Has ancient Indian approach predominantly metaphysical !!!!!– the scientific approach of ancient Indian system

           

            While most of the modern society brands ancient Indian approach which has been primarily based on Hinduism as a religion or its off springs, the Buddhism and Jainism, as the ones which are packed with meta physical approach and explanations, the real approach has always been different. Every insight related to any subject has been analyzed from different view points psychological, logical, ethical, social and metaphysical by different scholars be it life styles, medicine, psychology, sociology; even spirituality. No thought has been blatantly accepted by everybody. 

            The Samkhya school of philosophy describes two views on the theory of cause – effect (Karana, the cause and Karya the effect) relationship; the baseline of modern scientific approach. These views are

            The pre-existence of the effect in the cause  (Satkaryavada). This  theory maintains that karya (effect) is real. It is present in the karana (cause) in a potential form, even before its manifestation and an in-depth study of the cause Karana can lead us to the understanding of Karya, the effect even before it comes into existence. A theory that can be equated to generalization and universalizing of the results of experimental studies. The only difference being this relationship is understood more by observation and analyzing the happening in an uncontrolled manner  with out bothering about internal external and extraneous variables.

            There are two different interpretations of satkaryavada – Prakriti -parinamavada and Brahma-vivartavada. The Parinamavada suggests that the effect is the real parinama (or transformation) of the cause. On the other hand, the Brahma-vivartavada suggests that the effect is an apparent or distorted appearance of the cause. 

            The non-existence of the effect in the cause has been advocated by   Asatkaryavada. This  theory maintains that karya (effect) is asat or unreal until it comes into being. Every effect, then, is a new beginning and is not born out of cause, but from a previous effect thus trying to establish the fact that every karya, by itself becomes the cause for the subsequent effect or change and every happening is an effect-effect relationship and not a cause effect relationship, just like a medicine being developed as a potential  supporter to fight a disease,  by itself becomes a cause to damage quiet a few other human systems, which in-turn can lead to other diseases.

            The ancient Indian system has also described the patterns of deductive reasoning. Nyaya school of philosophy describes the principle of elimination that separates what is not a causal condition from what is, viz., that if some effect is observed without  a cause, the latter is not a causal condition of the former. This is a corollary of the principle of co-presence (anvaya) that wherever there is the effect there is one or more  causal condition or the sum total of causal conditions. While some causal conditions may not individually lead to an effect,  wherever there is the sum total of causal conditions there is the effect (tat-sattve tat-sattā;)hat could mean the sum total of causal conditions in the first occurrence and the effect in the second occurrence, then we have the second version, or tat could mean the effect in the perceived first occurrence and the causal condition or the sum total of causal conditions in the one that is understood by probing into to the reason thus becomes the perceived second occurrence.

            The other principle promoted by nyaya philosophy is inductive reasoning, the principle of recognition that if some effect is observed not to come into being when everything else is available except something a particular cause, the latter is a causal condition of the former. This is a corollary of the principle of co-absence (vyatireka) that wherever there is absence of a causal condition there is absence of the effect (tat-asatte tat-asattā). In the view of many Nyāya philosophers these two principles are not equivalent and one does not necessarily follow from the other.

            This detailed description of the cause – effect relationship by itself is a important proof of the utilization of scientific approach by ancient Indians in their understanding of the happenings, changes and expressions of various thoughts and ideas related to the same

            One more evidence to prove the scientific approach of the ancient Indian systems is that the society or the scholars did not approve any new thought or ideologies before it is scrutinized by intellectuals. The prime methodology adopted was counterfactual reasoning or debate (TARKA) among eminent scholars to prove their thoughts, insights, inventions or discoveries with proper evidences, experiences and examples. Tarka has been describe to be of five kinds:

·         Self-dependence or trying to prove a concept but exploring deeper and deeper in to it,

·         Mutual dependence or trying to prove the cause-effect relationship

·         Circularity or trying to prove vicarious cycle of one cause leading to the other which in turn becomes the cause for a second event and this event becoming the cause for the repetition of the cycle. For example a failure leading to the development of negative attitude and this negative attitude becoming the cause for further failures

·         Infinite regress

·         Undesirable consequence where the first four kinds are included in the last

            Scripts available show that there has been debates among various intellectuals to give evidences and prove their insights.  Nothing has been accepted without establishing the credentials of the person propagating a thought. Evidences for can be quoted is the life history of Adi Shankara.  In a debate with one of the scholars when Adi Shankara was questioned about marital relationships, his answers were not accepted since he did not have the experience of marital life. But the story goes on to say that Adi Shankara learnt it by allowing his soul to enter the body of a dead king, and after under going the experiences he answered the questions.

            Even if its taken just as another story it can surely be taken as an evidence for the system available in the ancient Indian culture. May be the perception of metaphysical dominance can be attributed to the fact that only ancient Indian system analyzed every issues from the metaphysical dimension when compared to any other culture or systems and that is the reason it has evoked a great deal of interest in the western scholars

            One simple difference in the ancient Indian approach was it tried to analyze every thing in a wholistic way, the system in which one dimension has an interconnectivity, interdependency and influence of the other. So these scholars never tried to analyze and document it in a compartmentalized manner and the mix-up of the meta physical aspects make look as just a subject with metaphysical dominance with all other dimensions scoring very less importance. May be the natural human tendencies to show interest in what is not perceived through sense organs and left to fantasies and assumptions would also have played a role in viewing  ancient Indian views as metaphysical dominant ones

Definition of Personality - the ancient Indian approach

Defining Personality as understood in Ancient Indian approach

           

            Understanding the individual in relationship to his environment has been the primary approach of Ancient Indian psychology  when it comes to the description of human behavior; the prakrithi – purusha approach. Prakrithi - the perception of environment  and purusha- perception of self. 

              Charaka Samhita expresses this idea as follows: “Mind, Soul and the Body—these three constitute a tripod, upon the meaningful combination of which the world is sustained. They constitute the substratum for everything, which is endowed with life. combination of the above three  is Purusha who is sentient and who is the subject matter for this science. The body and the mind are the abodes of diseases as well as health. Proper body-mind interaction is the cause for happiness”. Prakrithi, the environment, when it comes into contact with the purusha the individual self, the self, starts on a process of evolution that leads through several stages to the creation of the existing material world.

                In the Samkhya view, only prakrithi is active, while the self is incarcerated in it and only observes and experiences what the prakirthi is, the perception of the environment in relation to self.   It is devoid of consciousness. Prakrithi is unintelligible and gets greatly influenced by the Purusha, the perception by self.  It manifests itself as the various objects of experience based on the perception of he/she, th Purusha. Prakrithi is dynamic.  As a result, Prakrithi and all the physical objects that are effected or produced by Prakrithi, are also in a state of constant change and transformation. This dynamic state of the environment has been confirmed by the scientists today on various dimensions.

            Samkhya also describes Prakrithi as being constituted by tri-gunas, namely sattva, rajas and tamas. The term guna, in ordinary sense means quality or nature. But here, it is to be understood in the sense of constituent (component) of prakrithi. Sattva is concerned with happiness, rajas with action and  tamas with ignorance and inaction. This description by Samkhya can be clearly viewed as the prakrithi is not just being understood as a physical or materialistic environment; but a body which also comprises of human begins of different natures and characteristics grouped under the tri-gunas.

            This understanding further strengthens the idea that the interaction between prakrithi and purusha is not just an interaction between the individual self and the physical environment, but an interaction between the self and the environment as a whole, in which the other human beings of different natures are a part. Prakrithi being dynamic is the understanding of continuous and consistent changes that happen in the society as exposure to knowledge, experiences increases. Purusha’s interaction with prakrithi also makes him dynamic with changes also occurring in him as it happens with prakrithi.

            The perceptions or perceptual distortions in the interaction between prakrithi and purusha  causes the creation of 23 constituents, including intellect (buddhi,mahat), ego (ahamkara) and mind (Manas) which in turn leads to the development of swabhava  the consistent behavior or habit. This explanation based on samkhya view  comes very close to the definition given by Gordon All port for personality - "Personality is the dynamic organization within the individual of those psychophysical systems that determine his unique adjustments to the environment."

THE COGNITIVE BEHAVIOR APPROACH OF BAGAWAT GITA

            The best and most effective contribution which has been to a very great extent relevant to the modern psychology has been from the holy script bagawat gita which talks about increasing objectivity, transcending change by accepting it and integrating it into the system for effective living.

            For a long time baghavat gita has been projected more a directive counseling with its roots being present in the guru-chela model. It was also accepted as a process of directive counseling. But a proper scrutiny of the way bagvat gita has been documented its gets more closely to the CBT model rather than a counseling one.

            The process is more on an interactive dialogue related to various aspects of the situational behavior attitude and emotions. The socratarian dialogue is clearly visible in the process. These socratarian dialogues were aimed at challenging the belief systems related to self, environment and future that were present in around.

            The whole script is divided in to eighteen chapters with the first chapter explaining the setting in which Arjuna (Client) became incapacitated and the next seventeen chapters dealing with a specific issue related to the individuals perception, cognition and behavior. In other words it is a systematic cognitive behavioral intervention with seventeen sessions elaborating of various ideas which aid cognitive restructuring.  The vital areas dealing which was directed at changing the attitude behavior and personality were

Ø  The strong and virile alone are fit for a life of great consequence

Ø  Strength natures life, weakness wears it away

Ø  Potency drives away diseases, incapacity aggravates it

Ø  Virtue and righteousness are the outcome of strength, vice and wickedness have their origin in weakness

Ø  Cowardice creates crookedness, it is feeble who resort to foul play

Ø  Action born in manliness leads to freedom and its opposite to bondage

Ø  Strength and sense of achievement are identical

            The whole transformation was described to be brought about as a slow steady perceptible mental evolution.

            Bagawat gita has been described as an event when Arjuna (Client) was confused and preoccupied with self defeating thoughts when the kurushetra war between Kauravas and pandavas was about to start. The activating event was the Arjuna (Client) (Client) witnessing army in an organized frame work with most of his close relatives in the opposite group. Immediately he starts feeling that he cannot fight these people (the belief system). Arjuna (Client) also started dreading the consequences of his actions and starts feeling sick and incapacitated. So he drops his bow(c- consequences). The type of sudden, negative thought that Arjuna (Client) had in this situation is called an “automatic thought” in CBT. (An “automatic thought” is a sudden thought, often unrecognized by an individual, which leads to a negative emotional or behavioral response.)

            According to cognitive theory, individuals develop cognitive schemas that affect how they evaluate and make meaning of internal and external stimuli. Schemas are influenced by experiences and can be thought of as filters through which a person perceives situations. Problems arise when a person develop depressive or anxious schemas that lead to overly negative, pessimistic, or fearful views about oneself, the world, or the future. This was the real experience of Arjuna (Client) in the battle filed

            Arjuna (Client)'s distorted way of interpreting the situation primarily based on his immediate situational emotions, lead to overly extreme interpretations, as well as a tendency to focus on negative pieces of information. It was in these conditions Arjuna (Client) failed to realize his goals and also the purpose of his presence in the battle field. Arjuna (Client)’s core belief that he was the person responsible for the war and for winning the war typically lay dormant in the background until activated by stressful and context relevant events. These activated the core belief made him interpret the events and gave rise to automatic thoughts that are consistent with them.

            Arjuna (Client)’s harbored these negative core beliefs and rigid and extreme automatic thoughts in the situation which demanded action with an internal attributional style in which he excessively started attributed blame to internal versus external factors. These made him react with strong intentions to leave the place.

            This avoidance has also prevented him from disproving this belief and receiving satisfaction from engaging in activities of pleasure and mastery. It was essential to break the vicious thought–belief cycle and make Arjuna (Client) understand how to change extreme cognitions, so that he can do things which he was supposed to do in that situation, there by  engaging in rewarding activities by which the self-defeating thoughts are weakened and new self-affirming thoughts and beliefs are strengthened.

            It Was in this situation Krishna (Therapist) acted just like Cognitive behavioral therapists to work closely with Arjuna (Client) to develop more realistic and flexible thinking styles and information processing, including learning how to identify, challenge, and modify maladaptive automatic thoughts and core beliefs. The whole of Gita which proceeds as interactive dialogue shows how the constellation of interacting components that contributed to Arjuna (Client)’s current problems were conceptualized and created conditions for identifying key situations, automatic thoughts and their associated meanings, emotions, and behaviors thus paving way for a change in perception cognition and attitude.

            But just like any individual when Arjuna (Client) still could not get over the inertia and start his act as it happens With severely anxious or depressed patients, Krishna (Therapist) (Therapist) initially focused on instilling some behavior change, which may quickly provide some relief, increase energy, and instill confidence in the therapeutic process, before extensively working on changing entrenched thoughts. The turn of events depict how Krishna (Therapist) made Arjuna (Client) act, by creating a strong idea that he was destined to act and whatever he does is just his role for which he was born, and he as the Holy Spirit is the ultimate decision maker of who does what. But this step at the end makes bagawat gita look more like a philosophical literature rather than a effective intervention model which is very closely relate to the current model of CBT

            If the situation had been perceived just as a conflict with in Arjuna (Client) whether to fight or retreat, then Krishna (Therapist) could have given an immediate solution based on his own decisions on how Arjuna (Client) should act at this juncture. But instead Krishna (Therapist) understanding the distress tried to enlighten Arjuna (Client) with a systematic approach which involves education (psycho education), cleared understanding of perceptual modalities and deeper analysis of core belief system to bring about a comprehensive change in personality has been adopted which clearly simulates a therapeutic intervention which has the structure of cognitive behavior model. The profound ideas in Bhagavad gita allow themselves to be approached, applied and verified from different angles of vision which makes it a universally applicable model.

           

            What has been made popular as the comprehensive statement of Bhagavad gita is “do your duties, with out the expectation of its outcome”. But people who have understood bagawat gita clearly can only comprehend that the core message of Bhagavad gita is “ find pleasure in your actions rather than its results which can only make you function consistently and sustain the goal directed behavior”

Ancient Indian Contribution to Psychology - the incomparable Bhagavad gita

                   The major contribution to the field of psychology both in the form of knowledge about the thinking and behavioral patterns and methods of challenging their maladaptive patterns came from the Bhagavad gita which has eighteen chapters. The first six chapters are devoted to explanation of “sat” or the existence aspect of reality. 

                   These chapters explain how feelings differentiate the function aspect of a man from a machine. These chapters also describe how feelings are concomitant with life and how these feelings undergo modifications from like to dislike, friendship to enmity, fulfillment to frustration, admiration to jealousy and support to opposition and vice versa. Expression such as like, friendship, fulfillment admiration and support are all the positive aspect of the faculty of feeling, while dislike enmity, frustration jealousy and opposition are all its negative expressions.  According to gita the positive aspects of emotion promote growth and evolution while the negative ones retard.

               The next six chapters are devoted to how man has inclination to move towards attaining  “anandham brahmam” the supreme bliss where he reaches a status where nothing is important to him. Even though Bhagavad gita explains it as a person’s attraction towards god which happens through purification of emotions where human beings are not driven by need satisfaction approach, there is a lot of explanation about awareness, cognition and how the coexistence of emotions and cognition in a balanced manner add luster and brightness to human life. 

               To a very great extent these explanations can be associated with various components of  emotional intelligence, the self awareness, self management, social awareness and social management. According to Bhagavad gita every living being is aware of its own existence and it is evident that this awareness is born out of cognition. There may be variation in the intensity of cognition and the difference between one life and other is the degree of cognition. 

                These six chapters tries to explain the link between emotion and cognition. Cognitions as it is in its raw form is rigid like hard iron and experience / expression of emotions is the process of melting it to become soft  and gain luster. Gita states that when emotions get purified then cognition get sharpened while impure emotions lead to confusion and internal conflicts which becomes the source for stress fear and anxiety. just like love and sympathy between two persons lead to a better understanding of each other and creates a sense of affinity and strengthening of relationship, the link between love and knowledge can strengthen the relationship on an individual with his internal “ self” which in turn leads to better knowledge and awareness about self  and this awareness becomes the source of solutions to most of the problem encountered by an individual. According to gita intelligence, awareness, cognition, consciousness and conscience are the same in a way that the later is the evolution of the immediate preceding.

            The last six chapters describes the path of knowledge. These chapters describe how with increasing knowledge a person can proportionally increase identifying himself and his surroundings in a better and clearer manner which can lead him in the direction of achieving satisfaction and glory. The knowledge contributes to the purification of the faculty of understanding which include intelligence, awareness, cognition, consciousness and conscience until it reaches its culmination with the innate knowledge as a result of which perfection of the individual becomes perfect or in terms of Humanitarian psychology the mans drive to attain his ideal life gets completed. When completion of this process ends the need based drive in person making him mentally controlled and balanced in all types of environment. These chapters also explain how this process can be over shadowed by lethargic attitude, disuse, negative emotions and experiences, hampering the goal directed behavior. These chapter also explain the need to overcome this shadowing and methods of doing it.

                 To be continued............

Ancient Indian Contribution to Psychology

              The modern Indian contribution to the field psychology as a whole has been very limited. Most of them are studies based on the theories and models contributed by the west. Most of the researches are also subject to cultural bias because the most of tools questionnaires and other methodologies and either the one developed in the west or a standardization of the western tools. Very few tools have been developed by keeping n mind the uniqueness and diversity of the Indian culture and traditions.

              But the ancient India has contributed a lot in the disguise of spirituality to the field. Since religion was a significant binding factors all these contributions were recorded in the form of religious practices, communications prayer and acquiring knowledge about self and god. It is these contributions that made even the then practiced Hindu religion a huge source of solace in situations of emotional problems, reduced the sense of loss of control and happiness, gave a cognitive framework that every thing that is happening to the person and around the person has goodness in it, which helped people to make assessment of negatively perceived situations in a rational way, at least after the emotional phase was over. This helped in reducing the suffering and enhances self esteem and self confidence.

           The prime contributions from ancient India was in the various psychic phenomena’s which have been accepted to be in existence but could not be scientifically proven. These are also the ones for which the western world could not provide a concrete explanation, but forced to accept its existence even without appropriate supportive evidence. These include extra sensory perception (ESP), telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition and psychokinesis, the direct effect of mind over matter.

          One of The most relevant factors from ancient Indian contribution has been from Vedas which broadly categorizes three types based on the dominant characteristics in a person or “GUNAS”, even though Vedas state that the psycho physical disposition consists of a mixture of guans.  The three gunas are

• Ø  Sattva guna  - people who are dominated with the characteristics of truthfulness, cleanliness, dutifulness, discipline, mental equilibrium, respect to superiors, sharp intelligence, sense control, strong determination, assertiveness, attractiveness and detached approach towards contentious situations .
• Ø  Rajas guna- people with significant characteristics of desire for sense gratification, intense activity, dissatisfaction with ones position and performance, emotionally charged, irrational, dominant, focusing on materialistic achievement, poor spiritual involvement and always in a hurry to complete their tasks.
• Ø  Tamas guna- people whose dominant characters are arrogance, poor impulse control, feeling helpless and worthless, laziness, procrastination, depression, poor motivation, goal lessness  and mental imbalance

            One more important contribution by the Vedas is related to people orientation towards vocational preference. Vedic varnasharma system divided occupation under four major categories. Leaning and education, development and defense, mediation and negotiation and basic need satisfactions. Learning and education was handling by people then known as Brahmins, development and defense by kshatrias, mediation and negotiation by vaishyas  and all activities associated with basic need satisfaction by sudras.  Vedas also describe the nature of person fit for each job making it the first guide to understand the  career orientation of a person. Vedic philosophy also maintains that one’s characteristic can change especially by associating with persons of different tendency. Even though the Vedic philosophy propagated harmonious relations between persons of different types and profession, over a period of time these profession became branded as hereditary one creating the caste system which virtually undermined the whole purpose of developing such an guide and system. Thus the effective evaluation method of identifying a person’s fitness for a job got buried under the name of caste system

          Panchatantra is another importance scripture that has contributed to the field of psychology. This scripture primarily deals with the five important aspects of life building of self confidence, prosperity, knowledge, friendship and endeavor. Panchathnadra did fall under the branch of science of the ancient India the “neethi sastra” meaning a book on wise conduct in life. It an important source for learning on how to understand people, how to choose reliable and trustworthy friends, how to meet difficulties and solve problems through tact and wisdom, and how to live in peace and harmony in the face of hypocrisy, deceit and many pitfalls in life. So in a subtle way “panchatantra” do carry a lot of informations associated with various types of personality, cognitive development, behavioral modifications, interpersonal relationships, motivational aspects, adaptation to environmental demands and effective methods of achieving goals. But since the same has been described in the form of stories and characteristics of animals the real psychological factors brought out was never highlighted.

        The  scripture NYAYA VAISESHIKA views that personality consists of atman- the self, manas – the mind, and sarira – the body. It also describes the qualities which are the essential ingredients of any personality. These qualities are ichha-desire, dvesha- aversion, prayatna- effort, sukha-pleasure, dukha – pain and jnana- cognition.

          SANKYA yoga system describes how the interactions between the for internal constituents buddhi-intelligence, ahankar- egoism, manas-mind and chitta- memory, with the 10 external constituents, the five organic sensations – hearing, seeing, touching, tasting and smelling and the other five active expressions moving, grasping, speaking, eliminating and reproducing determines the behavior and personality of an individual. 

                                                                                                ..........................To Be Continued