Consciousness: Beyond the Chemistry of H2O || Acharya Prashant (2024)
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LearningTranscript
00:00Namaste, sir. Sir, you said that we are same as H2O. Then where does the concept of thinking
00:12becomes very different? And what about our consciousness? And most importantly, I'm talking
00:18about our existential interest. And when it comes to self-awareness and introspection,
00:26I think water lacks it scientifically. And we seek meaning and purpose beyond our own
00:32survival. We have the power to choose. And all that is connected to our consciousness.
00:39I think it lacks in water molecules. So, sir, please tell us what really is consciousness
00:45and how we are really different from H2O. And if we are same as H2O, then where does
00:53the concept of this consciousness came into being?
01:08You know of Argon? Argon? Molecule. I have heard. I'm not from science.
01:17You know of inert gases? Yeah.
01:26You also know probably that oxygen is soluble in water. Yes. You know that, right? Carbon
01:34dioxide, ammonia, all these are gases that dissolve in water to some extent or the other.
01:40So, keep an inert gas and oxygen close to water and ask it to choose. What would it choose?
01:58It would be more attracted to any one of them.
02:04We know that the inert molecule has no affinity for water and vice versa. What would the water
02:13molecule choose? There will be no choice.
02:20But there is going to be a reaction, right? There were two possibilities. There is water
02:24here and I managed to blow both the gases over the surface of water. An inert gas as
02:33well as oxygen. What do I find dissolved in the water? Oxygen. Oxygen. So, something
02:40happened, right? One was chosen, one was rejected. Yeah, right.
02:46Sir, where does this concept of consciousness in human psychology came from?
02:55Vanity. General vanity. Sir, I am thinking most people in your age. We have all kinds
03:04of sexual orientations, I understand. But still, an overwhelming majority, if you come
03:12across a girl and a boy, what are you likely to be attracted towards? Which one?
03:22Opposite gender. The choice is already made. Just as you know in advance what the oxygen
03:30molecule would affiliate itself to. Similarly, I know in advance that if you have a choice
03:39between a girl and a boy, you would go towards the girl. Where is the choice? But since language
03:46is our own invention, we accord ourselves a lot of vanity. The right word is hubris.
03:54Stratospheric pride. What you call as choice is something that is predetermined. There is no
04:12choice. What choice is there? This is a street, this one, right? This is a mosque. This is a
04:30temple. You are a Muslim. Which direction you bow down to? To the left. To the left.
04:42But you say, I chose that. Did you? No. The oxygen molecule. Didn't you choose anything?
04:52It was pre-decided. The oxygen molecule is chemically conditioned. We too are physically
04:58conditioned. And to make the whole thing thicker, add social conditioning to it.
05:06Now the soup is really rich. Chemical, physical, social. All kinds of conditionings.
05:15And still we have the face to say, I am a conscious decision maker who chooses.
05:24Where is the choice, sir? Where is the choice?
05:27Ever seen, I mean, keep exceptions apart, ever seen a man who decides to marry a man?
05:34Where is the choice? The hormones have already decided that being of one gender,
05:41you will drift towards someone of the other gender. Where is the choice?
05:48If you want to take things in a certain direction, you have to take it in a certain direction.
05:55If you want to take things forward, they'll get really interesting.
06:05The kind of woman or man you are going to like, even that is preordained to some extent.
06:11Sir, but when it comes to going against your hormonal balance and basically going against
06:24your mental wills or maybe your physical being in a spiritual path, we have to…
06:30Then you are no more who you are.
06:34Means?
06:36Means then you are no more the one who is talking.
06:42Sir, I didn't get you.
06:45You see, as long as you are the one,
06:50you will remain conditioned. You will remain conditioned.
06:54And when you are not conditioned, then there is a totally separate thing that comes over.
07:04You cannot say, I am the same person who was conditioned and now I am the same one who is now
07:11conscious or free of conditioning. No! These are two separate centres.
07:18You cannot say, I graduated from being unconscious to conscious. You don't graduate.
07:25You go. You dissolve. What remains is a totally different thing.
07:30Sir, what many evolutionary scientists say is that we don't have free will.
07:36It is in the dimension of…
07:39Right on the money. They are exactly right.
07:43As we are products of evolution, in our identity and existence as products of evolution,
07:51there is absolutely no free will at all.
07:54No product of evolution will have any free will ever.
07:59The point is, can you transcend evolution? The body evolves. Can you see all that?
08:09Can you see the whole process of evolution and see how
08:14just the bondages keep evolving into newer kinds of bondages?
08:18If you can see that, then you have transcended the whole stream of evolution.
08:26Sir, understanding is what makes it against the free will.
08:30Not against. Beyond.
08:32Beyond. Sir, isn't it transcending these things is the abstract thing?
08:39Very abstract. Very abstract. For the one who we are.
08:43Yes.
08:44Right. The sky is such an abstract thing for the fish.
08:52True.
08:55The fish never went up there and remaining the fish, it will never go up there.
09:02So, the fish will never go up there.
09:05The fish never went up there and remaining the fish, it will never go up there.
09:12So, the sky is just an abstraction as long as it remains the fish.
09:23So, Sir, transcending starts from understanding always.
09:28First of all, acknowledging.
09:31Acknowledging that which we call as free will or conscious choice is all a facade.
09:39Nobody is operating freely here.
09:41We all are slaves to, as you said, the process of evolution, our chemicals, our hormones,
09:49the way we are indoctrinated, the religion, the media, the education, all these things.
09:54So, these multiple forces, they coalesce to form what is called the human being.
10:02Once you acknowledge that and that's a very humbling acknowledgement.
10:06It shatters you from within. So, you don't want to come to that.
10:10But once you acknowledge that, once you very clearly see that happening within you,
10:16I am not.
10:19My grandfather sits within me and speaks and within the grandfather, his grandfather sits.
10:26I am not.
10:28My male hormones are talking right now.
10:30I am talking from my testicles.
10:33Once you start seeing all that, then you are left with very little energy to defend yourself,
10:41very little energy or motivation because you have seen.
10:45Now, your honesty will not allow you to unsee.
10:49You have seen.
10:51That acknowledgement has to be there.
10:54Right now, this is not me.
10:56There is some random chemical talking.
10:59This is not me.
11:00This is my upbringing as a Hindu or Muslim talking.
11:04This is not me.
11:06I am speaking right now as somebody from a particular city or state or country.
11:10Oh, this is not me.
11:11I am speaking as a member of a particular species.
11:14Therefore, I am treating all other species as inferior.
11:17This is not really me.
11:18This is the wider thing called human beings or homo sapiens.
11:25This isn't me.
11:26There is nothing particularly me in all this.
11:30That acknowledgement, you must honestly come to.
11:34And this acknowledgement is a gift of being a human that we can.
11:40Usually, one is forced into that, you know, because the acknowledgement humbles and because
11:49we don't want to be humbled.
11:51So, usually, we don't come to it unless we are forced.
11:56Now, I don't want to force you to come to it.
11:59Unless we are forced.
12:02Now, either life forces you to that point or your own honesty and your own suffering.
12:12But nobody does it out of his great happiness.
12:20One has to be kicked into doing that.
12:23So, this existential angst in which a philosophical person get into in various phases of reading
12:31philosophies and understanding this existential angst, is it a gift that we are acknowledging
12:36the fact that it is completely settling a certain.
12:39That gift is available to everybody, kid, everybody.
12:43You know, we are living false lives.
12:46And if you're living a false life, then life is all the time sending you messages and reminding
12:52reminders and you're stumbling over stuff and you find your knees bruised and bleeding.
12:58All that is constantly happening.
13:00It's lack of honesty that doesn't allow us to acknowledge.
13:07Now, is honesty a gift?
13:08I don't know.
13:09Yes, probably.
13:10Sometimes people call it grace.
13:12But I don't want to think of it as grace.
13:14Sounds discriminatory, you know.
13:16Somebody received grace, somebody didn't.
13:19So, it's not as if there is some special gift contained here.
13:25Some people want to know.
13:29Others just wait for their time to come, maybe.
13:34I don't know.
13:35Time for a kick from life.
13:38Or a bigger kick from life.
13:41Life is kicking you all the time.
13:43What you're probably waiting for is a bigger kick.
13:47Yeah.
13:48So, Sir, being honest always results in existential angst.
13:55Don't call it angst again and again.
13:58Otherwise, you will be…
14:02you are creating a barrier.
14:04You use such a huge word, angst.
14:07Then you're saying, you know, I don't want to get into it.
14:08It would be so problematic.
14:10It would be so hard-wrenching.
14:12Angst.
14:13And also, when you say angst, it assumes some melodrama.
14:19The fellow is like holding his heart and saying, you know,
14:23somebody is wringing it from within.
14:28These are constant reminders.
14:32You know, you're arguing over something
14:34and then you realize that you are just a pathetic insect.
14:38Arguing over nonsense.
14:40Arguing just to uphold your pride.
14:43That's that kind of a daily thing.
14:46No special angst contained in it.
14:52Look at the way we consume our food.
14:57Something as quotidian as that.
15:01Look at the way you go to the toilet.
15:04Look at the way you go and wash your face
15:08and allow the water to keep draining into the basin.
15:13Why? Because it's cold.
15:15Remember the winter months?
15:17You say, right, right, right. Let it keep flowing.
15:21I don't want to entertain the prospect of having cold water splashed over my
15:27still half-asleep face.
15:30Still half-asleep face.
15:35These are things. Nothing special.
15:38In everything that we do, there is disgrace.
15:42There are certain people who do not want to live with such disgrace.
15:46They say, there must be some dignity beyond all this rubbish.
15:49They are the ones who confront the fact of what we call as life.
15:55Others just carry on.
15:57It depends on you.
15:59You can choose to carry on with all the dishonesties
16:04and the nonsense and the cruelty and the fakeness
16:10that is called as normal life.
16:13Or you could say, not for me, sir. Not for me.
16:19I want to address this issue.
16:21Why am I like this?
16:25Five minutes I just kept brushing my teeth and the water kept
16:28flowing.
16:31All it needed was one flick of the hand and
16:38why didn't I do this? Why am I such an asshole?
16:42That's the question you must ask.
16:45And only the rare one has the guts to acknowledge that.
16:51Begins from there, you know, I'm an asshole.
16:58Thank you, sir.