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| AYURVEDA |
Self Determination and other Determinations
The manner in which the neutral reals may combine among themselves has a limitation grounded in the very nature of the reals themselves as also of the particular combination as the reals themselves have their own inherent natures or qualities so each of their combinations has special characters or qualities and the manner in which these combinations may enter into the history of other combinations may enter into the history of other combinations is limited by the structural quality, character or nature of such combinations. In the spheres of theoretical science we try to discover the nature of such limitations through induction as in associated with it, and try to formulate what are called the laws of nature. The uncertainty associated with all inductive propositions and laws relating to cause and effect and even to the uniformity of nature is grounded in the fact of our ignorance of the ultimate limitations of the noumenal reals and of their combinations in relation to one another. From the point of view of pure theoretic science or metaphysics it would be possible to overcome the limitations of any combination of reals and to transform one combination into another, provided we had the exact knowledge of the nature of the limitations of each combination and had the apparatus by which we could relate any combination with those other combinations in the presence of which each combination would change its history. A practical chemist not only studies the properties of elements and compounds but also tries to determine in the presence of which compound other particular compounds change their internal history. We know that a catalytic agent either in the outside world on in the animal body in the form of enzymes, produces chemical change in other compounds without itself undergoing any change. A practical physicist not only studies the ultimate electronic structures of elements but also tries to discover the possibility of effecting such structural changes in the constitution of an atom of an element by the forces of heat, electricity or pressure that the atom may change it s history as one element into that of another. Thus in the material world we find that in the presence of force as electrical, thermal, chemical or doubtfully chemical (e.g. in the case of a catalytic agent) chemical compounds or elements change their individual or mutual history. By history I mean properties or behaviours of an entity in the presence of other entities in determining or effecting change in itself or in those entities which form its environment or which are copresent with it. History thus is self-determination and other-determination in the copresence of other entities.
The nature of this determination must be different in the physical, chemical, biological, physiological and the mental world. But history means the manifestation by a real of new qualities as actualization of the potential in copresence with others, participation in the history of others at their constituents or change of its own history in copresence with others. No case of causation is a case of external determination, but the elements that seem to determine a causal change or effect a causal operation are but the conditions under which a composite unity determines or changes its own history. The so-called other determination mentioned above is also to be regarded as self-determination from the point of view of the composite unity that undergoes the change. The nature and ground of this self-determination are to be sought in the inherent tendency of the neutral reals forming the structure of any composite unity to change its history in copresence with other composite unities, in consonance with the mode in which alone the entire evolutionary process from the inorganic tot he organic and from the organic to the highest development of man and his spiritual powers, has proceeded. The limitations in the behaviour of any composite unity are in consonance with this universal tendency with regard to the entire whole which has to emerge or evolve as an actualization of its potential career. Every individual history, be it of an atom, or molecule or compound, of the physical, electrical or thermal behaviour of inorganic substances, of living units, of mind, or of societies or nations, is only a part (abstracted mentally) of the universal history which is in a process of unfolding. Every individual history is at once its own self-determination as well as its determination by the universal history; it is an epitome of the universal history. The concept of causation is not one of production of change by an extraneous entity nor one of assemblage of conditions or transformation of energy or of parallel changes in the causal conditions and the effect, but the self-evolution of an entity in copresence with its conditions from the proximate to the remotest. Such a self-evolution may mean either the unfolding of the nature of an entity, its contribution to the unfolding of the nature of other entities or its participation in the history of the unfolding of other entities. The tendency that guides the modes of self evolution of any entity is on the one hand the actualization of its potentiality and on the other its subordination to the history of development of other composite entities in the interest of the total cosmic development of which every individual development is a part and towards which it has a tendency.
Time and Space
It may be remembered that in accordance with the fundamental metaphysical position of this system, space and time have no separate existence: they are not the general condition of all occurrences, but are only the modifications or combinations of the ultimate neutral reals and are thus continuous with objects. Space is not like a box in which all things exist, but it is continuous with all objects. All matter has evolved out of space and time has its first physical manifestation as a mode of space. The first physical category in the evolution of the neutral reals is space. Time is nothing but the constitutional or structural movement in space and in all space-products. Thus it may be regarded as a determining or structural mode or matter or space. In some older schools of Sankhya – Yoga theory time is regarded as an original dynamic existing prior to space and determining the evolution or emergence of space, and also of the neutral reals in their active capacity, from an original hypothetical state of equilibrium in which their functions were inoperative. It is thus seen that time is not a separate entity, but is an original function inherent in the neutral reals, space, the psychical spheres, and all products of space as matter. When it is said that time is the fist physical manifestation of space, what is meant is that since time in the phenomenal world means the structural movement of the ultimate reals, it exists even in the psychical sphere, as is realized in the apperception of time in the mind. Time exists as a structure of the mind or the psychical sphere as a pre-condition of its apperception which is a result of a process that may be either mental or physico-mental. Space is the first category that merges in the physical plane as a result of the combination of the neutral reals. But since time is the dynamic in the structural changes of the reals and since space is the first result changes in the reals, time may be regarded as manifesting first in the physical of structural space, in But as the ground of the emergence of all other physical categories from space has the structural movements of the reals, time exists in all the products of space in the material and the biological world. There is a difference between our apperception of time as measurable moments of the phenomenal time and the noumenal time represented in the very nature of the structural changes of the gunas. The phenomenal time or time as apprehended in consciousness has a measurable form. We may look forth for the finest, the smallest measure of such time and the limit of such smallness may be fixed in an imaginary fashion as the movement of an atom in the space of its own dimension. But even then such a unit of time or any time conceived by the addition of such units would not represent the real time either as the mode of space or as the structural changes of the neutral reals. Time as apprehended by us is thus false not only in its measure as a unit but also in its functional aspect; it is conceived as a flowing stream and as associated with the changes of matter and our experience of it. It will be realized that such a conception of time is false as it does not show either the structural or the modal function of time. The apprehended time, therefore, is false both in its aspect as measurable and in its function as the locus of all experiential and material changes. It is therefore held that the appehended time is a mental construction (buddhinirmana).
Mental Construction or State (Vikalpa)
Returning to the problem of causation and regarding the relation among the assemblage of conditions that effect a causal change, we find that these factors of the causal operation, apparently existing in differential points of space and separated by the time-element involved in the process, are not in reality discontinuous from one another. The so called primary cause and the conditions are to be regarded as forming plain in one organized whole theoretically associated together with the entire organization of the universe. Individual organizations, when looked at from the standpoint of their separable or separate existence, are but the results of our mental construction (vikalpa) generally from the point of view of our practical needs and interests. When the potter makes a jug out of a mass of clay, we may say that the clay evolves itself into the jug by its self evolving process through the contributions of its conditions, the energy of the potter, the wheel and the like. But the proper scientific view of causation would be to regard the clay, the potter, the wheel, the associated space and the associated time as one organised whole evolving process each element of the organized whole undergoes a change peculiar to its own nature, but none of these elements can be conceived as having an existence by itself independent of other elements. None of the elements are in reality separable. They can all be taken together in relation to the organized whole as discharging a function with reference to the whole and also with reference to each and every constituent of the whole. The ordinary definition of cause as invariable unconditional antecedent is no true definition and has only a methodological value. It only serves to separate a certain entity in which we are directly interested from others in which our interest is more remote. In the Yoga view of the situation the difference between cause and conditions also ceases to have any real significance and has only a methodological value. The condition as the spatio-temporal elements of the mentally separated causal whole, are continuous with the organization of the effect – whole constituting its own spatio-temporal and material elements. The differentiation of the effect whole from the causal whole is also the result of a mental construction. The effect whole exists in the causal whole as involved in its self-evolving process as its moments of self-expression.
Material and Extraneous Causes
The ordinary objection against the Yoga view of causation that since the effect exists in the cause, the apparatus of the causal operation and its movement is inexplicable, arises from a misapprehension of the whole situation. It is not the so-called material cause that evolves by itself independently of everything else, but it is the else-evolution of the entire organized whole of the so-called material cause and all its conditions including the spatial and the temporal elements. When it is said that the oil exists in the sesamum, it does not mean that such an existence is a ground for its self-evolution. The oil exists in the sesamum as much as the plant of sesamum exists in it. As a matter of fact the whole universe may exist in the sesamum, for it has for its constituents the neutral elements which are the constituents of the universe. The Yoga theory of causation is not interested merely in the barren assertion of the existence of the effect in the material cause. The true effectuating existence of the effect in the cause is with reference to the organized whole and it is this alone that can be called the true material cause. In the Yoga theory of causation there cannot be any place for an extraneous entity as an outside agent. Such an internal organization is possible from the fundamental notion of the neutral reals which co-operate together for mutual self-evolution and the evolution of the organized whole. But when the different elements constituting an organized whole move forward for their own individual – self expression in consonance with the self-expression of the organized whole, which in itself is a unity and has its own specific self-expression, the contribution in the joint effectuation of any of the constituent elements may be **regarding extraneous from the point of view of the **different **structural elements which we emphasize from our practical interest. Thus when a seed is put under the moist ground, the moisture, the temperature, the pressure, the space, the mineral and other elements present in the soil, the contribution of the microbes as the fertilizers may be regarded as extraneous causes (nimitta Karana) and the seed as the material cause. In the seed also, if we consider the function of the cellular walls which allow the passage of the proper nutrients through osmotic pressure, the cellular walls may be regarded as extraneous to the operation of the seed as a material cause. So, if we continue our analysis of the different physiological operations of the different structural elements inside the seed, we shall see that the so called material cause as apart from the extraneous causes is reduced to a mere fiction or to the tendency of the organization as a whole towards its specific self-expression. When a number of joint operatives work as an associated whole, which from our point of view seem to be more intimately associated in their operations, or which may somehow be regarded from our points of view as belonging to a different order in their modes of operation, we may ignore the internal, structural and functional activities of that integrated whole, regard it as one unit and as separate from the environmental influences and call it the material cause.
Thus the different structural elements have their independent existence and discharge independent functions through which new products come in and new bio-chemical and physiological operations set in. Such operations take place through the joint co-operation of the structural elements, their functions and products and signify the self-expression of the organized whole – as the seed of its growth. The joint operatives inside the seed may be regarded from the point of view of our separative intellect as being more intimately associated with one another than the environmental influences which may be more easily separated from them. It is from this point of view that the seed is regarded as a separate entity and the material cause. But in reality the seed in its production, existence, its effectuation as shoot and plant, its processes of growth and changes and variations of growth as well as in its destruction depends entirely on the environmental influences and their contribution. The potential and actual life of the seed is thus as much a function of the integral organization of the seed as that of the environment. It is for this reason that the fauna and the flora of a country are determined by its climatic and other conditions. Even the position of the earth in the limitless space determines the conditions of the production and growth of animals and plants. Thus the true cause is the organized whole and it is from a purely methodological point of view that the separative intellect may introduce different concepts of causation, which may seem to be conflicting with one another when the true point of view is not held before the mind.
Nine Kinds of Causes
Thus in the Vyasa-bhasya (11, 21) we hear of nine kinds of causes viz cause as production or transformation by which the indefinite makes itself definite, cause as integral maintenance of the whole through inner teleology, cause as manifestation to consciousness of what is already existent, cause as determined in change of directions in a process, cause as determined in mental movement of syllogistic nature by deduction or induction, cause as attainment of a true state of consciousness negating the false ones, cause as negating the false state; causes as extraneous agent determining the transformation and cause as a sustaining agent. It will be seen that at least four or five of the above concepts apply in the mental field and the rest are of universal application. But it can be shown that these concepts of causality are drawn from the application of the fundamental principle of causality as applied in different spheres or as looked at from different points of view. As such they are not in any sense exhaustive and have only a methodological value.
Force – a Behaviour
We have seen so far that causation means self-determination of an organized whole; each organized whole holds within it further organized systems and in tracing the subtle history of these related organizations and sub-organizations we may bring ourselves up to the limit of the assumption of structural determinations in space of almost an incompressible nature. The reference of these determination to the ultimate neutral reals come to the domain of metaphysical hypothesis. Each organization works in general harmony with all other possible organizations and in specific harmony with certain other possible organizations with which it may be more directly or proximately related. What is generally called force is an illusory abstraction and as such the enquiry into the association of force with a substance in which it is supposed to inhere is also an illusory attempt. The manifestation of the so-called force is but the behaviour of any organization or sub-organization or element with reference to its own self-expression or the self expression of any other-organized whole or wholes with which it is related. Electricity is regarded as a force, but in reality it is nothing but a behaviour. Thus Russell says: “Electricity is not a thing like St. Paul’s Cathedral: it is a way in which things behave.” The-so-called force is a self-relationing process involved in all specific self-expressions which again cannot be distinguished from the very nature of any organization.
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