[Advaita-l] cloning and inevitable mrutyu

Raghav Kumar Dwivedula raghavkumar00 at gmail.com
Tue Apr 24 01:20:30 EDT 2018


Namaste

A more difficult to answer question would be of the kind -
How do we decide a given entity is a jiva with sanchita karma or is it just
an Android or machine which merely mimics speech, facial features etc.
I.e., a sophisticated robot ?

Any clone is generally initially cultured in vitro (i.e., in a "test tube")
and later transplanted in vivo (into a uterus) and later the baby is
delivered in a regular way. And given its biological/organic physiology and
neuronal architecture it's quite credibly a jiva in its own right with its
own sanchita karma etc. This is my understanding.

Now if we consider a futuristic android (a real android not its namesake
smartphone OS !) which has a brain consisting of just electronic devices
with no neuronal structures, it's does not sound believable if some people
like the proponents of strong-AI claim it's a human being who has the
faculties and capacities and consequently the rights of a human being.
(Others like Roger Penrose contradict this). But can we give a precise
reason why an electronic entity cannot be considered a jiva with the usual
faculties of iccha, GYAna, and kriya and having sanchita karma etc.

Another related question - we can talk of higher mammals like deer, cows
etc., as having sanchita karma etc. Now the question is, can we extend the
privilege to still lower entities like insects (yes), viruses (doubtful),
plants(yes), stones (no). But where do we draw the line?

The concept of chidAbhAsa is to some extent helpful in figuring this out
since it (chidAbhAsa) does indeed depend on the underlying neuronal biology
and not merely on the superficial faculties of speech and motion which a
robot or android can mimic.
Om
Raghav


On Tue 24 Apr, 2018, 9:17 AM Bhaskar YR via Advaita-l, <
advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:

> praNAms Sri Sada prabhuji and Sri Venkateshwaran prabhuji
> Hare Krishna
>
> Thanks for the clarification.  Just wondering what would be karma / dharma
> for these cloning creatures :-) Perhaps it is their karma phala to get
> created through cloning technology :-)
>
> Hari Hari Hari Bol!!!
> bhaskar
>
> _______________________________________________
> Archives: http://lists.advaita-vedanta.org/archives/advaita-l/
> http://blog.gmane.org/gmane.culture.religion.advaita
>
> To unsubscribe or change your options:
> https://lists.advaita-vedanta.org/cgi-bin/listinfo/advaita-l
>
> For assistance, contact:
> listmaster at advaita-vedanta.org
>


More information about the Advaita-l mailing list