Elusive Consciousness

Author(s): Narendra Bhandari, Surendrasingh Pokharana, Jitendra B Shah
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

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Yoga System of Indian philosophy which claims to be spiritual and holistic underlying consciousness principle. This consciousness-based concept of man presented here has also been evaluated critically in the light of latest empirical findings of physics, neurology, parapsychology, biology, psychology and other related disciplines, studying man scientifically and this consciousness based theory of man has been found to be empirically validated too.
Theoretical Crisis and Need for Consciousness Research:
Not only existential but theoretical crisis faced by the scientists of different disciplines also necessitates the Spirituality or Consciousness Research. e.g.
• Many findings of modern quantum physics like paradoxical nature of reality, dancing and unpredictable movement of electron at subatomic level as suggested by Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, mutually convertible nature of matter and energy, interconnectedness of matter at micro-subatomic level etc. suggest that matter is too complex to fit into the mechanistic paradigm of science.
• Similarly Wilder Penfield's research on epileptic patients, Nobel laureate neuroscientist John Eccles' analysis of a number of neurological findings, Split-brain studies of Roger Sperry, Karl Pribram's Holographic model, Libet's experiments on motor movements of conscious volition etc suggest that the materialistic monism (brain alone can explain mind) cannot explain logically the existing neurological findings.
. Serious gaps found in fossil record, findings about homologous organs, research about punctuated equilibrium, biological research by Alister Hardy, zoology professor at oxford, etc raise serious doubts against the biological orthodoxy of Darwinism.
Undisputable findings of ESP experiments with highly significant results , Ian Stevenson's world-famous research on reincarnation, SPR's voluminous data on Mediumship and many other parapsychological researches point to the non-mechanistic and spiritual, consciousness-based explanation of human personality.
Finally Third wave of Humanistic psychology by Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers also imply that purely behavioristic and mechanistic explanation of human behavior are insufficient models to explain the above-normal self-actualized behavior of human beings.