This is the story: Three travelers are going down a road in the desert. One is an experienced desert explorer. One is a novice. A third is wearing polarized sunglasses. The novice sees water in the road ahead and thinks it’s real. The experienced traveler instantly recognizes this as a mirage. The person wearing polarized sunglasses doesn’t see any water.

One of Jay’s points is that the person who doesn’t see any water would not be the wise, enlightened being. An enlightened person SEES relative reality, but recognizes it as not inherently real. So, the person with the sunglasses is just a consumer idiot with expensive sunglasses — totally out of it. The novice is “us” with our ordinary dualistic consciousness perceiving our conventional world. It’s the person who sees both who is the wise one here.

Remember the definition of consciousness is: that which is aware of objects.

Therefore, Consciousness is inherently dualistic.

Mind Only philosophy was developed by Vasubandu as a further refinement of Madhyamaka philosophy to specifically address this dualistic polarity between what is perceived as an objective world ‘out there’ and the subjective mind or consciousness perceiving it. According to this description, all things have three natures which co-exist.

In the story, the ‘mirage’ is the Imaginary Nature. Now, all things/objects perceived ‘out there’ as independly existing, real things are ‘mirages’ or ‘hallucinations’ but the fact that it’s a real ‘mirage’ makes this clearer. The Dependent Nature refers to the fact that the appearance is dependent upon a subjective consciousness perceiving it. The True Nature, or as Jay puts it, the Consumate Nature, is the actual non-existence of this duality described by Vasubandu in positive terms, i.e. the nonreality of duality REALLY EXISTS!!! These apparent things which mascarade as independent phenomena, this nonexistence of apparent reality, is the Consumate or True Nature that all phenomena have.

In our little story, on the subjective side, the one who is fully accomplished intellectually and meditatively — and recognizes the false aspect of relative reality (our experienced desert traveler) represents the subjective aspect of the True Nature and the True Nature on the objective side is the (mirage) which has been thoroughly analyzed and understood.

Nagarjuna’s (negative) definition of Emptiness: Emptiness == lack of essence
Vaubandu’s (positive) definition of Emptiness: Emptiness == lack of subject/object duality, and this REALLY EXISTS.