Across the top are these seven kinds of knowledge and awareness that I talked to you about at the beginning of the class, and down the side are 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 categories, general categories. So across the top are specific types of cognition which don't overlap with each other. Down the side are characteristics of consciousness which apply to these seven types. And we don't usually have a chart like this in yoga room classes, but I thought you might be able to use it while we're discussing, so you can learn how to use it. This is a template which you can use for contemplation. It's kind of like making a certain kind of

[01:10]

a space in which you can study the mind. And down at the bottom are the seven types with their Sanskrit and some variations on translation. Does that make sense? The seven are listed at the bottom which are across the top with a little bit more information on them. And on the back of this is kind of a summary of particularly last week and a number of discussions but kind of a summary on the back of this piece of paper. And I have another summary which I made which isn't the same as you have on there, but I'll just say this to you, and then maybe we'll refer to the chart as you listen to this. So for direct perception, the appearing object and the object of engagement are the same.

[02:19]

Does that sound familiar? So like if you're, if we have the perception of a color, you have this actual electromagnetic radiation that's interacting with the sense organ and also interacting with the previous moment of consciousness, and these three main conditions come together to give rise to the sensory perception of a color. The thing that's being engaged with is this electromagnetic radiation of a certain wavelength, that's actually the object that's being engaged with, which gives rise to this perception. The object of appearance is the way that object appears to the consciousness, and in perception the

[03:23]

way that the electromagnetic radiation appears and the thing that's engaged with are the same. So the mind is actually engaged with the radiation, and the radiation appears to the mind. So the object of engagement and the object of appearance are the same in direct perception. Any questions about that? The way the mind grasps the object of engagement and the physical data, in reliance on the data itself, the organ, and a previous state of consciousness, the way the mind grasps that is the same way that that data appears to the mind in direct perception. In conceptual cognition, the appearing object and the object of engagement are not the same. So, for example, if there's a color,

[04:38]

or even, let's just say there's a color, the mind is engaging with the color, and there's a sense perception of it, where the appearance of the color and the engagement with the color are the same, but along with that sense perception there can be a conceptual cognition also of that color, so the conceptual consciousness is engaging with the color, but the way the color appears is mixed, the appearance is a mixture of an image with the actual object. So the way that the appearing object is not the same as the object of engagement or the engaging object, they're not the same. So that's one of the main differences between conceptual cognition, but another way to say that is that the conceptual cognition uses

[05:39]

an image in the process of grasping the object. The consequence of that is that the grasping of the object and the way it appears are not the same. Any questions about that? For direct perception, if the object of engagement, or the engaging object, is true, then the appearing object is also true, and vice versa. If the appearing object is true, then the object of engagement is also true. What do you mean by true? True basically means that it's in accord with reality. So for example, it exists, the object

[06:53]

exists, is basically it. That's what it means by true, that the object actually exists, like the color actually exists. There actually is a blue color, or a loud sound. There actually is water, or there actually is a tree. There actually is a person. And the way the mind engages, the way the mind, the organ, and the object engage each other is actually true. Actually it's an existent phenomenon, and the way it appears is the same. Appears in direct perception. In direct perception, right. If the engaging object is false, so will the appearing object be. So if the object that

[07:57]

appears, for example, if it looks like water is out there, but there actually isn't any water, but that's what the mind is engaged to, is an image, is not an image, but is with light and colors that look like water, but actually it's not water, it's for example could be a mirage, a thermal radiation, misconstrued as water. Then the mind actually is engaged with this thing which doesn't exist, and the way it appears is the same, it doesn't exist. So again, as I said last week, when perception is off in terms of the engaging object, it's off in terms of the appearing object, and vice versa. And if it's correct in terms of the engaging object, it's also correct in terms of the appearing object. But that's not always true for conception. Yes?

[09:00]

Back in the first class, you said something like everything is mind-independent. Yeah. You were saying that there is an objective reality independent of mind, I don't see that being true. There is no phenomenon independent of mind, but there are some, in some schools of Buddhism there are phenomena which are not mind, but they depend on mind. So the phenomena of color, the experience of color is a good example, there are not colors out there. There's electromagnetic radiation sort of out there, but for it to be a phenomena it needs to be grasped by mind. So, again, I don't want to get into this too much, but this plays into quantum theory, is that phenomena are probability distributions until they're observed, and then they become

[10:05]

phenomena, because phenomena are things that the senses deal with. There are no phenomena aside from the senses. But that's not to say there's nothing, it's just that things aren't existing in a phenomenal mode until they're engaged by senses, because phenomena means something that's detected by senses. But when it is detected by senses, or when the sense is stimulated, that's not quite enough for a being to have experience. But that one more factor is that there's cognition somewhere nearby, like the previous moment, and that previous moment of cognition together with the stimulated sense organ, and this thing which is now a phenomena, it's a physical thing, and when it interacts with the sense organ it becomes a phenomena. Before it interacts with the sense organ it's not a phenomena, and it has lots of possibilities of what it can be. But once it connects with a particular

[11:09]

physical body, living being, it starts to become, in some sense, it turns into a phenomena. And that's part of what is actually faulty in the whole basic process, or not so much faulty, but there's a basic distortion of the universe in the process of perception, because the way electromagnetic radiation is, aside from interacting with the sense organ, is not phenomenal, but when it interacts with the sense organ it gets changed, in a way, into a phenomena. So in that sense, perception does, in some sense, distort reality in terms of the way it would be when it's not a phenomena. I'm going to try to stop there now. Conceptual cognition, did you want to ask something before I go on to this, Vera? Well, when you talk about direct perception, you use the example of color frequently. I don't know if you use any other...

[12:13]

Color, sound, smell, taste, touch, those are direct sensory perception. And I told you about four kinds of direct perception. There's direct sensory perception, direct mental perception, and direct aperceptive cognition, and direct yogic cognition. There's four types of direct perception. In other words, and these four perceptions, and direct sensory perception and direct mental perception can both be true or false. They're direct, they're not mediated by conception, but they can be true or false. And in just a minute, I think, I'll tell you about some more examples about how direct sensory perception and direct mental perception can be false. But there's also aperceptive perception, and aperceptive perception, I

[13:17]

think, if you look on this chart, is a perception that is based on the perception of the mind and the body. See aperceptive cognition? Aperceptive cognition is not one of the seven types of cognition. Do you see that? It's on the vertical column. Do you see that? Aperceptive cognition. Can everybody find it? So, if you go across now, you'll find it's listed under valid perception. Can you see that? However, if you go one more thing, you'll see it's not listed under valid inference, which is valid cognition, I mean valid conception. Can you see that? So, aperceptive cognition is a type of direct perception, and now with that, but it's listed, it can be a valid perception, and that's another thing I want to tell you about tonight, about what

[14:20]

a valid direct perception is. But you can see it there, it's a valid perception, it's a perception, it's a direct perception, so I talked about that before, right? Aperceptive perception, it's not, it doesn't, it's kind of the way the mind knows itself without using an image to know itself. It knows itself directly without interposing an image between itself and itself. It's self-awareness, not mediated by concepts, so it's direct perception. And it can be, we see valid, and valid, again I'll tell you more about that in a little while, then if you go over a little bit, you see it can also be subsequent cognition, which is, which, and if you go over further, you can also see that it can be imperceptible perception. And I can tell you that by going across it, you can see, I think, maybe that aperceptive cognition in all three cases is a direct perception.

[15:23]

Inattentive. Inattentive, yeah, direct, I told you before also, direct perception is mostly for us, unless we're in very deep states of concentration. Direct perception is mostly inattentive perception, or a longer definition is, if you look down there under number five, inattentive perception or awareness to which the object appears but is not ascertained. So this is like the vast majority of our sensory cognitions, and actually the vast majority of our cognitions are sensory cognitions. We have gazillions of them in a minute. However, almost none of them in their actual instantaneous arising and ceasing, almost none of them are we actually aware of, unless

[16:28]

we're in a very deep state of concentration. And if you just have one flash of an electromagnetic radiation of a certain wavelength that could be a color, if you had one flash of it, and that was it, you didn't get another one, unless you were very, very concentrated, you would not know, you would not be able to ascertain that you had the experience at all. Now if you had several moments of that same or similar type of electromagnetic radiation interacting with your sense organs, and perceptions arose in each of those cases, you had a series of similar or same sense perceptions of that color, that series would be strong enough to then stimulate a mental consciousness of it, and then that whole pattern would stimulate a conceptual cognition, and that's where we usually know that we're seeing a color.

[17:34]

But at that time, we're not directly perceiving the color, we're interposing the idea or the image of blue between the cognition and the thing. But those are the colors we usually know about, and those are the colors we can name, and so on. So all those series there are direct perceptions which are imperceptible, inattentive, or we're not able to ascertain them. Yes? We can have simultaneous inattentive perceptions? Like we have, could we have like a sound? And we can have simultaneous, yes. We could have five simultaneous inattentive perceptions, direct perceptions at a given moment. And then in common parlance, if we're talking about one-pointedness, then we're bringing awareness to one? Is that what would differentiate,

[18:34]

like it wouldn't be in, you know, sometimes we speak of one-pointedness, and it was my understanding that you could only be one-pointed with one thing at a time. And so what I'm asking is, is that a way of saying that if we become one-pointed with something, then it's brought into awareness and it's no longer inattentive? I think, I think that what I would say to you on this is that each one of these, each one of these sense cognitions is one-pointed on its object. So you have simultaneous, you could have, you have simultaneous one-pointed direct perceptions of five different types of sense media that could happen, or just one, or zero. There are some moments where it could be that there's no, there are some situations where there's no sense cognitions, no sense direct perceptions arising, that the mind is totally focused on mental phenomena,

[19:40]

and there's no, there's no sense cognitions arising. The organs still might be stimulated, but they're not giving rise to sense perceptions. But if there are sense perceptions, in some sense, they're always one-pointed because the mind is, in a sense, focused on its object. Okay, now, just to finish this thing, sort of a review, is that for conceptual cognition, the appearing object, the appearing object or the object of appearance is always mistaken. If the engaging object is true, namely existent, then the conceptual cognition is true. But although it may be true because what it's engaged with exists, it's still mistaken in terms of how it appears. So then, for example, if you have a cognition of impermanence, and

[20:49]

you can only have a cognition of impermanence because impermanence cannot be known directly as, you know, it's a concept. So if you have a cognition, a conceptual cognition of impermanence, in fact, if it's an impermanent color or a sound or whatever, in fact, impermanent colors and sounds do exist. Or if you have a sound and you see it as impermanent, in fact, such the impermanence of sound does exist. So the engaging object, an impermanent sound, does exist, but the way it appears is not true. But it's a true conceptual cognition because the object of engagement does exist. So having a conceptual cognition that a color or a sound

[21:52]

is impermanent is a true conception, even though it's not true. It's mistaken in terms of how that impermanence appears to it. Similarly, or on the other hand, a conceptual cognition that's engaging with an object that doesn't exist is a false cognition, a wrong cognition. So as I said in the summary, conceptual cognitions can be half-right and half-wrong or all-wrong. So when they're half-right, however, when they're called half-right and half-wrong, usually we call them true conceptual cognitions, because the half-right is that they're actually engaging with something that exists. The half-wrong is that the way it appears to them is false. They have a false view of something that really

[22:57]

does exist, and that's called a true conceptual cognition. Whereas perceptual cognitions, if their object of engagement is true, then their object of appearance is true, so they're all right. And if their object of engagement is false, then they're all wrong, just like a conceptual cognition would be. Again, if you look at the chart ... you can see that perception ... go over to the far right ... perception can be mistaken cognition, and conception can be mistaken cognition. Okay? They both can be mistaken. Most perceptual cognitions are not mistaken, and many ... almost all perceptual cognitions for most people are not mistaken, and many conceptual cognitions are also not mistaken

[24:04]

cognitions. So if you look under conception, you'll see, for example, you'll see four other examples which are not mistaken. So a valid inference is a conceptual cognition that is true, and subsequent cognitions are also true conceptions, and also indecisive or doubting consciousness is also a true conception. Yes? For example, if you doubted a person, and you doubted that person, and you doubted that whether something existed, that wouldn't be false, it wouldn't be a false conception, just your doubt of it. Like if you doubted that people had a self, that would be a true

[25:12]

conception. But also if you doubted that people didn't have a self, it would be also okay, because you wouldn't really be saying that they did have a self. Q. So you're holding a question. Yeah. And it's conceptual, therefore it's not really false, because you're not really engaging with something that doesn't exist. It's rather that you're questioning whether something exists or not. You're questioning whether a self exists or whether a not-self exists. You're not sure. It's related to correct belief. In that case, you would like correctly believe that things didn't have a self, and you would correctly believe that it was false that things do have a self. But if you look on a chart, both of those are conceptions. And the horizontal line, there's no overlap. So none of the first six are wrong cognitions.

[26:21]

Only the last category is wrong. The previous ones are not wrong. So all the previous ones are either true perceptions or true conceptions. Now, the big thing that you haven't heard about yet, which I intend to introduce tonight, is the first two types of awareness. As you can see, one's a perception and one is a conception. Valid perception and valid inference is a conception. Valid perception is a perception,

[27:23]

of course, and valid inference is a conception. So can you see that these previous categories horizontally don't overlap with each other? They're exclusive, and only the last category is where all the wrong stuff goes. And in particular, I would draw your attention to the last category, mistaken cognition, lining up with conception. So mistaken cognitions can be of two types. What are the two types of mistaken cognition? Direct perception and conceptual cognition. Those are the two types of wrong cognition that there can be. As you can see, if you just go along the top two lines, a perception can be of mistaken cognition and a conception can be of mistaken cognition. Those are the

[28:31]

two types, okay? Conception and perception. However, if you go down one more line, you see sensory cognition also can be a wrong cognition. You see that? But that's already been included in what I said, because it's a perception. You go down one more, mental cognition, that's also included, but that's also a perception. Go down a little bit further, non-aperceptive cognition. You notice that non-aperceptive cognition, you notice it applies to every single one of the seven categories? Does that make sense to you? Linda's shaking her head yes. How does it make sense to you? Good question, yeah. Non-aperceptive cognition, all those seven types are non-aperceptive cognitions, because

[29:31]

aperceptive cognition, if you look at aperceptive cognition, it doesn't apply to all, it isn't X'd out on all the different types of the seven. All the different seven types are not or cannot be aperceptive cognitions. Only the what type can be aperceptive cognitions? The perceptual cognitions are the only types that can be it, but the non-aperceptive applies to all of them, because each of those seven types is a non-aperceptive cognition. The basic cognition that we have, all the cognitions we have are basically non-aperceptive. So however, every single non-aperceptive cognition has the aperceptive cognition with it. However, the aperceptive cognitions are only direct perceptions. So if you have, no matter what

[30:37]

kind of cognition you have, it's a non-aperceptive cognition. So if you have a conceptual cognition, it's a non-aperceptive cognition, and if you have a conceptual, it's non-aperceptive. So all seven types of conceptual and non-conceptual, or direct perception and conceptual cognitions, all those are non-aperceptive. However, accompanying every non-aperceptive cognition is a aperceptive cognition. But the aperceptive cognitions are just of three types, the three types of direct perception. So every conceptual or non-conceptual cognition is accompanied by a non-conceptual cognition. Every direct or indirect perception, every direct or indirect perception is accompanied by a direct perception. And there's only direct and indirect cognitions,

[31:40]

there's only direct and indirect ways of knowing, so all the ways of knowing are accompanied by one of the ways of knowing, namely direct perception. So if you look at the chart, you can see that. And down at the bottom, you have false cognition, false cognition, false cognition, so that checks with mistaken cognition up at the top, the bottom line, and the 11th type and the 7th type, can you see that down in the corner? And then non-valid cognition can be mistaken cognition, and there can be a non-aperceptive mistaken cognition. So mistaken cognition can come in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 different categories. Yeah. Yeah. Would you sort of hold your face sort of erect, because you're talking to the ground and my

[32:51]

head's not down underneath you. I'm having problems with my vision. Yes. Okay. I said that false cognition could not be, was not possible with doubting or indecision. I just said that doubting or indecision is not possible. Doubting or, if you look at, what is it, doubting consciousness or indecisive consciousness, it's a type of conception, do you see that? It's on the conception line? Yes. It's a type of conception, and also, if you go down, it's a mental cognition. Mental cognitions can be direct perceptions or, and of course, conceptual cognitions are

[33:54]

mental cognitions. It also is a non-aperceptive. It's also can be, it's also non-valid. It's also non-valid, which you maybe understand in not too long. And it's also a true conception, see? It's a true conception, therefore it's not a false cognition. And it's also, it can also be a false, oh, excuse me, it can also be a false cognition. It can be true or false. False cognition is a mistaken, a false cognition is a mistaken cognition or a false cognition.

[35:00]

So, I guess I should, I guess I kind of got it wrong, so if I, if I doubt something that's true, that's a false cognition, I guess. If I doubt something that's true, it's a false cognition? No. If I doubt something that's true, I'm not, I'm not clear about this right now. Sorry. I have to work on that one. I also just want to tell you briefly, just something to get this out of the way quickly if I can, and that is, I just want to say something about mistaken, about this last category of mistaken cognition. And mistaken cognition can be, as you see from the chart, mistaken perception or mistaken conception. So a direct perception can be mistaken, and

[36:07]

there's four types of mistaken direct perception. Actually, there's two main types of mistaken direct perception. The two types, the two types of mistaken direct perception, so you see, again, if you look under perception you see that it can be mistaken. Can you see that? If you follow the top line, the top horizontal line, perception can be mistaken. There's two basic types of perception that can be mistaken. Sensory cognition can be mistaken, and mental cognition can be mistaken. So in terms of perception, of direct perception, it can be mistaken in basically two types, sensory and mental. And sensory is of four

[37:07]

types. So four different types in which direct perception can be wrong. And I just like to briefly mention that. One way, are you okay with this? Four ways that direct perception can be mistaken cognition. Okay, so you see on the chart that it can happen, right? Even though it's not direct, it can be wrong. Four ways. One way is sensory perception in which the source of the deception exists in the object. So again, sensory perception, the three main conditions for sensory perception are, remember what they are Bernard? No. No. Remember now?

[38:15]

The three conditions for... My mind is somewhere else. I know, but now you're here. So now, sensory perception, direct perception, three conditions, what are they? Three main conditions. Dominant. Dominant? Okay, there it is. So the first condition, the dominant condition for sensory perception is what, Bernard? The organ. The organ. Okay. So the first type of error that the sense perception can have is that when the source of the error is in the dominant condition, the sense organ. That's the first type of error that sensory perception can have. So I mentioned before, if you have jaundice, the dominant condition is the source of the deception because things will look yellow. The second type of error exists... Excuse me. Got it wrong. What I just said was one of the types.

[39:17]

I'll change the order. It's not wrong. So the second type is when the error exists in... What are the other conditions for sensory perception? The object. The object. So the object conditions. So the other source of error is when the error is in the object. Okay? How can the error be in the object? Yeah. What's an example of error being in the object? Mirage. Huh? Mirage. Pardon? Mirage. Mirage? Yeah. A mirage? No, because that depends on conception. Now what's an example where it's an object? Here's an example. Maybe the mirage might work. Here's the example that they gave in the book

[40:19]

was like if you take a stick of incense in the dark and move it in a circle rapidly, move it around rapidly, you see a circle. In the ants. Huh? Ants. In ants. There actually isn't a circle, but by moving the... And you can also go up and down like this and see kind of a saw-edge thing with the light on the end of the stick. There actually isn't that saw thing in the air and there isn't a circle, but because the object is moving in a certain way, we see something that's not there. So in that case, that type of object presents itself as a circle rather than as a bunch of dots in motion. Have trouble with that? I have trouble with that. It still seems to me an error of perception. It is an error of perception. It is an error of perception. What do you mean? I'm just saying... No, but it's how the eye isn't able to accommodate the movement.

[41:25]

Well, you say the eye isn't able to accommodate, but it's the eye together with the organ, I mean with the object. Because the eye does seem to be able to accommodate in other cases, but certain types of objects the eye can't accommodate, so then we blame the object rather than the organ. Whereas when the organ's got a problem, it has problems with all the stuff. But when the organ's operating properly, certain objects trick it and others don't. So it's not exactly the organ either, it's the perception. The perception isn't the organ or the object or the supporting consciousness. It is the actual thing that you think is happening. That's the perception. And so we have these three conditions, so what we're going to find out is that of the four sources of error in direct perception,

[42:26]

we're just being taught that the three conditions will be three of the sources. The cognition's arising and it's not correct, so the error is in the organ, in the object, or in the state of consciousness that preceded it. Those are three of the four, and those are the three conditions which give rise to sense perception. So Donald's saying that he thinks in the case of the circle of fire, he thinks that the source is the organ. So I'm saying, I can see that, but I'm saying that if the organ's operating properly, it would be able to handle other organs, but not this one. So when a generally properly operating organ can't handle an object, then we put the source into the object. But that object plus other objects can't be dealt with properly by certain organs.

[43:29]

When that organ can't deal with anything properly, then we put it with the organ. Does that work any better for you? Not quite? Again, this is to contemplate, okay? This is to contemplate. Think about it. The third example is the third support for sense perception, sense cognition, is the previous moment of consciousness. In other words, you have consciousness happening in the previous moment, and that sets up the possibility of consciousness in this moment. Now if the person, if I or you, are in a state of strong emotion, like strong hatred, strong jealousy, strong lust, strong attachment, if the previous moment of consciousness is like that, that condition, which is one of the three conditions,

[44:33]

colors then the sense perceptions. So actually people say that you actually... This is being proposed that when you're angry, actually your sense perception is affected by the anger. Actually the color of things is affected. And there's also the example of if you get intoxicated, like they often say, everybody's beautiful just before the bar closes. People get really good looking. The bar's about to close and you've been drinking all night and almost everybody's good looking at that time. But another way to interpret that is because you're intoxicated, your mind opens up to unwholesome states of consciousness where you start finding everyone extremely attractive. So the state of consciousness, which arises from intoxication, tends to be more prone to lust or hatred, actually.

[45:33]

And when you actually are in this state of lust, things look much more attractive than they do when you sober up and the lust goes down. So we can actually be in a state of lust, not towards necessarily a particular person, but just generally in a lusty mood. So like a lot of people look really attractive and then when the lust goes down and the anger goes up, almost no one looks attractive. Everybody looks kind of like obnoxious. So that's putting the... But they're not. It's a misperception. Do you have this experience? When I'm on a train, and the train across the track moves and I think my train's moving. You know that one? Or somebody or a porter is moving, he moves a cart,

[46:36]

and I think my train's moving. It's situational. But it's an error. My train moving is a non-existent train. So the way it appears to the sense perception and the way I'm engaged with the situation are both wrong. So those are the four types of mistaken sense perception. And I want to make this big step, but Ellen? Well, I was just curious. You gave those examples of the previous moment of consciousness. Is that kind of it, or are there more of those? You know, lust, anger? Is that just an example, or is that sort of the whole thing? Well, the main ones are... It could be sleep or... I mean, is there a whole other realm, or is it just... Well, it's not so much sleep,

[47:38]

but what do you call it? Being drowsy? Or being in a state of torpor? Well, you're actually still awake, but... No, no. Well, those are the most... I mean, those are the Greenhagen illusion, or the basic unwholesome things. And unwholesome states of mind actually, we're saying here, they actually can distort your sensation process, which we don't usually think that. But they actually can disturb your sense perception, not to mention your conceptual cognitions. There they really go to town. Okay, now, the next thing I would like to introduce to you in the short time we have remaining is the first two categories. And I have a handout on this too, but I didn't want to hand it out before and deal with that piece of paper. But I have a brief introduction to the first two types of awareness,

[48:39]

which are called valid perception and valid inference. And this is... I'm using the word... I chose the word valid here, and... Where is the thing? I'll just use it. There's a Sanskrit word, it's called pramana. Pramana. Pra... means... can be etymologized in different ways by different people. One etymology is ideal. Another one is perfect. Another one is best. Another one is valid. Another one is prime. Or principle. And mana is mind.

[49:41]

So... I'm proposing just that my favorite of these translations would be valid mind or valid cognition. And valid cognition comes in two types. Conceptual and direct perception. And the... the usual way this is taught is that a valid mind, a valid cognition or a valid... a valid cognition, a valid perception or a valid conception depends on three characteristics.

[50:44]

One is freshness or newness. That's one main characteristic. The next one is infallibility. And the last one is cognition. The last one is very simple. It just wants to make the point, or I want to make the point that valid cognition actually is a cognition. It's not, for example, a sense organ which some people propose. So really the two main conditions to look at are freshness and infallibility. So a valid cognition, a valid perception is a fresh one. It's the never before experienced cognition. A new one, not a successive one or a succeeding one. A fresh, unique experience, either conceptual

[51:47]

or perceptual. Second characteristic of infallibility means that we comprehend, or we have a comprehensive engagement with the object which means we clearly ascertain what it is and we do so in such a way that we have no doubt as to what the object is. So in the handout that I gave you I'm using the example of a rose. The example of a perception that comprehends its object would be a visual perception of a rose that creates a sufficient impression on the mind to be able to induce a correct

[52:47]

conceptual ascertainment that the object seen was a rose. Furthermore, since on the basis of this perception there is no possibility of misconception of misconceiving the rose to be anything else than a rose it is said to be capable of eliminating any doubt or misconception about the object. So another way to look at this is if you look under look at the first two lines now perception so you'll see perception x under valid perception so perception can be a valid perception in other words a sense perception

[53:48]

or a mental perception, direct perception can be valid, it can be fresh and infallible and a perception can also be a subsequent cognition, you see but the subsequent cognition is not a valid cognition because it's not fresh. So you can see a rose and then you can see the rose again but the second time you see the rose it's not that valid perception of the rose it's not you could say it's non-valid not invalid but non-valid non-valid and where's my definition of valid where are you valid means what? yes another meaning

[54:52]

of valid is that it's well grounded and another meaning of valid is that is an argument a valid argument is one where the premises lead to a conclusion that cannot be denied without contradiction valid means an authoritative experience one that has force and power the original experience of the rose was authoritative it had the power to convince the subsequent ones they're being convinced because of the previous one the subsequent ones are just riding

[55:54]

along on the power of the first one and not just the first one because not just the freshness of it but the authoritativeness of it yes and then if you look also on the on the perception line one more over there inattentive perception ok so inattentive perception is a perception but it's a separate category from the valid perception because inattentive perception doesn't clearly ascertain its object it perceives it but not in clearly ascertaining it and so it doesn't it really isn't authoritative and when you have a flash of

[56:56]

sensory perception that's inattentive you and somebody says is that the same one you might say yes but you really wouldn't know you'd just be guessing two possibilities, yes or no, yeah I saw it so the inattentive one is not the inattentive one actually could be fresh you could have a sensory perception, nice and fresh see something you never saw before ok it's not a subsequent one it's a new one a new one so it's got the fresh part mostly we're experiencing fresh sensory perceptions but they're inattentive so we don't ascertain them and if somebody said that it was something other than what it was we'd kind of go hmm but the ideal perception if somebody says holds up a different rose

[57:57]

a different rose it's not just you saw a rose if they hold up a different rose you would say it's not the same rose but if I flash a rose up there real fast and then say is this the same rose if you don't have that authentic fresh infallible direct perception in your heart you would not know if that was the same rose or not in your mind you would not know but when you do have a perception like that and you have had perceptions like that then you are sure and the same with conceptions they also can be fresh and they also can ascertain the object infallibly however in order to do that look again at the chart here now

[59:00]

go across there conception can be a valid conception can be a valid inference in other words conception can be fresh first time, never had this conception before and infallible irrefutable it's possible look at the next category subsequent, once you have this you can have subsequent cognitions conceptual cognitions but they won't be fresh anymore however you will still be convinced but the subsequent cognitions the subsequent conceptions would not have sufficient force to convince you it's just you continue to be convinced but not by the new conception the next one correct belief if you hear that things are impermanent and you believe it that is a correct conception it's a true conception however

[60:04]

it's not an ideal conception because your belief is not yet fresh and totally convinced the only way you can totally convince your conception is by reasoning in such a way that the conclusion of your reasoning leaves absolutely no doubt in your mind and cannot be denied without contradiction so the conceptual cognitions in order for them to be ideal or are valid they have to be it's the first time that you have a cognition about something which is totally irrefutable the first time subsequent times are not that so what we want to have is to focus on this chart is you go over then down the conceptual line you see that there is possible there wrong conception and the last

[61:07]

column second one down that could be circled in red some people say that that category of misconception is the root cause of suffering mistaken cognition second from the top so mistaken cognitions can be perceptions and I told you about mistaken cognitions that are perceptions right they are like things like thinking that your train is moving when is the other one moving we need to clear this stuff up and we do we try to learn how to do that and not be confused about those things but they do not cause the deep suffering that misconceptions do like for example the misconception that things are permanent the misconception that things have self these misconceptions

[62:07]

these wrong consciousness which are conceptual that is the main problem on the chart however if you can develop ideal or valid inference you can correctly conceptually cognize for the first time that the misconception which is a separate state of consciousness which you have experienced for an awful long time you can have a new conceptual cognition to go with the old conceptual cognition but the new one is that you actually conceptually cognize that that is a false cognition and it is irrefutable conceptual cognition and the one that is really powerful is the first one the first time you get that in an irrefutable way actually the

[63:08]

misconception can also be fresh you know you could have that is an old thing we did that a long time ago so the misconception is old but the valid conception which can overturn the misconceptions which are the source of our problem it has to be it is the first time and the irrefutable one the succeeding ones you can see on the chart there are subsequent cognitions on the conceptual line too in other words subsequent to the ideal inference they are true cognitions but they don't have the power of the fresh irrefutable one they are no longer fresh of course because they are subsequent but also they don't have that irrefutable power in themselves they are just riding on the valid cognition that happened earlier

[64:11]

like the example there for a rose when you see a rose in this way such that you cannot so you have no doubt that it is this rose have you ever had an experience like that? if you have a direct if you have a hologram of a rose can you see that direct perception? and if you see that in an irrefutable way then if somebody shows you a different hologram you say it is not the same one what I just said you clearly ascertain the hologram in such a way that if anybody showed you any misrepresentation or misconception about it

[65:17]

or said anything about it there would be no room for doubt if there is any room for doubt you don't have this kind of cognition perceptual or conceptual and you would be able to notice if it was conceptual cognition that if anything went against it you could see that there is a contradiction so I just want to say briefly that I'll pass this out this introduction to this to this this new the first two categories you can pick that up later and I just wanted to get this out there during this class because we are going to pick it up more in the next one and go deeper into this yes? I have trouble with the fresh here is my hand yes there is something hanging from that

[66:18]

is this fresh now? can it be fresh again? is there some sort of latency period by which something can be ascertained like you seem to say subsequent cognitions it's not fresh so I'm just wondering it's hard for me to see how you could have a fresh ascertainment of something I think that because the conditions are new I think that if you go to the inattentive perception I would say that the inattentive perceptions satisfy the fresh part of the valid perception in other words you say here is my hand but actually the visual impression of your hand each one of those is fresh and unique many of them right but

[67:20]

to ascertain that one of those flashes of your hand to ascertain that that one in a way that was irrefutable infallible that would be a valid perception of your hand and the first time you had that kind of perception of your hand would be a valid perception of your hand the first time, the one that made you really sure was your hand if that's the example but you can have lots of other inattentive experiences so in that example just theoretically speaking of three years old and all of a sudden there's a hand there you're saying that could have been it? that could have been the fresh, original valid ascertainment of my hand that was valid? that could be the valid

[68:22]

ascertainment for that three year old of their hand at that time at that time because that's not the same hand as the forty year old but even the forty year old given its hand, it's changing but still, given its hand you can have inattentive, direct perceptions of the hand which you would be having if it was flopping in front of your face many inattentive ones but those, each one would be fresh, so that part would be satisfied but you wouldn't clearly ascertain any of them and if you don't clearly ascertain them, you wouldn't be able to you know, be absolutely completely have no doubt about whether this was the same hand or a different hand okay, so there's are you talking about the infallibility component? yeah so I don't see how that carries through when, you know, your attention

[69:25]

and your mind move on to other things and then you come back why there isn't a why you don't go through another fresh ascertained, infallible cognition you could you could you could have another one, the hand you got now but this hand you got now if somebody took this away and gave you another one that wasn't it you would have no doubt that it was not the same hand you would know that it's not the same hand because everything's changing it seems like there's a component of habit in there and things are in close proximity but even though things are changing if you have a momentary flash of direct perception of something that's fresh and infallible then you can have subsequent perceptions of it but they don't have that freshness anymore

[70:29]

but they're still based on it but they're still perceptions but they're based on the previous one so they're not fresh and also they don't have the power to establish certainty in themselves I can kind of see that so the transformative power of the inattentive of course is very weak because you hardly even, you don't even ascertain if you don't ascertain you can't be you can't get to a state of no doubt but again the inattentive ones are fresh the subsequent ones you're convinced but you're not, but you don't have the freshness plus, because you don't have the freshness the actual power of the thing is not there so it's just not as powerful to transform your understanding of the physical world in this case so lots of questions if it makes sense yes, Kara there's been a question that's been coming up

[71:32]

in my line talking about the whole mistaken cognition and I was wondering how we can skillfully act once we've actually got to the place where we are aware of our own false perceptions of our mistaken cognition how can we skillfully act in the face of encountering people who have who are still there in that mistaken cognition and false perception and then also in dealing with situations at least one that came really close to me my mother had borderline personality and obviously in those situations the person is suffering from something that in some ways they can't help so I'm wondering what is a skillful way to deal with those two situations I feel that question is out of scale for 9.16pm it's not, it's relevant

[72:33]

but I just, I can't it's too big at this point in the evening I'm sorry well the main place to start which is not to try to get into this material just put this material down and just remember that the person you're describing is an object of compassion this person you're describing should be dealt with with compassion we should practice generosity with this person we should practice precepts with this person we should practice patience with this person we should be diligent and we should be tranquil with this person that you're describing who has misconceptions and also misperceptions that they're suffering with so that's the first way now then after that

[73:35]

while you're doing that you can start studying this material and we can discuss it but the first aid is compassion towards such a person and like I say 7th column second line until we deal with that one those basic misconceptions we ourselves are not fully able to be compassionate either but when we meet people who are caught by false consciousnesses they should be dealt with with compassion and part of our compassion should be that we study the mind to be helpful to them more and more and understand that you know we're all working together here for this person to have this misconception they didn't come up with this misconception all by themselves we don't come up with the misconception that we come up with things by ourselves all by ourselves we think we come up with our own problems by ourselves or other people do but that's a misconception we don't really come up with this stuff by ourselves

[74:37]

we're working together but we do share together misconceptions that we do do things by ourselves That's that misconception that we have to get over. Until we do and until other people do, we and others are objects of compassion. Always, no matter how bad we get. We should be dealt with with compassion. So anyway, I appreciate you hanging in here in this class. I know it's been one of the hardest ones that have ever occurred here at the Yoga Room. I've sat tight in the yoga classes. But I appreciate that you're still here and that I am too. So I'm going to, I'm daring to offer this class again and I hope somebody shows up. And there's another handout here for you to take home with you.

[75:40]

Introducing this, the first two types of awareness. The two types of valid cognition. Can you leave us with a little teaser for the next season? Do you have any sense of where this goes? I'd like to use this chart and meditate on this chart. And particularly, I'd like you to understand more. I'd like to really go into what valid cognition is. Because it's through valid cognition that our mind is changed. That we actually, our mind changes from all the misconceptions we have to some new conceptions which are not misconceptions, but that are irrefutable. And again, if you look at the chart, there's misconceptions or wrong consciousnesses. But that's just the last column. The other ones are not wrong. We have other consciousnesses which are not wrong. However, the wrong ones keep happening until we get the first two types

[76:42]

which can transform the wrong kind. We have the first two types which transform wrong consciousness. The middle ones don't have the power. The correctly assuming consciousness, the doubting consciousness, the subsequent consciousness, these consciousnesses don't have the power to transform the wrong consciousnesses. The first two do. So studying valid cognition is very important to understand how the mind can cure itself. Through its actually normal processes, how that can happen. Is that enough of a teaser? It's not exactly, you know, the next season of Desert Housewives. But it's similar to this other one called, what's it called? Arrested Development. Oh, what's that other one? Oh, Curb Your Enthusiasm. I just wanted to let you know that

[77:54]

I'm probably not going to be able to make it this week as far as the treehouse goes because I've got a lot of stuff happening. Plus, we're sitting Saturday. I appreciate you letting me know. Next week, though. Irene has me slated for... What do you mean by next week? What date are you talking about when you say next week? What day is that? Thursday? Saturday is the 17th, Sunday is the 18th, Monday is the 19th. So what do you mean by next week? I mean like Monday through Saturday. You might come then? Yeah, because... That'd be perfect. I have to come in and do that roof, too. Yeah, well, that'll be fine.

[78:32]

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