Change is taking place everywhere, from the smallest and least to the highest.  Atoms and reals are continually vibrating and changing places in any and every object.  At each moment the whole universe is undergoing change, and the collocation of atoms at any moment is different from what it was at the previous moment.  When these changes are perceivable, they are perceived as dharmapari@nama or changes of dharma or quality; but perceived or unperceived the changes are continually going on.  This change of appearance may be viewed from another aspect by virtue of which we may call it present or past, and old or new, and these are respectively called the lak@sa@napari@nama and avasthapari@nama.  At every moment every object of the world is undergoing evolution or change, change as past, present and future, as new, old or unborn.  When any change is in a potential state we call it future, when manifested present, when it becomes sub-latent again it is said to be past.  Thus it is that the potential, manifest, and sub-latent changes of a thing are called future, present and past [Footnote ref 2].

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[Footnote 1:  Vyasabha@sya, Tattvavais’aradi and Yogavarttika, III. 14.]

[Footnote 2:  It is well to note in this connection that Sa@mkhya-yoga does not admit the existence of time as an independent entity like the Nyaya-Vais’e@sika.  Time represents the order of moments in which the mind grasps the phenomenal changes.  It is hence a construction of the mind (buddhi-nirma@na).  The time required by an atom to move its own measure of space is called a moment (k@sa@na) or one unit of time.  Vijnana Bhik@su regards one unit movement of the gu@nas or reals as a moment.  When by true wisdom the gu@nas are perceived as they are both the illusory notions of time and space vanish. Vyasabha@sya, Tattvavais’aradi, and Yogavarttika, III. 52 and III. 13.]

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Causation as Satkaryavada (the theory that the effect potentially exists before it is generated by the movement of the cause).

The above consideration brings us to an important aspect of the Sa@mkhya view of causation as satkaryavada.  Sa@mkhya holds that there can be no production of a thing previously non-existent; causation means the appearance or manifestation of a quality due to certain changes of collocations in the causes which were already held in them in a potential form.  Production of effect only means an internal change of the arrangement of atoms in the cause, and this exists in it in a potential form, and just a little loosening of the barrier which was standing in the way of the happening of such a change of arrangement will produce the desired new collocation—­the effect.  This doctrine is called satkaryavada, i.e. that the karya or effect is sat or existent even before the causal operation to produce the effect was launched.  The oil exists in the sesarnum, the statue in the stone, the curd in the milk, The causal operation (karakaiyapara) only renders that manifest (avirbhuta) which was formerly in an unmanifested condition (tirohita) [Footnote ref 1].