VII. Question: Do hungry ghosts and humans perceive the same objective aspect? For instance, when observing the same river, a hungry ghost, a human, and a celestial being perceive it differently: humans see a river, celestial beings see lapis lazuli, while hungry ghosts see flames or pus and blood.

Answer: Since it is the same river being observed, the objective aspect must be identical; only the subjective aspect differs for each. This discrepancy arises due to the workings of karma. If a hungry ghost sees a river within its own realm, that river is certainly different from the river humans perceive in the human world—the objective aspect differs. If the hungry ghost perceives matters from the hungry ghost realm, it has no relation to us humans, and the objective aspect is distinct. However, if it observes the mountains, rivers, and earth of the human world, although what it perceives differs from human perception, the objective aspect remains consistent—it is still observing the river as it exists in the human realm.

Though the hungry ghost realm has its own way of life and material environment, distinct from the human realm, when a hungry ghost observes people or things within the human world—for example, when a ghost sees a human—is it seeing a being from the ghost realm or a human from the human realm? The person it sees is the same person others see. Could the objective aspect be the same? It must be the same.