What is Maya?

Originally Posted by ketzer

I agree, it's a matter of perspective (pun intended).

QUOTE=JaSG, Gold and jewelry. Clay and pot. Ocean and wave. One aspect is "permanent" and the other "transitory". One is "real" and the other "unreal" or more "real" vs. less "real".

Gold, Clay, and Ocean seem like the more real and less transitory. And from the perspective of a material world they are. Yet get rid of gold, clay, and oceans, and I can still have jewelry, pots, and waves. So from that perspective, it is the latter that seem more fundamental and less transitory. A pot is something that does not depend on transitory matter to define it, only to experience it in form.

Speaking of waves, I believe quarks, or any of the fundamental particles are more or less how consciousness experiences peaks in the waves of the underlying quantum field. In that sense I suppose one could say they are illusions. Personally, I suspect that before we get to the bottom of existence, the physical fades away into ideas, spacetime and matter become experience, created by consciousness with information encoded in the quantum field (which itself is not physical either). The field itself is really just a mathematical ??Thing?? that lies beyond the horizon between potentiality and realization, derived from solving the quantum wave equation with respect to time. Yet this nonphysical ?quantum wave equation mathematical entity thingish thing? which we draw the information from which we use to create our experiences of realities, within our own consciousnesses, is not really something we would typically think of as 'real'. But from the perspective of that consciousness, the forms it creates are real things. Some say the information is the base or fundamental level of reality, but by then we are looking to something we don't usually call real to give us that information. So I am still drifting around at see with no land in sight....have been for a while now.

The analogies are internally consistent. You could also replace clay and clay pot with wood and wood pot. Both are internally consistent. That is clay can exist without the clay pot but the clay pot cannot exist without the clay. Same for wood and wood pot. Same for gold and gold jewelry. Same for ocean and ocean wave. Quarks can exist without a proton or neutron but neutrons and protons cannot exist without quarks.

As far as the physics, any intellectual construct we can conceive just won't get us there. It's limited by the fact we are operating at a less real level of reality. Non-duality simply can't be intellectualized. It's a fool's errand.

EDIT: I should say driving physics down to a Unified Field Theory seems impossible. For instance it's thought to go beyond electroweak unification to GUT (electroweak + nuclear weak force ) would require a particle accelerator 10,000 light years in diameter to generate sufficient energy to tease it out. Folding in gravity for a TOE, well, that would require energy levels not seen since the moment of the Big Bang...

2nd EDIT: To fully understand maya we would need to understand exactly what happened at the moment of the Big Bang. To see what was there before energy levels dropped and the forces and particles manifested as energy levels decreased. Even then that might not be enough because no one knows what happened before the Big Bang. It'll be one hard nut to crack. LOL!

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

The analogies are internally consistent. You could also replace clay and clay pot with wood and wood pot. Both are internally consistent. That is clay can exist without the clay pot but the clay pot cannot exist without the clay. Same for wood and wood pot. Same for gold and gold jewelry. Same for ocean and ocean wave. Quarks can exist without a proton or neutron but neutrons and protons cannot exist without quarks.

As far as the physics, any intellectual construct we can conceive just won't get us there. It's limited by the fact we are operating at a less real level of reality. Non-duality simply can't be intellectualized. It's a fool's errand.

I suppose internally consistent analogies are as good an explanation of the experience of reality as is any scientific model of such that I have heard of. I am not so sure however, that neutrons and protons cannot exist without quarks. After all, they did so for many years before anyone ever heard of a quark, as did atoms before anyone ever heard of a neutron, proton, or electron, and before that we just had plain old mud from which to our make pots out of. They are all just matters of perspective.

As far as duality and non-duality go, one might say that intellectualizing is where such things come from in the first place, just like quarks, subatomic particles, and atoms. We see what we need to, to analogize and explain our foolish notions of what is 'real' and what 'real' means.

Edit: The thing about energy is that nobody has ever really seen it. We say matter is made from it, it has a property we call mass, and we store it up in accounts called potential and kinetic. But that is just information about energy, what energy itself is nobody can really say. But then nobody has ever held a bitcoin in their hand yet it has (had...has again..?) value and seems quite real for something somebody apparently just made up. Where does bit coin gets it real value from?

Perhaps the big bang is happening right now, maybe we could just go take a look at what is happening, perhaps we are doing the same thing in each instant of time. If so, it would seem we either have a lot of energy, or at least we are good at recycling it.

Originally Posted by ketzer

I suppose internally consistent analogies are as good an explanation of the experience of reality as is any scientific model of such that I have heard of. I am not so sure however, that neutrons and protons cannot exist without quarks. After all, they did so for many years before anyone ever heard of a quark, as did atoms before anyone ever heard of a neutron, proton, or electron, and before that we just had plain old mud from which to our make pots out of. They are all just matters of perspective.

As far as duality and non-duality go, one might say that intellectualizing is where such things come from in the first place, just like quarks, subatomic particles, and atoms. We see what we need to, to analogize and explain our foolish notions of what is 'real' and what 'real' means.

Edit: The thing about energy is that nobody has ever really seen it. We say matter is made from it, it has a property we call mass, and we store it up in accounts called potential and kinetic. But that is just information about energy, what energy itself is nobody can really say. But then nobody has ever held a bitcoin in their hand yet it has (had...has again..?) value and seems quite real for something somebody apparently just made up. Where does bit coin gets it real value from?

Perhaps the big bang is happening right now, maybe we could just go take a look at what is happening, perhaps we are doing the same thing in each instant of time. If so, it would seem we either have a lot of energy, or at least we are good at recycling it.

It's a conundrum to be sure and an amazing one at that. LOL!

All I can say is I embrace both aspects, the physical and the spiritual, the dualistic and the non-dualistic and don't see any inherent conflict. I think the exact same Truth lies at the foundation of both.

There was a time when I wasn't so certain about the spiritual aspect but that uncertainty evaporated.

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

It's a conundrum to be sure and an amazing one at that. LOL!

All I can say is I embrace both aspects, the physical and the spiritual, the dualistic and the non-dualistic and don't see any inherent conflict. I think the exact same Truth lies at the foundation of both.

There was a time when I wasn't so certain about the spiritual aspect but that uncertainty evaporated.

I know what you mean. There was a time I was quite certain about things that it turned out were not so certainly true. That certainty prevented me from seeing the possibility of that which did not agree with what I already knew, many possibilities which it turns out seem so as well. Now, as a matter of principle, I try to keep a bit of uncertainly about everything. Always keeping that door ajar a little bit allows things to come through that otherwise would be kept out as false, and one never knows what might walk through and surprise ya...keeps things interesting anyway.

But getting back to the OP, perhaps as much as every thing else, Maya is the illusion that what we are often so certain about is certainly true.

Originally Posted by ketzer

I know what you mean. There was a time I was quite certain about things that it turned out were not so certainly true. That certainty prevented me from seeing the possibility of that which did not agree with what I already knew, many possibilities which it turns out seem so as well. Now, as a matter of principle, I try to keep a bit of uncertainly about everything. Always keeping that door ajar a little bit allows things to come through that otherwise would be kept out as false, and one never knows what might walk through and surprise ya...keeps things interesting anyway.

But getting back to the OP, perhaps as much as every thing else, Maya is the illusion that what we are often so certain about is certainly true.

This is one of the first presentations that really got me thinking in what I think is the right direction. It's a long watch but well worth it and addresses maya when it speaks to phenomenon vs. noumenon.

https://youtu.be/-d4ugppcRUE?list=PL...XfywQvhBzzdrQA

An Advaita Vedanta talk on maya.

https://youtu.be/MxUXl2YXXL4

[Unseeking Seeker]

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

An Advaita Vedanta talk on maya.

https://youtu.be/MxUXl2YXXL4

***

Thanks for the link. Swami Sarvapriya Nanda is an excellent orator and apparently well versed with different non dual scriptures. One of my favourites!

On this occasion too he speaks eloquently but seems to spiral about evasively ... maybe that’s maya too!

***

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

This is one of the first presentations that really got me thinking in what I think is the right direction. It's a long watch but well worth it and addresses maya when it speaks to phenomenon vs. noumenon.

https://youtu.be/-d4ugppcRUE?list=PL...XfywQvhBzzdrQA

That guy does seem familiar. I will have to find some time to watch it (YouTube watch later list is rather out of control at the moment).

As to this phenomenon vs. noumenon thing, I have drifted away from materialism and realism over the years into the philosophical idealism camp, although more at the level of consciousness itself and not so focused on its state as human mind. I suppose phenomenon and noumenon would be more or less the same for me. So that would make consciousness primary for me as well. Within one's own consciousness is where information is transformed into form and subsequent awareness, knowing, interpretation, and experience takes place. Which I suppose is just another description of how maya comes about.

Here is a link for you. I can't find the one I like better, but this one is fairly good. I part ways with it on some of the arguments and conclusions in the second half (I am sticking with Many Worlds for the time being as occam's razor is not sharp enough for me on that point), but overall it is still pretty good.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4C5pq7W5yRM

Originally Posted by ketzer

That guy does seem familiar. I will have to find some time to watch it (YouTube watch later list is rather out of control at the moment).

As to this phenomenon vs. noumenon thing, I have drifted away from materialism and realism over the years into the philosophical idealism camp, although more at the level of consciousness itself and not so focused on its state as human mind. I suppose phenomenon and noumenon would be more or less the same for me. So that would make consciousness primary for me as well. Within one's own consciousness is where information is transformed into form and subsequent awareness, knowing, interpretation, and experience takes place. Which I suppose is just another description of how maya comes about.

Here is a link for you. I can't find the one I like better, but this one is fairly good. I part ways with it on some of the arguments and conclusions in the second half (I am sticking with Many Worlds for the time being as occam's razor is not sharp enough for me on that point), but overall it is still pretty good.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4C5pq7W5yRM

At its essence phenomenon is our perception of reality whereas noumenon is reality in and of itself, depending how far one can drive it down. Is it a molecule, atom, electron, proton, neutron, quark, string, pure consciousness?

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

At its essence phenomenon is our perception of reality whereas noumenon is reality in and of itself, depending how far one can drive it down. Is it a molecule, atom, electron, proton, neutron, quark, string, pure consciousness?

Yeah, I get the conceptual difference between the two. And I suspect what one finds when they drive it down as far as it will go, is that perception of phenomenon is all there really is. Kinda like that dog chasing its tail around. When it finally finds something to sink its teeth into, it discovers it is itself it was chasing all along.