The other day I was talking to a neurosurgeon, a very young and bright fellow. He said that memory, or rather the neurons containing memory, are not in one area. The eye, the ear, the nose, all the five sensory organs in your body have a different sort of memory. But they don't yet know for sure. So we have to get more answers. As I see it, everything is genetically controlled. That means you don't have any freedom of action. This is not what we have been taught in India — the fatalistic philosophy. When you say that there is no freedom of action, it means that you have no way of acting except through the help of the knowledge that is passed on to you. It is in that sense, I said, no action is possible without thought. Any action that is born out of thought which belongs to the totality of knowledge is a protective mechanism. It is protecting itself. It is a self-perpetuating mechanism. You are using it all the time. Every time you experience anything through the help of that knowledge, the knowledge is further strengthened and fortified. So every time you experience greed and condemn it you are adding to its momentum. You are not dealing with the actual greed, anger or desire. You are only interested in using them. Take, for example, desirelessness. You want to be free from desire. But you are not dealing with desire but only with the idea of `how to be free from desire'. You are not dealing with something that is living there. Whatever is there or happening there cannot be false. You may not like it and may condemn it because it doesn't fit into your social framework. The actions born out of the desire may not fall into the society's framework which accepts certain actions as socially acceptable and certain others as anti-social. But you are concerned only about values. You are concerned about grappling with or fighting that which you condemn. Such a concern is born out of culture, society, norms, or whatever. The norms are false and they are falsifying you. ....
Q2: What is the way of making this system, let us say for convenience, `mind', more efficient?
UG: Why, it is already efficient.
Q2: We would like it to be more efficient.
UG: By trying to do that you are only sharpening the instrument. That instrument [thought] is useful in achieving certain results which are outside the field of living.
Q2: Is the mind itself outside the field of living?
UG: It is all dead. It can deal with only ideas or thoughts which are actually dead.
Q2: Say there are two cities and a river in the middle. These two cities have to communicate, and we have to build a bridge.
UG: Yes, you already have the technical know-how.
Q2: No. We don't.
UG: You don't have, but someone else can give it to you.
Q2: Suppose no one gives it.
UG: Then, you don't bother about that. We don't discuss hypothetical situations. Who the original man was, how did he get this idea — whether it was by trial and error — we don't bother about all that. The demand to cross over to the other side because there is a rich land there is a kind of drive — the drive for survival. That drive is an extension of this survival mechanism that already exists in nature. You don't have to teach dogs, cats, pigs, and other wild animals, how to search for food, eat and survive. All our activity is nothing but an extension of the same survival mechanism. But in this process we have succeeded in sharpening that instrument. With the help of that instrument we are able to create everything that we are so proud of — progress, this, that, and the other. You may be able to put this record player together and take it apart. This kind of knowledge can be transmitted from one person to another. But the problems which we are interested in solving — the day-to-day problems, living with someone else, or living in this world — are the living problems. They are different every time. We would like to treat them on a par with mechanical problems and use that knowledge and experience [coming from dealing with the mechanical problems] to resolve problems of living. But it doesn't seem to work that way. We cannot pass on these experiences to others. It doesn't help. Your own experiences don't always help you. You tell yourself, for example, "If I had this experience ten years ago, my life would have been different." But ten years hence you will be telling yourself exactly the same thing, "If I had this experience ten years ago, ...." But we are now at this point and your past experiences cannot help you to resolve your problems. The learning concerning mechanical problems is useful only in that area and not in any other. But in the area of life we don't learn anything. We simply impose our mechanical knowledge on the coming generations and destroy the possibility of their dealing with their problems in their own way.
The other day I met somebody, a leader. I don't know him. He had come straight from some university. He said, "We have to help the coming generation." He said that the future belongs to the young generation. I told him, "What the hell are you talking about? Why do you want them to prepare to face their future? We have made a mess of this world so far, and you want to pass this mess on to the younger generation. Leave them alone. If they make a mess of the whole thing, they will pay the price. Why is it your problem today? They are more intelligent than us." Our children are more intelligent than us. First of all, we are not ready to face that situation. So we force them into this mold. But it doesn't help them.
The living organism and thought are two different things. Thought cannot conceive of the possibility of anything happening outside the field of time. I don't want to discuss time in a metaphysical sense. I mean by time yesterday, tomorrow, and the day after. The instrument which has produced tremendous results in this area [of time] is unable to solve problems in the area of living. We use this instrument to achieve material results. We also apply the same thing to achieve our so-called spiritual goals. It works here but it doesn't work there. Whether it is materialistic goals or spiritual goals, the instrument we are using is matter. Therefore, the so-called spiritual goals are also materialistic in their value and in their results. I don't see any difference between the two. I haven't found any spirit there. The whole structure which we have built on the foundation of the assumed `self' or `spirit', therefore, collapses.
What is mind? You can give a hundred definitions. It is just a simple mechanical functioning. The body is responding to stimuli. It is only a stimulus-responding mechanism. It does not know of any other action. But through the translation of stimulus in terms of human values, we have destroyed the sensitivity of the living organism. You may talk of the sensitivity of the mind and the sensitivity of your feeling towards your fellow beings. But it doesn't mean a thing.
Q2: But there must be some sensitivity without a stimulus.
UG: What I am talking about is the sensitivity of sensory perceptions. But what you are concerned with is sensuality. They are different things. The sensory activity of the living organism is all that exists. Culture has superimposed on it something else which is always in the field of sensuality. Whether it is a spiritual experience or any other experience, it is in the field of pleasure. So the demand for permanence is really the problem. The moment a sensation is translated as a pleasurable one there is already a problem. The translation is possible only through the help of knowledge. But the body rejects both pain and pleasure for the simple reason that any sensation that lasts longer than its natural duration is destroying the sensitivity of the nervous system. But we are interested only in the sensual aspect of the sensory activity.
Q1: When you refer to `we' whom do you mean?
UG: Because we are using the word `we', you are asking me the questions, "Who is the `we'?" "What is the entity that is using it?" etc. This is only a self-perpetuating mechanism, and it is maintaining its continuity. When I say `self', I don't mean the `self' in the sense in which we normally use the word. It is more like a self-starter in a car. It is perpetuating itself through