(Update Pending)
In the Epistemology Category, we have focused on Buddha’s two means of knowledge: inference and direct perception. Inference refers to the inferentially connected word-based knowledge humans use to understand what Dr. Fisch calls “the world we experience.” On the other hand, direct perception is what Buddha uses to understand the “experiential contents” of the world by becoming part of it. While Dr. Fisch calls “experiential contents” that can be felt empirical facts that can be felt, both represent the raw information embedded in the mental construct of everything in the cosmos that leads to the understanding of what Dr. Fisch calls “how things stand in themselves.”
In this post, we explore the possibility that humanity’s understanding of reality would be complete if Buddhism and science could work together, given the mutually exclusive but complementary nature of inference and direct perception.
In their respective investigation of nature, Buddhism and science have a fundamental difference: their need to make assumptions. While the scientific method starts with making hypotheses, one won’t find phrases like “thus I opine” in Buddhist sutras.
Buddha did not need to make assumptions because his teachings are what he had directly perceived about the mental reality of nature before he started teaching. Before his enlightenment, his two guru teachers invited Buddha to teach with them. He rejected their invitations but chose to become enlightened before teaching. By the time he started teaching, Buddha had “opened his consciousness to encompass all objects of knowledge,” a requirement for becoming the highest enlightened being called Tathagata, of which our historical Buddha is one.
Like “experiential contents” that can be experienced and empirical facts that can be felt, “all objects of knowledge” represent the raw information embedded in the mental construct of everything in the cosmos that can be directly perceived, which is the meaning of opening one’s consciousness. By encompassing “all objects of knowledge,” Buddha can teach that there is Nothing but Mentality in the cosmos without needing to to make assumptions.
Nothing but Mentality in Buddhism can be compared to the “Theory of Everything in physics. While the Theory of Everything “is a hypothetical singular, all-encompassing, coherent theoretical framework of physics that fully explains and links together all aspects of the universe,” Nothing but Mentality is also Buddha’s singular, all-encompassing, coherent framework that links together all aspect of the mental universe, except that Buddha’s framework is nether hypothetical nor physical. Instead, Nothing but Mentality is a verifiable natural phenomenon.
The scientific method begins with making assumptions because physicists still do not have their Theory of Everything. Energy is such an assumption.
By definition, energy in physics is “the quantitative property that is transferred to a body or to a physical system, recognizable in the performance of work and in the form of heat and light.” Furthermore, quantitative property, also known as physical quantity (or simple quantity), “is a property of a material or system that can be quantified by measurement.”
Without question, energy is an invaluable tool that allows scientists to use mathematical expressions to investigate “the world we experience.” However, while energy allows science to fulfill pre-Socratic ancient Greek philosopher Pythagoras’ profound insight that “all the workings of the material universe are expressible in terms of mathematics,” it’s important to remember that numbers in equations are not reality of nature.
Equally important to understand is that scientific knowledge is based on inference, i.e., inferentially connected word-based knowledge. Therefore, the results scientists receive are similarly inferentially connected.
Those who have taken physics classes in high school and college should be familiar with the following equations:
- Einstein’s famous formula: E=mc2.
- Newton’s second of motion: f=ma.
- Potential Energy: PE=mgh.
- Kinetic Energy: K=1/2mv2.
- Weight W=mg.
In these equations, E stands for energy, m=mass, c=speed of light, f=force, a=acceleration, g=gravity, h=height, and v=velocity.
As it is apparent, each term – energy, mass, speed, force, acceleration, gravity, and velocity – can define each other through mass by simple mathematical manipulations. Ultimately, though, mass is energy, as Einstein’s formula, E=mc2, states.
There are more examples. Maxwell’s equations are “a set of coupled partial differential equations,” “together with the Lorentz force law, form the foundation of classical electromagnetism, classical optics, and electric and magnetic circuits.” While these “equations provide a mathematical model for electric, optical, and radio technologies, such as power generation, electric motors, wireless communication, lenses, radar, etc.,” ultimately, they are but different manifestations of energy.
Indeed, in a world of energy, everything is about how different manifestations of energy relate to each other. As Dr. Kuhn understood, while inferentially connected words allow knowing how “everything is related to something else,” they provide “no foundation between what I believe and what the world really is. So, how do I know anything?”
Of course, not knowing what the world is like is not to minimize the great discoveries science has made and continues to make. Instead, it is a needed acknowledgment of the limits and scope of human knowledge and, therefore, the limits and scopes of science. As Dr. Fisch said, “The limits of what we can know, the limits of our world, is the limits of our language.”
An apparent phenomenon in physics is that when physicists are incredibly close to understanding the fundamental nature of reality, they often run into obstacles.
Let’s use the expansion of the universe and Einstein’s Cosmological Constant as examples. When Einstein first published his General Theory of Relativity in 1915, he had no idea that the universe was expanding. Therefore, he did not conceive the term that would later carry his name in his equation. However, in 1917, he introduced the mathematical term into his equation to comply with the then-accepted scientific view that the universe was static, assuming its value to be negative. Unfortunately, by 1931, science no longer deems the universe static but expanding. Einstein then abandoned his term, believing its value to be zero. By the late 1990s, however, scientists discovered that the expansion of the universe was accelerating. Einstein then reintroduced the term into his formula, “implying the possibility of a positive nonzero value for the cosmological constant,” which remains so until today. Later, he would call this whole episode his “biggest blunder.”
Today, the value of Einstein’s Cosmological Constant has been measured and is “in excellent agreement” with a value obtained through a theoretical model. Einstein’s Cosmological Constant is now officially positive.
So, why is the Cosmological Constant so important? It is because it is “closely associated with the concept of dark energy,” and scientists would like it to be the vacuum that “holds the key to a full understanding of nature.”
The problem is that a vacuum that can hold the key to a full understanding of nature must have absolutely nothing in it: no particles or fluctuations. However, such a vacuum does not exist in the universe because the “simplest thing” in the universe is already full of quantum fluctuations. So, a discrepancy exists between the vacuum, where there should be absolutely nothing, and “the simplest thing” in the universe, which is already full of fluctuations. Known as the Cosmological Constant Problem, the discrepancy between where there should be nothing and where there is full of fluctuations “is calculated to be between 50 and as many as 120 orders of magnitude.”
Scientists such as Dr. Lawrence Krauss understand that this is a practically unsolvable problem. Indeed, the only solution possible is to separate where there should be absolutely nothing from where the simplest thing is full of fluctuations. Separating where there is absolutely nothing from where there is full of fluctuations is what Buddha’s two realms of reality offer.
In Buddha’s two realms of reality, the Ultimate Reality is where absolutely nothing. There are particles or fluctuations in the Ultimate Reality because there is Nothing but Mentality, as confirmed by Adyashanti. On the other hand, non-luminosity is where the simplest thing is also full of fluctuations. The Cosmological Constant Problem vanishes naturally from Buddha’s two-realm setup by separating the two realms with different fluctuating statuses. Since it is the setup of nature that Buddha perceived directly, it is a barrier that physicists who use inference cannot overcome.
Additionally, Buddha teaches that the expansion of the universe does not occur in the universe. From the Buddhist perspective, the universe is illusional because it is a “mere projections of consciousness.” Instead, Buddha teaches that the expansion of the universe occurs in the Ultimate Reality. That makes the Ultimate Reality equivalent to dark energy. Indeed, if dark energy is the Ultimate Reality, then it makes sense that the Cosmological Constant “holds the key to a full understanding of nature.”
As Dr. Max Planck famously said, “Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature. And that is because, in the last analysis, we ourselves are a part of the mystery that we are trying to solve.” The mystery that humanity has never understood since pre-Socratic times is mentality. Indeed, as Dr. Planck understood, a person can only understand the mental nature of reality by becoming part of it. As discussed, direct perception of nature until enlightenment was the method that allowed Buddha to mentally become part of the world of mentality to realize the mental nature of reality in the cosmos. Such knowledge is not available from inferentially connected word-based knowledge.
While it is without a doubt that science needs Buddhism to understand the full scope of the mental world, it is also true that Buddhism needs contemporary philosophical and scientific teachings to help understand Buddha’s teachings taught 2600+ years ago.
An example is Buddha’s teaching on the Five Aggregates. The Five Aggregates are critically important in Buddhism because, as the example of Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara shows, it is through a proper understanding of the Five Aggregates that Buddha’s soteriological mission can be accomplished. Such a proper standing of the Five Aggregates is accomplished through contemporary epistemological concepts provided by Dr. Fisch.
Another example is the linking of epiphenomena with ripples in the quantum field, as provided by Dr. Frank Wilczek, a 2004 Nobel Laureate in Physics. By suggesting that epiphenomena are ripples in the quantum field, Dr. Wilczed links Buddha’s epiphenomena, known as “neighbor-to-emptiness dust (Chinese=鄰虛塵),” to non-luminosity (Chinese=無明). Such a link is essential to understanding Buddha’s teaching known as The Three Delicate Marks. The Three Delicate Marks are important because, in this doctrine, Buddha teaches how unenlightenment begins and what its consequences are for all sentient beings.
Indeed, humanity can benefit much from understanding both Buddhism and science. It should not be difficult. While scientific knowledge gained from inferentially connected words and the knowledge Buddha gained from direct perception are mutually exclusive, they are also complementary. Indeed, between the scientific world where everything is energy, and Buddha’s world where everything is mentality, the complementary of their means of knowledge means that energy and mentality are complementary. Together, scientific knowledge from inference and Buddha’s knowledge from direct perception can cover all knowledge needed for humanity to understand “the world we experience” and “how things stand in themselves.” Energy can help humanity understand and investigate the world and provide scientific mechanisms to help understand its underlying mental nature that Buddha teaches, such as his teachings on Causality, how the conscious universe originated, quantization, etc.
Mentergy, which combines mentality and energy, is such a concept.
It is essential to realize that while understanding direct perception is not hard, practicing it until enlightenment is extremely difficult. Many have tried, but only a few have succeeded. In this era when AI leaders are already calling for regulations “to prevent AI (from) destroying humanity,” is it not time for humanity to understand if machines that can learn are conscious? If humanity waits for the next Buddha to educate them again on consciousness, is it possible that the conscious machines that can learn have already caused them much trouble?
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