Wielding Occam's Razor in a Review of Evolution of Forms and Consciousness and the Significance of the Universal Creation

0:00 When we observe the evolution of forms and then investigate the evolution of consciousness, that is the secret driving force behind the evolution of forms and which provides meaning to the development of the outer forms. We can try to limit this development to the current phase and simply declare that the human being is the supreme result of this process and thus the evolutionary cycle ends here. Certain religious beliefs hold that mankind is indeed the result of the development, whether they explicitly accept the concept of evolution or not, and is intended to master all of nature for its benefits to human needs. In these religious tenets, God created man in His own image and found the creation good.

0:55 The need now is to overcome the original mistakes or sins of the first man and woman who somehow disobeyed God's directive in the Garden of Eden. Thus we have the further extension of this concept with the advent of Jesus representing a man embodying a new higher spiritual consciousness of oneness with God who comes to redeem mankind and salvage the future destiny of mankind. Some traditions simply hold that regardless of the external evolutionary cycle, the objective is to find a way to escape the illusory nature of the life we lead and focus our entire attention on the spiritual reality and either escape the illusion or at least recognize it and not be carried away by it.

1:46 For these traditions, the development of a new evolutionary principle and the forms that can manifest that principle is not either essential or of any concern. The role of the individual is to shift the standpoint out of this external body, life, mind complex and achieve liberation in one form or another. Yet others hold that there may be developments beyond the human, but they occur on other planes or worlds, and once we have completed our process here on earth, we simply move to other realms where a different form of existence pertains. What each of these directions shares is that they tend to minimize the importance and significance of the evolutionary developments of both form and consciousness. The universal machinery is seemingly set up to carry out evolution without any real purpose behind it. Sri Robindo provides another view of the matter. The problem solving principle known as Occam's Razor holds that when there are competing explanations, the simplest 1 tends to be the correct one.

3:04 In this case, the simplest explanation for the vast machinery of evolution and the development of consciousness is that it indeed has a purpose and is an essential part of the existence within which we live. All the other explanations noted above, as well as others, tend to create a complexity that tries to find a way to overlook or avoid what we experience in the world. If we find a significance to this process and observe the progressions that have taken place, as well as the limitations that are obvious in the mental consciousness, we can easily appreciate that the evolutionary process is not yet completed.

3:52 Rather, that they're actually signs that the next phase or stage is in the process of revealing itself. And that this next stage will necessarily involve a greater power of consciousness. One which can overcome major limitations in the mental consciousness while helping to achieve a New Balance and harmony in the physical, vital and mental framework of the creation as we experience it today. This natural continuance and progression of the evolutionary process provides the simplest and most straightforward explanation of the universal existence Sriorobendo notes quote.

4:37 All these are conclusions that can be arrived at even from the observation of the outward phenomena of nature's progression, her surface evolution of being and of consciousness in the physical birth and the body. But there is the other, the invisible factor. There is rebirth, the progress of the soul by ascent from grade to grade of the evolving existence, and in the grades to higher and higher types of bodily and mental instrumentation. In this progression the psychic entity is still veiled even in man. The conscious mental being, by its instruments, by mind and life and body, it is unable to manifest fully, held back from coming to the front, where it can stand out as the master of its nature, obliged to submit to a certain determination by the instruments, to a domination of Purusha by Prakriti.

5:36 But in man the psychic part of the personality is able to develop with a much greater rapidity than in the inferior creation, and a time can arrive when the sole entity is close to the point at which it will emerge from behind the veil into the open and become the master of its instrumentation in nature. But this will mean that the secret indwelling spirit, the demon, the Godhead within, is on the point of emergence, and when it emerges, it can hardly be doubted that its demand will be, as indeed it already is in the mind itself when it undergoes the inner psychic influence.

6:20 For a diviner, a more spiritual existence in the nature of the earth life, where the mind is an instrument of the ignorance. This can only be affected by a change of consciousness, a transition from a foundation in ignorance to a foundation in knowledge, from the mental to a supra mental consciousness, A supra mental instrumentation of nature. End Quote reference Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, the psychic being soul, its nature, mission and evolution Section 3. Growth and Development of the Psychic, page 77.