NMT (No-Me Teaching) new series 65:
Some Ramana Maharshi quotes:
In Non-duality, Meditation may be regarded as by the Self, for there is no other Knower, & upon the Self, since there is no Object of the Meditation. In Meditation upon Self-Knowledge one cannot stand apart from the Self to contemplate upon Self-Knowledge.
Knowing the Self is being the Self, & Being means Existence, one’s own Existence.
No one denies one’s Existence any more than one denies one’s eyes, although one cannot see them.
The trouble lies with your desire to objectify the Self, in the same way as you objectify your eyes when you place a mirror before them.
You have been so accustomed to objectivity that you have lost the knowledge of yourself, simply because the Self cannot be objectified.
Who is to know the Self ? Can the insentient Body know it ?
All the time you speak & think of your “I”, yet when questioned you deny knowledge of it.
You are the Self, yet you ask how to know the Self.
The many objective differences are not real but are mere superimpositions on Self, which is of nature of True Knowledge.
If the idea “l am the Body” is accepted, selves are multiple.
The state in which this “I am the Body” idea vanishes is the Self since in that state there are no other objects.
Since the Body itself does not exist in the natural outlook of the real Self, but only in the extroverted outlook of the Mind which is deluded by the power of Illusion, to call Self, the Space of Consciousness, dehi [the possessor of the Body, lit: cremation fuel] is wrong.
The World does not exist without the Body, the Body never exists without the Mind, the Mind never exists without Consciousness, & Consciousness never exists without Reality.
For the wise one who has known Self by diving within himself, there is nothing other than Self to be known.
Since the Ego which identifies the Body as “I” has perished, the wise one is the formless Existence-Consciousness.
The jnani knows he is the Self & that nothing, neither his Body nor anything else, exists but the Self.
What difference could presence or absence of a Body make ?
Fine-Tuned Universe 45:
[In the unreal reflection called the “Universe”, a product of an unreal Mind, even there, Infinite Intelligence is evident and inspiring.]
Haldane asked: Must we assume that the Universe is composed at the outset of Matter – eternal, unchangeable, & independent ? Henderson had said: Biology deals, not merely with the “efficient” causes of ordinary Physics & Chemistry, but also with what Aristotle called “final” causes.”
It is in the Biological facts that “Teleology is revealed as immanent in Nature – as of its essence & no mere accident appearing in the Physical Environment – & not only in organisms.
Haldane believed: Biological concepts must be extended to the Inorganic world. While knowledge of how this would work is not now present, it requires only a further extension of knowledge. Haldane’s hope for the future was that: Physics & Chemistry would be penetrated by conceptions akin to those of Biology. If this occurs, “Teleological reasoning will take a natural place in the Physical Sciences”
This is not where Henderson was going; & in a later criticism Haldane stressed how his & Henderson’s divergent views & also the extent to which Henderson’s commitment to the understanding that living things are Physico-Chemical systems further separated them.
Henderson later reported that he stepped back even farther from Teleological guides. He also stated that he
became significantly more skeptical of Metaphysics – to the extent that he regretted some of his earlier writings, seeing the discussion of “Teleology, Vitalism, & so forth, more or less irrelevant & immature.
He noted that he had been less skeptical than he should have been & claimed that much of what he wrote in attempting to explain “Fitness” in Metaphysical & Teleological terms was meaningless. But he did not reject “Fitness” as a concept & continued to see it as a valuable, & perhaps even the most interesting, part of his Scientific work.
Henderson restated the claims he originally for the critical role of Carbon, Hydrogen, & Oxygen, which “make up a unique ensemble of properties . . . which are of the highest importance in the Evolutionary process,” making Diversity possible.
These elements, he emphasized, provide the “fittest ensemble of characteristics for durable mechanism.” He still claimed: “For these facts I have no explanation to offer. All that I can say is that they exist, that they are antecedent to Organic adaptations, that they resemble them, & that they can hardly be due to chance.”.
“Fitness” did not challenge & provoke his contemporaries to take up the concept & use it as a guide to further scientific work. His later work on Physiological systems much more clearly evoked the laboratory labors of his contemporaries. Its detailed analysis of what he referred to as “an immensely complex system in equilibrium” served as a vigorous stimulant to further experiment & explanation.
“Fitness” remains to this day a symbol of attempts to provide broader explanation of the complexity of the Worlds of the living & the non-living. Henderson’s pre-World War I book was written at a time when the atom was gaining its redefinition at the hands of Rutherford, Rydberg, Mosley, & Bohr. This was before important new forms of chemical bonding had been established, & Biochemistry was still in its infancy.
One of Henderson’s conjectures was that: “A possible abode of Life not unlike the earth apparently
must be a frequent occurrence in Space” & that perhaps even “‘thousands” of such planets exist. He further noted the current expectation of there being “many thousand million millions” of such possible abodes for Life.”
It is in this sense that Henderson’s “Fitness” takes on an expansive meaning. It has fueled renewed
interest in the Origin of Life & the obvious extension: the synthesis of Life in the laboratory.
Some more selected verses from the Ramana Maharshi disciple Master Nome:
The supposedly knowing Mind & the Universe known are both imagined. Existence-Knowledge, which is Being-Consciousness, that alone is real. The Reality exists without anything else. That Self is alone the Knower & the Known, but any forms given to Knower & Known are only imagined. Difference, which manifests only in the Mind within the Waking & Dream States, such difference is unreal. Non-Dual Consciousness alone exists.
The ancient Sages gave their instruction in Silence & with Teaching that reveals how “That you are, (tat tvam asi).” Inquiry into this instruction removes all ideas, of what is not the Self, from the Self. This is like the proverbial negation the Analogy’s snake from the rope. Negation of the not-Self is never negation of a reality, but rather a negation of false assumptions or superimposition. If real things would have to be negated, Liberation would be transitory, or not occur at all. For how would it be possible for anything truly existent to go out of existence, or for something to actually change its nature.
Self-Inquiry & negation eliminate only Ignorance & Illusion. All that is objective, & also the Ego, are negated by Self-Inquiry & negation summed up as neti, neti “not this, not this”. Such reveal Being, which is Consciousness, the one Self.
The Ego is ignorantly assumed to be the Self &, thus the Knower. The conception of the Mind determine whether one is endowed with wrong knowledge, doubtful knowledge, or true knowledge. With mis-identification, there is wrong knowledge. Then, what is regarded as knowledge is actually Ignorance. Thereby arises self-caused Delusion regarding Happiness, Identity, & Reality.
With spiritual practice, wrong knowledge gives way to yet-doubtful knowledge. This means there is some actual knowledge regarding Happiness, Identity, & Reality. But this knowledge is not yet steady for it is either a conviction, without direct experience, or a conviction fused with some experience. But still, it is not steady because there remains the need to destroy remaining tendencies to mis-identify.
True Knowledge, however, is that state in which Knowledge is invariable. Also, here knowing & Being are one & the same. At all times, the same Consciousness is the only Knower, even when it appears as an Ego, a dissolving Ego, or as purely Ego-less. This is just like a clear crystal appearing as if endowed with different colors or as transparent, according to the proximity of various colors, or the absence of them. In Truth, all such states & their content are known by the Self, have their apparent existence by the Self, which is free from them & depends on no thought whatsoever to know itself. Even so, all such states & their content do not exist apart from the Self, though the Self itself can never be other than the Knowledge, Being itself.
Calculus for Yogis, part 8
First off, we attend to one of the various topics used in introducing Derivatives, topics that we have omitted, or in this case put off so far, for the sake of simplicity.
In previous examples we had talked about y being a function of x so that y is graphed on the Vertical scale & x is graphed on a Horizontal scale. We also said that another Independent Variable like Time, t could be the horizontal scale.
Well graphs aside for the moment, both y & x can be functions of t , while y remains a function of x . In that case, with x being of the function of t & y begins as a function of x , then what is called y as a function of t is a “composition” of the functions y & x in terms of x‘s variable t .
(y ∘ x)(t) = y(x(t))
Please know that the Rule for taking the Derivative of that Composition is called the Chain Rule. In terms of just the differentials d y, d x, d t , it looks like they could be canceled & the expression below could be proven by simple canceling of terms. That is a useful way of remembering how it works, but it doesn’t quite work that simply. That aside the Chain Rule is:
d y/ d t = (d y/ d x) x ( d x/ d t) – the Chain Rule
The foregoing, that is: taking the Derivative of the function of a function, called the Derivative of a composition of functions, for purposes was a necessary prelude to an easy introduction to the next basic pattern that we had put off. And that would be the general pattern or formula for taking the Derivative of one function times another, the Product of 2 functions. Both are functions of the same Variable. For instance, we can take Time as our Independent Variable & we have x & y to both be Dependent Variables, functions of Time, t .
Then if we take the Time Derivative of the product xy it turns out as :
d(xy)/dt = y dx/dt + x dy/dt , which bears some resemblance to the Chain Rule, which it should when we consider (xy) to be a fuction of x & y namely “multiplication” of the two.
d(xy)/dt = [d(xy)/dx] x [dx/dt] + [d(xy)/dy] x [dy/dt]
= y (dx/dt) + x (dy/dt)
thus the same Product Rule as above. In other words, the Product Rule shows one function times the Derivative of the other, plus that other function times the Derivative of the 1st function, as it were, taking turns having the Derivative taken while simply multiplying by the other function. We can also affirm the simpler expression in terms of just “differentials”
d(xy) = x dy + y dx
When we take the trimmed–down inverse of the Derivative or just the “differentials”, that inverse sometimes called the Anti–Derivative, the trimmed–down Indefinite Integral, of each of those last 3 terms:
∫ d(xy) = xy = ∫ x dy + ∫ y dx , or rearranged to:
∫ x dy = xy – ∫ y dx
Corresponding to the Integral expression is on in terms of sums & differences:
n n
Σ fk ∆ gk = [fn+1 gn+1 ∆ fm gm] – Σ gk+1 ∆ fk
k = m k = m
Again to put the Integral expression in other words, if taking the Integral of 1 Variable, such as x in terms of y, is difficult, then we can instead take the Integral of that other Variable, such as y in terms of x. Taking the xy part as one kind of “fix” among various corrective factors, we here see for the 1st time, a relating of:
∫ x dy to: ∫ y dx
The Integral pattern of is more clearly a “change of Variable” from: x to y .
x y = ∫ x dy + ∫y dx
d/dt[ x y] = x dy/dt + y dx/dt
d/[ x y] = x dy + y dx
F (z) = ∫ f (x) e–2πxz dx , taken from – ∞ to ∞
f (x) = ∫ f (x) e2πxz dz , taken from – ∞ to ∞
Corresponding to Integral expression is the Fourier Series in terms of Sums:
. N
sin N (x) = 1/2 Ao + Σ [ An cos 2 nx /P + An sin 2 nx /P ]
. k = m
The Laplace transform, like the Fourier transform transforms a expression in ordinary Variables to one in a Frequency or “imaginary“–Frequency–type Variable.
F (s) = ∫ f (t) e–st dx , taken from – ∞ to ∞
f (t) = 1/ 2πi ∫ f (x) est ds , taken from γ – i ∞ to γ + i ∞
To the Integral expression there is no corresponding is the “Laplace Series” in terms of Sums.
The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:
http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/
or with Caps-sensitive:
Duplicates (but with graphics) have been available on:
http://www.blogger.com as “Being-as-Consciousness, Non-Duality – new & final version” with link:
http://being-as-consciousness.blogspot.com/
[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]
“There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth.” – the “no creation” school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada
for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see: www.ajatavada.com/
Nonduality and Science 