“The Blind Man's Meal”
Painted in 1903 by the painter,
draughtsman, and sculptor
Pablo Ruiz Picasso
(1881-1973)
by Swami Krishnananda (1922–2001)
Published by The Divine Life Society (2003) - Numerical edition
Chapter V: The Theory of Perception
Part 4 - The Nature of Truth
An empirical perception is to be regarded as true when it stands the test of correspondence, coherence and practical efficiency, and is capable of satisfying the principle of non-contradiction. According to the correspondence theory, truth is a relation between an idea and its objective content. The idea of an object should correspond or agree with the content of perception. Realists hold that truth is independent of human cognition and remains unaffected by it. Reality does not depend upon our perception of it. Truth is here fidelity to reality, agreement with fact. According to the coherence theory of truth, truth is the relation of consistency or internal coherence between all parts of our experience. Truth depends upon the harmonious constitution of consistency of the different constituents of a proposition or judgment with the parts constituting truth. Logical coherence is the criterion of truth, and not mere agreement of idea with fact. The pragmatic theory of truth leans on practical efficiency, workability in experience, what leads to satisfactory consequences, what is useful in practice and life. Truth is valid. What works as truth or satisfies us as truth is to be considered as truth for all human purposes. It is true that there cannot be correct perception unless there is a real object outside, to which our knowledge may correspond. But correspondence is not the only criterion of truth, for there can be correspondence even in the case of partial truths or even errors. Correspondence has to be testified by the principle of coherence or the organic nature of knowledge, which satisfies consistently the perceptions of the different sense-organs and agrees with similar perceptions of the object by others. Truth also has the character of practical efficiency or workability in actual life. Though the workable need not necessarily be true, the true is always workable. Though utility is not the test of truth, truth has always the utility that is unique to its nature. All these tests, however, are based on the fact of the self-evident and perfectly valid nature of one’s self-consciousness. Consciousness is its own test and proof, and it exists as the basis of all proofs. The reality of the silver seen in nacre is nacre, and the reality of nacre is the universal consciousness. The reality of dream perception is rooted in the waking consciousness of the individual, and the reality of this latter is the Turiya or the Atman. The truth of an object should correspond with its essential nature. But no human idea or concept can correspond to the reality of the Atman or Brahman, for here no relational category can be introduced into knowledge. Empirical tests of truth cannot be applied to it, for all these tests are based on the notion of duality, while the Atman is non-dual, is its own proof and validity, and the test of its experience is its self-evident nature. This is the only experience which is ultimately non-contradicted and so the ultimate truth. In this highest being of consciousness the knower and the known are one, and in it all logical tests lose their significance.
For all purposes of life, an object of correct perception by the Pramatrichaitanya is real and has an existence of its own leading to successful activity, corresponding to empirical facts and cohering with the perceptions of others in regard to it. But it has to be added here that what satisfies these tests of truth need not be absolutely real. The world of experience, to the Vedanta, is, in the last resort, subject to sublation in the knowledge of the Atman, to which the objects of the world cannot correspond, and in which it loses all practical efficiency, and also proves to be incoherent with the structure of the hidden and real nature of the universe. Metaphysically, and apart from what is revealed in temporal perception, all things exist in a system in which they are interrelated and mutually determined as elements ultimately contained in a supersensible completeness. Everything in this universal system implies and is implied by everything else, so that in essence everything is everywhere to be found. Consequently, it would mean that to know anything in the world perfectly one would have to know the whole world at one stroke, and intuit pure being in non-temporal immediacy, for the search of the ultimate reality of any object leads one to other objects, the nature and mode of whose existence determines it, so that the search can end only on reaching and realising indivisible being. Empirical judgments have only a pragmatic value, are relatively valid and sufficient for all practical purposes in one’s day-to-day life. But such judgments are not ultimately valid, for all sense-knowledge has to be classed under appearances, since it proceeds from the reflection of the Atman in the Antahkarana and catches only aspects of reality in the forms of discrete objects in space and time. Everything in the world points beyond itself to a boundless existence, and this fact is demonstrated in the constant change that things undergo, and their tendency to overcome barriers and obstructions at every step. Everything embraces all other things, for everything is a mirror reflecting the whole universe. Judgments which presuppose the isolated existences of things cannot be ultimately true, for all things exist in and for the whole. The knowledge of the true essence of things is given not in relational perception of externalised conditions or objects, but in the intuitional revelation of the Absolute.
Part 4 - The Nature of Truth
An empirical perception is to be regarded as true when it stands the test of correspondence, coherence and practical efficiency, and is capable of satisfying the principle of non-contradiction. According to the correspondence theory, truth is a relation between an idea and its objective content. The idea of an object should correspond or agree with the content of perception. Realists hold that truth is independent of human cognition and remains unaffected by it. Reality does not depend upon our perception of it. Truth is here fidelity to reality, agreement with fact. According to the coherence theory of truth, truth is the relation of consistency or internal coherence between all parts of our experience. Truth depends upon the harmonious constitution of consistency of the different constituents of a proposition or judgment with the parts constituting truth. Logical coherence is the criterion of truth, and not mere agreement of idea with fact. The pragmatic theory of truth leans on practical efficiency, workability in experience, what leads to satisfactory consequences, what is useful in practice and life. Truth is valid. What works as truth or satisfies us as truth is to be considered as truth for all human purposes. It is true that there cannot be correct perception unless there is a real object outside, to which our knowledge may correspond. But correspondence is not the only criterion of truth, for there can be correspondence even in the case of partial truths or even errors. Correspondence has to be testified by the principle of coherence or the organic nature of knowledge, which satisfies consistently the perceptions of the different sense-organs and agrees with similar perceptions of the object by others. Truth also has the character of practical efficiency or workability in actual life. Though the workable need not necessarily be true, the true is always workable. Though utility is not the test of truth, truth has always the utility that is unique to its nature. All these tests, however, are based on the fact of the self-evident and perfectly valid nature of one’s self-consciousness. Consciousness is its own test and proof, and it exists as the basis of all proofs. The reality of the silver seen in nacre is nacre, and the reality of nacre is the universal consciousness. The reality of dream perception is rooted in the waking consciousness of the individual, and the reality of this latter is the Turiya or the Atman. The truth of an object should correspond with its essential nature. But no human idea or concept can correspond to the reality of the Atman or Brahman, for here no relational category can be introduced into knowledge. Empirical tests of truth cannot be applied to it, for all these tests are based on the notion of duality, while the Atman is non-dual, is its own proof and validity, and the test of its experience is its self-evident nature. This is the only experience which is ultimately non-contradicted and so the ultimate truth. In this highest being of consciousness the knower and the known are one, and in it all logical tests lose their significance.
For all purposes of life, an object of correct perception by the Pramatrichaitanya is real and has an existence of its own leading to successful activity, corresponding to empirical facts and cohering with the perceptions of others in regard to it. But it has to be added here that what satisfies these tests of truth need not be absolutely real. The world of experience, to the Vedanta, is, in the last resort, subject to sublation in the knowledge of the Atman, to which the objects of the world cannot correspond, and in which it loses all practical efficiency, and also proves to be incoherent with the structure of the hidden and real nature of the universe. Metaphysically, and apart from what is revealed in temporal perception, all things exist in a system in which they are interrelated and mutually determined as elements ultimately contained in a supersensible completeness. Everything in this universal system implies and is implied by everything else, so that in essence everything is everywhere to be found. Consequently, it would mean that to know anything in the world perfectly one would have to know the whole world at one stroke, and intuit pure being in non-temporal immediacy, for the search of the ultimate reality of any object leads one to other objects, the nature and mode of whose existence determines it, so that the search can end only on reaching and realising indivisible being. Empirical judgments have only a pragmatic value, are relatively valid and sufficient for all practical purposes in one’s day-to-day life. But such judgments are not ultimately valid, for all sense-knowledge has to be classed under appearances, since it proceeds from the reflection of the Atman in the Antahkarana and catches only aspects of reality in the forms of discrete objects in space and time. Everything in the world points beyond itself to a boundless existence, and this fact is demonstrated in the constant change that things undergo, and their tendency to overcome barriers and obstructions at every step. Everything embraces all other things, for everything is a mirror reflecting the whole universe. Judgments which presuppose the isolated existences of things cannot be ultimately true, for all things exist in and for the whole. The knowledge of the true essence of things is given not in relational perception of externalised conditions or objects, but in the intuitional revelation of the Absolute.
