Science and religion are often set one up against the other. But at their core, they point to the same reality: all the various forms of matter, including living organisms, are merely collapsible "in-carnations" ( em-bodiments) of energy. Energy sprouts into bodies or forms and relapses back into whence these were formed. Nothing comes into or goes out of this universe because nothing can - because there is nowhere beyond the universe to escape into. Life and death are thus meaningless phrases, since nothing can either be created or destroyed.Things, as both science and religion know, merely change forms.
Both science and religion agree on the existence of some order or 'Laws' (hukam) underlying this universe. God is nothing but the sum total of all these laws and all that is -hence nothing mysterious. That may be why men and women who have attained 'enlightenment' have generally laughed at the simplicity of their task once accomplished.
'God' is all that there is, and another name for all that there is, is cosmos. An inspired scientific insight is as much an act of 'enlightenment' as is a 'spiritual vision'. 'Kan kan main bhagwan' is translated into ' every particle is a universe in miniature form and is fired by the same energy.'
The Hindu system talked of billions of casements in human body opening into the vast, eternal reality; science talks of every centimeter in any form of matter, including the human or any other body, as a cluster of unvierses.
There is no place for God as a figurehead either in a mystical vision of truth or in science. Both however recognise the permanence and omniscience of Energy, though they address it with somewhat different nomenclatures. Both recognise the immortality of creation, and the mortality of forms. Death of forms is a cool fact; but forms die only into a 'whole' which is immortal. (Individual souls merge back with the universal spirit from which they seemed to have sprung. And even the springing forth is not separation because there is no seprate reality to spring into. The entire drama is play-acted witnin one, indivisble and unfathomable whole.
The distinction between science and reliigion is maintainable only throgh a distorted versions of both. Neither can afford to be snobbish towards the other. I think science and religion as pursuits of the same reality have no issues with each other, but their followers and students do sometimes seem to have. Unfortunately, their petty quarrels are carried out at he expense of the very truth they claim to pursue.
Comments: 1:
I thought the religious folks would ahve objected to such de-mystification of their concepts about what they call the "supernatural"....About your references to 'out of body experiences, telepathy etc, yes this is an area that requires more research. Religious thought need not be arrogant on this and science need not close its doors on further research into such phenomenon. And I seriously believe that science does not close its doors on anything.
Comments: 2: Believers in a scientific way of life must not allow their open-ness of mind to become a victim of prejudice against the place of religious thought in the progress of human intelligence. All that religion says need not be taken as a final statement on truth but must be viewed as tentative ploddings of the human mind into the zone of knowledge. Much that many religions profess is just a bunch of nonsense, but there is much else which is highly valuable as an attempt to make sense of this universe and life. There is no need to reject the entire body of religious thought on the basis of errors committed in its path of progress; that would be a highly unscientific approach. And when I tried to reduce something as supernatural as God to something as simple and explainable as energy, I thought the followers of faiths rather than the students of science would have objected. I still believe that religion represents man's first attempt to make sense of the world around him. It may not have been a totally successful attempt but it went a long way in underlining the need for a unified ( theory?) system of thought to comprehend the universe in which we live. Science and religion at their core are marked by humility, but the same could not be said about all the followers of these two approaches that represent a single urge: the urge to understand the universe.
(Sammy Gill: ..."There is no place for God as a figurehead either in a mystical vision of truth or in science. Both however recognise the permanence and omniscience of Energy, though they address it with somewhat different nomenclatures. Both recognise the immortality of creation, and the mortality of forms. Death of forms is a cool fact; but forms die only into a 'whole' which is immortal. ..." ( The following statement is in brackets and is a reference to what religion professes...) I thought the religious folks would have objected to such de-mystification of their concepts about what they call the "supernatural"....About your references to 'out of body experiences, telepathy etc, yes this is an area that requires more research. Religious thought need not be arrogant on this and science need not close its doors on further research into such phenomenon. And I seriously believe that science does not close its doors on anything, including the mysteries of the universe. The last word is yet to be heard. But before that, one that can be safely avoided is a needless haste to prove that only religion or only science has all the answers. Persisting with such haste would itself be unscientific - and even irreligious.Believers in a scientific way of life must not allow their open-ness of mind to become a victim of prejudice against the place of religious thought in the progress of human intelligence. All that religion says need not be taken as a final statement on truth but must be viewed as tentative ploddings of the human mind into the zone of knowledge. Much that many religions profess is just a bunch of nonsense, but there is much else which is highly valuable as an attempt to make sense of this universe and life. There is no need to reject the entire body of religious thought on the basis of errors committed in its path of progress; that would be a highly unscientific approach. And when I tried to reduce something as supernatural as God to something as simple and explainable as energy, I thought the followers of faiths rather than the students of science would have objected. I still believe that religion represents man's first attempt to make sense of the world around him. It may not have been a totally successful attempt but it went a long way in underlining the need for a unified ( theory?) system of thought to comprehend the universe in which we live. Science and religion at their core are marked by humility, but the same could not be said about all the followers of these two approaches that represent a single urge: the urge to understand the universe.
Comments 3: To Mohindra Singh: Your grasp of science is way better than mine. I am attempting only a 'tentative' reconciliation between two seemingly opposite disciplines. If you seriously believe these must be treated as inimical to each other, I have no issues. But, no, my idea of reincarnation is not the immortality of a single unit in creation, as is commonly understood. I DO NOT believe in the immortality of individual souls or persons. I pretty much subscribe to the view that once dissolved, the entity known as 'person' ceases to be. I was only referring to the immortality of what science calls energy and religion sometimes refers to as "universal spirit'. I see neither energy nor universal spirit, except as expressed in some form of active or latent force. Again, I thought opposition to these ideas would have come from those who profess a faith in the immortality of individual souls - the followers of the Pharaohs. I do not believe in such immortality, though I am willing to be proved wrong. I am also not comfortable with the evidence on the phenomenon known as 'rebirths'. This - along with some other similarly intriguing phenomena - need to be looked at closely and their claims be either conclusively rejected or conclusively proved. Personally, I have not yet met anyone who remembers his previous life nor have I met anyone who may have met someone who did remember. Yet, I am not closing my mind on the possibility. I need more evidence to make up my mind either way. In sum, I lean towards a scientific explanation of universe but do not see in this a conflict with the possibility of a different layer of existence. I have strong faith in the ability of science to reveal to us the final truths about universe and our place in it. That hasn't happened yet -- as some of the greatest scientific minds have gracefully conceded -- but science is a self-correcting and self-updating exercise. It can not be dismissive of any claims till these are conclusively disproved just as it can not be absolutely certain of anything until that has been conclusively proved..
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