God, Universe and everything between them – Part II

 

Light-Darkness…Morning-Night…Living-Non-living…Life-Death….happiness-sadness…Hope-despair…Male-Female…God-Devil…Angels-Demons…Real-Virtual…Positive-Negative…Matter-Vacuum…Outer-Inner…Action-Reaction…etc. Do you know what is similar in all these pair of words? They are ‘Opposites’.

Newton’s third law status that for every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction; which means that for every action there should and will exist an equal reaction but against the direction of action.

In 535 BC a Greek Philosopher named Heraclitus put forward the theory of “Unity of Opposites”. According to him every object co-instantiates at least one pair of opposites (though not necessarily in simultaneously) and every pair of opposites is co-instantiated in at least one object. He believed that the Universe underwent continuous change and this change was due to the presence of Opposites in Matter.

Scientists in recent times have proved that every Matter has corresponding antimatter associated to it and when this antimatter comes in contact with matter, it annihilates.  Annihilation was coined from a Latin word “nihil” meaning “Nothing”. Hence Annihilation is defined as “the total destruction of an object” or “to make Something into Nothing”. This also shows the possibility of existence of the reverse, i.e., Matter and anti-matter were created from Nothing. This reverse concept has not been proved yet but still it holds good position to be researched.

Consider this possibility that we are all “Matter” and there exists an “Anti-matter” associated to us and when we meet with our “Anti-matter” we get converted into “Nothing” or we just disappear. I have been thinking about this for a long time and whenever this thought comes into my brain I feel awe struck. I just think….“is there a philosophical meaning attached to this?”. There has always been arguments with scientists and theologists over the Origin of Universe and therefore theologists must have mention about the “Anti-matter” somewhere, somehow sometime…but where, how and when?

Is annihilation equal to “Salvation”? If Salvation is annihilation and if I am the matter, then what is that anti-matter that would convert me into Nothingness? According to the definition of anti-matter, “it is the same as that of matter except for it’s opposite state”; in this case what is that which is related to me but exists in a different state? An Opposite? Salvation may also be called "deliverance" or "redemption" from deeds and its effects. A matter can never be stable, it constantly undergoes changes and so its always under cause and effect. A matter can only be stopped by making it come in contact with it’s antimatter. In that case, deeds (good or bad) are nothing but man’s actions. When man gets salvation he is redeemed off his actions or their effects. One of the most powerful word that theologists hold is the “Salvation” and different religions have their own deferent believes over it.  Let me show you few facts before is start my discourse.  

Let me tell you about the evolution of Faith and Religion of mankind. The oldest religion ever know was the ‘Hinduism’.  The current version of what majority of people consider as ‘Hinduism’ is not actually what it was. The word ‘Hindu’ is derived from the Sanskrit   word Sindhu, the historic local appellation for the Indus River in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent. The word Hindu was first used by Arab invaders and then went further west by the Arabic term al-Hind referring to the land of the people who live across river Indus. ‘Indus Valley civilization’ is the ‘Bronze Age civilization’ which is the Oldest civilization ever recorded and dates to about 3300–1300 BCE that was located in the northwestern region of the Indian Subcontinent. 

Not only this but just imagine that 5000 years before the current age, man followed principles of Nature and what ‘knowledge’ he acquired was then written down in ‘Sanskrit’ (Devanagari script) which is again the oldest know language. ‘Knowledge’ in Sanskrit is known as ‘Vedas’. The first Text that consists of about 1,028 Vedic Sanskrit hymns and 10,600 verses in all, organized into ten books, in Sanskrit called as ‘Mandalas’ was the ‘Rig Veda’. Later other Vedas and Upanishads were written. Next to Rig Veda was the ‘Yajurveda’ then ‘Samaveda’ and the last was the ‘Atarvanaveda’.  Each text consists of poetic praises of the four elements of Nature (Lord of Wind (Air) ‘Indra’; Lord of Rain (Water) ‘Varuna’, Agni (Fire) and ‘Soma’  (Earth) (‘Sau-ma’ in Sanskrit which means to drink the juice by pressing the stalk of a plant. ) Maybe the implied meaning is that which grows from ‘Earth’.

Earth, Fire, Water and Air are the four elements that are of utmost importance for mere existence of life. These Vedas were written by great people having intellectual powers. They were so close to nature and they perceived thing in a much higher spiritual levels. They personified nature, so as to make the layman understand ‘spirituality’ in simpler terms giving rise to different ‘Powerful Men’ ruling different elements of nature in different forms. As ages passed, these concepts started taking different stand. Man forgot what Vedas intend to tell and they only held on to the image created by it., ‘Super Natural Men’ ruling nature and all the elements of nature. Thereby different God’s and forms, idol worship came into existence. But, the real essence of Vedas are now known only to the ‘Spiritually enlightened’ men. Vedas declare that Life and the universe itself came from the powerful source the “Shakthi” (Energy in English).  This Energy is responsible for all that which exists and that which doesn’t exists. This energy gives rise to Good-bad, real-virtual, existing-non existing, everything-nothing….actions and their effects and causes. Everything includes ‘Man’ also. This energy exists as “Athma” (Soul/Self/Spirit) in us. We will realize that we are one with the Nature and the Energy one with us when our “Athma” annihilates (Moksha or self realization) with the “Shakthi” (In other terms also called as ‘Parham - Athma’).   It is said that “Eko devah sarva Bhutantaratma" which means one God who dwells in everything. Which in broad sense means that ‘God’ is nothing but Energy and this is what that has caused the existence of everything, which means again that the existence of the universe.  Other Religions have also pointed to the same oneness but in different versions and languages and believes. All that we hear now and believe now may not be coherent to what it was actually intended to be. 

Hence, Science and Religion are two different paths leading to the same quest.

God, Universe and everything between them – Part I

Whenever I look at the stars they make me feel very happy. More than making me feel happy, they also make me wonder about many things. I look and admire at the stars but likewise will they be able to look back at me over this vast distance? Am I not just a tiny grain of sand in this Earth?

I am just a living organism, living in mere less than 600 sq feet of land on Earth which is about 510,072,000 km2 in area and is only the fifth largest of the 8 planets of our Solar System which in turn has planets ranging to about more than 50 AU (an AU is equal to 149,597,870.7 km) from the Sun. I won’t feel surprised if your getting Goosebumps now. If you haven’t got it yet, you’ll get it now. Solar System is like just a baby in our Milky Way galaxy which contains about 200-400 billion stars and is estimated to have at least 50 billion planets, 500 million of which could be located in the habitable zone of their parent star. Hold on your breath, The Milky Way is not the only one left to mention, it has its own family, the Local Group of galaxies and Milky Way is one of around 200 billion galaxies in the observable universe.  I can feel my head go whirling now. Ohooooo…..gee whiz!!

‘Universe’ by itself is the most mysterious of all and many scientists are still working to uncover it. Theologists believe that “God” created the universe; But, how will they prove the existence of “God”? There has been constant tug of war between Scientists and theologists regarding the Origin and existence of Universe. There have also been many theories form both the sides but non have been able to completely prove themselves in this regards. Some believe that both scientists and theologists are trying to prove the same thing.

Johannes Scotus Eriugena a medieval philosopher and theologian defined ‘Universe’ as ‘Everything’; “everything that is created and everything that is not created”. Time is not considered in Eriugena's definition; thus, his definition includes everything that exists, has existed and will exist, as well as everything that does not exist, has never existed and will never exist.”

The same thing has been retold scientifically in ‘Path-Integral Formulation’ of Feynman in Quantum Physics,

“The probability amplitudes for the various outcomes of an experiment gives a perfectly defined initial state of the system are determined by summing over all possible paths by which the system could progress from the initial to final state. Naturally, an experiment can have only one outcome”

In simple words something that exists is complemented by even the once that does not exists or even in more simple terms, Universe was created by and from nothingness.  

Let us look at what theologists say, “God is the supreme being, who has created all Matter and he is the source of all energy. He governs the world with is power and facilitates all life activities.” When we further dig into religions we find that “God” is perceived as a “Human” having extraordinary or superlative powers who can create, protect and destroy things. I would like to take you thousands of years behind, when religions did not exists and there were no telescopes to see the outer space. Man during that time lived in harmony with nature. He believed that nature by itself is powerful. Man “feared and worshiped” nature and he considered himself to be just a trivial being compared to Natures Majesty, these people were called “Pantheists”. Pantheist is a one who believed Nature and God are identical. The word is derived from “Greek” word πάν(pan) meaning “all” and θέόs(theos) meaning “God” in the sense of theism. Over ages, man evolved and started dominating the Nature. He started building his own philosophies for Truth of Universe and considered himself as a being capable of controlling all nature. Different believes and religions started to spring and few of the most prominent religions are Abraham’s religion (Judaism, Christianity), Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism etc. out of these Hinduism is the most ancient religion which has Pantheistic ideologies. Each religion had their own version of the Origin of Universe and Form and Presence of God as the Supreme being ruling over the universe. 

Belief is knowledge if the belief is true, and if the believer has a justification for believing it is true. Scientists work towards knowledge more than just believing in what is told. Scientists have done lot of research and had proposed many theories based on the formation of the Universe. Georges Lemaître a scientist put forward a theory which latter was called as the “Big Bang” theory. According to this theory Universe at beginning was a extremely hot and dense mass of matter which later exploded (hence the name Big Bang). The exploded parts of the matter broke from the parent mass and started receding away from it due to the intensity of the blast, this lead to the theory of expanding Universe. The age of the universe is 13.75 ± 0.11 billion years (433.6 x 1015 seconds in SI units, or 13.75 Gigayears) within the Lambda-CDM concordance model. This is however only the estimated time since the Big Bang.  Still researchers are trying to find out how That Hot matter which such magnificent density was created. Quantum mechanics is playing a significant part in finding out this. From macro physics scientists have moved towards the study of the micro physics; composition of matter, structure of nucleus, elementary particles, symmetry and so on. As of now, Scientists have found that The universe appears to behave in a manner that regularly follows a set of physical laws and physical constants. According to the prevailing Standard Model of physics, all matter is composed of three generations of leptons and quarks, both of which are fermions. These elementary particles interact via at most three fundamental interactions: the electroweak interaction which includes electromagnetism and the weak nuclear force; the strong nuclear force described by quantum chromodynamics; and gravity, which is best described at present by general relativity.

Scientists and theologists are still warring on each other but who’s theory is true, this only time will show us, until then ill keep enjoying the Mystery in which am living, the magnificent ‘Universe’.

'Anything and Everything including Nothing'

 

Right from how life springs from the fusion of a needle shaped sperm as small as having head of about 5 µm(micrometer, which is 1/1000 of a millimeter, or 0.001mm ) by 3 µm and a tail of 41 µm length with the ovum of size 120µm which then grows into a fetus, then comes out of the mother’s womb as a baby, grows up stage by stage with all it’s physical and mental developments and till it gives up the body during death; natures enigmatic works are proven time and again. Not only this but in every field like, Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, Geology, Geography, catastrophes, theology, spirituality etc., many philosophers, scientists and religious people are still befuddled before the magnitude of Nature’s mysteries. Every answer to nature’s mystery gives rise to couple of more baffling questions. Human mind by itself is a wonder. Why some things happen, who had planned it and how was it planed are still some of the prominent unanswered questions. Religious people declare that these are the handiworks of the “Supernatural being”, while scientists argue against it. Am here, not to take any sides but to exult and admire mysteries as they are. It brings me Goosebumps to even think that am also a part of this wonderful nature., a master piece so unique. This blog is dedicated to the Nature’s Enigma and to all the baffling questions that have triggered the neocortex of my brain which consists of about a half-million of neocortex columns (diameter of about 0.5 mm and a depth of 2 mm), each of which further contains approximately 60,000 neurons.