Scientists Seminar 1, Brockwood Park, 8 June 1984
Questioner: Some of the unresolved questions in the area of brain research lie in perception, memory and the nature of intelligence. You, Krishnamurti, have explored these questions without any scientific background and yet have indicated that thought is limited. You have also indicated that there is an intelligence beyond the ordinary functioning of the brain. As long as there is psychological conditioning, which is the self, this intelligence cannot act.
I would like to introduce you to Dr Shainberg, he’s a psychiatrist from the United States. Dr Peat is a physicist, writer and film maker from Canada. Professor Bergstrom is a neuro-physiologist at the University of Helsinki, Finland. Professor Varela is a neuro-biologist at the Max Planck Institute for brain research in Frankfurt. I am a neuro-biologist and teacher at Brockwood Park.
One important instrument in the understanding of the brain has been thought. I was wondering if we could discuss whether thought can help us to understand the brain, and the complexity of life.
Krishnamurti: Do I start right off?
Q: If you wish.
K: Sir, can one understand one’s own brain and the activities and the complexity of the brain without operating on animals, dead bodies and so on? Can one observe the very complex structure and nature of the brain in oneself, rather than seek it externally, outside? Is that possible? I feel it is possible if one can watch very carefully, objectively, without any bias, the reactions, the biological responses and the inward urges and temperaments and idiosyncrasies, the whole complexity of human existence.
To approach this very, very complex problem, if one has a complex mind, then it’s not possible to understand complexity, but if one can approach it very simply. I mean by simplicity, without compulsion, without will, without a direction, motive; just to watch the whole operation of one’s own activities and so on, and then I think it’s possible to examine or to observe the activity of one’s own brain without seeking it externally.
David Shainberg: What do you mean by understand?
K: By observing – I don’t mean understand – by watching very carefully the complexity of oneself: what is the operation of thought; how thought arises; what is the cause of… the origin of thought and the activities both externally, technologically, the moment of thought and the limitation of thought?
Questioner: When you say that is it possible to understand the brain, do you mean only thought and psychological reaction or do you mean things like the fact that I can see the glass? Perception, do you mean perception as well?
K: Yes, perception, surely.
Q: And the use of language?
K: Surely. Linguistic, all that. The whole complexity of human endeavours, action and feelings… all the imagination, the whole content of all that.
Q: And learning.
K: Watch it.
Q: Watching and being able to learn something new. Being able to learn and work in a totally new situation.
K: Would you call it learning? What is there to learn by just watching?
Q: Well, that seems to me precisely where there seems to be a fundamental distinction between merely observing – or not merely – observing, completely observing…
K: Yes, without the *me*.
Q: …without the *me…*
K: Yes.
Q: … and a notion of creating a way of understanding how that observation comes to be, which is traditionally what Western thinking has done, including science, creating what one can call a model, a process, a theory, a law, whatever. Now, would that endeavour be out in the approach you are proposing?
K: I don’t quite understand ‘out’; what do you mean?
Q: Would not be pursued; would be left behind. That actually coming up with a theory or a model that would explain how does it come that we see what we see.
K: Ah, wait a minute, sir. Theory or model. Is it necessary to have a theory and model to see what is actually going on?
Q: I wouldn’t say it is necessary to see what is going on, but it seems to be necessary, as far as I can understand it, to understand why do I see what I see. If one has the inclination of asking the question beyond the seeing, why do I see what I see.
K: Why do you see what you see; why do I feel what I feel.
Q: Yes, why do I see blue when I see blue. Very simple questions like that, which are the ones that I have been concerned with as well.
K: Yes, I understand. Is it we have all called that book, ‘book’?
Q: Right.
K: And I accept that; we accept it, all of us: that thing is called a book, and that thing is called a table. But the computer can’t call it a table immediately.
Q: But then you can ask yourself a question why the computer can’t and we can. How are we made different?
K: Because we have got the capacity to see anything, four legs, or two legs, or one leg, a table, instantly.
DS: Yes, but what is that capacity?
Q: This is the point.
DS: You see, what is the capacity to do it, and then what is the relationship of that capacity to… in other words, what is the relationship of your capacity to say, ‘That’s a book’, to your capacity to say, ‘It’s a table’ or to your capacity to see it’s a table?
Q: Well, perhaps I think we should go to the very beginning question.
K: Slowly; slowly, you mean.
Q: You introduced the question of observation somehow, which was different from theorising about something and I think perhaps it would be good to start clarifying what do we mean by observing something.
K: Shall we do that, sir?
Q: I felt that he clarified it very well. I felt that I understood what he meant by observing. I don’t feel…
Q: What did he… will you tell me what you think he meant?
Q: All right, I’ll try (laughs). I think he meant by observing completely bracketing a preassumed understanding and going into a mode of not being self-centred but of being with the object or with the movement without any precondition. To the extent that that is possible then there is an experience, there is an observation.
K: So, sir, does that imply to observe there must be no conditioning?
Q: Yes.
K: Yes, that’s… let’s start.
Q: I think I understand that.
Q: We have to go slowly here because somehow you mentioned you see an observation without the *me*.
K: Yes.
Q: It doesn’t seem for me so clear, that, because whenever I am looking at something there seems to be the separation between my observing of something and there seems to be this division in the brain.
K: Is that our conditioning?
Q: It seems to be one of them. Why is that?
K: There is a see-er and the seen.
Q: Yes.
K: The observer and the observed; the thinker and the thought; the experiencer and the experienced.
DS: Well, turning it the other way, though, from what Professor Varela was saying, I would like to know what you think the relationship is between the theory and observation?
Q: Well this is precisely where I wanted him to… (inaudible).
K: I don’t think there is any theory.
Q: Well, all right. Well, I mean, you accept therefore that the endeavour you are proposing would be a radical departure from what has been all of the models of knowledge… (inaudible).
K: Yes sir; yes sir; yes sir. If I’m… I may be wrong.
Q: No, no, but this would not have… (inaudible).
K: But in observing why should I have a theory about it?
Q: Well, it seems to me that… let me… can I try just… (inaudible)?
K: Yes sir, please.
Q: Okay. When I look at that question it feels that there is something inside me that by itself is inquisitive about why is it, how come this is the way it is. Isn’t it interesting that the paper is white and book is blue, isn’t that interesting; why isn’t it red?
K: Oh, there is a red book there.
Q: Yes, but why is that red and not this one red?
K: Ah, ah, because we have called that red.
Q: Yes, but why have we called that red? What is the process from through that comes about?
K: Ah, ah, what is the process.
Q: That is the natural inquisitiveness that leads one into building this sort of theories…
Q: Yes sir, I understand.
Q: … which eventually, for example, might allow me to build a machine – right? – which would have a mind, with big quotation minds of thoughts…
K: Like a computer.
Q: Yes; which could say, ‘Oh, that is a red book and that is a blue book’, just at the same time when I would say it.
K: Yes.
Q: I would consider that interesting. That’s what interests me in science.
K: No, that’s not very interesting, though.
Q: No?
K: Go on, sir… (inaudible).
(Laughter)
Q: I find it interesting.
K: All right, go ahead, sir. I thought you said that was not very interesting.
Q: No, no, I find it interesting and that’s why I said when you asked do we need a theory at all, I said not really, but there is this inquisitiveness that seems to constantly come up of asking the question of how is it like that, how can we understand that, how can we have an image, a representation of the process where that… (inaudible)?
DS: (Inaudible)… I don’t think you are saying enough. Now, I wish you would say more about what… it’s not just that the theory is good because you’re inquisitive but the theory also functions to establish for you and for me the interrelationship between these issues, therefore you’re not just looking… because this ultimately will come down to our question, what is the relationship of theory to observation, but your theory function is a way to help you to distinguish red, white and blue and why you’re seeing it, and therefore you have an interdigitation of many different aspects of your curiosity.
Many: (Inaudible).
Q: (Inaudible)… we’re talking about perception and it’s not clear we were talking about perception as psychological perception. But if we just ask how you see the glass and Krishnamurti has said that it’s possible to explore the whole mechanism of seeing the glass of water by… one can observe oneself doing it you know. I think…
K: That’s my…
Q: All neuro-scientists would say that that’s nonsense, that can’t be possibly be true. There must be many levels of operation which are purely mechanical, which we can never can have any direct experience of, at the level of the eye and the optic nerve. And Krishnamurti seems to be saying something different but I’m not sure if I understand that he’s saying something much more radical than that. Is it possible to be aware of every level of the process?
Q: There are two… coming back to the original question about the brain, understanding the brain as such, or dissecting it and so on. So if we see from the point of view of neurophysiology and brain research and so on, so there exists as a matter of fact two kinds of brains. The whole brain… (inaudible) I am seeing red or blue and so on, but then the other brain is the brain which consists of its parts, the cells, synapses, molecules and so on. And the physiologist looks, and there comes the theory in – isn’t that so? – experimenting, dissecting, theorising and so on, looks at the brain which consists of the parts, it’s an assembly of fragments. And then the other way — and now I’m coming to the original question — the other way we have to face as physiologists also, that brain which perceives, which is only one me or whatever the individual calls itself, and that’s another way. I always think that we have to distinguish between those two. And the first would be the theoretical brain with fragments, parts and so on, and the other would be the human brain.
K: Sir…
Q: And therefore I answer Krishnamurti’s question that I think we can really know about brain without dissecting it.
Q: That we cannot?
Q: That we can study the brain as a whole; that we do…
K: Why do we divide the brain at all?
Q: Yes, that’s the question.
K: Why not treat it as a whole movement of it?
Q: I don’t have anything against that. That doesn’t resolve the issue of whether we need a theory for the observation.
K: No, wait sir… Yes; I know.
Q: Because I can have a theory which is a holistic theory, which deals with the brain as a totality.
K: Not a holistic theory, but it is so.
Q: Yes…
Q: But I think the theory comes into being in order to organise the certain facts that you have. You have to give a certain… (inaudible) and logic to the facts that you are accumulating. And I think what Professor Varela said is something very interesting, because you take, for example, a child. From the very beginning it seems this natural tendency to discover things, you know, and to attribute meaning to things.
Q: But a theory cannot be holistic… (inaudible) always parts, a connection… (inaudible).
Q: Oh, that’s a touchy one. I don’t agree. That would… (inaudible).
K: By collecting all the parts you make the whole?
Q: No, of course not.
K: No.
Q: I agree absolutely but you can… what I mean by holistic theory is a theory that has built in itself the awareness of its fragmentedness.
K: All right; one is aware…
Q: Which is quite a different thing.
K: Can we put it this way: one is aware that we are fragmented human beings. Right?
Q: Yes.
K: Those fragments, we are trying to bring all of them together, and that doesn’t make the whole.
Q: No.
Q: No, it doesn’t.
Q: Absolutely.
K: So…
Q: So how is one to proceed then?
K: You see the obvious.
Q: It doesn’t follow from that.
K: I mean, spokes. You collect all the spokes of a wheel and the spokes don’t make the wheel; you have to put it… Right? I don’t quite see the difficulty in this.
Q: But to put the wheel together you also need some technical knowledge as well as the perception of the whole.
K: Yes, but is that…
Q: And where does the technical knowledge come from?
K: Is that what we are trying to do? Technical knowledge, how to put the brain together?
Q: No, but you say to understand the brain it is not necessary to… the technical knowledge is not really important.
K: No, I didn’t say that, sir.
Q: Oh.
Q: I said can we?
Q: Can we.
Q: Can we, without the dissection, without opening the hood of the car and seeing all the parts inside.
Q: For my part I can say that to me is a fascinating question because there is nothing that I would like more than to be able to ask the questions about how knowledge works, without having to disrupt an animal. It sort of pains my heart that we have to carry on with this knowledge by disrupting life. I don’t like that. As a matter of fact I don’t want to do it anymore.
K: No, sir.
Q: But still the inquisitiveness is there.
K: Now, wait a minute, sir. Where shall we begin? We have put some many things here.
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: There is one reason why we should know a little bit about brain cells and so on, and they are the diseases… (inaudible).
K: Sir…
Q: So that, I think, was the real… one of the reasons why they began to fragmentize this, dissect.
Q: Perhaps we could come back and stick to one question, you know; we said…
K: Yes sir; yes sir, go on.
Q: We started by saying that can the brain understand itself, what does that mean really, and is that possible that thought can understand the brain? I think we should stick to that somehow.
Q: Yes, surely.
K: Would you say, sir, the brain is the centre of thought…
Q: No.
K: Just a minute; just a minute. Let me… Thought, feelings, physical responses, biological responses. And also the brain is the centre of one’s – quote – consciousness, fears, pleasure, anxiety, all that, sorrow, the whole of that consciousness, if you accept that word, is in the brain. It is not out there. Would you…?
Q: I’m afraid I would have to disagree.
K: Oh, delighted!
Q: I don’t think that thought or consciousness is in the brain. That this is precisely one the greatest mistakes…
K: Wait, sir. Thought is outside.
Q: It’s neither outside nor inside, there is a quality of relationship which thought…
K: Yes; wait a minute; so, wait, sir. Then we have to inquire what is thought. Can we begin with that?
Q: All right.
K: Ah, would you…?
Q: Yes, let’s do that.
K: Let’s do that. What is thought? What is thinking?
Q: Do you want… (inaudible)?
K: We… both of us; we are… discussion; discuss.
Q: I would say that thought belongs to a form of action which is related to separating precisely, to separating a unit from its context. That any separation of a unit from its context is a form of cognition or thought…
K: Thought…
Q: … at a fundamental level.
K: Yes sir; what…
Q: Therefore the thought cannot exist without the relationship between that which is distinguished and that which it’s distinguished from.
DS: Wait a second. Would you say… do you thing that thought is an event that arises *de novo,* or is it some sort of process event which articulates the separation and arrives at the… in other words, that the arrival of thought is the articulation of the separation…
Q: No.
Q: … therefore it’s… ?
Q: It’s an emergent quality.
DS: It’s an emergent, so it’s not *de novo* separation; it is an emergent of that.
Q: Yes.
K: Wait; if it’s emerging; it’s emerging…
Q: Yes.
DS : Yes, but emerging not a separation at the instant but is…
Q: …is imminent in the action… (inaudible).
DS: (Inaudible).
K: Is emerging; it’s being born.
Q: Exactly.
DS: But that’s an important distinction.
K: Yes sir. Being born all the time.
Q: Exactly.
K: From where?
Q: What’s the source… (inaudible).
DS: What is the source… (inaudible)?
K: Wait; wait. Right?
Q: Right; the source is…
K: The thought is being born, emerging, growing, coming and going. Right? From where?
DS: Well, wait a minute; that may be the wrong question: from where, because you’ve established… in other words, by saying from where, in a sense you’ve already defined… (inaudible) a definition.
K: No no; I… no…
DS: And you’ve separated out process from… you’ve made a distinction which… by saying ‘where’, you’ve got a definition.
K: No. I want to know what is the cause. Put another word if you like.
DS: You’ve got to have… I’m saying… I would say, would prefer: what’s the action that arrives in thought?
K: Now, wait, sir. What is then, we have to ask what is action?
Q: (Inaudible).
B: (Inaudible)… a movement?
K: Yes, what is this whole movement?
Q: Okay. When I inspect that question for myself, in myself, the only answer I can get to is it’s an unlimited frontier; that is, the moment I am in thought I have obscured for myself that which I’m asking. Therefore the source of movement, or the source of thought is an unlimited space which is beyond thought.
K: Ah… I wonder.
DS: About what? What do you wonder?
K: I… what is the relationship between thought and action? That’s what we are discussing, aren’t we?
Q: Yes, but thought occurs, thought happens.
K: Yes, thought…
Q: I find myself in thought.
DS: Therefore it is action.
K: Sir, you just now said thought is born, comes into being. Right? It must have some causation.
Q: Yes, but in order to see the causation I would have to put myself out from thought.
K: We’ll see. Now, who is… Sir, we have now to inquire whether it’s possible to observe the causation without the observer, who is the outside. Right?
Q: Right.
K: Right, sir?
Q: Right; absolutely. And the question as you phrase it… (inaudible).
K: Wait; wait. So can one observe the cause without the observer?
Q: That’s…
Q: Let him finish… (inaudible).
K: Right? Can the causation be observed without the outsider or the observer, the witnesser? And which means the observer, the person who perceives, is not the observed the observer.?
DS: Say that again.
Q: Yes; please.
Q: Can you say that again?
DS: Say it again, Krishnaji. Come on… (inaudible).
K: I… no, I can’t repeat it. I’ll put it differently…
Q: Put it another way.
K: … another way. There is a perception of you sitting there and I sitting here. When I see you – you have been introduced to me and so on – I remember all that memory of it, he is the observer. Can I look at you without the observer, without the knowledge of you? You understand?
Q: Yes.
K: Of course I can.
Q: I think we have to go slowly there because it’s a great step.
Q: Yes, you can.
K: Of course.
Q: Yes.
K: Therefore the observer is the observed.
Q: Yes.
K: There is no separation. There is separation only when there is the observer different from the observed.
Q: Absolutely.
K: Right?
Q: So that’s an observation.
K: That’s real observation, without the observer.
Q: Yes; correct.
K: The observer is the past, memory, knowledge, experience. All… the observer is the past. Can I look at something without the past? Of course it’s possible.
Q: Yes; yes.
Q: Oh, I don’t know…
K: Just a minute, just… let me finish. And then what is action? You understand?
Q: Yes. What is action for that… (inaudible).
K: What is action? Leave that for the moment.
Q: Okay.
K: What is action? When there is no observer — right? — what is action?
Q: It must be of being together only and nothing else without separation.
Q: Well, I would like to…
K: … come back (laughs).
Q: … if I may, to come back to the question. You see, why are we normally doing this separation, you see, between what we observe – the brain is normally doing that anyhow. So perhaps one could say that it might be normal for the brain whether… (inaudible).
K: That may be our tradition; that may be our education; that may be we have been told from childhood, ‘That is different from you; you are different from me.’
DS: But when you were introduced to him… let’s say when you were introduced to him your perception of him at that instant was the observation without the observer. Then now when you look at him, you’ve got the memory.
K: I begin to… the brain begins to accumulate the knowledge about him.
DS: There is an action.
K: He says he won’t operate anymore, so I say, ‘By Jove, is he…’ – you know? – all the rest of it. So can I… Forget… – no – my point is this, sir, to put it much simpler: not to record. Right?
DS: You did record.
K: I did but that’s a very…
Q: (Inaudible).
DS: You didn’t record, then you did record.
K: No sir. No. Just a minute. In my relationship with you, with you all, I have recorded — suppose I have recorded — then that record becomes the observer; but if there is no record there is only seeing, observing.
DS: But suppose we say that the brain is recording.
K: I see… No, sir; is it possible not to record? I know the mechanism of recording.
Q: Well, you see, but even when…
K: We’re off on something else.
Q: No, I think it’s an interesting point…
Q: (Inaudible)… for a second, it’s just I want to pursue that for one moment. But we have agreed that it is possible to observe without record yet…
K: No… Is that a theory or…?
Q: No.
K: Actuality?
Q: Yes. It is possible.
K: No; moment it’s possible you have made it a theory.
Q: I think we have to agree it’s a theory for us; it’s a theory.
Q: Yes, you see, that’s… (inaudible).
K: I’m..
Q: I don’t think we’re being honest… (inaudible).
K: Of course, sir.
Q: We are just saying yes, but we don’t really believe that.
Q: No… (inaudible).
Q: You see, for example… I don’t know what you would say. I mean, normally, science, you know, there is a person doing science and to a certain extent one could say that this division between the observer and the observed is necessary to a certain extent. Right? When you are dealing with some experiment or with the outside world. Right? So now it doesn’t necessarily follow that psychologically, you see, we are doing exactly the same.
K: I understand, sir. After all, as a human being we’re the result of fifty thousand years — right? — tremendous accumulation of knowledge, experience, oh… – you follow? – all that… I am that. And that is looking at something else, so separating itself constantly.
Q: Yes, but also, you see, this is precisely the point that that separation has to be sustained by an ongoing process which has constant breakdowns, and at the points of those breakdowns there is that closing the gap. So in my perception, for example, of you right now I’m constantly having gaps or flashes of this observer, and he’s like… (inaudible).
K: I say why; why does this…
Q: Well, why is it…
Q: Yes… (inaudible).
K: … contradiction all the time.
Q: No, no, this is precisely the point. Why do we have to see a contradiction there?
K: Yes sir, I can explain it.
Q: It seems that both things… (inaudible).
K: One can explain it.
DS: What did you say? I… What did you say?
Q: No; I was actually going back to something you raised, that it seems that we have both of them, observation with observer and…
K: At one level, yes. If I met you again tomorrow, I can’t re-introduce and say… it would be silly.
Q: Yes.
K: But at that level it’s necessary — right? – but at a deeper level, why should I carry all the memory of meeting you and all the… why should there be a recording of it at all? I meet you – finished.
Q: Yes, so…
Q: Why didn’t you just answer the question by saying that if you did one without the other, if you just met me without accumulation, then tomorrow we would have to go… (inaudible)?
K: Oh no, that would be absurd; that would be insane.
Q: Therefore both of them are necessary.
K: Yes, at one level.
Q: Yes.
DS: I would like to hear you say more about what… I’ve never heard you use those words *level*. What do you mean by levels and what is the relationship between levels and your terms?
K: I think it’s fairly simple.
DS: Well, I’m stupid. I don’t understand.
K: I’m stupid probably.
(Laughter)
Q: That makes two of us… (inaudible).
(Laughter)
K: Sir, I need to know how to write a letter — right? – there knowledge is necessary, drive a car, anything. Physically, to do anything I must have a great deal of information, knowledge and accumulated memory and so on. Right? Psychologically – if you don’t like to use that word – inwardly, I don’t… why should I accumulate? Why should there be accumulation?
Q: Yes, but if I understood well what you were saying, Francisco, and you, even when you say that the brain does not record there is still a process of recognition, you see, which necessarily must involve certain levels of memory.
K: We said that.
Q: Yes.
K: We said that.
Q: So what do you mean by… when the brain does not record?
K: Is that possible, first of all, psychologically not to record? You understand my question?
Q: Yes but…
K: You say something brutal to me; why should I record it? This recording is the self.
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: Suppose I said that to see anything there has to be a great accumulation. You could say there could be no perception without an accumulation and the accumulation includes the actual structure of the brain that’s evolved over millions of years; that is in a sense a form of memory. Matter has formed in certain connections and that is preserved over a very long time. So I could say that there’s no perception without so-called accumulation of memory and knowledge.
K: Of course, sir, we agree; we have stated that.
Q: So without that, without it there is no perception and this is something that always continues. And this is different from… is this different from a psychological recording?
K: That’s what we are asking, sir.
Q: I think that’s an important question to clarify.
K: Sir, we made it clear just now, didn’t we?
Q: Absolutely.
K: That I need knowledge to put… if I’m a carpenter, I need a great deal of knowledge: the quality of the wood, the grain and the instruments and so on and so on and so on. That is necessary. I don’t object to that. That is so, otherwise we can’t live. But at the inward level, inward…
Q: Careful with that…
K: Forget the word; all right, throw the word out. Inwardly.
DS: What is that? What is inward?
K: The feeling, the psyche. You should know; you’re a psychologist… (inaudible).
Q: (Inaudible)… a psychiatrist.
(Laughter)
Q: (Inaudible)… two levels between… a re you pulling the two apart and saying that’s the psychological, that’s the practical?
K: No no.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: I see knowledge is necessary, and also I’m questioning whether inwardly, psychically, psychologically — any word you use — inside the skin as it were, why should there be any recording at all?
Q: Okay, now…
K: Wait; just a minute, sir. This recording inwardly is the divisive process. The divisive process is the self, the *me* and the *not me*, which is creating havoc in the world. Right?
Q: Yes sir.
K: That’s all, and I say…
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Wait a minute; let me finish.
Q: I’m sorry.
K: And i s the mechanism which has gone on for centuries, the *me* and the *not me*, can that mechanism stop, so that there is no *me* inwardly? The *me* being the self and all the rest of it. That’s all. This has been not only a question for the scientists, for the religious people – the serious ones, not the phoney ones – the real religious people have said can there be no self at all, and live in this world, not go off into monasteries or run away to some kind of fanciful entertainment. Actually live without the self. That’s all. Which requires a further statement, which is: is it possible not to record inwardly, psychically, and all that? I say it is possible. You may say, ‘You’re a nut; you are crazy’, but it’s all right, we’ll discuss it.
Q: There is I think a stage in the development of the child, you see, very, very early child; possibly a child can have this.
K: You see it already in the child. Give him a toy and you try to take it, he says, ‘It’s mine’.
Q: Yes, but I think before that stage, a child at one or two years, but then comes that, ‘That’s mine’…
K: Yes; yes; yes.
Q: …but before there is a stage…
K: Before; probably not.
Q: … where I think they live together; they are one with the mother and so on so there might be a…
K: Sir, I believe… I have read somewhere or I’ve been told – I’m not a reader – I’ve been told by scientists who are looking at the babies that the babies already know when a visitor is friendly to the mother or not.
Q: Yes.
K: Already; you understand, sir?
Q: Already.
K: By the atmosphere, by the feeling, by the mother’s shrinking, or seeing the mother…
Q: That’s true.
Q: But in your question, one of the reasons why it has so many sides to it, is that as a brain researcher, as a scientist like… it seems reasonable to say that the brain is organised so as to construct a stable world, therefore to solidify, to be caught, in your words. That’s what it is there for, if you… (inaudible).
K: I understand, sir.
Q: Right. I mean, this is what his history has been; this is what its main… (inaudible) this is as far as I understood. Now, it is only when it comes to human beings where this question is posed, that then we can ask ourselves the question, is this no recording possible, as a swimming against the current of natural history, as it were.
Q: Evolution.
Q: Of evolution. Because natural history goes the other way. And at the moment this possibility arises and then is it possible to unlearn evolutionary wise so as to come to the state of living in the world without recording, without self…
K: Yes sir.
Q: … and yet be a functional human being, able to brush your teeth.
K: Of course. I said that.
Q: Yes, I know. My feeling is that that is a question that can only be answered by exploring it from actual experience of human beings. And the history seems to say, yes, it is possible. We have examples and we know people who seem to have done that. Now, from the point of view of how that what implies for the brain it’s a fascinating point.
K: Sir, therefore… could we put the question differently?
Q: Yes.
K: The brain has evolved through time, centuries, a million years or forty million years, whatever it is, forty thousand. And it has reached, at probably a highest level, as much as it can. And that involves time, duration. What is time? Right? Unless we understand what is time I can go on indefinitely. Right? People have asked too, is there an end to time; not science fiction – actually. Right?
Q: Yes.
K: Now, what is time, apart from the clock? Cut it out. Time is the past and the present and the future. So time is contained in the now, all time. So the future is now.
Q: Yes.
K: Ah, no sir, it’s not a theory.
Q: No, I understand.
K: The future is now and the past is now. Right? Then what is action? If action is, ‘I will do’ – the future, or ‘I have done’, it’s not action. Action is now. The very word *act* means now. Right?
Q: Yes.
K: So can the brain which has evolved — you follow my question? — go on, sir.
Q: Well, the very… the description of saying the brain has evolved is already the trap.
K: We said that; it’s a fact. I’m not denying that. But if there is no radical revolution psychologically, I will tomorrow be… modified, as today.
DS: I’d like to come back to where we were at the very beginning of this because I see a connection here, which is the fact that at the level at which you talked about, the so-called inward level…
K: Leave the word *level;* I said cut it out (laughs).
Q: Inwardly.
DS: …inwardly there is an action. Now, at the beginning we talked about the fact that that inward action, immanent in that inward action is thought, and immanent in that movement of action is thought which separates. Now… (inaudible)…
K: Yes sir.
DS: … that’s where time gets… that’s where… (inaudible).
K: That’s what we have said. Therefore thought… we are saying thought is limited.
DS: Yes, but what I’m trying to get at is the fact that in the inward level – and I’ll keep that word for the minute – out of the inward level comes thought. Now, the question is what is the relationship of that movement, that action to thought?
K: I don’t quite follow this.
DS: In other words, the state of observation without the observer, the action is immanent within a thought.
K: No sir. Sir, the observer is the observed. We agree to that. Right? Right? It’s not a theory.
DS: But immanent in that…
K: Sir, no; just… wait a minute, sir. The observer is the observed. That’s a tremendous fact. It’s not a theory. It changes the whole way of living. There is no division as the observer and the observed, therefore no conflict. Ah, that’s a theory, but to live that way, which means total eradication of conflict, upon which the brain has evolved. You follow?
Q: Yes.
K: So when there is that… observer is the observed and no conflict, there is a radical change in the brain. You follow?
Q: Yes.
K: A whole mutation takes place, if I can use that word.
Q: Yes, but your mutation implies time.
K: Ah, mutation is… no; mutation… biologically as well inwardly there is a radical revolution, because the brain has lived for forty thousand… on conflict.
Q: Now, can I ask you what is the connection now between that possibility…
K: I would not… You see, I wouldn’t use the word *possibility*.
Q: All right. What would you use?
K: When you use the word *possibility*, it means it may be possible.
Q: Yes, okay that actuality.
Q: Means time.
K: Ah, actuality.
Q: Right.
Q: And the question you posed at the beginning: can I observe my brain…
K: Yes.
Q: … without tearing it apart.
K: And without books. All these books.
Q: How do these two things relate because…?
K: Would you state that question again?
Q: Okay. You said at the beginning, ‘I would like to say that I investigate my brain without tearing it apart, by seeing *what is.*’
K: Yes. By seeing exactly *what is.*
Q: *What is*, yes, and now you have also said there is the actuality of the ever-present nowness of the non-distinction where the observer is the observed.
K: Sir, do you realise what that means?
Q: I do and I don’t. It comes and goes.
K: To you it’s a theory.
Q: Some… (inaudible).
K: Forgive me; I’m not being personal. I mean, it’s a theory.
Q: Well. sometimes it’s not.
K: Ah, no; either it is or it’s not.
Q: Well, it comes and goes.
K: Ah no, it can’t.
Q: Why not? It is glimpses which do not persist.
K: Sir, make it simple. When you see something dangerous, it’s finished. You don’t go and say, ‘Well, I’ll go and play with something dangerous’ – it’s over.
Q: No, but you can see the car coming and get out of the way.
K: You do, but you can’t… each time you see a car coming keep out of the way all the time.
Q: No, but, sir, are you telling me that it is not possible to learn by having a glimpse of something? When you have the glimpse you are there, and then something else happens that takes you off; that there is a possibility of building on the continuity of the glimpses.
K: Ah?
Q: Why does it have to be a black and white… (inaudible)?
K: Ah, ah… no, don’t put it that black and white. That means total division.
Q: Well. that’s what I understood… (inaudible).
Q: Well, I think what you are saying is that in one’s lifetime one sees certain things, one discovers something and then becomes again a memory from which one acts.
Q: Which is not the thing itself.
Q: Yes, but I think what you are saying that the moment when you have an insight into that it is obviously not a memory somehow.
Q: It is actuality.
Q: Yes.
Q: But then it becomes memory and then it becomes actuality again… (inaudible).
K: Back and forth; back and forth.
Q: Back and forth.
K: No; no.
Q: How is it then?
K: Sir, look, put it… – I’m not a philosopher or anything, I will put it very simply. I have been going north for the last forty thousand years. You come along and say, look, that goes nowhere; go south, or east, or west. The very movement of going… moving away from north to south, in that second – moving – in that movement the whole brain has… the cells of the brain have changed, because it has been accustomed to going there…
Q: So you are…
K: Keep it simple; keep it simple.
Q: Yes. So you are raising: is that at all the case? Is that available to human beings?
K: Oh yes, if they pay attention.
Q: Yes, but this is precisely my point that in my own experience…
K: They don’t; they don’t.
Q: They don’t; it’s true.
DS: But why don’t they?
K: Oh, because they… sir, that’s simple enough. They have so many interests, so many… they have, first of all that they have to earn a livelihood – not that we don’t have to – they have oh, a dozen problems they have.
DS: But wait a second. You came in and you’ve been introduced to Professor Varela…
Q: Francisco, please.
DS: Francisco; you were introduced to him and…
K: And to you and to him.
DS: Okay, and tomorrow you come along and you say to me, ‘Oh, hello, how are you today?’
K: Yes?
DS: Implying that you remembered.
K: Of course.
DS: So now, what’s the relationship between that and this other?
K: Oh, sir, we’ve made that clear.
DS: No, we haven’t made it because we’re bringing it up here… are you in that state at that moment you… it seems to me you’re not… you’re caught by something else.
K: I recognise, sir, that it is necessary that constant being introduced is silly. I see that’s necessary, but inwardly it is not necessary.
DS: What’s your relationship to me at that moment that you’re recognising me and seeing it’s not necessary?
K: What do you mean? It’s not necessary.
DS: But at that moment where are… what is the state?
K: I don’t quite understand.
DS: In other words, at the moment there is recognition what is the action… is there a state of action without the memory also going on?
K: I don’t quite follow this. What do you mean…?
Q: Well, perhaps what he’s saying, the very fact that you recognise somebody implies memory.
K: Of course; I said that, sir.
DS: But what is the action then at that moment of the memory?
K: What do you mean by action, sir?
DS: Well, are you able… is one able to observe without memory while using memory? While seeing the relevance of memory but not being… (inaudible).
K: I see it is relevant to have memory of a certain kind. Inwardly why should I have the burden of memory? You say something to me flattering, why should I carry that? It’s silly.
Q: So here is our man, walking for forty thousand years to the north, and then you along and say it’s possible to walk south. And for the first time I turn around…
K: At that moment there is…
Q: Yes. But now the observation – the observation; this is not theory – the observation of both the world, the natural world and in myself is that I turn south and then I say, no, I have to go north; and I say, well, maybe I can go south. And there is this kind of process of… until one finds a permanent or reorientation… (inaudible).
K: Now, why? Why? Just…
Q: Why…?
K: I’ll show you in a minute.
Q: Okay.
K: Why do we do this? I have been going north and you come and tell me, look don’t go that way, it’s stupid; go east.
Q: Right.
K: And I’m not quite convinced. You…? I am not quite sure whether you are right because I have been used to going north.
Q: That’s right… (inaudible).
K: Wait; wait; wait. I’ve been used to that, and you say to me go east. I say I wonder if he’s right. Let me look at east… no… There is this attraction to north, which I’ve been going on for forty thousand years and also I listen to you; there is some logic in what you say, reasonable, seems sane, and I turn but the attraction goes on, which means what? I have not really listened to what you have said. Whether you are really serious — you understand? – whether you mean what you say; whether you are… it’s your – not theory – it’s yours – you understand? – in the sense that you have found it. So what you are, the quality of your voice, the quality of your being, says go east. And I say, by Jove, I’ve listened to you very, very carefully and then I go east; I forget north. It depends whether you are speaking the truth or the theory. You.. not you, personally.
Q: No, no, no, I understand.
K: I mean, somebody says go north; I say, well, my dear chap, what do you know about it?
Q: No, no, no, granted, granted. But again I go back to the observation that that kind of complete communication…
K: That’s all; that’s all.
Q: Yes, but that kind of complete communication…
K: Complete communication; then I forget north.
Q: But why doesn’t it happen?
K: Because we never… it’s really simple, sir. In going north have found security.
DS: But that’s not true… (inaudible).
K: Yes sir; yes sir. Don’t reject it; don’t reject it. Look at it a bit more closely.
Q: But what I meant is that…
K: Sir, to change a habit, physical habit – right? – which is fairly simple, but a psychological habit demands much greater energy.
DS: Okay. Then look, what is it that would… then let’s go at more concretely; what is it that would break the habit of memory?
K: No sir; no, no. Memory is necessary — right? – to write a letter, to read a book, to drive a car, to… linguistic communication, all that is necessary, but inwardly why should there be all this memory carried about what you said to me, why you hurt me — you follow? – all that stuff, throw it out.
DS: That’s too simple. That’s simplistic – just throw it out; we don’t.
K: It is not… it may sound simplistic but it’s not.
DS: We don’t.
K: Why. That’s the point he was raising.
DS: (Inaudible)… raising it too.
K: Because, first of all, sir, you come and tell me… I have been going north for the last forty thousand years – right? – and you come and tell me, go east. I don’t believe you. Who are you to tell me? What do you know… ? I begin to doubt, I begin to question, I’m cynical, so I’ve shut it off, all communication. But if you are really serious, in the sense that you have gone east, your whole being is different. Right? I don’t know. You’re no longer a theory; it’s a fact. I think that we are cursed with theories — sorry.
Q: I go back and look at the history of many of the greatest and most alive spiritual traditions and all they have been concerned is to precisely coming up with skilful means to constantly open up, reopen up that communication because human beings seem to be incapable of actually sustaining that communication except in the most extraordinary cases.
K: Why?
Q: The only way I can say of why, is to become again a biologist and say there is just too much past.
K: Yes sir.
Q: And it takes a long time for a change to occur.
K: Look, sir.; look, sir..
Q: And there is no way we can change that fast.
K: That’s right; I know that, sir; I know that argument; I know. So we have taken forty thousand years, another forty thousand years.
Q: Well, maybe less.
K: All right, twenty thousand. You don’t say that to a person who is suffering.
Q: No.
K: No. Exactly. A person who is frightened, lack of security, say, wait, old boy, you have lived that way for another… twenty thousand years?
Q: No.
DS: But wait a second. You just said that I’m going north and I don’t change because I’m finding security in the north…
K: Yes sir.
DS: … but I’m not really finding security in the north.
K: I think I…
DS: But I think I am.
K: That’s it.
Q: That’s it.
DS: Okay; now, what is the understanding of the false security? In other words, how am I going to understand that it’s false security?
Q: Where does understanding come into the whole thing to see what is false?
DS: Yes, in other words…
K: No, I wouldn’t…
DS: You tell me I’m going north and you say go east and I say, look, this is fine by me. I don’t believe that’s any better.
K: Yes.
DS: Why should I listen to you that that’s better?
K: You don’t.
DS: That’s right.
K: Why?
DS: Because this seems… I mean, this… both… I don’t know why.
(Laughter)
Q: I’ll tell you what I think; one listens, at least for glimpses, and then frightens back, is because north causes pain.
K: Going north?
Q: Yes.
K: Why?
Q: Because the security is constantly based on this sense of struggle, which is painful.
K: Yes, which is…
Q: Therefore that is what allows the communication of the alternative to happen because you say, that seems better – you know? – it’s as simple as that.
K: No sir. But would you grant that human beings want security?
Q: Yes.
K: The brain can’t function at its highest energy…
Q: Yes, that’s what it’s built for.
K: … if it is not secure. Right? So where is there security?
Q: Well…
K: Just a minute. Either it’s in illusion, or in a bank account — right? – or in my relation to somebody. I want… in my relation to somebody I want it secure; no change: for God’s sake, remain as you are, and no living being can remain what they are, so there is conflict. And in spite of that conflict I say I must have security in her or in him — right? – or I seek security in God, in some faith, in some belief – right? – which are all illusions. So I seek security in illusion, in relationship, in the bank account, or in the nation, in my tribe. Right? My brain is wanting security.
Q: I mean, a brain wants security in memory and thought but why is that?
K: Of course; of course; of course. It must have security.
Q: Yes.
K: And now the professors, the scientists come up with new theories, new problems, new issues, and the politicians – you know what they are, what they are doing. And you come along, oh, so many gurus – you follow? – I’m lost. So I say, my God, where am I going to find security — right? – so another theory comes along and I say, yes, I’ll hold on to that, it sounds reasonable — right? – so I’m… the brain is always searching for security somewhere. Right?
DS: But there’s also something, you see, I have a different… the same perspective but slightly different in the sense that the brain not only is searching for security, but the brain is offering itself security in the process of the actual insecurity.
K: Yes sir.; yes sir; agreed. Add…
DS: That’s the genius of the brain… (inaudible).
K: Add that to its… (laughs).
DS: No, but that’s… it’s essential because it means that we’re stepping on our own toes all the time.
K: That’s what I am saying. You invent God and then worship God.
Q: Exactly.
Q: So it like somebody building up a Hollywood stage and then forgetting he built it and… (inaudible).
DS: (Inaudible). Go ahead, yes.
Q: I think we have the same question.
DS: Right.
Q: This is precisely the point, that we are so used to that which we can understand; it’s crazy, that it’s completely crazy.
K: Absolutely.
Q: Right.
Q: But it is like a body which has been falling for twenty thousand metres and five metres before the ground he cannot say, stop. He can say, ‘It’s stupid that I’m falling’, but there is this mass of inertia… (inaudible)…
K: … mass of impetus and so on.
Q: And the experience of man’s past has been that that kind of complete communication, of completely grasping the craziness of keeping on going north, has to go through that flicker and if the learning is stabilising that flicker until one internalises that and that might take, I don’t know, a lifetime or whatever.
K: Sir, that’s the whole point; that’s the whole point. You say going north has taken time.
Q: Oh, a long time.
K: A long time. And also you need time to go east. So you think — not you — we think time is necessary to change. Yes; yes; of course, sir.
Ds: No, I don’t think that. No, I don’t think that. I think we need to come to an awareness. The thing I object to in what you’re saying is the fact that you’re implying somehow or other that we can see it, and I’m saying that we’re so caught by stepping on our own toes we’ll never get out of it; we have to somehow come to terms with what we are.
K: Yes sir. Just a minute.
DS: We’re stepping on our own toes; that’s our nature.
K: Yes sir, but wait a minute. Somebody like me, or X, comes along and says, just keep quiet for a minute. Please keep quiet. Just listen. But we can’t keep quiet — right? – we’re chattering; telling me you’re right, you’re wrong. And I say for God’s sake, keep five minutes quiet.
DS: Do you know the story of the scorpion and the turtle?
K: No.
DS: The scorpion comes along and he says to the turtle, ‘How about taking me across this lake?’ The turtle says, ‘What do you think, I’m a nut? We’re going to get out in the middle there, you’re going to sting me and we’re going to drown’. ‘Why would I do that?’ says the scorpion, ‘We’ll both drown’. The turtle says, ‘Yes, you’re right, we’ll both go, so get up my back.’ So they get out into the middle and the scorpion stings the turtle; he says, ‘What did you do that for?’, he says ‘That’s my nature’.
(Laughter)
Q: (Inaudible)… our own nature.
Q: But I mean, where are we now? You see, we started with the question whether we can understand the brain.
K: Sir, let’s begin again.
(Laughter)
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: That sounds good.
K: First of all, I would like to ask: do we see thought is limited? Whatever it does it’s limited.
Q: Yes.
K: And… I don’t know why you accept it so quickly.
(Laughter)
Q: It’s something that I have been exploring myself.
K: Yes; which means our experience is limited, our knowledge is limited, now or in the future; therefore our memory is limited; and without memory there is no thought, so thought is limited. The sequence. So whatever it does is limited. Technologically, psychically, if you like… or inwardly, it’s limited — right? – and limitation must inevitably cause conflict, division — right? – and therefore is it possible for thought to operate where it’s necessary and not operate in other directions? You understand?
Q: Is there something which is not limited?
K: Maybe; we don’t know but you can only find that out if thought has its proper place and no other place. Right, sir?
Q: But I think the confusion arises when you say thought might be used in one place and in the other place not. It seems to introduce a certain fragmentation in it.
K: No sir. Thought is necessary; I’m speaking to you; there I must know English and you know English. If you spoke French and I spoke French, then we’d be speaking the same thing – right? – or Spanish or Italian, we’d do the same. Right? So knowledge is necessary to speak in English — right? – of course. Now, what… has knowledge any place in the psyche?
Q: Well, I would say it helps to a certain limited extent to understand oneself.
K: No.
Q: May I say that in Finnish, from Finland, the Finnish language has… the word know is *tieae*, and it would be in English, rote, as knowledge. But then understand in Finnish is (inaudible), it is embrace. You understand?
K: Ahah.
Q: So we agree, in Finnish language ‘to know’ would be to go along a road and not to know anything else but…
K: Yes sir; yes sir.
Q: … then this understanding in Finnish is embrace, go around, and therefore I objected when you say knowledge and understanding would be the same.
Q: I think… (inaudible) what I’m saying is that…
Q: No, but the brain has two ways: the knowledge is really to go a particular way, you see, and search and search and so, but then this understanding, that’s a function of the brain also, it is to embrace… (inaudible).
K: Yes sir, I understand that.
Q: That might clarify this thing also.
Q: What I was saying is that even knowledge, you see, has in itself a certain understanding that might be limited, I mean, it might be so… (inaudible).
K: Could … would you use a different word?
Q: A different word?
K: Insight.
Q: Or intuition.
K: Ah, intuition is a bit doubtful, because you can… having desires and you can…
Q: Could we say then the understanding out of… coming out of memory and thought is to a certain extent mechanical?
K: Let’s use the word *insight* for the moment.
Q: Yes.
Q: Ah, insight.
K: I have an insight going north is futile, and the insight says goes east and I move. There is no interval between the movement…
Q: Yes, but, you see, again we keep coming back exactly to the same point.
K: Yes sir, that’s what I’m saying… repeating.
Q: Yes, but you asked a question a moment ago: can we have thought to take its proper place.
K: Yes; there.
Q: There. Now, that is to say, we are respectful for what it is.
K: Yes, yes; put it… yes.
Q: Right. Now, when you say I have the insight to go east and I do it, to be respectful to thought is also to realise that it is in the nature of thought to obscure that insight, to fill it with thought.
K: Of course; then it’s not insight.
Q: And continue to go north.
K: Yes; it’s not insight.
Q: Well, it was for a moment and then it was occluded.
K: I understand; you’re repeating the same thing.
Q: Well, we are all going around the same subject because I’m trying to see — let me put it this way – the question I have is: what is the basis from which you are saying that in that insight all thought would be put into its right place without the flickering.
K: Yes sir.
Q: What is the basis for that?
K: It’s now five minutes past one. Should we stop?
Q: Yes.
Q: We can pick it up next time?
K: Yes sir.
Q: From there, please.
K: Yes, all right; anywhere you like, sir.
Q: Insight; understanding; knowledge – it’s all important question.
K: So first of all, we ought to discuss what is insight – right? – the word. To have sight in something. Right? An insight implies no memory, no time, quick perception, instant perception.
Q: Yes, but the perception has to display itself through…
K: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Instant perception. Have we got that? Have we got that? Have I…? Say for instance, I see something instantly and that perception never changes. I see the futility of all religions, organised. That’s over; I don’t belong to any religion. There is no going back to the temple or to the church or to another guru; it’s finished. I recognise those are all forms of entertainment really, so I don’t want to be entertained; it’s finished; wiped out. There is no… any kind of temptation to go and investigate, to look, it’s… I understand it. And this is a fact to me because I’ve done it. I’m not boasting or anything; it is so. Right? Take any factor which human beings cling to: this terrible nationalism – right? – I say… to be a Hindu, to be a Muslim — right? – so I’ve finished with it. I don’t go back and say, ‘Oh, let me play with nationalism a little bit.’ So can one move that way, all through life? Ah, yes sir.
We’d better stop Do we stop, sir?
Q: Yes.
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