From: prasanth@gn.ecn.purdue.edu (Ravi K. Prasanth)
Subject: Re: A Passage from the Rig Veda
Organization: Purdue University Engineering Computer Network
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 93 21:58:55 GMT


In article <C1KpMz.K2n@ucunix.san.uc.edu>, bhatnagr@ucunix.san.uc.edu (Raj Bhatnagar) writes:
> 
> Yes, Science includes all kinds of "search for Truth." (To
> parpharase from Vivekananda's works :) Science is nothing
> but a search for "Unity."

There are at least two pitfalls in including all kinds of "search
for Truth" in science. Variables that are used in science must have
air tight definitions that do not depend on the author. Terms such
as "Truth", "Consciousness" etc have no scientific definition and
therefore cannot be part of scientific literature. Secondly, what
method is used for "searching" is important. To give an example,
there is a "Christian scientist" who has developed a "scientific
theory" according to which the Universe was created in 4004 BC. He
uses only scientific quantities (speed of light, its decay, etc),
but his methodology isnt scientific. 

The knowledge acquired through science has definite structure. So
does the methodology used to acquire it.  

> As for the scientific method, intuition, reason, and sensory
> verification are all its parts. For Physics and Chemitsry the
> sensory verification is a must because of the "sensory" nature
> of the concepts that are to be understood.

I do not see why sensory verification is a must. The aim of
science is not to find theories that fit data. Instead it is
to explain why things are the way they are. An explanation is
incorrect if it violates some data. That a theory fits all
known observations doesnt mean much (in the sense that we
cannot decide whether the theory is true or false).

> knowledge." I mean, all the concepts like curved space and time,
> Black holes, sub-atomic particles, super strings, forays into
> the ideas of expanding and contracting of the universe - are all
> these ever going to be brought under the thralldom of sensory
> verification Or are they going to forever remain in the realm of
> intuition+reason?

Scientific variables are of two types : observables and calculables.
Length of a rod is observable and hence measurable. But the Reimann
metric for curved space isnt. Abstract nonobservable quantities are
part of science and there is no need to find ways to verify them.

> Now, the religion, the search for the super consciousness, is
> that ever possible to have any manifestations in the sensory or
> empirical domain? I don't know. Is it that this "science," by the
> very nature of its objective, confined only to the realm of
> intuition+reason? I don't know.

Religion is not science. I would use philosophy in place of 
science. Philosophical speculation can be of scientific and
religious nature.

> would have understood the laws of material processes (and therefore
> airplanes and space rocket mechanisms etc.) but their result 
> should be viewed only from the perspective of efforts of trying
> to understand the unifying principles of consciousness.
>

Has any Rishi, any religion, any scripture ever defined 
consciousness ? I know that they all talk about it at length.

> ---raj

RKP
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