I am seriously beginning to think that a search confined to external journey would never lead to a sense of fulfillment . Understanding things intellectually is never the same as true experiencing. It can't be something one waits for another to prove. It's got to be an inner journey that takes one from self to Self and then non- Self. The answers may not be found but perhaps the questions dissolve. Enough clues have been left by those who have traversed these paths. Its upto those interested to take the challenge to test it out. Denying something without knowing or experiencing does not seem very scientific! Nothing short of an experiment gives a conclusive yes , no or at times even a may be.
Whatever it be lets enjoy the journey. There can be no wrong path as I don't think there can be anywhere else to go : ) Some paths may be smooth and short, some winding, some fraught with frustrations , some exciting and some fulfilling . Perhaps we choose or perhaps it gets doled out! By who? If there is a common or a single Source then that question is moot.
Its been an engrossing thread and I must say I enjoyed reading every post in it. DM must have matured ! For a change everyone has been so patient lately, no fireworks or bashing!
Analogous to Schrodinger's cat being simultaneously dead and alive , the photon exists in a wave and particle form simultaneously the observer quashes the superposition possibilities to an "observed" single outcome, the unobserved remains both, simultaneously.
Sensory comprehension is handicapped by the 'either-or' paradigm and can cognise only a polarised ,committed ,tangible alternative.
Sensory perception, is processing and assimilating gigabytes of tangible, unequivocal polarity -- either one of the duality, wave or particle, day or night, true or false, dead or alive and so on. The perceptive faculties cannot perceive a simultaneous concurrent duality that is inclusive rather than exclusive, based on 'and '.
The wave -particle conflict reflects a limitation of perception. The brain is programmed to interpret unity as a partial 'virtual ' diversity. Much the same as a drop of water splits light into a spectral delusion, the brain permits only an "either or" program to serve as the operating system, a binary code that can have only one of two values at any given point of time. Assigning both values simultaneously corrupts the software and hangs the system. Duality is a perceptive warp, that coerces the senses into a distortion of the fundamental nonduality.
Non duality represents a 'paradigm shift' from this reductionist 'either or' syntax to a holistic 'and' awareness . Nonduality alludes to an undifferentiated whole, that is not exclusive, but inclusive. A quantum superposition state, that reveals all quantum states as an unqualified oneness. An awareness that transcends 'attribute and form' , sagun saakaar, the progenitors of the subject-object dichotomy to an exalted 'nirgun niraakaar' state. An awareness that becomes aware of this duality-based sensory deception.
Rephrasing the immortal words of Tagore:
"Where the awareness is without illusion and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where reality has not been broken up into fragments'"
This is aptly described by philosopher saint Tukaram as 'saandili triputi' or ending the trilogy of the observer, observed and observation. A grand unified theory of sorts, that makes all answers redundant ,by unifying the questions ,the seeker and the questioning.
Until that quantum 'leap of consciousness' occurs, our perception will remain mired in the 'either or' domain. The 'wave -particle ' conflict will continue to haunt us till a 'wave' of realisation sweeps over our 'particulate ' perceptive distortion.