Understanding life, the creation and its creator

The debate between science and spiritualism is actually one between logic and belief, proof and faith. The most contentious issue has been that pertaining to creation and origin of life. Interestingly, these skirmishes have been recent phenomena and in all probability, scientific temper and spiritual dogma were peacefully co-existing until the medieval age.

The middle ages were witness to the almost simultaneous rise of a new age of experiment-driven science as well as a resurgence of religion-driven spiritualism. So today we have eastern and western versions of science and spiritualism. Therefore any discussion on the science versus spiritualism would have to be conducted with a perspective on “which type of science” versus “which type of spiritualism”

Big Bang and Nasadeeya Suktam
On the matter of origin of the universe, ancient scientific hypothesis and spiritualism belief seem to be strikingly similar in essence and differences, if any, are semantic at best.

If you’d prefer… to build a… Big Bang universe, you’ll need… to gather up everything there is… and squeeze it into a spot so infinitesimally compact that it has no dimensions at all. It is known as singularity.
- Bill Bryson in “A short History of Nearly Everything”

The Big Bang theory, which happens to be statistically and logically the most accepted scientific explanation of how an inflationary universe was born and the Rig Veda, which is the oldest code of living in practice amongst Hindus have a similar explanation on the birth of the universe.

“At first was neither Being nor non being; There was not air nor yet sky beyond;
What was its wrapping? Where? In whose protection? Was water there, unfathomable and deep?There was no death then, nor yet deathlessness; of night or day there was not any sign. The One breathed without breath, by its own impulse. Other than that there was nothing else at all.”
- Nasadeeya Suktam

This compels one to wonder if spiritualism and science are different viewpoints of the same thing. Is spiritualism the fragrance and science the chemistry of perfume?

Aliens and Biblical Genesis
Passages in religious texts to the process of creation in general and the appearance of modern man in the map of evolution in particular have more than subtle references to cloning, stem cell research and genetic engineering.

“And God went on to say: ‘Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness’. And God proceeded to create the man in his image”
Genesis 1:26-1:27

“Hence Jehovah God had a deep sleep fall upon the man and, while he was sleeping, he took one of his ribs and then closed up the flesh over its place. And Jehovah God proceeded to build the rib that he had taken from the man into a woman and to bring her to the man”
Genesis 2:21-2:22

Even by the most conservative estimates, the probability of intelligent life forms originating, surviving and evolving independently of each other on different planets at different points of time seems sacrilegiously high. The notion of all-knowing beings who always came from the heavens above wearing shining armour, performed super-human tasks zipping across the skies in fiery chariots could have well been a scientific alien or spiritual God depending on one’s choice of words.

“I claim that our forefathers received visits from the universe in the remote past… I proclaim that these strangers… produced a new, perhaps the first homo sapiens”
- Erich Von Daniken in “Chariots of the Gods?”

The indestructibility of atoms, genetic variability and the immortal Atma
At the atomic level, the law of conservation of mass would mean that atoms are unrealistically durable. According to Martin Rees, the life of an atom is probably 1035 years. This means that a significant number of atoms that make each one of us were once part of something or someone. Even after we die, these same atoms will become a part of something or someone else. So we are reborn in a way.

“Nainam chindanti Śastrāņi nainam dahati pāvakah
Na c’ainam kledayanty āpo na Śoşayati mārutah”
- Srimad Bhagavad Gita

Also, genetically speaking, it is roughly one nucleotide base in every thousand that differentiates one human being from another – in other words, a similarity of 99.9 percent. Moreover, genetic researchers have found that the genetic variability between a human and a fruit fly is only about 60 percent.

To conclude, on the matter of the life and its origin, science and spiritualism are different ways of interpretations. While one sees cause and effect, the other sees fate. While one sees destiny, the other sees logical explanation. As long as one seeks an answer in what is evident or what can be explained, the two disciplines will always be in disagreements. The truth in all probability lies not in what can be explained, but in that which either cannot explain. And as in marriage, harmony (between science and spiritualism) does not lie in seeking similarities but in acknowledging the differences & respecting the same.