Vivekananda’s Justification of Panentheistic Cosmopsychism

Abstract

Abstract Chapter 10 reconstructs Vivekananda’s philosophical justification of panentheistic cosmopsychism and his account of how the single Divine Consciousness individuates into the varied conscious perspectives of humans and non-human animals. He provides two complementary arguments in favor of panentheistic cosmopsychism: (1) an “involution argument” for panpsychism, which is based on the Sāṃkhyan satkāryavāda, the doctrine that an effect pre-exists in its material cause, and (2) an argument for panentheistic cosmopsychism, which is based on two sub-arguments: namely, the argument from design and the argument for the epistemic value of supersensuous perception (i.e., AEV, discussed in chapter 5). The chapter then explains what it calls Vivekananda’s account of “grounding by self-limitation,” according to which Divine Consciousness manifests as everything in the universe by playfully limiting, or veiling, Herself through the individuating principle of māyā. The chapter concludes by bringing Vivekananda into dialogue with the contemporary philosopher of mind Miri Albahari.