Personally I think it would be a good use of this blog to examine our use of certain words and phrases. It's clear that when one man uses a word, another man 'hears' something else (there is no personal comment implied to anyone here). So we endeavour to communicate but we filter words though our own associations and hence live in our own universe.
I recently read about Buddha. Buddha was described by the author as the embodiment of bodha. Bodha was defined as 'pure intelligence'. As we know, the words Buddha, bodha and buddhi all trace back to the same sanskrit root, 'budh' to do with being awake. This definition of 'pure intelligence' rang a bell here. So...
What is intelligence? What is intellect? Are they different? It seems to me that our habitual associations with these words are very different. Intellect, in common parlance, seems to be referring to analytical mind, manas. The word intellectual has come to be used (particularly in the school) as a derogatory term. ‘Someone who hasn't gone beyond book knowledge’ or something similar.
As I'm sure most are aware the Sri Purohit Swami translation of the Gita uses ‘intellect’ for buddhi. And I suspect the average reader would hear fairly un-buddhi-like connotations on reading it. But even in the english, getting back to ‘pure’ conception, devoid of associations:
Intellect:
1 a : the power of knowing as distinguished from the power to feel and to will : the capacity for knowledge
[Merriam-Webster Dictionary]
‘The power of knowing’ is an interesting notion. Depends on what sort of ‘knowledge’ we’re talking about as to how we think of this? Our current intellectual climate would probably associate ‘capacity for knowledge’ as ‘ability to absorb and order lots of facts’ ? i.e, manas.
What about the word intelligence? The modern connotations are perhaps to do with IQ or something similar. Despite the limitations of IQ, I suggest there is an important characteristic contained in those kinds of tests. The idea is that the ability to solve the test is not related to prior knowledge. All the information should be in the question. Of course it doesn’t quite work like this when confronted with 5 anagrams and asked, ‘which of the following is not a poet?’. Is this testing the ability to solve anagrams or testing 'information about poets which I have committed to memory' ?
To me, the ‘pure intelligence’ is that faculty of mind that operates in the present, ‘awake’ without reference to prior constructs, systems etc. It ‘sees’ directly what is true or false and it can only operate when ‘awake’. Intellect in its ‘pure conception’ as ‘power of knowing’ must amount to the same thing. I wouldn’t consider this to be a denial of analysis, systems etc. The buddhi is the overseer that can pick up or put down a number of conceptual tools. It doesn’t have to be bound by any of them. It knows that none of them are ‘the whole truth’.
“Words stand between silence and silence: between the silence of things and the silence of our own being. Between the silence of the world and the silence of God. When we have really met and known the world in silence, words do not separate us from the world nor from other men, nor from God, nor from ourselves because we no longer trust entirely in language to contain reality.”
~ Thomas Merton
Sunday, December 24, 2006
Intellect
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2 comments:
It's a feature of all languages, which are always changing, that a word -- especially those connected with human qualities -- tends to be divided, when there seems to be a need, into two similar words with different usage which carry different emphases.
The Latin word 'inter-lego' -- 'to choose between' -- is one example. We would say that it fits perfectly the definition of Sanskrit 'buddhi' in action ?
But its actual usage as two (not too distinct) derived words, 'intellect' and 'intelligence' tends to imply (at least to me) that intellect is used for a more precise quality of mind, while 'intelligent' is used in a more active and practical context. We/I might say 'it's clear that dogs have intellect' but
'What an intelligent dog you are, Fido !' (tail wags...)
The same progressive division can be seen with the related word 'intelligentsia'. It is quite a recent, 20th century derivation, used with approval by the Russians and Poles to describe the highly educated class who possessed culture and power. But already in English usage, there can be a 'sneer factor' in the assumed usage of the word -- so people now have to add another word to sort this out -- 'The so-called intelligentsia' (I hate them..) or
'the real intelligentsia' (that's me and my mates...)
Add to this the factor of translation -- if the Conversations were mediated through Hindi, the word used for 'intelligent' could be 'hoshiyar' or 'tej'...
Dare I say this, but words 'run down'...they are used incorrectly, or approximately, or innocently -- who looks up the dictionary between speaking every word ?!
So language and meaning have a precarious relationship -- especially when looking to usage rather than definition !
Is that an, er, intelligent, even relevant, answer ?
Or as 19th century schoolmasters trained in Greek would say -- 'Use your nous, boy !' (intelligence drawn out of innate knowledge...)
I must say that I don't have negative associations with "intellect", or indeed with "manas". Nor do I believe we can or should try to create a 'one word, one meaning" culture. Words can 'run down' as Vamana puts it, but they can also 'climb up'.
I think the old argument about meanings eroding is a bit of a sham. You will hear people saying things like "'Gay' used to be such a happy word", as if we don't have any alternatives, or as if we don't need words to speak about homosexuality. In fact all that is being said is that the speaker does not like homosexuals.
It could be said that our language is becoming sexualised, but what needs to be addressed is that our culture is becoming sexualised. Language does cause changes in culture, but I think this has effect has been exaggerated. More usually, the language changes as a result of cultural change. The School and the Politically Correct are oddly of one accord on the issue of language - I think both are wrong.
Kapila's quotation from Thomas Merton agrees with HH - "no-one needs to bind himself to a word".
Sanskrit seemed to me when I studied it as a rather poverty-stricken language so far as vocabulary goes. EG there is only one word for 'goose', 'swan' etc. Evidently the pandits were not great observers of the natural world.
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