Direction of Science....work in London

[Guest guest]

Dear List members

 

Let me share my experience of the work in London.

 

Today was the start of a new and interesting phase.

 

I had asked one of the youngsters at Brunel University to

arrange for me to give a talk to his engineering faculty on

'Future direction of Science'. I had specified that the title

should not mention words like 'religion, spirituality or

Hinduism' : ) That talk took place today.

 

There were about 10 people present (mostly doing

postgraduate work in engineering).

 

At some stage I have to take on the science community.

My real contribution has to come in the field of 'Science

and Spirituality'.

 

No doubt, I will meet a lot of resistance from the hard-headed

scientists who will never tolerate intrusion in their field by anything

that remotely sounds mystical, or spiritual. Today I had a taste

of what is to come.

 

Today the resistance I encountered was from the following

lobbies.

 

(1) A strongly materialistic lobby that somehow thinks

that findings of quantum mechanics etc are just a temporary

interruption to a further materialistic interpretation of reality.

I responded that " This however is not possible - Science has

entered a new era where explaining reality in terms of material

objects is strictly impossible " -quoting Heisenberg.

So this reaction can be classed as trivial

(just reflecting a lack of real understanding of quantum

mechanics by some in the audience).

 

(2) At the mention of the word 'spirituality' there was another lobby

that was up in arms (this included the head of the department)

against the idea of a creator God...

I had to quickly cut in saying --I am not here to defend a

Judeo-Christian Creator God. I am drawing on an ancient

Hindu philosophy called Samkhya which does not entertain

the concept of 'God' but emphasises 'existence'.

 

The head of the department asked:

Then you are proposing a theory of 'existence' rather than

theory of God?....... I said yes, in this Hindu philosophy 'existence'

is elevated to the status of the ultimate and hence the question:

" Does God exist? " becomes meaningless -as it would translate as

does existence exist?

 

Today's experience was very fruitful. I am beginning to enjoy

this development. From now on my talks at Universities will

focus on themes from Modern Sciences like:

 

(1) What is Quantum Mechanics?

(2) Consciousness in neuroscience

(3) Theory of evolution

 

Will keep the list posted on how this develops : )

 

jay

Vivekananda Centre London