9. Epistemology (vii): The Five Aggregates – Resolution of the Mind-Body Problem

Our discussion on epistemology began with the Mind-Body Problem. There is the Mind-Body Problem because it is not obvious how the concept of the mind and the concept of the body relate.” The central question that has never been answered over the centuries is: “Are the mind and body two distinct entities or a single entity?”

The debate between philosophers John Locke (1632-1704) and George Berkeley (1685-1753) was used as an example in our discussion. Locke thought that “our notion about what actually exists – and therefore our understanding of the reality of the world – must always derive ultimately from what has been experienced through the senses.” To which Berkeley wondered, “What possible warrant can we have for asserting that the existence of these mental contents is caused by things of an entirely and fundamentally different character from them to which we can never have direct access, namely objects.” 

In his presentation “How Do We Know What We Know?” Dr. Fisch essentially agreed with Locke that “our understanding of the reality of the world – must always derive ultimately from what has been experienced through the senses.” However, as no one has since Berkley had, he could not answer Berkeley’s question on how material reality can become mental content.

Indeed, as someone who relies exclusively on inferentially connected vocabulary to understand the world, even world-renowned scholars like Dr. Fisch are not in a position to answer the question, “Are the mind and body two distinct entities or a single entity?”

In our current discussion to resolve the Mind-Body Problem, we leverage Dr. Fisch’s insight into humanity’s five sensing steps to help us explain the five aggregates of being Buddha teaches. While Dr. Fisch’s five sensing steps match Buddha’s five aggregates of beings precisely, their difference is that Buddha’s five aggregates of being involve consciousness.

In discussing “How Do We Know What We Know?” Dr. Fisch enumerates the following “sensing” steps.

  • “the world impacts on us in a causal manner through all our senses,”
  • the content imparted on those stimuli is the reading-in of the mind,”
  • the content gets fashioned and conceptualized by our minds in ways that we do not govern,”
  • Sitting in the command room of our minds with the inner eyes and looking out,”
  • seeing on the screen the world that we experience.”

Aggregates are known in Romanized Sanskrit as Skandha.

Skandha (Chinese=蘊), according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit, lit. “heap,” viz. “aggregates,” or “aggregates of being.”

Buddha’s Five Aggregates of Being are listed below.

  • Rupaskandha (Chinese=色蘊), the Aggregage of Rupa;
  • Vedanaskandha (Chinese=受蘊), the Aggregate of Sensing or Receiving;
  • Samjnaskandha. (Chinese=想蘊), the Aggregate of Active Mentality;
  • Samskaraskandha (Chinese=行蘊), the Aggregate of Action; and
  • Vijnanaskandha Chinese=識蘊), or the Aggregate of Consciousness

Let’s compare them one by one.

1) Rupaskandha (Chinese=色蘊), or the Aggregate of Rupa.  

Rupa (Chinese=色), according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit and Pali, “body,” “form,” or “materiality,” viz., that which has shape and is composed of matter. More generally, rupa refers to materiality, which serves as the object of the five sensory consciousness (vijnana): visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, and tactile.” In other words, rupa represents the material world that humans experience through seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and touching., Rupa, therefore, represents the “body” in the Body-Mind Problem.

Therefore, the first Aggregate of Rupa corresponds to the last step of Dr. Fisch’s process, which he describes as “the world that we experience.

2) Vedanaskandha (Chinese=受蘊), or the Aggregate of Sensing or Receiving.  

Vedana (Chinese=受), according to the Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit and Pali, “sensation,” or “sensory feeling.” The Chinese translation of Vedana is “to receive or accept.”

The Aggregate of Sensing or Receiving fits Dr. Frisch’s description that “the world impacts on us in a causal manner through all our senses.” The senses, of course, are the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and bodily parts referred to earlier in step one.

However, Dr. Fisch did not elaborate further on how material phenomena could impact our senses without crashing into them. Additionally, Dr. Fisch did not address the nature of the “content” that would become the “reading-in” of the mind and be conceptualized in the following steps.

To answer these questions, we turn to Buddha and quantum mechanics.

In this episode of Closer to Truth, Dr. Frank Wickek, a 2004 Nobel Laureate quantum physicist, said that Newtonian particles are no longer building blocks of the universe. He said, “The most basic objects out of which to construct the universe are not particles but objects we call quantum fields. We think of them as space-filling ethers that create and destroy the objects, the particles. …….. We see particles as epiphenomena. They are kind of ripples on the deep structure.

In other words, quantum fields have replaced Newtonian particles as the building blocks of the universe. However, even particles no longer exist because they have become epiphenomena, secondary phenomena derived from ripples in quantum fields. Like particles in quantum mechanics, rupas in Buddhism are also epiphenomena. Their difference is that while particles in quantum mechanics are secondary phenomena derived from ripples in the fluctuating quantum fields, Buddha’s rupa are secondary phenomena derived from ripples in a fluctuating mental field known as non-luminosity.

The following are images from Dr. David Tong and Dr. Tony Tyson. These images show that all phenomena in the universe, from the ripples in the quantum realm to clusters of galaxies in the sky, are epiphenomena because they are all ripples in their underlying fluctuating field.  

Dr. Tong’s Image showing ripples in the quantum field.

Dr. Tony Tyson’s Image showing clusters of galaxies as spikes of ripples.

Since Buddha’s rupas fluctuate in mentality, they are conscious because a fluctuating mentality is the definition of consciousness. On the other hand, when mentality is quiescent, it is known as awareness. Therefore, there is nothing solid in the world that could crash into our senses. Instead, it is the waves of consciousness carrying “experiential content” of “the world that impacts on us in a causal manner through all our senses.”  

As discussed in a previous post, experiential contents, which Dr. Fisch calls empirical facts, carry information embedded in the mental construct of everything in the cosmos.

3) Samjnaskandha. (Chinese=想蘊), the Aggregate of Active Mentality.

Samjna, according to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “in Sanskrit, “perception,” “discrimination,” or “(conceptual) identification.” The Chinese translation of samjnaskandha is the Aggregate of Thinking, indicating an active mentality. Indeed, whether it is perception, discrimination, or (conceptual) identification, they all require an active mind.  

An active mind is essential because it allows the “experiential contents” to become the “reading-in” of the mind. When the mind is quiescent, “reading-in” of the mind is impossible.   

4) Samskaraskandha (Chinese=行蘊), the Aggregate of Action.

According to the Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, samskara is” in Sanskrit, a polysemous term that is variously translated as “formation,” “volition,” “volitional action,” “conditioned,” and “conditioning factors.” The Chinese translation of samskaraskandha is “action.”

With help from Dr. Fisch, we realize that after the experiential content becomes the “reading-in” of the mind, the action in the mind is its conceptualization “in ways we do not govern.”

5) Vijnanaskandha Chinese=識蘊), or the Aggregate of Consciousness

Vijna, according to the Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, is “consciousness.”

To discuss the meaning of the Aggregate of Consciousness, we turn to the Consciousness-Only School of Buddhism.

Consciousness-Only School of Buddhism (Romanized Sanskrit=vijñanavada; Chinese=唯識宗), “also known as the Yogachara school, is one of the two major Mahayana schools in India. Maitreya, who is thought to have lived around 270-350 (350-430 according to another account), is often regarded as the founder of the Consciousness-Only school. This school upholds the concept that all phenomena arise from the vijnana or consciousness and that the basis of all functions of consciousness is the Alaya-consciousness.

According to The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, “the cardinal doctrine of the Consciousness-Only School is that the objects of experience are mere projections of consciousness. Thus, all objects are mere representations, and all categories are mere designations. No object is the natural basis of its name; rather, the mind itself instead designates the object.”

In other words, “the objects of experience,” which Dr. Fisch terms “the world that we experience,” and known as Rupaskandha as the First Aggregate, are all “mere objections of consciousness.

However, if “the objects of experience” are “mere objections of consciousness,” what projects consciousness?

Buddha provides the answer. The “objects” are “objects of the five sensory consciousness (vijnana): visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, and tactile.”

Indeed, Buddha assigns each of our sensory bases its own consciousness. The five sensory consciousnesses are:

  • Eye or Visual consciousness (Romanized Sanskrit=caksurvijnana; Chinese=眼識)
  • Ear or Auditory consciousness (Romanized Sanskrit=srotravijnana; Chinese=耳識)
  • Nose or Olfactory consciousness (Romanized Sanskrit=ghranavijnana; Chinese=鼻識)
  • Tongue or Gustatory consciousness (Romanized Sanskrit=jihvavijnana; Chinese=舌識)
  • Body or Tactile consciousness (Romanized Sanskrit=kayavijnana; Chinese=身識)

In other words, after the waves of consciousness carrying the “experiential contents” of the world “impact us in a causal manner through all our senses” and get conceptualized “in ways we do not govern” to become “the objects of experience,” the images of the already conceptualized “objects of experience” are projected by the consciousness of the same senses that receive their corresponding “experiential contents.”

Undoubtedly, there is no “body” in the five aggregates of beings. Instead, all the five aggregates of being are consciousness, the “mind” in the Mind-Body Problem.

Our discussion on Epistemology began by saying that Buddha considers the Mind-Body Problem a delusional misunderstanding of reality. Furthermore, Buddha teaches that delusional misunderstanding of reality is the cause of existential suffering in humans and that Buddhism exists because Buddha wanted humanity to correct that delusional misunderstanding and be liberated from existential suffering.

In the following post, we will discuss how a well-known Bodhisattva liberates himself from his existential suffering by recognizing the equality of the mind and body through understanding the Five Aggregates. His example shows why Buddha’s teachings, based on his unique epistemology, are uniquely the only self-sufficient and logically consistent education in the world.

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