Emergence Is An OBJECT To Consciousness
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- čas přidán 6. 09. 2024
- #identity #consciousness #existentialquestions
✦ What is consciousness, and why does this question matter?
✦ It matters because it's an answer to the question: "Who am I, in the final analysis?"
The Pith
★ Consciousness is fundamental.
★ Consciousness does not emerge from matter; objects emerge IN or appear TO consciousness.
Go Deeper
1.) You can't do better than "The Upanishads." The Easwaran translation (you can google it) is very accessible, and the prose is quite beautiful.
2.) For an excellent analytic philosophical treatment of this topic, see Bernardo Kastrup, "The Universe In Consciousness" (PDF: philarchive.or.... Go deeper still: His best book, in my view, is "The Idea Of The World."
3.) Rupert Spira's "The Nature Of Consciousness" offers a powerful, elegant defense of the "consciousness-only" model. He is one of the clearest expositors today of the perennial nondual teaching, which is most evident in Advaita Vedanta.
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It’s not overly spiritual, because this is starting in physics, this is scientific based. And psychological, then we get into spirituality, but it’s the same story of self discovery, and discovering divinity within oneself. Like I said, you cannot have some thing exist without an observer. The universe created itself-we are Aperture which the universe is looking out, but we are all one. Alan wants to set the above.
im only 5 mins in and can tell that you are a really good speaker. with some people i have to exit the video after the first 10 seconds because of the rambling, annoying tone. keep up the great work!
Wow, that's a very kind comment. And it's also a testament--your comment, I mean--to the possibility of genuine civic discourse even in the digital age.
@@secondaxialage My pleasure! Yes I'm working on an EdD right now at a social justice themed university and I have been getting a little alarmed and depressed at how immature and generalizing the supposed "academic/intellectual" speech has become, with nobody even challenging this decline and watering down of how we present ideas, not to mention the inability for people to engage in debates with those of opposing views. Everyone just gets the deer-in-headlights blank stare, or they start panicking and hysterically shut down the conversation out of fear.
I'm trying to keep a positive attitude and hoping more people start taking your approach in the way they speak and the level of intelligence to which they (hopefully) choose to arise.
@@OneSliceNation Well said. And agreed. Wishing you well with this project.
Everything is in Consciousness Bernard Kastrup champion of Idealism.
His theoretical expositions are great. "The Idea of the World" is, I think, his best book.
Hi and thank you for producing these videos.
I have been meditating for sometime and reading and listening to the teachings of a number of spiritual teachers. When I use thought to drill down about, “what am I?“ I ultimately arrive at, “I am consciousness.” However, the question I cannot answer is, “Is consciousness fundamental or has consciousness sprung from this self-replicating system of matter?” It seems to me that my brain supports consciousness and that when this physical body dies, this localized consciousness at least, will be no more. I’m not saying I disagree, I’m just explaining my observation. I suppose if I had an experience of ‘Oneness’, the question would be settled, but I have not. How comforting it would be to have a true understanding, not a belief, but an experiential understanding that consciousness is fundamental and that we are it and there truly is no individual self.
Great comment!
A few remarks:
1. When you ask, "What am I?“ just be silent. Of course, you might be simply conveying, in your comment above, what it wordlessly the case for you during meditation. For that reason, I may misunderstand your answer: "I am consciousness."
And yet, if I'm not misreading your reply and so if that thought often arises during meditation, then just let it go and sink naturally into the silence of being.
2. "Is consciousness fundamental or has consciousness sprung from this self-replicating system of matter?” One could wade through a lot of absolute idealist philosophy and then one could vigorously go through trenchant critiques of materialism or physicalism--but such is not necessary! The direct path teaching of Advaita Vedanta cuts right through this question--and helpfully, elegantly so.
a. See clearly that this question is _just a thought_.
b. And now see that all thoughts are simply arisings.
c. To what are all of these thoughts, including the one above, arising? To consciousness!
d. Therefore, simply be conciousness wakefully!
e. "But I have more doubts!" Then go through, gently and not mechanically, a-d above.
3. The answers to your questions will come experientially once you let vritti--or mental activity--naturally (not forcefully) come to a halt.
With kindness, Andrew
I will tell you what consciousness is through experience. It’s awareness, it’s awareness without, interjection or the judgment of the ego with labeling. It’s untying the knots that bind us to our character
Let me ask you? Have you ever observed the observer and then removed both? You’ll see nothings left, and you are everything.
My hypothesis is it needs an observer, otherwise, there is no existence.… Either that or symbols, but anyway, we are evolving now. We are supposed to lol that’s all I’m gonna say.
1. "My hypothesis is it needs an observer, otherwise, there is no existence." This needn't just be a hypothesis; it's confirmed by meditation or--call them--introspective experiments. Case A: Try, for instance, to experience seeing-arising without *being aware* of seeing-arising. You'll discover that such is impossible. Hence, *being aware* of seeing-arising is a necessary condition for seeing-arising. Case B: Simply consider (in ordinary parlance) that the eyes may be open, and yet there may be the experience not of seeing but of deep daydreaming. Then witnessing consciousness is *aware of* daydreaming (imagining). This shows that any objective experience is *dependent upon* witnessing consciousness in order to appear.
2. Go further, now, than the hypothesis. Even the observer stand ultimately disappears or dissolves. If you listen to the last 2 minutes of this video (czcams.com/video/crenFbrOiKg/video.htmlsi=5vJ5e9K28qhJo7GH), you'll find a thought experiment that's meant to mimic what Vedantins refer to as "deep sleep." It's worth trying as it starts to hint at "samadhi" or "nirvikalpa samadhi."
@@secondaxialage I have experienced samadhi
If I didn’t mention in the above post… I was observing the observer, and I removed both. Nothing was left, and I was everything.,
Consciousness has developed through evolution. It has helped us succeed as a species in that we have spread all over the world and multiplied vastly. It has made us a dominant species in that we have no serious competitor as a species. That consciousness has given us the knowledge of our own mortality and it has allowed us to see the vastness of existence. We can learn secrets of life and nature, but can only make guesses about a wider purpose of existence. The idea that we are special in some way, perhaps having a role as the awareness of the universe, is just guess work. It is the consciousness of our own mortality that sparks religion and philosophy. Ironically that fear of death is also an evolutionary tool. If we could conquer that fear by changing our perception of time, then we could live enlightened lives, ie just living as human beings, not fantasising about a special place we have in the universe.
Franklin Merrill-Wolffe! I haven't heard that name in 30 years!
Love it! His 2 works are really great. Have you seen his aphorisms (or heard him recite them)? The first one is right out of Gaudapada: www.merrell-wolff.org/fmw/aphorisms.
@@secondaxialage I sat with him in '74 and '75 at the ashram.
@@kiplambel4052 Amazing! This really makes my day.
thanks
You're very welcome.
@@secondaxialage The"me" being brain-damaged keeps forgetting we need objects for the consciousness to keep us from being in a permenant "as-if" sleep in the Parabrahman, so turyia to you!! Once again, thank you!
@@Lawrence.Bennett One "keeps forgetting." Yet you're that which knows the object, the thought labeled "forgetting" (nama). Be this knowing, turiya. 🙏
You could be the Europeanised image of Jesus
"The Europeanised Jesus" sounds like a name of a 90s band. ;)
This is multidisciplinary, and my wisdom is divine. But I will tell you, once you learn the symbolism, language of the unconscious, the importance of allegory , mythology, zoom out, and find the similarities relevant for the time and culture created.
My wisdom is more divine than yours but thanks for playing.😂😂😂😂😂
I have a huge amount of respect for this view and I am indebted to it greatly. This video is a fine defence of consciousness's unique and fundamental nature, guided by Eastern introspective traditions. Could you contrast this with some of the rival dualistic traditions in future, whether Western or otherwise? I can see why consciousness is fundamental in its own right but I can't see why the deliverances to consciousness can't be sourced from fundamental beings in their own right - objective objects. You don't explicitly reject this possible state of the world but I'd wager that you are inclined to say that consciousness circumscribes all reality, so I had to ask for curiosity's sake.
This is just the right question. What a keen one.
Here it is again: "I can see why consciousness is fundamental in its own right but I can't see why the deliverances to consciousness can't be sourced from fundamental beings in their own right - objective objects."
Let me offer a short answer here; a longer answer here: pathwaystotao.substack.com/p/an-introduction-to-advaita-vedanta.
1. The Vedantic teaching unfolds in a series of steps. Each step is "sublated" by the next step as the understanding is refined via intellect and, above all, through meditation.
2. The starting point for this video essay is a misunderstanding thanks to physicalism (plato.stanford.edu/entries/physicalism/ ). In order to correct this misunderstanding, we start with a standard picture that no reasonable being would reject: there is a subject and there is an object. Then the question is: "What, in truth, is the subject, what the object?"
3. *It turns out* that witnessing consciousness is the subject, and the body, mind, and world are all objects (so understood).
4. We're now in a position to answer your question. At this stage, we then "go back" and examine objects. And what's discovered, in fact, is that objects are made only of consciousness. Here are sub-steps: (4a) Objects arise in consciousness. (4b) Objects are pervaded by consciousness. And (4c), in the final analysis, just as waves are only made of water, so objects (or arisings) are only made of consciousness.
5. Therefore, it's *experientially understood* that there is only consciousness, i.e., that all that exists is nothing but consciousness. This is the *absolute end* of suffering and, what is the same thing, the *absolute peace* that is none other than consciousness.
Coda: Of course, all of these steps need to be understood experientially, and that cannot be conveyed in a CZcams reply. The intellectual understanding can be conveyed (hence this reply), but not the experiential understanding. The former invites one to dive deep into meditation in order to realize the truth for oneself.
@@secondaxialage I can't thank you enough for taking the time to give such a thorough answer to my question. I'll definitely go through the long answer you linked to.
I agree with the general thrust of the explanation you give despite my brief encounters with meditation. I'd like to take it further a bit by adding a few more considerations. My first encounter with similar ideas was with the philosopher George Berkley's criticism of the distinction between secondary and primary properties in empiricism. After a lengthy struggle with him, I was convinced that there was something suspicious about the 'objectivity' of objects. Nonetheless, I couldn't quite let it go.
In part 4 of your answer, you put forth several facts about our experience of objects. There may still be room for reality independent of consciousness in this picture. We agree on step (4b) that consciousness pervades objects as they arise. I'd continue the ideas this way. The consistency of such objects is a mark of their structured nature - one that seems independent of ourselves as witness consciousness. These objects appear to us, yes, but they retain their being and identity in a way seemingly independent of our whim or anything we can identify as part of ourselves. Doesn't this smell of objective behaviour? A kind of persistence that is independent of us. This apple I presently hold will endure as it is in experience regardless of how long I look at it. Here is a question that might clarify what I mean. Why does consciousness pervade these things so faithfully and with such costly diligence?
I'd expect to see a freedom of form on the thesis that consciousness is fundamental but the content of experience is remarkably rigidly structured. I can't help but posit that this is because other beings, just as fundamental, structure and condition consciousness. I tried my best to put this into words so forgive me if it's still a bit obscure. I am eagerly looking forward to your answer when you can offer it.
@@gofaonepaul You're asking just the right questions.
1. You'll find an answer to your excellent question if you go through the experiments in Greg Goode's The Direct Path: A User Guide. Goode wrote his Ph.D. dissertation, in fact, on Berkeley.
2. For now, here's a reply (#2-9) that's in line with Goode's:
"These objects appear to us, yes, but they retain their being and identity in a way seemingly independent of our whim or anything we can identify as part of ourselves. Doesn't this smell of objective behaviour? A kind of persistence that is independent of us."
It does "smell" of objectivity--*but* it's not there. Let's see:
3. Put an object--a rock, an orange, etc.--in your hand. Close your eyes, and pay attention only to touching. That is, set aside seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, thinking, and feeling.
Now, what if, following Goode's lead, we were to drop the label "object" and substitute the label "arising"? Henceforth, we won't use the label "object," only the provisional (clearer) label "arising."
4. What is your direct experience? It's only a sensation: a tingling or warm or dull (etc.) sensation. Does that sensation tell you, on its own, that it's a physical object? No, it doesn't. Do you find (consider too, e.g., Hume) that there's, in your direct experience of this sensation, a cause of this sensation? No, you don't. You just find the sensation. Do you find, in your direct experience of sensation, that there's a hand feeling or doing the touching? No. Again, just the tingling sensation.
Be, as Rupert Spira says, like a newborn infant. Go back through #4 until this is clear.
5. Go further. Do you actually discover *a continuously present* sensation here? No. It comes and goes, rises and falls.
Look closely. See that the sensation is tingling--rising and falling--and, as such, is not continuously present.
6. For all these reasons, there can't be "an object" outside of experience, and this experience is, in fact, just sensing-arising. And this sensing-arising isn't continuously present (it doesn't perdure); it's intermittent.
7. Now, what is THAT which is continuously present while sensing-arising is occurring *and* when sensing-arising is absent? Witnessing consciousness! Witnessing consciousness is continuously present!
8. But--here's the surprise--YOU are witnessing consciousness. So, *you*--not some imaginary object--are continuously present throughout all experience, i.e., throughout all arisings. You're like a single line that runs through all temporary arisings.
9. Therefore: BE witnessing consciousness *knowingly*.
I’m waiting for you to tell me the view, but I will have to challenge with origins of consciousness by Neuman because I came to some of these realizations prior, but I have an open mind
I will never stop talking, this is my purpose for the life that I leave because my hair is on fire… Or at least I’m supposed to be looking for a pond. Second, please be as abstract as possible, and what else is the meaning of life in my opinion? Nonsense,