First question is from Samir. In your YouTube talk on it from bit from chit, you made a
brief mention of Vedanta and Samkhya as being able to explain consciousness as the causal
base, though only Vedanta was described. Therefore, I have the following question. Traditional
Samkhya seems to separate consciousness and non-conscious elements absolutely. Assuming
Purusha is consciousness which lumines all understanding activities of the Bodhi, couldn't
the three states of consciousness, Jagrtha, Svapna and Sushupti, be terms better applied
to the states of mentation, while Turiya simply becomes the power illuminating the mirror
of Bodhi?
Okay, there's a lot going on there. I have noticed one thing. I don't know if you have
seen, if you have been following this series over the years, the questions have become
more and more difficult. Because they have become more precise and more sophisticated,
more refined, which is good. So what's this question about? Samir is asking, he's talking
about something I said in a talk, unforgettably titled, It from Bit from Chit. So the title
It from Bit, I was inspired by Jim Holtz's book, Why Does the World Exist? In that there
is a chapter, It from Bit. It means universe, material universe. So is it possible that
our material existence has come from information? Basically, the ultimate reality is not one
more particle but it's information. So that radical idea. And then David Chalmers, in
our conversation, online conversation, he said, It from Bit from Chit, that sounds like
a good title for a talk. And I said, yeah, I'll do that then. So the next talk was titled
It from Bit from Chit. Now what the basic idea of the talk was, this physical material
universe is based on a more subtle mental universe and that is based on consciousness,
Chit. Now what Samir is asking is, in Sankhya philosophy, they make a clean distinction
between consciousness and matter. In Sanskrit, Prakriti and Purusha. See it's very logically
sound and psychologically sound also, the Sankhya philosophy. It is attributed to the
great sage Kapila, whom Swami Vivekananda called the first philosopher of the human
race. What it says is, it's pretty easy to understand because it follows the structure
of our experience. All our experience is basically subject-object. You are experiencing something,
I am experiencing something. I am the subject and everything else is the object for me.
And what Sankhya says, this is right, this is the truth. You the subject, you are consciousness
and what makes something a subject? Awareness, consciousness, the ability to experience.
So you the subject, you are actually consciousness. And the object, whatever is the object, whatever
you can experience, the stars and planets out there, the streets and buildings and people
and our own bodies and even our own minds. We can experience our minds. Look inside and
you will find thoughts, emotions, ideas, memories, desires. All of that is object. So you are
pure subject to pure consciousness and everything else is object and everything in the object
domain from the physical universe to the subtle mental universe, all of it is called Prakriti
or nature. So nature provides us with the object and we are pure consciousness. So there are two
realities, consciousness and object or material reality. And here material reality includes even
thoughts, ideas because they are all experienced. So far it isn't difficult to understand. Not only
not difficult to understand, it seems to follow our experience. That's how we experience the
universe and that's where Sankhya stops. Sankhya philosophy, it tells us that our problem is we
have mixed up the subject and the object. What belongs to the object we have appropriated to
the subject. You know the body is object but I have taken it as I and therefore body is getting
old, I am getting old. Body is getting sick, I am getting sick. I don't have any doubt about it. It
seems like a living fact to me but Sankhya says it's not. It's a terrible, terrible mistake. One
sadhu in the Himalayas, he put it so simply in Hindi, I'll tell you and translate. He said, how
to practice Vedanta? Jo jaha ki cheez hai usko wahi rehene do mahatma ji. Keep whatever, you know what
belongs where, just keep them there. What does that mean? Sickness. Yes, it belongs to the body,
to the prana, not to you. Keep it there. We have never thought of it that way. I am sick, I am
obviously suffering but notice sickness, suffering, if you carefully note where is that suffering? It's
in the body and you are aware of it. Therefore you are awareness. The body and its sickness are
objects. It's a bit of a weird way of looking at it. It works. It works. Even before you are fully
enlightened in the Sankhya sense, until you realize yourself as pure consciousness, even before that,
if you think of sickness, pain, mental distress, unhappiness, negativities, all of them as objects,
this cloth you are seeing, just like that, an object. A psychological gap opens up between
you and what you experience. It gives a lot of relief. In fact all therapists, especially these
days cognitive behavior therapists, they try to do this. They try to drive a wedge between you and
your problems. You are not defined by your problems. Once this gap is there, you can deal
with those problems. When a doctor treats your illness, your sickness, for that doctor your
sickness, so-called your sickness, is an object and Sankhya says, so it should be for you also.
Alright, so this is how Sankhya deals with it. Separation of Prakriti and Purusha and not only
understanding, they have an allied system called Yoga, Patanjali Yoga and if you practice that,
it becomes a living fact. You can separate yourself from and you still remain. It's not
that you somehow pop out of your body, you're there, but a clearly existing difference becomes
clear to us. It was not clear earlier, it was covered over. But this is not Advaita, this is Sankhya.
A lady wrote to me saying that my little daughter's name is Sankhya and she watches,
I guess her mom makes her watch, she watches all your talks and she is delighted when you
say Sankhya. That's the only part she is delighted with. Alright, so this is Sankhya. Now the question
is that, notice in Sankhya consciousness and matter are distinct but not entirely apart
because consciousness depends on nature for experiences and nature depends on consciousness
for being experienced. So what does nature give to consciousness? Nature gives to consciousness
two things. It's called Bhoga, Apavarga, experience and freedom. So experience is all our life,
pleasure and pain as we evolve through lifetimes. All of that is provided by Prakriti or nature.
And finally freedom, enlightenment and freedom from birth and death, from suffering. So that's
what Prakriti provides for consciousness. What does consciousness provide for Prakriti? Life
and experience and knowability. All of that comes from consciousness. So they depend on each other.
That's the Sankhya system. Now he is asking that, so in Vedanta we have this term Turiya,
the witness of the waking, dreaming, deep sleep. So waking, dreaming, deep sleep, his words are that,
can't we regard them as meditation? That's what he says? Waking, dreaming, deep sleep. Meditation
means aren't they functions of the mind? Yes, you are right Samir. In Vedanta, in Sankhya,
they are functions of the mind. Mind is awake. What falls asleep? Mind falls asleep. What dreams?
The mind dreams. Consciousness illumines all of this. So isn't this the Turiya of Vedanta? No,
there is a difference. In Sankhya, consciousness is the witness of waking, dreaming, deep sleep.
So also in Vedanta, however, Vedanta has this huge difference. All of what Sankhya says is
acceptable to Vedanta. You are pure consciousness, you are witness and then Vedanta does two more
things, big steps forward. Sankhya insists that we are all separate consciousnesses. Vedanta says
there cannot be any separation in consciousness, so we are one consciousness and there are arguments
to prove this. So we are all one consciousness. Then next Vedanta says the objects that we
experience are also ultimately not separate from consciousness. Sankhya insists there are two
different realities. They seem to be. I am the object, they seem to be. But Vedanta says take a
closer look. Where is this object? If you say is it outside your body? Yes, certainly. I am here,
the table is outside my body, clearly. But as awareness, the body is in awareness,
the table is also in awareness. A good way of understanding this is our dreams. In our dreams,
the subject and the object are both in the dreaming mind. See when you are walking around
and meeting people and seeing the sky and the earth, in your dreams when you wake up,
what do you say? All that sky, earth, trees, people, all of that was dreamt in the mind.
Not only that, I was part of the dream. I was walking around and seeing things and that me
who was in the dream, the real me is lying here on the bed and sleeping. That me who was in the
dream was also part of the dreaming mind. The dreaming mind in itself became subject and object.
And Vedanta claims that is true in the waking state also. It's not the mind,
consciousness appears as subject and object. Vivekananda put it in his poem in this language,
one only exists, it appears as nature, soul. Sankhya will say two exist, nature and soul.
And there are many souls. Souls means Purusha or consciousness. There are many,
many souls and nature is there. So two realities, two kinds of reality. In Advaita Vedanta, one.
Because nature, object, whatever is appearing to you is finally reduced back into an appearance
in consciousness and not apart from consciousness. It's not a solid, separate, independent reality
apart from you, the consciousness. And Advaita claims this is actually according to our experience.
It's impossible to have something outside consciousness. You say, why not? But if you
have that outside, something outside consciousness, other than consciousness,
it can never be experienced. If it cannot be experienced, why do you talk about it at all?
So Advaita Vedanta reduces the object back to the subject and therefore consciousness becomes
non-dual. Subject is consciousness. Non-dual means no second reality apart from consciousness,
no second reality apart from you. Now this question of Turiya, being only the witness
of the waking, dreaming, deep sleep, illumining the waking, dreaming, deep sleep, not just
illumining, not just being witness. This Turiya is the waker and the waker's world.
Sankhya will never say that. Sankhya will say you are the experiencer and the world
is provided by Prakriti for you. But here Vedanta says you are both, you the experiencer and the
world that you are seeing. Just like a dream. You admit it in your dream. When we wake up,
what do we say? The whole world which I saw in the dream was in my mind, the dreaming mind,
and I who saw that world in the dream, I was also in this mind. The mind in itself became
seer and seen, subject and object. So Turiya is waker and the waking world, dreamer and the
dream world, deep sleeper and the potential, the seed state of deep sleep. It is both subject and
object. It is non-dual. Sankhya consciousness is not non-dual. This is the difference.