Embryo development and the arrival of gandhabba

Are you sure? There seems to be a lot of information on the web concerning IVF twins, but maybe you have a better filter than I for looking through these results. I’m hardly an expert.

Yes, IFV is a common method.

This is not intentional.

Multiple transfers also done to select them after implant to reduce unexpected twinning.
This twinning may be occuring due mechanical injuries in the process.

Since, they transfer several embryos that might also result non-identical twins. (This technique can be used to get twins.)
Please read the article…

Looking for some clarification here…
Can someone explain to me the meaning of “two consciousnesses”? I understand consciousness to be an element akin to earth, water, etc.: in which case I could see two portions or allotments of consciousness, but not two consciousnesses.
Grammatically speaking, it’d be like the difference in English (and I noticed that the original author is not a native English speaker, but Bhante Sujato seems to have co-signed it) between uncountable and uncountable nouns: i.e., the difference between stuff and things. For example: two bowls of oatmeal vs. two apples. Oatmeal is originally just one mass of stuff that may later have some portion of it placed into a vessel; an apple was always that individuated apple for the duration of its existence. Maybe it sounds like semantics; but this sounds dangerously close to the Sati the Fisherman heresy to my ears, and I would have to differentiate between the two.
Additionally, it seems to me that oatmeal, being an undifferentiated mass, could be instantly apportioned out into however many shares one wished (a la the planariae example), while an apple sliced in two will never become two apples. Take that for what it’s worth.

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I am a native speaker of English (well, since I was 5) and I would consider consciousnesses a correct pluralization, for what it’s worth.

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But there is a third class to which I think the word ‘consciousness’ probably belongs: nouns that are countable when used in one sense but not countable when used in another sense. Like ‘life’, for example. We can pluralize the sentence, “One life was lost”, without committing any solecism, but we can’t do it with the sentence, “Life is fun”.

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Embryo is namarupa ? I wonder how come no one notice ! ? Or no one care to explain . Does an embryo has feeling perception volition contact attention Yet ?
According to the text nama is feeling perception volition contact attention .

@Coemgenu and @Dhammanando,

Indeed. And I just thought of another English example, “fire,” which can be both countable and uncountable; and, more to the point, is, along with consciousness, one of the six elements.

But the grammaticalness of the word consciousnesses aside, I am looking more at the dhamma- or adhamma-ness of the idea of individuated beings (for that is what gandhabas are) entering into (or being “placed” into) a embryos in connection with conception and/or gestation; and if that was in fact what was meant by

Conflation of gandhabbas and re-incarnating, several consciousnesses is attested in the canon, as I remember, and was considered a heresy. That’s why I am asking for clarification on what the original poster of this otherwise fascinating thread meant.

In Vibjangasutta, viññāṇa defined as,
“Katamañca, bhikkhave, viññāṇaṃ? Chayime, bhikkhave, viññāṇakāyā – cakkhuviññāṇaṃ, sotaviññāṇaṃ, ghānaviññāṇaṃ, jivhāviññāṇaṃ, kāyaviññāṇaṃ, manoviññāṇaṃ. Idaṃ vuccati, bhikkhave, viññāṇaṃ.
Translated as,
“And what, bhikkhus, is consciousness? There are these six classes of consciousness: eye-consciousness, ear-consciousness, nose-consciousness, tongue-consciousness, body-consciousness, mind-consciousness. This is called consciousness."

In mahāvedallasutta viññāṇa defined as,
“‘viññāṇaṃ viññāṇa’nti, āvuso, vuccati. Kittāvatā nu kho, āvuso, viññāṇanti vuccatī”ti?
“‘vijānāti vijānātī’ti kho, āvuso, tasmā viññāṇanti vuccati.
“Kiñca vijānāti? Sukhantipi vijānāti, dukkhantipi vijānāti, adukkhamasukhantipi vijānāti. ‘Vijānāti vijānātī’ti kho, āvuso, tasmā viññāṇanti vuccatī”ti.
Translated to english,
“Your reverence, it is called ‘Discriminative consciousness, discriminative consciousness.’ Now in what respects, your reverence, is it called ‘discriminative consciousness’?” “Your reverence, if it said ‘It discriminates, it discriminates,’ it is therefore called discriminative consciousness. And what does it discriminate? It discriminates pleasure and it discriminates pain and it discriminates neither pain nor pleasure. If it is said ‘It discriminates, it discriminates,’ your reverence, therefore it is called ‘Discriminative consciousness.’”
Mahavedallasutta

Please read this story,

Samuel Alexander Armas (born December 2, 1999) is the child shown in a famous photograph by Michael Clancy, dubbed the Hand of Hope

Samuel Armas
Samuel_Armas_Aug19_1999

As the OP identifies the gandhabba with the paṭisandhi-viññāṇa, which is conceived as a very ephemeral entity, I doubt he has in mind anything like the quasi-eternal viññāṇa concept of Sāti Kevaṭṭaputta.

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With ignorance as its conditions there arises sankhara , consciousness , (Embryo) ?! Six sense base , contact , feeling , craving …

Consciousness First , then Embryo comes into existence !?

Do you think, fetus has no ignorance? Perhaps a state where he or she has less amout of evil (klesha) but that doesn’t mean he is not ignorant.
There is a sutta where, The Blessed One take a baby to compare wrong view,

A young tender infant lying prone does not even have the notion ‘sensual pleasures,’ so how could sensual desire arise in him? Yet the underlying tendency to sensual lust lies within him.
The Greater Discourse to Mālunkyāputta

Venerable , the problem lies in , Embryo has not come into being , where does the consciousness comes from ?

The Blessed One explained the birth (jāti), is not the emergence of a baby or other young from the body of its mother, but 1st thought or viññāṇa associated with kāya of this life (fetus).
This is explained in vinaya regarding the age for upasampadā ordaination.
Gabbhavīsūpasampadānujānanā

I am afraid that doesn’t answer the question . The first consciousness was a mistaken concept . Consciousness can’t be in existence if depart from the other four aggregates . And six classes of consciousness function simultaneously .

Please, read mahanidanasutta

Venerable , I would regard this as late concept , an addition to the text .
That contradict the dependent origination principle . Apart from the four aggregates there are no consciousness to be found .
How does the meditator contemplate on the process of dependent origination if namarupa taken as embryo !?
Anyway , I hope if possible to think outside the box for a while .

Regards

Dependent origination principle happens every single moment in a continuous. Its not worng if someone says that you die every moment.
Cittantaro ayaṃ, bhikkhave, macco.
Karajakāyasuttaṃ

The process never stops, who ever, where ever you are, even when a being in the womb share the same nature.

Can anyone help me with what are the practical implications of all this discussion to one’s development of the path? :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

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This type of discussions help you to feed your mind when curiosity plays arround and wanders, nothing else to my knowledge.

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