From Which Consciousness Do Concepts and Experience Arise?

Concepts exist only within the mind consciousness. The mind consciousness corresponds with concepts, whereas the five sense consciousnesses, the manas, and the eighth consciousness have no concepts of dharmas. This is because the mind consciousness corresponds with the characteristics of dharmas and possesses the ability to think, analyze, generalize, and summarize—abilities that the other consciousnesses do not have.

Experience is the wisdom and cognition accumulated in the process of encountering corresponding dharmas. The five sense consciousnesses have experience of the five sense-object states, and the mind consciousness has experience of mental sense-objects (dharma-objects). The experience of the six consciousnesses lasts only a single lifetime and is subject to forgetting. The manas, however, accumulates experience from life after life; it does not perish, and at critical moments it can be swiftly activated to protect one's own safety and interests. As for the eighth consciousness, although it does not perish life after life, it has no memory, and there is no such thing as "experience" for it, because its wisdom is fixed and is so by the very nature of dharmas (dharmatā)—neither increasing nor decreasing. Therefore it has no experience and needs no experience, yet it can still operate all dharmas in an orderly and normal manner.