The "mad" science Professor and Babaji
Dr Karandikar and his dilemma
The world of science, especially the quantum world is strange (or even mystical…with due respect to scientists). The idea in the movie, was to illustrate the limitations of science despite the gigantic strides it has taken in the past century. Banaras Hindu University has produced some world class physicists, like Dr Jayant Narlikar and it was only appropriate to bring forth some of the dilemmas of science and explore the answers in the mysticism of Banaras.
Since Babaji represents the mystics of Banaras in the movie, we thought it appropriate to discuss both in the same context.
Dr Karandikar is teaching Shwetambari (through his lecture in the class) and Babaji is educating Soham.
“Two (quantum) particles get separated and travel in different directions from a distant galaxy. After millions of years they are separated by infinite distance… yet they can communicate with each other instantly...According to science this is impossible...Yet it happens...How?” This is the observation Dr Karandikar makes n the class….
If one has no background in quantum phenomenon ( I suspect a lot of audience would be in this category and would be lost right here..) but let me quote John Wheeler, a world renowned theoretical physicist discussing this in a television interview and captured in a book called “ The ghost in the atom”
“…Let us say fortunately there is a quasar (a bright shining star ) by chance situated in space ( some 5 billion light years away) in such a way that its light comes to us by two different routes-each on a different side of a intervening galaxy which just happens to be in the same line of sight in the sky. The two beams are bent by the gravitational field of the intervening galaxy so that they converge on the eye of an observer here on earth………….
The photons (the constituent of the beam of light) reaching us start out more than 5 billion years ago- that is before there was anyone on Earth. Waiting here on Earth we can cast a die and at the very last minute decide whether will observe an interference photon (that is a photon which has come, as we jokingly describe “both ways”) or change our method of registration so that we will find out which way the photon has come. And yet the photon has already accomplished most of its travel by the time we make this decision.”
So despite that photon has already traveled either one way or the other, depending on our choice of the instrument to determine as to whether we want them to have come one way or the other or both ways, they change the evidence of their travel. This is really bizarre and perplexing. When the event has already occurred how can they change the evidence of their travel depending on our detecting measurement? There behavior seems to suggest as we deployed a particular device they seem to have communicated back in time the route that they would take while traveling. This also illustrates that the way we decide to look and view things changes the nature of reality itself.
This is an extremely puzzling phenomenon and not easy to explain. I have tried to put in simple form so that it could somewhat be understood. At the same time let me state that what goes on around us at micro level is far more bizarre than what I have just described above.
Now let us see what Babaji says...
“Every particle of the cosmos is connected with each other. There is no boundary or separation. The separation is only in our mind. What we are able to understand becomes science what we have not understood yet, is mysticism that’s recorded in scriptures.”
We will discuss this detail using the discussions of other scientists as well...
But for now let’s try and understand the first part.
Please leave your comments.
posted by Unknown @ Thursday, June 08, 2006
6 Comments:
dear sir,i am posting some extracts from a book "code name god" by mani bhaumik
after the discussions on meta physics in banaras...this book looked quite relevant to the discussion
The universe and us
Suppose they gave a party and nobody came.
Who are they? Is it still a party if nobody comes? What kind of a party would it be if the people in attendance did not see the host? Let’s frame the question another way: Suppose a universe was made and nobody was there to see it?
The essence of the principle is that if the initial conditions and natural constants of our universe were not exactly what they are, there would be no one here to observe it, much less to inquire into its origin. The principle corollary is awe-inspiring; it suggests that the conditions were such at the moment of the creation of our universe as to presage eventual emergence of intelligent life in it.
The only reliable detector of consciousness is another conscious being.
The unfolding universe
The big bang. It is important to note, however, that it was an explosion of space itself and not an explosion in any existing space. There was no space before; it appeared along with the bang.
Cosmologists generally agree on the fact that something as enormously vast as our universe has emerged from an infinitesimally small nugget of space.
We are not equipped to envision how small a place it may have been .it is at most ,one hundred millionth of a billionth the size of a single proton.And that is only if we grant the dignity of size at all.
As to why the universe does not collapse………………………….thats how finely balanced our universe was when it started on the fulcrum between contraction and eternal expansion. One smidgen of matter more or less and the universe would have been either a shrinking violet or a runaway train. That matter now includes you and me .SOit is,in fact, scientifically accurate to say that the universe would not be complete without you.
Code name God
“The kingdom of heaven is within” is a perfectly cogent statement of the fact that all participants in the great concert of creation, that the macrocosm is the microcosm, and that we are connected to one another and to the source of all being-the “I am that I am” of exodus.
Whether one is a Christian quietist, a Jewish Kabbalist , a Muslim Sufi ,a Hindu Yogi ,a Buddhist Tantrist ,or a Zen Master ,when you get down to the level of religious epiphany ,the experience is the same: the dissolution of ego boundaries, a merging of observer and the observed ,a union with the one source of all.
Contrary to the scientific bias that mysticism is a vague, metaphysical thing, the mystical experience is evidently of great clarity, otherwise how could so many of such diverse backgrounds describe it in such similar terms?
dear sir... very intereseting explanation... shows how everything is synchronized at quantum level...
Dear Deepti/Meeta,
There is such simplicity and aesthetics at every level.
We will discuss Dr Karandikar'a each statement one by one and investigate its content.
To me it's all so fascinating.
We indeed live in a miraculous world and I wonder why can't we all live in perpetual ecstacy?
I invite you to visit my website This Quantum World or (for an introduction) my blog Koantum Matters.
dear sir, and friends,
i dont understand meta-physics...nor do i try to
i dont need to understand 'how internet works' to work on it
similary .i dont need meta physics to explain to me exsistence of god.
seems like a long route to a simple thing.
but otherwise it will be an intresting thing to discover...to learn a few new things.
Super color scheme, I like it! Good job. Go on.
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