Scientists cannot produce even a grain of rice

[Sadhu Sanga] New Book" Idols of the Mind vs True Reality, by Bhakti Madhava Puri, Ph.D.

Idols of the Mind vs True Reality, by Bhakti Madhava Puri, Ph.D.

"One must therefore go back 300 years and reflect on how one could have proceeded differently at that time, and how the whole subsequent development would then be modified." - Schroedinger

The theme of the new book, "Idols of the Mind vs True Reality" by Bhakti Madhava Puri, Ph.D. is concerned with the clear exposition of the pivotal conceptions and misconceptions of Galileo's and others' ideas that produced the subsequent development of what would become modern mathematized science.

The confusions and almost complete ignorance that exist today regarding something so fundamental as consciousness is immediately cleared up when the obvious errors are seen in the ad hoc presumptions of the original founders of modern science who were blindsided by the metaphysical ontologies that held sway during their lives, but to which we no longer adhere, thanks to the development of philosophy beyond that period. We trace this progress out in a concise way in the book.

The modern mind, thanks to science education, is focused on the one-sided empirical approach to knowledge by sensuous perception, but this fails to account for the role of subjective cognition or conception - the role of consciousness in such perceptions. This artificial separation of the original unity-in-difference between conception and content has been rendered impossible to broach because of the historical metaphysical tradition of dualism firmly held by the fathers of modern science such as Galileo and Descartes.

The presumed impossible gap between subject and object is bridged once we realize that the object is what the subject knows it to be. This does not reduce the object to the subject as the abstract idealists (monists) naively are only too hasty to presume as an immediate identity (oneness). Mediation is involved; there are both difference and identity at play. It is merely lazy un-thinking that ignores the intricate dynamic in the mediating activity that is the heart and life of consciousness. The main purpose of the book is to restore the central importance of the conceptual moment that is integral to science and which makes it truly worthy of the name Science or scientific knowledge. 

https://www.amazon.com/Idols-Mind-vs-True-Reality/dp/1734908955/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=idols+of+the+mind&qid=1594563634&sr=8-1

Google Groups "Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D." group.
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“The scientists would say ‘everything is made from some electrons.’ The smallest atom is hydrogen and that is made of an electron [and a proton and neutron] but that doesn’t produce consciousness or life. We are not just moving electrons – electricity. Produce all the electricity you want but you cannot produce life. The scientists cannot produce even a grain of rice. We could not live if we were depending on the scientists. Life is the most important principle, not matter, but where is it coming from?”

— Sripad Bhakti Madhava Puri Maharaja, Ph.D.
(Serving Director, Princeton Bhakti Vedanta Institute)

Futility of strict shastra based laws

YES. Vivekananda was writing pages after pages in his book about "difference between Aryas and Mlechhas'.

And these guys here are saying that Vivekananda disapproves of the concept and existence of Mlechhas. Ha ha ha.

RW liberalism makes people dumb

https://twitter.com/TIinExile/status/1308753642808246272?s=19

@HindolSengupta is right. Vivekananda is not condeming Mlecchas here, he is simply using it as a counter against Brahmin orthodoxy. He says 'if you want to blindly follow Shastras, then burn urself as well' . @TIinExile should be fair and accept the mistake

https://t.co/bY5rSmCOpO

https://twitter.com/Okeera4/status/1308735358410973184?s=19

@TIinExile was right about the iconography of Vamana . He was also right a out Ashoka ( he became a Buddhist before invading Kalinga) . But he is wrong here . We have to be intellectually honest if we are seeking the truth . Nothing personal

Swami Vivekananda is not using these examples to denounce Mlecchas , as you suggested , but is simply using the discourse to point out the futility of strict shastra based laws in the modern context.

Indeed, the root is your rebuttal to this tweet .Question is whether Swami Vivekananda opposed the notion of Mleccha.U quoted a snippet in which he USED the term;this isn't rebuttal since the context was rhetorical , and not endorsement of Mleccha concept

https://t.co/UxiGz75vwW

https://twitter.com/Okeera4/status/1308748131358523396?s=19

I never made the claim that he never used the word Mleccha . Pls read the threads again 

My entire point was based on the original claim of @HindolSengupta suggesting that SV DISAPPROVED of the of Mleccha concept . Your countered that he USED the word . This is not a rebuttal++

The 1887 comment on food was clearly rhetorical and cannot be taken as his definitive view. But if you were to show that the other dozen or so references were after the 1984 speech , I will concede

https://twitter.com/Okeera4/status/1308756245432549382?s=19

To be honest , it does suggest that he placed Aryan values over Mleccha values . But this cannot be considered a final picture of someone who wrote as widely as Swami Vivekananda . @HindolSengupta 's tweet might be what SV ultimately thought about the matter . To counter HS++

To counter HS++ , one should show a chronologically later quote of SV where he re asserts the Arya-Mleccha binary

https://twitter.com/Okeera4/status/1308753663834251264?s=19

Swami Vivekananda was of course playing to the western gallery on western soil. Hatred in the context he mentions connotes safeguarding oneself from evil or ill influences of degrading culture and is not the harmful emotion it is associated with.

https://twitter.com/sanjeevkadv/status/1308774593339957249?s=19

See Brother on the Context of Dharm there is no bigger authority than Guru Sankaracharya , mean no disrespect to Swami Vivekananda, this by no means was a disrespect of him,but when it comes to Dharm only Sankaracharya is the Highest authority not swami vivekananda...

https://twitter.com/ka2ekaatejaenge/status/1308773845822832645?s=19

Yeah. Secularisation of Vivekananda and Paramahamsa is widespread. 

Swami Vivekananda is shown as a nationalist, but his hindu identity is suppressed.

https://twitter.com/lifeofsurya/status/1308757291009597447?s=19

Vivekananda has been promoted by Christian World .Many of his things he said were false .Read traditional Hindu books

https://twitter.com/Subhash194/status/1308757891491528708?s=19

Mlecchha is probably derived from Meluha, people beyond the Makkoran or Makran coast. It means different culture. I don't know what formal education Swami Vivekananda had in Hindu dharmic tenets, his Guru was a mystic.

https://twitter.com/vijayvaani/status/1308758001428254720?s=19

To clarify my stand on Vivekananda - like any other human being he had his own fault lines. But the never ending love,courage and compassion he had for the cause of awakening the spirit of India and continuing to inspire India is second to none.

https://twitter.com/chyavanmallya/status/1308763069070241793?s=19

He is Shankaracharya Maharaj, has higher authority than Vivekananda.

Vivekananda maybe well versed on the philosophical part (as Maharaj Himself admits) but had a very poor understanding of Varna Ashrama Dharma.

https://twitter.com/gajaturagapada/status/1308763754272702467?s=19

So Swami Vivekananda travelled all the way to Melacha land, to address malechas as brothers & sisters.

Sir - this is not Sincere.

Do not call spade a Holy spade

🙏

https://twitter.com/pa_dd_y/status/1308764200160776192?s=19

I am not interested in arguments but facts. What you presented itself says that Vivekananda had great reverence for Jesus. 

Anyway, you are free to keep your biases. Bye.

https://twitter.com/TUndercoverMonk/status/1308764462350958592?s=19

What Vivekananda is saying is practice what you preach then the world would be at your feet. The particular example was taken as the orthodox brahmin society at that time preached such things but themselves hobnobbed with Mughals, Brits etc

https://t.co/B9gehbrhCA

https://twitter.com/Dutt_An/status/1308766668471119878?s=19

Vivekananda is a rookie lmao. Calling him the "greatest"😂

English speaking is not a measure of one's intellect. At best Vivekananda can be compared to pop culture "Gurus" like Sadhguru 😂

Ever heard of Dharma Samraat Karpatri Maharaj? Yeah he is the G.O.A.T.

https://twitter.com/raghav22554468/status/1308767993808080896?s=19

Science theory is a subdiscipline of ethics

Here you finally admit the way you really think. You have concluded in advance that the Srimad Bhagavad-gita is truth, and that anything that contradicts it must be explained away by hook or by crook. It is not surprising, then, that you callously accuse hundreds of thousands of scientists of having done the exact same thing: you're projecting, because you have never even imagined that anyone would actually think in a scientific way.

... you admit that you only pretend to engage in science – that the goal for you is not better understanding of the subject matter of science, but "to achieve the ultimate goal of the human form of life"! The outer appearance of science is just a means to a completely different end to you! Here, too, it is not surprising that you callously accuse hundreds of thousands of scientists of having done the exact same thing: you're projecting your own goal-oriented thinking onto everyone else, because you have never even imagined that anyone would actually think in a scientific way.

Please don't get me wrong. If you believe you know what ultimate goal of the human form of life is, and how to achieve it, by all means do so and tell us about it! I'll be honestly happy for you! But it would be a fundamental misunderstanding to believe that science tries to achieve any such goal. The goal of science is to better understand its subject matter (which I like to call "reality" as possibly distinct from "truth"); no less, no more. Don't pretend to pursue that goal when you're actually pursuing a quite different one. You would only continue to confuse people – including, evidently, yourself.

Of course not many scientists are _only_ scientists, _only_ insterested in the goal of science. Many believe in political or religious ideologies and hope to use the understanding they gain through science to further the goals of these ideologies. As an almost trivial example, a noticeable number of scientists have been (and of course some are today) Christians who hoped that their research in the sciences of nature, of Creation, would give them greater insight into the Creator. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this kind of thing. But the moment you assume you _already have_ that greater insight into the Creator and deduce from it that anything in science which appears to contradict this insight must be explained away by hook or by crook – that moment you are no longer a scientist, you're no longer doing science.

Be honest with yourself. Science is the application of science theory, and science theory is a subdiscipline of ethics – the ethics of belief.

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Ethics_of_Belief

David Marjanovic

To view this discussion https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/Online_Sadhu_Sanga/trinity-5fa0ad58-5a4d-4484-87a9-6b091cf3077b-1598975759812%403c-app-gmx-bap34.

An almost hymnal rhythm to the prose

Holland’s central thesis is that the West, despite its loss of faith and abandonment of religious ritualism, remains nonetheless thoroughly Christian. That modernity (and even post-modernity) as it is commonly understood in the West is a product of Christian assumptions not necessarily shared by other civilisations and that these continue to inspire and inform its contemporary moral precepts and social mores. [...]

When Nietzsche declared God to be dead he was declaring in effect, that everyman (and woman) was henceforth their own god. It is a message that in the one hundred and twenty years since his passing has been embraced with alacrity across Western Europe. While, as Holland points out, Nietzsche had lamented that Christianity’s sternutatory pollen still afflicted European noses back in the late 1800s, were he a witness to our current post-modernist era I suspect his mood would be far more upbeat.

Leo Strauss, the famous 20^th century political scientist, saw in the artistic output of a civilisation the reification of its philosophical underpinnings and where once this had a distinctly Christian radiance today it carries the aura of…well nothing. In the words of Douglas Murray, the renowned neoconservative author: [...]

Today, as Western birth rates plummet (based upon distinctly un-Christian assumptions and attitudes) and its nations find themselves in the grip of a collective neurasthenia induced by the massive and sudden collapse in faith, the clamour amongst the Muslim multitudes for the revival of the Caliphate – for the restoration of the City of God and for His Will to be done on Earth as it is in Heaven – grows ever stronger. In an irony befitting of a Biblical parable, it is Muslims today who lay far more an authentic claim to the legacy of Jesus (peace be upon him) and Paul, than the average ‘Christian’ European or American. 

[Ok, so I've finally published my musings on @holland_tom's latest book Dominion (it was recently released in paperback). It's long (9700 words) but of all my blog posts over the years I really do recommend you read this one.] https://t.co/24lzETkuKY

Veronique Tomaszewski, VM Kärkkäinen, David Marjanović, and Peter Nyikos

Amoeba Words by Sam Mickey

“What is an amoeba word?” Amoeba words include many of the words thrown around when people are talking philosophically. The philosopher-priest Ivan Illich explains:

I take the term from the work of Professor Uwe Pörksen of Freiburg, a linguist and medievalist. [...] Ivan Illich in Conversation, with David Cayley (Toronto: House of Anansi Press, 2007), 253-254

Representation of Women's Quest For 'Self'in the Selected Works of Kamala Das

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S Chaudhuri - 2019

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VB Agrawal

… life and death. Metaphysical poets like Tagore and Aurobindo have illumined this theme with the radiance of their thoughts … Tagore envisions the presence of God in every atom. Aurobindo visualizes a divine scheme in the birth of Savitri to redeem the world. Krishna …

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My Creative Experience: Finding Voice, Finding Silence

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Veronique Tomaszewski

Similar to your talk "Why Organisms are not only Machines?", today we have also received a very nice new submission for the event with the title "Biological Evidence Against the Mechanical and Chemical Simplification of Organisms" by Dr. Alak Kumar Patra. 

We would like to share with you and other on this list one interesting peer reviewed articles Organisms ≠ Machines published by Daniel J. Nicholson (Senior Research Fellow, Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research) at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1369848613000824

This article Highlights

Organisms and machines differ in their internal organizational dynamics.

Organisms are intrinsically purposive whereas machines are extrinsically purposive.

Machine metaphors in biology are theoretically inadequate but heuristically useful.

The rhetorical use of machine metaphors provides support for intelligent design.

Thanking you. Sincerely,

Bhakti Niskama Shanta

"Life is a unity in multiplicity. It is a process as a united flow, but it consists of many instantaneous moments - like the frames of a movie. The tendency of abstract understanding is to either think of a unity OR a multiplicity. Pure multiplicity is indicative of the atomic thinking of material reductionism. Pure unity is the indeterminateness of abstract monism. Unity in multiplicity is the comprehensive thinking of dialectical reason. Life has to be comprehended as a process in which its participants are simultaneously both ends and means to one another."

— Śrīpād Bhakti Mādhava Purī Mahārāja, Ph.D.

(Serving Director of Princeton Bhakti Vedanta Institute of Spiritual Culture and Science, NJ, USA: http://bviscs.org )

Well, as far as I understand, this framework buckles when applied to most of the universe. A star has a material cause (a cloud of hydrogen), an efficient cause (gravity) and a formal cause (gravity plus electrostatic repulsion). Ockham's Razor denies that a star has a final cause. I have a material cause (food), an efficient cause (hard to summarize, but ultimately electrostatic attraction and repulsion) and a formal cause (DNA). I have a final cause only in so far as my parents wanted a child; they did not specifically want me, nor did they have a way of imagining specifically me, nor would that have changed anything.

Genetics entails the hypothesis that DNA is (most of) the formal cause for various of these traits, but also that mutations in the DNA are random. It does not entail any belief in a final cause.

The environment is the efficient cause of natural selection. But selection happens among alleles that have arisen by random mutation. Mutations have all kinds of efficient causes, including Brownian motion, chemical tautomery of nucleotides, and radioactive decay; the latter two are genuinely random parts of quantum physics to the best of current understanding.

Here, too, there is no need to assume any final cause.

Yes, with the understanding that there is no point in trying to figure out the (efficient, let alone final) cause of any particular mutation.

At the risk of reinventing the wheel, I like to make a distinction between "truth" and "reality".

Reality is that where the _argumentum ad lapidem_ is not a logical fallacy. Science deals with reality, not necessarily with truth.

Truth could be the same as reality. This option is called physicalism; of course it is the simplest assumption, so if your metametaphysics https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Metametaphysics&oldid=593996199 includes Ockham's Razor, it will prefer physicalism. Only under this option is science necessarily able to tell us anything about truth.

Or, of course, the truth could be that I'm the solipsist, and that reality is nothing but a remarkably consistent figment of my imagination. In that case, _argumenta ad lapidem_ would be just as silly as philosophers generally think they are, and science would just be my own exploration of my own mind.

Or, of course, the truth could be that God is the solipsist, and that reality (including my mind this time) is nothing but a figment of His imagination. As far as I understand, some Christian philosophers have wondered aloud about this.

Or, of course, the truth could be that reality is _māyā_.

Or, of course, reality could be a metaphor for truth. This idea underlies a number of religions. (In the Gospel According to Matthew, Jesus does pretty much everything "in order to fulfill Scripture" – to make history an image of truth, one could say.)

So, when I say "wrong", I mean wrong within the confines of reality. Whether the truth is different is a separate question, and a question that does not need to be answered for science to work.

Best regards,

David Marjanović

The main target of this brilliant essay comes later, in his refutation of the claim that servomechanisms, such as a target-seeking mechanism in a torpedo, are intrinsically purposeful. I recommend reading it to anyone interested in the claims of "strong AI."

Peter Nyikos 

Professor, Dept. of Mathematics 

University of South Carolina 

http://people.math.sc.edu

Dear Peter Nyikos, 

Namaste. It is necessary to clarify between inner and outer teleology in order to fully consider the purposeful existence of things.

Aristotle's position was that inanimate natural phenomena, such as rocks, only have external teleology. They may be utilized in some purposeful way by organisms. In reference to mechanical artifacts such as a roulette or clock, we must understand that our use for them, their external purpose (which includes the roulette's purposeful design to be unpredictable) is separate from the internal purpose of the device. Internally, a roulette's purpose is to be spun and slowly become still. The internal teleology of a clock is for the gears to move. External teleology is relative to a thing's external environment. Telling time is a purpose which is externally applied to a clock, and would not be evident to one who does not have prior familiarity with the connection between a clock and time.

Internal and external teleology take on a dialectical aspect when considered in terms of organisms, as explained by Sripad Bhakti Madhava Puri Maharaja:

"Participants cannot be isolated from the whole in which they are participants and remain what they are. A DNA molecule can no more be what it is as a producer of protein molecules, than the protein molecules can be what they are as produced from the action of DNA, and producing the DNA. Each participant is cause and effect of every other participant, as Kant defined organism. Therefore nothing in an organism is without purpose, nor is the organism as a whole without purpose in the environment. Thus everything in the organism is both purpose [end] and means."

Kind regards,

Krishna Keshava Das

Serving Assistant

Princeton Bhakti Vedanta Institute of Spiritual Culture and Science www.bviscs.org

Certainly what he was saying had been proposed in physics. He has a whole chapter in Essays saying so and citing Schrodinger. However, as he also points out, Schrodingers profound point was ignored and is to this day. There is a collective myopia about final and formal cause and it is not easy to correct it because people will attack the philosophy without following the logic...

My own synthesis of Rosen's work results in definition of a holon which is a circular causality moving between local and non-local domains - I'm now wondering if in some way that itself could correlate with this idea of torsion?? Any thoughts?

John

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Malady of mechanical bias in ontological thinking

Dear friends, 

Namste. Often the concept of the center of the functional unity of the living cell is presumed to be understood by the unsuspecting modern educated man as something mechanical, chemical or emergent whole. 

However a sincere student of science must inquire about the fundamentals and not be satisfied merely by utilitarian ends of such assumptions in biology. In this regard we can refer to the Socratic method, the essence of which has been to apply its techniques to discover what we do not know about what we have assumed to be already known.

The cell is considered the smallest functional unit of life. From a reductionist viewpoint, the cell is made up of atoms and molecules which are actively producing all the necessary requirements for the cell to act functionally. Thus we have so many chemical cycles such as the Krebs cycle, photosynthesis, ATP process etc. But is it sufficient for us to conclude from these that the cell is reducible to molecules. 

Traditionally there are three logical concepts dealing with reality. (1) Mechanical logic dealing with machines, (2) Chemical logic dealing with chemical activity and (3) The logic of the organic whole, which is to deal with objects with internal teleology, such as living organisms. Organic wholes are not a result of addition of parts. They are produced from already existing wholes and are irreducible to mechanical or chemical logic. In this way natural processes have been described in philosophy. 

But the biological studies in modern science have yet to let go of the mechanical bias in their ontological thinking. Socratic Methodology gives us a precise methodology to settle the question. We can focus on the question: Where is the center of the functional unity of the cell. 

The subjects of Socrates' conversations often revolved around search for a definition focused on the true nature of the subject under question and not just on how the word is used correctly in a sentence. Hence our focus should be what is the true concept of the cell, rather than what we think nature should be, or what merely a mechanism should be. We must let go of our different biases and allow nature to reveal to us. Further even though we may be professors, or scientists or coreligionists or whatever, we must take up the position of a student, and allow ourselves to be taught through these questions. We should desist the tendency to declare opinion of an individual, or of the majority as truth. This cannot be the criteria of truth of any subject in hand.

We must recognize ideas such as Mechanical Whole, Chemical Whole and Organic Whole etc are ideas. Where as the subject here is the Functional Unity of the Cell. There are according Prof. R.W. Paul, from University of Michigan six types of Socratic questions that can help us gain valid knowledge:

1. Questions for clarification: E.g. we may ask why do we think that the cell follows merely mechanical and chemical concept of Whole. How does it relate to the question of the unity of cell functioning etc.

2. Questions that probe assumptions: Why have we moved away from the logic of organic whole which was understood by philosophers like Kant, Hegel, Aristotle and Plato. Kant had even said that there will never be a Newton for the Blade of Grass. Then all of a sudden why the current shift of ontological thinking about the unity of the functional cell to a mechanical logic.

3. Questions that probe reasons and evidence: What would be an example of a cell that follows logic of mechanical and chemical whole in natural processes. Why there is no result after more than 150 years attempts to manufacture even a single bacterium from de novo processes in our advanced chemical labs even after spending billions of dollars worth of time and manpower. What is the Causal principle behind the cellular function. Why is it still irreducible to linear simplicity. Cell continues to display circular complexity in its causal flow. So how can we accept the mechanical reduction of the organism.

4. Questions about Viewpoints and Perspectives: Then what will be the alternative for us. How many things and properties have we explained in these different logical concepts. Which one comes out as the most relevant of all. Why there is no agreement among scientists. Why different schools such as semiosis, which focuses on living organisms, even at the level of DNA code, being interpreted by the organisms etc as sign systems gaining popularity. Should we not go back to what the erudite philosophers have always said. That is life comes from life. The concept of Unity of the functional cell is afterall the teleological concept of the Organic Whole discussed by Kant and Hegel.

5. Questions that probe implications and consequences: What are the general feature of cellular function. For example we may say, irreducibility of complexity, that intelligent and smart, novel features come out more easily in which picture. What do these imply for the concept.

6. Questions about the question: What was the point of mechanistic approach and spending so much valuable time and energy over the past 200 years, without any positive result. What does this effort of scientist mean to us. How does this apply to the deeper question of life. etc

Socrates is well known for his questioning style. He would disarm anyone who had a presumption of being knowledgeable and bring them to the point of thinking the very contradictory result. from their own presumptions. Thus he would prove that they knew nothing. Even Socrates said that he himself knew nothing. But he acknowledged at least he knew that he knew nothing. But generally everyone is thinking that they know, when they knew nothing. This is called Socratic Irony. Isn't that again applicable today. We try to explain the organisms as chemicals or objects. But they turn out to be subjects, intelligent, purposive etc. Then what kind of basis we should have for biological thought. This must be focus of education for all of us.

Thanking you,

Bhakti Vijnana Muni

Google Groups "Sadhu-Sanga Under the holy association of Spd. B.M. Puri Maharaja, Ph.D." group.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/Online_Sadhu_Sanga/2044152781.275937.1582292120959%40mail.yahoo.com

...

the Orchid and the rOse: Defective worldviews of the past need to be jettisoned https://t.co/Miv8HL3fkr

If you harbour

even an iota of desire

to know #TheMother

and #SriAurobindo;

Here's a chance

just at a glance

post by @NathTusar

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Ordered structure of a crystal

Fundamental difference between the nature of Mechanical, Chemical and Biological Systems

 Sripad Bhakti Madhava Puri Maharaja, Ph.D.

 Serving Director of Princeton Bhakti Vedanta Institute of Spiritual Culture and Science, NJ, USA

http://bviscs.org

The unity of a mechanical system, like the solar system, made up of mechanical objects, is established externally in the form of a law, which reigns outside of and over the parts and by which the parts of the system are regulated. On the other hand, the unity of the chemical system is intrinsic to the parts, arising from their intrinsic natures. The ordered structure of a crystal is based on the nature of the constituent parts of a chemical system. Still, the parts of a chemical system retain their identity even apart from the interactive system, so that their initial and final states can be differentiated. In this sense the parts are both independent as well as dependent. For example, an acid and alkali can be isolated in different bottles and then added together to form a third substance - a neutral salt.

Those parts that can not be separated from a system without destroying it as a working system, can no longer be called parts but are participants or members of a dynamic whole. The participants are as essential to the whole as the whole is to the participants - this is the biological system or organism. Here we are removed from the stasis of fixed objects and are in the milieu of pure dynamical activity. Participants cannot be isolated from the whole in which they are participants and remain what they are. A DNA molecule can no more be what it is as a producer of protein molecules, than the protein molecules can be what they are as produced from the action of DNA, and producing the DNA. Each participant is cause and effect of every other participant, as Kant defined organism. Therefore nothing in an organism is without purpose, nor is the organism as a whole without purpose in the environment. Thus everything in the organism is both purpose [end] and means.

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Dear Friends,

Namaste. The Soctratean view is that Knowledge is inseparable from the Notion of Virtue. This view is congruent with the Vedanctic view. For example in the Bhagavad - Gita (5.18), it is mentioned:

vidya-vinaya-sampanne brahmane gavi hastini

suni caiva sva-pake ca panditah sama-darsinah 

Translation: The humble sage, by virtue of true knowledge, sees with equal vision a learned and gentle brahmana, a cow, an elephant, a dog and a dog-eater [outcaste].

We can find here in Bhagavad - Gita also, that the notion of knowledge is inseparable from the virtue known as humility. More importantly the Bhagavad-Gita considers Knowledge is also connected to the notion of Shreya , which means that which is eternally good for the self, without any trace of inauspiciousness. Knowledge must lead to true and pure auspiciousness or Good. This is also an important ingredient in the Socratic Philosophy, where the notion of Good is Ultimate idea or Form (Eidos).

In their theory of Eidos, which is translated as Theory of Ideas or Forms, Forms are the non-physical essences of all things, of which objects and matter in the physical world are merely imitations. Plato suggests that these Forms are the only objects of study that can provide knowledge. They considered that these Ideals or Forms were real and the objects of the world were merely imitations of these ideals. These ideals constitute all the essential features of all individual objects belonging to the same class. For example what all trees have in common that makes them trees. Or what all acts of justice have in common that makes them just.

These are ideas and hence Plato’s theory of Reality is called idealism. These are the perfect, unchanging examplars of all naturally occurring existences and all good things. These include for example perfect tree, dog, horse and also perfect circle, triangle, straight line etc. Additionally when all such Eidos are considered, then by reason one can arrive at the Ultimate Eidos, which is that which all other Eidos have in common. This ultimate Form of Eidos is the “Good”.

Thus we find in the Socratean-Platonian view that Reality in highest form is the Form of the Good, and is Independently real and the material realm with all its object were dependent reality. The Form of Good is therefore Independent, immaterial and Perfect. Whereas the material realm is constituted of objects that are all imperfect imitations of the perfect realm of Forms, or Ideals, whose Ultimate Form is The Good. .

In the Bhagavad-Gita, the Supreme Lord Sri Krishna has mentioned BG (10.41):

 yad yad vibhūtimat sattvaṁ śrīmad ūrjitam eva vā

tat tad evāvagaccha tvaṁ mama tejo-’ṁśa-sambhavam

Translation: Know that all opulent, beautiful and glorious creations spring from but a spark of My splendor.

The difficulty of the modern positivist line of thought is that they are concerned with only the measurable, sensible side of the reality. But they are not encouraging reason. But there is also the negative side. Reason can see this. We have to only recognize this. There is no thought without the thinker. thus thought and thinking always go together inseparably. We have to recognize both the sides of Reality: Positive and Negative side and the movement between them. Philosophy and Science Proper can only begin here. It only requires us to recognize this.

There is a vast reality that is accessible to reason, but we ignore that and try to reduce everything to the positive, appearing side of the energy. But the Vedantic truth finds truth in the Socratic view and it is also being confirmed in modern science as they failed to explain how consciousness could arise from matter.

Thanking you,

Bhakti Vijnana Muni, PhD

...

Is the field of genetics not a product of the belief that there is a cause for the various traits found among individuals in a given species? Is evolution not a product of the belief that there is a cause for the variety of species, and the similarities seen among them, that we observe in nature?  Is biology not based on a desire to understand life, to figure out what causes the vastly intricate nature of biological systems?

You conclude by defining a principle which, I presume, you see as fundamental to science:

"Science: 'if I were wrong, how would I know?'"

On the surface, this seems to imply that science is a means to systematically align one's consciousness with consistently empirically observable phenomena interpreted as truth.  However your definition reveals some deeper assumptions which are fundamental to our teleological nature. The simple recognition of, or consideration of possibly being wrong, alludes to a desire for truth. If we indeed "just exist", than why this tendency towards a desire for truth? This inherent nature towards truth is called inner-teleology.    


Kind regards,

Krishna Keshava Das

Serving Assistant

Princeton Bhakti Vedanta Institute

of Spiritual Culture and Science

www.bviscs.org