Yoga, the Noble Prize, and the Idea of ‘One’
““The concept of the self is a product of the thinking mind, which constantly reinvents the self from moment to moment, bearing little resemblance to the stable and coherent self, believed by most of us.””
One key idea originating from India is: all things in existence are part of the same essential ‘One.’
The Greeks and Egyptians also held similar beliefs. The concept of interconnectedness is captured in the phrase by the Greek philosopher Heraclitus: “From all things One and from One all things.” The Egyptians revered the presence of a comprehensive, yet elusive unity in the Goddess Isis.
Science, on the other hand, has mixed feelings about exploring a fundamental unity in natural phenomena. This ambivalence emerged during the 1920s and 1930s when it was discovered that particles could exhibit both particle-like and wave-like behavior at the quantum level.
Additionally, the particle and wave aspects of matter can never be observed simultaneously. Physicist Wolfgang Pauli illustrated this finding by suggesting that one could view nature with two different eyes, perceiving either particles or waves, but if both eyes were opened together, understanding would be lost. This suggested that the fundamental reality of the ‘One’ was inherently unobservable.
Since quantum physics was still in its early stages and there was no known way to measure and experiment with quantum-level phenomena or apply them to everyday life problem-solving, it was agreed upon to focus on observable and experimentally measurable aspects.
The situation began to change around the 1970s when a connection was established between quantum-level phenomena and everyday life. It was discovered that we are unable to perceive quantum-level phenomena in our daily lives because the very act of observation leads to the collapse of the quantum state and generates the experience of large objects existing in definite shapes and specific locations (referred to as decoherence).
Albert Einstein once expressed his frustration with this quantum weirdness to the young physicist Abraham Pais: “I recall,” Pais wrote, “that during one walk Einstein suddenly stopped, turned to me and asked whether I really believed that the moon exists only when I look at it.” Decoherence provides an explanation: the environment always “measures” it, even when nobody is observing. For example, all the photons of sunlight bouncing off the moon serve as agents of decoherence, fixing its position in space and giving it a clear outline.
The idea of ‘One’ was buttressed by the award of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics for the study of entanglement. Entanglement refers to the connection between pairs of photons or electrons, which remains intact regardless of the vast distances separating them. This resembles the emergence of a ballet or tango from individual dancers; entanglement arises from the connection between particles, regardless of their separation. One can say that there exists an underlying unity, but it remains unseen and unfelt because the moment we observe something, the unity breaks down and becomes invisible.
Simultaneously, neuroscience explains why the individual governed by the brain is unable to perceive the ‘One.’ Humans relate themselves to the self, the ego, or “me”, and it is this “I” that brings our thoughts and feelings to life. Increasing experimental evidence is suggesting that the brain creates explanations and reasons to make sense of the surrounding events. Essentially, the brain constructs interpretations or stories.
This line of thought aligns with Buddhism, Taoism, Advaita Vedanta, and other Eastern schools of thought. They believe that the idea of the “self” is fiction, albeit a very convincing one. The concept of the self is a product of the thinking mind, which constantly reinvents the self from moment to moment, bearing little resemblance to the stable and coherent self, believed by most of us. The Buddhist term for this idea is “anatta,” often translated as “no self”, and it is one of its fundamental principles.
Combing the findings from quantum physics and neural science shows that decoherence is the result of the act of observation and interpretation by the brain, which creates the experience of large objects and specific locations. At the same time, the collapse of the quantum state prevents us from seeing the underlying unity and connection (‘One’) between objects or entanglement.
From above, it becomes evident that what Western thought is discovering experimentally was recognized experientially by Eastern spiritual traditions. The mainstream acceptance of the idea of the ‘One’ is perhaps the greatest tribute to Yoga on this International Day of Yoga. The term ‘Yoga’ is derived from the Sanskrit root ‘Yuj’, meaning ‘to join’ or ‘to unite’ and the aim of the practice of Yoga is to lead to the union of individual consciousness with the ‘One’.
