Four Applications Of Mindfulness Retreat 2013 with B. Alan Wallace (part 43)

0:03 So this practice of shamatha, or the consciousness of consciousness, awareness of awareness, as a shamatha practice, was actually taught by the Buddha himself in the Pāli canon. Very rarely taught nowadays in the Theravata tradition. The Buddha taught it as the foremost, or the pinnacle, the most profound of all shamatha methods. Report an error in the passage at 0:03 Highlight the passage at 0:03

0:24 And it's included among ten kasinas. And a kasina is an emblem or a representation of something such as earth, water, fire, air. Report an error in the passage at 0:24 Highlight the passage at 0:24

0:34 So I want to elaborate a lot, but someone simply focuses on an emblem, a physical object that represents earth element, water, fire, air. And then there's four primary colors. And then there's space and there's consciousness. And that makes ten. And each of those was suggested by the Buddha as an object of shamatha, with this one again being the most profound. Report an error in the passage at 0:34 Highlight the passage at 0:34

0:59 It's called the Vijnana Kasina. The emblem of consciousness where you're focusing on a representation of consciousness, a good sample, it's your own. And by fathoming the nature, just like if you really fathom the nature of one H2O molecule, that'll do it. Now you know about H2O molecules throughout the entire universe. If you really fathom it, that's good, because they're really very similar, extremely similar. Report an error in the passage at 0:59 Highlight the passage at 0:59

1:24 In contrast to snowflakes, which they say are unique. So your mind is unique. Everybody's got an absolutely unique mind. I think there's a really good reason to believe that, even if we can't test it. But when the snowflake of your mind melts right down to just basic consciousness, denuded of your gender, ethnicity, personal history and all of that, then we're down to brass tacks or down to sheer luminosity and cognizance, in which case you understand one flow of consciousness, you've got them all. Report an error in the passage at 1:24 Highlight the passage at 1:24

1:53 And so... So the Buddha taught this and I'd like to spend just a few minutes. We have only a few minutes. Going back to the Pāli Canon of the early Theravāda commentaries. Because now we know we're kind of dealing with those foundational teachings that are accepted really by scholars, Buddhists of all traditions. Report an error in the passage at 1:53 Highlight the passage at 1:53

2:12 Whether or not they know about it, I don't know anybody who really refutes this. Very solid, very grounded and very helpful and meaningful. And so here, in terms of this Bhavaṅga, Bhavaṅga, bhava means to become and anga has different meanings but it means, among other things, ground, basis, foundation. So I think ground of becoming is very good. Report an error in the passage at 2:12 Highlight the passage at 2:12

2:31 It's the ground of becoming of all the javana, all the javana, all the activities of the mind. And that includes five modes of sense of consciousness. Those are javana also. But they all emerge from this bhavana, this bhavaṅga. Bhavaṅga. And so, Here's what the Buddha referred to when he just gets right down to the very nature of the mind itself. He says, I know of no other single process which thus developed and made much of is pliable and workable as is this jitta. Report an error in the passage at 2:31 Highlight the passage at 2:31

3:04 Jitta is your mind or essentially your consciousness. So he's pointing out that, I think by clear implication, that with some eye exercises you may be able to refine your eyesight somewhat. There's clear exercises for doing that. Maybe the same thing can be done with your other physical senses. But among all of our modes of cognition, of attention, memory and so forth and so on, what he's saying is the most workable, malleable, the most plastic, the most trainable, the most extendable is your mind itself, consciousness. Report an error in the passage at 3:04 Highlight the passage at 3:04

3:37 Monks, the citta which is thus developed and made much of is pliable and workable. Monks, I know of no other single process so quick to change as is this citta. I think we all witnessed that. Monks, this citta is brightly shining. Brightly shining. That term from the Pāli, if I can remember it. Report an error in the passage at 3:37 Highlight the passage at 3:37

4:00 Not right now, it'll come back. But that term that's being translated as brightly shining is also, it's right on the tip of my tongue, is also translated as clear light. Clear light. It's Ursa in Tibetan. Prabhasa. Prabhasa. Prabhasa citta. Prabhasa citta. The brightly shining mind, Pabhasacitta or Prabhasacitta in Sanskrit is very similar. But in the Mayan tradition, Tibetan Buddhism, how often have you heard this for those who have studied it, mind of clear light, mind of clear light. Report an error in the passage at 4:00 Highlight the passage at 4:00

4:35 It's the same word, same word, Pabhasacitta or Hurser Kisem in Tibetan. And so this citta is brightly shining, it's clear light, it's clear, it's luminous. But it is defiled by adventitious defilements or obscuration defilements. Adventitious, it's a big term that has a very simple meaning. Adventitious just means it comes and goes. People coming into a train station and then going again. The train station is always there. That's a given. Report an error in the passage at 4:35 Highlight the passage at 4:35

5:08 But the trains come, people come and go. They're adventitious. They're not always there. They come and go. Clouds across the sky. Coming and going, coming and going. So likewise the defilements, the mind being obscured with anger, with rumination, with dullness, with emotions and so forth and so on. Report an error in the passage at 5:08 Highlight the passage at 5:08

5:26 These come and go and this mind is obscured by them. There's a lot to be said about that, but we have to move on. It's obscured by adventitious defilements. Report an error in the passage at 5:26 Highlight the passage at 5:26

5:39 Monks, this chit is brightly shining, says it again, but it is free. So he said, Chitta is brightly shining, but it is defiled by adventitious defilements. The monk says, Chitta is brightly shining, but it is free from adventitious defilements. And what he's getting at there again is so clear, it's transparent, and that is the defilements, the obscurations, the neuroses, the instincts are not intrinsic, not hardwired, they're not indelibly in the very nature of your mind itself. Report an error in the passage at 5:39 Highlight the passage at 5:39

6:14 All the defilements, all the mental afflictions, all the obscurations of all kinds, they come and go. Even though we're born with them, and that's of course true for many of them, doesn't mean they're intrinsically there. It's a major statement, because I think largely in biology, if you're born with something, I think they'll generally assume that you're stuck with it. You're a primate, you're a human being. What are you going to do to it? Your brain is wired that way, therefore it's just human nature to get angry and belligerent and selfish and lustful. Report an error in the passage at 6:14 Highlight the passage at 6:14

6:41 And envious and hostile and arrogant and so forth. What do you expect? You're human after all. And they give us this lead ceiling and say, don't even try. You won't get beyond it. That, I think, real bad parenting. You're only a C - student, kid. Don't even think about it. You're mediocre. That's a mean parent. So many of the disadvantages of this block-headed ideology. It's really quite tragic. Report an error in the passage at 6:41 Highlight the passage at 6:41

7:08 It's funny, but it's really tragic. Report an error in the passage at 7:08 Highlight the passage at 7:08

7:13 Then continuing from, and all of these are from five-star sources, I tend to be very picky, but from the commentary literature, the Bhavaṅga is, that is, when he speaks of citta, citta, citta, that's what the Buddha is referring to, then go to the Theravāda tradition, they're kind of the custodians of the Pāli Canon, they're the ones that have preserved it, commentated on it, study it, that for them is Buddhadharma. Report an error in the passage at 7:13 Highlight the passage at 7:13

7:35 And so from the great Theravāda commentaries we read that the bhavaṅga, this ground of becoming, is the undefiled state of the radiant mind that precedes Javana and from which Javana arrives. It is naturally pure and undefiled. So this is a dimension of consciousness. It's not Buddha nature. It's not ultimate. It's not mystical. Report an error in the passage at 7:35 Highlight the passage at 7:35

7:57 It's not transcendent. It's just the ground state, the relative ground state. But it's the ground state when it's relatively unobscured. Relatively unobscured. What I'm about is, even though it's not here, it's so useful. And that is shamatha, the practice of shamatha is really all about, frankly, it's all about unobscuring, unveiling this dimension of consciousness. It's just that simple. Report an error in the passage at 7:57 Highlight the passage at 7:57

8:22 And this dimension of consciousness, it's not, again, it's not nirvāṇa, it's not Buddha nature, it's not divine. It's just you're uncloaked. Sheer luminosity and cognizance of awareness, but it's by nature pure. Not absolutely pure, but pure of a lot. And specifically what it's pure of, that is it's free of, and is adventitiously veiled by, are the five obscurations. Report an error in the passage at 8:22 Highlight the passage at 8:22

8:45 Or the five hindrances. But obscuration, as I said before, is better. It's a better translation. For the following reason. And that is, if you study any of the classic Theravāda treatises, meditation manuals and so forth on shamatha, The five obscurations, they'll call them the five hindrances, are really spoken of at great length and with a lot of precision and insight. I'm going to run through them quickly. The first of these in order is sensual craving. Report an error in the passage at 8:45 Highlight the passage at 8:45

9:11 Sensual craving. I don't think I've run through it before, but I don't think so in this retreat. Or maybe very briefly? Somewhat? What's that? Report an error in the passage at 9:11 Highlight the passage at 9:11

9:22 Not the same. This is a subset. I think it's worth doing, even if it's repetition, it's okay. So the first of these is sensual craving, but it's not just yummy food and sex and nice music and so forth. In Tibetan it's a Debeyun and a Chapa, its attachment to the bounties of the desire realm, the attractions of the desire realm. Report an error in the passage at 9:22 Highlight the passage at 9:22

9:41 So of course that includes all the five sense goodies, you know, nice fragrances and so forth, but also the more intangible ones, like wealth, oh that will make me happy, or fame, or power. Report an error in the passage at 9:41 Highlight the passage at 9:41

9:55 Those are attractions of the desire realm. So whenever we are fixated on them, this is not simply wanting water when you're thirsty or wanting to have enough wealth that you can take care of your children. That's not fixation. Attachment or craving is a reasonable and sensible desire. Nothing wrong with that. Report an error in the passage at 9:55 Highlight the passage at 9:55

10:15 But it's when we're attending to any of these as a veritable source of happiness, that will be my happiness. And then we get fixated on it. That's what it's talking about. And of course when we're fixated on some object, a mental object like fame or a sensory object, of course that's going to obscure the very nature of awareness itself because our attention is elsewhere and glommed onto it, fixated like a deer staring into the headlights. Report an error in the passage at 10:15 Highlight the passage at 10:15

10:38 So that's the first one. The second one is ill will. Ill will, malice, animosity, enmity. Where we really wish someone harm. That will obscure the nature of awareness big time. The third one is laxity and dullness. So laxity is just kind of if you've lost the edge, that sparkling sharpness of your awareness has gotten soft. And dullness is just more of the same, which is your flat out dull. Report an error in the passage at 10:38 Highlight the passage at 10:38

11:05 So those are two terms with a gradient. Laxity, more subtle, dullness, thicker. And of course they're going to obscure the nature of awareness because they cloak it like a woolen cape. And then there's excitation and anxiety. They go hand in hand. And that's just where all the agitation is. We know about that. So that's going to obscure it. And then finally there's an afflictive uncertainty. Report an error in the passage at 11:05 Highlight the passage at 11:05

11:29 That wobble, wobble, wobble. Maybe, maybe not. I'm not sure. Maybe I'm not quite sure. And then it just kind of fixates us like, hmm, it just obscures. And there are analogies for these which are really cool. And that is if we liken your bhavaṅga, and I'm going to say the bhavaṅga is equivalent to substrate consciousness. Substrate consciousness, I'm skipping the whole chitta mantra, not talking about that, mind only school, never mind later, later. Report an error in the passage at 11:29 Highlight the passage at 11:29

11:54 I'm speaking of the Dzogchen tradition, which is not metaphysical, it's radically empirical, and that's where they keep to when they speak of the substrate consciousness. There's no philosophical embellishments, it's just straight what you experience. And so I'm going to say substrate consciousness and the bhavaṅga, or ground of becoming, are the same. Report an error in the passage at 11:54 Highlight the passage at 11:54

12:11 So, if we liken this, let's call it again the Bhavaṅga or Grounded Becoming, liken this to a crystal clear pool of water. Report an error in the passage at 12:11 Highlight the passage at 12:11

12:24 Then that water, the very nature of the water, which is transparent, it's luminous, it's clear, sparkling, pure. That sparkling clear water can be obscured by throwing a cup of dye into it, like red dye. Then you can't see, you can't see the qualities of water, you just see the dye. okay? Report an error in the passage at 12:24 Highlight the passage at 12:24

12:44 That's sensual craving. You can't see your awareness. All you can see is what you're craving. You're fixated, mesmerized by it. That's the first one. On the other hand, you can take that same pool of water and put a big fire under it and have it boiling. Boiling, boiling. We know what that looks like. Boiling pot of water. Then you can't see the water. Report an error in the passage at 12:44 Highlight the passage at 12:44

13:02 All you see is the bubbles and all the... You know what it's like. You've got it visualized already. That's the mind, that pool of clear water obscured by... Aggression, malice, ill will. Report an error in the passage at 13:02 Highlight the passage at 13:02

13:21 And then when the mind is obscured by laxity and dullness, this is like it being covered with moss or scum. Look into it, all you see is the scum. You can't even see the water, perhaps, or barely through it. And so likewise, the awareness that it's obscured by dullness and laxity, well, you're hardly even conscious, especially if you go into sleepiness. Report an error in the passage at 13:21 Highlight the passage at 13:21

13:47 And then, When the mind is obscured by excitation and anxiety, this is like that same pool of water where the surface is whipped by the wind and you're looking at it from the top and all you can see is the waves. You can't see down into it. You can't. It's the waves. And we all know what that's like. You're trying to practice Samatha and all you're getting is a bunch of rumination. Report an error in the passage at 13:47 Highlight the passage at 13:47

14:08 And that's not very satisfying. And then finally, this afflictive doubt, this is like the same pool of water just filled with silt, with yuck. Report an error in the passage at 14:08 Highlight the passage at 14:08

14:18 Sedimentation and so forth. You can't see it. All you can see is the sedimentation. And so those are five, I think, very, very helpful analogies. And the whole process of shamatha is to remove all of those layers of obscuration, the five obscurations. And what's left when it's unobscured is the bhavaṅga. By nature pure, because water, the H2O molecules don't get red. H2O molecules don't obscure themselves when they're getting hot. Report an error in the passage at 14:18 Highlight the passage at 14:18

14:45 And so forth. We see all of those are on the macro level. Obscuring the nature of the water itself. And so all of these five obscurations, all of which are mental afflictions, they obscure the nature of the bhavaṅga. And in order to temporarily remove those five obscurations, shamatha is the method. There's a wide variety of shamatha methods, but that's the genre that's designed to uncloak the very nature of awareness itself, which here we're calling the bhavaṅga. Report an error in the passage at 14:45 Highlight the passage at 14:45

15:12 It is naturally pure and undefiled. So it's pure. In the sense that it's pure, free of, undefiled by these obscurations and mental afflictions of the coarse mind. It's not completely pure. It's not nirvanic. It's not Buddha nature. Because it's still, as I said before, you can be grasping, clinging to the bliss, luminosity and non-conceptuality while resting in that. Report an error in the passage at 15:12 Highlight the passage at 15:12

15:35 So it still has some very subtle impulses of mental afflictions. But they're pretty tame. And of course then the real problem is that None of those five obscurations have been irreversibly cleansed, purified, eradicated. As soon as you lose your shamatha, then they can come right back again. Report an error in the passage at 15:35 Highlight the passage at 15:35

15:54 So the bhavaṅga is the mind's naturally pure state, says the Theravāda tradition, but one that is normally inaccessible, as it mainly occurs during deep sleep. Again, as I mentioned before, when your coarse mind dissolves into the bhavaṅga in deep sleep, most of us are not lucid, so we don't know anything, we don't even know we're asleep. Report an error in the passage at 15:54 Highlight the passage at 15:54

16:14 And that's likewise when most people are dead, they don't know they're dead. When they're anesthetized and so forth, when you fainted, you don't know you fainted. In all of these cases, you're slipping into the bhavaṅga. To unlock the power of this natural purity, the mind must be fully woken up by meditative development so that its radiant potential may be fully activated. Report an error in the passage at 16:14 Highlight the passage at 16:14

16:33 So this is where shamatha comes in, rolling up the sleeves and accessing that same dimension of consciousness that we've all experienced countless times, but doing so lucidly. So just as it is much more worthwhile to have a lucid dream than to be ignorant and deluded while dreaming, which is to say be in a non-lucid dream, so rather than simply having only implicit consciousness, when your coarse mind is dissolved into the bhavaṅga, to access that state lucidly, and that's what you do with shamatha, so that its radiant potential may be activated. Report an error in the passage at 16:33 Highlight the passage at 16:33

17:09 The bhavaṅga is also the natural unencumbered state of citta. And it is the very last moment of a person's life. So again, in the dying process, the brain is shutting down. The brain is no longer able to act as a support or a faculty, the different parts of the brain. Now, number one, of course, the brain is serving many, many functions in the body apart from the mind. I mean, it's regulating processes all over the body. Report an error in the passage at 17:09 Highlight the passage at 17:09

17:37 So it's got a lot of tasks going on. And many of them are fully active when you're asleep. In fact, the brain is very, very active when you're dreaming. Report an error in the passage at 17:37 Highlight the passage at 17:37

17:46 But when the brain then is dying, I mean, you're approaching brain death, you're about to die, then those parts of the brain that are necessary but not sufficient for generating visual perception, all five sense modalities, necessary but not sufficient for generating recognition, memory, fantasy, emotions. Report an error in the passage at 17:46 Highlight the passage at 17:46

18:09 And so forth and so on. As the brain is shutting down, then that whole dimension of mental activity that belongs to the coarse mind or the psyche, what psychologists study, that's shutting down. You're losing your mind. And again, if that's all you see, then it's quite normal. What else would you think? Is that your mind is just disappearing. It's becoming nothing. But that's because all you're looking at is the brain and behavior. Report an error in the passage at 18:09 Highlight the passage at 18:09

18:29 And you think, okay, the person is behaving less and less and less. Oh, dead. Now no more behavior. The brain is functioning less and less and less. Now it's flatlined. No brain. If that's all you can see, what other conclusion could you possibly draw apart from the conclusion that, well, now consciousness stopped. Report an error in the passage at 18:29 Highlight the passage at 18:29

18:53 But of course you weren't watching consciousness in the first place so you don't know whether it stopped or not because you can't measure consciousness, not scientifically. So all you've seen is what everybody knew already. Dead people don't move and the brain that is dead doesn't move. But that's not exactly breaking news. Report an error in the passage at 18:53 Highlight the passage at 18:53

19:09 And that's all they've actually told us. So if there's going to be, if there is, this is an open hypothesis, if there's going to be any kind of continuity of consciousness after brain death, brain scientists and behaviorists will be the last one to know. Report an error in the passage at 19:09 Highlight the passage at 19:09

19:26 They're looking in the wrong place. John Searle, I have mixed feelings about his philosophy, sometimes very smart, sometimes I think very confused. But he does cite a wonderful analogy for this. I don't know where they made it up or not, but it's very apt. And the analogy is if a person has lost his keys, remember that one? A person has lost his keys at night, his car keys. Report an error in the passage at 19:26 Highlight the passage at 19:26

19:49 And so he goes out, he's up there on the sidewalk, and he walks under a street lamp, and he's very carefully looking around. And somebody comes over and says, what are you looking for? Because obviously, he's looking for something. And the guy says, I'm looking for my keys. And the guy said, oh, did you lose them here? No, I lost them way over yonder. Report an error in the passage at 19:49 Highlight the passage at 19:49

20:08 But this is where the light is. And that's so apt. It's perfect. Because what science for the last 400 years in this noble, majestic, fantastic growth of knowledge, what it's good at, where the light is, is the objective, physical and quantifiable. It's really easy. Those three. Objective, physical, quantifiable. Fantastic progress. Only problem is, awareness is not physical, it's not quantifiable and it's not objective. Report an error in the passage at 20:08 Highlight the passage at 20:08

20:35 Nor is any other subjective state. So how should we study it? Shall we study it introspectively, where we actually lost it, where it actually is, that is introspectively, or shall we say, no, no, that's not scientific. Let's just study it where the light is. We'll study it objectively, quantifiably and physically. And even though it's not there, at least that's where the light is. Report an error in the passage at 20:35 Highlight the passage at 20:35

20:59 And that's what's happened for the last hundred years or so. Looking for it where it isn't, but at least you have a lot of technology and it keeps on getting better and better. So you get at it indirectly. You can draw a lot of inferences about the mind by way of brain and behavior, but you never see it. And if there is any mind that continues independently of physical behavior and brain activity, then these people will be the last people to know because they're looking in the wrong place. Report an error in the passage at 20:59 Highlight the passage at 20:59

21:24 And the contemplatives, or anybody who's taking first-person experience seriously, they'll be the first people to know. Or that neurologist. Neurologist who then had his brain dead for how many days, and had these elaborate, detailed visions, stellar, spectacular, of heaven, and then came back and wrote, okay, I just proved it. Report an error in the passage at 21:24 Highlight the passage at 21:24

21:44 But of course it proved for him, but it didn't prove it for everybody else necessarily. And then the materials will be jumping on the bandwagon to come up with ad hoc explanations about how it can't be so, because it contradicts their beliefs. So they're doing that a lot. It's really quite cute. Charming. Report an error in the passage at 21:44 Highlight the passage at 21:44

22:03 When I hear fundamentalist Christians coming up with one explanation after another for dinosaur bones, it's really cute. My grandmother, God bless her soul, she's one of the sweetest, kindest people I've ever known. So benevolent. But she really took everything in the Bible literally. And those dinosaurs, you know, they weren't on the ark. Report an error in the passage at 22:03 Highlight the passage at 22:03

22:27 They probably would have eaten everything else on the ark. Just a few Tyrannosaurus Rexes could really ruin your day. And they'd have two of them, right? And the brontosauruses, I mean, the whole ark would probably go. And so, you know, so no dinosaurs is an ark. Therefore, they didn't exist. Therefore, God just planted them. You know, just put them there to see who you're going to trust, me or your very own eyes. Report an error in the passage at 22:27 Highlight the passage at 22:27

22:54 God was really very mischievous. I feel like it's really a good chuckle. I find equally the chuckle on the other side of the fence because it's exactly the same attitude. If we can't measure it. It doesn't exist. If it's not in our book, it doesn't exist. So there we go. But here's a point that's very interesting, I think, as a comparativist. And that is, as we're reading here, that the bhavaṅga is the unencumbered state, the very last moment of a person's life. Report an error in the passage at 22:54 Highlight the passage at 22:54

23:19 The bhavaṅga citta is the form of falling away of citta. The form of falling away citta. That is your coarse mind dissolving. It's falling into, dissolving into the bhavaṅga. And that's the last moment of your life. All that's left is the bhavaṅga. Report an error in the passage at 23:19 Highlight the passage at 23:19

23:34 Well, you read elsewhere in the Pāli Canon, Theravāda, oh, I have to stop, Theravāda commentaries, that the Bhavaṅga, now bear in mind, they're doing their research independently. They're off in Sri Lanka. People didn't go back and forth between Sri Lanka and Tibet. If you like Sri Lanka, you hate Tibet. If you like Tibet, you're not going to like Sri Lanka. As a place to live, it's hard to be any different. Report an error in the passage at 23:34 Highlight the passage at 23:34

23:53 I mean, I've lived, I've been to both places, but you know what I'm getting at. They didn't communicate. Thailand, Southeast Asia, they just didn't communicate with people up there on the Tibetan plateau or even in China that much. They didn't talk. They were doing their own research in their wats, in their kutis down in Sri Lanka. Report an error in the passage at 23:53 Highlight the passage at 23:53

24:10 And Tibetans just never came down. They couldn't stand India. They'd go down there for merchandising, come right back up again. But what's so interesting here is that in the Theravāda tradition, they say there are three occasions when the Bhavaṅga manifests. Deep, dreamless sleep, death, And then when you're comatose, just normally, comatose, you fainted, what have you, those are the three cases when it occurs naturally. That's all that's left. Report an error in the passage at 24:10 Highlight the passage at 24:10

24:36 Death, deep sleep, and comatose, fainted, anesthesia. And then there's one way it manifests, but when you're actually lucid, and that's when you achieve it by way of shamatha. That's what stayed in the Theravāda tradition. In the Dzogchen tradition, now, there's never been any Dzogchen down in Southeast Asia, as far as I know. It was from India right up to Tibet. Report an error in the passage at 24:36 Highlight the passage at 24:36

24:57 In the Dzogchen tradition, when they refer to the substrate consciousness, they say, well, there are various occasions when it occurs naturally. Let's see, deep dreamless sleep, when you fainted, comatose, death. Oh, and you can access it by way of shamatha. And then they describe it in virtually identical ways. And that's independent. So when you see two independent labs, and they're not sharing any scriptures, the Tibetans didn't have access to the Pāli. Report an error in the passage at 24:57 Highlight the passage at 24:57

25:23 The Pāli canon is not in Sanskrit or Tibetan. They didn't have that. It's not like there's no overlap, but they're different. And the Theravadans, they never studied Mahāyāna. I mean, historically. And they certainly didn't study Tibetan or Dzogchen. So it's interesting from a comparative perspective. And that is, if you have scientifically two independent labs using different methodologies and starting out with somewhat different conceptual framework and vocabulary, and then they point to something using different terminology and it looks to be the same, then you might think maybe this is not an artifact of the system of measurement. Report an error in the passage at 25:23 Highlight the passage at 25:23

25:56 Maybe it's not just some concoction of smart people, but maybe they actually have discovered something that's universal, coming in from different angles, different terminology, but pointing to exactly the same thing. And especially if it's something that we all share, namely consciousness, then maybe they've come up with a legitimate replicable discovery that everybody should know about since we're all conscious. Report an error in the passage at 25:56 Highlight the passage at 25:56

26:18 So it's quite interesting. But now it's lunchtime, so I'll see you at 2 o 'clock and we'll continue. Report an error in the passage at 26:18 Highlight the passage at 26:18