Time, Space and Knowledge and Non-Conceptuality

Introduction

Time, Space and Knowledge1 (TSK) was the first of a series2 philosophical guidebooks by Tarthang Tulku created to “clarify some of the issues of traditional meditative techniques.”3 Born in the Golok region of Tibet and trained at Tarthang Monastery prior to leaving Tibet sometime around 1959, Tarthang Tulku eventually came to the United States in 1969, where he has taught and published extensively. Regarding TSK, Tarthang Tulku further wrote:

As I became more familiar with Western concepts, particularly with those found in the sciences, I saw the possibility of a visionary medium through which a common ground could be found in the pursuits of knowledge carried out by the various sciences and religions.4

Non-Conceptuality

In a sense, TSK is an introduction to non-conceptuality. Conceptuality is a deeply-ingrained habit of thought. It is very difficult to think or talk about anything without invoking some form of conceptuality. We are trained since infancy to learn words, which are the basis of communications and of thoughts. How many of your thoughts involve words? How many do not involve words? Even those that are images, sounds, scents, tactile sensations, and the like still tend to involve concepts, concepts that furthermore can usually be rendered into words to a greater or lesser degree.

So from the standpoint of TSK, concepts are actually the source of discontent.5 For example, we might not think that we conceptualize about pleasure and pain very much – as opposed to merely experiencing them – but a strong case can be made that they result from dwelling in a world of concepts. The kinds of concepts that come into the scope of TSK are inside/outside, self/other, now/then, here/there, and so on. So from the standpoint of TSK, contentment has to do very much with the resolution of concepts.

We all experience non-conceptual states from time to time. Music theorist and composer Jonathan Kramer6, who wrote about losing his sense of time – a time dilation – during a performance of Satie’s marathon piece “Vexations,” was describing a non-conceptual, or at least semi-conceptual experience as the result of his exposure to art. This strikes me as a naïve example of what Tarthang Tulku would call “Time – stage two”7 perception. He (Kramer) was still in temporal conceptual space, but the normal units of time were severely stretched. There are other more ordinary examples. There is a moment in a sneeze, where we are momentarily in a non-conceptual state. The same is said to be true of orgasm. These are biological motivators of a momentary lapse in the normal conceptualization of experience.

Role of Awareness

Non-conceptual moments can be aware or not aware. More specifically, the usual dualistic categorization of opposites (i.e., self/other, inside/out, etc.) is not operative. It is not that these conditions do not exist, but rather one’s thinking is not focused on them. It is a different focal setting,8 as it would be expressed in TSK.

So the primary theme of TSK is the cultivation of non-conceptual states with awareness. There is not only the experience but also – necessarily – the recognition of this focal setting. In order to be pervasive, this non-conceptuality would operate in terms of temporal, spatial and reflective acuity – in other words, time, space and knowledge.

From the standpoint of TSK, the imbalance that we experience in our lives results from the domination of our mental and emotive processes by conceptual thinking not being balanced in some way with non-conceptual perspectives on our circumstance and the specific activities of living.

“Cracks” in the Ordinary Experience of Time

When Tarthang Tulku writes about “Time stage-3,” this is a perspective of time that is not based in conceptual thinking processes. If we try to imagine, using concepts, undifferentiated time where there is no before or after, where past, present and future are equally present, it is very difficult to do. We tend to think that it is nonsense. In one way, that is perfectly true, because to the conceptual frame of reference, time is linear and any suggestion otherwise has no integrity. If our experience overall completely matched that scheme of things, then there would be no point in pursing this subject. However, Kramer’s experience is merely one example of numerous examples suggesting that the conceptual framework has “cracks.” So then the question is, what is it that is showing through those cracks?

Kramer described an experience where his watch showed one thing and his internal sense of time showed another. He had lost – for a while – a sense of the forward motion of time. As he put it, “I lost touch with past and future as I became engulfed by the present.”9 What this suggests is that our perception of time has a great deal of flexibility.

Probably we all have the experience of deliberating slowing time down. Driving to an important event and being late, sometimes it helps to pay so much attention to each moment that we seem to get further faster. Special skills such as music or athletics bring out some of the same capacities.

Applying Awareness to Time, Space and Knowledge

In TSK, we do something similar by examining each moment in great detail. Perhaps it is for the purpose of discovering the past/present/future of each moment. Perhaps what we are doing is looking for the space between thoughts. TSK provides many such exercises. If, for example, you get really involved with one of the book’s exercises, so that you are not thinking about anything else, you will most likely experience a time dilation.

So the first objective is to induce non-conceptual moments of time/space/knowledge awareness. The second is to provide a context for understanding what these moments are and how they fit into the larger scheme of living. It is not important to place the perceptions of non-conceptual awareness on the same ontological footing as ordinary conceptual awareness. As non-conceptual awareness develops, it will gradually redefine our conceptual awareness just through the process of integration. The important point, rather, is to develop the capacity to recognize conceptual and non-conceptual alike and to understand their relationships with each other.

TSK provides an interesting perspective in saying that the non-conceptual is the basis and the conceptual is founded upon and grows upon the non-conceptual. So in one sense, developing an awareness and knowledge of the non-conceptual is a way of going “back to the source,” so to speak. These are mysterious and very personal things. In the end, each of us must decide if this makes sense in some useful way. What TSK does, is provide a rich and convenient pathway for developing this acquaintance – this intimacy – with non-conceptual awareness.

\(\triangleleft\) Essays

Footnotes

  1. Tarthang Tulku, Time, Space and Knowledge: A New Vision of Reality, (Emeryville, CA: Dharma Publishing, 1977).↩︎

  2. Love of Knowledge, 1987, Knowledge of Time and Space, 1990, Visions of Knowledge: Liberation of the Modern Mind, 1993, Dynamics of Time and Space: Transcending Limits of Knowledge, 1994, Sacred Dimensions of Time and Space, 1997.↩︎

  3. Tarthang Tulku, Time, Space and Knowledge, xxxi.↩︎

  4. Tarthang Tulku, Time, Space and Knowledge, xxxi.↩︎

  5. “This feeling of lack of space, whether on a personal, psychological level or an interpersonal, sociological level, has led to experience [sic] of confusion, conflict, imbalance, and general negativity with our society.” Tarthang Tulku, Time, Space and Knowledge, 5.↩︎

  6. Jonathan Kramer, The Time of Music: New Meanings, New Temporalities, New Listening Strategies, New York, Schirmer Books, 1988, 378-381.↩︎

  7. Time, stage one “involves the ordinary sense of time,” Tarthang Tulku, Time, Space and Knowledge, 136. Time, stage two is the “essential force that lets moment give way to moment,” Tarthang Tulku, Time, Space and Knowledge, 146. Time, stage three – Great Time – “is not a thing or a process. It is not disposed in one way rather than in another. It is not conditioned by anything nor does it condition anything,” Tarthang Tulku, Time, Speace and Knwledge, 159.↩︎

  8. “…it may be possible to discover a kind of space in some intimate connection with each thought, each sensation, each surface, and each conceptual category which constitutes our lived world. The availability of such discoveries is entirely a matter of the particular ‘focal setting’ or perspective we use.” Tarthang Tulku, Time, Space and Knowledge, 4.↩︎

  9. Kramer, The Time of Music, 379.↩︎