Aristotle, often called the father of physics, described physics as a branch of science that studies natural phenomena. The word physics comes from ancient Greek and means knowledge of nature. Nature includes both non-living and living matter, so physics studies the behavior of both. Most philosophers after Aristotle did not confine their research to non-living matter or living matter. After Galileo developed telescopes and observatories to study the motion of planetary bodies, and after Isaac Newton discovered the laws of motion and gravitation, a general notion prevailed that Physics involves the study of the behavior of non-living matter only. The rapid development of science over the last two centuries has produced so much knowledge that it has become inevitable to classify it into many disciplines. As a result, a physicist may think his field of investigation is limited to physics and that he has nothing to do with biology or any other discipline. But for a dedicated scientist committed to studying nature, this division of science has no meaning, and he studies every phenomenon of nature, ignoring it. Many great physicists, such as Erwin Schrödinger, Max Planck, Eugene Wigner, and Max Delbrück, have stepped outside their native field to help solve various mysteries of life.
Spirituality is an important aspect of life, and it has made a surprising comeback in the mainstream in the past few decades. Research has already begun to study the effect of spiritual practices on mental health.[1] My life took an unprecedented turn 25 years ago when I said goodbye to my well-settled scientific career to begin my spiritual journey after a realization that spirituality is another dimension of Physics. I began this spiritual journey to explore spirituality scientifically. I began practicing Yoga, a purely spiritual practice developed by ancient Rishis of India, as described in the ancient text of Yoga known as the Patanjali Yoga Sutra. After exploring and studying every aspect of life from the perspective of Physics and spirituality, I came to the conclusion that the human body is much more than a physical system made of flesh and blood that works on physical energy in terms of calories we get from food, and an important aspect is missing from the present study of life. Before presenting my study of the physical, philosophical, and spiritual aspects of life, I will discuss the aspect of life that Schrödinger discussed in his book What Is Life?
PHYSICAL ASPECT OF LIFE
Ludwig Boltzmann was the first physicist to speculate on the thermodynamic perspective of living organisms. He proposed that living organisms also need entropy for existence, along with food and energy. Richard McCulloch explained this macroscopically by comparing the human body to an internal combustion engine or a heat engine. A human body gets energy from food and converts it into mechanical energy, as a heat engine does by using fuel. In the fundamental expression PV=kT, the variables vary greatly in a heat engine, and entropy also increases greatly. But in the human body, these parameters vary only slightly. Physicists agree that this becomes possible only if entropy is negative, that is, entropy is fed into the body.
Erwin Schrödinger analyzed the issue microscopically. In his book What Is Life, he explained that living matter evades decay to thermodynamic equilibrium by homeostatically maintaining negative entropy in the system. Schrödinger, among the founders of quantum mechanics, viewed living organisms as ensembles of molecules that also contain a hereditary molecule, later identified as DNA. He compared the structure of molecules in a living organism with the crystalline structure of solids. While crystals in solids are highly ordered and repeat continuously, the hereditary molecule in an organism does not repeat itself much, and Schrödinger called this an aperiodic crystal. When a solid gains energy as heat, atomic disorder increases, and so entropy also increases. In an organism, when it gets energy, the order of molecules is not disturbed, so entropy does not change. Schrödinger did not conclude anything in his book about why living organisms feed on negative entropy. He speculated that the behavior of living organisms may be understood by other laws of Physics, hitherto unknown, which, however, once they have been revealed, will form just as integral a part of science as the former. Schrödinger also offered his philosophical views on living organisms. He was influenced by Arthur Schopenhauer and by Hindu philosophy of Atman = Brahman, according to which Atman is the animating principle in all living organisms and responsible for negative entropy in organisms
EXTRA-PHYSICAL ASPECTS OF LIFE
Biology presents living organisms as having multiple biological, self-sustaining processes such as growth, movement, metabolism, reaction to external stimuli, energy transformation, and reproduction. I will begin by claiming that biological processes are self-sustaining. This cannot be true because nothing in nature can be self-sustaining. A fundamental law of nature, the law of causality, holds that no effect or change can occur without a cause. No motion is possible without a force. For example, if you ask a doctor why a heart pulsates, he may reply that the heart gets a train of electric pulses from a sophisticated oscillator made of neurons and housed in the medulla region of the brain. The heart’s muscles contract in response to electric shocks, and the heart continues to pulsate according to the pattern of electric pulses. When I asked a neuroscientist what causes the oscillator to stop suddenly, leading to cardiac arrest, He may have no answer, or he may reply, “Just like that.” I have seen many cases where many health- conscious, young persons with no history of heart disease have died of sudden cardiac arrest, and the doctors do not know the cause. Biological studies cannot tell what causes an oscillator to work. The self- sustaining process can be compared with perpetual motion in Physics. A perpetual machine is a fantasy many engineers have imagined, but it cannot become reality because it would contradict the basic law of conservation of energy, and nothing can happen against the laws of nature. In this article, we are exploring what causes the heart to pulsate.
Many people mistakenly believe the human body’s physical system runs on the energy we get from food. If this proposition were true, then it would be impossible to explain many inequalities among human beings. For example, we know that an adult’s physical energy consumption is around 2000 kilocalories, with a margin of about 15%, but there is an order-of-magnitude difference between individuals’ outputs. At one end, we find extremely inactive persons in the category of beggars who cannot earn their bread and depend on others for survival. They just sit on the roadside all day asking for food. clothing, or money. On the other hand, we may find very active people who work up to 18 hours a day with a smiling face, and they may even consume fewer calories than someone with a sedentary life. In short, the output in terms of achievements is not proportional to input.
In psychology, active people have more motivation, while inactive people lack it. The brain is the seat of motivation; therefore, I will discuss motivation from a neuroscience perspective. Every human brain is almost identical in structure, except for minor variations. What may shape human behavior, intelligence, and motivation is how many neurons in the brain process the information needed to perform a task. A small mental task activates fewer neurons, while a very complex task activates many more. The number of neurons in the brain is so large that a scientist like Einstein used only 30% of the brain’s total neurons in his entire life. According to this, every human being should have the same motivation and intelligence, since motivation, consciousness, intelligence, and creativity are products of the brain alone. But research shows a continuous spectrum of motivation and intelligence in human beings. Some people spend their lives doing petty jobs because they lack the motivation or intelligence to learn a higher skill and earn more. At the other extreme, there is a category of great people who did magnificent work that changed the course of the world. This discussion implies that faculties like motivation, intelligence, creativity, and consciousness are not products of the brain, a part of the human body’s physical system. This conclusion also follows from a posthumous analysis of Albert Einstein’s brain. His brain was preserved after death to investigate a region of the brain that could be attributed to his extraordinary intelligence, but scientists found nothing remarkably different from the brains of normal people. It is not difficult to conclude that, in addition to biological processes of movement, growth, metabolism, reaction to external stimuli, energy transformation, and reproduction, life has many other Extra- Physical features such as consciousness, intelligence, motivation, and creativity, and in this article, we are exploring the agency responsible for these features. I would like to clarify that I consider all biological processes physical because physics can explain them, and Schrödinger explains this beautifully in his book What Is Life. What is more intriguing is that there are myriad organisms in nature without blood and flesh and even without a brain that still possess consciousness and intelligence. An article in Scientific American describes a fascinating behavior in a species of slime mold: a single-celled organism without a brain, a nervous system in any form, or even sense organs. [3] In a study, scientists found that slime molds behave intelligently. They have consciousness and memory. They navigate a maze to reach food, and when food is scarce, many slime molds merge to form a single unit to save energy. If a U-shaped path is provided to reach food, they attempt to follow the shortest path, such as climbing upward, to save energy. Thus, intelligence and consciousness are essential features of life that do not require a structure such as the brain. This makes the belief firm that plants also have consciousness. A growing body of empirical research suggests that the consciousness and intelligence traditionally assumed to be exclusive to animals are also exhibited by plants. [3] An Indian scientist, Jagdish Bose, empirically established a century ago that plants have consciousness. Many oppose the idea that plants and cells have consciousness; therefore, I will argue that consciousness is integral to plants and cells, and that life is not possible without it.
Life has five components, or phases. These are: (1) origin of life, (2) biological functioning of life, (3) long-term stability of life functions or survival, (4) continuation to the next generation or reproduction, (5) termination of life functions or death. Life is not possible if any of these components are absent or unstable. By stability, I mean that many biological functions are occurring in a living organism, and these functions are physical processes that are intrinsically stable. I say this because I have transitioned from physicist to full-fledged electronic engineer, and I have devoted 20 years of my life to developing control circuits for electronic, electrical, and mechanical machines. After studying neuroscience and physiology, I learned that every biological process works in a closed loop with negative feedback, which is essential for stability. Negative feedback requires monitoring, which is not possible without consciousness. The next component of life is survival, or the continuation of biological functions within organisms. These processes require energy from food, so organisms must depend on the environment. Life cannot exist in isolation, and interaction with the environment is inevitable. Highly evolved organisms such as animals and human beings interact with the environment through consciousness, but less evolved organisms like slime mold and plants lack sense organs, and consciousness is the only medium for interaction. Through consciousness, cells and plants sense food in the environment, and through their intrinsic intelligence, they choose the right food to eat. As human beings, we are taught which foods to eat and which not to eat. But lower organisms and animals use intrinsic consciousness and intelligence to choose the right food only. Animals never eat poisonous plants, and apes are also known to know medicinal plants.
I would like to jump into the argument presented in an article rebutting the concept that plants have consciousness. [4] First, consciousness has not been defined unanimously, so scientists are confused about what it is and where it comes from. They are talking about plant consciousness, animal consciousness, and human consciousness. This classification is meaningless; plants are less evolved organisms, so they do not use consciousness much. Animals use consciousness much more than plants do, and humans use consciousness in more ways. Some scientists classify consciousness as primary or secondary. It is a universal and fundamental entity that originates and sustains life. A botanist has dismissed the idea that plants have consciousness and cognition because they lack the structure and functional complexity needed for consciousness to emerge. [5] In fact, this idea is not new; it derives from Francis Crick’s proposition that consciousness emerges from a complex network of neurons. I discuss this topic later and show empirically that this proposition is false. Second, there is no singularity in nature according to which, if consciousness is present in higher organisms like animals, it must be present in lower and the lowest living organisms because higher species have evolved from lower organisms, according to Darwinian theory of natural selection.
I have been studying consciousness and Atman for the last 25 years. I have also experienced and explored consciousness through Yog. I have attained a very advanced stage of Yog, known as Samadhi, where the mind becomes completely thoughtless, and I can directly experience consciousness. Based on this experience, I have proposed a theory of consciousness grounded in physics. Consciousness is not only about feeling or experience; it also means awareness of the inside and outside world. Sensing and awareness are possible only because of consciousness. Organisms are aware of food in the environment because of consciousness. I will discuss later that consciousness is a physical entity like an electromagnetic field. Max Planck, father of Quantum Physics, also firmly believed that consciousness is fundamental. Many great thinkers also emphasized the relevance of consciousness in life. Perhaps this is why research on consciousness remains inconclusive after thirty years. According to a theory of Atman that I have proposed, consciousness existed since the beginning of the universe, and life came much later. In fact, only consciousness originates and sustains life. Max Planck, the father of quantum physics, made a famous quote: I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything we talk about, everything we regard as existing, presupposes consciousness.
PHILOSOPHICAL CONSIDERATION OF SOUL AS ANIMATING PRINCIPLE
The question of what runs life has puzzled philosophers for millennia. The concept of an animating principle, a life force that drives a living organism, is ancient and can be found in Greece and India. Greek philosophers such as Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle believed that the soul, as a life force, is logical and difficult to refute. They considered the soul incorporeal and the animating principle of a living organism. Plato was the first to propose that the soul was both the source of life and the mind. Aristotle defined the soul as the first actuality of an organized body and also used the term Actus et Potentia, which is responsible for the full actualization of the living body. According to Emanuel Kant, the soul and body occupy the same space at the same time, and the human soul gives rise to cognition. Baruch Spinoza held similar views about the soul, but he believed the soul was not immortal and died with the body. René Descartes was more specific about the soul. He considered the body and soul separate entities that interact. According to him, the brain is the seat of the soul, and when the soul interacts with the pineal gland, it generates consciousness.
PHILOSOPHICAL CONSIDERATIONS OF PSYCHIC ENERGY AS LIFE FORCE
Psychology did not exist as a discipline until the mid-19th century. Philosophy discussed concepts such as consciousness, the self, human behavior, and ethics. As new scientific concepts and experimental methods developed in the natural sciences, scientific empiricism began to outweigh philosophical rationalism. Sigmund Freud was the first scientist to explain the philosophical concept of the soul through the scientific concept of psychic energy. He treated the biological system as a thermodynamic system that works with physical energy. Later, he realized that psychic energy has nothing to do with physical energy. According to Freud, psychic energy is a force-like thing that drives and sustains mental activities. For this reason, psychic energy was also called mental energy. Carl Jung further developed the concept of psychic energy and proposed that it cannot be measured. According to him, the psychic energy performs all psychological tasks such as perceiving, thinking, feeling, wishing, and attention-related tasks. These activities are possible only if life exists. Therefore, the psychic energy is the same as Vital energy. Vital energy drives life.
VEDANTIC EXPLANATION OF VITAL ENERGY
Yog is the only way to experience the existence of Vital energy in the body. Rishis of ancient India, whom I refer to as the ancient scientists, began the practice of Yog thousands of years ago. They explored the nature of Vital energy by experiencing and studying its effects on the body during the practice of Yog. They concluded that the body is only a yantra (machine or instrument) made of blood and flesh. Vital energy performs all life functions, such as the work of the body’s internal and external organs, and all mental functions such as consciousness, thinking, desire, intelligence, and creativity. They argued that the human body is identical in every respect; therefore, it cannot be a person’s identity, and it is also perishable. Therefore, the body cannot be considered the true existence of a human being. They used the Sanskrit word Atman to mean vital energy, psychic energy, or mental energy. Though Atman translates into English as soul, the soul is not equivalent to Atman because the soul is a religious word, while Atman is a scientific word, as it is referred to in ancient Indian science known as the Vedanta. Rishis of India studied every aspect of nature comprehensively. They studied human existence in terms of mind, consciousness, behavior, the causes of life’s miseries, how to overcome them, and herbal medicines to cure bodily ailments. The enormous knowledge Rishis acquired through the practice of Yoga was compiled in four scriptures known as the Vedas, the pillars of Hinduism. All other scriptures, such as the Bhagavad-Gita, either elaborate on the concepts in the Vedas or apply them to understand and improve human life.
Later Rishis debated the Vedas intensively, consolidating the essence of Vedic knowledge, widely known as Vedanta. According to Vedanta, Atman plays a gross role in human existence, while the body is merely an instrument, or a machine made of blood and flesh. Food supplies nutrients and physical energy to the body, needed for mechanical work and to replace the physical energy lost to the environment. The Atman directs and controls the body’s movements. We mistakenly understand our body as our identity. The following passage describes Atman in Vedanta. Atman thinks and creates new ideas. Consciousness is a dimension of Atman that makes us feel our existence. Atman is what feels pain and pleasure. Atman only sees, hears, and senses the environment. Atman moves our hands and legs. We are alive because of Atman. In first person, I am not a body; I am an Atman, and therefore, in philosophy and in spirituality, the word self is used for Atman. My body is not the real me or my self; the Atman is the real me. I do not exist without Atman because my body stops working without Atman and turns to a corpse that is not me. When Atman is gone, my existence is gone.
SPIRITUAL EXPLANATION OF ATMAN
The foregoing Vedantic description of Atman seems to be part of a philosophical or spiritual discourse. I hail from a spiritual family, and I used to attend weekly Satsang, a holy gathering, to listen to the discourse of the spiritual Guru of my parents. My house had a large collection of spiritual books, and once in a while I would go through the literature out of curiosity. As a child, I couldn’t grasp anything, but the spiritual quotes stayed in my mind as question marks. After I began the practice of Yog and I could shift my attention from outside to inside, I could grasp the meanings of those spiritual quotes, and I realized the existence of Atman. But for a layman, it is not necessary to practice meditation or Yog to realize Atman’s existence. If a person contemplates the Vedantic description of Atman, it may spark curiosity to learn more about Atman.
Scientists have kept their distance from Atman and spirituality because Atman, or the soul, is considered the subject of spirituality. Many scientists, particularly in later generations, see spirituality as very different from, or even opposite to, science. When I explored spirituality as a scientist through the practice of Yoga, I found no such opposition between science and spirituality. Physics mostly studies non- living matter, and spirituality is about human life, which is living matter. Living and non-living matter are both parts of nature, and science systematically studies nature. Therefore, science and spirituality cannot be different. Max Planck, the father of quantum physics, never saw spirituality as separate from science. Here is a famous quote from Planck: There can never be any real opposition between religion and science, for the one is the complement of the other. Here, the word religion refers to spirituality. In German, the words religion and spirituality are often used interchangeably. Spirituality is a secular term about exploring nature. Religion refers to institutions of worship such as Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism. Many forms of worship are seen as irrational and lacking scientific grounding; therefore, most scientists keep their distance from religion. Confusion between spirituality and religion may be why scientists keep their distance from spirituality.
After I began my spiritual journey as a scientist, I studied all the religions to understand the difference between spirituality and religion. I found that spirituality is the root of all religions, but most people ignore it because it is difficult to practice Meditation and Yog. People find it easier to pray, worship God, and perform religious rituals such as fasting and pilgrimage. Most people follow religion out of fear and social pressure, or they expect something from God that may fulfill their wishes. All religious practices are irrational, monotonous, passive, and non-yielding. After studying Hinduism, I found that it has two distinct components. The first is a religious component, and like other religions, it is also an institution of worship where people worship idols of different Gods according to protocols set by the priests. The second is the Dharmic component, based on the teachings of Vedanta, and therefore spiritual and secular in nature. One may call it secular Hinduism that is about truthfully performing the duties of life with peaceful coexistence by crossing the boundaries set by religion, race, caste, and creeds. Hinduism prioritizes performing life’s duties truthfully over worship. According to Hinduism, five mental distortions are enemies that obstruct a person’s development. These distortions are: (1) Kaam, that is, unethical and unreasonable desires, (2) Krodh, meaning anger, (3) Lobh, meaning greediness, (4) Moh, meaning unreasonable attachment, (5) Ahankar, egoism, a belief that I am only right. Only after addressing these mental distortions can a person achieve the mind’s maximum potential. Although the pioneers of humanistic psychology, Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers, also put forward the concepts of Self-actualization and a fully functional personality, Vedanta describes a practical way to attain it.
STUDY OF MIND THROUGH YOG
Vedanta is a science developed on the basis of experiential knowledge acquired during the practice of Yog. Experiential knowledge is not much different from knowledge acquired through experiment, provided the basis of investigation is the Law of causality. An experiment is performed with electronic instruments, while Yog is performed with the mind as the instrument. Indian Rishis realized that the human body is a great source of knowledge, and that Yog practice can explore and tap it. During Yog practice, I found that when attention focuses on breathing, it slows considerably. Wallace et al. [7] reported similar results in an earlier experiment. This discovery of the relationship between Mind and body corroborates René Descartes’ proposition that Mind can be studied only through its effects on the body. Yog will play an important role in science by providing a solution to the centuries-old mind-body problem posited by René Descartes. This discovery of the mind-body relationship has been instrumental in laying the foundation for an entirely new science known as Yog Science, which I will discuss in later posts. This relationship between Mind and body is so strong that when I make my mind fully focused by the practice of Yog, to the extent that wandering thoughts stop and I attain a thoughtless state of mind, the inhalation part of breathing disappears. In this state of mind, I do not need environmental oxygen and can survive without it. I demonstrated this in a nitrogen chamber experiment performed publicly on International Yog Day, 2023. [7] I have also used the Mind-Body relationship to develop instrumentation that empirically monitors changes in state of mind by measuring changes in breathing. I have written a book (upcoming) entitled An Introduction to Yog Science, Theory of Mind and Atman, which establishes the existence of Atman beyond doubt.
MIND AND ITS EFFECTS ON BODY
Biologists have limited their field of study to biology and the body’s physiological processes. Neuroscientists have limited themselves to studying the brain and neurological processes, while a neurophysiologist studies only the relation between brain and body. What they have missed is the basic law of nature, the law of causality in these studies, according to which no process or change can take place without a cause. They have not bothered to know the cause behind a biological process. There is broad consensus that the mind controls the body, but life scientists have little to say about the mind’s role in life. Myriad observations establish, beyond doubt, the mind’s effect on the living body. It is well known that the body begins to shiver in fear. There are a large number of physiological effects caused by various states of mind; for example, during depression, our body becomes weak, and we do not feel like doing anything. Too much stress causes malfunction of the heart and lungs, and prolonged stress and anxiety give rise to many diseases.
A positive mindset can also positively affect the body. A review of research on religion, spirituality, and mental health suggests that religion and spirituality may play a crucial role in improving mental health. [1] This is because true religious and spiritual teachings help develop a more equanimous state of mind with fewer wandering thoughts, which relaxes the mind. In addition to religion and spirituality, a new non-academic field pioneered by Napoleon Hill and Norman Vincent Peale emerged in the last century. These authors wrote extensively on the power of positive thinking and on developing a positive mindset to perform better in life. Renowned psychologists Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow founded a movement in psychology to tap human potential, develop a fully functional personality, and strive for self-actualization. These studies confirm that the mind has great potential to improve the body’s functioning and behavior. In other words, the mind is a crucial component of life, and studying it will provide valuable information that may help cure many psychological disorders.
Life science has advanced greatly, and we understand biological processes to a large extent, but we know little about the mind. We do not know how the mind affects the body’s functioning. The mind is closest to us, but it remains a mystery to scientists. It is surprising that, earlier, most scientists did not agree to study the mind scientifically. They argued that the mind is a subjective phenomenon occurring in the head and cannot be studied empirically, since no instrument can interact with it. Psychologists may devise procedures to study the mind, but self-reports are less reliable than instrument readings. Another group of scientists argued that the study of the mind falls within the realm of spirituality. Whatever the arguments, the reality is that the mind is a natural phenomenon that must be studied through scientific investigation. Natural scientists cannot shirk the responsibility of studying the mind on the pretext that they lack instruments to interact with it. Despite these odds, Francis Crick convinced a few neuroscientists and ventured into the empirical study of consciousness, an attribute of the mind. He faced so much criticism that he wrote a book, Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for Soul, to convince scientists. But Crick was criticized for his materialistic approach to studying consciousness.
MIND ACCORDING TO PHILOSOPHERS
Mind has been a favorite topic of discussion among philosophers since ancient times, as it is an instrument of thinking, and they enjoyed using it. According to Aristotle, the mind is a dimension of the soul that permeates the body. While Aristotle assumed the mind is part of the body, Plato and Socrates believed the mind is made of a substance different from the body. René Descartes was a dualist like Plato, but he added further that the mind cannot exist without the body. Descartes was far ahead of his predecessors; he was also a mathematician and a scientist, and he practiced meditation and wrote extensively on it. His thoughts on the mind are more scientific and easier for a scientist to grasp, while philosophers’ thoughts are harder to understand. Descartes describes the mind as follows:
- The mind differs from matter in that Physics can explain matter but not the mind. Scientific equipment can interact with matter but not with the mind.
- The brain exists in physical space, but the mind does not. We can measure a boundary between brain and matter. This is not true of the mind.
- The mind experiences sensations that physics cannot explain.
- The mind is a necessary whole which cannot be divided like matter.
We will see later that this description is close to the Vedantic description of mind because it is based on experiential knowledge acquired by meditation, and Vedanta is also based on experiential knowledge acquired during Yog.
FREUD’S PSYCHOLOGICAL MODEL OF MIND
Sigmund Freud proposed a model of the mind in which he suggested that the human mind consists of three layers: the conscious mind, subconscious mind, and unconscious mind. The conscious layer is the topmost layer of the mind that generates consciousness. It directs our attention to our work; thinking and imagination take place at this layer. The subconscious layer sits just below the conscious layer and stores information needed for quick recall. This layer stores what we have learned in life and also directs our behavior. Involuntary thinking originates here and then surfaces in the conscious mind. You can think of it as the mind’s RAM (random access memory). The unconscious mind stores old memories, past experiences, and forgotten trauma. As the mind’s deepest layer, its information surfaces in the conscious mind less often. Freud also introduced the concepts of the Id, Ego, and Superego, which contemporary psychologists found irrational and unscientific, and they rejected them. Freud’s model also ignored the mind-body relationship proposed by Rene Descartes and lacked an empirical basis. Freud developed this model specifically as a theoretical underpinning for his psychoanalysis.
VEDANTIC MODEL OF MIND
Vedantic model of mind is based on the experiential knowledge acquired through the practice of Yog and the principle of Advaita Vedanta, which proposes the existence of a subtle matter, called Brahman, pervading the universe, and an infinitesimally small portion of it is the animating principle in every living organism, known as the Atman. Schrödinger expressed this principle as: Atman = Brahman. When a Rishi attained a thoughtless state of mind through the practice of Yoga, they could study the nature of mind and propose a model of mind. According to psychology, there are five sense organs: eyes, ears, tongue, nose, and skin that sense external signals. Vedanta proposes the mind as the sixth sense organ, sensing internal signals such as thoughts and emotions. That is why the mind is known as an internal organ or Antahkaran in Sanskrit. Freud described the mind as having three layers, while Vedanta describes it as having four faculties. The first faculty is Chitt, a hub of consciousness. One can experience it only after long Yog practice, when the thinking process halts. The second faculty is the Manas, a hub of thoughts. When problems arise in life, thoughts appear in Chitt and take the form of Manas, which we experience as thoughts and emotions. We normally do not experience Chitt because it is always full of thoughts. The third faculty is Buddhi, a hub of wisdom, logic, and reasoning. The fourth faculty is Ahankar, a hub of personal experiences such as learning, personal thoughts, and ethical values. It is a person’s ego system. Every person behaves and thinks according to his ego system.
Apart from these four faculties, the sense organs are seen as the extension of mind. The sense organs are incomplete without mind. A very significant revelation of Vedanta is that all faculties of mind and the sense organs need Atman to work. This implies that thought, consciousness, and other mental processes are products of Atman. No sense organ works without Atman. For example, the eyes, retina, and optic nerve are only instruments for transmitting signals; Atman senses and sees. Similarly, Atman feels sound, smell, touch, taste, and pain, not the brain. This implies that the faculties of the five senses are intrinsic properties of Atman, not properties of any region of the brain as understood by neuroscientists. This is not mere conjecture or hypothesis; Indian Rishis experience this truth at various stages of Yog, and Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra also mentions it.[8] The authentic Vedanta text Brahma Sutra Bhasya by Adi Shankaracharya presents the theory behind these experiences.
SCIENCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND VEDANTIC MODEL OF MIND
Research on consciousness that began three decades ago still has not produced conclusive results, and it has failed to explain what consciousness is or how the brain generates it. This research faces criticism from many quarters. The foremost criticism is that consciousness is only described, and no universally accepted definition exists; therefore, measuring it is not possible. Without a definition, scientists may doubt that consciousness has more than one NCC. Another fundamental problem is that consciousness is subjective and accessible only from the first person, but self-reports are unreliable and cannot be part of a true scientific investigation. No consensus exists on how to measure consciousness. If we can measure consciousness in the future, will research on consciousness help us understand other, more important aspects of the mind, such as attention, thinking processes, motivation, and creativity? Will the research provide answers to metaphysical and philosophical questions pending so far,
Amidst this criticism and unending list of questions, the Vedantic model of mind may give a big jolt to consciousness research. According to Vedantic principle: Atman = Brahman; Atman is the operating principle in the brain that gives rise to mind, which is the hub of consciousness, attention, thoughts, and all mental activities. Max Planck also believes consciousness to be fundamental. If Atman is the operating principle and consciousness is fundamental, then Francis Crick’s hypothesis that consciousness emerges from a complex network of neurons becomes invalid. The Advaita principle, Atman= = Brahman, is also present in the West in the form of panpsychism, which was the default philosophy of mind. Philosophers Plato, Aristotle, Leibniz, William James, and Bertrand Russel also ascribed to the concept of panpsychism. I have also posited a theory of Atman based on experiential knowledge acquired during the practice of Yog after attaining a thoughtless state of mind, and on the principle of Advaita Vedanta. I have explained the structure and properties of Atman in my upcoming book Yog Science, according to which Atman generates oxygen in the brain when the mind is fully focused. I demonstrated this by performing a nitrogen chamber experiment publicly on International Yog Day 2023, in which I enclosed myself in a pure nitrogen gas chamber for 30 minutes and showed that the oxygen level in my blood did not fall. This experiment establishes the existence of Atman beyond doubt. This implies that the philosophical thought of Materialism, according to which matter is the fundamental substance in nature, and all other things such as consciousness and mental states are the result of material interactions with material things, is not true. This is the outcome of studying life from the perspectives of Physics, Psychology, and Spirituality.
Reference
[1] Research on Religion, Spirituality and Mental Health by Harold G Koenig, The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, Vol. 54 No 5 May 2009
[2] How brainless slime molds redefine Intelligence, Ferris Jabr, published 13 November 2012, Nature 2012.
[3] Consciousness and Cognition in plants. Miguel Segundo-Ortin, Paco Calvo https://wire.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/wcs.1578
[4] Debunking a Myth: Plant Consciousness, Jon Mallatt, Michael R Blatt, Andreas Draguhn, David G. Robinson, Lincoln Taiz https://doi.org/10.1007/s00709-02-01579-w
[5] Plants neither possess nor require consciousness, https://pubmed.ncbi.nim.nih.gov/31279732/ published in 2019, Prof. L. Taiz.
[6] Wallace and Benson (1972), Journal of Behavioral Medicine
[7] YouTube link: https://youtu.be/ZPwylt1NhVc[
8] This is a spiritual text that describes the practice of Yog with theory extensively.