[Advaita-l] Reconciling current research with Advaitic theory of mind

[Mahesh Ursekar]

Pranams Praveen:

A lot of what you say is based on the Tripura Rahasya and talks of "a still
part of the mind and the moving part." such that "The moving mind is what is
termed as the mind, in general, and the still mind remains as the
consciousness!"

I have not read the book nor am I familiar with the above theory so cannot
comment on your post in any intelligible way. If you (or any other member
familiar with this text) can throw some light as to how it explains the two
tests that I cited in my post, it would help tremendoulsy. Furthermore, I am
curious if this theory is in consonance with 'standard Vedanta' theory of
mind.

Pranams, Mahesh



On 2/24/07, Praveen <bhatpraveen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> praNAms all,
>
> >>Maheshji wrote:... It is important since split-brain persons do not
> have multiple personalities like schizophrenics....
>
> praveen: I was just about to bring out this comparison. I feel that
> the condition is quite similar, even if not at the same gravity. In
> short, split-brain seems to be one way of creating multiple/ dual
> personalities (upto an extent).
>
> Nonetheless, the consciousness that comes with a feeling of I in
> advaita is not the same that comes with the scientific understanding
> of I. What I grasp from Tripura Rahasya is that the consciousness
> itself is split, so to say, into a still part of the mind and the
> moving part. The moving mind is what is termed as the mind, in
> general, and the still mind remains as the consciousness! The
> awareness of the object is objectification of this moving mind through
> the senses, ergo, resulting in consciousness of the object, or many
> objects simultaneously, as the case usually is. I'll try to say this
> in other words towards the end of the mail.
>
> Some other points that I'd like to bring up here are that a *similar*
> feeling of consciousness being split and a different existence felt
> when one recalls on waking up that he dreamt something, but doesn't
> know what! Wasn't the brain and thence the mind split then too? IMHO,
> multiplicity is a very common feature of all (human) existence, moslty
> caused by thoughts; these thoughts make up the mind. Any sadhaka will
> find this very feature to be the most difficult hurdle (and the only
> one, perhaps) in one's sadhana!
>
> Finally, what I want to say, putting all of this together, is that
> humans have something called as *I know* that is akin to the feeling
> in all sentient beings. *But*, humans seem to *know that they know*.
> Thats a recursive behavior ad infinitum! That makes it impossible for
> one to conclusively say that the consciousness is tapped through brain
> waves or understood any which way. The very act of scientifically
> studying (or witnessing meditatively) the consciousness is creating
> duality of mind and witnessing one with the other!
>
> So what is studied can *never* be the consciousness; it has got to be
> something other than that! (not mixing sarvam khalvidam brahma)
> Atmost, what Maheshji pointed out from the article "They can tell, for
> instance, whether a person is thinking about a face or a place or
> whether a picture the person is looking at is of a bottle or a shoe."
> could be is the *result of* moving (part of) mind, not moving (part
> of) mind itself, and definitely not still (part of) mind, that makes
> up the consciousness.
>
> Rgds,
> --praveen
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