The Fire Rages On

 (Something I wrote at the beginning of Spring last year, while staying in Calcutta)

 Winter had taken away every trace of green and the bony hands of bare branches thirstily stretched up towards the deceptive promise of a blue sky above. The little orchard had gone dry and dusty, except for the hardy jack fruit tree that stood at one corner with its thick skinned green leaves. Little whirling spools of dust roamed on the ground with impish delight, in the company of cavorting dry leaves.

That was a couple of months back, before the 'Koel" announced the arrival of spring and triggered a genetic wonder with its crystal-sweet awakening call. A few whimsical showers meandering across the narrow lanes and jammed roof-tops, played their supporting role. The songstress has since retired to her cool sub-Himalayan recess, having slipped in her ash-gray spotted eggs into the nest of the unsuspecting surrogate mother-crow.

In the last two months, the orchard has gone through a magical transformation. The romantic, frivolous mood of early spring has given way to responsible sure footsteps of productive youth.The trees and bushes are now leaden heavy with fruits and the air is fragrant with the smell of their flowers.A recent welcome shower has left a sheen of lustrous green on the plentiful cover. Butterflies in all colours and patterns flitter among the lush undergrowth. Bees, hornets, spiders, cicadas, marching files of ants and a hundred other denizen, that keep nature's food chain working; are all flourishing in their rightful niche. In the light afternoon breeze, the swaying branches and dancing twigs, instill a sense of joy and well being, to the passer by. No one would suspect that only the other day, spectre of hunger and famine loomed there.

As I sit at my window and savour the green, nature opens for me the door to her wonders. I hear the silent soothing strain of nature's music, that surge and ebb  in rhythm with the changing seasons. Soft, sure, unhurried, it flows on, never missing a beat; rekindling life and aroma millions of year old. The little orchard leads the timeless, ageless life of nature; yet never stagnant, never static- always evolving, always new. In contrast we humans outside the four walls of the orchard, lead frenzied lives, with frayed nerves and dazed minds. We have cut the umbilical cord that connected us to mother earth and are now futilely searching with inflamed brains, for the lost rhythm in the plenty of a material world.

After Thought:
The orchard beckons me back to nature. Oh! how I wish to douse the fire in my inflamed brain, and put myself to sleep in nature's lullaby.
Yet I hold back from yielding and close my eyes to search inside. No, I am unable to douse this flame. For this fire is kindled by our curiosity, our thirst for knowledge and understanding; to make the unknown known and to find our place in the cosmos. The light from this flame is a beacon, in our search for an all encompassing Cosmic Rhythm, of which the rhythm in my orchard is but a single musical note. I have no idea if that celestial rhythm will ever reveal itself to us; but only with it shall I be able to decipher the music of my little orchard, which I can enjoy, yet not fully understand.

NATURE OF THE UNIVERSE AND ITS CONSCIOUSNESS

Why at all does The Universe exist? Why not Non-existence ? Why is there preference for Existence? To such questions, the only fundamental reason that appeals to me is that, 'Non-Existence is an impossibility.' It is a 'non state' that cannot exist. If all of existence vanishes, there will be no Space and no Matter/Energy; also no Time. Along with this all consciousness also will vanish. The true 'non-stste' of 'Non-Existence' is inconceivable. It only requires some quiet contemplation with a little emagination. All those who tried to think of such a possibility, which I too tried; have seen their path leading them to a Sanatorium. For it is a concept inconceivable and incomprehensible to the human mind. A conscious entity like the human brain, cannot cope with this line of thought, where even Consciousness is  not there. I welcome all to try this out, in a mental excercise, to think of a state where both Space and Consciousness vanishes. To say the least, it is a thoroughly disconcerting experience. I was saved from the Sanatorium, by an article of a Russian scientist, many years back, which gave this simple yet profound explanation; that Non-Existene is an impossibility and thererfore Existence is perpetual. It was always there and it will always be there.

But this leads to another unacceptable concept- Eternity. By whatever yard stick you measure, Eternity is again an unacceptable concept: All this activity going on and on and on ad-infinitum. Human reason-based mind, again reject such an existence. Here too a little mental imagination is helpful in realising the impossibility of Eternity. Infinity as a mathematical limiting concept is fine, but not as part of reality. A compromise solution and the only one possible is an Cyclic Universe. An Universe that has a birth, a finite life span and a death. Only that the death is not a true death, it is an act of regeneration. The end of the old Universe coincides with birth of a new one; an universe with different laws than the earlier one. A completely new one, without any memory of the past, but connected only through a Consciousness - 'Chetana'. Chetana or Chaitanya in sanskrit is the 'ability to be aware of one's own existence'. In this cyclic form, Universe is Finite and yet is Eternal. Such a cyclic Universe satisfies both our above problems of impossibility; namely the State of Non-Existence and the concept of Eternity. Its like the hand of a watch, which comes round in 12 hours and the end point of 12 hours is also the beginning of the next cycle of 12 hours; there is no discontinuity. Since each Universe is a completely new one, our senses are not revulsed by the requirement of living on and on ad infinitum under the same rules, in an ifinite stretch of life span.

 But is there any way to reason that the Universe is in-fact a Conscious entity. Let me try as under. Today's science avoids this question. Let us try to play a reason game to see if we can arrive at any conclusion.

Space cannot exist alone without time. All objects that give meaning to space has to be animate ie have some movement ie some amount of energy.   But all movements, whether it is inside the atoms and nucleus in the very construct of matter or  in kinetic bodies (physically moving bodies) or in the form of radiation; all are dependent on Time. Because movement is 'Change of Place with Time.' All movement takes place as much in Time as in Space. That is why Einstein also states that Space and Time do not have separate existence, there is only Space-Time; one entity.
Also a hypothetical body, which do not posess any kind of movement/energy, whether internal or external (body movement), cannot announce its presence, because it cannot send any information. So for sending any information by a body and telling the rest of Existence that it exists; it needs both Time and Movement (energy). Which means an Inanimate body cannot form part of Existence. So we see that Space and Time must come into existence simultaneously, in the making of the Universe and all bodies have to be animate.

Along with Space and Time, the presence Matter/Energy too is necessary to give meaning to the universe. Space-Time can become alive, only with presence of some kind of Energy- Radiation or Matter.( as I have already said above). A Universe of only Space-Time, again do not carry meaning unless it gets populated by some body or radiation, which can utilise Space-Time and give it form. It is animated matter and radiation, that gives life to the Universe.

Therefore Space, Time and Energy, all three must come into existence simultaneously in the making of the Universe. They are not independent of each other. The present accepted concept of the Universes's birth, also adheres to this requirement.

Now let us go one step further.  Let all of Universe come to existence with all its splendour and the beauty of its interlocking natural laws. Universe is that entity that encompasses all existence and there is no outside to it. We can only conceive the boundary of the Universe to lie where 'Time' comes to Zero. It is not a physical boundary in space. Now this body (the Universe) as a whole entity, has no other body to tell about its own existence. Therefore it cannot register its existence or presence.  A body which cannot register its presence anywhere is the same as Non-Existence. Such an hypothetical Universe do not make any qualitative difference to the impossible state of 'Non-Eistence'; unless it has some means to declare its presence and come into existence.
A ray of light emitted by a body may move all its life without interacting; but at the moment of its emmission it interacted with the emiting body and thus has already registered its existence. Therefore even though it is moving witout interacting all through the life of the universe, it still exists. By contrast the Universe has no other body from which it could have similarly come to existence. It is all of existence by itself. So only way the Universe can register its presence, is by means of recognition by an Cognitive presence (consciousness), within itself.

Such a line of thinking leads us to the conclusion that the Universe is an conscious entity itself. An entity which is conscious about its own existence. Therefore apart from the three components of Matter-Space-Energy, a fouth component is also necessary as an integral part of the Universe, which is 'Consciousness'. So to satisfy our logical-reasoning, the Universe has be alleast a Four-Component entity; the fourth one being, Consciousness.

[Cognitive life like us, who can recognise the presence of surrounding environment/the Universe, came much later. It took billions of years for the first conscious life to emerge, who has the power to recognise the existence of the universe. If we reason we will realise that our consciousness is not independent; it is merely an active arm of the 'All Pervading Consciousness of the Universe.' 

At the moment of regeneration from the old universe into a completely new universe, it is only this Consciousness that remains. It is this consciousness that creates barrier between Existence and Non-Existence, even when the other dimensions of Space, Energy and Time conceivably come to Zero at that crossing point. These three dimensions have to come to Zero- only then the memory of the old universe can be completely erased; which is the requirement for having a completely new-universe. It is only Consciousness, which we may call 'Cosmic Consciousnes', that is indistructible.
I also reason, that we cannot have anything in our making, which is already not there in nature in some basic form. It is this Cosmic Consciousness from which our own consciousness and intelligence has emerged. We are not seperate from this consciousness; we are part of this cosmic-consciousness only. I conceive Cosmic Consciousnessis as to be a Latent State and our Consciousness as the Active state, that has grown out of it. We are integral part of the Cosmic Consciousness, and not separate entities from it, even though we like to think so. [This is what is called 'Brahmatma or Paramatma' by our ancient Vedas; the books of Science not of Religion. When we die our consciousness merges with the Universal Consciousness, loosing its temporary active existence.]

If anyone has cared to read this this far, I request then to share their own thoughts and comment upon it. I accept the possibility of being called a Mad-Cap.



LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE

It greatly annoys me to read questions like: "Are we alone in the Universe?" or "Is there someone out there?". To me there is no place for questions at all, life and intelligence are for me funamental component of the universe.

The start of the journey for evolution of life and Intelligence starts much before the large organic molecular were formed; the journey of evolution starts at the very beginning, where atoms come together to form molecules. The progressive formation of bigger and bigger molecules and then getting imbubed with property of life, the development from virus to bactreria to more complex life forms and imergence of higher level of Intelligence is part of the same journey. In fact the seed of life and intelligence is inherent in the property of the Universe itself, right from its inception* (*if ever there was a biginning to the universe). To make it like a scintific statement I can say, that there is an underlying Vector in all the workings of Nature, pointing towards creation and development of Intelligence. Nature's activity is not random, but it is Vectored to generate life and Intelligence. There exists a "Latent Intelligent Consciousness" in the fabric of Nature, which is being converted into 'Active Intelligence' all over the Univerese. It is interesting to note that if we replace the word 'God' with 'Nature', then the proclamation from religious books that "God created man in its own shape.', takes the form 'Nature Created Intelligene with its own essence.'

The Universe is vast beyond our ability of normal comprehension. There are millions of galaxies already detected by space telescopes, extending upto 13.5 billion light years. Each galaxy on the average has hundreads of billions of stars. But all this vastness is composed of the same building blocks of less than 100 stable elements. All this vastness is governed by the same physical laws; such as Graity, Quantum nature, Space-time duality, upper limit of speed, electro-magnetic waves and flow of ectrons as mode of enery trafer etc. Whatever is taking place in the universe are taking shape under the influence of these same forces. Our Sun and our planets are one of many billions of similar systems. There is nothing special about us. It is inconceivable that the same forces of nature under similar environments existing in billions and billions of similar planetary systems will create life and Intelligence in only one of them. In experiments conducted in laboratories on artificialy created early earth environments of 4 billion years ago, readily produced myriad of large molecules, which are building blocks of life on earth. Thus such molecules and subsequent life forms have definitely emerged in billions of planets and larger moons all over the universe including in our own galaxy. Even if we leave out leave out 99.99% of planets to have hostile environments for life, still we will have billions of them where life can emerge and prosper to varying degrees.

Anyone who is a keen observer of nature, will see that nature does things at an grand scale, so that there is maximum probability of success. Look at our earth, where millions of life forms have emerged and died, taking different paths, so that even as numerous species die out all the time, life and Intelligence has maximum chance for survival.Earth is one of those luckier experiments, where Life has survived over billions of years, overcoming hostile periods and environments to reach the level of intelligence as of Humans, who can now theorise about the Universe and aspire to reach out to its origin. Lookong to the large number of possible negative factors that can extinguish life from a planetary environment, such examples as of our earth is bound to be very few. But starting with billions of life bearing planets, even this miniscule number must be quiet large. Thare is no question that we couls be alone. As Einstein once remarked, we can also say, Nature do not play dice. Universe does things in such a way, that it leaves nothing to chance and ensures that emergence of Intelligence, which appears to be so vital to its own Life Cycle, do not fail. Universe is the mother and Intelligence is its child.