Question on method of arriving at conclusions

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

IAN wrote:

> IAN: The traditional non-contradictional logic counter to your analysis
> is that "self" *is* contradicted by all the universe that is defined as
> "not-self." I can deny that this chair is part of myself, thus the
> consciousness that I am, which is the measure of "the Self," is
> not universally present. How would you answer this counter?

Not necessarily so. The consciousness, "I am" is a prerequisite even to
make any statement about the chair or this computer. You may differentiate
between self (you) and not-self (chair, computer, whatever else), but
remember it is you that does the discrimination, which therefore presumes
the discriminator.

This is why advaita vedanta takes the double approach of talking of AtmA
and anAtmA on the one hand, and brahman on the other. Note that in the
analysis of the five koSas, and in the via negativa reasoning of neti, neti,

there is a discrimination between AtmA and anAtmA. However, nowhere in the
upanishads can you find something mentioned to be not brahman. Paradoxically,
it is only through the AtmA-anAtmA discrimination does one come to the
realization that there is nothing that is not brahman, ergo, there is
nothing that is not the Atman. Thus, at the end, sarvam khalvidam brahma
and sarvam AtmaivAbhUt are equivalent statements.

> The only answer I can see requires a proof that allows the area of the
> universe defined as "not-self" to be included into the area defined as
> "self." As a result there is no area that can be defined as "not-self,"
> thus my self and the consciousness that I am, is equally everything.

The only problem that I find with this is that it seems to presume that there
is something that is "not-self" that has to be extraneously included under
"self" to begin with. I wish there were some English words equivalent to
Atman and brahman, so that one can talk non-duality in English as well as in
Sanskrit!

Of course, the realization that there is nothing that is not-self is itself
the summum bonum. If you mean to say that the original definition of some
part of the universe as not-self is a false one, you are right. But note
that the realization of self is partless (akshara). To see parts in the partless
is the fundamental error.

S. Vidyasankar