The drive to understand the universe, with the sense that it has a holistic, unified basis, has inspired great minds for thousands of years. The most advanced research in quantum physics is growing ever closer to verifying what wise sages from both East and West have perennially told us about consciousness. Progress towards understanding an underlying, scientifically plausible “unity” has been steady, bringing together different theories into a more coherent and unified synthesis.

Because of advancements in science, we at last stand on the verge of honouring those visionary thinkers with a clear explanation that verifies what they intuitively knew. Dr Nader makes abstract questions about the nature of the universe understandable, looking at consciousness in terms of human physiology and discussing quantum mechanics in physics in relation to Vedic science. Through his publications he examines what scientists call the “hard problem”: “What is consciousness?”

Maharishi wanted to explore, in a systematic way, the concept that the human being is constructed according to the quantum fluctuations that are the dynamics of natural law in the unified field and that are expressed in Veda and Vedic literature. He knew that Dr Nader was the perfect individual to integrate the insights of modern science and Vedic science, with his years at MIT and Harvard gaining in-depth knowledge of the intricacies of the human neurophysiology and the structure of the brain and nervous system and how they work.

Dr Nader spent a year and a half working with Maharishi studying the correspondence between the forty aspects of the Vedic literature and the highly detailed discoveries of modern science about the human physiology, especially the brain and nervous system. He was able to pinpoint one example after another of an exact correspondence between these two fields of knowledge and demonstrate that the fluctuations of consciousness as expressed in the Veda appear to be reflected in the structure of our human body. The physical is a mirror of the non-physical: it is an expression of consciousness. Physiology and intelligence are different aspects of the same thing: matter is consciousness, physiology is intelligence. This became the basis of his first book, Human Physiology: Expression of Veda and the Vedic Literature. The overriding theme of this book is that “Consciousness,” as Dr Nader understood, “is all there is”.

This book was published in 1994. Maharishi was so pleased with the results of Dr Nader’s work that he wanted to honour him in an ancient, traditional way by awarding him his weight in gold. Four years after the book’s publication, Maharishi bestowed this award on Dr Nader at Maharishi Vedic University, Vlodrop, the Netherlands. The gold was given as a scientific award to support Dr Nader’s continued studies and research in human physiology, leading to his second book.

Ramayan In Human Physiology, which Dr Nader published in 2011, documents the correlation between the characters, relationships, locations, and events of the Valmiki Ramayana with the structures and functions of human physiology. Dr Nader’s study does not conclude that the Ramayana belongs to any one religion or race or belief system. Rather, the Ramayana is the story of natural law and how it unfolds in every individual and in the universe. Through his extensive research on consciousness, Dr Nader has discovered that the universe itself is a unified whole, a vast field of pure Being, a unified field, in which the endlessly diverse objects of our daily lives all give the illusion of being real on their own. “Planets and galaxies, leptons and quarks, muscles and genes, all appear to be independently real but, under closer scrutiny, turn out to be, as described in the quantum realm, condensations of the field.” Dr Nader’s studies and research help us to deepen our understanding of the scientific significance of the Veda, the timeless foundational expressions of the science of consciousness.

In 2015 Dr Nader founded the International Journal of Mathematics and Consciousness and is currently the chief editor for the journal. This journal is devoted to exploring the interface between consciousness and the physical world using the rigorous approach of mathematics. The correspondence between mathematics and nature is a principal tool of the modern scientific method. Discoveries such as complementarity and non-locality in quantum theory challenge our confidence that any mathematically described physical theory could ever perfectly correspond to physical reality; nonetheless, developments in mathematical physics have allowed us to understand nature with much greater precision than was available in past centuries and, on that basis, to develop powerfully effective technologies to improve our quality of life.

As Dr Tony Nader regularly reviews and writes for this journal, he actively encourages and invites all mathematicians, scientists, and thinkers to submit papers using a mathematical approach to consciousness and “consciousness at work” in all its aspects. As founder and editor-in-chief, Dr Nader has also offered a mathematical model for how the multiplicity of matter arises from a fundamental “singularity” or oneness of Transcendental Consciousness through the mechanism of consciousness knowing itself. “Logic is a framework that we can call a backbone structure of consciousness. Mathematics, for example makes universal sense because consciousness operates within that set framework of logic. Mathematics is a very subjective mental exercise. It is pure logic made formal by using well-defined symbols and assumptions. When logic is followed the conclusions are accurate, that is of course, when the original assumptions are accurate.”

To further elaborate on the knowledge he has gained and the nature of changing, “relative” aspect of existence and the non-changing “absolute” aspect - consciousness and its significance - Dr Nader has written another fascinating book that is now in the process of being published.