By Kesava Krsna Dasa
It will be difficult to challenge scientists on their own turf, in laboratories, in established equations and theories and other strongholds. But they can be exposed in areas of purpose where they say there is no purpose:
Atheistic Scientists Exposed, On Purpose
Scientists are fond of saying that there is no purpose to life, and yet they live their lives full of purpose. They like to marry and have children, and keep pets. They like to keep photographs of loved ones and they love their families, even though love is simply a chemical stimulant for them. Scientists have purposeful ambitions within a āpurposelessā world. They want to see purposeful improvement within human society while at the same time they say that determinism and sheer survival is the rule.
If and when they do get married, are they, as parents, going to say to their children, āI only apparently love you my child… .ā what sort of reaction would that generate? Will the same scientists as husbands say to their wives, āI only apparently love you too…ā If a slap is deserving for this lifeless opinion, then this slap is symptomatic of what happens in greater society. An unloved people within society receives the slap of scientific indifference.
Sometimes a scientist will suggest an abortion when an expectant mother knows she has a Downs Syndrome child yet to be born. In this case the scientist advocates purposeful termination of pregnancy in a world without purpose. Other scientists want population control and a reduction in human numbers. Why should this purpose be useful in a āpurposelessā world? At every moment atheistic scientists seek purpose on different levels of human society while advocating purposeless existence. Is this not hypocrisy? Is this not wanting to play a purposeful role as Gods and controllers in absence of a God they have eliminated?
Scientists are very human with ambitions, motivations, cheating propensities, faulty faculties, limited sensorial perceptions and the rest. Added to this they want purpose and behave with purpose. When purpose is eliminated from the meaning of life, this creates a vacuum for scientists to become those same purposeful Gods. People talk of religion being the opiate of the people but science is the opiate, in that it has an established hold on peopleās thought processes.
Scientists say that life is simply a miraculous, purposeless chance occurrence, yet they want to manipulate and create life with purpose. People forget that Artificial Intelligence creations of robots that could eventually control humans also have purposeful life origins in the same scientific creators. Scientists have political preferences just like everybody else, so when one group of communist scientists create perfect robots and capitalist scientists create their perfect robots, those robots will hate other perfectly ā perfect hatred in a world where hatred is a chemical ping. Doesnāt hatred induce purposeful activity?
Scientists are mainly after-the-fact specialists ā they observe physical phenomena, try to make sense of it, imitate it, and then add their names to it. Why purposefully add names for fame to discoveries if purpose has no meaning in life? What is the point of reputation in a purposeless existence? Atheistic scientists say that the will to survive is just apparent purpose, then why will scientists purposefully cherish and save the lives of their loved ones and pets if life is meaningless?
Scientists make huge proclamations on the origins of life which has no purpose than to exist, yet they scheme and purposefully plan to exterminate or prolong life. Scientists want to live and remain alive while saying there is point in simply being. Human emotions and experiences they say, are simply biochemical reactions and yet they use these to live and be loved by others. Why the need to be loved and respected if these subjective feelings are zero data buzzes?
In all of the above instances we can see hypocritical actions of atheistic mentalities. Atheistic scientists are stringently bound up in life coils as prisoners of life itself, but they pursue life with paradoxical purpose. The creations of scientists will also have purpose. There is purpose in every aspect of their being. They want to see, touch, smell, hear and taste all things related to purpose and life. This opiate has relative ease of access in clouding the minds of the masses who do not understand science. The one antidote for all such hypocrisy is the acceptance of CONSCIOUSNESS as being, and being to be. Yet Consciousness is not the final solution.
Consciousness Is Not The Solution, Alone
There are a number of materially credible individuals who champion the cause of consciousness. Among them are top scientists and writers. I listened to Graham Hancock who gave his take on life. Though it is encouraging to see him want a more humane world in which the phenomena of consciousness is accepted by science, he still panders to the supposed idea that conscious awareness simply popped up somehow, after man became anatomically modern some 40,00 years ago. This burst of consciousness is known as epiphenomenalism in some circles.
Mr Hancock admitted to bring stoned for around 16 hours a day for 24 years. During this time he wrote a number of books on ancient civilisations and other intriguing subjects. Hard-nosed scientists will hardly take him seriously, especially now that he claimed to have had an awakening from a Goddess who enlightened him while he was on an ayahuasca (hallucinogenic plant mixture found in the Amazon) trip.
Epiphenomenalism at least tries to explain the āemergenceā of consciousness. Presently, most scientists theorise that consciousness as we donāt know it, is a combined mass of data stored in neural processes in our brains. It is this mass, they say, that makes me and you consciously aware. This will seem illogical to us who are versed in Vedic concepts of the soul, but in the absence of detection of consciousness by scientific apparatus, what else can they come up with?
Not knowing what consciousness is ā and it remains one of the biggest mysteries in science ā they dare postulate on all theories that are incapable of handling conscious awareness, governed by blind chance. Srila Prabhupada was emphatic on wanting to expose these fallacies. How can we play our part if we ourselves are not scientists? Even top scientists who advocate consciousness have difficulty in being taken seriously. Present scientific theories are so grounded, so rigid, that it can only take a revolution to acknowledge consciousness as the living force of all that lives.
What can we do? We can point out that scientists themselves live lives full of conscious awareness and purpose. They in fact, know very little about the phenomenal world in which we live. Scientists do not even understand the properties and behaviour of water which confounds physical laws as they see them. What happens in physics at the sub-atomic level are further strange and mysterious occurrences that stupefy scientific observers. Should we be worried about this pervading lack for consciousness?
Srila Prabhupada identified the lack and its insidious effects on humanity. He knew that such conscious-less theories shape the type of society we live in and how people behave towards each other. It is of such importance. Now, if suppose a revolution in science does take place and consciousness is the new order of things, would that help to create a more humane world? Not necessarily. Demons such a Kamsa were aware of consciousness and the soul. Did this make him into a saint?
To acknowledge consciousness is the next step in scientific progress. A world of people believing in a soul for every living being can still be hell. People who believe in different Gods and deities might want to exterminate others who do not share their beliefs. Clearly, consciousness is not the solution to the ills of society alone. Everyone is still going to think, āIf we all simply believe in this, everything will be alright…ā Inevitably, questions will arise about trying to form a one-world religion and a one-world order to try to keep the peace. The world appears to be moving in this direction as alluded to by Srila Prabhupada in his Srimad Bhagavatam introduction. Before any order can be established, there will be messy human conflicts and geopolitical realignments. It all sounds very familiar.
Meanwhile, all we can do is try to use a medium that has the power to influence consciousness ā the holy name. This purpose can somehow create sufficient sukrti in others who will eventually see purpose to everything. This purpose is revolutionising thought processes in more people than we think. Whether we play scientists at their own game on their own turf or we expose conflicts of life interests in atheistic inferences, extra-dimensional spiritual sound can and will have an effect, through the Bhakti touch of compassion.
Ys Kesava Krsna Dasa
I genuinely enjoy when Kesava Krsna Prabhu writes on Dandavats, providing thought provoking items to stir up our hearts. Several things came to my mind. One incident took place in Mauritius the morning after a dangerous head on collision in which Srila Prabhupad, Brahmananda Prabhu and myself were passengers. The next morning Srila Prabhupad continued his routine by taking his morning walk on the beach with the two of us. One thing amongst others we talked about was Srila Prabhupad posing the question: “So what is wrong with the world?” I offered, “People are trying to enjoy”. Srila Prabhupad said, “No, it is natural that they want to enjoy. We are part of Krishna Who is the supreme enjoyer. But, they do not know how to enjoy”. Srila Prabhupad’s incite into reality is so wonderful.
So, now we have the examples of the mundaners, as I shall call them. Whether they are material scientists, material enjoyers, or even frustrated materialists of all kinds…their proposal for enjoyment has failed! Look at the results. Phalena pariciyate, just a thing by the results! People are unhappy, frustrated, unfulfilled enjoyers. Divorce, desparation, and depravity, with deception, the carrot held out before us, that if we can only reach the carrot, everything will be ok. Materialism has failed, and will always fail, because we are looking for enjoyment in the wrong places. Enjoyment is our right and our very nature, but it can never be achieved through self-centric materialism. Each individual is floating through matter, each considering themselves the enter of an illusory enjoying environment. The soul is the knower of the field (ksetra-jna) and
the field is the senses and mind (ksetra). And, we are in this matter, but we are not truly part of it. In the world but not of it! Hence, Srila Prabhupad repeatedly advised us, “Do not try to Lord over matter”.
It is not truly necessary to beat scientists at their own game. They first need to understand the playing field and the rules that they are dealing with. Common sense is a good start. Being able to observe your own condition and make sense of it is a good start. The second chapter of the Bhagavad Gita As It Is is a very, very good start.
If the intent of a person is to lord over matter, rather than to come to grips with the truth…it is like trying to awaken a person who is pretending to sleep. If one tries to awaken a person who is asleep, you can do it. But, if one is trying to awaken a person who is pretending to sleep, it is not possible. Compassi
on can only go so far, and even Krishna describes the four classes of people who will never surrender to Him: na mam duskritino mudha prapadyante naradhama… So, there are some nuts that cannot be cracked, and Krishna has given them the intelligence and lack of intelligence to remain fixed up in the material world.
Listen, I am not the best devotee, only an aspiring devotee, but I came to understand that preaching to and with the bhaktas is a joy…but preaching to the nondevotee community is a duty, if not an austerity. Only on the order of Sri Gurudeva, and not for self-aggrandizement. Lord Chaitanya chanted the Holy Names in public, but privately He was very selective about with whom He would associate. All Glories to Srila Prabhupad. Pusta Krishna das
I loved the freshness of this article and its boldness. Just the way Srila Prabhupad’s mood was — always bringing something fresh put in a bold way into the intellectually moldy West, caught up in the same circular debates. Srila Prabhupada truly brought us the precious gemstones of not only an ancient, genuine spiritual path, but also of a new way of thinking about science, for those who may not come directly to the temple. He wanted a scientific department for the study of the soul and I don’t think he was exaggerating at all.
I recently found books by a devotee which are doing the same kind of challenge, attacking the core of scientific theories using insights from the Bhagavata Sankhya of the Srimad Bhagavatam as presented by Srila Prabhupada. For instance, the book’s Godel’s Mistake (Ashish Dalela) dedication says: “Dedicated to His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, whose writings made me aware that numbers were useful constructs not just for counting objects but for counting even subjective aspects of our experience such as sensations, concepts and intentions.”
Indeed, in his other books, such as Sankhya and Science, Is the Apple Really Red? and Quantum Meaning, the author repeatedly makes the case, from various stances, that science not only doesn’t explain consciousness, but even sensations, meanings, thoughts, intentions or morals, which are not in themselves conscious entities. Because science only studies gross matter, science cannot even theoretically explain how it is possible for objects to refer to other objects in the form of symbols, such as how the meaning in a book describing reality can exist in the same reality. We might find these things very simple and intuitive in our everyday view of life, but theoretical science has no place for symbolism and meaning, just like Kesava Krishna prabhu was suggesting. And if we will accept the existence of meaning then — the author argues from chapter 6 onwards in Is the Apple Really Red?, — four supreme forms of consciousness will logically be necessitated (one that is outside space-time, one that is the origin of space time, one that is everywhere in space time and one that sequences the occurences in space-time — these correspond to the well-known Mahavishnu, Garbodhakasayi Vishnu, Ksirodakasayi Vishnu and Lord Sankarshan ).
In conclusion, I think Prabhupad’s books will not only revolutionize the current religous picture in the West, but it will also inspire a new revolution in science, in which meaning will have to be incorporated and Prabhupada’s dream of a department for the study of the soul at MIT will be realized.