Skeptics, fetal nirvana & more...

[M Suresh]

Giri wrote:

>         However even in deep sleep or in yoga-nidra, the brain is
> functioning to produce delta waves, thus NOT proving that you are not the
> mind. The Menninger foundation which conducts a lot of experiments in this
> area says that proving the dependence of consciousness and the central
> nervous system is crucial. Yoga says that consciousness is not the product
> of the central nervous system, which what most scientists would laugh at.
> Some modern scientists have gone as far to say 'Give me a central nervous
> system, I will show you consciousness.' Yoga points out that the central
> nervous system is only a wire while the consciousness is the electricity
> and hence not dependent on the wire.

You have talked  of consciousness above.  Since we are a mirror of the
all prevading Sat-Chit-Ananda ( A side question:  how can we attribute
characteristics of  Sat-Chit-Ananda,  i.e Being-Consciousness-Bliss to
the atrribute-less Nirguna Parabrahman? ), there are 3 characteristics
in us which  distinguish us from machines.  WILL corresponding to SAT,
CONSCIOUSNESS  corresponding to  CHIT,  and  EMOTION corresponding  to
ANANDA.  Such an explanation is found in the  introduction of Bhagavad
Gita Translation by Swami Chidbhavananda.

>         To prove that consciousness is independent of the nervous system
> is simple. Just measure the activity of the cortical portion of the brain
> (which should be a flat line in EEG) of a person in turiya (fourth
> state). It would directly show that both are independent of each other
> scientifically (the last couple of sentences are paraphrased from the
> above book).

Do you mean that normally flat-line EEG is there only when the nervous
system is not active  as in the deep-sleep,  and in turiya there is no
such dependence?

> Namaste.
>

Namaskar,
Suresh.