1. Continuity of the self and the doctrine of Anatta
The Buddhist doctrine of Anatta denies the existence of the ‘self’ or the soul. What is perceived to be ‘the self’ is but a combination of matter and states of mind – the five ‘skandhas’ – aligned temporally in rapid succession, so as to give an illusion of continuity. The term ‘I’ is but a convenient designation for the five skandhas (also known as name and form) – form, feelings, perceptions, predispositions, and consciousness. (2006(1) Chadha, 2004 Chadha, p. 125).
This may seem counter-intuitive, as generally speaking, one feels that they are the same person at this time as they were the previous day, or ten days ago. However, Bhante Nagasena claims that “…the duration of the life of a living being is exceedingly brief, lasting only while a thought lasts” (2004 Chadha, p. 123). Without the soul, or any continuous element, some explanation is required for the intuition that the self at t1 and at t5 are still the same.
The doctrine of dependent origination may shed some light on this. When Bhante Nagasena says “…neither as the same nor as a different person do you arrive at your latest aggregation of consciousness,” (ibid) he is referring to the aforementioned doctrine (ibid, p. 124). One combination of name and form is directly causally responsible for the next combination, in the same way in which milk is causally related to cream, which is then causally related to butter (ibid, p. 123). One does not equate the butter to the milk, but also cannot deny that it is because of that milk that the butter came to be. Thus, when he says that they are ‘neither the same’, he means they are not qualitatively or numerically identical to each other. Just as the milk and the butter are not the same thing, the person is no longer the same person from one moment to the next. When he says ‘nor are they different’, he means that they are nonetheless causally dependent on each other, and that one could not come into being without the existence of the previous stage (2006(1) Chadha).
2. Mimamsa view: Continuity of the self over time
The Nyaya/Vaisesika arguments for the self refer to ‘the best possible explanation’. They infer that since there is activity, there must be a ‘self’ that causes this activity. Also, if there are properties, there must be a self that bears these properties. Since one uses ‘I’, there must be a referent – the self. Finally, there is memory, and this is evidence of a persisting self over time (2004 Chadha, p.200-1)
The Buddhists, however, disagreed with the Nyaya arguments. For each of those four factors, they claimed, could be explained by person-stages causally succeeding each other, and that therefore, the self is not necessary as an explanation (2006(4) Chadha).
The Mimamsa arguments are an attempt at defending Hinduism against Buddhist thought. They considered the Buddhist objections to the Nyaya arguments to be valid, and therefore expanded on the Nyaya argument from memory. They agree with the Buddhists is saying that memory can be explained by means of causal relations. However, instead of saying that this is evidence for a continuously existing self, they say that this reveals the self, because in each of those stages, there is an ‘I’ that has experiences and perceives (1992 Taber, p. 203). It is not merely the perception of my laptop on an orange meditation cushion, but the knowledge that it is ‘I’ that has this experience. It is this recognition of the self as the perceiver that reveals the self in any given moment.
The next stage of this argument is dependent on the first. If it is ‘I’ that does the experiencing at any given moment, then it must be the same ‘I’ that remembers it now. If I say ‘I remember I have been sick for the past two days’, then it is ‘I’ at this moment which is equivalent to the ‘I’ of two days ago and the ‘I’ of yesterday. To reach the ‘I’ of yesterday, one could say, ‘I remember that yesterday I remembered having been sick for a day.’ Thus, the Mimamsa argument reveals a self that experiences at different stages and equates them to one another.
3. Regressive self
As already apparent from the aforementioned ‘I remember that yesterday I remembered having been sick for a day’, there is here a possibility for an infinite regress. I can say ‘I know that I know that right now I remember… etc’. It is because of this infinite possibility for regress that the Buddhist would say that the experience was not of recognising oneself as being sick, but merely of the sensation of sickness as a cognitive state, and thus, the recollection is of that cognitive state (2004 Chadha, p. 238).
There is a proposed thought experiment that could possibly help to overcome this difficulty of regress. This is to first “imagine being an elephant” and then to “imagine you yourself being an elephant” (2006(4) Chadha). If there is no phenomenological difference between these to imaginings, then this is victory for the Mimamsa. The regress problem is but a linguistic one, and not a philosophical one, if this is the case.
However, both of these experiences are entirely fictional. I can imagine being an elephant or myself being an elephant, but there are no phenomenological differences between them simply because this is not a physical possibility. If I were to imagine ‘cooking dinner’ and ‘I myself cooking dinner’ the picture becomes different. In fact, I can easily understand cooking dinner, but the addition of ‘I myself’ makes the concept more difficult to comprehend, as I must then ask ‘How do I imagine an ‘I myself’?’
Of course, only my experience is not enough to discount the Mimamsa argument. It is worth noting that the Mimamsa argument is still an account that offers inferential evidence for ‘the self’ and can not provide empirical evidence. It is saying that what is revealed through these experiences is a ‘self’ (1992 Taber, p. 204). This view is troublesome for the Buddhist view, as Buddhist philosophy can not provide a more plausible alternative, yet neither is the Mimamsa argument more plausible than the Buddhist. The Mimamsa requires one to accept the ‘self’ as being ‘revealed’, whereas the Buddhist will argue that it is not the ‘self’ that is revealed, but a ‘person-stage’ consisting of name and form.
References
- Chadha, M. 2006, ‘Topics in Indian Philosophy 2006 – Lecture 9: Buddhist View: The Doctrine of Anatta (No-Self),
- Chadha, M. 2004, PHL2850/3850 Topics in Indian Philosophy – Study Guide and
- Taber, J. A. 1992, ‘The Mimamsa theory of self-recognition’ reprinted in PHL2850/3850 Topics in Indian Philosophy – Study Guide and Readings, Churchill, Monash Distance Education Centre
- Chadha, M. 2006, ‘Topics in Indian Philosophy 2006 – Lecture 8: Mimamsa argument for the Persisting Self’,
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