Sambodhi 2009 Vol 32

Author(s): J B Shah, K M patel
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 21

Vol. XXXII, 2009
Major progress linking modern science and...
15
holistic approach of Vedic science can be described as a top down consciousnessmind-matter ontology in which the parts emerge from the whole, consistent with developing theories of the unified field. In the holistic view, matter and mind emerge from consciousness. Consciousness is at the level of pure Being, or Atma; and from conscious Being, the subtle field of mind emerges, as well as all grosser levels of energy and matter-particle fields. This is just the opposite of the reductive physicalist matter-mind-consciousness ontology (1).
In the holistic approach, the reductive physicalist paradigm that the whole emerges from combining the parts is characteristic of reasoning and consensual validation based only on fragmented, outer, object-oriented experience in the ordinary waking state of consciousness. Vedic science provides systematic developmental technologies for direct empirical validation (through regular practice of yoga) of the consciousness-mind-matter ontology in higher states of consciousness, beyond the ordinary waking state in which objective modern science has been constrained.
In the top down consciousness-mind-matter ontology, the ultimate indescribable unified field can be described as inherently conscious, orderly, and dynamic. To explain the process of phenomenal manifestation, the ‘nature of the unified field is described as the simultaneity of infinite silence and infinite dynamism, wholeness and part, infinity and point. In each point is infinity, and the infinite singularity contains infinity of points. It can be described as ultimate reductionism to infinity of points, and ultimate wholeness of infinite singularity, at the same time (25). It is the coexistence of opposites of infinity and point; but it is nondualistic. Remaining beyond all duality, to explain phenomenal manifestation it is attributed two coexisting opposite qualities. As Maharishi has recently stated: “Silence and dynamism, they are one thing, not two things (18).”
To explain how the opposites coexist, the unified field is described as infinite self-referral, instantaneously reverberating from infinity to point and point to infinity, infinitely referring or curving back upon itself. In the process of phenomenal manifestation, the apparently opposite qualities of infinity and point become expressed in increasing limitation, extending from infinite wholeness, totality of existence, or Being to the phenomenal appearance of no consciousness, no intelligence, and no life at the most expressed levels of gross inert matter (1). In the holistic view, our familiar, conventional, physical space-time is a phenomenal limi