Summary (of "Question", "braHmavid=Krishna?" series of mails)

[Kiran B R]

Dear Roger and group,

I believe that there is no such thing as a conflict
between science and religion. All such conflicts exist
only because of a communication-gap between the two
camps.

Science is a study in maayaa of maayaa. Every time it
progresses, science uncovers more and more of maayaa.
I often liken a new discovery in science to the
opening of a new door in an infinity of doors. Some
scientists go ahead thinking that there aren't really
an infinite number of doors, while some others go
ahead because opening every new door gives them some
kind of a kick, and money too.

When science cannot open a door (for whatever reason),
it tends to humour itself with probabilities. Since
current physics cannot tell why an electron seems to
be spinning "up" or "down" according to its own will,
it humours itself with Quantum Mechanics, which
postulates that subatomic particles are unpredictable.
Only a handful continue to ask what causes such
unpredictable behaviour. The rest roll up their
shoulders and fool governments to fund them, having
convinced them that banks will be looted otherwise.

Thus, Roger, it is untrue that science only occupies
itself with deterministic or repeatable events. If I
can run 100m in 2s one day, science will never forget
it. If Hailey had forgotten the famous comet, there
wouldn't have been a Hailey's comet which appears once
in 75 (?) years. Science takes note of
non-deterministic events, observes them over a long
period of time, and applies to governments for money.

Jaldhar made an observation in an earlier mail, which
is worth recollecting here. He observed that even
though this whole universe is a maayaa, its seems to
be the SAME for all of us! That is, maayaa seems to be
following a set of laws which hold irrespective of
colour or creed or caste or sex. Now these laws (which
are nothing but observations), never seem to change.
For instance (oh not again!!!!!!!), water never
freezes on boiling.

WHY? Why doesn't this
water-boils-and-not-freezes-on-heating-law never
change?

No scientist has the answer to this. Science is still
trying, and convincing governments for funding. It can
bury us in further details of the process of boiling
which it observes, but there ultimately remain more
doors to be opened, because it is an infinity of doors
out there!

Religion, on the other hand, has an answer to this.
Almost every religion says water does not freeze on
boiling because Ishvara hasn't willed otherwise yet!
An avatAra hasn't willed otherwise yet!

Advaita makes it easy. It takes your mind away from
trivial things like water and boiling. It says "Cut
it! What is there in water and what is there in
boiling or freezing? Trivial material things they are!
I will show you that which water cannot dampen and
that which can neither boil nor freeze, that which is
all pervading and actionless and of the nature of
existence, knowledge and bliss, which is nothing but
thee!"

I say, "Hey, gee, thanks, but errrr...ahem...wait a
minute, wait a minute! I think we're forgetting
something!"

The Advaitin says "No, you're not forgetting anything,
it is all thy Self!"

To which I say, "That's really cool! Since it is all
my Self, can I turn these trivial things around so
that water freezes when I boil it? Can I?"

And man, we have some emails! Did I say in some mail
that my faith in Advaita (which exceeds my faith in
anything else) will vanish if I can't be convinced
that I can indeed turn "these trivial things" around?

:-)
Kiran


--- Roger Floyd <Slowfork at AOL.COM> wrote:
> Dear Jagannath and group
>
> Namaskar
>
> Please forgive the uncompleted state of my last
> email. I had to attend to
> other business half way through writing it and
> inadvertantly posted it,
> unfinished, when I returned to the computer.
>
> You are of course right about the relevance of
> practice to resolving these
> issues - the more practice, the deeper the insights.
>
> The conflict of world-views that I referred to in
> respect of Kiran's
> questions arises out of  the refusal of  Science a
> priori to countenance
> miracles. Its explanations must, as a matter of
> principle, exclude the
> miraculous. By a miracle I mean the intervention  of
> a divine hand (or indeed
> any kind of supernatural hand) in ordering the
> world. Let us suppose, for the
> sake of example, that Kiran did one day run 100m in
> 2s. What would be the
> attitude of Science to this? By "Science" I mean the
> scientific community. It
> would say,"OK Kiran let us see you do it again". If
> he could not, Science
> would respond with a "Sorry Kiran, I only deal in
> repeatable phenomena". It
> would resort to fraud or hoax as an explanation of
> his performance and
> rapidly lose interest in the affair. On the other
> hand suppose that Kiran
> could repeat his run to order. Science would now
> take a serious interest in
> the matter but would it admit that a miracle had
> occured? Not a bit of it.
> Instead it would try to encompass the 100m-in-2s run
> in a new broader
> world-view consistent with known phenomena. To put
> it another way, according
> to Science the laws of nature are never suspended or
> broken. On occasion
> however they may prove to be inadequate in which
> case they are replaced with
> new more encompassing laws. Under no circumstances
> does it allow of miracles
> (if it did, it would cease to be Science). In this
> sense there is a conflict
> between Science and Religion (or at least religion
> which admits of the
> miraculous).
>
> Hari Om
>
> Roger
>


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