Sachchidananda 'The Life Divine' Book I,Ch.9, 10, 11, 12 (The Mother Insitute of Research - MIRA) - Track 906

There are three grounds on your side on which you can still show that it is not hallucination. Even in your subjective experience you have hallucination and you can detect whether it is hallucination or not. Even in your subjective experience. It is not that only in objective experience there are hallucinations and you can detect whether its hallucinations or not. Even in your subjective experience you have hallucinations and you can distinguish very well that this was hallucination and this is a real experience. You know fire lights being seen by you in a drunken condition and fire lights being seen by you not in that condition but which are not seen by others they are invisible to you. Invisible to the others and yet you can make a distinction between the two. In other words you might say that there is in the subjective experience a capacity to distinguish between hallucination and the real experience. Now, how do you make a distinction when you can repeatedly percieve identity? It is a new concept I am introducing now. When you can perceive identity subjectively then you can say that when same thing is seen identically again and again then you can say it is true as distinguished from a hallucination which can be seen sometimes but they are not repeatedly identical in the case of hallucination. This experience of identity is one of the most fundamental things in the field of knowledge. Infact some of the materialist have been able to perceive this point. This is another group you might say of materialists. Bertrand Russell for example belongs to this group, the best type of materialist  you might say, who says that there is one experience which you cannot objectively verify but which nonetheless is true or even it is objectively verified. Even in physical terms later on but the real proof is in pure subjectivity. What is that experience? It is an experience of recognition. How do I recognize that this is Sarita whom I had seen yesterday? What is the proof that this is the same Sarita which I had seen yesterday. I recognize her very well. Now remember this is a very deep question because basically I recognized you, in my subjectivity that that whom I had seen yesterday who is not before me, therefore not physically seen by me now, so that whom I had seen which I have now only subjectively know, is not objectively known now, is a same as the impression  that I have received now from outside which is also my subjective perception and I am tying up these two perception subjectively and subjectively I know that this is the same as that one identity. Bertrand Russell accepts that there is one experience he says materialism cannot explain. He admits very clearly. He wrote a book called ‘Analysis of Mind’ in which he tried to show that all that you see, all that you experience can be physically verified. Purely on materialistic terms, but having done all kind of analysis he comes to this experience of recognition and he say I have not yet found a materialistic answer to this experience of recognition. Of course he say one day I will find out that is another matter but so far at least he says I am not able to find a physical answer to this question.

Question – It does not respond to remembrance?

True, but what is remembrance precisely it’s purely subjective. You verification is subjective and yet I believe it is true, its not hallucination. A subjective verification which gives you a standard of truth, so merely saying it is subjective and there is no argument. Actually speaking it may be argued that all knowledge is basically subjective. Fundamentally all that you are perceiving even from outside, even if five people see the same thing each one perceives subjectively. It is my subjective consciousness which understands what is objective, which gives credence to objectivity but that is all based upon subjectivity. Agreement of my subjectivity with your subjectivity is understood by whom. By your subjectivity and my subjectivity therefore subjectivity has a capacity of understanding what is objective and therefore what is true and what is not true. You don’t need to have a physical proof for saying whether it is true or not. A subjective capacity exists. Now this is a proposition, which opens up a field for a new enquiry. Once you grant this some materialist can see this point as Bertrand Russell has to say but although he still says I will find out a materialistic answer in future which during his life time he couldn’t. There are two or three questions on which he said that I will find out materialistic answers to those three questions, but until the end of his life he could never. In any case this is the one door on which now you have a better field and you can say now you institute an inquiry now when you institute an inquiry you find something very interesting, but to start with let us take a very simple example. We all have the experiences of chauffeurs who drive our cars. On what grounds do you allow your driver to drive your car in which you are seated? The only ground is that he has a judgment which is subjective, which he knows is true subjectively and you know that it is true. If you did not believe that his judgment is true you will not allow a driver to drive at all. Now on what ground do you believe that his judgment is true? There is a further ground that he has got to be sincere in his perception. That means you know that if somebody is insincere he can perceive wrongly but if he sees sincerely he will perceive rightly. You know that if he sees insincerely he will himself get killed, if he sees insincerely he himself will get killed. But you know that if he sees sincerely his judgment, his perception would be  really right perception, therefore what is your criterion of believing that your driver will drive rightly, that he cannot but be sincere. Preservation of life being such a tremendous feeling in us that he cannot even play with insincerity. He cannot say let me drive just like that for the sake of play. Even that is dangerous he will die, he will crash, therefore the one criterion in subjective matters, whether something is true or not is sincerity. A sincere perception…..