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MA79S1 - How can a human being bring about a radical change, not only in himself but outside?
Madras (Chennai), India - 26 December 1979
Seminar 1



0:18 Q: I don’t comprehend this.
0:28 Achyut Patwardhan: Sir, we are passing through a very critical phase of human history when everything seems to be degenerating, particularly in a country like India, you feel it very starkly. And things are so serious that one begins to wonder if we are witness to the death of a culture. Outward forms of culture will live for some time, on a preceding momentum, new temples may be built and new pujas may be made, but actually the soul is already languishing, disappearing. It’s a very grave crisis. One main feature of this crisis is that it is not restricted to India, but each one of us is looking at it sectorally, in terms of our own problems, and the crisis has much wider amplitude. We were wondering if we could explore with you, if there is a way to approach this fact, the fact of degeneration in various directions, and discover a point of regeneration.
2:16 K: Professors. Sir, are you asking what is the root of this degeneration not only in this country but various other countries also, what is the basis, the source of this general human disintegration? Is that the question, sir?

AP: Yes, sir. Sir, it was very fortunate that for people like me, my generation was able to harness itself to some system or another, and then we hoped that that working for that system, we shall automatically arrive at a point of regeneration. Now, all that has let us down very badly, and I think every system has lost its credibility. Not only that, but people who are earnest and who are capable of deeper thinking, know that through systems we are not going to find a solution to this problem of degeneration. So systems as such are a factor of degeneration.
3:39 K: Sir, I am not the oracle only, there are all the professors and all the oracles.
3:45 Questioner: There is no gainsaying, sir, that there is degeneration in every walk of life, in every aspect of society. For society, as we know, is human relationship on a wider scale. So, automatically, as we see things, society, if it is left to itself, only degenerates. So what is the factor which is in the very making of society that leads to degeneration? Or it is something else, we would like to know.
4:19 K: I am not the chairman, sir, we are all the chairmen. it’s a very ancient culture, could in some way respond to this challenge? Or should the individual completely cut himself from the culture, the land, tradition, and seek the solution or the truth for oneself? I wanted to know what relation the culture has to this problem.
4:56 Q: Sir, I am one of the listeners. May I say one thing here, please? we can all join in but it’s generally restricted. Would that be all right, sirs? What do you say? Do we ask the observers to join in?
5:34 Sunanda Patwardhan: First week of January.
5:37 K: Then you can bombard me with a lot of questions.
5:43 SP: Are you saying a culture, like Indian culture, obviously you see all signs of degeneration: crisis in character, there is a disappearance of ethical values, whether it is business ethics, political ethics or personal ethics. Is there a capacity in a degenerating culture to renew itself? Has it got elements in it which can correct itself, and where do you find these elements — is that the question? Or as he put it, or as you put it do you walk away from this culture, you can’t do anything with this? If that is so, then where are you going to start?
6:30 K: Could we define not too definitely the meaning of that word ‘culture’?
6:40 Q: I think it’s something to cultivate...
6:44 K: That means, sir, to grow, to cultivate, to multiply, to expand, to explode, to create, bring forth something original. All that’s implied in that word ‘culture.’
6:59 AP: Sir, when I asked this question relevantly to this inquiry, I feel that during the last fifty years there has been a telescoping of regional cultures so that regional cultures are losing their identity, and all the developments that are happening in the world — man going to the moon, atom bomb, pollution, everything, all this is creating a loss of identity for each separative culture, so that the day of separative cultures is over. And there is man and his culture. So that labels as Indian culture, as American culture, as the American way of life, the Russian communist style — everything has lost its credibility in terms of today, because today everything has been pushed into one single lump, as it were. And man is asked to face that. I wonder if that is so, actually. Though we continue to live with my sacred threads and this and that, but somehow or the other that is very superficial. Basically, at the core of it, man is realising that his life cannot be separated into regional cultures and regional cultures. Take for instance the entire movement of revival that has taken place in the Muslim countries. It’s a hopelessly reactionary, anti-human, anti-humanistic movement. Now you can see that in the name of culture, something totally anti-humanistic can also come into being, and we see the danger of it, of mere revival, because they are ignoring the fact that there is a fusion, we are living in a period of fusion.
9:15 Pupul Jayakar: Achyutji, may I ask you something? Is culture an additive process? Or is it...? Does it contain both the additive and the transforming element? You can continue to add to culture, therefore when you talk of regeneration in culture, are you talking of it as an additive process? That is, to add...
9:55 K: Strata by strata by strata. Sir, if I may ask, without interrupting your thinking: is it the crisis in consciousness or environmental crisis? You understand what I mean, sir? Is it a moral, psychic crisis, or a crisis of various superficial cultures knocking at each other, and the stronger wiping out the other? Or is it various stratas of various cultures are being imposed on each other, and therefore there is no... I wouldn’t use the word ‘identity’ — there is no depth to it? So I am asking, if I may, is the cultural crisis in the economic, political, religious, social, or is it at much greater depth, which is in the very consciousness of man himself? That I would like to ask.
11:28 AP: Sir, in India we use a word which is ‘sanskara.’
11:36 K: Sir, if you don’t mind, don’t introduce Sanskrit words.
11:39 AP: No, I am introducing that word only with the idea of bringing in a new element, a new element which we have so far ignored, that is that culture is not something that I voluntarily take or renounce, but culture is something that comes to me like my in the form of genetic memory, something like that.
12:22 PJ: Genetic memory is possibly part of it, but culture must be what has been acquired, what has been and what is acquired. In the ‘what has been,’ you can do nothing about, but in ‘what is acquired’ you can do something.
12:47 Q: And being transmitted also.
12:51 K: I think, if I may ask again, is it a crisis in the very nature and the consciousness of man which is his brain, his emotions, his senses, his thoughts, which make up all the contents of consciousness, in that is the crisis, or externally? That’s all I would like to know.
13:14 Q: (Inaudible)
13:33 K: Are you saying, sir, the psyche itself is not affected but rather, influenced by the various pressures externally?
13:48 Q: It is to an extent only that psyche is affected by what is taking place in society.
13:55 K: Yes. So there is the psyche, a permanent psyche, are you saying, a volatile psyche?
14:06 Q: How is a psyche affected by society, sir?
14:10 K: The psyche being affected by the society — let’s stick to that. I am not the only dog barking. What do you say, sirs? The gentleman says that the psyche, if one may use the word, the essence of man, is affected by the society in which he lives, by the pressures of society, pressures of religion, pressures of economic situations, political and so on. So that essence is shaped by the society. Is that so? I’m not saying you’re not right, sir. I’m just questioning it.
15:14 Q: I want you to solve this, sir, that it is true only partially, it is affected only to an extent, not fully affected.
15:22 K: Then we’ll have to ask, sir, if I may, who created this society in which we all live — deplorable, ugly, cruel, brutal, aggressive, competitive and so on? Who created this society? Man has created it, psyche has created it. Is the society different from the psyche?
16:05 Q: I would view the psyche slightly differently. If we want regeneration, that means we want to change, something must be willing to change or capable of being changed. We will not get anywhere by talking about permanent or close to permanent changes. We must talk in terms of, things can be changed. An individual will act based upon forces that affect him — his sense of happiness, or whatever is needed for his survival, secondly, whatever he contributes to. So I think instead of saying the problem is too deep-rooted, we must assume that individuals haven’t changed substantially over a period of time. But the reinforcements that are necessary for them to contribute and act in certain ways is lacking. So we must assume we can change it, and change will not be too difficult — I hope — because if it is too difficult then we are asking for forces that cannot be regenerated or cannot be created.
17:12 K: Sir, there have been changes, historically, revolutions, every form of change is going on around us all the time. The Western culture imposing on the Eastern culture, and the Eastern culture subsiding, and the other is dominating. So when we say individuals can change, must change, shouldn’t we ask, if I may suggest, is there an individual at all? We assume we are individuals. It may be one of our comfortable illusions. The common ground, whether it’s in the East or in the West, we say we are all individuals, individual enterprise, private enterprise, the whole business of it. So shouldn’t we, if I may respectfully suggest, or ask, if there is an individual at all. Or, are we the result of a million years of human experience, which we have translated as the individual? The individuality that we have because of millions of years of existence cannot be blamed because this change has occurred.
19:08 K: I’m not blaming anything.
19:11 Q: But the fact of it, if we have that, is probably not what we commonly call as individuality.
19:17 K: No, I think again we have to define the word ‘individual,’ The word ‘individual’ means a human being who is not broken up — indivisible. The origin of that word comes from that: not to be divided. If you take that common meaning in the dictionary — good dictionary — then you will find most human beings are not individuals at all. So if we could move away from that word, and the feeling of that word, the content of that word — emotional, intellectual, traditional, all that — are we individuals at all?
20:20 Q: Not in the sense you describe, sir. We have division in us.
20:32 K: Therefore you are not an individual.
20:34 Q: Not in that sense.
20:36 Q: We’ve already said, sir, that the self-enclosed centres of activity,
20:43 K: Yes, sir. I know, sir, we use that word to convey a certain activity, a self-centred activity, an activity of becoming, which means there is a being from which you are becoming. Is there a being? I don’t know if you want to discuss in this way.
21:15 Q: In that sense, sir, the crisis is not peculiar to our times.
21:23 K: That’s what I’m questioning, sir.
21:25 Q: It has been there, all along.

K: All along. That’s what I feel — which we have evaded, which we have dodged, escaped from. Because the problem of pollution which threatens to wipe out I feel that the peculiar nature of the degeneration in the midst of which we are born and will live, you can’t just say that it is eternal.
22:13 K: I’m not using the word ‘eternal.’

AP: No, you are not, sir,
22:21 K: Not only present time: has this crisis not existed before?
22:30 Q: Isn’t there something unprecedented in the crisis?
22:35 AP: Unprecedented.

K: Yes, yes, maybe.
22:38 S. Ramachander: I think one of the major differences is that
22:49 K: Atom bomb. And because of the pace of telecommunications, the global village, and all the rest of it, the human consciousness is now being bombarded with impact of a force, of a kind which never happened before.
23:06 K: That’s why I’m asking, sir, are we concerned with the impacts or are we concerned with the very consciousness of man, which needs transformation, which needs to be changed? So I don’t know how, sir, how are we attacking this problem?
23:37 SR: Obviously, it has to be the consciousness, there’s no choice.
23:40 K: So would you then go into this question whether it is possible for human beings to bring about a mutation in the very consciousness of itself?
24:08 Q: Do you mean to say that by changing the human psyche, the problem before us, the problem of social degeneration, cultural degeneration will be solved?
24:27 K: Sir, that’s why I asked, whether my consciousness — yours and others — is that an individual consciousness in the accepted sense of that word, or is it the consciousness of whole humanity? Because our brains, our minds have evolved through a million years. So I do not see that I’m an individual. To me, that sounds so ridiculous. I represent the rest of humanity.
25:25 Q: Totally, sir, or in parts? Do I represent the total human being totally or in parts?
25:33 K: Ah, no, no, no, no. No, no!
25:40 K: Verbal.
25:41 SR: Well, verbal is one thing, sir. Another is the subtle difference between saying, ‘I represent the totality of human consciousness’ which is even verbally very easily graspable, if you know what I mean. The other thing is to say, ‘I am the consciousness of the world,’ or ‘I am the world,’ or ‘The world is me,’ or whatever.
25:57 K: I’ve said that.
25:58 SR: But it seems to me, the first stage is very easily comprehensible. The second stage, to you seems almost synonymous, to me, it certainly doesn’t seem synonymous.
26:12 K: I don’t quite follow this.
26:17 K: Forgive me. When I use the word ‘represent,’ I am humanity.
26:23 PJ: I think what Ramachander was saying, sir, was that when you say that you are humanity, as a statement, you say, surely, ‘I am humanity.’ But when it means not only accepting it at the verbal level but having a state of mind which is humanity...
26:43 K: Of course, I mean that. I will retract that word ‘represent’ if you will forgive me.
26:56 SR: Because I understood it as ‘A represents B’...
26:59 K: No, no, no, no.
27:01 Q: I’m sorry, sir, I’ve not followed what you are saying when you say that you are humanity, what do you mean? In what sense are you humanity? Do you mean yourself or are you saying everyone should say that?
27:14 K: All. Each one of us.
27:17 Q: But what is the meaning of the sentence?
27:22 K: All right, sir. Every human being whether he lives in different parts of the world, suffers.
27:34 Q: But they suffer differently.
27:38 K: But it is suffering. That suffering may live in a small house or a big house.
27:44 Q: Suffering from indigestion is different from suffering from hunger.
27:48 K: Yes, yes. I am saying, hunger.
27:50 Q: So you can’t say everything is suffering.
27:52 K: Sir, if you will forgive me, may I explore a little bit, and then we’ll meet perhaps. Every human being suffers. The causes may vary, but the suffering is common. Whether it is economic suffering, social suffering, injustice, the act of feeling, the shedding of tears, the intense feeling of despair, that’s common to all humanity. To all human beings — I won’t even call it ‘humanity’ — to all human beings. Right, sir?
28:43 Q: Yes and no. Some people suffer, some don’t.
28:46 K: What do you mean ‘some people’? Who says no?
28:53 SP: To suffering. Is there anyone who doesn’t suffer?
28:56 Q: Yes, but I’m saying the way of classifying all suffering under one omnibus, doesn’t help analysis.
29:02 K: No, no. I’m not trying to help yet. We are investigating, not trying to help. That’ll come much later.
29:15 Q: We should investigate in a way that we can proceed.
29:19 K: That’s all.
29:20 Q: So if you use one word to encompass everything...
29:23 K: No, I am going into different words.
29:25 Q:...it doesn’t produce clarity.
29:32 PJ: If I may say, if there is a death for instance, it’s a common experience all over man. The pain which death brings, of someone very near to you is a factor which is common to man. It may vary if it is one’s child or... but the pain out of the fact of an ending like that — a total ending like that, is a common thing to all man.
30:08 Q: You are giving examples of common sufferings, but hunger is not a common suffering.
30:13 PJ: No, we are not talking of hunger.
30:14 Q: I’m talking. So kindly take that into your analysis.
30:20 PJ: Of course, in an affluent country where there is no hunger, there is no pain of hunger.
30:25 Q: But even in India some people don’t feel hungry.
30:28 PJ: Naturally.

Q: So that’s not common.
30:31 PJ: But death is a common factor. Loneliness is a common factor.
30:37 Q: Are we talking of only those kinds of sufferings?
30:41 K: We are talking, sir... First, let us be clear. There is physical suffering — hunger, disease, poverty, and so on. That exists, more or less, in most countries, Russia included. Even in the affluent society of America, this exists. That exists in every part of the world, this physical suffering, physical hunger, physical deprivation, physical lack of housing. That’s suffering, at one level. There is suffering also at another level, at the psychological level — I lose my son, I want to fulfil, can’t. There is not only my suffering, but the suffering of my wife, and so on, so on, so on. There is psychological suffering, which is anxiety, jealousy, hatred, competition, and a sense of desperate loneliness, right? This is common. And this desire to be rich is common. So, we are saying, basically, human beings have all these factors. Basically. Right? Therefore I’m saying this common factor is in all of us. And from that I say this common factor makes one think I am the rest of humanity — I am like the rest.
32:57 Q: Oh, I see.
33:00 K: I may have brown hair, or white skin, or black skin or Chinese skin, but this is the common denominator, common root — not root — the common state of man. I am only talking about that.
33:20 K: Oh, that comes, of course. There are various talents, you are a poet, I am an engineer, somebody is a painter, I’m a dirty politician, and so on. If you agree to that — not agree verbally, but actually — that we all go through this business of existence which contains all this. Right, sir? That’s all. Therefore I say I am not an individual at all, basically. I may be better educated, I may have no food, my wife may run away from me, but the basic thing is that.
34:24 Q: How does it follow, sir, that you are not an individual because your sufferings are shared by...?
34:29 K: No, sir, I was born an American, or a Russian. The culture round me is either totalitarian or so-called free democratic, etc. But the basic movement of the American and the Russian is the same. Right, sir? I mean that’s so obvious. So what is an individual then? — if the individual, according to the dictionary means a human being indivisible. Right, sir?
35:27 Q: That’s one meaning, sir.
35:29 K: Give it any meaning you like, sir. This is the common meaning according to the dictionary.
35:38 Q: Separate selves — if you want another word.
35:41 K: If you say ‘separate self,’ what is the separate self?
35:46 Q: People with different experiences.
35:51 K: All right. What are the experiences? Sexual, poverty, religious, hunger, loneliness, we come back to that. The self is all this. There’s nothing divine about it. So the self is the result of the movement of thought. No, sir? Thought has built the self, and the super-self, and the god, and the higher, nobler — all the movement of thought. I mean, you may disagree, let us talk over it. then if the crisis is not in the culture of today, but in the mind of man.
37:06 K: That’s consciousness.
37:09 PJ: Now, the mind of man — this being in pain, being in anguish, being in sorrow, this tremendous suffering man brings into the world with him, and projects into his life and into the future, is the area in which transformation has to take place. If there is to be a change, therefore, I’m not saying that there hasn’t to be a change. There has to be a change in the environment, you cannot live in this country and say that there has not to be a change.
37:55 K: How do we bring about this change?
37:57 PJ: Both in the environment and the individual.
38:03 K: As the communist, socialist, the Maoists and all those people say change the structure of society. Right, sir? You know about it. Right, sir? You seem doubtful.
38:19 Q: Yes and no. I don’t think they are saying that you don’t change yourself, also, but they’re saying that’s not enough.
38:29 K: They emphasise that first, and this second.
38:35 Q: Just as you are doing as well, sir.
38:37 K: No, no, I am not doing the reverse. Marxists — you know, sir — say change the environment, and then perhaps you will change man.
38:50 Q: No, I don’t think it’ll be quite the correct reading of Marx.
38:55 K: Explain to us, sir.
38:57 Q: As far as I understand it, he is saying both. But he is saying that certain forms are exploited, and have become structural. They have gone into society, and you have therefore to change.

K: Change that. Which means what, sir? The structure has to be changed.
39:18 Q: Yes, the relational production.
39:22 K: Sir, we all know that. So the structure has to be changed to bring about good relationship between man. So, which means what? Structure, then man.
39:38 Q: No, it doesn’t proceed like that, sir.
39:40 K: Proceed your way you like, sir.

Q: It could be simultaneous.
39:45 K: Does it ever happen?
39:48 Q: Well, nothing has ever happened.

K: That’s all.
39:50 Q: I don’t think you can test.

K: It hasn’t happened. By saying both are important...
39:56 Q: In some places it might have happened.
39:58 K: Might!
40:00 Q: (Inaudible)
40:18 Q: It will be too simplistic to say that of Marx. If we have time on, to view his readings and so on, but obviously this is not the place.
40:27 K: The problem is this, sir, as Achyutji pointed out, what am I to do to change myself, in relation to the society I live, in the culture in which I have been brought up, what am I, as a human being to do? That is, I find I am degenerating, I am corrupt.
40:59 Q: No, but somebody else is corrupt. I am being exploited.
41:08 K: Of course, of course.

AP: But I am part of it.
41:12 Q: There are innocent people who are exploited.
41:14 K: Oh, yes, sir. I agree.

Q: Then who is to change?
41:17 K: The innocent becomes the exploiter, given a chance, the innocent also becomes the exploiter.
41:24 Q: No, but that time will come provided you give him a chance. Let me put a very concrete question because I think we shouldn’t...
41:36 Q: There is the politician exploiting me, money lender exploiting me, tax fellow is exploiting me. Now, should I start changing myself or changing him?
41:48 Q: Can I answer this question first: whether I am exploiting anyone?
41:53 Q: No, I am not exploiting, I am the exploited. There are some people who are just exploited.
42:01 Q: I don’t comprehend this.
42:05 SP: (Inaudible)
42:25 AP: I must concede that when I see exploitation in the world, I am not somebody standing out of that and saying, I am pure and society is impure, it is not like that. I am part of a social process, and the entire social process is in the throes of degeneration. So, I am part and parcel of a process of degeneration and I am trying to understand this as a unitive factor.
43:01 Q: Sir, could we be a little concrete? When a Harijan chery is set fire to there is an atrocity... That is a concrete situation. Are you saying the Harijans are also exploiters? You talk of degeneration. Degeneration is...(inaudible)
43:19 AP: I’ll explain what I say. Three hundred generations of my ancestors as Brahmins have created a social system in which society accepts the burning of the Harijan huts as a matter of course. So I can’t say I don’t share the guilt.
43:43 Q: No, I’m talking as a Harijan, you’re talking as a Brahmin.
43:49 AP: I’m saying that whether you call yourself a Harijan, the moment you separate yourself from one sector as the pure, that I have not exploited anyone, everybody else is exploiting me, I think this is a very unscientific way of looking at modern society because modern society as we see it, consists of a process of exploitation, a process where the smaller fish eat the bigger fish. The bigger fish eat the smaller fish, I beg your pardon. And whether at one moment I happen to be the victim of exploitation, at another moment I happen to be the cause of exploitation, I must look at myself as a unitive phenomenon, because I cannot merely hope to cope with this problem by saying that, ‘Oh, I am the immaculate, exploited, I have not exploited anybody, now how shall I deal with society.’ I don’t think we are, any of us, in that position. None of us sitting here and discussing today can claim to be in that position of being immaculately free of the processes of degeneration and exploitation. We are all party to it because we live in a society which is unitive, integrated. Now I am asking this question that as we see this society today, we are part and parcel of it. It is not as though the society is divided between black sheep and white sheep. I wish it was so simple as that. It would be terribly simplistic to say that society consists of white sheep and black sheep, and now how are we to save the white sheep from the black sheep. I don’t think we are discussing the problem of cultural degeneration at that simplistic level. We are saying this is a total phenomenon, and we are part and parcel of it. How do we deal with it as individuals accepting responsibility for what is happening, at the same time feeling that we are caught up in a machine which is beyond our comprehension and control, which is dragging us. Do I make any sense, sir?
46:32 PJ: Wouldn’t you also say, Achyutji, if I may say, the fact is I am not a Harijan, I am Pupul Jayakar. The fact is, I am in the realm of the exploiters, not in the realm of the exploited — the fact is. And therefore if I am dealing with the fact, I have to see what are the tendencies, what are the demands, what are the factors which are causing that which is outside — which I call ‘outside.’ These are: the urge for power, the urge for money, urge to exploit. All these are tendencies within me. So identifying those tendencies, seeing that they are the cause of the degeneration, is it not urgent for me to ask myself: ‘Can there be an ending of these tendencies within me?’ If they end within me, then possibly there can be an action which will be meaningful. Otherwise, my sitting here and talking of the Harijan or the talking of the exploited, I do some social work...
47:48 AP: I want to go one step deeper than this. It is not a question of mere physical privation. When you take a Harijan basti, you see a human being, his whole manner of life is such, he will beat his wife, he will gamble. He is unawakened to the potential of his human significance. I feel that is a much greater tragedy than hunger! Hunger is nothing compared to this. I can just fill a hungry man, I can give him a good meal and say, ‘Have a good meal.’ But I can’t end the misery because the misery consists in the man being alienated from the core of his human essence.
48:48 K: Achyutji, I’m not quite sure you’ve convinced the gentleman.
48:51 AP: The modern crisis, when we talk of the modern crisis and cultural crisis, and when we bring in culture and the decay of the Indian culture, I think we are going into a depth where man is losing his integrity, his sense of being a human being. He is bartering away his heritage.
49:15 K: Achyutji, the gentleman, you haven’t convinced him.
49:21 Q: I look at it this way. When there is an actual situation, say, in my village, Harijans — I may not be a Harijan, I belong to the other, more fortunate section, but I am aware, say, of what is happening. I cannot think that by changing the structure, if the Harijans come to power, they will also do in future what the Brahmins have done. I mean that kind of thinking can also become escapism. Because then you will not do what should be done at that moment. Because certain things have to be done at that moment, and you cannot say history will repeat itself, so things will not change.

K: Do you agree to all this?
50:10 Q: (Inaudible)
50:14 K: What is preventing our common meeting, sir?
50:18 Q: First of all, I’m not sure whether we are discussing ourselves here, or society.
50:24 K: I am the society. You may say that’s simplistic. By using that word you are cutting me off. But, as Achyutji pointed out, I don’t differentiate myself from society. Society has built me.
50:45 Q: No, sir, this I’m simply not interested. There is such a thing as society apart from myself.
50:52 K: I am the society, I said. It’s an assertion. You keep saying, ‘I am society.’
51:03 K: He went into it, sir. Please...
51:07 Q: No, he says society is unity or something.
51:11 AP: Unitive.

Q: I don’t understand that.
51:17 Q: I see it being very divided. How do you say it is unitive?
51:22 K: What is this? What did you say, sir?
51:26 Q: I say society is very divided, he says it is unitive. I don’t understand.
51:32 Q: Process is unitive.
51:40 Q: No, sir, I will not hold up your discussion. Quite content as an observer. Because all of you seem to be meeting somewhere. who is exploiting whom, or who has exploited and so on. All that is included in the question: can human consciousness be changed?
52:03 Q: Sir, did you say your concern is not who is exploiting whom?
52:09 K: I said it’s all included. Exploitation, cruelty, war, beating each other up, violence, the desire to be peaceful, all that is included in my consciousness, in human consciousness. I am a Harijan. You exploit me. And as that gentleman pointed out, when they come on top, ‘I’m going to exploit you.’ Which is what’s happening. So, that’s one part. I have been hungry, and perhaps one day society will change and feed me, you know, all the whole business of it. All that is included in my consciousness. When I use the word ‘consciousness’ all that is included. Would you agree to that, sir?
53:01 Q: Sir, are you saying it’s only a matter of consciousness, hunger is a matter of consciousness?
53:09 Q: No, please don’t get impatient.

K: Ah, no, I’m not going to bite.
53:13 Q: Only that sounds like ‘shoo, shoo, shoo!’
53:17 Q: Can’t one have a discussion?
53:19 PJ: No, I thought I would explain one thing. If you divide action from consciousness then you can say, ‘Well, you know you’re just dabbling, going around in this, and the man starves outside.
53:41 Q: No, Mrs. Jayakar, I’m not dividing consciousness from action, but I’m saying consciousness should lead to action.
53:49 Q: There cannot be a consciousness...
53:51 PJ: Naturally.
53:55 Q: We cannot make a change in consciousness.
53:56 K: Sir, sir, sir. Please, have some patience, sir!
54:01 Q: No, I thought there was another...
54:02 K: Yes, sir, yes, sir. What is a human being to do faced with all this? Exploitation, competition, you know, the whole lot of it. What am I to do?
54:22 Q: Sir, I am not interested in this very last question. Now I just want to pose one concrete question which nobody answers. There is, in actuality, an act of exploitation.
54:39 Q: The chery is getting burnt.

K: Yes, sir.
54:41 Q: What should you do?

K: Don’t exploit.
54:44 Q: No, I am not exploiting, my chery is getting burnt.
54:47 K: Yes, but don’t be exploited.
54:53 Q: How do you not get exploited?

K: Fight it. Fight it. and beating me with that word. I said, you stand up. Strikes are going on in Europe, you do all those things. I’ve just come from England, therefore, you know, trade union, form them, you know, do all those things. But will that stop exploitation? Right, sir? I joined, I used to belong to ILP, which is Independent Labour Party, when I was a young boy. And they are the bosses. So I’m asking you, consciousness implies not only action, but the correct action. What is a human being to do, surrounded by all this? Which doesn’t mean he withdraws into some mountain or some theoretical principles and all the rest of it. He is involved in action. If you admit that, then we can proceed. Shall we?
56:10 Q: I feel a little reassured by what you have just said.
56:16 K: Why should I reassure you?
56:18 Q: No, if you say that at least one should fight.
56:20 K: No, sir, that is logical, sir! My consciousness is inaction, action, love, hate, right? And we are asking in what manner is this consciousness which exploits and is exploited, which is sorrowful, which is ugly, which is brutal, all that, how is that to be changed? That’s all.
56:49 AP: Sir, my problem is unfortunately ignored. Because when you take the instance of one chery being burnt here, and asking what is my reaction to this? What I am saying is that you are narrowing down the entire scope of the problem and simplifying it to your own convenient little dimensions that oh, if I can save that chery from being burnt and all those people being rehabilitated, then I shall feel holy and I shall not feel guilty. I think the problem is not like that, the world does not permit you any such consolation, because I have before me Kampuchea. And right in front of me ten million people are being butchered. More people are being killed in Kampuchea than were killed in Vietnam. Now what I am saying is same thing in Russia, same thing in America. I am suggesting that we have to look at the problem of man as he is today, not only in a very simple way of how I can live a very orderly life in a very disorderly world, in a very chaotic, crumbling world, in a totally disintegrating world, how can I live like a holy man? That is not my problem. That would be an oversimplification. I am saying that that sort of thing does not satisfy me anymore. I am not satisfied with being a holy man away from the world, and doing a little good somewhere, and washing the bottoms of poor people I feel that I cannot give any solace to myself by this kind of personal solutions to a problem which has vast dimensions, in which is involved the sorrow of man. And I feel that I am personally identified with that sorrow of man. The sorrow of man is that he has a certain human potential, and the environment is quite favourable, and at the same time there is some crookedness somewhere, something has gone wrong, and this whole civilisation is disintegrating, so that I am unable to get what potential I have in me as a human being. This is not I, but this is so in the whole human race. And we are looking at it sectionally, naturally in India we look at it as an Indian problem, and I say, ‘India is passing through a crisis.’ I suppose they will be saying the same thing in some other country.
59:28 K: They are saying the same thing all over the world.
59:32 AP: I thought we were discussing this subject.
59:35 Q: What then is the correct action? We may postpone action in search of very correct actions.
59:41 AP: I am not postponing, I am saying that the consideration of the widest dimensions of this problem is an aid to personal action, to effective personal action. It is not as though I’m running away from personal action, but I’m demanding from my personal action an effectiveness, a voltage of effectiveness which I will lack unless I get an understanding of the global dimensions of this process of degeneration. There is a process of degeneration. I see it. And I am asking myself, can man survive in this? So, Krishnaji has raised a problem: would you like to deal with this in terms of consciousness, or would you deal with it as an environmental phenomenon which has to be dealt with through adjustments in environment, etc.? I don’t know if I understood you rightly. You raised this question. Am I understanding you rightly?
1:00:50 K: Right.
1:00:53 Q: May I say something? I am a biologist by training and my observations may be slightly biased in that direction. In natural evolution there have been very few instances of social organisations that have been set up by any animal species and man is a prime example of this. But in other animal kingdoms there are very few instances of social behaviour, in quotes, ‘cultures.’ Insects have a few social societies, to have elementary social structure. I was struck by this morning’s conversation in the fact that it related mainly to a view of the world from an ethnocentric point of view in which man is the centre of its concerns, and where, to be cruel or unjust to other men is an important consideration, but more importantly the injustice to nature, and injustice to the total globe on which we are all living today. A very important vantage point which helps me to look at this question is to make a mind experiment and travel, maybe a few million miles outside earth, and look down on this earth, and problems like what we are discussing seem important but at the same time seem kind of relevant in terms of universal concern of how life originated on this earth and what is really happening to it. The age of the earth is about four and a half billion years old. Life probably originated on earth about three billion years ago. Human evolution is about two million years old, a thousand generations, and only in the last hundred generations, two (hundred) thousand years ago, was one generation able to communicate with the next generation by the invention of language. And I think that the real problem that often one sees in biology is the accelerating pace of change. Change is accelerating at a rate which is difficult for any organism to adapt to in a finite lifetime. Our ability as a society to accept the rate of change as accelerating is of very great importance, I think. The real problem is of not being aware of the fact that we live on this earth and that not only are we common creatures and we are humanity as Krishnamurti said, but we are really part of nature. And that it is of great significance to find something like a genetic code in which the tree and I have the same roots of existence. The roots of genetic code for both these organisms, which function in very different ways, are identical. The more one realises this condensed position of us on this earth, maybe with the idea that other life forms have also equal relevance. You were talking of the environment. I feel it’s not only the environment of our social structure, but actually the total quality of life, the way we deal with other things and other people is a very off-handish and high-handed way that often creates problems. I think it’s partly because we do not understand the rate of change. From examples of social behaviour in insects, altruism, which is one of the questions which was being raised in an indirect way, altruistic behaviour is known in other societies but it exists in very, very special conditions. Where altruism actually benefits the whole social order, then it functions, but if it doesn’t, it is selected against by natural selection, altruistic behaviour disappears, selfishness pervades and the beehive is destroyed. The basic mechanisms to understand this problem, for me have been to try to study living systems other than man. I’m not a human biologist but trying to understand something outside of me, so maybe I can get some insights into how I or others work.
1:07:11 K: Agree, sir?
1:07:12 Q: Nothing to agree, he’s giving some explanation.
1:07:15 K: I mean that is so. He says, ‘There’s nothing to argue.’ Would you say we are part of nature, the whole human system is... ...we are condensed, we have brought all this into a centre called ‘me.’ But that ‘me’ has separated itself. It doesn’t accept the whole. Am I making myself clear? And this centre, with all its self-centred activities, is thinking itself separate and fighting the rest. And I’m sure this doesn’t happen — I’m asking you, sir — in the animal kingdom. They join together, they fight a common enemy, but they don’t fight among themselves which is what we are doing.
1:08:40 K: Of course, I know, I know, I know. I pose it as a question rather than as information, to think of some of these problems in a less ethnocentric way.
1:09:06 AP: Would you mean by ‘ethnocentric,’ man-centred?
1:09:09 Q: Yes.
1:09:11 AP: We usually mean by ‘ethnocentric’ treating as Indian or treating as American. The word ‘ethnocentric’ as we use it is that when a Russian looks at the world as though Russia was the centre, an Indian thinks that Indian culture is the core of the world culture.
1:09:31 Q: I personally do believe that there is reasonable evidence that we are in a closed system floating in the universe, maybe with other civilisations in other planets, and that unless we get it straight why we are here, what we are doing, that we are not alone, we don’t have a special dispensation to do as we will with this world, including our own fellow human beings, I think we are sunk, as you rightly say, and I don’t think this question of the rate of change can be understood only in terms of our own interactions with ourselves. I think it has to be understood in terms of nature.
1:10:17 SR: Surely some awareness of that has already been created in terms of the rate of change of exploitation of non-renewable resources, how it’s been exponential in the last fifty years. What further... other than letting more people know the same facts?
1:10:44 Q: I have been most impressed by the American Indians. They have been occupying that continent for thousands and thousands of years when Greece and Rome and India were exploring its cultures, and when the white man found the American continent he found it in very good shape.

K: Marvellous state.
1:11:11 Q: It hadn’t been destroyed ecologically, it hadn’t been exploited nothing terrible had happened. Whereas all man-centred cultures such as ours, and Buddhism and Christianity have actually seen man at the top of a pinnacle and then gone ahead and played havoc with nature. I think that the first photograph of the earth taken from the moon resulted in the beginning of the ecological movement. Suddenly you saw yourself It was the beginning of the realisation that we have to make sure that we don’t mess it up.

K: But, sir, our gentleman would say, ‘How will you feed the Harijan?’
1:12:01 Q: It is this very question, this realisation of understanding a very complex set of questions.

K: That’s right, sir.
1:12:18 Q: Even to understand the whole... why something like the Harijan concept even arises in society, probably that is not even understood, at least, I don’t understand it.
1:12:41 PJ: This might be so, but in order to get face to face with that factor which makes the Harijan possible, is it not necessary to come face to face with that within myself who wants to have the power to be at the top and put the person down below? It’s that factor of divisiveness, of wanting someone to be below. Is it not necessary to come face to face with that?
1:13:12 Q: There was a very interesting television programme, it was something to do with will, will to power. There was a programme on Eskimos that I once saw in which Eskimos in this area of Alaska do not live in villages but live separately. Their main occupation is hunting. The interesting thing was that the people, whenever they hunt, all the different Eskimo families work together and hunt. There is no winner or loser in this situation. The Americans have a new gadget called a skidoo which is a ski-operated motorcycle, so that you can go over long distances on snow. The manufacturers arranged races of the skidoo. It was most interesting that for the first time in Eskimo culture the idea of a winner and a loser was introduced, and the will to power and somebody was better than another.
1:14:28 PJ: But now this factor exists in man’s mind. You have to take things as they are. This factor exists in man’s mind. Without some deep change in that factor, do you think any new movement is possible, any new perception is possible?
1:14:48 Q: But Pupulben, that if we think of beating a horse, and we think we are more powerful than the horse, then I think we are doomed to treat the Harijan also in this way. If we treat nature that way, no wonder we treat our own people...
1:15:02 SP: I think one of the points is man-centred culture is responsible for this degeneration. What does it mean? Self-centred, man-centred, means completely self-oriented: ethnocentric and man-centred culture. I think there’s a lot of meaning in that.
1:15:19 K: I see all this, sir. I’ve seen that film and the commentator, and all the rest of it. My question is, how is this human being to bring about a radical change, not only in himself, but outside? That is what we are trying to discuss. What is a human being, who is fairly cultured, fairly informed, and fairly intelligent, he’s asking this question. He knows all this — the Harijans, the Eskimos, we’re all fairly well-educated. They all see this. And the flow of events is so fast, he’s being carried away. But he never stops and says, ‘How am I — not as an individual, as a human being — to do something about all this?’
1:16:26 Q: I say to myself I do not understand. And I want to understand nature.
1:16:31 K: Yes, sir, but I’m part of that. Therefore I have to understand myself.
1:16:36 Q: Yes.
1:16:39 K: That’s all we are saying. And in the understanding of myself there might be a possibility that I transform myself, that I don’t enter into this murderous game.
1:16:56 Q: Is it conceivable that if I spend a lot of time trying to understand a tree, I may have so little time to beat the Harijan? Is it possible?
1:17:10 K: That involves a question of time, whether time is the factor of change. Or is there something else which doesn’t involve time? We have accepted time as a means of change. If you question that, that there is no tomorrow — psychologically, you understand, sir? — then I am faced with an immediacy.
1:17:48 Q: May I say something, sir?
1:17:51 K: Yes, sir. Don’t ask me, we’re all part of it.
1:17:55 Q: The problem is this: say there is dictatorship in the country, and I fight it. And I know that when my people come to power they may not do anything better. But can I stop fighting dictatorship, can I stop fighting exploitation? You talked about right action. Sometimes we do not know what right action is, but we are moved to act — like going on a strike, maybe I have to, if I am exploited. I know that strikes may not solve this problem, but still there is no alternative to me to going on a strike. What do we do then? This is what I wanted to discuss. We cannot wait for the permanent change of consciousness. Sometimes you have to act.

K: Of course.
1:18:45 Q: If I am the exploited person, I have to act. Say tomorrow there is emergency in the country I have to do something, even to preserve my self-respect, my sense of what is right.
1:19:00 K: Sir, do I take the whole or take the part and say, ‘That must be solved first’?
1:19:15 Q: Yes, but, sir, is there a way out of that? Sometimes we are forced to see only the part and that’s what we have been doing and there doesn’t seem to be an alternative in terms of action. By action I mean not only changing myself but changing the structure. I may have to ban the use of certain things to preserve the atmosphere. So legal changes are also necessary, structural changes are also necessary. So they have to go hand in hand. But we are always limited in doing this, and there doesn’t seem to be the right kind of action which will bring about a more lasting change.
1:19:57 K: Sir, can we discuss that even? What is right action?
1:20:03 Q: Yes, we should discuss that.
1:20:09 PJ: It’s very interesting, Krishnaji, there seems to be time for everything except the time to find a way of looking which is inclusive.
1:20:25 SP: Also, the field of action may be in the area in which we live, but the way we function need not be fragmented, the quality of mind which functions.
1:20:36 K: Sir, what is action? I’m not quibbling over words. What is action? I see a grown-up man beating a boy. I see — all the rest of it. What is action? May I explore it a little? If you agree or... Action means doing, not having done or will do. Having done means remembering, all the rest of it, and that remembrance is acting. Right? Now, I am acting on remembrance. Is that action? Or I have had a great many experiences and that has left a great amount of knowledge, and from that knowledge, I act. I am a Harijan, exploited, you know all that, remembered all that, and from that I act. I hate anybody who is not this. So my action is either based on my remembrance of past things, or on an ideal which I have conceived — a belief, a concept, a conclusion, all that. The concept, the structure, all that is based on the past. My action then is caught between the past and the future. So, I am not acting. My prejudices are acting, my conclusions are acting, my beliefs are acting. And therefore there is division: you believe in communism, I don’t. Or I believe in something or other, and you don’t. So, is there an action which is — difficult word, forgive me — which is common to us — not Harijan, Brahmin, American, Englishman, Eskimo, etc., etc. Is there a common action which is right?
1:23:46 Q: Since we are already fighting for our self-interest in our different groups, which is a fact. A fact that Americans exploit the under-developed countries and the rich exploit the poor, it’s a fact, it’s there.
1:24:01 K: We’re all exploiting each other.

Q: Is it possible to find a common...
1:24:05 K: Yes, sir!
1:24:06 Q: ...among these people who are already fighting, divided?
1:24:09 K: No, they won’t even listen to you!
1:24:17 Q: If you are in search of that kind of action, doesn’t it make us feel desperate? It is impossible to find a common platform.
1:24:24 K: I’ve talked to a great many Americans — top, low. ‘We haven’t time. Go and tell somebody else.’ They won’t even listen to you. And here we’re trying to listen to each other, therefore understand each other, and therefore I am saying, what is action in all this? You base your action on Marx, I base it on Shiva, and somebody else, so on. So can we be free of my Marx, you of yours and he of his, and meet together, find out what action is? Which doesn’t mean we are going to take months, years, and in the meantime no action. Is there an action which is not based on time? Right, sir?
1:25:38 Q: Would you say that action could stem from two basic needs? One could say, I know I am a communist, or a capitalist, and therefore, since I know, I will act this way. The other may be to say that I don’t know, therefore I find out. It seems much better to start with that.
1:26:04 K: That’s right, sir, that’s all I am saying. Can I drop being a communist, when I have been trained for years and years to be communist? I won’t drop it.
1:26:22 Q: Does it seem to you that because the rate of change is accelerating, it’s a safer bet to say that I do not know.
1:26:35 K: Yes, sir. But nobody takes that stand, sir. Sir, which means my action, our action, is based on time. Time being memories and future, past. Is there an action which is not of time? Which means an action of immediacy. Shall we stop?