Science has been investigating Siddhis. Read from article about Patanjali's Yoga sutras and science.
SIDDHIS IN THE PATANJALI YOGASUTRA FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF CURRENT SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
Introduction
The patanjaliyogasutra(PYS), a seminal text of Samkhya philosophy and yoga theory and practice is widely recognised as a matter-of-factly description of a psycho-physical discipline and of its effects on the bodies and minds of its adepts. Although scientific bio-medical and neurological research has recently validated the beneficial and healing effects of yoga on practitioners, in the third section (vibhutipada) of the sutra, the ‘supernatural’ or ‘paranormal’ powers (siddhis) that may be attained by the advanced initiate in ashtangayoga are still regarded as fictitious from the standpoint of modern science.
This discrepancy enshrines a paradox: how can a manual found to be accurate in its methodology to optimise mind and body states be so removed from reality or even apparent reason with regard to the superhuman attributes and abilities it claims to confer?
This paper briefly recapitulates the various siddhis alluded to in the sutra’s third section and also the further attainment it advocates as a goal of the practice in the beginning of the fourth section, the kaivalyapada. It attempts to draw certain parallels and correspondences with current developments and recent revelations in areas of scientific research that may contribute to support the validity or at least the plausibility of the claims made in PYS.
The following and last section of Patanjali’s memoir is indeed an exposition of the nature and effects of the kaivalya state towards which the yogi’s progress should be unerringly directed. It is rather evident that supernatural or at least exceptional powers, while fascinating to observe and investigate, do not give their possessors any higher degree of happiness, wisdom and peace than ordinary mortals and can even be sources of distress, frustration, social alienation and physical suffering. However, we are no longer able to deny their existence from a scientific standpoint, even though the approach taken to investigate and attain such powers nowadays is mostly technological and relies on engineering applications of relativistic and quantic concepts and mechanics.
Yet science today acknowledges the central and paramount place of consciousness and admits that no sharp boundaries but rather differences in the degree of subjective perception stand between the ‘physical’ and psychic realities which are substantially not separable. Indeed, material tools, including sophisticated instruments are mere crutches for our perceptive and operative abilities which yoga teaches to do without. In essence, the powers are within us and not in the tools we fashion to deploy them. Machines (yantras) are technical projections of the psychic aptitudes manifested through mantras and tantras. Patanjali points to that when he defines yoga as the exercise of samyama which combines citta and purusa by separating (viyoga) the true Self from the vrittis of Prakriti. The conclusion is that in order to manifest super-human abilities, the yogi has to identify fully with the limitless purusa in which everything is possible and ‘demystify’ the seemingly material mind-body complex.
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