RE: Will Spirituality Be Taught in Schools in Future as Part of Scien

[Guest guest]

>aiyers

 

Raju - beautiful article. I have a question. or comment.

>If science is uncomfortable with traditional religions, it is far less so

>with Advaita. There are a number of reasons for this. One is Advaita’s

>approach which is close to that of science itself. Some of the basic tenets

>of Advaita are no doubt axiomatic since they must be taken on faith and

>cannot be absolutely proved.

--------

I am not sure advaita rests on axiomatic tenents.

 

That I exit - is it an axiomatic statement? On the other hand axiomatic

statements presuppose my existence. Is it not?

 

The same is I am conscious entity. That is not an axiomatic statement

either.

Existence and consciousness has to be eternal and infinite and therefore

anantam follows to avoid logical contradictions.

 

Sat - Chit and ananda or limitlessness are self-evident facts since

axiomatic tenants presuppose an existent-conscious entity, which has to be

infiniteness.

 

Nonduality follows since there cannot be anything other than sat -chit and

ananda. satyam is same as sat. while shivam and sundaram follow from their

infinteness.

 

Implications are advaita is not based on any tenants but self evident facts

as they stand.

 

Prof T.P. Mahadevan, a great philosopher said advaita translated as

non-dualism - the non applies to not only duality but to ism as well.

 

I agree that vishiShTa advaita and dvaita are based on axiomatic tenants

which they justify using Vedanta pramaaNa.

 

Hari OM!

Sadananda

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These axioms however do appeal to our intuitive sense of what Truth

ultimately must be: a) “satyam”- must “ring true” so that the mind naturally

accepts it without need for external proof; b) “shivam”- capable of

bestowing peace on the knower of the Truth; and c) “sundaram”- beautiful in

its simplicity. Using logic, Advaita then develops these axioms into a

theory that covers the full gamut of experience, spiritual and material. In

this Advaita is very much like any other branch of science that starts out

with axioms. The proof of a science lies in how well the statements it makes

accord with verifiable experience. Some of the assertions made by Advaita

are verifiable in our day-to-day lives, while those dealing with the

realized state appear reasonable and also stand attested by the reported

experience of Yogis.

 

 

 

 

 

>A second reason for science’s affinity with Advaita has to do with the

>discoveries made in relativity theory and quantum mechanics in the last

>century. These discoveries have thrust suddenly and irrevocably into

>fundamental science what many think is a decidedly spiritual element. The

>world-view of the new physics, it has been often noted, shares much in

>common with Advaitic and Buddhist teachings.

>

>Yet another window to spirituality has been opened with advances in

>neurophysiology, concurrent with an increased acceptance by the public of

>yoga and meditation. Study after study by researchers equipped with latest

>neuro-iamging techniques is bearing out the views long held by Yogis.

>There is growing consensus affirming the real benefits that meditation and

>yoga confer on the mental and physical health of the practitioners,

>irrespective of their age, religion or other background. These studies

>also provide evidence that the benefits are not limited to the duration of

>the meditation, but carry over to the rest of the daily activities- in

>other words, they transform life. This probably marks the first time

>anything approaching a universal spiritual law has been scientifically

>tested and validated.

>

>Taken together, these theoretical and experimental developments augur well

>for the greater involvement of science in spirituality in the future. It

>is just possible that out of this work will grow a new discipline of

>science of spirituality bearing, for aforementioned reasons, similarity to

>Advaita.

>

>What role will Mathematics play in this future scenario? The work reported

>in the last twelve postings has hopefully demonstrated that some of the

>concepts of Advaita can be captured through mathematical models.

>Admittedly, what is presented is only a first baby step, a sort of

>“proof-of-concept”. Yet, it shows how the entire continuum “from the

>Knower of the Field to the Field” (i.e. everything save the Brahman Itself)

>can be represented by a two dimensional geometry and the state of spiritual

>evolution of a jeeva by a single variable. It also yielded results in the

>spiritual realm with unexpected similarity to results from the material

>world.

>

>Is there any experimental validation of the time contraction result derived

>from the model? I recently raised this question with Prof Sara Lazar, of

>Harvard Medical School, where numerous studies on the effect of meditation

>have been carried out. According to Dr.Lazar, there have been no

>quantitative studies to measure the effect of meditation on time

>perception, but expects someone to do that sooner or later. Regarding

>contraction in perceived time, Dr. Lazar however noted in her e-mail that

>“this phenomenon is often mentioned by practitioners (along with need for

>less sleep)”.

>

>In pages 29-30, I have mentioned some of the ways that the model could be

>developed further with future work. There is of course no guarantee if any

>of this work will be fruitful, but we should leave that to the Lord.

>

>Time was not too long ago when mystery and secrecy surrounded the practice

>of medicine by the village “magic healers”. All that changed with the

>impressive progress in life sciences over the last three centuries. Today

>there is a uniform standard for the medical profession around the world, a

>standard built on “evidence-based” medicine. Very few will deny that the

>changes to medicine brought forth by science have been on the whole only

>beneficial to mankind. Now, physical and mental health is important to a

>human being, but spiritual health is even more so. Could, or should, there

>be a similar revolution using evidence-based spirituality?

>

>When science and mathematics do succeed in understanding and affirming

>spirituality in their own terms, the wall separating science and religion

>would have to come down, inaugurating a new era in human history.

>Spirituality would become part of the science curriculum in schools.

>Religion as it is practiced today would be changed for the better,

>stressing more on their underlying universal spiritual laws and

>de-emphasizing their mere exterior ornamentations. The effect would be to

>liberate spirituality from the superstitions surrounding religions.

>

>I end this series with these optimistic thoughts. I thank Ramachandran ji

>for inviting me to present my ideas and sincerely appreciate the comments

>from readers. Presenting my ideas in this forum has been tremendously

>useful to me and I hope some of you also saw some value in reading it.

>

>Hari Om! With Pranams to Gurudev Swami Chinmayananda ji,

>

>Raju Chidambaram

>

>

>

>Discussion of Shankara's Advaita Vedanta Philosophy of nonseparablity of

>Atman and Brahman.

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