To discuss consciousness, to discuss the Vedantar tradition, to discuss that confrontation or perhaps collaboration with science in looking for this meaning,

ladies and gentlemen, please welcome one of the most eloquent propounders of Vedanta.

This is Swami Sarwapriyananda, the chief of the Ramakrishna mission in New York,

a very eloquent man, a very curious man.

Please welcome Swami Sarvudhryananda. Swami, thank you so much for coming.

Thank you for having me and for this wonderful event.

Thank you.

Swami, I want to dive into the deep end.

You know, when I first reached out to you, I wanted you to define what is spirituality in an era of AI and gene editing and quantum and, you know, when science

is pretty much deciphering every last atom of existence, has spirituality almost become, you know,

obsolete, you know, is the soul obsolete.

But through all of yesterday, we were not able to define that.

So before I take you into that debate between science and spirituality,

I'd like you to share with the audience and us,

how is consciousness defined in the Vedanta tradition?

And I know that the Vedantah has many schools.

So let's stick with the Adwaita for the time being.

Yes, big question.

I'll start with a little story.

Consciousness is something that's very common to all of us.

We all know it, and we are using it all the time.

The story is like this. There was this washerman, our very familiar traditional Indian dhobie,

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