Thursday, January 11, 2018

Creation and Evolution Should be Studied In the light of Sentience in Living Beings

Dictionary defines science as "the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment."

Let us try to digest this definition first:

What is science? It is an Activity;  It is an Intellectual Activity; It is a Practical Activity; It is a Systematic Study
What does it encompass? It encompasses the Systematic Study; (Of Structure and Of Behavior;) (of Physical and Natural World) (Through Observation and Experiment)

Two Dissimilar things are acknowledged here in this definition:

1. There is "Intellect" and therefore there is "Intellectual Activity" that can be performed.
2. There is a Physical and Natural World that can be Observed and Experimented with by the "Intellect"

The Physical and Natural World includes a complex combination of two dissimilar things, from the point of view of "Living Beings." (From Unicellular Organism, all the way to Human Beings).

1. The Physical Body - The visible material thing made of 5 elements - Water, Air, Space, Fire and Physical Matter.
2. Life - the invisible, abstract component that keeps the visible component running

This article attempts to explore/understand Life, and its relationship with the physical body.

Life is the "Intelligence" faculty that is continuously operating within each of us. The Intelligence not only tells helps you in decision making when faced with a complex situation, it also takes makes certain decisions involuntarily to keep the body operating - maintain the body temperature, keep the internal organs operating etc.

When "Intelligence" goes away - the remaining Physical Body - will not respond to any medical treatment nor will its internal bodily organs function.  Death is therefore the "Separation of Intelligence" - or simply put, the separation of the two dissimilar things that came together at the time of birth of the "living being".

Therefore:

LIFE = INTELLIGENCE

It is the same with other life forms - insects, fishes, birds, animals, etc. However, the maturity of the "intelligence" faculty varies  from the Human's. The intelligence faculty is the highest in human compared to other life forms, because it is in this form that a person is capable of owning the responsibility for one's actions. If a tiger kills its prey, even if it is a human being, it will not be tried in a court of law and hung for the murder. Humans are the only ones that need a constitution and a code of law within the framework of which, he/she may act responsibly in "pursuit of happiness."

Responsibility, Restraint, Charity, Kindness, etc are all considered virtuous human qualities. Intelligence is the trigger to feel and practice these qualities. Such a human being is considered to be "more evolved" than the ones that practice meaningless violence in the name of some warped scriptural injunction. People that practice these virtuous qualities also feel more at peace with themselves than the others. Education is the process by which we expand the horizons of the knowledge and fine tune the intelligence to pursue these human values, and seek happiness within the framework of law.

That means the primary role of the intelligence (that makes humans superior) is the ability to discriminate the good (virtue) from the bad (non-virtue). We humans, as decision makers in every situation in life, are responsible for our actions, and pursuits. We may consider ourselves as the enjoyer /sufferer of the results of our actions and pursuits. The residual result of each of our action is called Karma.

Karmic Debt we have collected as a result of our decisions to act in a certain manner accumulate over a life-time and it, along with our strongest desires at the time of death, determine the circumstances of our future birth. We are very much born in the next life, to fulfil the desires from past life. However, the life-form we will assume will depend on whether we behaved "responsibly" in previous life - by refraining from harming other living forms, conducted ourselves in compliance with the law of the land, refrained from harming nature in our pursuit of wealth, etc.

Therefore, acting responsibly in this life has an implication on our future life. This cycle continues on and on, until we become devoid of desires. At the zenith of the evolution of intelligence - human desires in pursuit of happiness will die down - and we will come to an understanding that our happiness is intrinsic to each of us - and does not lie in our material possessions. When desires die out completely, in that birth, the human being attains the so called nirvana or the escape from the birth/death cycle. The logic is straight forward - you have no more desires - what do you have to take another birth for?