Science, Vedas, and philosophy

This is an extract from my upcoming book on Vedic Theology, a chapter on Science, Vedas, and philosophy. Kindly provide feedback.

Science, Vedas, and philosophy

Big Bang Theory:

The Big bang theory postulates that once there was?an?infinitesimal point with infinite mass that then started expanding to create the expanding universe. The Vedas on the other hand, talk about and infinite body of the supreme personality of godhead lying down?in the causal ocean and from his bodily pores come universes since the body of Karanodakasayi Vishnu has infinite number of poles infinite number of universes come about as this Vishnu breeds in all the universes go back into his body and when this Vishnu breeds out all the universes become manifest. In a way this can be considered as a Big bang.?In this way, all science looks at the outcomes of physical phenomena. While the supreme personality of godhead is the causal force behind such physical phenomena. Modern philosophers sometimes contend that the entire universe is a quantum experiment and various physical phenomena are interacting. Even if someone took this approach, it is still possible to rationalize this approach with the Vedic understanding of manifesting and un-manifesting universes. Universes. Some scientists contend that the universe is constantly expanding. This can also be rationalized with?the Vedic understanding of the breathing in and breathing out of this Karanodakasayi Vishnu. So, there is not just one big bang but there are multiple big bangs happening simultaneously in the breathing out phase of the breadth of Bhagawan Vishnu. Almost everything that the modern science sees experiments and validates can be core the lens of the Vedas.

Life and consciousness:

The general thinking of scientists is that life comes from.?There are a number of experiments such as?the Miller Yuri experiment where the scientist combined ammonia water methane and hydrogen in sealed equipment to replicate the Earth's original atmosphere. Today this experiment is contested for a number of reasons as the Earth's original atmospheric composition may not be well known. In the early 20th century, the primordial soup model gained traction. Organic matter was exposed to energy in various forms of volcanoes and electrical storms which catalyzed chemical reactions and produce self-replicating molecules. What is not clear in this?argument is where did this organic matter come from??The Vedic understanding is that there is a person behind this creation. This person is an intelligent sentient being who controls producers develops and orchestrates the creation,?maintenance and destruction of the universe. It is not so difficult to understand this concept because for any physical product such as an automobile or an intellectual product like a software to operate, a computing system requires a person to brainstorm, think, develop and test the software. In the same way at a gigantic scale, we need somebody to imagine invent, conceptualize, develop and deploy the universe. Similarly, we can extend this argument to say that individual living entities like humans, animals, birds, reptiles, fish trees, grasses, bacteria, etc. Are designed, developed and deployed in individual bodies. Hence, our argument is that life comes from life, life does not come from matter, although it may appear so. ?

Source of consciousness:

So, if life came from life has discussed in the earlier paragraph, where did the consciousness within the life come from? From was it introduced prior to birth of a living entity in the womb during the birth or after the birth? This question has intrigued doctors. Gynecologists, scientists and the general population. Life is a gift and to be sentient is a pleasant experience for most. According to modern science, consciousness may be a product of interactions of the neurons in a person's brain. For lack of a better explanation that explanation of consciousness in the brain has taken a firm root in modern science and in the general population. However, the Vedic system describes consciousness has not coming from combination of matter or as a result of interactions of the neurons in a person's brain. If that were true, we could have developed computers with artificial consciousness. Since artificial intelligence uses a set of algorithms with an entry node, multiple middle layers and the final node, we could have replicated the human consciousness in these intermediate layers of a neural network to develop an artificial brain. Despite 40 years of research and big companies such as Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Amazon and Twitter allocating over a billion dollars each in research in this space, we have not seen any evidence that consciousness can be artificially built and also if it were even built that is still dependent on the flow of electricity in those artificial neural networks in order to sustain them. The moment there is a power loss, these algorithms no longer function either in the cash or in the RAM of a computer. Today we see an explosion of computing technologies such as docker containers, Kubernetes, open shift container platform, and many solutions that can facilitate the running of massively parallel algorithms. Despite all of this, we have not seen any evidence that we can replicate consciousness. Yes, we can replicate the decision-making capacity and capability of an individual in a specific domain such as supply chain, finance, fraud detection or military applications. However, when it comes to being sentient, no robot physical or virtual on-premise or in the cloud has been able to achieve consciousness. This is not to be pessimistic and derived the efforts of scientists around the world. What we are trying to highlight is that there are certain aspects of consciousness. Actually, many aspects of consciousness that are not material at all. Hence to replicate something non-material with a material technique is bound to fail. Arubindo, the spiritual teacher from Pondicherry India developed several models of consciousness based on the ancient Vedic scriptures. The bhakti Vedanta institute has conducted enormous research in this space. The founder Acharya of the international society of Krishna consciousness, has repeatedly said that consciousness is a symptom of the soul. The soul itself does not belong in the body. The soul does not even belong to this material. World of millions and billions of universes. The soul comes from outside the system. Just like a scientist who conducts an experiment is in general outside the experiment itself and conducts the research on a set of subjects commonly known as guinea pigs, The soul is outside the system and comes into the system from time to time due to a combination of reasons. When the soul comes into this system, the consciousness comes along with the soul. Because consciousness is a symptom of the soul. The soul may be deployed into a variety of bodies based on a concept of karma that we will discuss later. So once the soul comes into a specific body, it is governed by the limitations of the body. The soul wants to dash about at hundred miles an hour, however?the body will not allow such rapid pace given that the body is only capable of walking 10 miles an hour. When the same soul is placed in the body of a fast-running cheetah, it can run at a much faster pace. And the same soul when placed in the body of amoeba oblongata, it can only walk a millimeter or two in a day. Day. So, the soul has infinite potential and the soul has infinite consciousness. However, when it is trapped in a finite body, its ability becomes limited. Much of the spiritual process is about reclaiming that infinite capacity of that soul and eventually liberating the body from the confines of the severely limiting body within which the soul is currently trapped.

Evolution:

The most common theory for evolution is by that off Charles Darwin and English professor who traveled to certain islands and came up with the theory of evolution by piecing together various evidences collected over it 10 to 12?year duration. Charles Darwin was not filled with hubris. He acknowledged the fact that there are gaps in his theory and he was very humble about it. However, later scientists latch down to his theory as an absolute theory that cannot be questioned. Coupled with Joseph Mendel’s genetic theory, the scientist then referred to Darwin's theory as an absolute theory, something that cannot be questioned and something that needs to be taken at a face value. Darwin himself gave some examples of the missing link like the Java man and his inability to explain the complexity of the human eye and many other aspects that did not fit with his overall model. In his humility, Darwin did progress the frontiers of science. However, the thinking that Darwin's theory is the absolute finding of scientific achievement may not be the best approach to take. The Vedic knowledge talks about a different level of consciousness here. The consciousness carried by the soul is limited by the physical boundaries in which it is trapped. That is the physical body in which it is trapped. So, although the soul may have infinite consciousness when it is trapped in the body of a lizard, it cannot think like a human. The soul trapped in the body of a bacteria cannot think like that of a monkey which can peel a banana and eat it much to the amusement of the children watching it. Hence, we need to understand that there is a evolution of the soul not evolution of the body. There are 8.4 million species which have been documented by the scientist, give or take a few, and has the soul migrates from body to body. Body it's consciousness changes. So as the soul comes from body of a cow into body of a human, it’s consciousness has now suddenly expanded and even within human there are different species of humans. Not everybody is created equal. So, if somebody is in the lower level of intelligence which is suited for farm work or physical labor and in the next life the soul goes on to the body which has a higher level of consciousness of that of Albert Einstein. For instance, the soul now able to research and figure out more esoteric concepts compared to when it was trapped in the body of a farm boy. So essentially, we are talking about evolution of consciousness and not evolution of the body. This is the primary difference between the Vedic concept of evolution and the traditional Darwinian evolution.?