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SOME PROBLEMS IN JAINA PSYCHOLOGY
complexes which are conserved in the mental structure of the individual and bring about changes in it. The conserved elements are not the mere mass, but are organized wholes through cohesion, as Drever writes. Such cohesion brings about force and facilitates recall. Perceptual experiences are retained in the form of mental dispositions. This is also Spearman's Law of Retention. Thus, retention is a necessary condition of recall. However, it is not itself recall and should not be identified with recall. We have seen that in the Pramāṇamīmāmsā also there is a description of retention as a condition of recall.
Hemacandra describes the process of recollection. According to him, it is smrti. It arises from the stimulation of mental dispositions, vāsanā, which may be considered to be equivalent to saṁskāra. Perception, once experienced continues to remain in the mind in the form of an unconscious mental trace, or an unconscious mental disposition. This is a latent condition of memory. But when they are stimulated, they come to the surface of consciousness and we recall the experiences which we once cognized and which remained so far in the form of mental traces. Therefore, Hemacandra says that the stimulation of the mental trace gives rise to recollection.9 The emergence of the latent mental trace by stimulation then, constitutes a necessary condition of recall. Unless the stimulation is present, recall is not possible. According to the Naiyayikas, smrti is a form of qualified perception and has reference to the direct presentation of some object, although it involves an element of representation. In memory, there is a revival of past experience in the form of ideas and images, in the same order in which they were actually experienced by us and were retained by the soul.10
The emergence of the mental trace to the conscious level is, as seen, due to its stimulation. This stimulation is determined by different conditions. The conditions for the emergence of the mental trace to the conscious level may be classed into two types: (i) external conditions, and (ii) internal conditions. The external conditions refer to environmental factors. Observation of similar objects, for instance, is an external condition necessary to arouse the mental trace to the level of conscious state. Mohanlal Mehta, in his Jaina Psychology, has mentioned that external conditions necessary for the fact of recalling may be classed into three types, which represent the three laws of association: the law of contiguity, the law of similarity, and the law of contrast.11 The recollection of an object experienced in the past refers to the object as "that", "that jar", "that cloth". Perception always refers to the
9 Pramāņamimāṁsā, 1, 2, 3. Vāsanodbodhahetukā tadityākārā smrtiḥ'.
10 Tarkasamgraha p. 85. (Calcutta)
11 Mehta (M): Jaina Psychology, p. 87.
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