Vedic perspective - Matter and its quality: Part 3/3

Part 1/3                              Part 2/3                     Part 3/3

Cognition or Knowledge or Jnana which was original topic of my search comes here. The first 2 parts gives a perspective where this falls into. The todays topic of Psychology or Neuro-linguistic / Psycho studies are focussed on the physical structures of mind. Our quest is not on those lines but trying to understand what are the different types of knowledge acquisition process and et al.


Cognition is of 2 types. They are: 

1. Remembrance/Smriti: This is subdivided into the true and erroneous smriti or remembrance. Smriti is always a recollection either from the primary or secondary memory, which is actually filled with the Apprehension type of knowledge which is defined below.
  





2. Apprehension/Anubhava





Apprehension is of 2 types. Valid Apprehension and invalid Apprehension.






Valid Apprehension is of 4 types.







1. Pratyaksha Pramanna (Perception)





2. Anumana Pramanna (Inference)





3. Upamaana Pramanna (Analytical knowledge)





4. Sabda (Sayings of the great people)






Erroneous Apprehension are of 3 types:







1. Doubt/Samsayah





2. Misapprehension/Viparyaya





3. False Assumption.

I notice that I have already blogged about the various categories 2 years back and can be accessed here. This is a 2 part blog.

Part 1: http://ragsgopalan.blogspot.com/2008/11/part-1-perception-art-of-seeing-things.html 

Part 2: http://ragsgopalan.blogspot.com/2008/11/part-2-perception-art-of-seeing-things.html

So, whats the summary or conclusion? 


1. In Hinduism all the knowledge sprouts from a common source and also linked to each other in its philosophy, mythology, legendary figures and also in rituals. I felt that part 1 and part 2 of the blog actually gave that link very well as to how every aspect is linked to the mother scripture the vedas. A little more understanding would highlight that even an art like cooking is well linked to Ayurveda and also to the vedas. Exploring and Understanding this manifested and unmanifested interconnection between each other happens at the heights of wisdom.


Also in tamil there are a very terse verse:

"கற்றது கைமண் அளவு, கல்லாதது உலகு அளவு "

which means what we have learnt is just handful and what we have to learn is to the size of this world, giving a relative size of knowledge we have. Lets recognize that this statement is made by people who are well versed with all the 18 disciplines we have listed in part 1 of this blog.

What certainly keeps one going is the list of items that you have to learn and understand and this certainly looks like multi-life event and not going to end up in this life!...

Tama soma Jyothir Gamaya!

Part 1/3                              Part 2/3                     Part 3/3

Happy Reading!