Science is the biggest enterprise that man ever created. Of all the living things on this planet, man is the only one that seems to have started thinking about how this world works. To understand that he started this new venture, called Science, which was originally meant just to understand how this world works. Some exceptionally brilliant minds did accidentally stumble upon some understanding of the world’s laws like gravity, buoyancy, and others in the west while Indian sages had realised this much earlier.

Next step was to find out how the world works by doing some experiments. That was the stage when the Churches started obstructing “Science” as this kind of scientific enquiry, the Church felt, might interfere with religious beliefs. That is where the first conflict between religion and science started. The fall out was that scientists subconsciously developed an aversion to the God concept in religion and thus God was kept out of the scientific realm.Let us, therefore, think from now on. Science, then, was more of a hobby for the well to do. The leading lights of that generation were Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein. There were a host of others but less illustrious than these two. Newton’s Laws of deterministic predictability and Einstein’s laws of relativity together founded a world view of “space-time” constraints where everything else out with this space time module was rejected. Their followers tried to split an atom to study subatomic particles, which in itself was another big business resulting in the atomic bomb! According to the space-time world view, the speed of light is the fastest.

When this group had some confusion they would call for a Copenhagen Conference where the problems would be discussed and “settled”! Their Nobel Prizes and Royal Society Fellowships made them arrogant. Buoyed up by the successful technological advances of their initial scientific achievements like the aeroplane, communications’ facilities, infrastructure, industrial growth, atom bomb, space travel, weapons of mass destruction, hi-tech medical quick-fixes etc, scientists became money-wise. This scientific world view makes man very arrogant with some scientific authority. They are bound to sell their souls for money, which in fact, is a sordid boon. Evolution was said to be genetic based on Darwin-Mendel hypothesis forgetting the vital role environment plays on evolution, initially put forward by Lamarck. New Evolutionary biologists like Elisabet Sahtouris have tried to revolutionise evolutionary biology where the world view is totally new.

Some thinking physicists started wondering about the behaviour of subatomic particles not confined to space-time constraints. The particle wave distinction also died down gradually when they could easily discern that both the waves and particles are but two sides of the same coin. Science took a quantum jump into this new field of quantum physics which has created a new world view coming closer to reality compared to the old “Space-Time conundrum.” For a novice, it is a bit confusing as this new world view is more of a possibility than actuality, coming into view only when we look at it.

However, no more doubt remains as most of the new concepts are proven by experimentation. It is a new revolution in what had been the classical view of the world, with the surprising recognition that matter is not really material at all, but a web of relationships, a kind of gestalt, or in certain way “information” without any carrier.” Hans Peter Durr had a better word in German language for it, Wirklichkeit. Experimental physicists have shown that a particle, like in the double slit experiment, could be directed to go through the path the experimenter wants — mind at work! Non-locality, a concept that Albert Einstein did not agree till his last breath, is a reality now. This reality was well known in Eastern philosophy, especially Indian Vedanta. Teleportation, transfer of knowable or known entity from one place to another without loss of time, and with no communications facilities, has brought spirituality closer to science. When one tries to understand the new quantum physics, one is struck by the existence of a superior intelligence (consciousness) at work.

Consciousness has now become a scientific concept and revolutionised medical science in a big way. That is why I am interested in this field. Non-locality brings in telepathy, a well-known concept in Vedanta. Quantum entanglement brings us together. Many other concepts like quantum tunnelling etc. take this science nearer to mysticism. Mystics were able to transfer powers to others. Experiments now have shown how evoked potentials in one brain could be simultaneously seen in other brains in contact with the first one psychologically. Are you reminded of telepathy, not an unusual experience among thinkers?

Physics still has to grapple with 95% of dark matter and energy. This is possible with Vedanta. In his autobiography, one of the founding fathers of quantum physics, Erwin Schrödinger, claimed he obtained his central intuition from the Vedas. Schrödinger and Heisenberg created a universe based on superimposed inseparable waves of probability amplitudes, the sea of waves, and a view consistent with the Vedic concept of All in One. One could argue that the parallels or analogies between Vedanta and quantum theory are merely coincidental. But Vedanta certainly is not a copy of quantum logic! The earlier science gave an impression that man is the one who can make this world run as per the laws of deterministic predictability within the constraints of space time, with speed limited to the speed of light. The Indian concept of manovega, the speed of the mind, is a reality in the quantum world. Quantum world view teaches us that we are all the same wave energy and, therefore, interconnected.

In the quantum world view your award is your capacity to be compassionate. This new science opens the flood gates to quantum healing, a limitless field. This also leads to the inner development of man for the good of mankind. My hope is this scientific truth will bring man and man together

by B Hegde For New Indian Express