On 'The Higher Consciousness'

Many classical forms of Hinduism and Buddhism (and, more recently, the various New Age groups that these have spawned in the West) claim that it is possible to attain a Higher Consciousness where the subject-object duality that pertrains to much of our day-to-day interaction and perception will be revealed as being an illusory form of 'folk psychology', and that this duality can be transcended in the intuitive insight into Oneself. I shall neither defend nor challenge this claim here, only give the techno-savvy (and hard-nosed empiricist?) reader an example to show what it is being claimed.

Right-click on the Recycle Bin icon on your desktop : you shall see three items, 'Open', 'Expore', 'Create Shortcut' and 'Properties' highlighted and one item, 'Empty Recycle Bin', etched out. Why is that so? This is because although you can (with a bit of expertise) send everything else on the desktop into the Recycle Bin, you cannot send the Recycle Bin into itself. Therefore, even after everything else has been dissolved into the Recycle Bin, the Recycle Bin stands supreme in its absolute serenity, dispassionately gazing at Itself.

The New Age gloss on this observation will go as follows : The plurality of icons on the desktop have emerged from the unity of the One Recycle Bin. Those who are ignorant think that these icons are distinct and many, but those who have attained the Higher Consciousness will know that it is the unitary Recycle Bin that underlies all these manifestations as their innermost reality. Indeed, they shall then know that they are the Recycle Bin itself.

(Environmentalists, are you listening? It just might not be too late to turn New Age yet. Hehe.)