Hare Kṛṣṇa! Daṇḍavats!
Let me present to you a few doubts, which I have; please respond:
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Do I exist? What is the proof that I exist?
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Can you prove to me that the basic premises of knowledge are a reality? Let me explain: why do you accept that you are a male or that rasa-gullā is sweet or that the sun is bright? Why should I assume that such entities exist, that they have stated properties, and that I can actually know them?
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Suppose I axiomatically accept (that does not save you from answering the first two questions) that I exist and that what I perceive is reality. However, that does not mean I can generalise my experience. Who decided that the laws of mathematics and logic are self-evident truths? Why should I accept? If you see me with a red face, shouting and banging my fists and kicking objects around me, why do you presume that I am angry? Why does a doctor presume a disease based on symptoms (I am making it easy for you)?
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Suppose you tell me that you got 90% on your test. Why should I believe? What is the proof? Even if you present your marksheet and also your academic authority's testimony, how do I know that the documents are not forged or that the authority is not lying? On what premise does the law-court decide such cases? Why does the court trust witnesses and documents, even award capital punishment on that evidence?
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How do you know there is a reality beyond what you perceive (if that is a reality)? Why do you think that there is God? Just because you feel, does it make it a reality? How do you know that the world existed before your birth? Maybe time itself began with you. Suppose Kṛṣṇa Himself comes to you. How do you know He is Kṛṣṇa, not some demon in disguise or your own hallucination? Suppose, while chanting, tears rolled from your eyes and your hair stood on end; is that the criterion for accepting the validity of chanting? I do not experience, but you do. Prove to me that it works.
Actually, from birth, we accept certain self-evident truths, and that makes our lives simple. All our questions should be based on certain authoritative premises; otherwise, there are no answers.
If you say I do not experience anything while chanting, how can anyone possibly prove that it works? In fact, your understanding is faulty: you are not experiencing what you think you should experience, not that chanting has no effect. Experiment: How long can a person chant 16 rounds and masturbate daily? Now, if you say, “But we already have a previous conditioning about the purity of chanting and impurity of releasing semen,” then I can ask if you had no previous conception, why would you chant at all? It is more natural to masturbate than to chant. Why? Because we identify more with our physical conditioning. But isn't the Bhagavad-gītā true that sense enjoyment leads to misery? What do you get after masturbating? You feel total waste, an idiot. But after chanting, you do not feel wasted. You feel inspired to serve Kṛṣṇa. Again, you can object on the conditioning ground. That is, if you believed that masturbation is helpful to devotional service, then you would actually experience that. I consider such doubts totally unscientific. But they are valid per se. That does not mean they can be answered.
Every question cannot be answered. One or even multiple failures to get results do not disprove a mathematical law. In college, we used to do many experiments with slide callipers, pendulum, electric meters, mixing chemicals, titration, etc. Even if we did not get standard results after repeated failures, we had to stick to the established measurements. The pendulum thing almost always gave wrong results (g has to be around 9.8 and we got anything from 108 to 2 – I do not remember properly), but we never said Newton was wrong and faithfully recorded some fake numbers to get g ≈ 9.8 (never exact, that is another story). I still believe Newton's calculation is correct and have no hesitation in admitting that it's my fault. Why?
Actually, we are not trained to accept the śabda-pramāṇam. It requires training, beginning with the practice of brahmacaryam. Why can't you accept that Prabhupāda is correct, even if you feel you did not get results? It is difficult because we are not trained. Then someone will raise the question that we are actually brainwashed to accept śabda-pramāṇam or that there are so many scriptures (which is correct). Then you are brainwashed to accept laws of mathematics, logic, grammar, etc., which cannot be empirically verified, if empirical evidence is accepted as reality. What do you say? As far as the multiplicity of scriptures is concerned, śabda-pramāṇam is not just about the revelation of one person. That is the mistake committed by all the religious sects. It requires a more comprehensive premise, which is provided by the Vedic authority. It is not a revelation at a point in history to one person at a particular geographical location. It is about an immemorial tradition of multiple schools with the culture of disputation as well as self-realisation through a spiritual process. It is jñāna-vijñāna-sahitam.
Although we have lost a lot of grey matter by releasing semen and filling our minds with other garbage, by the mercy of Śrīla Prabhupāda, his movement and his books, we have got this rare opportunity. Let us utilise it and make our knowledge and realisation perfect. You will surely get the stated results by chanting. Ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam… that we can experience immediately. I do. I bet you do too. If not, then you decide. Otherwise, join the saṅkīrtana movement (param vijayate śrī-kṛṣṇa-saṅkīrtanam).
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