15
UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY: A COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE David Burton The notion that our minds have unconscious depths has become commonplace due to the popularity of psychoanalytic and related therapeutic techniques. Our conscious minds—that is, those mental processes of which we are aware—are just the tip of the iceberg, as the cliche ´ , says. Most mental activity occurs below the surface, as it were, inaccessible to and often concealed from consciousness. The two great early-twentieth-century theorists of the unconscious, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, are largely responsible for its wide acceptance in our culture today. According to Freud, the unconscious is primarily the repository of repressed impulses, especially those of a sexual nature, that are considered to be socially unacceptable. Michael Palmer (1997, 94 – 5) remarks that, in Freud’s view, ‘the unconscious is, as it were, the underside of consciousness: it is that extensive and dynamic field of mental life in which repose ideas and memories censored from the conscious mind through the powerful mechanisms of repression.’ And Jung (1953, 66) writes that the unconscious consists of ‘lost memories, painful ideas that are repressed on purpose (i.e., forgotten on purpose), subliminal perceptions, by which are meant sense-perceptions that were not strong enough to reach consciousness, and finally, contents that are not yet ripe for consciousness.’ Moreover, for Jung, the mind contains a deeper, shared level—that is, the collective unconscious—which consists of archetypes, such as the animus, the anima, the hero, the divine mother, and so forth, psychic patterns or predispositions supposedly common to all human beings. As Palmer (1997, 100) writes, ‘the collective unconscious represents the impersonal and transpersonal foundation of the psyche, undergirding both consciousness and the personal unconscious.’ According to Jung, the symbolism and myths of religion, as well as the artistic and literary imagination, draw on and give expression to these archetypes that, Jung claims, occur trans-culturally as the common psychic bedrock of the human mind. There have, of course, been many criticisms of Freud and Jung’s theories. Nevertheless, they are indisputably of huge impor‘tance as popularisers and Contemporary Buddhism, Vol. 6, No. 2, November 2005 ISSN 1463-9947 print/1476-7953 online/05/020117-130 q 2005 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/14639940500435620

Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

Embed Size (px)

Citation preview

Page 1: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST

PHILOSOPHY: A COMPARATIVE

PERSPECTIVE

David Burton

The notion that our minds have unconscious depths has become commonplace

due to the popularity of psychoanalytic and related therapeutic techniques.

Our conscious minds—that is, those mental processes of which we are aware—are

just the tip of the iceberg, as the cliche, says. Most mental activity occurs below

the surface, as it were, inaccessible to and often concealed from consciousness.

The two great early-twentieth-century theorists of the unconscious, Sigmund

Freud and Carl Jung, are largely responsible for its wide acceptance in our culture

today. According to Freud, the unconscious is primarily the repository of repressed

impulses, especially those of a sexual nature, that are considered to be socially

unacceptable. Michael Palmer (1997, 94–5) remarks that, in Freud’s view, ‘the

unconscious is, as it were, the underside of consciousness: it is that extensive and

dynamic field of mental life in which repose ideas and memories censored from

the conscious mind through the powerful mechanisms of repression.’ And Jung

(1953, 66) writes that the unconscious consists of ‘lost memories, painful ideas that

are repressed on purpose (i.e., forgotten on purpose), subliminal perceptions, by

which are meant sense-perceptions that were not strong enough to reach

consciousness, and finally, contents that are not yet ripe for consciousness.’

Moreover, for Jung, the mind contains a deeper, shared level—that is,

the collective unconscious—which consists of archetypes, such as the animus,

the anima, the hero, the divine mother, and so forth, psychic patterns or

predispositions supposedly common to all human beings. As Palmer (1997, 100)

writes, ‘the collective unconscious represents the impersonal and transpersonal

foundation of the psyche, undergirding both consciousness and the personal

unconscious.’ According to Jung, the symbolism and myths of religion, as well as

the artistic and literary imagination, draw on and give expression to these

archetypes that, Jung claims, occur trans-culturally as the common psychic

bedrock of the human mind.

There have, of course, been many criticisms of Freud and Jung’s theories.

Nevertheless, they are indisputably of huge impor‘tance as popularisers and

Contemporary Buddhism, Vol. 6, No. 2, November 2005ISSN 1463-9947 print/1476-7953 online/05/020117-130

q 2005 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/14639940500435620

Page 2: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

systematisers of the notion of the unconscious mind. However, as significant as

Freud and Jung’s contributions are, it seems clear that thinkers from various

cultures have long been aware that the mind has unplumbed depths. One need

look no further than Plato, with his theory that knowledge is recollection of what

one already knows (i.e., the eternal, immutable Forms), which needs to be

retrieved from the hidden recesses of memory, to find evidence of an inchoate

notion of the unconscious mind at the root of the Western philosophical tradition.

And when Achilles declares in Troilus and Cressida (III, iii, 308–9) that ‘my mind

is troubled, like a fountain stirr’d; And I myself cannot see the bottom of it’

(Blakemore Evans 1974, 474), we can be sure that the idea that one’s mind’s

contents can be concealed from oneself is not confined to ancient Greeks and

modern psychologists. Shakespeare was also aware that one’s own impulses,

desires, and beliefs are frequently unfathomed and perhaps sometimes

unfathomable. Lancelot Law Whyte (1960) argues that the explicit idea of the

unconscious arose in reaction to Cartesian dualism; the benighted Descartes, in

dividing the world into just two substances, res cogitans and res extensia, and

identifying consciousness as a characteristic essential to the former and absent

from the latter, envisaged the mind as a translucent entity with no hidden depths.

For Descartes, to have a mind is to be self-aware, always to know what one

is thinking and feeling. According to Whyte (1960, 27– 8), it was in response to

Descartes’ choice of awareness ‘as the defining characteristic of an independent

mode of being called mind’ that the idea and eventually the term ‘unconscious

mind’ entered Western thought as a corrective to Cartesianism. Many thinkers

prior to Descartes had, Whyte (1960, 27) contends, ‘taken for granted factors lying

outside but influencing immediate awareness’; after Descartes’ influential and,

according to Whyte, erroneous theory, there was a need to make explicit and

defend the position that awareness is not the defining characteristic of mentality

and one’s mind contains dimensions that are not accessible to consciousness.

Whyte’s book is almost entirely focused on Western thought, with just brief

and rather superficial references to Eastern traditions (see, for example, Whyte

1960, 12). My intention in this paper is to help fill this lacuna by providing an

analysis of what I will call ‘unconscious beliefs’ in Buddhism. Of course, scholars

such as Lambert Schmithausen (1987), Padmasiri De Silva (2000) and William

S. Waldron (2003) have already given admirable and detailed textually based

studies of the rich vein of Buddhist speculations about what might be termed the

unconscious mind. In addition, Jungian psychology and its offshoots make much

of Buddhist visual representations and myths concerning Buddhas and

Bodhisattvas, ma_n_dalas, and so forth, as expressive of the archetypes of the

collective unconscious. However, unlike previous studies, this paper will explore

a typology of unconscious beliefs developed by the contemporary Western

epistemologists Nicholas Everitt and Alec Fisher (1995, 54–5). They identify three

distinct senses in which beliefs can be unconscious. Although they at no point

make any reference to Buddhist or any other Eastern thinkers, I will argue that

118 D. BURTON

Page 3: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

Everitt and Fisher’s taxonomy can be used to identify ways in which, for Buddhism,

one might have a belief and yet be unaware of it.

This paper is thus an exercise in what is sometimes called comparative

philosophy; it will take ideas developed by two Western thinkers and use them to

explicate and reflect on Buddhist ideas that were not originally formulated using

such a typology. Of course, critics of such comparative studies claim that they tend

to be superficial and pointless. It is uninteresting, they claim, to demonstrate that

the thought of a particular thinker or tradition in the East is in certain respects

similar to the reflections of a philosopher or philosophers in the West. So what,

they will ask? Indeed, it is possible for comparative philosophy to descend

into banality. However, I hope to show that, in this case, such comparison

can contribute significantly to our understanding and interpretation of the

unconscious in Buddhism, helping us to reflect on the issues it raises about

the mind and human nature.

Detractors may also argue that such comparison is actually intellectual

colonialism, where violence is unwittingly done to Buddhist ideas in order to make

them conform to Western categories. However, this objection smacks to me

of relativism run amuck. Different cultures are not hermetically sealed monads

without any prospect of interaction or dialogue. While acknowledging that there

is always a tendency to misconstrue the unfamiliar in terms of one’s own culturally

informed biases and interests, I am not so sceptical about the prospects for

genuine conversation between contemporary Western philosophy and Buddhism

or any other system of thought. After all, prejudices can be challenged and not just

confirmed in such an encounter. Nevertheless, there is undeniably a degree of

interpretation and appropriation in this study, given that Buddhists themselves,

as far as I am aware, have not traditionally used any term that could accurately be

translated as ‘unconscious belief’, let alone distinguishing three types! Perhaps

I am guilty of imposing a Western concept onto Buddhist thought, although

I would argue that it is a creative synthesis and development rather than an

imposition. Buddhism is not a museum piece, incapable of adaptation and

transformation when confronted by new ideas. Applying Everitt and Fisher’s

typology to Buddhism will, I think, illuminate Buddhist attitudes to the mind,

providing an opportunity for reflection on and assessment of them.

Beliefs as dispositions

Everitt and Fisher claim that one has some beliefs of which one is not

conscious, and never has been conscious. Is this not paradoxical, for surely one has

to have been conscious at some point of one’s belief in order for it to be one’s

belief? It might seem non-sensical to claim that one might have a belief without

ever having been aware of it. However, Everitt and Fisher think not. As an example,

they give the proposition that ‘there are more than ninety-nine ants in the world.’

This is a proposition that, presumably, I have not thought about in the past.

Yet, when it is brought to my attention, I assent to it. Furthermore, this proposition

UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY 119

Page 4: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

does not strike me as a revelation; it as though I believed it all along without ever

having thought about it. Bimal Matilal (1986, 102) gives the example of the belief

that ‘the floor will not melt under my feet’, a belief that ‘I may not have wondered

[sic] or apprehended consciously until today’ but which ‘my action of walking has

always assumed.’ We might choose, with Freud (1971, 102 –4), to label these

beliefs as pre-conscious, for they are contents of our mind of which we have not

ever been aware. In other words, there are propositions that we are disposed to

accept, but we have never consciously considered—and Everitt and Fisher are

claiming that these dispositions are unconscious beliefs.

This theory has the consequence that each of us has a vast number of

beliefs. There appear to be an indefinitely large number of propositions to which

one would give one’s assent but about which one has never thought (see Moser

et al., 1998, 53–4). For instance, not only do I believe that ‘there are more than

ninety-nine ants in the world’, but I also believe ‘there are more than one hundred

ants in the world’, that ‘there are more than one hundred and one ants in the

world’, and so on. In addition, I believe that ‘there are more than ninety-nine

moths in the world’, and so forth. I have never thought about these propositions,

but I would accept them if they were brought to my attention.

Propositions that we have never thought about but that we are disposed to

accept are very significant in Buddhism. An important notion in the Theravada

scriptures is the anusaya, defined by the Pali–English dictionary as ‘a bent, bias,

proclivity, the persistence of a dormant or latent disposition, predisposition,

tendency’ (Rhys Davids and Stede 1995, 44). Waldron (2003, 40–1) points out that

these anusayas are described at Majjhima Nikaya I 303 as being of three varieties:

the tendency to lust (raganusaya), the tendency to aversion ( pa_tighanusaya), and

the tendency to ignorance (avijjanusaya). In other words, there are both emotional

and cognitive hidden proclivities. The anusayas underlie our conscious minds,

and, when the conditions are right, they burst forward as active afflictions (kilesa);

that is, manifest experiences of craving, hatred and wrong views.

De Silva (1991, 43) writes that, according to Theravada Buddhism, there

are wrong beliefs that exist in the minds of Unawakened people, unbeknownst

to themselves: ‘Wrong beliefs exist at the level of dormant dispositions

(di_t_thanusaya) and account for the unconscious roots of prejudices and strong

biases which colour our emotional life.’ Most important among these prejudices is

the ‘personality view’ (sakkayadi_t_thi); that is, the belief that one has a permanent,

unchanging self. The Majjhima Nikaya I 432–3, for instance, claims that: ‘The young

tender infant lying prone does not even have the notion “personality”, so how could

personality view arise in him? Yet the underlying tendency [anusaya ] to personality

etc. lies within him’ (trans. Na_namoli and Bodhi 1995, 537).

De Silva (2000 , 75) also highlights the frequent use of the term ‘asava’ in the

Pali scriptures; this term is often translated as ‘taint’ or ‘canker’ and is associated

with the metaphors of an intoxicating extract of a flower or tree and the discharge

of a sore or wound. As with the anusayas, they are thought to be cognitive as well

as emotional. The asavas explain our tendency to ignorance and also selfish desire.

120 D. BURTON

Page 5: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

The mind is said to be tainted or intoxicated by an asava, which produces the

wrong view that there is a permanent self or soul. It is deeply engrained in the

human psyche even if it has not necessarily been articulated as an explicit view.

Metaphors abound in a variety of Buddhist traditions for the latent

disposition to ignorance. For instance, the Sautrantika Buddhists refer to it as

a seed (bıja) or scent (vasana) that lies dormant, persisting as a potentiality

underlying the flow of momentary conscious mental events, and which comes to

fruition as the wrong view that there is a permanent self. Adopting the Sautrantika

imagery, and piling metaphor on metaphor, the Yogacara Buddhists claim that the

seed or scent exists, along with many others, in the storehouse consciousness

(alayavijnana) that, they claim, exists like a subterranean stream below the ever-

changing modes of manifest consciousness ( prav_rttivijnana); it is the subliminal,

hidden aspect of the mind (see Schmithausen 1987; Waldron 2003).

Clearly, the disposition to accept the permanence of the self is thought to

explain the prevalence of religious and philosophical views that assert the

existence of such an entity. Waldron (2003, 40) notes that, according to Buddhism,

the anusaya manifests in adults as a developed capacity that traps and obsesses

them. For example, it occurs as the religious belief that one has an eternal soul.

The Abhidharmakosa V, 19 (cited in Waldron 2003, 118) distinguishes an innate

view that there is a permanent self (sahaja satkayad_r_s_ti), said to exist even in

non-human animals, from a deliberated (vikalpita) view that humans hold

when they make explicit, articulate and elaborate the innate view. In Tibetan

Buddhism, Tsong kha pa (see Napper 1987, 84–7) and his disciple mKhas grub rje

(see Cabezon 1992, 128 –35) mirror the Abhidharmakosa by distinguishing the

innate or inborn (lhan skyes) misconception, which exists in all sentient beings,

from philosophical (kun brtags) misconceptions, which are an expression and

elaboration of the innate misconception. These Buddhists clearly think there is

a deep-rooted and misguided proclivity to accept the permanence of the self.

They claim that it exists in us whether or not we are aware of it, and it is extremely

difficult to eradicate. Indeed, mKhas grub rje claims that refuting philosophical

misconceptions is preliminary and relatively superficial; this can be merely

a stepping-stone to the removal of the innate misconception. Fundamentally, it is

the innate misconception, although often not articulated and unconscious, that

influences behaviour; it fuels the selfish desire and attachment that causes

suffering and continued rebirth.

But why does this disposition exist? The common Buddhist answer is that all

of the dispositions, both emotional and cognitive, are karmic formations

(sankhara, samskara) that exist as innate personality traits and are psychological

tendencies that occur as consequences of actions in previous lives. There is no soul

that is reborn, but the process of physical and mental events that is the present life

contains relatively stable affective and cognitive proclivities that are passed on

from past lives. However, this is obviously question begging, as an explanation

needs to be given for the existence of the latent dispositions in previous

existences. Indeed, the Buddhists’ position appears to entail an infinite regress,

UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY 121

Page 6: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

for they contend that there is no traceable beginning to the latent disposition that

causes wrong views. It is a result of beginningless ignorance.

Evidently, this Buddhist explanation, or non-explanation, relies on the

questionable notion of rebirth. Nevertheless, the theory that there are such

unconscious proclivities that influence our thoughts and actions might be true,

even if we doubt the Buddhist account of their origins. Faced with the lack of

epistemic warrant for a belief in rebirth, and a considerable body of evidence from

biology, psychology and the social sciences, we might seek to explain the mind’s

unconscious cognitive impulses to be the result of genetic or early environmental

factors, or, most probably, a combination of both. Perhaps the tendency to believe

in a permanent self and so forth is a result of a physiologically based urge for self-

preservation. We do not wish to die and we desire to carry on living, so we tend

to believe in our own immortality as a kind of wish-fulfilment. In addition,

the inclination to accept such beliefs is doubtlessly a result, in part at least, of the

child’s exposure to them via the religious views of his or her family and the wider

society.

However, are these beliefs really, as the Buddhists claim, a purely imaginative

projection that results from human insecurity and unrealisable desires for eternal

life? There seems to be little doubt that such religious convictions are rooted to

some extent, perhaps to a great degree, in a longing for immortality. Surely

some wishes can come true, however, and explaining the origin of the belief as

a psychological need for permanence does not prove that an eternal soul does not

exist. Have not the Buddhists here committed a form of the genetic fallacy?

That is, are they not making the mistake of dismissing the truth of this belief

because it originates in a human need? It might be that we tend to wish for

permanence and that our wishes are in accordance with reality. In other words, we

might doubt the Buddhist contention that the belief that there is a permanent self is

definitely a wrong view.

Of course, this distinctive Buddhist claim arose originally in opposition to

the belief in Hinduism and Jainism that there is an eternal atman or jıva that

underlies the changing personality. The Buddhists are famous for analysing the

personality into its constituent elements, pointing out that there is no element

that can be observed that is permanent; the body and mental states are in a state

of flux. In a famous analogy from the Milindapanha 25–8 (Horner 1990, 34–8), the

self is likened to a chariot that is made up of destructible parts. There is no

separate, independent and permanent chariot-entity; ‘chariot’ is simply a name

attributed to the parts when they are appropriately organised. In a similar fashion,

the self is simply a label attributed to a conglomeration of physical and mental

processes, because there is no independent, permanent self-entity that can be

perceived in addition to these processes.

It might seem that the Buddhists are arguing that something must be

observable in order to exist; this is of course an assumption that proponents of an

eternal soul need not share. It is not apparent why one should accept the Buddhist

claim. Indeed, it can be objected that there is no observable evidence that could

122 D. BURTON

Page 7: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

conceivably prove that unobservable entities such as an eternal soul do not exist.

Surely the Buddhist insistence that there is no permanent self is unproved and

possibly unprovable. Therefore, it seems that the Buddhist commitment to the

non-existence of an eternal self is an article of faith like their opponents’ belief

to the contrary.

However, the Buddhists can reply that it is not that the inability to observe

the eternal self establishes its non-existence; after all, many Buddhists themselves

accept the existence of unobservable entities—namely, the microscopic, atomic

dharmas—which they infer must exist as the building blocks for everyday

perceivable things. Rather, the objection to the existence of an eternal self is that

it is an unnecessary postulate; everything about the physical and mental processes

that constitute our personalities can be explained satisfactorily without resorting

to a mysterious soul, which acts as a ghost in the machine somehow lying behind

these processes. Understood in this way, the Buddhist rejection of the eternal self

employs what is known in Western philosophy as Ockham’s razor or the principle

of parsimony; explanations should be as simple and economical as possible, and

no more assumptions should be accepted in an explanation than those that are

absolutely necessary.

Proponents of a self will object that a stable locus of identity is required for

the ever-changing mental and physical processes that one experiences.

Experiences require an experiencer who persists throughout the processes and

whose processes they are. Given the Buddhist belief in a beginningless and, short

of Awakening (bodhi), endless series of rebirths, this persisting self must be

permanent.

Furthermore, it is arguable that the Buddhists should accept that, in so far as

the mental and physical process that is the present person can be traced back

endlessly into past lives, and will continue forever in the future if Awakening is not

attained, it is permanent even if is not unchanging. The stream of causally

connected events flows on and alters over time, but it is nevertheless always the

same stream, in so far as the Buddhists think that its present form is continuous

with its previous and future manifestations. In addition, is it not the case that

dispositions such as the tendency to accept a permanent self and to crave are

everlasting, in that they have no beginning and, if Awakening is not achieved, no

end? Does not this entail that the stream has certain features that not only persist

but also have been present forever and can remain in perpetuity? Of course, the

Buddhists will claim that here we are beguiled by language; we should not reify

a process, for it is nothing other than the numerous transitory events that make

it up. And what we call dispositions to ignorance and craving are not permanent

entities that remain embedded in the mind until Awakening; in reality, they

are simply a series of unconscious, impermanent events. Rather than a single

disposition persisting at t1, t2, and so forth, there is a disposition event at t1,

followed by a new if very similar disposition event at t2, and so forth.

This process ontology has radical implications, for it entails that the world

of things is not really as it appears to be. For the Buddhists, everyday objects, such

UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY 123

Page 8: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

as mountains, trees, houses, selves, and so on, are only conventional; that is, they

only exist relative to our perceptual apparatus and the interpreting mind with its

concepts and labels that it uses to shape its world of experience. They are

convenient designations or a pragmatic shorthand for what are actually complex

webs of events. Furthermore, the Buddhists claim that we are largely unaware

of the mind-dependent nature of the things we perceive. We are often tricked by

language into thinking that the named objects exist when, in reality, they are no

more than names attributed to their parts. We are easily misled by appearances

because we are naive realists by nature. We accept the world as mind-

independent even if, for the most part, we hold this view without our being aware

that we do so, let alone being aware that it is mistaken! In other words, we have

not only the disposition to believe in a permanent self; we also possess the largely

unconscious and, according to the Buddhists, erroneous tendency to regard the

merely conventional world of named entities as real.

Beliefs as post-conscious

Everitt and Fisher identify a second type of unconscious beliefs; namely, any

belief of which one is not presently thinking but of which one has thought at least

once in the past. These beliefs might also be called post-conscious, as their defining

feature is that they have been, but are no longer, present to consciousness.

Everitt and Fisher notice that there are many such beliefs. Take, for instance,

my beliefs that ‘Paris is the capital city of France’ and that ‘2 þ 2 ¼ 4’. These are

beliefs I hold and that I have held consciously, for example, when I learned these

propositions in school. However, I rarely think about these beliefs. I certainly am

not continuously rehearsing them in my mind. Most of the time, they are

unconscious beliefs; that is, beliefs about which I am not thinking. I can and do,

when required, bring these beliefs to consciousness, and this is the proof that I do

indeed have them. At any particular time most of one’s previously consciously

held beliefs will be below the threshold of consciousness, so to speak, in this way.

One is explicitly thinking about only a minute amount of what one has consciously

believed at some point. Indeed, there are occasions, such as deep sleep, when

everything one has consciously believed is unconscious. Note, however, that it is

not that such unconscious beliefs have been forgotten. They are still available

to consciousness when required and retrievable, sometimes with and sometimes

without effort. It is just that they are not presently objects of consciousness.

Some of our competence knowledge is like this. Admittedly, some ‘knowing

how’ does not seem to be reliant on ‘knowing that’ at all. An animal’s instinctual

competence knowledge is a case in point; a bird’s ability to fly is not dependent

on any knowledge of facts about the flying process. Similarly, we learn our native

language without propositional knowledge of many, or even any, of the

grammatical rules. And we learn to use many implements, such as doors and stairs,

without ever having formulated any propositions about how to open and

close doors, ascend and descend stairs, and so forth. However, other cases

124 D. BURTON

Page 9: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

of competence knowledge seem to be different; they depend on some, and

sometimes a large amount of, initial propositional knowledge, on which one

becomes decreasingly reliant as one’s ability increases. For instance, in learning to

play the piano I might need, in the beginning, to think very actively about the

techniques that will enable me to be successful in perfecting the skill. However,

as I become more adept, the need to hold this information in my consciousness

diminishes. With sufficient practice, I rarely if ever need to bring it to mind. I master

the skill, and it becomes second nature or habitual.

People hardly notice many of their beliefs. For instance, I may glance out of

the window and perceive a tree with green leaves, swaying in the wind and with

a blackbird perched on one of its branches. Suppose that I form the belief that

there is a tree with green leaves, swaying with the wind and with a blackbird

perched on one of its branches. Very soon, my mind moves on to other matters.

It would be unusual for me to stop and think about the belief I have formed; that

is, to hold it in my mind and give it some consideration.

How might this species of unconscious beliefs be applied to Buddhism?

The Buddhists recognise that many people—in particular, but not exclusively,

those who have accepted the tenets of Buddhism—do accept that there is no

permanent self. However, in most cases such people are unconscious of this belief

in the sense that they rarely think about it. In other words, their belief is something

they have thought about from time to time perhaps, but they do not bring it to

mind often or often enough. They believe that they and other things are

impermanent, but, according to Buddhism, they do not take enough notice of this

belief. They are insufficiently attentive to what they believe. This is important

because, according to Buddhist psychology, being inattentive to transitoriness

leads to inappropriate and ultimately painful emotional responses of selfishness

and attachment. Failing to attend to their impermanence, we tend to cling to

things, forgetful of the futility of and eventual disappointment inherent in such an

attitude.

Thus, Buddhism promotes the value of attentiveness to impermanence.

The Theravada tradition calls it ‘mindfulness’ (sati) and thorough or wise attention

(yoniso manasikara). Commenting on the idea of yoniso manasikara as it occurs at

Majjhima Nikaya 1, 7, Bhikkhu Bodhi (Na_namoli and Bodhi 1995, 1169) writes that:

‘Wise attention (yoniso manasikara) is glossed as attention that is the right means

(upaya), on the right track ( patha). It is explained as mental advertence,

consideration, or preoccupation that accords with the truth, namely, attention to

the impermanent as impermanent, etc.’ The Satipa_t_tanasutta, ‘The Discourse on

the Foundations of Mindfulness’, teaches the Buddhist monk to develop this

mindfulness in all of his activities and with respect to all of his feelings, thoughts

and bodily functions. The monk is encouraged to be attentive to the transitory

nature of his body and mind as transitory physical and psychological processes.

The Abhidhammattasangaha lists sati as one of the universal beautiful mental

factors (sobhanacetasika), present in all wholesome of skilful (kusala) states of

consciousness, and characterised by ‘not wobbling, i.e. not floating away from its

UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY 125

Page 10: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

object’ (see Bodhi 1993, 86). In the Tibetan tradition, Tsong kha pa’s Lam Rim Chen

Mo identifies mindfulness (dran pa) of death as a key spiritual practice. He extols

the virtue of persistent reflection on the certainty of death, the contemplation that

our lifespan is always brief and constantly diminishing, and that life is precarious,

so that the time and cause of our impending death is uncertain (see Cutler and

Newland 2000, 143 –60).

Clearly, the fundamental point here is that a life lived with awareness of its

brevity and fragility is preferable to one that overlooks this truth. It is worth noting,

however, that the practical ramifications of such attentiveness to impermanence

are debatable. For instance, persistent awareness of transitoriness could lead one

to devalue the things of this world, consistent with a path of renunciation and

asceticism. The Buddhist tradition, dominated as it has been by monasticism,

often appears to favour this attitude. Alternatively, a life lived with mindfulness

of the ephemeral nature of things is compatible with a more world-affirming view,

where one seeks to appreciate and enjoy, without grasping and attachment, the

fleeting beauty of things of this world, a beauty that is perhaps enhanced by its

fragile transiency. Perhaps we find evidence of this attitude in the Buddhist

tradition in, for example, the Zen visual arts and poetry, which often appear to

celebrate the aesthetic pleasure derived from the natural world.

Beliefs as repressed

Everitt and Fisher (1995, 54– 5) identify a third form of unconscious belief.

It is arguable, they say, that there are beliefs that one has never consciously held

and that one would fail to recognise as one’s beliefs, even if it were suggested that

one does hold the beliefs in question. People would hold such beliefs without

being able to admit to themselves that this is the case. They would deny that they

hold these beliefs, and yet hold them they do. Everitt and Fisher give the example

of beliefs that have strong and unpleasant emotional significance, such as the

belief that ‘my father hates me’. Some people who hold this belief might not be

able to ‘face up’ to it. Their belief might remain hidden from their consciousness.

They would not believe that they have this belief! Such a belief is repressed and

involves self-deception.

This notion of the repressed belief is, I think, useful as an explanatory

device for Buddhism. It can be claimed that people repress their awareness

of impermanence because it is an emotionally uncomfortable belief. They choose

to evade the transitoriness that is evident in all experienced things. Some people

go so far as to deny to themselves that they believe that things are impermanent,

adhering to consoling religious doctrines of an eternal soul and so forth.

And, granted the Buddhist claim that there is a latent proclivity to accept that

there is a permanent self, it is all too easy to take refuge in such beliefs.

There is a strong similarity here with Martin Heidegger’s (1962, 279– 311)

claim in Being and Time that, for the most part, people live in an inauthentic

relationship with the prospect of their own inevitable death. Dasein, in its

126 D. BURTON

Page 11: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

everyday fallen state, flees in the face of death. Awareness of our own finitude,

Heidegger claims, causes us anxiety, and thus we seek a state of tranquillisation

in which reality is avoided rather than faced. Forgetful of our mortality, we are

alienated from the prospect of death. Heidegger also recognises that our

inauthenticity supports and is supported by that of other people; it is as though

there is a group conspiracy, which Heidegger calls ‘the they’ (das man), to evade

the disturbing, personal reality that each of us must die. We try to cocoon

ourselves from reality by avoiding discussion of death, or talking about it in

a banal, impersonal way, without really taking it seriously as something that will

happen to us, or we collectively resort to a comforting belief in an afterlife and

eternal soul.

So too, for Buddhism, human beings attempt to distract themselves from

the disturbing reality of their own finitude and that of the things to which and

people to whom they are attached. Presumably, this tendency to evade the

painful truth explains why it is so difficult for us to remain mindful of transitoriness.

Our desires and emotions have a strong influence on the beliefs that we allow

ourselves consciously to entertain. As we have already seen, Buddhists are well

aware that the dispositions that inform our personalities are as much emotional,

and volitional, as cognitive. Hence, there are latent tendencies not only for wrong

views, but also for selfish desire, conceit, anger, and so forth. In particular, we have

a tendency to crave our own continued existence and sensual experiences of

various kinds. Indeed, it seems difficult to dispute the Buddhist claim that we have

this psychological proclivity, supported as it is by so much evidence. Generally, we

do desire pleasant sensual experiences and we often fear death. Now, if one

experiences craving for one’s own continued existence and craving for sensed

objects, then one’s awareness of the evanescent nature of oneself and the objects

of one’s craving is liable to be unpalatable and will thus tend to be repressed.

Desires and fears can cloud the mind, allowing it to overlook distressing truths and

to fabricate pleasing fictions.

A curious implication is that one can have contradictory unconscious beliefs

at the same time, in the sense that one might have a disposition to believe that

things are permanent, while also repressing one’s contradictory belief that things

are impermanent. Indeed, there is surely a strong relationship between the

disposition and the repression; because we are inclined to believe in permanence,

we find our awareness of impermanence unpleasant and seek to forget it.

Obviously, the theory of repressed beliefs has been developed and

popularised by Freud. It has not been without its critics, however. For instance,

Jean-Paul Sartre (1956, 86–96) argues that, contrary to Freud’s theory, one’s mind

does not have hidden recesses containing repressed beliefs and emotions of

which one is unaware. This is because, according to Sartre, the act of repression

entails that consciousness, as the repressor, is aware of what it is repressing.

The Freudian appeal to unconscious motivations is thus a species of what Sartre

calls ‘bad faith’ (mauvaise foi); an attempt to explain our behaviour by reference to

deterministic causes over which we do not have control and which influence

UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY 127

Page 12: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

us without our consent. For Sartre, the self-deception here is that we pretend to

ourselves that we are unaware of our beliefs, emotions and desires as a way

to renege on our responsibility for them, for how can we be responsible for that of

which we are unaware? This is, Sartre claims, an illegitimate attempt to attribute

the opacity and causally determined nature of being-in-itself (etre-en-soi) to the

transparent, free and responsible existence of being-for-itself (etre-pour-soi).

If Sartre is right, Descartes was not so misguided after all, despite White’s

protestations to the contrary!

However, perhaps the Buddhist concept of the unconscious is not open to

Sartre’s charge of bad faith. While Buddhism often accepts that we have

dispositions to wrong views, to craving, hatred, and so forth, it claims that we are

able to become aware of and overcome these dispositions. After all, this is the

ultimate aim of Buddhist ethical and meditative practices. Although these

dispositions are part of the facticity with which we are confronted, we are not

inexorably determined by them—they can be weakened, and the final goal is to

eradicate them once and for all. In addition, while Buddhism acknowledges that

we tend to be unmindful of impermanence and seems to maintain that we repress

our awareness of it, this does not entail that, for Buddhism, we are unaware that

we have repressed this information. As Matilal (1986, 148–53) has shown, some

Buddhist philosophers, notably Dignaga and Dharmakırti, uphold the reflexive

nature of awareness (svasa_

mvedana); to be aware of an object or proposition is

always and necessarily to be aware that one is aware. Their claim that

consciousness is self-luminous is strikingly similar to the position of Descartes and

Sartre and would seem to entail that, if consciousness represses its awareness of

impermanence, it must be aware that it does so. Furthermore, Buddism often

claims that we have the capacity to transcend this unmindfulness and repression;

we can conduct our lives with attentiveness to the transitory nature of others and

ourselves.

It is here, I think, that a real problem with the Buddhist analysis emerges.

For Buddhism can be accused of optimism unwarranted by the evidence.

Can dispositions to ignorance and selfish desire really be overcome? Can the

human mind really achieve the consistent mindfulness of impermanence that

Buddhism advocates? Do not human beings need to take refuge in inauthentic

attitudes to death in order to make life bearable? Is not the Buddhist sanguinity

rooted in an unrealistic view that our basic selfishness and inability to come to

terms with impermanence can be transcended? Perhaps the dream of authenticity

and faultlessness represented by Awakening is unrealisable because it contradicts

human nature. Admittedly, Buddhism often acknowledges the difficulty of the

task, claiming that Awakening is a rare occurrence only achieved with great effort.

However, the suspicion remains that it might more accurately be described as

impossible. Buddhists might accuse those who advocate belief in a God and/or

eternal soul as guilty of wish-fulfilment, but it seems reasonable to wonder

whether the Buddhist ideal of Awakening is itself nothing more than a fantasy

originating in a quixotic urge for an impossible perfection. But perhaps this

128 D. BURTON

Page 13: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

is rather hard on the Buddhists; after all, it is conceivable that the perfection they

seek is indeed possible. Perhaps human nature is more pliable than my scepticism

suggests. Furthermore, it might be that, even if Awakening cannot be attained,

it serves an important pragmatic function as an ideal, establishing standards of

wisdom and compassion that, even if unrealisable, can at least be approximated

by fallible human beings whose imaginations and actions are stimulated by it.

Are there really unconscious beliefs?

I have argued that Everitt and Fisher’s taxonomy can be fruitfully applied to

Buddhism. Many Buddhists would accept that there are dispositions to ignorance

that one has without being conscious of them, that one can be unmindful and

hence unconscious of impermanence, and, furthermore, that one can repress

one’s awareness of transitoriness.

Of course, it is debatable whether are Fisher and Everitt are right to claim

that beliefs can be unconscious. Everitt and Fisher have arguably over-extended

the use of the term ‘belief’. Contrary to their analysis, it might be that propositions

that we would be inclined to accept if they were brought to attention, statements

that we have thought about but to which we are not presently attending,

and information which we have actively repressed, are only believed when we

do bring them to mind. Prior to this awareness, there is no belief. We should

distinguish a mere disposition to believe that p from an actual belief that p. In this

case, a proposition of which we have never been conscious but which we would

be inclined to accept if it were brought to our attention is not a belief. It only

becomes a belief if and when we think of it. Nor is a repressed belief really a belief

at all; rather, it is a proposition that one refuses to believe. A belief that one has

thought about but of which one is not presently conscious is not actually a belief

either; it is simply information, once believed, that becomes one’s belief again

whenever one attends to it. According to this view, to hold a belief requires

current awareness of the belief one holds. Everitt and Fisher’s taxonomy, as

applied to Buddhism, seems successful in showing three distinct notions of the

unconscious; that is, unconscious dispositions, propositions of which one is

unmindful and propositions that one has repressed. However, it is a moot point

whether these are forms of unconscious belief.

REFERENCES

BLAKEMORE EVANS, G. (ed). 1974. The Riverside Shakespeare. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin

Company.

BODHI, BH. (ed). 1993. A Comprehensive Manual of Abhidhamma. The Abhidhammattha

Sangaha. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society.

CABEZON, J. I. (trans). 1992. A Dose of Emptiness. An Annotated Translation of the sTong

thun chen mo of mKhas grub dGe legs dpal bzang. Albany, NY: State University

of New York Press.

UNCONSCIOUS BELIEFS IN BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY 129

Page 14: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective

CUTLER, J. W. C. and NEWLAND, G. (eds). 2000. The Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to

Enlightenment. Lam Rim Chen Mo. Volume 1. New York: Snow Lion Publications.

DE SILVA, P. 2000. An Introduction to Buddhist Psychology. 3rd edn. Houndmills:

Macmillan.

EVERITT, N. and FISHER, A. 1995. Modern Epistemology. A New Introduction. New York:

McGraw-Hill.

FREUD, S. 1971. New Introductory Lectures in Psychoanalysis. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

HEIDEGGER, M. 1962. In J. Macquarrie and E. Robinson (trans), Being and Time. New York:

Harper and Row.

HORNER, I. B. (trans). 1990. Milinda’s Questions. Oxford: Pali Text Society.

JUNG, C. G. 1953. In R.F.C. Hull (trans), Two Essays on Analytical Psychology. London:

Routledge.

MATILAL, B. K. 1986. Perception. An Essay on Classical Indian Theories of Knowledge.

Oxford: Oxford University Press.

MOSER, P. K., MULDER, D. H. and TROUT, J. D. 1998. The Theory of Knowledge. A Thematic

Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

NA_NAMOLI, BH. and BODHI, BH. (trans). 1995. The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha.

A New Translation of the Majjhima Nikaya. Boston: Wisdom.

NAPPER, E. 1987. Dependent Arising and Emptiness. A Tibetan Buddhist Interpretation of

Madhyamika Philosophy Emphasizing the Compatibility of Emptiness and

Conventional Phenomena. Boston, MA: Wisdom.

PALMER, M. 1997. Freud and Jung on Religion. London: Routledge.

RHYS DAVIDS, T. W. and STEDE, W. 1995. The Pali Text Society’s Pali – English Dictionary.

Oxford: Pali Text Society.

SARTRE, J. P. 1956. In Hazel. E. Barnes (trans), Being and Nothingness. New York:

Washington Square Press.

SCHMITHAUSEN, L. 1987. Alayavijnana. Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist.

WALDRON, W. S. 2003. The Buddhist Unconscious. The alaya-vijnana in the Context of Indian

Buddhist Thought. London: Routledge Curzon.

WHYTE, L. L. 1960. The Unconscious Before Freud. London: Basic Books.

David Burton, Canterbury Christ Church University, Canterbury, Kent, CT1 1Qu

UK. E-mail: [email protected]

130 D. BURTON

Page 15: Unconscious Beliefs in Buddhist Philosophy - a Comparative Perspective