One of the philosophic problems that Nagarjuna raised for epistemology has to do with an alleged regress of justification, on the assumption that a pramana is required in order to know, and that to identify the source of a bit of knowledge is to certify the proposition it embeds. Nagarjuna claims that this is absurd, in that it would require an infinite series of pramana, an identification of a more fundamental source for each source relied upon.

Vedanta philosophers argue that such a threat of regress shows that knowledge is self-certifying, svatah pramanya. Vedantins connect the Upanishadic teaching of a truest or deepest self (atman) as having awareness with the Mimamsa epistemological theory of self-certification: at least in the case of spiritual knowledge (vidya), awareness is self-aware.

From this it follows that only awareness is relevant concerning all questions about awareness, since only awareness itself has, so to say, access to itself. Awareness itself is the only consideration relevant to any question about awareness itself, its existence or its nature.