Perhaps the most readily recognized but most difficult to describe mode of perception is that of self-consciousness. Finally there is the noetic perception of the accomplished meditator. It is incommunicable to one who has no commensurate experience save by analogy and correspondence, for it reflects the perceptive mysteries. A cow which is seen is unique and cannot be replaced by another cow without altering the perception. The cow that is inferred, however, belongs to a class, and any member of that class can be substituted by any other.
Perceptual knowledge is, therefore, of particulars and inferential knowledge is general.
Objects of perception consist of instantaneous moments given seeming duration through an act of the mind which blurs perceptions together. Similarly, the false sense of self is formed by assuming continuity on the basis of a contiguity of moments. When objects of perception are stripped of these superadded mental accretions, so that they remain purely svalakshana, they are paramarthasat, absolutely real. From this standpoint the highest Enlightenment is pure perception. Negative perception, perceiving that something is not, has some epistemological relevance but played no logical role in Dharmakirti's system.