For those who are inclined--some food for thought.

[renuka]

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life is indeed beautiful

with best{?} brains of this forum slugging it out.

people are learning to understand each other to the benefit of all .

this lot of members are under the influence of seven and half years of sani god. others can watch and enjoy the transactions .lol

Dear Krish ji,

I dont believe in any seven years Sani.

I believe in a good wrestling match!LOL

 

[renuka]

Dear Sravna,

I will try to read up the book about Quantum Physics and Buddhism if I get the time over the weekend and share some info here.

Need to work out too in my home gym..need to brush up fighting skills to handle some here!LOL

 

[sravna]

Dear Sravna,

I will try to read up the book about Quantum Physics and Buddhism if I get the time over the weekend and share some info here.

Need to work out too in my home gym..need to brush up fighting skills to handle some here!LOL

Sure Renuka. I look forward to your views on the book.

 

[Vaagmi]

After that exchange between sri tks and renukaji, now let me see whether there is physics or consciousness in the OP, with whatever little I am equipped with. Hope knowledgeable Doctors will put up with me. If they do not, I will tell them what the proverbial Mr. Mathai said to the Priest in the Church after a confession.

1. The original contributor of the piece of write up in TOI was Mr. Deepak Ranade and he frequently writes in The Speaking Tree about Advaitam. Here he has reproduced a small piece of info that came from a Lab in France and has tried to interpret it with advaitam or rather has tried to interpret advaitam with the help of that piece of info.

2. Sri Ranade says that the attribute of a fundamental particle has been separated from the particle “for the first time”. That may be the case. But the reason why he has taken this up is because the attribute which is usually inseparable from the object has been separated. But this is not the first time that this has happened. If the idea is that an inseparable attribute has been separated from an object, there has been occasions in the past too when attributes have been separated from the objects because science or physics has been developing and improving its tools to separate such attributes and take a look at them. So there is nothing great/remarkable about the ‘moment’ of a neutron or the spin or charge of an electron getting separated from the substrate of the particle or even the “mass” of a neutral particle getting separated from the “particle”, as it was attempted in the path to the discovery of the God Particle. This is all about the physics there in the write up.

3. Now from this innocuous development in the field of physics Ranade moves to epistemology and then to metaphysics. Let us move along. Indian epistemology starts usually with pramA and pramAna. Prama or valid knowledge should satisfy two conditions. pramA should reveal the existence of an object or agree with external reality. Secondly it should serve some practical need. “yathAvasthithavyavahArAnugunajnAnam pramA”. The distinctive cause of a particular pramA is pramAna. A cause is considered distinctive or best since knowledge arises without delay through its agency. Perception, inference and verbal or scriptural testimony are the three ways of knowing. Perception has for its object something always characterized by difference.

Perception is of two kinds, determinate and indeterminate. Indeterminate perception does not mean the apprehension of an object bereft of all distinctions. For, whatever enters into human experience under any circumstance appears with some elements of spatial and structural relations. Even the perception of an object for the first time involves thinking and discrimination as ‘this’ or ‘that’. So indeterminate perception is the cognition of an individual for the first time, with attributes, configuration etc. When the object of the same class is perceived for the second or third time with the notion of its generic character, the perception is called determinate.

The act of perception involves three factors 1. the knowing subject, 2. the object, not as something constructed by the mind but as something relatively independent of it and 3. the consciousness which issues from the subject and illuminates the object. This issuing out is done through the sense-channels. This consciousness comes in contact with the object and reveals it. The consciousness while revealing the object also reveals itself too.When the consciousness is directed upon an object through any one of the senses, one becomes aware of that object with its attributes. Indian metaphysics and epistemology does not recognize any attributeless object. Consequently the sense-qualities such as the color are not constructions of the mind. There is a process of the act of constructing in so far as things with their attributes are presented to the mind. If the attributes of an object are not the construction of the mind they must have their locus elsewhere. That is in the object independent of the mind.Here the very nature of the consciousness presupposes the existence of a conscious self as well as objects independent of the self.

Our friend Ranade reinterprets the above stated position in the light of the new scientific achievement. Now it is for members here to discuss whether there is substance in his argument or not.

Also members can now decide for themselves whether there is physics and consciousness in the OP or not.

 

[tks]

I was not going to comment on this thread further but since Sri Vaagmi has taken time to produce a long write up , I thought I will amplify my original cryptic observation and objection.

1. Why in my view Mr Ranade's conclusions are wrong (and continue to be wrong even after reading Sri Vaagmi's write up)?

The genesis of Quantum Mechanics (QM) which predicts many experimental results well is almost 100 years old. It has been long known that this theory is invariant to the arrow of time.

This means the description of reality provided by QM as understood even today can fully support a world where time can flow from Past to Present to Future OR from future to present to past!

Imagine Mr Ranade using this information and then declaring that Time travel has been established. The absurdity of the conclusion is similar to what was in the original article cited in the OP.

One can use lots of Physics terms but it does not make for understanding of the basics.

Let me show the connection to this time symmetry of QM to the phenomena reported . (I do not intend to debate much more with absurd conclusions in an article).

About 50 or so years ago it was established by a well known Physicist that the time symmetry of QM will lead to experimental results where in the world of subatomic particles measurements could reveal that a particle's inherent attribute could 'apparently' be shown to be separated from the particle. An experiment was proposed then using improved technology in 2001 to observe such a conclusion and in July of this year the experimental results validated the prediction. The concept of Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland has been around as a prediction for a long time based on time symmetry of QM

All this points to is that there is ongoing need to improve our understanding of the reality of the world.

The above has nothing to with any meta-physics except in the minds of a few. There is no connection made in either the original write up or Sri Vaagmi's amplification.

2. Why in my view Mr Ranade's understanding of what he calls Advita is wrong?

Mr Ranade did make a weak connection with his analagy to neural networks with this statement.
"Consciousness is traditionally attributed to an emergent quality of neural network. "
This view is held in the west because it is based on Descarte's "I think therefore I am" paradigm.
Teaching of our scriptures popularly called Advita is exactly opposite which is "I am therefore I think"

His understanding of Advita notwithstanding how many articles he writes is inadequate in my view since it is broken at a basic level.

3. In QM particles can be in different places at the same time, travel by many paths at the same time, spin clockwise and anticlockwise all at the same time. They have been shown experimentally to instantaneously influence each other from across the universe!

Our world experience is not at all like what is observe in this subatomic world. Full explanations do not exist today though there are many attempts at a unification theories.

All this points to the fact that the scientists continue to not have a deep understanding of a unified theory. Therefore experiments like the one reported continue to show a strange portrait of our world. There is nothing more to take away from the reported experiment at this time.

4. There is not a connection made between experimental results of a theoretical conclusion made 50 years ago to consciousness since there is nothing to connect to notwithstanding lots of words used by Sri Vaagmi, most of which are irrelevant in my view. Sri Vaagmi's descriptions (inner reality, external reality etc) are also not in alignment with any understanding I have. And I have no desire to debate something that is meaningless to me. I know Sri Vaagmi will disagree and once again we will agree to disagree..

Peace!

After that exchange between sri tks and renukaji, now let me see whether there is physics or consciousness in the OP, with whatever little I am equipped with. Hope knowledgeable Doctors will put up with me. If they do not, I will tell them what the proverbial Mr. Mathai said to the Priest in the Church after a confession.

1. The original contributor of the piece of write up in TOI was Mr. Deepak Ranade and he frequently writes in The Speaking Tree about Advaitam. Here he has reproduced a small piece of info that came from a Lab in France and has tried to interpret it with advaitam or rather has tried to interpret advaitam with the help of that piece of info.

2. Sri Ranade says that the attribute of a fundamental particle has been separated from the particle “for the first time”. That may be the case. But the reason why he has taken this up is because the attribute which is usually inseparable from the object has been separated. But this is not the first time that this has happened. If the idea is that an inseparable attribute has been separated from an object, there has been occasions in the past too when attributes have been separated from the objects because science or physics has been developing and improving its tools to separate such attributes and take a look at them. So there is nothing great/remarkable about the ‘moment’ of a neutron or the spin or charge of an electron getting separated from the substrate of the particle or even the “mass” of a neutral particle getting separated from the “particle”, as it was attempted in the path to the discovery of the God Particle. This is all about the physics there in the write up.

3. Now from this innocuous development in the field of physics Ranade moves to epistemology and then to metaphysics. Let us move along. Indian epistemology starts usually with pramA and pramAna. Prama or valid knowledge should satisfy two conditions. pramA should reveal the existence of an object or agree with external reality. Secondly it should serve some practical need. “yathAvasthithavyavahArAnugunajnAnam pramA”. The distinctive cause of a particular pramA is pramAna. A cause is considered distinctive or best since knowledge arises without delay through its agency. Perception, inference and verbal or scriptural testimony are the three ways of knowing. Perception has for its object something always characterized by difference.

Perception is of two kinds, determinate and indeterminate. Indeterminate perception does not mean the apprehension of an object bereft of all distinctions. For, whatever enters into human experience under any circumstance appears with some elements of spatial and structural relations. Even the perception of an object for the first time involves thinking and discrimination as ‘this’ or ‘that’. So indeterminate perception is the cognition of an individual for the first time, with attributes, configuration etc. When the object of the same class is perceived for the second or third time with the notion of its generic character, the perception is called determinate.

The act of perception involves three factors 1. the knowing subject, 2. the object, not as something constructed by the mind but as something relatively independent of it and 3. the consciousness which issues from the subject and illuminates the object. This issuing out is done through the sense-channels. This consciousness comes in contact with the object and reveals it. The consciousness while revealing the object also reveals itself too.When the consciousness is directed upon an object through any one of the senses, one becomes aware of that object with its attributes. Indian metaphysics and epistemology does not recognize any attributeless object. Consequently the sense-qualities such as the color are not constructions of the mind. There is a process of the act of constructing in so far as things with their attributes are presented to the mind. If the attributes of an object are not the construction of the mind they must have their locus elsewhere. That is in the object independent of the mind.Here the very nature of the consciousness presupposes the existence of a conscious self as well as objects independent of the self.

Our friend Ranade reinterprets the above stated position in the light of the new scientific achievement. Now it is for members here to discuss whether there is substance in his argument or not.

Also members can now decide for themselves whether there is physics and consciousness in the OP or not.

 

[Vaagmi]

I was not going to comment on this thread further but since Sri Vaagmi has taken time to produce a long write up , I thought I will amplify my original cryptic observation and objection.
1. Why in my view Mr Ranade's conclusions are wrong (and continue to be wrong even after reading Sri Vaagmi's write up)?
The genesis of Quantum Mechanics (QM) which predicts many experimental results well is almost 100 years old. It has been long known that this theory is invariant to the arrow of time.
This means the description of reality provided by QM as understood even today can fully support a world where time can flow from Past to Present to Future OR from future to present to past!
Imagine Mr Ranade using this information and then declaring that Time travel has been established. The absurdity of the conclusion is similar to what was in the original article cited in the OP. One can use lots of Physics terms but it does not make for understanding of the basics.
Let me show the connection to this time symmetry of QM to the phenomena reported . (I do not intend to debate much more with absurd conclusions in an article).
About 50 or so years ago it was established by a well known Physicist that the time symmetry of QM will lead to experimental results where in the world of subatomic particles measurements could reveal that a particle's inherent attribute could 'apparently' be shown to be separated from the particle. An experiment was proposed then using improved technology in 2001 to observe such a conclusion and in July of this year the experimental results validated the prediction. The concept of Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland has been around as a prediction for a long time based on time symmetry of QM
All this points to is that there is ongoing need to improve our understanding of the reality of the world.
The above has nothing to with any meta-physics except in the minds of a few. There is no connection made in either the original write up or Sri Vaagmi's amplification.
2. Why in my view Mr Ranade's understanding of what he calls Advita is wrong?
Mr Ranade did make a weak connection with his analagy to neural networks with this statement.
"Consciousness is traditionally attributed to an emergent quality of neural network. "
This view is held in the west because it is based on Descarte's "I think therefore I am" paradigm.
Teaching of our scriptures popularly called Advita is exactly opposite which is "I am therefore I think"
His understanding of Advita notwithstanding how many articles he writes is inadequate in my view since it is broken at a basic level.
3. In QM particles can be in different places at the same time, travel by many paths at the same time, spin clockwise and anticlockwise all at the same time. They have been shown experimentally to instantaneously influence each other from across the universe!
Our world experience is not at all like what is observe in this subatomic world. Full explanations do not exist today though there are many attempts at a unification theories.
All this points to the fact that the scientists continue to not have a deep understanding of a unified theory. Therefore experiments like the one reported continue to show a strange portrait of our world. There is nothing more to take away from the reported experiment at this time.
4. There is not a connection made between experimental results of a theoretical conclusion made 50 years ago to consciousness since there is nothing to connect to notwithstanding lots of words used by Sri Vaagmi, most of which are irrelevant in my view. Sri Vaagmi's descriptions (inner reality, external reality etc) are also not in alignment with any understanding I have. And I have no desire to debate something that is meaningless to me. I know Sri Vaagmi will disagree and once again we will agree to disagree..
Peace!

1. I have never said Ranade is right.

We (tks and me) agree on this above point. I wanted members here only to discuss the idea presented in the OP.

2. We differ on these points:

--This detailed write up could have been presented earlier in the beginning. This write up has come because there is physics there in the OP. LOL. The interferometer used in the experiment was an equipment usually used by physicists and the passing of the neutron beam through a silicon crystal is also the usual method of experimenting adopted by physicists.

--The "lots of words" used by me were meant for those members here who are not familiar with particle physics and not for a research scholar in physics. The scholar was supposed to skip them and look for only the essence of the argument. LOL.

--In the original write up Ranade has tried to connect the scientific finding with advaitam when he said "So separation of matter and its characteristics, attributes, or qualities wilol be an important landmark in our understanding of the phenomenon of consciousness". and went further to wonder: "Could consciousness be a mere form of energy that manifests in different forms by modulating its frequency and amplitude? Can perception be merely a play of consciousness, a phenomenon that simultaneously projects and comprehends the external world as a holographic reality?" and drew this conclusion that "The separation and distinction of the objective world is because of external appearances. If the elementary fundamental constituent is the ubiquitous atom, then the perceived difference of the external form may just be a programme of the subject's perception. Rather than the different particles carrying the information of matter and its qualities it could be that different loci in the brain might be activated to perceive matter and its qualities simultaneously". Thus his effort was to interpret the scientific finding to reiterate his position that "external world is just a projection emanating from a programme executed by the subject's perception" which is in a way the position of the metaphysics of advaitam. Why should we run away from this attempt by Ranade? He has every right to interpret the rality in his own way. We may not agree with him but we can take a look at what he has to say. To dismiss him as "no physics, no consciousness" and so no sense is confining ourselves to intellectual ivory tower. This is what I have said in my "elaborate"post.

Yes. Let us agree to disagree. Peace. This post is for neutral observers here-particularly many of my friends who are just silent visitors here.