Universal mind or universal consciousness is a metaphysical concept suggesting an underlying essence of all being and becoming in the universe. It includes the being and becoming that occurred in the universe prior to the arising of the concept of "Mind", a term that more appropriately refers to the organic, human, aspect of universal consciousness. It addresses inorganic being and becoming and the interactions that occur in that process without specific reference to the physical and chemical laws that try to describe those interactions. Those interactions have occurred, do occur, and continue to occur. Universal consciousness is the source, ground, basis, that underlies those interactions and the awareness and knowledge they imply.
Introduction
The concept of universal mind was presented by Anaxagoras, a Pre-Socratic philosopher who arrived in Athens some time after 480 BC. He taught that the growth of living things depends on the power of mind within the organisms that enables them to extract nourishment from surrounding substances. For this concept of mind, Anaxagoras was commended by Aristotle. Both Plato and Aristotle, however, objected that his notion of mind did not include a view that mind acts ethically, i.e. acts for the “best interests” of the universe.
The most original aspect of Anaxagoras's system was his doctrine of nous ("mind" or "reason"). A different Greek word, gnó̱si̱ (awareness), better reflects what is observed in the wider world of organic and inorganic being than just the human world. A worm, an amoeba, a bacteria, a raindrop, appears to act with "awareness" (gnó̱si̱) rather than "reason" (nous). Also, these actions would not commonly be referred to as being "reasonable" or "ethical".
In "The Huang Po Doctrine of Universal Mind", originated in around 857 CE, the idea of mind was disconnected from soul in this Buddhist school of thought.
Chu Ch’an says, “Universal mind, therefore, is something to which nothing can be attributed. Being absolute, it is beyond attributes. If for example, it were to be described as infinite, that would exclude from it whatever is finite, but the whole argument of the book is that universal mind is the only reality and that everything we apprehend through our senses, is nothing else but this mind. Even to think of it in terms of existence or non-existence is to misapprehend it entirely.” pp. 8–9 [3]
The term surfaced again in later philosophy, as in the writings of Hegel. - Hegel writes:
¤ 377 The knowledge of Mind is the highest and hardest, just because it is the most 'concrete' of sciences. The significance of that 'absolute' commandment, Know thyself − whether we look at it in itself or under the historical circumstances of its first utterance − is not to promote mere self−knowledge in respect of the particular capacities, character, propensities, and foibles of the single self. The knowledge it commands means that of man's genuine reality − of what is essentially and ultimately true and real − of mind as the true and essential being.” [4]
Descriptions
There are no definitions of the Universal Mind, but two authors within the New Thought movement offer vague descriptions in superlatives such as omnipotence and infinitude.
Ernest Holmes, the founder of the Science of Mind movement:
The Universal Mind contains all knowledge. It is the potential ultimate of all things. To It all things are possible.
New Thought author Charles Haanel said of the universal mind and its relationship to humans:
The Universal Mind, being infinite and omnipotent, has unlimited resources at its command, and when we remember that it is also omnipresent, we cannot escape the conclusion that we must be an expression or manifestation of that Mind. A recognition and understanding of the resources of the subconscious mind will indicate that the only difference between the subconscious and the Universal is one of degree. They differ only as a drop of water differs from the ocean. They are the same in kind and quality, the difference is one of degree only.
The nature of the universal mind is said to be omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent.
Psychological interpretation
Universal mind may be viewed from a scientific perspective as non-local consciousness. Michael Persinger wrote on non-local consciousness:
[a]s a human being, I am concerned about the illusionary explanations for human consciousness and the future of human existence. Consequently after writing the Neuropsychological Base of God Beliefs (1987), I began the systematic application of complex electromagnetic fields to discern the patterns that will induce experiences (sensed presence) that are attributed to the myriad of ego-alien intrusions which range from gods to aliens. The research is not to demean anyone's religious/mystical experience but instead to determine which portions of the brain or its electromagnetic patterns generate the experience
— Michael Persinger, in Huping Hu & Maoxin Wu
The atemporal nature of consciousness is explored by Mansoor Malik and Maria Hipolito. They summarise key theorists on the subject from different ontological perspectives:
Freud emphasized the timelessness of unconscious processes. He showed how unconscious ignores time and temporal progression. For example, in dreams and fantasy where past, present, and future are united in one representation, he showed that certain aspects of psychopathology are also essentially atemporal.
Hameroff (1996) conceptualizes consciousness as successive quantum superposition of the tubulin protein conformations in the brain. He proposes that with each conscious moment, “a new organization of Planck scale geometry is selected irreversibly”. This leads to apparent illusion of time. Thus without consciousness, there would be no time.
A research team in Australia conducted more than 20,000 experiments of universal mind and concluded: "Overwhelming evidence is pointing to the existence of 'supernatural' reality and a universal subconscious mind ( aka 'God' ): Many religious concepts are essentially a science of mind."
