Asvagosha's thundering Question

 

''What is the meaning of the Human Will?"

Oh? Such a deep thinker once walked this land 2000 years ago? Can you answer his question?...if you understand it.

To me this is one of the earliest applications of catuṣkoṭi (Four valued Indian logic or Tetralemma) by an Indian philosopher, even though it was formally published only a couple of centuries after Ashvagosha. He is not obsessing over 'God exists' or 'God does not exist' - like an Aristotlean logician might. He is transcending and going beyond the question.

1600 years later, a version of the same question tormented Issac Newton's mind. He spent an inordinate amount of effort reading and writing to try and answer the problem of Will and Space from a Christian Theist perspective. And even he could not provide a valid answer.

He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient, that is, he endures from eternity to eternity, and he is present from infinity to infinity; he rules all things, and he knows all things that happen or can happen. He is not eternity and infinity, but eternal and infinite; he is not duration and space, but he endures and is present. He endures always and is present everywhere, and by existing always and everywhere he constitutes duration and space. ( ...) He is omnipresent not only virtually but also substantially; for action requires substance (...). In him all things are contained and move, but he does not act on them nor they on him. [Newtons General Scholium to the Principia]

His answer was essentially- ''In him all things are contained and move, but he does not act on them nor they on him..'' . But later intellectuals rejected Newtons ideas of Space as an emanation and actions and motions inside it. Immanuel Kant, in particular, took up arms against Newtonian and Spinoza's ideas of space and Human action-

"Newtonian tradition had influentially portrayed God's role in the natural world as mediated by absolute space - as the receptacle (organon) of God's omnipresence in nature - Kant seems to warn us that going down this path would lead us to dangerous fatalism of action" [ Kants Critique of Pure Reason, a critical Guide, James R. O'Shea]

Like Friederich Nietzsche said “All things are subject to interpretation [and] whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth”. So we are free to dismantle and restate Asvagosha's question in a form relevant to modern human aspirations, in hopes toward an answer.

Ashvagosha 2.0 : WHAT IS THE HIGHEST ACHIEVEMENT POSSIBLE FOR A HUMAN BEING?

Most religions try to calm and tame the raging Human Will by the promise of afterlife. This has worked most of history and will continue to

work for most humans.

For ancient Christian Idealists of Alexandria (Yes, they once existed before being forced into extinction) - The world of forms is only an illusion, a simulation of sorts, created without the permission of the higher beings -the 'Pleroma'. Only those humans who gain 'true knowledge' can hope to achieve 'freedom', escape and to transcend this world. Sadly, most humans will never gain this Freedom of Will and action.

In Buddhist religion, the highest achievement possible is to 'Become a Buddha- a concept of multiple implications I cannot elaborate here. ALL humans have this capacity.

In Vedic religion, the highest attainment for a human being is complete union with God, and hence his Will. The drop returning to the ocean. Atman & Paramatma. The parable of two birds. Here, just as in Buddhist Nirvana, the 'Human Will' has to self-annhialate.

To a modern philosopher, a scientist or to a technocrat, all these religious solutions may seem depressing! Is THIS the human limit? THIS is what we exist for? Science may offer some desperate solace to the malcontent Raging Human Will: We all die, but our Species may one day conquer the universe. Our heirs will transcend all that which subjugates us.

Deeper interpretations of the question:

-What is the nature of the universe and the maximal potential role of the Human Will inside it?

-What should be the goal of our species as a whole?

-The Will of the higher beings/God who create the Simulation-- can we or should we hope to escape it?