KARL JASPERS FORUM

TA 105 (Vimal)

Commentary 1

( NEURAL NETWORKS AND BUDDHISM )

by Cr Alan Oliver

2 February 2008, posted 9 February 2008

<1>
I’m afraid I can only offer simple comments on this and the preceding related articles.

My view is that the descriptions of the physics of neural networks and associates matter appear to favour the notion that consciousness emerges from the biological processes in a brain. I concede this might be a little hasty on my part.

<2>
I guess I’m a bit biased from my reading of Patanjali, the main thrust of which is that Yoga is a science while Buddhism is a religion and this can be where viewpoints diverge. Mostly, what I find is that science in general has written what was already known 6000 years ago; this time in modern scientific terminology.

Your statement that SE’s are superimposed on elementary particles is a case in point; as I see it this is restating YS 3.17

3.17 The name associated with an object, the object itself implied by that name, and the conceptual existence of the object, all three usually interpenetrate or commingle with one another. By Samyama on the distinction between these three, the meaning of the sounds made by all beings becomes available.

(shabda artha pratyaya itaretara adhyasat samkara tat pravibhaga samyama sarva bhuta ruta jnana)

In simple terms so far as an information medium is concerned, one could rewrite this sutra to say that “the sound, the message within the sound, and the idea behind the message, all exist in the sound in a confused (entangled) state. By Samyama on the sound all three are clarified and made available to the seeker.”

<3>
An intuitive understanding might be to say that all SQ’s carry information from the levels of Purusha, Chit, Chiti-shakti, Ahamkara, Chitta, Sattva, Tamas, Rajas, Tan-matras and Bhuttas/tattvas.

This final pair is the five gross elements which loosely relate to the four basic forces of physics; what I find important here, and I know Bevan Reid would agree, is that the fifth bhuta, space, is missing in most scientific discussions. Yoga holds the view that this particular space, which is not physical space, is fundamental to the other four and thus this space, Akasha is given the title of Mahat (greatest teacher).

<4>
Whether consciousness emerges in the brain or occasionally interacts with the brain might be an interesting point, though I would say that what is being discussed really is not consciousness but mind, which is an artefact of the ability of space to retain information. Therefore I would say that PE’s are SE’s retained by space. I would also say that the SQ is the potentials of space as well as the process of space potential becoming real.

<5>
In mentioning Bohm’s Implicate Order as part of what he called the whole reality, that reality cannot be accurately described unless such description includes all of the whole, and space is by far the greater part.

And I could be wrong: it depends somewhat which version of Yoga one cites and this correlates to one’s samskaras.

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Alan Oliver
e-mail <cr.alan.oliver (at) bigpond.com>