanā. This is called Pañcopāsanā.
Transmigration and the logic of surrender
He says that, uh, the mind is not dependent upon the existence of the body; therefore, the mind may survive the body into immortality.
The gross body, when it is finished, the subtle body—mind, intelligence—remains; that carries me to another subtle body. Just like the example is that the flavor we cannot see, but it is carried by the air.
If it is coming from the rose garden, it's all very nice. You cannot see it. But it is carried by this subtle air. Similarly, I, this very soul, when I give up this gross body, then I am carried.
I have got what is still that subtle body: mind, intelligence, and ego. And according to my desire, that subtle body grows into another gross. So the mind and the intelligence, uh, they're not material?
I mean, uh, material. But they, they don't die. Huh? They die also? The mind, it disappears. Yeah, it disappears. Disappears when you are liberated. Then you have no more material mind.
Oh, but you carry your material mind throughout all of your lifetimes. Yes, as long as you're not liberated. So, the same mind. Uh, the same, the same mind. Same mind. So the mind I have now, I've always had. Yeah.
But the body I have now, the body that is... This is also material, that is material. But the subtle material accompanies me, Uh, unless I lived. So the subtle material is capable of longer life. Yes. Very long life.
It's acquiring some saṁskāras as it goes through body to body. Developing new bodies and acquiring new saṁskāras and pairing with the... the mind doesn't doesn't deteriorate or get old experience. It does change.
Constantly changing. Changing. That is... that is mind's business. Changing. Accepted and rejected. Oh, so the mind I have now, the mind I have now, I may not have had in the past. No, no, why not? Same mind. Same mind.
Uh, rejecting this... Oh, the function is the same. But the contents may be different. Just like you are sitting here. You can, by the dictation of the mind, you can go somewhere, somewhere else.
You can immediately go to your, um, American home. The mind, mind will carry you. So, um, he had a vague idea of Brahman realization by saying that the consciousness... everything is vague idea.
The consciousness eventually enters into the what he called the mother sea. The mother sea. Mother Sea? The mother ocean. Oh, I see. That's... that's as far as he could speculate. That's the bubble going popping in the ocean.
The bubble bursting into the ocean is the... merges into the supreme concept. Yeah, something like that. Mother sea. He says that experience and not philosophy or theology should form the basis of religious life.
That experience should be our religious life, not just philosophy. But actual applied, yeah, practice will give us... give us the right idea of the goals and our practical application is to give us the right cause.
He says that the life of religion is mankind's most important function. But right, uh, we say also, we don't really have a... a living entity no better than that anyway. So that is very important.
And he says that the evidence for God's existence is found primarily in one's personal inner experience. In other words, one has an intuitive experience that God exists. That God is supposed to be supreme power.
So as I know, even though I did not see my father, still I know I had a father. Or I had a father. So that he must be there. So presumably you could not convince someone through logic or did like that.
This is: God exists unless he has the personal inner experience that God exists. It is very simple logic. Because, uh, I am born of my father. My father is born of his father. His father is born of his father, born, born.
Find our original father. Of course, there must have been the beginning of all the fathers. Then how can I deny it? Very experience. Unless I have the experience, inner experience. It is in that experience. It is very simple.
Because my father is, therefore I am born of him. He is born of his father. He is born of his father. Go on. That's it. That is our process. Ultimately you come to Brahmā, the father of the single one.
Then Brahmā is also born of Nārāyaṇa. Yeah, but, uh, Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu. And the Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu from, uh, Mahā-Viṣṇu, Kāraṇodakaśāyī, and right from Mahā-Viṣṇu, go to Saṅkarṣaṇa.
Therefore, the Brahma-saṁhitā says: kṛṣṇas tv achyuta-ānanda- vigrahaḥ, anādir ādir govindaḥ, sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam. He's the original cause of all that. He he makes a few comments about, uh, religion.
He says that the religious experience is unique and it enables the individual to realize that the world he perceives is part of a spiritual universe, which alone gives the sensory world value, and that man's proper goal is to unite himself with that higher universe, and that prayer or inner communion with the universal spirit of God is the means whereby spiritual energy flows flows in and produces effects, psychological or material, occurring in the phenomenal world, and that religious faith imparts a new zest to life, taking the form either of lyrical enchantment or of appeal to earnestness and heroism, and that religion contributes some assurance of safety and peace and teaches love in human relationships.
That's nice. He sees some nice things about—that's nice. But practically, the practical aspects of it—that it has, that it imparts new zest to life, that it, uh, produces psychological and material effects, etc.
But he didn't believe that God was unlimited. That was his—he believed that God was somehow limited because there was evil, because evil exists, that God is somehow limited.
It does not—that evil does not exist in different ends. He does not know. But it is not independent of God. So it says, but either backside or front side is God. I cannot neglect my backside.
I cannot say that it can beat me on my backside. That I cannot say. A backside is as important as one side. But comparatively, uh, it is clearly explained that evil is backside power, sin. That is backside of God.
So he says that we can cooperate with God. But that means finally you are not in front side of God. You are sin. Oh. One doesn't stand before God. Stands in the darkness. So he says that we can cooperate.
Those who are sinful, they cannot stand in front of us. Krishna therefore says, unless one has a completely, uh, uncontaminated from the pāpa. Yeṣāṁ tv anta-gataṁ pāpaṁ janānāṁ puṇya-karmaṇām.
Te dvandva-moha-nirmuktā bhajante māṁ dṛḍha-vratāḥ. So one can know Krishna unless he is free from all sinful. But if you say that, "Then I am so much sinful, I can become Krishna's devotee?"
Then it will take long, long time. Yes, it will take long, long time. But if you accept Krishna's order immediate, "So you surrender unto Me, and I give you relief from all sins to you."
So you surrender to Krishna, so your sinful life immediately becomes, uh, pious. That is fact. Huh? You are hearing? Yes. Yes, you know. So by śravaṇam to Krishna, immediately one becomes quiet, is it not, at least? Yes.
That's it. So that's all for it. Thank you. Now Mr. Sen is...