I would never die for my beliefs, because I might be wrong.
-Bertrand Russell
There are almost no certainties in life. Almost every conclusion we reach, every decision we make, every thought that occurs to us and every word we speak is a leap of faith to some extent. I can’t even say that the table that is in front of me right now exists or not. I may say that if I assume that there is a physical table present in front of me, then through my perception (i.e. my eyes, retina, and brain), or through the sense data that I receive, I see the brown colour of the table. The brown color of the table is a combination of the actual physical object (if there is any) and my senses and not the sole property of the actual physical object. So me saying that “the table exists” or “the table is brown in colour” are also leaps of faith.
So many things that we might be absolutely certain of, can also be reduced down to a leap of faith. I found this great example to elaborate my point in the book Problems of Philosophy by Bertrand Russell. He says that we can say one thing for sure, that the sun will rise tomorrow, except can we? If someone asks you, why do you think that the sun will rise tomorrow? You’d probably say, “because it rises everyday” or “because earth completed one rotation and the laws of gravity suggest us that this will happen”, and you’d be right in saying that, but there is an implicit assumption here. You are assuming that since the sun has risen everyday till today, the trend will continue tomorrow. Or since we have observed that the laws of gravity were followed in the past, they will be followed in the future as well. We are creatures of habit and we tend to assume that historical patterns will repeat in the future, because it makes intuitive sense, but it is a leap of faith. He gives a great analogy to make sense of this. Not just humans, animals also are creatures of habit. If a person feeds a chicken everyday, the chicken expects food whenever it sees the person. But the same person wrings the neck of the chicken one day. The chicken expected that the person will give it food that day as well. It could very well be that we are the chicken and the laws of gravity are the person who feeds the chicken. So if we are forced to reach to a conclusion, we may go to the extent of saying that more and more repetition will increase the probability of something happening, the probability will be very close to 1, but will never reach 1.
There are two principles that are very core to Jainism called Anekantavada and Syadvada. We may discuss Anekantavada and Syadvada in detail in some future blog, but the conclusion that Anekantavada reaches is roughly “to understand one thing fully, we will have to understand everything fully”. So if I want to understand everything about this table in front of me, I will have to understand everything about everything in the world. This might seem a little far fetched initially, but think of how many things we will have to know if we want to know everything about this table. What type of tree does the wood of the table come from? Where in the world does this type of tree exist? What is the climate that is suitable for the growth of this tree? What is the cost of this wood? Why does it cost this much? Are there any trade restrictions or sanctions that the local or foreign government has enforced on this specific type of wood? How is this wood processed? How is it polished and assembled? How are the logistics handled? Why is this specific wood used in this table? What is the chemical composition of this wood? and so on. After a few such questions, we will quickly understand that how many subjects this covers. Each question triggers a chain reaction to 100s of other more nuanced questions. We will eventually reach to the most fundamental questions of human existence. So Anekantavada establishes this background and Syadvada expands on it. Syadvada says that since we don’t know anything certainly and completely, we should talk in probabilities and not assertions. We should say “this may be true” instead of “this is true”. This means that Jainism is open to multiple realities, much like science. This is a very rudimentary and simplistic explanation of topics as complex, detailed and nuanced as Anekantavada and Syadvada, but this serves the purpose for our discussion here.
Do you see the beauty of the conclusion we reached from Syadvada? There is so much humility in the statement when we say ‘may be’ instead of asserting something. We have to have supreme ego to say that we know something fully. Also, we have to be supremely arrogant to say that someone is dumb just because their leap of faith (that too just in our opinion) is bigger than ours. So many disputes in the world since the birth of humanity are because a few people did not understand that there could be multiple realities and multiple perspectives and every perspective is a leap of faith. The quote by Bertrand Russell mentioned at the beginning summarizes this beautifully. I am guilty of attaching my ego to my beliefs and I think all of us are. So let’s try to keep this in mind next time there is a heated debate with anyone 😄.
Hope you liked this one. See you next time.