yajvan
10 May 2007, 07:19 PM
Hari Om
~~~~~
Namaste,
It is always interesting to see when science measures something quantitatively that has been around qualitatively for years (eons). In this months 'Discover' magazine they discuss space (akasha).
It says that what we see , or matter in this universe accounts for ~ 4% of the universe. 74% is no-thing + 22% being dark matter + 4% matter = 100%.
Also this 0 , something we use every day, is that of no-thing and gives credit to India for this zero concept.
So, we are mostly no-thing. Even atoms ( or strings for those that believe string theory) are mostly empty space. What holds things together as if a solid is the electrical charges between sub-atomic particles.
The aricle also suggests that the universe was created out of this nothing state. We know this to be 'something' and that is Brahman, or aksara - from a or not + ksi to destroy, or perish. So the notion of all This comes from THAT, aksara.
The article also says that within this space virtual particles come and go and create energy - this is quantum field thinking . that from this aksara virtual particles form and annihilate each other in 10 to the -25th power, seconds.
It ends, 'Nothing can be the key theory to Everything' - which means to me: Idam brahma, idam kshatram, ime lokah, ime devah, imani bhutani, idam sarvam yad ayam atma.
"This Source of knowledge, this source of power, all these worlds, all these gods, all these beings, All this is just the Self." - SAGE YAJNAVALKYA , BRIHADARANYAKA UPANISHAD
saidevo
12 May 2007, 11:31 AM
Space or Akasha: Exoteric and Esoteric Views
The discussion of space or Akasha, from both the exoteric and esoteric points of views, brings in the concepts of matter, energy, time, sound and color. These are all nothing but manifestations of space, which itself is the SatChitAnanda Brahman. Now that Yajvan has brought the subject up (a favourite of his as well as mine), here is a rundown on space and its primary manifestations, viz. matter and energy.
Space: An Exoteric View
The exoteric perception of space is chiefly physical, even visual. How can it be visual if space cannot be seen? The scientific concepts about space in the physical world are arrived at chiefly based on visual data obtained by telescopes and laboratory experiments.
As Yajvan has indicated (1), according to the current scientific concepts of space, visible matter constitutes hardly 4% of the space in the universe. Some 22% are dark matter, and the balance of 74% is dark energy. Science no longer calls it nothing or empty or vacuum as it readily labelled matterless space in its classical days.
Matter is composed of physical atoms as its building blocks. The atoms in turn have a number of subatomic particles. There is also matter whose elementary particles do not aggregate to form atoms.
Dark matter is matter of unknown composition that does not emit or reflect enough electromagnetic radiation for direct observation. Presence of dark matter is inferred from gravitational effects on visible matter. (2)
Dark energy is a hypothetical form of energy that permeates all of space and tends to increase the rate of expansion of the universe. Ironically, dark energy causes expansion because it has strong negative pressure. Positive pressure is pushing onward, like fluids; negative pressure is pulling inward, such as a solid stretched to support a hanging weight. Negative pressure causes a gravitational repulsion as against positive pressure that causes gravitational attraction. It is this repulsion, according to science, is what causes the universe to expand.
Since the advent of quantum physics, science regards matter and energy not as two discrete entities but as two facets of the same entity. In other words, matter is condensed energy. While energy can condense as matter more readily, for matter to get back into energy, a force is to be applied. Just as space and time have merged into a single space-time concept in modern science, particle and wave have merged into a single wave-particle concept. An eletromagnetic radiation such as light appears both as waves and as photons that are discrete packets of energy.
Exoteric Matter: The Evolving Atomic Model
In the year 1808, John Dalton postulated a theory called Dalton's Atomic Theory, according to which the atom is fundamental, indivisible and readily aggregates to form molecules that are the building blocks of compounds.
In the 20th century atomic model, an atom consists of a nucleus and a set of electrons. The nucleus forms the center and the electrons orbit it. The nucleus itself is made of protons and neutrons. The protons and electrons have identical, opposite charges. The neutrons have no charge. Together these three particles make the atom stable.
Two occultists, Annie Besant and C.W.Leadbeater using clairvoyant research discovered in the year 1908 that the protons and neutrons had three particles each. They called them triads or triplets. Science discovered these particles about 70 years later and renamed them as quarks. (3)
Annie Besant and Leadbeater further discovered that the triads were not indivisible, but contained three numbers of aNu each. They also postulated that the aNu was the final, indivisible form of physical matter. (4)
Science is yet to find the aNu, but it currently has a theory: The Theory of Superstrings, which holds that quarks are tiny strings with a characteristic length of 10^-35 meters.
The word nucleon denotes both the neutron and the proton. The term baryon is also used for these two particles.
Fundamental Particles
While the subatomic particles electrons and quarks are composite, and aggregate to form atoms, there are other fundamental particles, which are not known to have substructure, and form matter which is not atomic.
Here is a partial list of other fundamental particles:
gluons are supposed to hold the quarks together.
Photons and neutrinos are produced copiously in the sun. The photon mediates electromagnetic interactions and makes up all forms of light. The photon has zero mass and travels at the constant speed c, the speed of light in empty space. However, in the presence of matter, a photon can be absorbed, transferring energy and momentum proportional to its frequency. Like all quanta, the photon has both wave and particle properties, exhibiting wave–particle duality. A photon has no electric charge.
Neutrinos are elementary particles denoted by the symbol v, that travel at the speed of light and has no electric charge. Neutrinos are created as a result of certain types of radioactive decay or nuclear reactions such as those in the sun, in nuclear reactors, or when cosmic rays hit atoms.
Bosons, named after Satyendra Nath Bose, are particles having integer spin, such as the photon. A strongly interactive boson is called a meson. A pion (short for pi meson) is the collective name for three kinds of mesons.
Fermions are particles with half-integer spin, such as protons and electrons. They are named after Enrico Fermi.
A lepton is a particle with spin-1/2 (a fermion) that does not experience the strong nuclear force.
The muon (from the letter mu (µ)--used to represent it) is an elementary particle with negative electric charge and a spin of 1/2.
A hadron, in particle physics, is a subatomic particle which experiences the nuclear force. It is a collective name for fermions and bosons.
Finally, the graviton :( is a hypothetical elementary particle that mediates the force of gravity in the framework of quantum field theory.
Each of the fundamental particle has its antiparticle. The scientific discoveries, speculations and particle-naming with the -on suffixes go on, with adjustments and readjustments among different models, with no end in sight.
Exoteric Energy: The Fundamental Forces
A fundamental interaction or fundamental force is a mechanism by which particles interact with each other, and which cannot be explained in terms of another interaction. Every observed physical phenomenon can be explained by these interactions.
In modern physics, there are four fundamental interactions (forces): gravitation, electromagnetism, the weak nuclear interaction, and the strong nuclear interaction. Their magnitude and behavior vary greatly: Gravitation with a unit strength (strength of 1), is followed by weak interaction (strength 10^25), electromagnetic (strength 10^36), and strong interaction (strength 10^38).
Space: An Esoteric View
The esoteric perception of space is metaphysical, philosophical, logical and ultimately experiential.
Space or Akasha is the subtlest of the five elements, which in the ascending order of density would be: space < air < fire < water < earth (akasha < vayu < agni < jala < prithvi). (5)
Space is the ultimate container of the other elements and the universe itself. Every atom has its home in a molecule, every molecule in a cell, every cell in a body, every body in a greater body, the greater body, such as our earth, in the solar ether, the solar system in a galaxy, the galaxy in a universe, and the universe in THAT, the ultimate Space, verily the SatChiAnanda Brahman.
This Akasha is not empty. It is the medium of expression of the life force. It is soniferous ether. This does not mean that the life force or the sound is different from Akasha. Space and the manifest creation thereupon are like the two sides of a coin.
Creation of matter and forms and ensouling them takes place not only in space, but they are made of space, which is infinite, eternal and ubiquitous. The formation of esoteric matter from space is described below.
Esoteric Matter: Mulaprakriti or Koilon
Space or Akasha is not empty, but contains Mulaprakriti (root-matter) or Koilon. The term Koilon derives from the Greek Koilos, meaning hollow.
The Koilon is roughly the ether of the Science, but it should not be confused with the etheric matter that composes the first four of the seven sub planes of the physical plane.
The space occupied by Koilon appears empty to the physical senses. In reality, it is far denser than anything we know. Professor Osborne Reynolds, whose theory agrees with occult investigation, has defined its density as 10,000 times greater than that of water, and its mean pressure is 750,000 tons to the square inch. Koilon is perceptible only to highly developed clairvoyant power.
Koilon filled all space and was at rest. The immanent Brahman changed this condition by pouring out His spirit or force into a certain section of the matter, a section the size of a whole universe.
The effect of the introduction of this force is like the blowing of a mighty breath. It formed an incalculable number of tiny spherical bubbles in Koilon. These bubbles are the ultimate atoms (UA), known as the ParamANu, out of which everything we call matter is manufactured.
H.P. Blavatsky in her book The Secret Doctrine calls this force (that originally formed the bubbles) Fohat. She speaks of it as "digging holes in space".
A modern equivalent of "digging holes" to create the primitives of matter is the way audio/video data (songs, pictures, movies and computer data) is recorded on a compact disc (CD-ROM) or a digital dideo disk (DVD). In this case, a laser beam burns holes called pits on a smooth surface of the disc. The pits and the raised surface bits grouped together, create patterns of data read by a computer or an audio/video player.
Man, in his creations, imitates his Creator, whose consciousness is ever active in him. As above, so below.
The bubbles are not like a soap-bubble, which is a film of water with an outer and an inner surface, enclosing air within it. They are like bubbles in soda-water, or boiling water, which have only one surface, where the air meets water.
To the highest sight available, the bubbles appear to be empty, with no apparent, inherent motion or rotation. Each bubble in reality is a point of His consciousness, and persists only so long as He wills to keep the enveloping Koilon in tact. These bubbles are the ultimate atoms of which what we call matter is composed.
Even though the bubbles appear to have no motion of their own, they can be moved as a whole from without, singly or en masse, by an exertion of the will. No two bubbles ever under any circumstances touch each other.
The Seven Worlds of the Solar System
Esoterically, space is seven-folded or seven-dimensional. There are seven cosmic planes from the cosmic physical to the cosmic adi plane. The seven planes of the solar system form the seven sub planes of the cosmic physical plane.
The seven impulses or "breaths" of the Solar Deity (a manifested aspect of Brahman), coming one after another, over long periods of time, create the seven planes of the solar system.
Each impulse sets up tiny vortices all through the sphere. Each of these tiny vortices draw into itself bubbles in multiples of 49, depending on the plane created. The bubbles drawn together are grouped in a certain shape, which forms the ultimate atom for the plane created.
The Hindu method describes this process as follows: "Each plane has what is called a tanmatra (literally, a measure of That), and a tattva (literally, the inherent Thatness). The tanmatra is the modification in the consciousness of the Logos: the tattva is the effect produced in matter by that modification. Thus every atom has its "Thatness", the divine consciousness.
Science admits that the physical atoms do not touch each other, even in the densest element. Actually, the space between the atoms is proportionately much larger than the size of the atoms. In the same way, there is a large space between the nucleus and the electrons in orbit. Each atom of Science is like a speck of dust in a large hall, such being the proportion of space around it.
Therefore, the ultimate atoms of the seven planes interpenetrate each other and the physical atom, occupying the same space. Every planet in our solar system has seven planes, occupying an identical space, interpenetrating each other.
These ultimate atoms of the planes are freely intermingled, so that specimens of each type would be found in the smallest portion of the sphere taken at random.
Each planet of our solar system is thus composed of the ultimate atoms of the seven planes, interpenetrating each other, and sharing the same space. The planes are called the seven planes of nature.
Each of the seven worlds has its own ultimate or permanent atom that consists of bubbles from koilon. The number of bubbles in each permanent atom of the planes is given below. The names in brackets are the commonly used older names.
1. Divine World (Adi) - 1
2. Monodic World (Anupadaka) - 49
3. Spiritual World (Atmic) - 2,401 (49^2)
4. Intutional World (Buddhic, Causal) - 117,649 (49^3)
5. Mental World (Intellectual) - 5,764,801 (49^4)
6. Astral World (Emotional, Kamaloka) - 282,475,249 (49^5)
7. Physical World (Earth) - 13,841,287,201 (49^6)
Thus, the Ultimate Physical Atom of the physical world, called the aNu by Annie Besant and Leadbeater (as mentioned under the section Exoteric Matter: The Evolving Atomic Model) consists of nearly 14 million bubbles of Koilon!
Esoteric Energy: The Three Intelligent Forces
There are three cosmic, creative, intelligent forces that are involved in manifested creation. They are fohat or daiviprakriti, prana and kundalini. These intelligent forces act as a bridge between the embodied form and the embodying spirit.
Fohat unifies the four forces of modern physics (the electromagnetic, gravity, and the strong and the weak nuclear) and other forces not yet discovered by modern science. Fohat, the energy of divine Ideation, is said to be the bridge linking archetypes in the divine Mind with material forms. Yet behind both archetype and form stands a spiritual Quality and its energy.
Prana is the breath of life; the third principle in the ascending scale of the sevenfold human constitution. This life or prana works on, in, and around us, pulsating unceasingly during the term of physical existence.
In working upon the physical body, prana automatically uses the linga-sarira (model-body) as its vehicle of expression during earth-life. Prana may be said to be the psychoelectric veil or field manifesting in the individual as vitality. The life-atoms of prana fly instantly back, at the moment of physical dissolution, to the natural pranic reservoirs of the planet.
In Sanskrit it refers to the life currents or vital fluids, variously numbered as three, five, seven, twelve, and thirteen. The five life-winds mentioned are samana, vyana, prana, apana, and udana. In this classification prana represents the expirational breath.
Kundalini is a divine energy represented by the ancient Indian Masters in
the form of a serpent, coiled three and a half times, lying asleep until it is
awakened, after which it can, in some cases, bestow superconsciousness.
Kundalini has been called a goddess, who is guarding a mighty dormant
force in the human body, located at the base of the spine. Actually, it is both
a force and the controlling mechanism of the force. (6)
Kundalini is the circular power; one of the mystic, recondite powers in the human constitution. It "is called the 'Serpentine' or the annular power on account of its spiral-like working or progress in the body of the ascetic developing the power in himself.
Space or Akasha is Brahman
The esoteric view of space indicates that it is verily the SatChitAnanda Brahman. Sat is the Ultimate Truth, which is the unmanifest space of Akasha. Chit is the Ultimate Storage of the archetypes of forms and spirit between and during manifest creation. Ananda is the Ultimate Consciousness or Intelligence that generates the cosmic, creative and intelligent forces and administrates manifest creation.
"To what does this world go back?"
"To space (akasa)," said he. "Verily, all things here arise out of space. They disappear back into space, for space alone is greater than these; space is the final goal."
-- Chhandogya-Upanishad (I, 9, 1)
Sources:
(1) - http://www.hindudharmaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1441
(2) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ (for dark matter, dark energy and fundamental particles, fundamental forces)
(3) - The Project Gutenberg eBook, Occult Chemistry, by Annie Besant and Charles W. Leadbeater, at: http://www.gutenberg.net/
(4) - Essentials of Occult Chemistry and Modern Science by H.J.Arnikar, The Theosophical Publishing House, Adyar, Chennai
(5) - http://www.hindudharmaforums.com/showthread.php?t=725
(6) - A Kundalini Catechism by Gopi Krishna
Theosophical Sources:
1. Theosophy Explained in Questions and Answers by P. Pavri.
2. The Solar System by Arthur E. Powell
3. Fountain-Source of Occultism by G. de Purucker
4. Encyclopedic Theosophical Glossary at http://www.theosociety.org/
yajvan
12 May 2007, 03:37 PM
Hari Om
~~~~~
Space or Akasha: Exoteric and Esoteric Views
The discussion of space or Akasha, from both the exoteric and esoteric points of views, brings in the concepts of matter, energy, time, sound and color.
Neutrinos are elementary particles denoted by the symbol v, that travel at the speed of light and has no electric charge. Neutrinos are created as a result of certain types of radioactive decay or nuclear reactions such as those in the sun, in nuclear reactors, or when cosmic rays hit atoms.
Namaste saidevo,
A very informative post...thank you for putting it together.
These neutrino's are of interest to me on two levels. One: the amount that are produced each second, and the second, our connection to everything and how an effect (apurva) can happen with us, the native, and the sun.
Today - it's calcuated that each second of each day (7x24x365) the sun produces 200 trillion trillion trillion neutrino's - each second! We and our solar system bathes in these things. If youlook at your thumb right now, a million neutrino's have just gone through it.
Today, scientist's 'catch' about 20 neutrino's a day out of the zilion zillon that are produced - this was a scientific feat no doubt , as they were first thought to have zero mass, and hence would not interact with other particles. This was proven incorrect - yet they fly through the earth with the greatest of ease!Now what does this have to do with the subject at hand and our general delight with talking of Vedanta, Brahman, Veda, etc? Well there is a great knowledge called the Panchagni vidya that is found in the Chandogya Upanishad. It discusses how beings come-and-go from this loka ( that would be humans and other beings). There are two paths one can travel after dropping the body ( really there are 3 but that can be for another post):
The Northern path - called uttarayana marga ( Owned by the sun);
This is also called devayana or path of the gods, the path of light.
The Southern path - called dhuma-marga ( owned bt the moon);
This is also called the path of smoke, dakshina-patha, etc.These ayana's define the experience for the native, that is, one on his/her way to Brahma-loka [ with due merit ] or, to return back to this earth via some stops along the way, again based upon ones merit.
Now w/o going too too deep here and steering us off course, our connection to our sun is via the nerve currents within us - we call these nadi's. People talk of thousands of these nadi's, yet this Upanishad points to the 101 of the nerve currents (sushumna-nadi). One of these nerve currents allows the passage of the soul to go upwards. Perhaps this is the role of the neutrino's ? The flood of these neutrino's give the passage for souls to transfer upward. Perhaps this is the path from a physical point of view and keeps the intimate connection with our sun ( surya, the atmakaraka of all).
just a thought... if one would care to read more of this path and passage they can refer to the 5th and 8th chapter of the Chandogya Upanishad .
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