Mind Sees Things before they appear

[Guest guest]

Namaste Sadaji and Sri Michael,

Thanks for your replies. Here are a few questions I have on

Michael's post :

> One of the points of these experiments and why they are so

interesting to

> behaviourists and materialists (no mind only matter) is that it

seems to

> explode the idea that consciousness is the end result of a series

of events

> that have to occur before we attain a mysterious plane called

consciousness.

 

Seems like Vedanta and Science are at direct opposites. In Advaita,

I would say that this Universe is considered as the mysterious plane

rarther than consciousness!! ( being under the inscrutable power of

Maya ). And consciousness seems to be only ever existent entity

since we are always conscious of everything around us ( at least

while in the waking state! )

> everlasting. Still the intellect, which is the limiting adjunct

of the Self,

> becomes transformed in the shape of the objects while issueing out

through the

> eyes etc.,

 

How is intellect considered as a limitant ? Isn't intellect what

tells us the difference between real and unreal ? I thought this

would be the one means to right knowledge that would lead us in the

right path.

> (from Chap.I on Perception pg.12 Sw.Madhavananda tran. Advaita

Ash.pub.)

> It cannot be thus urged that if the mind thus be not an organ, the

perception

> of happiness etc. will not be immediate (saksat); because the

immediacy of

> knowledge does not lie in its being due to an organ; for in this

case inference

> etc. also being due to the mind would not be immediate, and God's

knowledge,

> which is not due to any organ, would not be immediate.

>

> My Decipherment: I reject the contention that the sensation of

happiness can

> only be an immediate perception if the mind is an organ. To

support my claim I

> offer the counterexample of inference which is a mental act.

Inference is not

> an immediate thing. ((it is a process and proceeds in stages in

real time)).

> Moreover God's knowledge is an example of a knowledge which is

immediate and is

> not due to an organ or to a mind.

 

Unfortunately I don't have this text with me.

>From your statement above on the quote from the Pratibasa :

The argument looks like the assumption is made that the mind

is 'not' an organ. So I read it as ' Happines is immediate since the

mind is not an organ' .

Anyways, the logic is very complex here and I may have understood it

all wrong. Please tell me if that is so.

 

Thanks and Best Regards

Guruprasad

[Guest guest]

Hello Guruprasad,

Yes, consciousness is back in vogue as a study and the refinement of

measurement is throwing up some interesting data such as you related.

 

As for the intellect being a limiting adjunct. It is a way of explaining by

analogy how the intellect becomes identified with the Self. An example given

is that of a crystal in the presence of a red flower taking on a red hue. It

appears to be changed but it is not - the flower is its limiting adjunct. Its

essential nature has not changed. In Br.Up.IV.iii.7 (comm) Sankara puts it:

"The intellect being transparent and next to the self, easily catches the

reflection of the intelligence of the self. Therefore even wise men happen to

identify themselves with it first; next comes the Manas, which catches the

reflection of the self through the intellect; then the organs, through contact

with the Manas; and lastly the body through the organs. Thus the self

successively illumines with its own intelligence the entire aggregate of body

and organs."

 

Obviously the illustration involves two things whereas Consciousness/Self

pervades the intellect, body, mind and senses in a non-dual way. Any of these

analogies work if they are not over-cooked so to speak by being treated as

absolute parallels.

 

The intellect through analysis, discrimination, atma vichara can, I am told,

prepare the way for realization.

 

What V.P. is rejecting is the idea that only if the mind is an organ can the

feeling of happiness be immediate. The idea is that as in the case of the

organ of sight our seeing of things is immediate and direct, we likewise have

the inner experience of happiness through an inner organ called the mind.

 

<Unfortunately I don't have this text with me.

>From your statement above on the quote from the Paribhasa :

The argument looks like the assumption is made that the mind

is 'not' an organ. So I read it as ' Happiness is immediate since the mind is

not an organ' >

 

In this particular discussion, in which it is urged that the mind is an organ,

it is taken as a given by both the advaitin and the materialist that the

feeling of happiness is immediate. It is not in dispute so it does not have to

be demonstrated. The materialist holds that this is so because the mind is an

organ. V.P. rejects this for the reasons stated.

 

Sankara discusses these issues in Br.Up. IV.iii.6

 

Objection(materialist): Suppose the eyes and other organs themselves were the

agents of vision and so forth.

Reply: No: the rememberence that one is touching the very thing that one has

seen, would be impossible if there were different agents for these two acts.

Objection: Then let us say, it is the mind.

Reply: No; the mind also, being an object like colour etc., cannot be the agent

of vision and so forth. Therefore we conclude that the light in question is

inside the body, and yet different from it like the sun etc.

 

I hope that this is clear,

Best Wishes, Michael