In this paper I shall argue that the notion of the ‘existence’ of a ‘Mind Independent Reality’ (MIR) is ill conceived if one understands this concept as indicating that there is some ‘ultimate’ or final aspect of reality which is absolutely and totally beyond the mind’s com-prehension or experience. By elucidating the central features of the Buddhist Mind-Only metaphysical account of the operation of the ‘three natures’ of fundamental Mindnature in the context of modern quantum physics and quantum field theory I set out to show that a ‘Metaphysics of Nondual Epiontic Quantum Mindnature’ provides a comprehensive and exhaustive account of the process of reality; an account which has no room or necessity for a mind-independent reality (MIR).
In this paper I shall argue that the notion of the ‘existence’ of a ‘Mind Independent Reality’ (MIR) is ill conceived if one understands this concept as indicating that there is some ‘ultimate’ or final aspect of reality which is absolutely and totally beyond the mind’s com-prehension or experience. By elucidating the central features of the Buddhist Mind-Only metaphysical account of the operation of the ‘three natures’ of fundamental Mindnature in the context of modern quantum physics and quantum field theory I set out to show that a ‘Metaphysics of Nondual Epiontic Quantum Mindnature’ provides a comprehensive and exhaustive account of the process of reality; an account which has no room or necessity for a mind-independent reality (MIR).
The seemingly solid entities that sentient beings experience as the ‗truth‘ or mode of apprehension of the everyday world can, seemingly, be broken down into increasingly small particles. The ‗ultimate‘ truth, or ‗ultimate‘ level of reality, would, perhaps, be found when there is a ‗particle‘ which can no longer be divided, if such things ‗exist‘ ultimately. If they do not … well then we arrive at the quantum level, or what Buddhist metaphysics calls ‗emptiness‘. In this paper I will use the Buddhist philosopher Dharmakirti‘s imaginative deconstruction of reality, in the context of quantum theory, to try to answer the question which seems to be posed by quantum theory: Is ‗Reality‘ really real? In our search for the ultimate nature of reality we have to leave behind the ‗seeming‘ appearances of the everyday world, however persuasive the appearance may be, and break through to a more ‗ultimate truth‘ concerning the nature of reality. We shall discover that Dharmakirti‘s philosophical analysis, alongside other Buddhist insights, which lead to the ‗ultimate‘ realm of ‗empty‘ Mindnature, prefigures modern quantum discoveries, particularly the notion of an ‗Epiontic Universe‘ which derives from the ‗quantum Darwinism‘ perspective suggested by Wojciech H. Zurek.
It is quite clear that the new quantum perspective indicates that all sentient beings carry a small part of the infinite awareness-consciousness which lies within the heart of reality. This also means that, as John Wheeler in the twentieth century and Buddhist philosophers for at least the last two thousand years have suggested, sentient beings are the agents through which the epiontic ground of the process of reality creates the dualistic world of experience. In fact it seems as if we live in an Epiontic Universe within which the perceptions and activities of all sentient beings determine how, within the limits of the available potentialities, the universe actually manifests. Furthermore human beings, because of their greater sphere of free-will are primarily responsible for the fate and nature of the universe on all levels of manifestation. And, as Stapp, Wheeler, Zurek and others indicate, the intentions and perceptions of sentient beings have a universal impact upon the quantum ground, vanishingly tiny though it may be for any particular individual being. This impact of the intentionality and perceptual activities of sentient beings upon deep levels of the quantum Mindnature universe is such that, as Wheeler and others have clearly indicated, the actual fabric of the appearance of the material world is produced, over vast time scales, by the quantum epiontic mechanism.
The seemingly solid entities that sentient beings experience as the ‘truth’ or mode of apprehension of the everyday world can, seemingly, be broken down into increasingly small particles. The ‘ultimate’ truth, or ‘ultimate’ level of reality, would, perhaps, be found when there is a ‘particle’ which can no longer be divided, if such things ‘exist’ ultimately. If they do not … well then we arrive at the quantum level, or what Buddhist metaphysics calls ‘emptiness’. In this paper I will use the Buddhist philosopher Dharmakirti’s imaginative deconstruction of reality, in the context of quantum theory, to try to answer the question which seems to be posed by quantum theory: Is ‘Reality’ really real? In our search for the ultimate nature of reality we have to leave behind the ‘seeming’ appearances of the everyday world, however persuasive the appearance may be, and break through to a more ‘ultimate truth’ concerning the nature of reality. We shall discover that Dharmakirti’s philosophical analysis, alongside other Buddhist insights, which lead to the ‘ultimate’ realm of ‘empty’ Mindnature, prefigures modern quantum discoveries, particularly the notion of an ‘Epiontic Universe’ which derives from the ‘quantum Darwinism’ perspective suggested by Wojciech H. Zurek.
The Buddhist metaphysical conceptual analysis of the nature of reality has always been founded upon the basis of a rigorous employment of scrupulously coherent conceptual analysis, which is in turn based upon an empirical observation of experience in a manner appropriate to the time, although one major difference between the empirical attitude of Western science and philosophy during the age of science and that of Buddhism was the Buddhist development of rigorous techniques of meditation in order to explore the structure and nature of consciousness. In this paper I will use the Buddhist philosopher Dharmakirti‘s imaginative deconstruction of reality, in the context of quantum theory, to try to answer the question which seems to be posed by quantum theory: Is 'Reality' really real? In our search for the ultimate nature of reality we have to leave behind the 'seeming' appearances of the everyday world, however persuasive the appearance may be, and break through to a more 'ultimate truth' concerning the nature of reality. We shall discover that Dharmakirti's philosophical analysis, alongside other Buddhist insights, which lead to the 'ultimate' realm of 'empty' Mindnature, prefigures modern quantum discoveries.
Although the title of this focus issue is ‘The Possibility of Metaphysics’ the first part has as its focus not only metaphysics in general but Buddhist metaphysics in particular. This is because the motivation for this focus issue was sparked by an email from a colleague who asked for my opinion of a book written by Robert Ellis. The aspect of the ‘experimental metaphysics’ of quantum theory is examined in detail in the first article "The Matter of Mindnature" The Buddhist metaphysical viewpoint tells as the nature of ultimate reality is best understood as a fundamentally interrelated and interpenetrating field of Mind-like energy, or Mindnature, and such a view is clearly supported by the quantum violation of Bell’s inequalities. In this article I examine Ellis’s notion of the impossibility of metaphysics in the light of both philosophical considerations and the implications of the quantum evidence. The next article "Taking the‘Meta’ Out of Physics" is Ellis’s response to my criticisms of his work. I leave it to readers to come to conclusions without further comment from me. It is my hope that there will be feedback concerning the issues raised as I am personally convinced that Ellis’s position is untenable but am curious to know whether my viewpoint is widely held. Certainly the last two articles from James Kowall, ‘What is Reality in a Holographic World?’, and Brian Whitworth, ‘Introducing The Virtual Reality Conjecture’, seem to support my position.
As we shall illustrate in this paper, it appears that quantum ‘particles’ might be thought to have aspects of both reality and unreality, and this is a paradoxical viewpoint which leads us in the direction of some dramatic claims about the nature of reality made by Buddhist metaphysicians such as Dharmakirti and Nagarjuna, claims which move towards providing an answer to Penrose’s quandary: “can real objects be constructed from unreal constituents?” According to Nagarjuna: “everything is real and not real, both real and not real, neither real nor not real which is the Lord Buddha’s teaching”. The resolution of the apparent paradox will become clear as we explore the relationship between the implications of quantum theory and the Buddhist doctrine of the ‘two truths’, or ‘two realities’, in detail. In fact we will discover that an appreciation of the Buddhist perspective throws significant light onto quantum conundrums. We shall discover that Dharmakirti’s philosophical analysis, alongside other Buddhist insights, which lead to the ‘ultimate’ realm of ‘empty’ Mindnature, prefigures modern quantum discoveries, particularly the notion of an ‘Epiontic Universe’ which derives from the ‘quantum Darwinism’ perspective suggested by Wojciech H. Zurek.