[Advaita-l] Doubt on an argument in Advaita

[Mahesh Ursekar]

Pranams:

A common argument in Vedanta to justify that the real "I" is consciousness 
is that it is the only enduring entity in the three states of jagrat, 
swapna, & susupti (waking, dreaming and deep sleep). You do not go to sleep 
as person A and wake up as person B due to the presence of the same 
consciousness.

If you not familiar with this argument, see 
http://www.angelfire.com/co/advaitavedanta/AdvaitaPT3.html:

Now it is well know that Vedanta divdes the mind into four parts - Ahamkara 
(ego), manas (mind), buddhi (intellect) and chitta (memory / subconscious).

On this basis, can one not argue that this recollection of the "I" before 
and after sleep is due to chitta (memory) aspect of the mind? Why does 'cit' 
(consciousness) need to be the defining factor in this? One can say that 
'cit' provides us the sense of 'self awareness' but and it uses 'chitta' to 
provide us an idenity of being the same 'I'.


Two supporting arguments:
1. Your PC boots up (waking) after it has been shutdown (deep sleep) in the 
same Operation system it started with though it does not have any 
consciousness. This happens becuase the OS information is stored in its 
memory (chitta).
2. A person suffering from amnesia has the same consciousness before and 
after memory loss but has no recollection of who he or she is. Is this not 
due to chitta being destroyed and has nothing to do with cit?

Can someone help me to clarify this aspect?

Humble pranams, Mahesh