ways of thinking

Ways of thinking
In the world, the most of people are living in their life expecting four expectations. The Buddha also refers to common expectations of living beings which are 1, wish for happiness “Sukhakāma” 2, expelling suffering “Dukkapaṭikūla” 3, to be long lived “Jīvitukāma” and 4, not to die “Amaritukāma”. Any expectation comes under these four. In order to fulfill these expectations in their life we need knowledge. Without knowledge we cannot get these. That is why, knowledge is essential. Then to gain knowledge we need thinking. Thinking may be right or wrong. Right thinking results in right knowledge and wrong thinking begets wrong knowledge. In order to attain right knowledge they should think properly and in right way. Right thinking is called logical thinking. Logical thinking means thinking according to cause and effect. Everything happens according to cause and effect theory. Therefore we need to think cause and effect everything which are faced by us. The person who is not thinking will never obtain any special thing “Nācintayanto puriso visesaṃ nādhigacchanti”. So thinking is also essential. There are two ways in order to take right knowledge. One way is called direct perception and other is indirect perception.
Direct perception is nothing but using sense organs: eye, ear, nose, tongue, skin and their respective sense objects: form, sound, smell, taste, and touch. When sense faculties and their respective objects come into contact, there arise feelings: happy or unhappy or neutral. Feelings result in perception. That feeling is called direct perception. Concerning this way, we should observe that our senses should be clear. This is one way of logical thinking
The next one is indirect perception called Syllogism. This syllogism has five members. They are:
1. Pratijñā – statement to be proved
2. Hetu –reason
3. Udāharana – example
4. Upanaya – application
5. Nigamana – conclusion
As instance, we can say that the mountain has fire as a statement “pratijiña”. we should give the reason that we can see smoke in the top of mountain to prove the statement “hetu”. For that reason we should give similar example like in the kitchen wherever smoke, there is always fire in the kitchen therefore there is smoke in the kitchen, similarly there is smoke in the mountain therefore there is fire in the mountain “upanaya”. Finally, they can see and say that the mountain has fire as conclusion “nigamana”.
In Kālama sutta, there are ways of thinking as a source of knowledge based on ten factors;
1. Anussava – report,
2. Parampara – tradition,
3. Itikira – hearsay,
4. Piṭakasampadana – traditional text,
5. Takka – mere logic,
6. Naya – way of thinking,
7. Akāraparivitakka – considering external appearance
8. Ditthinijjhānakkhantī – delight in speculative opinion
9. Bhabbarūpa – possibility
10. Samano no garu – idea of our teacher.
If we consider these ten factors, we can get two ways of thinking. They are traditional thinking and rational thinking. This sutta expresses to give up unwholesome things and to follow wholesome things when we know their nature. Finally we can conclude that thinking should be arranged logically and with personal experiences.