The Guide - Religion is not Unscientific

Science & Religion

	Introduction
	Religion is not Unscientific
	Criticism of Material Science
	Science, Religion and Human Welfare

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON
SCIENCE AND RELIGION :

Religion is not Unscientific

In an attempt to reconcile Western Science and Eastern Philosophy, specially the Vedanta, Vivekananda first of all tried to show that the religious way of looking at the universe was not unscientific. He showed that the two principles fundamental to all scientific inquiry are satisfied by Advaita Vedanta. They are:

The particular is explained by general, the general by the more general, till the one universal is reached.
Explanation of a thing must come from inside the thing not from outside. An extension of this principle is the law of evolution, that the effect is nothing but the cause in another form, that all potentialities of the effect are present in the cause, that the whole creation is an evolution and not creation.

The Swami showed that the Brahman of Vedanta fulfills the above mentioned two principles of knowledge, in as much as, it is the last generalization and out of which everything else arise. It is the highest and the ultimate cause, as well as the lowest and the most distant of effects in a series of evolution.

The third principle of conclusion of science which tallies with the conclusion of Vedanta is the essential unity of things. Vivekananda showed, that we are all one, mentally, spiritually and physically, - a conclusion to which the modern sub-atomic science is arriving at, after almost a century. The whole universe is an ocean of matter, of which we are like whirlpools. The matter that is in my body may have been in you a few years ago, or in the sun or in a planet, in continuous state of flux. So with thoughts. Our thoughts enter each other's mind, we all know this. Coming to a still further generalization, the essence of matter and thought is their potentiality in spirit, which too must be one. The proud man is told that he is the same as the worm. The grand teaching of oneness of things is a great lesson to learn because we are very glad to be made one with higher beings but nobody wants to be made one with lower ones. Swami Vivekananda also showed that like any science, religion also had its own methods, and procedure, its own premises and its own conclusion based on reason and experience. The science of Yoga was based on observable experience which could be verified by anyone. In Yoga, the object of observation was the mind itself, and the instrument of observation too was the concentrated, purified and trained mind. But nonetheless, it was a documented science with details fully worked out. Religious inquiry, following the internal path, using instruments and methods appropriate to its own field, testing its findings by reason, and verifying its reasoning by experience, was a science in its own right.

Criticism of Material Science