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Paul Brunton's Notebooks: Category 21, Mentalism

CLASS at Wisdom's Goldenrod, Hector, NY

with Anthony Damiani (AD)

March 23, 1983

PB PARAS; MENTALISM

TOPIC: PB Paras

SUBJECT: Mentalism

SUBSUBJECTS: Epistemology, World-Idea, Witness-I, Individual Mind, Senses, Reasoning

CONTENTS:

MENTALISM AS THE KEY TO PHILOSOPHICAL UNDERSTANDING

THE PROJECTED WORLD-IDEA IS THE PROTOTYPE OF ALL KNOWLEDGE: WHEN YOUR MIND PROJECTS THE WORLD-IDEA, YOU'RE PROJECTING ALL THE IDEAS

"NO OBJECT OR IDEA CAN EXIST WITHOUT BEING THOUGHT OF, AND NOTHING PERCEPTIBLE CAN EXIST WITHOUT SOMETHING OR SOMEONE TO SEE IT"

ALL THE PRINCIPLES OF METAPHYSICS, EPISTEMOLOGY, AXIOLOGY, ONTOLOGY ARE INCLUDED IN THE STATEMENT "I SEE A TREE"

THE WHOLE MATERIAL WORLD, WHICH INCLUDES THE EMPIRICAL SUBJECT AND EMPIRICAL OBJECT, IS BEING THOUGHT OF BY THE WITNESS-I

THE KIND OF UNDERSTANDING THAT EXISTS BETWEEN THE WITNESS-I AND ITS WORLD IS NOT A KNOWING THE WAY WE UNDERSTAND KNOWING

PB SHOWS YOU THAT WITHOUT AN OBJECT THERE'S NO SUBJECT, WITHOUT A SUBJECT THERE'S NO OBJECT, THEN HE TAKES THE ENTIRETY, THE WORLD-IDEA, AND SHOWS YOU THAT THAT HAS TO BE AN OBJECT TO A THINKING MIND

YOU MUST BE ABLE TO REASON FOR YOURSELF, STEP-BY-STEP, HOW TO GET FROM THE EMPIRICAL SURFACE MIND TO THE WITNESS-I OR THE GREATER I, WHICH IS YOUR REAL SELF

INSOFAR THAT YOUR INDIVIDUAL MIND TAKES IN THE WORLD-IDEA, ALL OTHER INDIVIDUAL MINDS ARE INCLUDED IN THAT IDEA

"WHERE THE WORLD VANISHES AND THE EGO IS STILLED, WE BECOME ONE WITH THE INFINITE AND ETERNAL MIND BEHIND THE UNIVERSE"

YOU WANT TO KNOW THAT "I" IN THE SAME WAY YOU KNOW A POLE, WHEREAS YOU ARE THAT "I" YOU WISH TO KNOW

IF YOU MUST IDENTIFY WITH SOMETHING, IDENTIFY WITH YOUR GREATER SELF

AS STUDENTS OF PHILOSOPHY, WE SHOULD BE ABLE TO DEMONSTRATE THE EFFICACY OF OUR PRINCIPLES, E.G., BY DEVELOPING SIDDHIS

BOOKS / NOTES READ FROM OR REFERENCED:

Paul Brunton, Notebooks. 16 vols; Vol. 1 entitled Perspectives, published 1984-1988. Some Paul Brunton Notebook paras are, as of 2018, unpublished, and are noted as such.
Paul Brunton, The Hidden Teaching beyond Yoga
Paul Brunton, The Wisdom of the Overself
Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason
D.E. Harding, On Having No Head: Zen and the Rediscovery of the Obvious
Patanjali, Yoga-Sutras
Tim Smith Notes from PB Visit 1980 read in class

NOTES:

Tim Smith Notes from his PB Visit read at beginning of this class.
Unpublished PB paras, even if sourced, should be proofread.
Older transcript version (Scan File 1983 0323C1-08R03.PDF) exists.
March 23, 1983 was a WEDNESDAY, the usual PB class day.

TRANSCRIBED Verbatim by IT 2018. Reformatted from V11a version by JRM & JF 2019-2020, with Subheads and Table of Contents added by JRM. In 2023, IT reformats again to accord with new conventions, fixes prefatory matter and footer, updates audio file name, fixes/completes Book List, fixes minor errors, adds new notes within transcript. In 2025, MW expands Subsubjects and alters Subheads to make more accurate. Archival verbatim transcript – V14.1a.

AUDIO FILES: 1983 0323a (formerly 1983 0324b), 1983 0323b (formerly 1983 0324a). [Note 1: "Tape" and "Side" refer to original audio cassette tapes later digitized into .MP3 Audio Files. Note 2: See table below for new audio file names. Correct date verified from Events Master and AD Blue Book info.]

NEW FILE NAME	OLD FILE NAME
1983 0323a	1983 0324b
1983 0323b	1983 0324a

Highlight:

1983 03/23 at Wisdom's Goldenrod

PB Paras; Mentalism

Archival verbatim transcript

[Audio File 1983 0323a (formerly 1983 0324b) Begins]

RC: --his notes from PB when they were together in Europe.

[11 second pause, student whispering, shuffling about]

[Transcriber note: Sometimes TS switches a word or word order when re-reading parts of his notes. I transcribe verbatim as he reads it. Also, I don't have access to these notes so this needs to be checked. Transcribed as heard/read.]

MENTALISM AS THE KEY TO PHILOSOPHICAL UNDERSTANDING

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "If they can understand the way the mind and the senses interlock, and that the whole thing is mental experience, what the re-- what the results are and what it points to, if they can break through that barrier and see that, then they've also had a spiritual experience. Otherwise, it's very hard to get. If they don't have that experience, it's very hard to understand mentalism. Then they can just go to church. (some laughter) At least if they stu-- if they can study it intensely, it may open the way to a spiritual experience. Otherwise, they're just talking words. That's why I call it the key to philosophical understanding. The senses belong to the body, the mind is something else. How do the senses report the experience to the mind? Or is the mind creating the report or reading the report? The thoughts themselves are actually creating it all the time or seem to be creating the pictures of the world they get. But that word"seeing" is only a supposition. Thought is part of the creative work. Otherwise, there's no difference between a corpse and a living man."

S (faint): Why don't you go a little slower?

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading exaggeratedly slowly]: "What [one/two words inaudible]" (laughter)

S (amidst laughter): Of course. (S laughing, laughter)

TS (amidst laughter): Uh--

S: How can--

S: A little faster now. (some laughter, couple students assent)

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "The corpse can't register what-- what's happening, yet he's got all the organs, the same as the living man. So what's the difference? The living man has a mind. So it's a question of which can't-- came first, the cart or the horse, or the mind or the body's organs. The body's organs are useless without the mind, but so long as they think the mind is a lump of flesh, they'll never get the truth. Wei Wu Wei's last words to me were:"It's all in the mind." That part requires explanation. It's the hurdle-- It-- It is the hurdle. Russell came very near to it. In the end he couldn't make the leap over the hurdle. The reason why people can't make the leap is because they're so stuck in their body, and that depends partly on how they live and the way of life. That is why the way they live is a direct connection of the way they think."

[short pause]

LH (faint): Did he recommend any denomination?

S (faint): (Sure/Church). (laughter, students assent, student words)

AH: Tim, could you go over the very first part and perhaps explain specifically what-- what the hurdle is in relation to the senses and the mind? That first-- first couple of sentences there.

TS: Um-- [12 second pause] Some of this is going to be-- I think it's ambiguous partly because it was verbally [student assents, faint] taken down and there's some ambiguous pronouns and what not kicking around so I don't know that it's gonna withstand careful analysis. I can read the first part.

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "If they can understand the way the mind and the senses interlock, and that the whole thing is mental experience, what the results are and what points to it, if they can break through that barrier and see that, then they've also had a spiritual experience. Otherwise it's very hard to get."

TS: I think the barrier is to see the whole thing is mental experience.

[TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "If they don't have that experience, it is very hard to understand mentalism."

[short pause]

S: Could you read the first few words again please?

TS: Aught-- ok, uh--

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "If they can understand the way the mind and the senses interlock, and that the whole thing is mental experience, what the results are and what point-- what it points to, if they can break through that barrier and see that, then they've also had a spiritual experience. Otherwise, it's very hard to get."

[short pause]

AB: Tim? Does this mean that you have to have already had a spiritual experience to have this understanding or that gaining this understanding is the equivalent of a spiritual experience?

TS: I believe that it-- that the point that was being made here was the latter, that both understanding this is a spiritual experience and that the very effort to, [S: Ok.] through intense study, itself was a-- a kind of-- or he says that.

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "At least if they can study it intensely, it may open the way to a spiritual experience."

TS: That the very effort to understand mentalism, although difficult, was part of the-- is what he calls the key to philosophical understanding. But I don't think he's speaking here of necessary mystical experience prior to engaging and trying to understand, but that the very act of understanding carries with it its own potential for s-- for some kind of awakening.

DB: Tim? Could you please read the-- the part about the differences between the living man, corpse? [student assents, faint] That's [TS simultaneously: Ok.] something that I've never really understood.

S (faint): Yeah, sure.

TS: Well I'll read the rest, let me see-- (laughter, student words)

DB: Well, if the individual mind is [TS/S(?) simultaneously: Well, corpses don't have to work as hard.] creating everything, when it dies why doesn't the individual body disappear? I mean that's what it boils down to.

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "The senses belong to the body, the mind is something else. How do the senses report the experience to the mind? Or is the mind creating the report or reading the report? The thoughts themselves are actually creating it all the time, or seem to be creating the pictures of the world they get. But that word"seeing" is only a supposition. Thought is part of the creative work. Otherwise, there's no difference between a corpse and a living man. [TS: Why?] The corpse can't register what's happening, yet he's got all the organs, the same as the living man. So what's the difference? The living man has a mind. So it's a question of which came first, the cart or the horse, or the mind or the body's organs. The body's organs are useless without the mind, but so long as they think the mind is a lump of flesh, they'll never get the truth. Wei Wu Wei's last words to me were: "It's all in the mind." That part requires explanation. It's the hurdle. Russell came very near to it. In the end, he couldn't make the leap over the hurdle. The reason why people can't make the leap is because they're so stuck in their body, and that depends partly on how they live and the way of life. That is why the way they live is a direct connection to-- of the way they think."

DB: I-- I guess I still don't understand that part.

RG: Your question really being why doesn't the body disappear when the person dies.

DB: Yeah, it remain(s) the same as--

BS: Why doesn't what?

RG: Why doesn't the body disappear when a person dies if it's the individual mind that leaves and it's the individual mind that's created the body, why when the individual mind is no more associated with the body and doesn't think it into existence why is it still there, is his question.

AH: I thought, I thought the-- the passage was directed to explaining the fact that the corpse and living man are alike if you consider the mind to be stuck in a lump of flesh or the brain. [student assents, faint] At that level there's no distinction between a corpse and a dead man. But the body's anti-- animated by-- (bit of laughter, student words)

S (faint): And a living man.

AH: I mean if you-- if you take that point of view you can't hold a distinction between if he's dead or alive, 'cause the life principle of the body's in the mind, not in the brain.

DB: Right, yes.

AH: Like life doesn't depend upon the flesh.

DB: Right.

AH: The flesh depends upon life.

DB: Right. But, see the--

PD: The living man is the mind, he's not even the body, that's got nothing [AH assents, faint] to do with the living man.

DB: Right, yes, ok, but he speaks of the-- the body, the-- you know, a corpse and the living mind as being similar, I mean the-- they're both-- the organs are there in both cases, alright. But my problem was that, in-- in that particular section that he spoke of, it almost seemed as if the mind was something which, you know, was associated with the body at one time and then wasn't. Now from a mentalistic perspective if we say everything's in the mind, individual mind is creating that body that it's going to be associated with along with the rest of the world he experiences. Now when he dies, you no longer can say the individual mind is there but the physical body remains.

RG: But not for [S simultaneously: Yeah (Dave).] that individual mind.

S (simultaneously, very faint): Not for him, so--

DB (simultaneously): Granted.

AB: So when you look at it--

DB: But, alright-- I'm sorry, go ahead.

AB: I was going to say when you look at the dead body it's your individual mind that's creating that thought.

DB: Right.

RG (faint): Yeah. Then that answers your question.

DB: Ok, but, I mean, by the same token, by the same token, when I, you know, talk to you or I talk to somebody, the knowledge that I have of their mind, so to speak, is within my mind, right? I mean in the same way that the-- what I know of their body is in my mind. [RG assents] There's still a hiatus, there's still something going on here that I don't get. Do you see-- do you see the problem? There's a disasso-- an apparent disassociation of what he's speaking of here as the-- the mind from the body, [RG assents, faint] ok. Now when that takes place, yeah, I mean, another individual mind is capable of apprehending what's left. But not, you know, the living vital principle there. It's a problem, I mean, I don't get it.

PD: Is it the same problem that he's speaking of here though Dave? See, I don't see it as the same problem. [DB simultaneously: Well, yeah, I mean he's--] I think what you're referring to is the standard epistemological problem of-- [DB simultaneously: Well it--] of how does an object exist in knowledge.

DB: No, it's not really that because I'm not-- I'm not-- I hope I'm not trying to take the point of view that-- of asserting that there is this independent object prior to the mind, ok. But there does seem to be something-- I mean I don't understand why-- right, I guess the simplest way of putting it is, when an indi-- individual passes away, why does not physical body which has been a thought which they have created, you know, and have functioned through, why does that not disappear in the same way we say that the person who has passed away isn't there?

PD: Well who-- who has said that the body-thought is a creation of the individualistic mind?

DB: Well, we have.

PD: Who's the "we"?

S (simultaneously): This is the--

PD: I won't take part in that statement. (some laughter, student words)

S (amidst laughter): It's just an idea.

AB: Yeah, but maybe for the--

RG (simultaneously): Well it's my mind. No, it's clearly the point of view of the-- of the classes lately that my-- that your mind creates every-- everything that you could possibly know in sense-appearing.

AB: Yeah, so maybe for the--

RG (simultaneously): It's clearly--

LR: So maybe that doesn't die.

AB: No, for the consciousness that previously inhabited that body, that body is no longer present to that mind. [students assent, faint] So, the problem isn't there.

DB: Well--

BS: Swell.

AB: I mean--

DB (amidst laughter): For the particular individual in question it's not, right, but--

S (simultaneously): Yeah.

AB: And for me it is. So, that's my mind.

BS: Besides, why should his body go with him and leave the Earth behind?

S (very faint): What?

DB (amidst laughter/student words): Well I'm not saying it should go with him, I'm just saying (it wasn't/the question)-- (laughter, student words) Why is it-- I mean does this--

S (simultaneously): Because, because we've obliterated the distinction between individual mind and World-Mind.

PD: Well [S simultaneously, faint: Just-- you can't take them away.] why-- why are you confusing the different-- the different levels of meaning and definition? You gonna talk epistemology or aren't you?

DB: Well what's the very first--

PD: That's probably my first question to you, are you talking epistemology or aren't you? (bit of laughter, student words)

DB: No, I'm not.

PD: Ok.

DB: Ok. I'm [PD simultaneously: Proceed.] trying-- I'm try--

PD (simultaneously): I mean you're tr-- on one hand you sound like you're looking for a psychological description of what this mind is apart from a body relationship.

DB: No, that's ok, that's a mystery, that's-- I don't want to, you know-- that's fine, I can't-- I don't want to ask that question. Question I want to ask is, precisely what is-- was PB referring to in the very first couple of sentences there?

PD: First couple of-- I-- the import seemed to be to gain a-- a mystical ex-- insight, spiritual insight, into the mentalness of all experience.

DB: Right, now, ordinary human beings generally would be willing to assert that they have a mind, and they would also be willing to assert that they have a body. I mean, you know, you ask most people and they would say that. But, the problem is, from a mentalistic perspective, on one hand, we can say that everything is mind, alright, but nonetheless there's still this apparent division there. Right? [RG assents] And whether or not it's felt or whether it's there because of the lack of, you know, this mystical experience or whatever, there's, I mean-- I'm just trying to focus in very specifically on this one issue, ok.

PD: I'm listening.

DB: And that is, specifically, what is the relation between-- and I'm just getting it from the context of the-- of the quote that Tim read--

PD (simultaneously): Go ahead, what's-- what's the issue?

DB: What's the relation between the individual mind, ok, and its body?

RG: You have the same problem when you go to sleep. You don't have to do it in death, you could do it every night.

DB: Well, that's fine.

RG (simultaneously): Same epistemological problem, [student assents, faint] if you confine it to epistemology.

DB: Right, but-- well see it's--

PD: Ok now-- alright. If that's your question, that doesn't seem to be the context of the quote. Now maybe I'm wrong but that doesn't seem to be at all in dealing with this context of this quote. The context of this quote seems to be trying to point you to gain a spiritual insight, experience into its fundamental nature of all your experience. And he comes up with this analogy, a picture for you to try to drive this home, that you take a look at a corpse that's got all the senses, all the thi-- all the, quote, parts of the functioning vehicles, [DB: Right.] that isn't the principle of awareness. That's what he's trying to drive home in-- in his picture-gram he creates for you. [student assents, faint] I mean, I don't see how you're getting your question from that quote at all Dave.

DB: Well-- If I could see the thing I could-- I could specifically relate it to that, I mean just in terms of the way he lays it out, but what I'm trying to get at is--

AD: The body is part of the World-Idea.

[student assents, very faint]

DB: The body is part of the World-Idea. Ok. Now--

S: (Is specific.)

AH: That's-- that solves it.

LR (simultaneously): Yeah, it's a cosmic object, (bit of laughter) it's created by the World-Soul, the body.

DB: Body? Alright. The body is.

LR: Yeah.

DB: Ok. Now--

LR: So if you take that point of view, [DB: Yeah.] that mind identifies with that body. [DB: Right.] It is not solely responsible for creating it.

DB: Alright.

LR: Ok, so when the mind withdraws, that body is still [DB: Ok.] part of that world-picture.

DB: Ok, no that's fine. Now the problem then comes in wherein we have-- the body-- the individual body is part of the World-Idea, World-Idea including let's say the totality of-- of universal manifestation moment-by-moment. Now, what does it mean that the individual mind is associated with this particular part of the World-Idea in such an intimate way? I mean is that--

RG (simultaneously): That's the who-- that's the whole discussion of karma, cosmology, and not epistemology. That does-- that then becomes a meta-epistemological question there.

DB: Well that was the question I was asking.

RG: But that's not what the quote is about, par-- particularly. You got your answer. If you accept that the body is a cosmic object and held in a cosmic mind independent of your pers-- your individual mind knowing it, you've got an answer on an epistemological level.

DB: I can-- see the-- the problem is Tim-- Richard, I can understand that, I mean I'm familiar with that, that-- that train of thought but it's-- problem is that it's at this point barely more than words, and I'm trying to get my understanding of it to the point where actually say, "Oh, right well, this is what (happens/happened)." Do you s-- do you see the problem? I'm-- that's all I'm aiming at.

RG/S(?) (faint): That's good.

MB: Could I ask another question about this quote? I missed a point in the beginning where he said the thoughts seem to create the picture of-- he said there was something about that word 'seeing' and I missed the meaning of what he was getting at.

[9 second pause]

TS: Well, you know, you-- mind you that this-- this is copied down so there may be a phrase missing in the plan, [one/two inaudible MB words simultaneous with TS] that's why I said it-- well I can read what's here and I can tell you what I believe was in between.

MB: Ok. (bit of laughter)

TS (faint): Ok?

MB (simultaneously): There was something missing but I couldn't--

TS (simultaneously): Uh, yeah there is, (um/uh)--

MB (simultaneously): Yeah.

[short pause, bit of laughter]

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "The thoughts themselves are actually creating it all…"

TS: I'm sorry.

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "The thoughts themselves are actually creating it all the time or seem to be creating the pictures of the world they-- they get. [TS: Pause.] But that word"seeing" is only a supposition."

MB: "Seeing" or "seem"?

TS: "Seeing," "seeing". In other words, that the [S simultaneously: Oh.] seeing-- [MB: Ok.] that seeing the world is only a supposition, that the-- I believe in here the implication is that the-- is it the organs that see the pictures or is it the thoughts which create the seeing and the picture together. I believe he's pointing out, as he goes on to in the section which David was discussing, it's not the sense organs that are the vehicle of knowledge but the mind. And so that that-- when you say you see the world, he's implying here that no, you think the world. [short pause] That's how I understood it.

MB: That-- that fits in with the beginning part of the quote which [TS simultaneously: Yeah.] talks about how do the-- how does the-- how do the world and the senses and the idea(s) all get together.

TS: Yes, that's-- I think that would solve his problem.

AH: Could we discuss the very last sentence, that notion of--

TS: Yeah actually, you know Andrew, I think the only-- the two sections that are most important to me out of this-- this discussion or this comment that PB suggests are not the technical words because I think there are written passages which are-- withstand a lot more analysis than this but the section where he says that--

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading/paraphrasing]: "If you can study it intensely, it may open up a way to spiritual experience. Otherwise, they're just talking words. That's why I call it the key to philosophical understanding."

TS: And at the end, where he says, "That-- That part requires explanation." That is, the-- that it's all in the mind.

TS Notes from 1980 PB Visit [TS reading]: "It's the hurdle Russell came very-- It's the hurdle. Russell came very near to it. In the end he could not make the leap over the hurdle. The reason why people can't make the leap is because they're so stuck in their body, and that depends partly on how they live and the way of life. That is why the way they live is a direct connection of the way they think."

[9½ second pause]

AH: Could you say a little more about that? Like how-- how can the way you live keep you stuck in your body?

[student assents, very faint]

S: Right [one/two words inaudible]

S (very faint): Did you find (that/out)? (laughter, student words)

DB: Huh?

AH: Like I know, I know what the standard answers would be but I'd like to know what-- what he might have said or--

PD: Well, one [couple inaudible TS words simultaneous with PD] conjecture Andrew, anything that caters to the point of view of the self-comfort of the body would be a matter of creating a standpoint which is going to en-- enhance a materialistic perspective and a div-- and hence a division in ex-- in the experience. Anything that deprives consciousness of localizing itself in-- in the body-based system is going to lead towards the mentalistic perspes-- perspective.

S: What do you mean?

MB (simultaneously): Get-- get thee to thy cave.

S: Boo. (laughter)

S (simultaneously, faint): That's right.

Few students: Boo!

AS(?) (simultaneously, amidst laughter): Paul, that raised it--

RG: Doris to say boo--

MB (simultaneously): I said, "Get thee to thy cave." Paul, that's a very ascetical idea that you have there.

PD: Well, depends how you want to take that Myra. (some laughter) You can take it that way, you could take it in knowledge.

MB: In knowledge?

PD: Exactly. The more you're going to take the point of view of the body the more it's going to become your position. [MB assents] And that's what you're going to operate from.

AD: In other words in-- the more you think you see with your eyes the less chance you'll see with your mind.

[student assents, faint]

S (very faint): That's easy.

[short pause]

BS: That's different.

[short pause]

PD: And that [couple inaudible student words simultaneous with PD] correlates with the intense thinking. It's through the activity of intense thinking and intense thought that a transformation of perspective occurs. [student assents, faint] It's the intensity of thought more than the specific object of thought.

AH: See, Paul, when you said anything that caters to the comfort of--

AD (simultaneously): You're trying to, you're trying to tell these people that they don't listen to music-- that they listen to music with their ears, right?

PD: I don't want to get committed to any specifics. (some laughter)

AD: Well they do. They listen to music with their ears, I get comments all the time about it. Or with their eyes. Some of them even read the music, right off-- right off the album. (laughter, student words) We better get i-- we better get into the quotes that are accurate.

[short pause]

AH: I just wanted to follow up one thing that Paul said. He said-- his objections to the notion that anything that-- that would give the body a concession to comfort of the body. But I'm sure anything that would cause the body to be uncomfortable is equally-- [student assents, faint] is-- is equally committed to the body-based perspective.

PD: Exactly.

AH: So it means like, it's not a question of causing yourself pain or causing yourself comfort, but it's a cau-- a question of being disassociated from that locus.

PD: From making that the criteria within consciousness, yeah.

RC: Well, should we get to work?

AD: Yeah.

S (faint): Yeah, [S: Yes.] let's be--

BS: Well that didn't answer the question.

AD (simultaneously, faint, possibly part of background): [couple/three words inaudible]

THE PROJECTED WORLD-IDEA IS THE PROTOTYPE OF ALL KNOWLEDGE: WHEN YOUR MIND PROJECTS THE WORLD-IDEA, YOU'RE PROJECTING ALL THE IDEAS

PB [V13, 21:2.174, RC reading]: "Experience is a unity and cannot be broken into mind and matter. We cannot possibly separate the world from the mind that knows it. The two are always related. To object [RC reads: The objection] that such a relation need not exist outside the act of knowing the world, even though it must exist inside it, is to utter words which dissolve away as soon as their meaning is analysed. For the only world which human beings can ever discuss is [RC adds: the] one which they can think about and which is therefore an idea for their minds."

[12¾ second pause]

RC: Does anybody know a way out of that?

AH: Would you read it again please?

PB [V13, 21:2.174, RC reading]: "Experience is a unity and cannot be broken into mind and matter. We cannot possibly separate the world from the mind that knows it. The two are always related. To object [RC reads: The objection] that such a relation need not exist outside the act of knowing the world, even though it must exist inside it, is to utter words which dissolve away as soon as their meaning is analysed. For the only world which human beings can ever discuss is one which they can think about and which is therefore an idea for their minds."

AH: No way of establishing a world as ontic other than as known. [short pause] It's-- if you analyze-- if you analyze that statement that you're going to posit a world apart from the known one, it leads to this conclusion. That the positing of that world as ontic status behind the known one is another way of positing a known one.

[short pause]

RC: Well I think that's a key in there, that we can't separate-- we can't possibly separate the world from the mind that knows it. I think the way we're going to reconcile these apparent problems we have is by understanding more deeply what that mind is that knows it. But I think we have to hold on to that, to the-- to speak about any world apart from the mind that knows it is going to run us into some very serious and difficult problems.

AH: Randy, what-- just one more time please, what specifically was the error that he-- that he is speaking of in that quote? It's toward the end.

RC: He says--

PB [V13, 21:2.174, RC reading]: "To object [RC reads: The objection] that such a relation need not exist outside the act of knowing the world…"

AH: Ok, so you could object to the fact-- you could object to this argument, would you say, "Well that relationship can't exist outside of the knowledge situation."

RC: Uh-hm. [students assent] And a lot of people will say that. Like I actually was reading a guy a couple of weeks ago who accepted idealism, subjective idealism as-- as far as a person could go, but he wouldn't accept mentalism as describing the appropriate substance of the world.

AH: Ok. Ok, I-- And that's the objection he's going to--

RC: Uh-hm.

DB: The problem-- what he's saying there though is that even if you want to discuss a materialistic world, I mean the world that's based of material objects existing independently, can't [one word inaudible] because in order to do so you pre-- bringing in your own mind to do that.

AH: Yes.

RC: Yeah. No he doesn't say-- in this particular quote he doesn't say his mind that knows the world would properly be called "my mind" or anything. But he just says that you can't discuss the world apart from the mind that knows it.

[short pause]

[student assents]

RG: What do you think he means by world here?

S (faint): Yeah.

RC: I think fairly conventional, what we mean by world.

RG: Uh-huh, yeah, yeah. I mean I think he means pretty much sense-appearance.

[11½ second pause]

RC: But I think we gotta stay painted in this corner.

AH: So, would you describe it for me again please, personally?

PB [V13, 21:2.174, RC reading]: "We cannot possibly separate the world from the mind that knows it."

RC: And to say that such a relation need not exist outside the act of knowing, he's saying--

PB [V13, 21:2.174, RC reading]: "…is to utter words which dissolve away as soon as their meaning is analysed. For the only world which human beings can ever discuss is one which they can think about and which is therefore [RC reads: therefore is] an [AD/S simultaneously: Yeah.] idea for their minds [RC reads: mind]."

[9¾ second pause]

AH: Earlier in the-- earlier--

AD (simultaneously): But shouldn't it read "cannot exist"? [students assent, faint] "Need not exist," is that what you said?

RC: Yeah, it says--

PB [V13, 21:2.174, RC reading]: "To object [RC reads: The objection] that such a relation [RC emphasis] need not exist outside the act of knowing…"

[short pause with very faint background student talking]

AH: In other words--

AB: Yeah, in other words, if I said to you, well I agree with you that everything I know is mental, but the world is still there when I don't know it, I'm saying the relationship between my knowledge and the world need not exist [student assents] the-- when I'm not knowing it, which is not mentalism.

[short pause]

PB [V13, 21:2.108 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #48, RC reading]: "It is absurd even to suggest [RC reads: to suggest even] that there is an external world wholly outside of one's consciousness and wholly independent of it. One knows only certain changes of mental awareness, never of externals. The mind can only know its changes of individual consciousness. All its observations, each of its inferences, everything it knows--these lie enclosed within that consciousness and [are] never beyond it.

"One's knowledge of anything whatsoever is simply one's thought of it. This is not to be confused with one's right thought of it. It is a conscious mental state, and even other persons are but appearances within this state, creatures in the cosmic dream. To follow this line of reflection [RC reads: courage] to its inevitable end demands courage and candour of the highest kind, for it demands as ultimate conclusion the principle that knowledge being but ideas in the mind, the whole universe is nothing but an immense idea within one's own mind. For the very nature of knowledge is thus internal, and hence the individual mind cannot know any reality external to itself. It believes that it observes a world without when it only observes its own mental pictures of that world."

[19¾ second pause]

RG: And we could almost read that, that philosophy is impossible.

AH: Well, if philosophy can get you to this-- to this point of view it certainly does work.

RG (simultaneously): Well, psychology gets you to this view.

AH: It certainly it does work.

S: Uh-hm.

RG: No.

AH: I mean it takes a whole number of years to even begin to consider this position as tenable.

[students assent, faint]

RG: Many-- I mean--

AH: I mean, philosophy has a method and philosophy has a goal. You don't confuse those two things with it.

RG: No but I-- well, I don't want to be-- go ahead Paul.

PD: But the-- that line that he does where he makes a distinction between thought and right thought is the basis of reason.

RG: But allowing that gap allows a-- allowing the gap between my thought and thought seems to allow proper inference.

PD: Yes.

RG: And the inference can refer to a world-- you can know that there is a "that". In other words, if there was no distinction between right thought and just thought, the thought-- the right thought refers to something. In order to be true, that thought has to be-- the ref-- reference of that thought has to be to something independent of a particular ideating mind, otherwise you couldn't speak of it as right or not, it would just be your mental creation. And therefore I-- I think both are in that quote although, I mean [one/two words inaudible]

LR (simultaneously): Can you follow that up Dickie? [student assents] The consequences of that?

RG: It seems to-- I mean you-- in terms of right thought, when-- what do we mean when we say right thought? Don't we mean that the mind is aligned to something that exists, that is, that has truth to it?

AD: No.

RG: No, you don't. What do you mean?

AD (simultaneously): No Dickie, I think-- I think it's the same problem coming up again for you. (bit of laughter) If you try to keep in mind that the mind, in projecting its World-Idea, alright, if you try to keep in mind the way we spoke about it, that there's a series of step-- step-downs. The mind does project the World-Idea and then, you remember, we pointed out that the faculty of understanding synthesizes the sensations and then it projects it through-- it projects it through an empirical subject who is riddled with all kinds of dis-- distorting influences. And then there could be right inference and wrong inference. There can't be right inference and wrong inference when the mind directly perceives an object.

RG: Oh, oh, I agree. But your s-- your analysis of experience allows for three steps that seem impossible from this paragraph. First of all, that there is a World-Idea is an inference from within a mental-- mentally created world.

AD: No, that's not an inference.

RG: What is it?

AD: The experience of the world as your idea is direct and immediate, it's not an inference.

RG: But when you speak of the World-Idea as prior to the empirical subject's manifesting it for himself.

AD: Well, that-- that too is obvious. First thing you do in the morning when you wake up, if you take-- if you watch carefully you'll see there's just a presentation. The ego only, so to speak, crystallizes out of that presentation so that you know that there's a subject and an object relationship within that image. [short pause] But even so, wi-- without even the necessity to refer to that. There's no necessity to refer to that, just speak about the mind's experi-- the mind's knowledge can only be of what it itself-- what it projects out from within itself. And if it projects out this thought of the world, alright, then included in that thought of the world is the subject and the object, alright, and then you have to go further and say that the seeing which the Witness-I has is now con-- concomitant with the so-called functioning of your eyes. And I think he pointed out in a-- in a quote before that that's not so. You do not see with your eyes.

RG: So-- so you're saying you can't have knowledge of anything that isn't projected.

AD: I--

RG: That's what you just said. You said the mind only knows what it projects.

AD: Yeah, what it makes-- the I-- the World-Idea that it projects.

RG: Right, now what about knowledge-- what about the knowledge of those-- so you're saying, the corollary of that is that there is no knowledge of things that the mind doesn't project.

AD: Uh-hm.

RG: And that all the statements that have to do with those principles which don't get projected in the world-thought, what do you call that?

AD: Well what do you mean they don't get projected? I mean isn't the projected Idea the prototype of all knowledge? Where else you gonna go for it?

RG: The prototype-- being the prototype and being the thing are very different. Being the appearance of it and it are-- I mean, are worlds apart.

[short pause]

AD: Again, I think you're falling back into that artificial distinction, that you have an Idea and the corporealization of the Idea, alright, which is the image of a-- the World-Idea, and that these two are two different things. And that you have to infer the principles in the world-image.

RG: Not the-- just that you infer principles at all that are prior to manifestation doesn't seem possible in this-- Would you deny that there are principles prior to manifestation? I don't-- I don't think (that you--)

AD: We're saying that all these principles are in the manifestation. [short pause] If they weren't, if the-- if the Idea, the World-Idea, doesn't have all this then where in the world will our knowledge come from? You may not see it as sensible but it's there.

[short pause]

LR: Oh I see, so, if I can just try reiterating 'cause [student assents] this is a very interesting point to me also. You're sa-- I think you started by saying, the only way you would know the difference between wrong thought and right thought is if you had a standard outside of them both with which to compare them, by which to compare them. Right? That that standard outside of thought would be the only-- your-- your particular thinking would be the only way you could say right thought or wrong thought.

RG: Uh-hm.

LR: Right? And I think then Anthony said that standard too is projected by the mind. So that the mind projection includes right thoughts, wrong thoughts, and principles to compare them to.

RG: Uh-hm.

LR: That it just seems to enlarge the scope of what that mind is that does the projecting, and if you-- if you say that mind is the whole of-- well, I don't want to get into that but--

AD (simultaneously): It's no minor thing when you project the World-Idea, when your mind projects the World-Idea. [LR simultaneously: Right.] You're projecting all the Ideas. The entirety of manifestation are those Ideas.

LR: I think-- yeah. [student assents, faint] I think we-- the problem is we keep slipping into a narrower and narr-- more and more narrow aperture for the mind, concept that, if the mind has that kind of scope, then it could project, sure.

RG: Sure.

[9¾ second pause]

AH: So the study-- the study of metaphysical principles is the study of metaphysical principle(s).

AD: Is a study of Mind.

[13¼ second pause]

RC: Want a long one?

AD: Anything you desire.

RG: But then how does that-- but I'm sorry, Randy. How is that different than--

AD (simultaneously): We'll go back-- at the end of the class we'll go back to that long quote, we'll go over it again.

[simultaneously] [student assents]

RG: How is that different from the vehement critiques you've given of Mr. Jung in terms of, you can never know what's outside the psyche and therefore philosophy is an unfoldment of archetypes. And that you can't ever tell whether what you're thinking about is true because it's all within the psyche. And that all you know is what's in the psyche and you never have knowledge of anything outside it. Seems to be--

AD: Well, Mr. Jung evidently didn't go to a good optometrist, (bit of laughter) because right in the psyche is the very things which are beyond the psyche.

RG: That's a contradiction.

AD: [couple words inaudible]

RG (simultaneously): I don't know what that means. They're if-- if they're within the psyche, as within it-- I mean-- you have to explain that.

AD: I will, let me warm up, let's go on Dickie. (some laughter)

RC: It's almost a full page so--

AD: Good, good.

"NO OBJECT OR IDEA CAN EXIST WITHOUT BEING THOUGHT OF, AND NOTHING PERCEPTIBLE CAN EXIST WITHOUT SOMETHING OR SOMEONE TO SEE IT"

RG (amidst laughter): I don't know. I do! (RG laughing, student words)

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "This means in every act of thought there are two elements: the thinking itself and the object or idea thought about. These are so coupled together by the psychological constitution of man that the first cannot exist without the second. [RC: That is, the thinking itself and the object cannot exist without one another.]

"This is equally true of the act of seeing. We cannot see anything unless there is some object, something to be seen. Hence sight depends upon both seeing itself and the object seen. Both are so interrelated that the former could not exist if there were not the other.

"These statements may be [RC adds: much] more easily understood if, after due reflection-- These statements may be more easily understood after due reflection, but it will be much more difficult to understand that the contrary ones likewise hold true [RC reads: hold true likewise]. [short pause, flipping tape noises] That is to say, no object or idea can exist without being thought of, and nothing perceptive-- nothing perc…"

(Side 1 of original cassette tape digitized as 1983 0323a (formerly 1983 0324b) Ends; Side 2 Begins)

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "…nothing perceptible can exist without something or someone to see it. In short, the factors which have been coupled together here are mutually dependent.

"It is impossible for a thinkable object or idea] to exist in a state where thought itself is impossible. It is impossible for a seeable thing to exist in a state where sight is impossible, as in deep sleep. And, since everything material is either thinkable or seeable or both, it follows that the entire material universe has its being in being thought of or perceived. It is only an appearance within the mind of the thinker or dependent upon the perceiver. No idea, no object, could have any conceivable existence if the perceiver himself never had any. Something living and conscious that can think and become aware of them must first exist through their relation to it. They cannot possibly exist in disconnection from a conscious mind.

"If we imagine a universal state wherein there was no body present, no mind that could think of anything, perceive it, or be conscious of it, then we are quite unable to put any idea or object or sound or colour into this state.

"This is true whether we apply it to mere ideas or to hard and heavy things which we see and feel, such as houses and trees [RC reads: such as houses and trees, which we see and feel]. The point cannot be grasped by [the] understanding without previous reflection and meditation, for it appears to be contrary to common experience and common sense. In short, matter is a mental sensation and not the cause of [a] mental sensation."

[9¾ second pause]

RG: That clarifies it for me because he clearly here is speaking about a material-- I mean a presented universe. [students assent, faint] But--

LR: Dickie, we can't hear.

RG: He-- in this quote he's clearly speaking about a ma-- a perceptible universe, a univer-- a-- a sense-- a fabric of sense-perception it seems, [LR: Yeah.] and not one where you have to not think about po-- that-that the positing of ontology is-- could be of a-- of a different kind of experience. In other words, the critique here is of perceptible objects.

LR: So then you don't have a problem with it.

RG: Right, I don't have a problem. Yeah, well, Linda.

LR: You have a problem with the world of higher principles that don't get manifested in the way sensible appearances are. Is that--

RG (simultaneously): Right. Yeah. I mean as an object-- as objects of thought anyway. Now--

[12 second pause with very faint background student talking]

AH: You don't think that that description subsumes objects of thought as well as material objects?

RG: They include mere ideas, he said, our fancies, our notions, [AH assents, faint] yes.

RG: I think it allows for the positing of realms of being beyond the sensible.

AH: That are unknown.

RG: That are unknown to us, yeah.

AH: Well, how shall we posit that?

RG: We do all the time.

BS: As known.

AH: As known?

RG: As con-- no, in fact we posit them as unknown.

BS: As un-sensible.

RG: And as unknown to us.

AH: How can you posit something that's unknown?

RG: We do it all the time.

AH: In positing it it becomes known.

RG: I disagree, positing it is-- only the thought of it is known. The fact that the thought can refer to something that remains unknown is still an a-- is still a question.

AH: Is itself within thought.

RG (faint): But I don't-- I mean I don't-- I don't want to [few words inaudible]

S (very faint): Dickie?

AH: I still want to hear how--

RG (faint): I don't know, well--

AH: --the explanation of how Jung avoids that dilemma.

S (faint): He has to warm up.

[23¾ second pause]

PB [V13, 21:3.99, RC reading]: "If the egocentricity of human beings were to have full-- were to have free and full play in the making of their world-environment, the consequence would be a disorderly, disharmonious chaos (some laughter, student words) and not an orderly, harmonious cosmos. But the fact that they are unable to create or mold the world to their will shows plainly that they have only a very limited role in world-making."

S: In what?

RC: World-making.

PB [V13, 21:3.99, RC reading]: "It just is not [RC reads: isn't] true that the human mind can build a new body for itself or transform an old one, or shape its surroundings entirely according to its desires [RC reads: desire]."

S (very faint): Entirely according to--

S (faint): [one/two words inaudible]

DB: You can come in out of the rain but you can't make it stop raining. (bit laughter)

AH (faint): [couple words inaudible] (bit of laughter)

AD (very faint): Yeah. (bit of laughter)

ALL THE PRINCIPLES OF METAPHYSICS, EPISTEMOLOGY, AXIOLOGY, ONTOLOGY ARE INCLUDED IN THE STATEMENT "I SEE A TREE"

PD: Talk-- would you say, Randy, that like in-- with PB he's putting ontological distinctions within an epistemological framework of knowledge always.

LR: Say more Paul.

PD: Pardon?

LR: That [S simultaneously: Well we better read through it.] wasn't enough for me to get what you were saying.

PD: The fact that he establishes these ontic distinctions between the levels of mind contributing to-- towards the experience, he's putting his ontology within a framework of epistemology always or knowledge, and he does allow for correct thought or incorrect thought Dickie. I mean there is a validity to correct thought which incorrect thought doesn't have. There is a validity to how the-- the actual phenomenal world is constructed and a hallucination. But that is always within this framework of knowledge. And-- and you-- when you're reading the quotes you have to see those two in-- in juxtaposition, ontology-- statements with regard to ontology or statements with regard to knowledge or epistemology.

RC: Yeah, one thing I-- I keep watching happening in my understanding in trying to see how two of these things can be right when they're set up side by side that, on the one hand I can't separate anything I talk about from the mind that knows it, and on the other I can't equate the mind that knows it with my ego. And I'm constantly being batted back and forth between what's true about what my ego does and what's true about the only mind I can talk about.

LR: Are you saying then Randy that the mind that projects the World-Idea is not what we're familiar with as the mind that has to think it when reflecting upon it.

AD: The mind-- the mind that projects the World-Idea is eventually gonna correct the [LR simultaneously: The mi--] stupid mind [LR assents] that keeps misperceiving it.

LR: Right, that's--

AD: But Paul I wouldn't put it that way although I think I see what you're talking about. When you say "I see the World-Idea" or "I see a tree", you can see in that one sentence that you're going to climb from psychology all the way to ontology in that one sentence, "I see a tree". All-- all the, what we might call the principles of metaphysics, epistemology-- epistemology, axiology, ontology, is all in that statement, "I see a tree".

PD: Exactly but it seems like in terms of his presentation, the-- the framework-- the-- the broad framework is one of knowledge or epistemology and his ontological distinctions that he does make are going to be within the epistemology he has established.

AD: Well, [RG: I don't understand.] again, I'll repeat, I-- I think I understand what you're saying but I wouldn't put it that way.

PD: Now that's-- that's not limiting knowledge to illusion.

AD (simultaneously): Epistemology is a doorway into the others but it doesn't include the others.

PD: No, I-- I don't see that, I think it does, in his case knowledge is the fundamental category.

AD: In that case you're equating knowledge with epistemology.

PD: No-- yes and no. Yes. (AD laughs)

RG: Right.

PD: I mean, if you're gonna restrict your level of knowledge to the ego, and that's what you normally mean by epistemology, I would say no, that the position of knowledge runs from the ego to the Sage and that's the fundamental framework. Now at the lower level, he's always going to keep driving home the point of consciousness or that the world is an idea. And at the ultimate level or as a-- as a Sage the world is also an idea. But the position is one of knowledge.

S: Well, I--

RC (simultaneously): It seems you're saying, if you define epistemology as the study of how do we come to know, you mean really know. Not think we know.

AH: I think fundamentally Paul's correct, it's because the object is always a known one and by definition that's an epistemological content. Epistemology is the-- the study of how do we know things. There's no object in this discussion apart from a known one.

RG: And I--

AH: Is there? If there is I'd like to hear about it. Where is the object in this discussion other than a known one?

RC: But if this--

RG (simultaneously): Within epistemology there isn't. But if you re-- if you say that [AH simultaneously: I mean if you--] his discussion of ontology is within the field of epistemology, then you're defining ontology as within the field of the known, and I thought the definition of ontology was as exactly what wasn't in the field of the known.

AH: Well--

S: Very good point.

PD (simultaneously): But ex-- excuse me. [S: But--] If you say that, Richard, then-- then you're allowing for an ontology that is not going to be subject to rational discourse. It's gonna become a dogmatic ontology.

RG (simultaneously): No, not at-- not at all, not at all, those might be--

RC (simultaneously): That's what Santayana called a high--

RG: Wait a minute, that's not what I'm doing at all.

RC (simultaneously): [one/two words inaudible] metaphysical object of high animal faith. And we have to be careful, I mean, both sides can be fine--

RG (simultaneously): Yeah, we have to be real careful in first understanding what we're saying before we start saying [student assents] what we think we're all saying.

LG/DC(?): Sounds like Paul's epistemology is like Randy's "my mind", you know. [student assents, faint] It's really a--

RC/S(?): Well [one/two words inaudible]

AH (simultaneously): Could I try once more to frame what it is we're dis-- I think we're discussing? It seems for the last few weeks in PB's notes we've heard about again and again the only object that we could speak of is a known one, in the context of this [RC: Object.] object. If (we were/we're) [RC assents] talk about an object we have to talk about an object that is known, alright.

RC (simultaneously): Yeah but we-- I mean Dickie's gotta go-- I mean his point is right, and if we could sort out the language I think we could see that really we're in agreement. That normally in epistemology what we're doing is we're dealing with knower and known as already bifurcated, and we're trying to see on the one hand if-- we're operating within the field of that bifurcation. It seems when we get beyond that--

AH: Yeah but in the quote you just read there's no beyond that. He says the two are mutually inclusive always. There's never a situation where there's not the mix of known--

RG (simultaneously): In the material un-- in the material universe [one/two words inaudible]

AH (simultaneously): I'm not sure that that's the right context there.

RG (simultaneously): The full page we read was about the material universe.

AH: Well, what other one is he describing in this description?

MB: Could I bring out a different angle to this or--

AH (simultaneously): I mean what other world is there besides this one?

MB: Could I bring out a different angle Andrew? In the-- in the Hidden Teaching and in the early part of the Wisdom where he's still basing his argument on the epistemological framework, he talks about the thought as being a product of a certain activity which he calls thinking. [student assents] And the thoughts that we know, the subjects and the objects that we're familiar with are the product of thinking and that thinking is a power not-- he doesn't describe it as a kno-- as a knowledge but as a power, productive power which-- in which the ontol-- ontological levels that Paul is describing are really based on intensity of that power. And that's the framework-- that's the way in which he describes it in that particular part of the text and I just wanted to bring that out as a different angle. So that maybe you don't have to talk about ontology within epistemology. You can talk about an ontology underlying epistemology.

RC: Yeah. [possibly another student: Yeah.]

LDS (simultaneously): I think along those lines too Myra he mentions in the Wisdom that we can reduce the world to thought but we can't reduce reality to thought. So, reality, if we called the ontological realm, the principles of ontology, the world of the real, those cannot be reduced to ideas or thoughts.

MB: I think he was even beyond ontology when he spoke of reality in that (quote).

LDS (simultaneously): Yeah he could have been, I'm just taking (an example).

AH: Well I-- I could see the point I guess, I don't know, maybe I don't understand very well what the context of these quotes are. It seems to me that we're not-- this-- the discussion of mentalism is not restricted to-- to psychological examples or [one word inaudible] or just the material world. It seems that this is a point of view that would include all these levels that we wanted to speak from. I'd still like to I guess ask, how would you posit in this framework an object apart from a known one?

RC: I wouldn't.

AH: Ok, well that's all.

RC (simultaneously): I wouldn't posit an object apart from a know one-- a known one. Wouldn't have po-- posit either subject or object apart from their mutual interdependence.

AH: Right.

RC: But it seems that when we speak in terms of both being mental, [AH, faint, possibly part of background: (He won't/I don't) get it.] and both being products of one mind, [AH assents] that we begin to go beyond the epistemological situation [AH: Through mystical experience.] and into mysticism, yeah.

AH: Yeah, but that's not philosophy, that's something else.

[students assent, faint]

MB: (But people) discuss philosophically.

PD: See, but I didn't limit epistemology, maybe that's my wrong use of the word, um--

AD: Exactly. (some laughter, student words)

PD: Ok.

AD: You made it-- you made it omnivorous [AD pronounces: omnivorious], (bit of laughter) includes everything.

PD (simultaneously): Well, [S simultaneously: Omnivorious. (bit of laughter)] I-- you know, epistemology [AD simultaneously: No, gen-- generally, generally, in philosophic discussion, in philosophic discussion--] is the study of how we know and knowledge runs the whole gamut from one level to the next, so--

AD (simultaneously): Yeah. But generally in philosophic discussion if you say epistemology you don't mean ontology and if you say ontology you don't mean axiology. But when I say "I see a tree", [LR: Uh-oh.] I brought all of them in.

S: (Yeah.)

LR: You just added a new thing here, [CDA simultaneously: What's axiology?] axiology.

RG/S(?): But [one word inaudible] cut down the tree then and said--

PD (simultaneously): That's my point is that-- (laughter)

AD: Like ethics and axiology and value-studies and Being and epistemology, these are just different terms that are used in philosophy, aright? Now there is a clear distinction between when a person says "ontology" and when he says "epistemology". If he's talking to me, when he says he's going to get into a discussion on ontology, I will expect a discussion on either Divine Being or self-thinking Thought, things like that. I wouldn't expect him to go into a discussion on how he sees a tree. Now just-- just ordinary grammar says this is what epistemology is, this is what ontology is, alright? So the point I made there that-- was that when I say "I see a tree", I'm bringing in all these principles. Being, alright, because ultimately what I do perceive is not a tree but the idea of a tree, which takes me into epistemology. And then when I understand the idea of the tree it takes me into the notion of Divine Thought, alright. So that all these things are, so to speak, included in that statement "I see a tree". You have no discussion here about anything else, it's just a question of using the word right, [PD: Ok.] that's all.

LR: Well, so, what does that mean, does that mean in this dis-- in the discussion of mentalism we are restricted to a discussion of epistemology?

AD: No. PB's term 'Mind' is all-comprehensive.

LR (simultaneously): All-- right, it goes all the way up so--

AD (simultaneously): So when he says mentalism, alright, you've got to see in what context he's using it.

LR: So that he--

AD: But generally he would-- the same thing like if-- when you study Plotinus he doesn't use the word 'Mind' but you know it's mentalistic because if you start with Mind and everything is a product of Mind and everything is included with-- within Mind then there's nothing but Mind.

LR: But, all I'm saying is that when we're reading these quotes let's say you have sliding scale. Because using the word 'Mind' is not going to be restricted to the epistemological usage. In [AD simultaneously: Well--] fact he seems to blur the distinctions intentionally at times [AD simultaneously, faint: No, he doesn't blur.] to expand the notion of mind from what we normally think of as mind.

AD: Alright, read the quote again.

LR: Well I'm not saying right here necessarily but, I mean he does really expand the notion of mind very often. So (it/if)-- to say you'd have to restrict ourselves to either ontology or epi-- it doesn't seem to be possible.

AD: Oh, for heaven's sakes it's the same thing, Linda. If I speak about Mind in this all-inclusive sense, I can dissect it or I can make divisions within it. And when I speak about self-thinking Thought or Divine Mind I'm speaking ontology. And when I'm speaking about epistemology, the way a human being knows. That's not ontology. And it doesn't matter if you call it mentalism or call it (xerism).

LR: Right. And to do-- to understand mentalism or to have the experience, aren't you going all the way--

AD (simultaneously): You're going to ha-- you're going to have to bring all those classifications in.

LR: Good, that's-- we're not having an argument.

AD: No. (student assents, laughter, clapping)

LR: [one/two words inaudible]

AD: Let's hear it again, Avery.

S (faint): I think Randy was doing it.

S (simultaneously, faint): Randy was do--

AD (simultaneously): Randy? Someone.

RC: We still on the one about the egocentricity?

S: Yeah.

AD: The what?

S: The egocentricity.

AD: Oh.

RC: Is this the quote that you mean, "If the egocentricity of human beings were to have free and full play…"

AD: Oh no that's chaos, no, uh--

RC: You mean the one before.

AD (simultaneously): Yeah, yeah.

RC: Ok, you [AD simultaneously: The one that they've been discussing.] can't separate the world from the mind that knows it?

[13 second pause]

S: Or the thinking of it.

S (faint): Or the mind.

[13½ second pause with some faint background student talking, laughter]

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "Thinking is possible…"

AD: Well let's try one and we could read it, I wanted to see what we were discussing.

S: Yeah, the problem [couple/few words inaudible] (laughter, student words)

RC: "Thinking is possible only where there exists an object to think about," that one?

[students assent, very faint]

S (very faint): Yeah. Do that.

S (very faint): Do that one.

AD: Go ahead.

RC: That's the long one.

RG/S(?) (faint): No it's not.

S: (That's/It's) the one.

[student assents, faint]

S: That was a good one. (some laughter)

AD: That's-- that's very ancient too. Parmenides said and Zeno, all of them said that. Self-thinking Thought, su-- it was summarized by Aristotle self-thinking Thought, Divine Mind from Plato's and Plotinus. Yeah read it again, please.

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "Thinking is possible only where there exists an object about which to think, whether it be a material thing or a mere idea. We [RC reads: You] cannot think unless we [RC reads: you] have something in mind. This means in every act of thought there are two elements: the thinking itself and the object or idea thought about. These are so coupled together by the psychological constitution of man that the first cannot exist without the second.

"These statements may be more easily understood after due reflection, but it will be much more difficult to understand that the contrary ones likewise hold true [RC reads: hold true likewise]. That is to say, no object or idea can exist without being thought of, and nothing perceptible can exist without something or someone to see it. In short, the factors which have been [RC reads: are] coupled together here are mutually dependent.

"It is impossible for a thinkable object or idea to exist in a state where thought itself is impossible. It is impossible for a seeable thing to exist in a state where sight is impossible, as in deep sleep. And, since everything material is either thinkable or seeable or both, it follows that the entire material universe has its being in being thought of or perceived. It is only an appearance within the mind of the thinker or dependent upon the perceiver. No idea, no object, could have any conceivable existence if the perceiver himself never had any. Something living and conscious that can think and become aware of them must first exist through their relation to it. They cannot possibly exist in disconnection from a conscious mind.

"This is true whether we apply it to mere ideas or to hard and heavy things which we see and feel, such as houses and trees [RC reads: such as houses and trees, which we see]. The point cannot be grasped by the understanding without previous reflection and meditation, for it appears to be contrary to common experience and common sense. In short, matter is a mental sensation and not the cause of a mental sensation."

LR: Randy?

RC: Yeah.

LR: I missed the part where it said "It therefore follows". Actually, what I missed was that-- the logic of the argument when it switched from saying that anything-- for anything to-- for seeing to happen there must be an object of sight.

RC: Uh-hm.

LR: And then he made a transition [RC simultaneously: Yeah.] so that it would work the opposite way around.

RC: Yeah, these statements--

LR: But I-- I didn't-- wasn't-- well, this--

RC: Want me to read it again real slow and--

AD: That part there that she had trouble with, that transition.

S: Yeah.

RC: Stop me when you-- whenever you want.

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "These statements may be more easily understood after due reflection…"

RC: That's the earlier statements.

AH: But Randy those statements were referring to--

RC: We can't see unless there's an object, we can't think unless there's something to think about.

AH: And that was in a s-- in the reference of the subjective pole of experience, wasn't it?

S (faint): Yeah.

AH: Generally.

S: Uh-hm.

RC: Yeah that's the part that started out, "Thinking is possible only where there exists an object" and so on.

AH: Yeah, and that was like explanation of subjective experience.

RC: Uh-hm.

AH: Make-- and then when he switches he goes to the object.

RC: Yeah, and he's saying that the act and the object-- the act doesn't come into being unless the object of that act is also present. Now he's going to reverse it.

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "…it will be much more difficult to understand that the contrary ones [RC reads: statements] likewise hold true [RC reads: hold true likewise]. That is to say, no object or idea can exist without being thought of, and nothing perceptible can exist without something or someone to see it. In short, the factors which have been coupled together here are mutually dependent.

"It is impossi…"

LR (simultaneously): Ok, so, excuse me.

AD (quietly): [one word inaudible] well, let him finish.

LR: Ok.

AD: Finish, please.

THE WHOLE MATERIAL WORLD, WHICH INCLUDES THE EMPIRICAL SUBJECT AND EMPIRICAL OBJECT, IS BEING THOUGHT OF BY THE WITNESS-I

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "It is impossible for a thinkable object or idea to exist in a state where thought itself is impossible. It is impossible for a seeable thing to exist in a state where sight is impossible, [as in deep sleep]. And, since everything material is either thinkable or seeable or both, it follows that the entire material universe has its being in being thought of or perceived."

[short pause]

S: So--

LR: There really isn't a transition. I thought I missed one but I don't think he really provides it.

AH (simultaneously): Well I think there is a transition. He first speaks about idea subjectively and he uses sight as an analogy to help explain that. Then he says it's harder to understand the contrary is true, [LR simultaneously: Right. But my--] that contrary being that the object also is within-- You cannot speak of an object apart from a known one and that's the hard part to understand. And again he buttresses that argument with the analogy of seeing. So both arguments--

LR: I know but, Andrew, I was-- I--

AH (simultaneously): There is very clearly a transition.

[students assent, very faint]

BS: Well, but I see the transition as a--

LR (simultaneously): Wait, (can--)

S (very faint): (Go ahead.) (bit of laughter)

RC/S(?): Hey Linda.

S: What?

LR: If it's--

AD: Didn't something bother you with your--

LR: Yeah.

AD (faint): (Notebooks) are [one/two words inaudible]

S (very faint): I can't hear you.

[short pause]

LR: Let me just go back to that. Alright, what?

AD: You have an eye [LR simultaneously: What bothered (me/you)?] that sees an object, alright. And the object needs the eye as much as the e-- the eye needs the object. They're both part of material world then. Aren't they?

LR (faint): If you're going to call it material world. What's going on [one/two words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): Well, material world, yeah.

LR: Ok, yeah.

AD: World of thought, doesn't matter, the imaged world, doesn't matter. Ok?

LR: That's not the eye that sees.

AD (faint): Yeah. It's the one that is provided.

[short pause]

LR (faint): Well--

S (very faint): Where is it?

LR: Those two things are both objective to the mind.

AD (very faint): Yeah. They're both objective to the mind.

[student assents, very faint]

JC: Can somebody say something?

AD (simultaneously): [one/two words inaudible] that the mind produces. They're ideas in the mind.

[9¾ second pause]

LR: So does your problem just go away?

AD: No. Unless you understood that the-- all this was w-- within what you might call within the locus of the transcendental ego.

LR: Ok, I think I follow that.

AD: Within the Witness-I.

LR: Yeah. The Witness-I is the mind which projects vision, say, (that is--)

AD (simultaneously): The mind which projects the idea of the world.

LR: It has included within it a subjective pole and an objective pole, the sense and the sensible object.

AD: Uh-hm.

LR: Ok. Um--

AD: And they both have nee-- they both have need of each other.

LR: Well, if you state it that way, yes indeed the problem goes away. [student assents, faint] [AS simultaneously: Isn't there the--] But, there are those who claim-- and this is what I was trying to refute for myself, there are those who claim, yes, in order to see you must have a sensible object but no, the reverse is not true. In order for the sensible object to exist you don't need the sight. Yeah, like they're not on a par, they're not controvertibles.

HE: But then he says in a situation where seeing is impossible the object is impossible, he doesn't-- he sets that up-- I mean the way he states that is very--

LR: Wait, say that again Harriet?

HE: He has-- he says, in the condition where sight is impossible then the object would be impossible too, such as deep sleep. Rather than saying you have to be looking at it for it to be seen he says it's in a condition where you couldn't look [one/two words inaudible] where there wouldn't be anything to see. See what I mean, he's talking about a state of consciousness.

LR (simultaneously): That they would alw-- and within that state they'd always arise together both.

HE: Yeah, I guess.

S (faint): Of course.

S (faint): Yeah

AH: But the discussion isn't limited to sight, that-- I thought that sight was [student assents, faint] used in both cases as an analogy for what's going on in terms of mentalism of experience. Like he said, the mind works just in the same way as sight does analogically. I-- you're not-- isn't that the-- the logic of this passage?

AS: No I thought he was bringing out the thing that we're bringing out except in another context, like with the opposite degrees. We're saying you never-- if you're going to have-- if you're going to have so-- a so-called object, you have to have an o-- in-- in complementary relation to it the so-called subject and if you're going to have a so-called subject you must-- must manifest with a complementary object. He says in the Wisdom too the ego and its world or the subject and its world must arise together. Whereas if you take the higher position of the mind that produces them both, that's not-- you can't-- in other words, at the first point it's not clear until you read the whole thing which-- which subject he's talking about. But when he makes it clear that the two of them are-- always come together or always don't come together, it seems clear what position he's taking when he speaks about the subject as opposed to the object, [S, faint: Ok.] or what subject-- what the seeing is that he's talking about as opposed to the object.

LR: But Avery, is that a self-- that's the part I was asking about, is that self-evident do you think, that both always arise together?

DB: No, that's wrong-- what wrong thinking is, the assumption that they don't.

LR: Right, but I mean how-- what actual logical proof is given that those two poles will always arise together except to say that there are two sides and--

SD (simultaneously): I don't think he's giving a proof in this quote, he's saying that it's hard to understand and he's saying that they in fact [LR simultaneously: That it's the tr--] are correlative. [LR: Right.] But I don't think that he here is presenting the reasoning to show that.

AH: So Avery, what level is he speaking from? You-- you said that it's quite clearly a certain point of view and how would you describe that point of view?

AS (simultaneously): Well, I don't know. But--

AH: You think he's talking about experience of seeing objects?

AS: Well, would you-- would you s-- I mean-- yeah, wou--

AH: Or is he talking [AS simultaneously: May-- maybe I'm wrong.] about the way-- way things are in a mentalist world?

AD (simultaneously): Well read the-- well read the last two sentences again.

AS (faint): Yeah but--

[short pause]

RC: The last two sentences of the last time through?

AD: Yeah, what you just finished, the last two sentences.

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "[And], since everything material is either thinkable or seeable or both, it follows that the entire material universe has its being in being thought of or perceived."

AD: Now how would you interpret that, the entire material universe?

RC: Everything I conceive as being external to my body, [AS assents] and [S, faint: My body.] my body itself.

MB: How about everything you perceive? Not everything you conceive as just being external.

AS: Yeah, see now in that last sentence I would take back everything I've said before. (bit of laughter)

BS: (Yeah/See) I thought he was ref--

AS: I mean there he's obviously referring to the manifestations of the mind.

[students assent]

RG (simultaneously): All possible presentations.

AS: Yeah. And not-- and not within the subject-object.

AD/BS(?): (Well, see what--)

AS: But then that's a very funny-- then I think he-- then there is a switch.

LR: Yeah, there is.

AS (simultaneously): I-- then-- then it almo-- I don't understand that one sentence or two in the context of the whole previous because when you say that-- it just seems to me, I mean I-- you know, I always conceive that when you speak about the subject-- a subject that needs an object and an object that needs a subject, you must be in the realm of this apparent split, in other words within the imagination.

LR: Right.

AS: But to say that the witnessing mind-- now that's a-- I mean it may be what he's saying, but to say that the witnessing mind needs an object, then you're meaning something quite different than what you normally mean by talking about the apparent subject and the apparent object need each other. And I don't unders-- and that seems a quite different context.

PD: Well it seems like a different [S simultaneously: (Maybe/May be).] level but it's the same principle, isn't it, because [AS simultaneously: No, no, well--] he even say-- let me finish Avery. The World-Mind exists through the world. Without the world-thought there is no World-Mind.

AS: No, I don't follow World-Mind at all, I--

PD (simultaneously): So at that level, [AS: No.] there's a twofold, there's the world-thought and there's the World-Mind, [AS simultaneously: No I--] without wh-- [AS simultaneously: Ok. Go on.] without in the-- at the same-- with the level of the Witness-I. [AS: I don't--] Without the presentation, there is no Witness-I.

LR (faint): Is that true?

AS (simultaneously): Ok. That may be, I don't-- I don't know why you're bringing in World-Mind though, that threw me off. Because with the-- in the question of World-Mind there's no-- there's no separation to be talked of there so I-- but, I-- but there are two levels that we speak about and I-- let me try and phrase it again. In the first part, first he says, you know, you have the-- the fact that there's-- you never have a seeing or a thinking without there being an object to it, and--

AH (simultaneously): That first level is subject Avery. The first part of the discussion is reference to the subjective pole.

AS (simultaneously): He says you never have a knowing of it or a seeing of it unless you have an object.

AH: Well the first part of the discussion is an explanation the way that works subjectively. The harder part to understand is when the transition goes to the objective pole.

AS: No, I think-- I-- let me-- let me try again, I don't-- well--

AH: Why don't we listen to it again instead of-- instead of arguing?

AS: Uh-- (bit of laughter)

AD: Very simply all he did there, the-- that's the way I can understand it, that he shows the empirical relationship is a reciprocal and mutual relationship.

AS: Right.

AD: Alright?

AS: That's what I'm saying.

AD: And then he takes the whole of that [AS simultaneously: And puts it--] and-- [student assents] and shows that all of that is an idea for the Witness mind.

AS: Isn't that-- that's what I [students assent, faint] just said, isn't it? [S: Well--] I thought.

AH: Thought that's what I was saying.

S (faint): Right. (laughter)

AS (amidst laughter): Oh, (then we) great.

DR: So thereby I d-- I (dismiss). (laughter) I just--

RG (simultaneously): But Avery, I understand it's not clear yet that at the last sentence he means to invoke the same principle, that--

AS (simultaneously): No I--

RG: Right.

AS: Well can I try again, I mean I-- I was kind of, you know, in the middle, let me just try it again. Or not, I don't care, it doesn't matter, (do whatever). Go on.

S: No, [S simultaneously: Do something.] don't take off [S simultaneously: Right.] now, come (on/out).

BS: That's alright too.

DR: I would like to understand how all that was presented to the witnessing mind, I didn't see that the witnessing mind was brought in at all.

AD (simultaneously): But listen to the last sentence, [S simultaneously, faint: The last two.] listen to the last two sentences.

[few faint inaudible student words, possibly part of background]

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "And, since everything material is either thinkable or seeable or both, it follows that the entire material universe has its being in being thought of or perceived."

AD: Now, the entire material world has its being in being thought of--who's thinking it?

S (faint): Yeah.

PB [V13, 21:2.154, RC reading]: "It is only an appearance…"

AS (simultaneously): He switched levels there.

AD: Who's thinking it David?

DR: But he's not asking who's thinking, he's saying the relation--

AD (simultaneously): But I'm asking, who's thinking it? (some laughter)

S: But--

DR: But he's asking the relation between thinking and an object or seeing and an object and saying that the being of the object and the being of that seeing are both interdependent [AS simultaneously: And I'm sa--] and arise together.

AS: I think that was the-- the whole (previous--)

DR (simultaneously): Wait, wait.

S (simultaneously): [couple words inaudible] that was that.

AD (simultaneously): Within the empirical world there is this mutual reciprocal relationship which you cannot sunder, you cannot speak about an empirical subject without an empirical—empirical object, an empirical object without an empirical subject. This is beyond dispute. Ok? We don't have to go through Kant or any of that, do we?

S: No, I hope.

DR: Not that this-- that seems to be--

AD: Is't this what he's saying here? Alright. [sounds like student assenting, faint] Then the very last sentence he says now it follows that the whole material world--that has to include the empirical subject and empirical [AD pronounces: empirial] object, alright--is being thought of.

[students assent, faint]

S: So he's--

AD: Take the-- take (the/these) example of a dream. In a dream you have a dream subject knows a dream table, the dream table can't exist without the dream subject seeing it, and the dream subject, so to speak, can't be without the table. The two of them have to be simultaneous, whether you make it a table, a sheep, a goat, I don't care what you make it, alright? Now the point is he says now if this is true, alright, then that whole thing is being thought of. Now who's thinking it? It's certainly not going to be the dream subject, it has to be the dreamer who's thinking this. So the whole material world is being thought of. [DR: So you're saying that--] Otherwise you're going to go back in there and make the world the subject-- I mean make the world the object of the ego.

AS (faint): Oh the world.

S (faint): Yeah.

S: (We/You) don't want to do that.

S: No.

AD: No. [AH simultaneously: That's-- that's the dis--] You got-- you got enough problems. (some laughter)

DR: So you're saying that the-- that you're going to give the being of that world to its--

AD: The being of that world its-- is the perceptibility which is brought about by the Witness-I.

SD: Anthony, would you-- the last sentence, when you interpret the whole material world, that phrase, as referring to the entirety of the dream, why-- I don't understand why you [one word inaudible] it that way rather than thinking of it as the totality of all the possible dream objects that that dream subject could have a relationship to.

AD: What's the difference?

SD: Well because in that sense it's still only one of the two poles of the dream even though it covers a lot of possibilities that-- that that could be but it's still only one of the two poles within the dream and it doesn't raise it outside that subject-object relationship to the level of the-- of the witnessing dreamer.

AD: Yeah.

SD: But you did draw the conclusion that he is referring to the Witness in that last sentence and I guess I-- I also don't see it.

AD: Alright.

LR/S(?) (faint): Well, yeah. (bit of laughter)

AS: Well--

LR (faint): That's not so easy to--

THE KIND OF UNDERSTANDING THAT EXISTS BETWEEN THE WITNESS-I AND ITS WORLD IS NOT A KNOWING THE WAY WE UNDERSTAND KNOWING

AS: But I thi-- I thought there was another point there too is that the relation of the Witness to that whole world-thought is not the same kind of a reciprocal relation that you can posit between the empirical subject and object, the whole first-- all the way up to that end there he's talking about a reciprocal kind of relation, just as he always says. If an-- if there's no object, there's no seeing, if there's no seeing, there's no object, they both always go together. Now if you take the point of view of that whole thing, seeing (and/an) object, how is that known to the-- to the Witness? It's not that-- I mean, you can't posit it as that kind of a reciprocal relation any more. The reciprocal relation is within that witnessing. In fact, the whole-- the whole of that reciprocal relation.

LR (simultaneously): Are you sure?

AD: Absolutely.

AS: Yeah.

LR: Are you sure that there's no rec-- reciprocity just--

AS (simultaneously): It's not the same-- it's not that reciprocity [one/two words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): Absolutely, there's no kind-- you don't-- when you're the Witness-I you don't know the way you know here.

LR: Oh I know that, I'm not saying that. That's not [DB simultaneously: But wouldn't the-- wouldn't the recipro--] what I meant. [S simultaneously with DB and LR: Well pro--] I meant can you talk about--

AS(?) (simultaneously): But-- right.

AD: As a matter of fact it's better to call it no knowing.

LR: No, no, that's not what I meant Anthony, I-- I meant the reciprocity that exists within the empirical between the subject and object, is there a similar reciprocity between the Witness and what he's calling the entire material world?

AD: That's why I said, it's not a knowing, it's no knowing.

LR: But can one arise without the other at that level?

AD (simultaneously): Yes, you can have Witness-I without the (material universe).

LR (simultaneously): With-- that's right, ok.

DB: Would it be possible to speak of the--

LR (simultaneously): Without an object to know. The Witness-I could have a consciousness without any objectivity [AD simultaneously, faint: Uh-hm.] or projection going on.

DB: I wa-- I was wondering if-- is there a reciprocity between the Witness-I and the World-Idea which would form the basis for the-- the dualism--

LR (simultaneously): He just said no [one/two words inaudible]

DB: No not-- no not the projected material world, not that part.

LR: Oh but he just said you're-- that you could have the Witness-I without any object at all.

DB: But without a World-Idea you don't have the man-- universal manifestation, you would have [couple words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): You see, the reason I'm doing this is because the kind of-- the kind of understanding that exists between the Witness-I and the-- its world is nothing that we understand and it's not a knowing the way we understand knowing.

LDS: But Anthony I don't follow then how we can prove-- how with those last-- that last sentence, your position. If you're saying that the Witness-I doesn't need a content, then why-- why do we conclude from all the previous discussion in that section that this is an a-- analogical condition that the Witness-I has with the ego and its knowledge situation? [couple inaudible AS words simultaneous with LDS] Or aren't you doing that?

AS: It's not [RG simultaneously: Not analogical.] analogical.

LDS: You're-- oh, it's not analogical, it's a real split.

AS (simultaneously): I thought that was the point. Yeah, yeah, [LDS simultaneously: That's what he said.] that it's not a-- it's not analogical, [LDS simultaneously: It's not ana--] it's not at the-- it's not the same level.

LDS: But let me ask this too.

AS: That's why there's a s-- gap there [possibly one/two words inaudible]

LDS: When we say Witness-I, the very phrase Witness-I seems to connote some kind of knowing of a content. Now I'm not-- I'm not speaking about what mode of knowing that is. But, what sense does it make to speak of a Witness-I without a content, without something that it witnesses?

[Audio File 1983 0323a (formerly 1983 0324b) Ends]

[Audio File 1983 0323b (formerly 1983 0324a) Begins]

AD: --have in the empirical world, alright, with one-- in other words is, how does the transcendental ego perceive, alright, me and the object I'm looking at? So then you'll have three, right? Now you'll have that looking at me while I'm looking at-- at you. (bit of laughter, student words) And so you'll go on with an infinite regress.

[students assent, faint]

AH: But--

AD: It's no kind of knowing. [AH simultaneously: That we're familiar with.] Stop it there. Then-- otherwise we'll get into an entirely different kind of discussion. You're asking, how does the Divine Mind or the Undivided Mind know.

LDS: Ok, one more question then, I'll leave that one alone. But, [AD, faint: Yeah.] is the Witness-I a tentative position in the way you're using it right now or not?

AD: I'm sorry?

LDS: The Witness-I notion, principle, subject or whatever you want to speak of it, is it a tentative position as we've spoken previously?

AD: Tentative, what do you mean in relationship to [LDS simultaneously: In--] samadhi on asmita?

LDS: Whatever.

S (faint): It's whatever.

LDS: No I'm serious, I'm-- is the Witness-I the ultimate--

AD: Let's not bring that up now.

LDS: It seems impor-- I--

AD: It seems important? We'll get to that then we'll worry about what it's like to concentrate on asmita, what kind of knowledge that is. I mean you're asking for explanation of things that are utterly beyond any comprehension.

LDS: No, I don't want an explanation, I just wanted a yes or a no. (laughter, student words)

AD: Yes or no? [LDS simultaneously: The Witness-I is the--] Then you know the-- then you know the answer. That from a point of a view of a full self-realized soul that is a-- an expediency.

AH: The notion of a Witness-I.

AD: Yeah.

S (faint): Ok.

S: Yeah.

S: Let's not bother with that.

S (faint): But that'll be a new life.

DR: Well this-- this must have been the wrong quote. (laughter, student words) I mean--

AD: I think some of these notes of PB are just going to demand that you sit down and think. And you gotta wait because ve-- very often you'll see that the punch line comes in very sneaky. And he doesn't put up a red flag and say "Now…" (AD chuckles, bit of laughter) He doesn't do that. That's why I didn't want to go through Tim's quotation because there was some--

LR (faint): (Sneaks/Snakes).

AD: No, it wasn't phrased like PB. But the thing I liked about Tim's quotation was Tim told me that he told that to Devon. He says "If you don't study mentalism you might as well go to church." And I got hysterical when I heard that (Tim). (some laughter)

S: Yeah.

[student assents, faint]

AD: Let's have some more uh-- (bit of laughter)

S: Where was that last quote copied?

S (simultaneously): No comment.

TS: Um--

LR: That was the quote that Tim's referring to?

S (very faint): Yeah.

RG (faint): Uh-hm. Ok.

LR: Smith just comes down on the [one word inaudible]

RC: The last one was page 14 in the second volume of-- yeah, the orange one.

[student assents, faint]

AH: You know, after this discussion, is it inappropriate that you read that last quote again? I'd like to hear it again.

S (faint): Which one?

S (very faint): Yeah.

AD (very faint, possibly part of background): No [one/two words inaudible]

AH: Could we read it again please?

RC: It's sticking out from that pile [S simultaneously: Right.] on the right.

[short pause]

PB [V13, 21:2.154, TS reading]: "Thinking is possible only where there exists an object about which to think, whether it be a material thing or a mere idea. We [TS reads: You] cannot think unless we [TS reads: you] have something in mind. This means in every act of thought there are two elements: the thinking itself and the object or idea thought about. These are so coupled together by the psychological constitution of man that the first cannot exist without the second.

"These statements may be more easily understood after due reflection, but it will be much more difficult to understand that the contrary ones likewise hold true [TS reads: hold true likewise]. That is to say, no object or idea can exist without being thought of, and nothing perceptible [TS reads: perceptive] can exist without something or someone to see it. In short, the factors which have been coupled together here are mutually dependent.

"It is impossible for a thinkable object or idea to exist in a state where thought itself is impossible. It is impossible for a seeable thing to exist in a state where sight is impossible, as in deep sleep. And, since everything material is either thinkable or seeable or both, it follows that the entire material universe has its being in being thought [of] or perceived. It is only an appearance within the mind of the thinker or dependent upon the perceiver. No idea, no object, could have any conceivable existence if the perceiver himself never had any. Something living and conscious that can think and become aware of them must first exist through their relation to it. They cannot possibly exist in disconnection from a conscious mind.

"This is true whether we apply it to mere ideas or to hard and heavy things which we see and feel, such as houses and trees [TS reads: such as houses and trees, which we can see and feel]. The point cannot be grasped by the understanding without previous reflection and meditation, for it appears to be contrary to common experience and common sense. In short, matter is a mental sensation and not the cause of a mental sensation."

[short pause]

AD (quietly): So you could say there's-- they-- very simply that he took you out of the empirical world and forced you to realize that you are a mind.

MB: But Anthony, it's interesting that he does this without ever mentioning the Witness-I or the witnessing mind. It's like that's the concept that's behind it but he doesn't bring in that terminology, it's not necessary(--/.)

AD: I brought it in, true, to distinguish the "I" that you are with the "I" that you think you are. [students assent] But he pushed you right out of the body and made it very clear that the body and the world within which that body is located is the product of a thinking mind. You cannot locate that thinking mind in your head. [students assent] So therefore he pushed you out of it and made you realize that the whole of the perceptible world is an object to a thinking mind. This thinking mind, alright, has for its object, if we can speak incorrectly, that empirical subject and that empirical object. [short pause] Didn't you get the feeling of that, that he [MB assents] was doing that?

[students assent, faint]

MB (simultaneously): You're in a matrix, you're in a different-- the matrix of the mind, the matrix doesn't follow--

AD: Yeah, he's-- he-- he convinces you at one level, shows you that without an object there's no subject, without a subject there's no object, then takes the entirety, the World-Idea, and shows you that that has to be an object to a thinking mind. Now what thinking mind can that possibly be? The one you're not identified with, obviously. (bit of laughter) [short pause] Alright, we'll keep our own opinions. Tim, let's go on to another one.

YOU MUST BE ABLE TO REASON FOR YOURSELF, STEP-BY-STEP, HOW TO GET FROM THE EMPIRICAL SURFACE MIND TO THE WITNESS-I OR THE GREATER I, WHICH IS YOUR REAL SELF

PB [unpublished, 25a.0 (10v/26.230), RG reading]: "The ego's thoughts do not alone make its environment but contribute to the making of its environment."

[10 second pause]

PB [V16, 25:1.20, RG reading]: "Thus the World-Mind originates our experience for us but we ourselves mold it. It supplies the karmic-forces material and we as individuals supply the space-time shape which this material takes. Thus there is a union of the individual with the universal."

[10 second pause]

PB [V13, 21:3.97, RG reading]: "It is not enough to say that the world is man's idea. We need to know why he has it at all. To be sufficiently explained, his world-idea must be brought into relation with the World-Mind's world-idea, because his individual mind is inseparably rooted in the World Mind."

[17½ second pause]

PB [V13, 21:3.68 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #9, RG reading]: "Since the world is never found to be apart from our own minds, we are forced to relate it to them. And since it is equally obvious that the surface part of them [RG: Of our minds.] does not deliberately bring it [RG: The world.] into existence we are further forced to deduce, first, that the deeper and unconscious part must do so and, second, that this second part must be cosmic in nature and hold all other individual minds rooted in its depths. This deduction, arrived at by reason, is confirmed by experience but not by ordinary experience. It is confirmed by sinking a shaft down through the mind in mystical meditation and arriving at our secondary cosmic self."

[short pause]

S (faint): [few words inaudible]

[13½ second pause with students assenting in background, very faint]

PB [V13, 21:3.68 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #9, RG reading]: "Since the world is never [RG adds: to be] found apart…"

AD (simultaneously): Don't you want to hear that again?

[student assents, very faint]

RG (simultaneously): Hm, what?

AD: Don't you want to hear that again?

S (very faint): Yeah.

RG: I was starting to read.

S (faint): Yeah.

Couple students at once: (Rose--)

RG: I was going to read it again.

[9½ second pause]

RG/S(?) (faint): Do you want to hear that?

AD: Yeah, [student assents] please. (laughter)

PB [V13, 21:3.68 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #9, RG reading]: "Since the world is never found to be apart from our own minds, we are forced to relate it to them. And since it is equally obvious that the surface part of them [RG reads: our mind] does not deliberately bring it [RG reads: the world] into existence we are further forced to deduce, first, that the deeper and unconscious part must do so and, second, that this second part must be cosmic in nature and hold all other individual minds rooted in its depths. This deduction, arrived at by reason, is confirmed by experience but not by ordinary experience."

AD: Well, what do you think the reasoning process was that brings you from the superficial mind to the secondary mind?

AH: In terms of this quote?

AD: Yeah, in this quote.

S (faint): Well now--

AH (simultaneously): Well you say that because-- because you have to relate your individual mind to a world, you have to take the next step and relate that world to a deeper level of mind. And that's the unconscious part. And then you find-- then you have dilemma of an individual mind related to a-- a deeper level of mind that could only be verified in mystical meditation.

AD: Alright, what's the reasoning process that would get you, Dickie, from a superficial mind to the secondary mind?

RG: Well, he says it's number one, the world-- how-- what-- any concept we have of our own individual mind doesn't-- we can't create at will the world of our experience, it's given to us. We can't withdraw it, we can't change it. So we must reason that if it's mental, the mental form of it must be given by a mind that's-- that's greater than-- than what we call our-- our own mind, and that mind has to be cosmic in nature because we all experience a common world and we-- we relate through it.

S (faint, possibly part of background): So [couple/three words inaudible]

DB: My-- it seemed like when-- well, forgive me but it seemed like there was a step in there that we ordinarily speak of but he just went right over. But he go-- because he goes from a superficial empirical personal standpoint, from that immediately it seems to the-- to the World-Mind, which--

AD (simultaneously): Not to the World-Mind, he goes to the secondary self.

DB (simultaneously): Ok well, the-- the cosmic mind, the World-Soul, ok, which he speaks of as having a--

AD (simultaneously): Didn't go to the World-Soul, he goes to the secondary self, your greater mind.

[student assents, very faint]

DB: Which contains all the other individual minds within it. Yeah, I mean, that's--

AD: And what I-- what I asked was, do you, or can you for your own purposes go through a reasoning process where you can in an iron-clad fashion deduce step-by-step that the Witness mind or the Witness-I or the secondary self is your real self? Now, you got another ten years ahead of you, that's all I can tell you.

RC: But it (seemed/seems) like it's pretty straightforward in terms of where he's taken us so far as being forced to admit if we will follow that all we can talk about are ideas that are present in the only mind that we know about.

AD: Yeah but, Randy, the question is very precise. You must be able to reason for yourself, step-by-step, how you can get from the empirical surface mind to the Witness-I or the greater I or the secondary self. If you can't do that, you're going to be coming back, building more log cabins.

S: [one word inaudible]

S(?): [few words inaudible]

PD (simultaneously): When you say reasoning you don't mean the--

AD (simultaneously): Or go to church.

S (faint): (Yeah right.)

AH (simultaneously): Anthony, what--

PD (simultaneously): When you say reasoning you don't mean the mental chatter we call our normal thinking, you mean the actual-- for us we would call it the process in-- in being through which we get to that deeper mind.

AS/S(?): No.

AD: I'm sorry?

S (very faint): Reason [one/two words inaudible]

AS (simultaneously): No, the reasoning process.

RG: No I--

AS: Yeah, like (Rinpoche) was saying.

PD (simultaneously): Avery, let me finish Avery.

S: Please Avery.

RG (simultaneously): May--

AS: Well--

AD: Go ahead.

AS: What does that mean!?

PD: That the-- that the process that one has to become accomplished at is a certain intensity in the thought that can go from the surface self to the deeper self. This is a reasoning process, this is a process that is going to take you out of the limited individual point of view to-- of the cosmic view or the Witness view.

AD: Well, Paul say--

PD (simultaneously): And that transition (would/one) have to be apt at.

AD: Well I think what you're speaking about is the mystical phenomena, alright, where you realize your identity with the Witness-I, and I'm not going to disagree with that. But, I think, I think what I was asking was, can you in your own understanding reason step-by-step. It's not mental chatter because it's going to require the most logical, vigorous, intense kind of understanding, and you're going to have to retrace your step many times to get to that logically. Kant did it for instance, alright. He got to the transcendental perce-- the transcendental ego through his reasoning process and I think PB pointed out that it was a supreme achievement. And I think you'll find a few others who have done that. And I'm simply asking, if you cannot do that for yourself then you don't understand mentalism consciously, self-consciously. [PD: Yes.] Like if, for instance, when you look out and you see the Sun rise, alright, and then through a vigorous logical process of reasoning you can come to the conclusion that it is not the Sun rising but it's the Earth rotating and all that, just through reasoning you prove to yourself, alright, that the Sun does not rise. This is what he's talking about.

PD: See, I-- I did, I took reasoning in a-- that the reasoning process wou-- conjoined to a contemplative state of mind is what's the-- the vehicle for stepping up and stepping down levels of your own being. And that is how you go from the surface mind to the deeper mind and you could-- in a conscious manner.

AD: Yeah, I wouldn't disagree with that because certainly the kind of reasoning that is called for gets so intense that you can have flashes of this truth. But generally, I think he keeps them distinct, he points out the fact that you can, in meditation, drive a shaft deep down into yourself and come into an identification with the Witness-I. Or the other approach is like for some people that let's say are not orientated, you know, contemplatively, they can through a vigorous process of reasoning come to the same conclusion in a rational way without having the mystical experience. And the person who has the mystical experience sooner or later is going to have to rationally understand what happened. So you do need both ultimately, that would-- that's the ideal. But either way you can approach. So let's say some people, you know, are not capable of contemplative effort or medi-- meditative intensity to get them there but they have good reasoning ability. They-- they could work through Kant's Critique. Who was it, General Smuts carried it through campaigns reading it and every now and then stopping to direct a battle and then go back to reading it. (bit of laughter)

PD: But at a certain ideal--

AD (simultaneously): I did that with the Hidden Teachings. I used to go break the winch so I could read another chapter. (bit of laughter) You can use your reasoning and get to it.

PD: Yeah, I follow what you're saying but I'm thinking of more of a permanent possession than a one time achie-- accomplishment, that one can acquire the bili-- the ability to sit down and put oneself into a meditative trance and be at the position of the Witness-I and then bring oneself back to the superficial consciousness through a certain controlled process of--

LR (simultaneously): He's asking for that kind of map to do that in the same way he could it with concepts.

PD: Yeah, in terms of your own being.

[student assents, faint]

RG: Yeah, but-- [AD simultaneously: Well you-- you can get--] but I don't think that's what he means here by reasoning.

PD: Ok. I mean that's--

RG (simultaneously): I mean he pretty clearly makes the distinction that you arrive at it through deduction and then you-- it's confirmed by mystical experience, it itself is not the experience.

AD: And, you know, the funny thing about life is that if you get the mystical experience and you don't reason it out, you'll have to come back and reason it out. And if you reason it out and you don't get the mystical experience you'll have to come back and get the mystical experience. Because, it's a funny thing, you're gonna have to do both, whether you like it or not.

AB: Wasn't that the suggestion of the first quote we started out with tonight? That going through that process of intense reasoning is pr-- will produce or it-- he considered it a mystical experience.

AD (simultaneously): Yeah I think, I think in Hinduism they call that Brahma-jnana, like a-- [student assents, faint] and a certain-- no, Brahmananda. A certain joy arises when you intensely study and you start getting flashes or glimpses of understanding. You remember the quote from Kepler how-- how ecstatic he was he was thinking God's ideas? And he actually wrote like hymns of adoration as he was writing his treatises, because he felt he was thinking God's ideas. Of course what we would call our Brahma, you know, our Solar Logos, he-- he was thinking Its ideas and he got so intimate with them that he felt that, you know, for a while that, you know, he was participating in that. So we have to do both sooner or later. And so in the Hidden Teaching you got the exposition in a rational form and in the end of the Wisdom you got the exercises to complement that. And you have to do them both.

AH: I wanted to ask about [one/two words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): Somebody was telling me that-- she was telling me, says "You know, I'm afraid I'm going to have to come back to understand everything that's happening to me." That was a very intuitive woman. (some laughter)

AS/S(?) (faint): Who's gonna have to?

S (faint): (Right/Yeah).

S (faint): Uh-hm.

AH: I wanted to-- excu--

LR: Think anyone could say that but I don't think that's what you meant. (some laughter, student words) Right?

INSOFAR THAT YOUR INDIVIDUAL MIND TAKES IN THE WORLD-IDEA, ALL OTHER INDIVIDUAL MINDS ARE INCLUDED IN THAT IDEA

AH: This process that he describes, that logical process, the one that you recommend we make our own, the very first step of that logic is the hardest part for me. And I'd like to ask a question about that if I could. You said that--

LR (simultaneously): The first step being--

AH: The first step that he describes that like the individual mind is related to a world, ok? And through deduction, through thinking about it you could decide that that world is a known one to the individual mind. Then you have to take the next step, and the next step is a consequence of recognizing that that world has its autonomy apart from the one you want. There's a world [AD/S(?) simultaneously: (Andrew--)] out-- you-- we can get out of the rain but we can't make it stop raining. So--

RG: Well the way he goes about it it's not-- the emphasis in the quote isn't on the world, it's on inability-- it's-- it does not deliberately bring it into existence.

AH: Yes. Well it's at that point in the reasoning that I-- that I don't really--

S: Well--

RG: Well, it's pretty simple. I mean do you-- do you feel that you deliberately mani-- bring the world into existence?

AH: Ok, no, I know that's so, but then how do I take that next step where I posit the bigger mind?

RG: Well what conclusions would you draw from the fact that if you believe that the entire world presented is a mental one and yet what you call your mind, what you normally call your mind doesn't bring that mental world into existence, what would be the logical conclusion?

AH: That it has to be a mental.

S: Right.

BS: And is the Witness-I to be taken as what may be my participation in the cosmic mind? 'Cause I think he--

LR (simultaneously): Has to be.

BS: Excuse me?

LR: I-- yeah, I want-- I want--

BS (simultaneously): Yeah because he mentioned that all individual minds would be included in what Anthony called the Witness-I and I think PB referred to it as, am I right, cosmic or--

PB [V13, 21:3.68 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #9, RG reading]: "…that this [RG reads: there's the] second part must be cosmic in nature and hold all other individual minds [BS: Yeah.] rooted in its depths."

BS: But that secondary part Anthony you were referring to (is/as) the Witness-I?

AD: Yeah.

BS: So that would be like a participation in the cosmic?

AD: Well, I don't know, you-- you could use the word 'participation'.

BS: Well, I don't care what word I use.

AD: Well basically that mind is the one that has the sensations and the faculty of understanding and creating the concepts necessary to tether those sensations together and then inject them into the empirical mind or the empirical psychosomatic organism through which it has an apparent world to deal with. But, see I don't like to say that it participates. Because that individual mind does have the World-Idea within itself. It doesn't participate. Because then we start thinking, well I have a piece of it and you have a piece of it, you know. Whereas if we say that each and every one's deeper mind, alright, makes a representation for itself of that World-Idea, then that is its World-Idea. That isn't the World-Idea. And the Sage could actually witness the phenomena of watching his mind make the world, alright, and he could say "The world is my idea." But as long as we think we are the individual mind we cannot say that.

[short pause]

RG: (If/And) by saying that that mind holds all other individual minds in its grasp [one/two words inaudible]

AD: Yeah.

RG: What does that mean?

AD: Well that-- that means that insofar that your individual mind takes in the World-Idea, all other individual minds are included in that. Just like my mind will do likewise, take in the World-Idea and all other ideas-- all other individual minds are going to be included within that. So, like we pointed out last week, therefore, a person who has access to the World-Idea within his mind, directly, I don't mean through inference or deduction, can read your mind. [short pause] Your mind would be as objective, you know, as any-- any object. But you have to go back to that when you say that he's reading your mind. Or he knows, you know, like he'll just answer you-- like you're thinking something and he'll answer you, you know. Now remember don't think of this as a conscious process, that he's thinking what you're thinking.

LR: (very faint): Thank goodness.

AD: It would be embarrassing. (laughter, student words) [short pause] Alright. You have to do that for yourself though, and so-- it would even be worthwhile like for instance to devote a couple of weeks meditating and thinking, when you sit down, meditate on it--"Let me think this out for myself, to my satisfaction." And then, discuss it with someone and see if it still holds water. You have to do that for yourself, nobody can do it for you. And it's really quite delightful, it's better than eatin' waffles. (laughter, background student talking) Let's have a few more.

[10¾ second pause with background student talking]

"WHERE THE WORLD VANISHES AND THE EGO IS STILLED, WE BECOME ONE WITH THE INFINITE AND ETERNAL MIND BEHIND THE UNIVERSE"

PB [V16, 25:1.34, RG reading]: "What we know through the senses as forms point to the mind-- points [RG reads: point] to the existence of the mind. What we know through the intellect as thoughts points [RG reads: point] to the mind. What does the individual mind itself point to? We can find the answer by plunging deep into its core, deeper and ever deeper in the practice of contemplation until we come to its ultimate source. There, where the world vanishes and the ego is stilled, we become one with the infinite and eternal Mind behind the universe."

[20½ second pause]

AD: Those are the unwritten glories.

RC: That seemed to be the key question in that-- that big step, and if I-- if I follow the first part of what we've done and find that any object that I am dealing with points to the existence of a mind, and then really begin to inquire into what this-- what does that mind itself point to, that seems to be the real breaking point in the reasoning process.

[short pause]

AD: Yes, reason will take you there, to the actual experience.

[28½ second pause]

PB [V13, 21:3.73, RC reading]: "Just as religion is a foreshadowing of philosophy and just as an anthropomorphic God is a faint adumbration of the One for crude minds, so the divisions into matter and mind, objective reality and inner fancy, this world and an unseen world, are unconscious foreshadowings of the mind and its world-thought."

[short pause]

LR: Again please?

RC: It's interesting too because here mind is not capitalized.

[21½ second pause]

PB [V13, 21:5.100, RC reading]: "If a materialist would stop to think about this mystery…"

S (very faint, part of background): Be careful.

S: Yeah.

YOU WANT TO KNOW THAT "I" IN THE SAME WAY YOU KNOW A POLE, WHEREAS YOU ARE THAT "I" YOU WISH TO KNOW

PB [V13, 21:5.100, RC reading]: "If a materialist would stop to think about this mystery of the ultimate observer and if his thinking faculties were sufficiently sharpened, purified, and made capable of dealing with such an abstract subject, he would lose his materialism and become a mentalist. Let him ask himself who is it that speaks when he speaks about himself, what is this"I," this thing that bears his name? Since that which speaks and that which is spoken of cannot be the same but must be separate, then he would have to admit a further "I" behind the one that speaks about himself. He could go on analysing backwards in a never-ending series [in] this way. Each time the "I" would seem to have some other "I" to which it was an object and to which it could refer as the subject. The existence of his ego would be established in relativity, for it would seem he could move infinitely and indefinitely through this mystery of what is meant by "I." This is because the instrument which he is using for such analysis is the logical intellect, which would thus reveal to him its strict limitations.

"Observing these limitations he would then have to ask himself whether or not it were possible to use a subtler instrument, and then mystical metaphysics would tell him: Yes, such a subtler instrument is available--it is your intuition. Cultivate this rightly, shun its counterfeit, subject your feelings to the philosophic discipline, and then practice meditation. You will find that your intuition will lead you back and back to [RC reads: into] the one element which is the final"I" and which directs every operation of the subconscious functions of the body, and which gives your personality its consciousness of existence. This "I" is non-physical; it is the inmost [RC read: innermost] part of your mind. Understand this and you will necessarily have to give up materialism. You will become a votary of mentalism. Even more, the realization of this truth in actual experience makes you aware that the universe is friendly to you because you are intimately related to it. Your own mind grows out of the World-Mind. It is this relation which enables your mental nature to think and to know, your emotional nature to feel, and your physical body to act. Without it you would be dead in the fullest sense of the term. Everything inside of you, like everything outside [RC adds: of] you, changes; but this real Self never changes for it dwells in the Kingdom of the World-Mind, the kingdom of heaven which is an everlasting one [RC reads: fact].

"It is a phenomenal feat to understand Einstein's law of relativity as it applies to the physical world; but, after all, this understanding does not bring peace of mind or strength of life. It is quite another thing to understand the law of relativity as it applies to the inner Self and such understanding does bring these things. Our knowledge of physical relativity has led us to control of the atom, whose reward seems to be the likelihood that we shall destroy ourselves, but our knowledge of spiritual relativity leads us to [RC adds: the] control of the mind, whose reward is to save ourselves."

[short pause]

LR (faint): Where is that from Randy?

RC: It's volume 10, the red one, page 38.

AH: Randy, that first-- (that/the) first section of that, are you going to entertain questions or comments or-- If-- if you look for this "I" logically it leads to infinite regress. That seems to be the statement.

RC/S(?) (faint): Ok.

AH: But once that's understood, like once that-- once that's logically accepted, that if you look for it in that way it's infinitely regressive, then you must look for it through meditation.

RC: Well co-- more than just meditation.

AH: Intuition. Like once it-- once it's accepted that logically it recedes infinitely, or regresses [one/two words inaudible] it can't be discovered that way.

RC: Yeah.

AH: It has to be discovered through this finer instrument or more subtle instrument referred to as intuition. Could we talk about that-- Is that the process of stopping search for the "I"? Is that to like stop the mind?

[short pause]

RC: Well Tim actually just did a whole bunch of-- a whole bunch of material on what it means to cultivate the intuition and various practices. We could spend a lot of time on that, [AH/S(?): Uh-huh.] unless Anthony wants to say something now.

AD: Well it's-- it's really quite appropriate what he does there. When I ask a question, and I a-- if I address you Andrew and I say, "Do you know that these three angles together constitute a triangle?" And you say "Yes, I know." Now this "I", can you point to it?

AH: Yes I-- I can't. But if I-- but if I do so in any other way than a direct one, I'm faced with having to point toward it again.

AD: Do you know who this "I" is that says "Yes I know"?

AH: No. No I don't know.

AD (simultaneously): Well how could that be? You are that. How could that be that you don't know it?

AH: I am that but I don't know it and that's exactly the way it is.

AD (simultaneously): But that's because you insist on saying it!

AH: That's just the way it is.

AD (intensely): No, that's not the way it is, it's the way you made it!

AH: I am that but I don't know it. If I try to know--

AD (simultaneously, intensely): You are that but you don't know it.

AH: Yes, because as soon as--

AD (simultaneously): In other words, there's a difference between your being and your knowing.

AH: Yes. Because as soon-- yes.

AD (simultaneously): But isn't that absurd?

AH: That's why I come here for ten years. (laughter)

AD: Well you-- you don't have to, you can stop right now and start-- start saying to yourself "But I am I!" If you don't do that, you're going to imagine that this Witness-I is outside, you know, like the ring of Saturn, alright, and you're going to have to make a picture of yourself and you say "That's my cosmic"I", that's really "I"," alright. "But then I got a problem with this-- this one here, the one that just answered the question that these three angles constitute a triangle." [S, very faint: (Exactly.)] It's the same "I"!!

AH: See I can't leave that alone, I have to try to deal with that logically.

AD: Well what do you think I'm dealing with it, irrationally!? (laughter)

AH: Well-- well as soon as-- as soon as I try to deal with that--

AD (intensely): I'm just trying to point out that the knower that you are, alright, can't be circumscribed!! And just because it can't be pointed to as [AD bangs on something] this thing here, you say it isn't! It's a beautiful way of cutting out this stupid infinite regress of trying to go back forever. You are that "I" here and now!!! Everybody gives me the same story. I've never seen ignorance reared to such perfection (laughter) (en--/and) end-- endlessly. "That's not my"I"." No who's "I" is it? Who is it that knows it? My "I"?

DB: Does this mean that the correct answer to the question "Who am I?" is "Who wants to know?" (bit of laughter)

[short pause]

AH: So the correct answer would be "I am I". Who am I? I am I.

AD: You want to know that "I" in the same way you know the things in the empirical world, you want to know it like you know a pole. Whereas here the example is very clear showing you that you are that which you wish to know. Why go looking for another head to put on your one-- the one you already have!?

AH (faint): (That's/It's) a good question.

AD (intensely): And if you can't think like this you're not-- never going to get out of the ditch. Tell me, who is it that knows that the Sun doesn't rise? Somebody else's "I"? Think like that, you know, just keep thinking in the sense, "Well, it's not this"I" that knows it, it's my greater "I"," alright. [RG assents] So, we say "Alright. For the sake of expediency we're going to allow you to have a greater"I"." Now, who is it that knows!? I. Don't you get tired of going around in circles?

AH: Yeah, I'm really tired of it Anthony.

AD: Well that's one way I could win. (laughter, AD laughing) Batter you down until you just out of sheer, you know, fatigue say "That's me." (some laughter) It's the same "I".

[short pause]

AH: But, there is (another--)

AD (simultaneously): But-- but you're expecting something miraculous. [AH: No I--] When you say "I am that cosmic"I"" like you want to see the stars and flickering and everything, right? You want a real glorious revelation, "This is the"I" I want!"

AH: No, I don't think I expect that.

PD (simultaneously): That's only fitting for a Leo (though). (laughter)

AH: Well I-- I actually don't expect that but I am curious about specific point in this quote, if we could-- if we could just go around the circle again on that.

AD: Let's go around the circle, sure.

AH: Ok. The inquiry into the "I" is a logical and rational one and you've insisted upon that. But PB is suggesting in this quote that it-- that the solution will not occur at the level of knowledge being separate from being or in a kind of knowledge that's divorced from intuition.

AD: Well isn't that what I'm asking you to do?

AH: You're asking-- you're asking for an intuitive perception of the "I".

AD: Yeah. When I say who is it that knows that the Sun doesn't rise.

AH (faint): Yeah.

AD: It's not somebody else, it's you. [student assents, faint] This is your most immediate experience! [student assents, faint] And you keep looking.

RG: But from the fact that reason [one/two words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): As a matter of fact when you find out you'll have a hysterical laugh. (laughter)

LR: When you find out who it is?

AD: When you find out, you know, "But it's me that he was talking about all the time. (student laughing) It's actually me!" You remember like when that man got enlightened in the dark room, the Zen master blew out the candle? When he came out he was smiling. That's enough. You found out. That's an intuitive "I", right? You intuit that "I".

AH: Yes.

AD: As soon as you start elaborating that, it's lost.

AH: It's not-- it's not a grander one or not--

AD (simultaneously): We can't think it.

AH: Yeah, it's not a Witness one or a cosmic one or--

AD (simultaneously): Yeah, you can't think it.

AH: It's none of those things.

AD: None of those things.

[student assents, faint]

AH: How shall I--

(Side 1 of original cassette tape digitized as 1983 0323b (formerly 1983 0324a) Ends; Side 2 Begins)

AD: Alright, I've said enough on this one. (some laughter) When I think of the labor that Kant went through for twelve years writing the Critique to come out with the notion of the transcendental "I", I don't feel too bad, let's go on. (AD laughing, laughter, student words) And who was that fellow who wrote a book on being without a head? [Note: See D.E. Harding, On Having No Head: Zen and the Rediscovery of the Obvious.]

S: Yeah.

AD: Who was he?

S (simultaneously): Wei Wu Wei.

S: Wei Wu Wei.

LG/DC(?): On [S simultaneously, faint: Oh, right.] Having No Head, yeah.

AD (simultaneously): On Having No Head?

[students assent, faint]

S (very faint): Harding.

AD: Oh Harding, [RC: (June 16^th?)] Harding, yeah.

S (simultaneously, very faint): That's important. (student laughs)

LR: Which do you think (goes/was) further? Give me about twelve years, you'll [one/two words inaudible] [few faint inaudible student words simultaneous with LR] Which do you think goes [one word inaudible]

AD: But I had more fun than Kant.

S (very faint): Uh-hm. Did you have more fun?

S (very faint): [one/two words inaudible] (bit of laughter)

RG: He just [couple/three words inaudible]

LR (simultaneously): I think he had it easier actually, Anthony. Stayed in his room all by himself all the time. (some laughter)

AD: He used to go out and take a walk every day at four o'clock and people used to [LR simultaneously: Set their (one word inaudible) by his (one word inaudible)] set their watch by his walk. (laughter, student words)

BS: Not to be facetious but who thinks-- who would think that the Sun rises if they were-- (student laughing)

RC: Say who is it who knows the Sun doesn't rise.

LR: Who is it that thinks the Sun rises?

LDS (simultaneously): Yeah who's-- Ask [couple words inaudible] Bert. (bit of laughter)

AD: I know-- I was reading a report where some of them even think they have to spit on their hand and splatter it, otherwise the Sun won't rise. We're out of the mythological stage and we're being forced out of it gradually. It's taken-- it's taken quite a few number of wars but you're gonna lea-- leave that mythology behind, whether you like it or not. You're going to have to learn to address each other and speak with concepts that are clear and not fuddled. We don't have to go into an extensive, you know, undertaking to discover the meaning of mythology. We can talk these doctrines straight out in the open. Now, who believes that the Sun rises? People that haven't used their reason.

RG: That's good.

BS: Yeah, but that wasn't the thrust of my question.

S: I see.

LR (very faint): (I do not believe.)

LR/S(?) (very faint): We have to.

AD: You don't believe, that's conjecture.

LR (faint): No.

AH(?): Linda [AP simultaneously: This is nice.] we can't hear you but maybe you don't want us to. (some laughter)

BS (amidst laughter): [few words inaudible]

LR: Belief, you know [few words inaudible] The nature of belief that you see the Sun rise. If you strain to see it rise without the belief [one/two words inaudible] I believe the Sun rises [one/two words inaudible]

AD: But then your reason just as clearly points out that it doesn't rise.

LR: Not my reason, someone else's. (bit of laughter)

AD: Alright, someone else's. But it is an earth-- it is an earth-shaking event when suddenly the world lets loose a thinker and something that you-- that mankind believed for five thousand years suddenly gets shattered. And the most obvious truth, you know, becomes available to me. But the point here is it's that's reason that's doing it and you are the one that's reasoning and if you're looking for someone else who's doing it for you, your greater self, alright, then, again you're misunderstanding the whole thing. You are the one. [students assent, very faint] Let's have some more.

IF YOU MUST IDENTIFY WITH SOMETHING, IDENTIFY WITH YOUR GREATER SELF

PB [V13, 21:5.55 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #64, RC reading]: "The human body is [a] part of [RC adds: our] consciousness, indeed a major part, but [RC adds: our] consciousness itself is only a part of a larger and deeper consciousness of which we are normally unaware. Yet [RC reads: And] it is in this mysterious region that the creative origin of the body-idea [RC reads: body] lies. If the ordinary"I" cannot make the body keep well [RC reads: grow young or live perpetually] by merely holding the thought, this is because the creative power lies in an "I" which transcends it. The ego which identifies itself with the body thereby stultifies its latent powers. But as soon as it begins to identify itself with pure Mind, certain [RC reads: these] powers [may] begin to unfold. Many [RC reads: Innumerable] cases of mystic [RC reads: mystical] phenomena, such as the stigmata of Catholic saints, confirm this."

[short pause]

S (faint): What's that [couple words inaudible] Randy?

[short pause]

S (faint): I got here without this.

PB [V13, 21:5.55 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #64, RC reading]: "The human body is part of [RC adds: our] consciousness, indeed a major part, but [RC adds: our] consciousness itself is only a part of a larger and deeper consciousness of which we are normally unaware. Yet [RC reads: And] it is in this mysterious region that the creative origin of the body-idea lies. If the ordinary"I" cannot make the body keep well [RC reads: grow young or live perpetually] by merely holding the thought, this is because the creative power lies in an "I" which transcends it. The ego which identifies itself with the body thereby stultifies its latent powers. But as soon as it begins to identify itself with the pure Mind, certain [RC reads: these] powers [may] begin to unfold. Many [RC reads: Innumerable] cases of mystic phenomena, such as the stigmata of Catholic saints, confirm this."

[short pause]

AH: If there's an identification with that deeper level of mind, [RC assents, faint] in the case of the Catholic Saint, then it is possible to speak of transformation of the body at the manifest level.

AD (intensely): Why don't you do it when you reason about the sunrise?

[10½ second pause]

AH: Could do it then too.

AD: Sure.

AH: Yeah.

AD: That's why I gave you the example of Kepler, when he was thinking out these laws. He felt that he was participating in the Creator's activity and he was overjoyed and overwhelmed by it. PB's telling you the same thing here. If you must identify with something, do it with your greater Self. Why identify yourself with the ego? True that it's a habit. But it's a habit we have to break. Gradually, yes. But it's going to have to be broken. If you leave it to the ego with its intellect, it'll always be, you know, regressing, saying "Well, it's not this"I", it's the other "I"," alright, and then the other one and the one behind that. But stop that, you know, stop it right now and say "No, it's me, this"I"!"

AH: I just understood something. You (say/said)-- years ago I was fascinated by a-- a visit I had with a Zen master and I was telling you about him about he said stand up with God, sit down with God, what was it--

AD: Yeah, I know very well what I told you.

AH: You told me to try thinking with God.

AD: Think with God, yeah. (some laughter)

AH: I just understood that. (laughter)

AD: I should have told the Zen master too.

RC: Yeah, PB really stressed this point with me a lot. We talked about healing probably more than any other-- any other subject at the time when I was there. And-- well at one time I mentioned to him that a doctor had told me, wasn't really a question of if, it was more a matter of when I would get arthritis from the neck injury. He just-- he really became angry, or he appeared to become very angry. (bit of laughter)

AD: At the doctor, for thinking that way.

RC (simultaneously): At that doctor for being such a fool as to put an idea like that in someone's mind.

AD: Uh-hm.

RC: He said, "First of all it isn't true. And second, if you believe him it could become true." He said "But, it's coming to be will depend on your mind. If you don't want it to, it won't. That there is nothing-- you have to realize, there is nothing in this world that cannot be changed with the whole of your life."

S (very faint): Wait a minute.

AH: The whole?

S: The whole what?

[student(s) assenting, faint]

AD: Yeah, that means using the "I" that we were talking about, the one that you had just intuited.

AS STUDENTS OF PHILOSOPHY, WE SHOULD BE ABLE TO DEMONSTRATE THE EFFICACY OF OUR PRINCIPLES, E.G., BY DEVELOPING SIDDHIS

RC: And then he went on, he asked me what I thought of siddhis and I told him, "Well we don't get into that stuff, we're students."

AD: What-- I didn't hear.

RC (simultaneously): Siddhis, siddhis. He asked me [AD simultaneously: Oh siddhis, right.] what I-- what I thought about the siddhis. Said well we didn't get into that stuff because we were students of philosophy (and stuff). He looked at me like I was an idiot. (bit of laughter) He said "You can't be serious." And I said "Well I thought I was serious." (laughter) And he said, "A physicist can demonstrate the reality and the efficacy of the principles that he works with. If as students of philosophy we are not able to demonstrate the efficacy of our principles, we should leave the door wide open to the possibility that we're wrong. And until you can demonstrate these things, you should leave that door open."

AD: Well did you answer him back and tell him that I was trying to get mentalism across first? (laughter, student words) So that the siddhis could become possible? (AD laughing a bit)

S (faint): Yeah.

RC: But he said that the idea of restricting science to the material level was completely absurd and that [AD simultaneously: Oh yeah, oh sure.] science goes up through all the levels [one/two words inaudible]

AD: There are sciences that we can't even dream of or conceive. To restrict science to what is known, you know, in the past four hundred years--

RC: But for him it seemed the science of the mind is, I mean, very definitely involved in this whole thing of bringing the latent powers of the individual mind into being (in) [couple words inaudible]

S (very faint): Yeah.

AD: Well, you remember the classical text, Patanjali has whole section just on the siddhis. The whole third book is just on the siddhi, the development of supernormal power. [Note: See Patanjali, Yoga-Sutras, Ch. 3, "Vibhuti Pada".]

LG/DC(?): In the argument, the argument against Christian Science which states the same thing, being that they didn't-- being the fact of the matter was not understood, it wasn't the principle of mind that was misunderstood (or--) or the, you know, the possible activity of mind or that the-- that matter was misunderstood.

RC: Well they also would deny the existence of a lot of things that they'd have to accept, the existence of [couple/three words inaudible] Like the--

LG/DC(?): Like the what?

RC: Like a sickness.

LG/DC(?): Right, that's why it didn't matter if it was [one/two words inaudible]

LR (simultaneously): The thing is that it-- it's tricky what he says, the whole of the mi-- I mean, I would think if you changed the whole of the mind. The whole of the mind, what he must mean there must be the totality of one's karma and everything-- That's-- He's putting a lot in there, to say that any--

AD (simultaneously): No, don't start that because you're going to put obstacles in your way.

[student assents]

LR: Well, you put them in the way all the time.

[student assents]

S (faint): (Exactly.)

PD (simultaneously): Teachers are allowed that. (bit of laughter)

RC: They're allowed to take them back out (too).

LR: No, I mean when you-- well, that's true, [student assents] it's not a good argument, it's getting [couple/few words inaudible]

AH (simultaneously): But it seems-- it seems in this quote the restriction is the identification with the ego. Like in the case--

RC (simultaneously): Yeah, the ego which identifies itself with the body.

AH: Yeah. In the case of the Christian mystic this fervent prayer or devotion takes one-- one out of that egocentric perspective and there's identification with a larger level of mind. Didn't he make a comment there that the restriction is the ego stultifying--

RC: Yeah, he says the ego-- not that the ego does it, he says--

PB [V13, 21:5.55 and Perspectives, Chapter 21: Mentalism, #64, RC reading]: "The ego which identifies itself with the body thereby stultifies its latent powers. But as soon as it begins [RC: Again, ego."…soon as it begins] to identify itself with [RC adds: the] pure Mind, certain [RC reads: these] powers [may] begin to unfold."

[short pause, very faint student words in background]

PD: But wouldn't that sort of-- he makes them sound like a little-- little transition area, a minor transition (bit of laughter) from the identification with the body to the identification with pure Mind.

LR: Nothin' to it.

PD: (Yeah.)

S (simultaneously): Oh yeah.

AD: Just start doing 'em.

LR/S(?): Do what [one/two words inaudible] (laughter)

BS: Ok Linda, don't start doing it.

AD (simultaneously): Start-- instead of thinking how hard it is, just keep doing it. One more, Randy.

CDA: Can I ask-- can I-- can I ask a question about--

S (faint, possible part of background): [one/two faint words inaudible]

PD: Did you say something Carol?

S: I didn't. (S laughing)

CDA: I-- I didn't--

[someone rings class bell signaling end of class, followed by laughter, student words]

RG: That's not nice. (more laughter)

AD: Ask your question [one/two words inaudible]

LR: Go on, try it Carol. (laughter)

AD: Hurry up! (AD laughing)

S: We dare you.

RG: In eight seconds.

S (faint): Oh boy.

CDA: I really don't understand in this context what he means that the mind ha-- could have-- could change anything, it-- it is totally the antithesis of so many points of view that we have taken that the body has its own karma, [RG simultaneously: Isn't that great that it's the antithesis of every point of view we've ever taken! (RG laughing)] that a Sage will-- will not interfere with--

AD (simultaneously): He didn't say you could change it instantly.

CDA: Is that the point? It may take eons to-- (laughter, student assents) to turn our karma around?

AD (simultaneously): Not necessarily, not necessarily eons of times, it could be something that could happen rather quickly, it could be something spread out. Sure. But the point-- the point has to be taken that it can be changed.

CDA: That we do have--

AD: That we do have the power to [CDA simultaneously: --free will.] change ourselves, yeah. (student laughing) It may take a long time, I admit that. But sometimes it can happen rather quickly. It has. It has for you people. [someone rings bell] Less than ten years. [background student talking, shuffling about, continues until end] Thanks, Devon.

[Audio File 1983 0323b (formerly 1983 0324a) Ends]

Anthony Damiani Archive

Class

Wednesday, March 23rd, 1983