Two issues have intrigued me consistently throughout my life: what makes the Cosmos ‘tick’ (origin, structure, operation, and significance); and, will we humans ever know with any certainty what we think we know. That is, do the experts who tell us about the Big Bang; or the theory of evolution; or how the human subconscious works (anyone seen one?); or, worse still, who claim to know the mind of God (an unprovable cause of all causes – but who cannot be disproved either); do they really know?
Then, when I offered to help a person who had loudly threatened to kill herself, simply by holding most of her outside a second-story window in a cheap hotel in Chinatown, my conscious mind was clearly angry. I had probably lost my temper, which I had never done, ever. Then, to my surprise, another part of my mind asked ‘What are you doing, Stupid?’ I thus became aware that yet another part of my mind must have been observing this significant event, and been aware of this brief ‘dialogue’ – as a theatre-goer might watch a play.
I asked myself, who was the watcher? I know that Hindu writings do mention a watcher within oneself. What is its role? Why is it there? Of course, Freud and his confreres would have their own explanation. The first explanation (above) starts from the top, while the second from the bottom, of the human body. I do, however, prefer to be led by my mind. What then about that Hindu claim that the mind is only an instrument of that universal, all-pervasive consciousness?
Indeed, there are cosmologists (scientists studying the Cosmos) in the Western world who are beginning to wonder if all entities in the Cosmos are conscious. Will we ever know? If so, how?
RAJA ARASA RATNAM 