Dharmic Religions Only: Evolutionary Science and Hindu/Buddhist worldviews.

[atanu]

Luis, you will find a hard time defending science here. 'Sabda' is irrefutable.

Yes. It is so. That is the basis of Hinduism-Sanatana dharma.

In my opinion, there is no need to reject shruti in order to defend science, which as such requires no defence.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Shruti is seen in different ways by different people.

 

[sayak83]

I believe they did change. Natural selection works, however mutations cannot ever produce "new" information, they simply remove or change the existing genetic code. More often than not, such mutations are not favorable and the majority are harmful (the protein stops working negatively affecting function) or harmless (they don't affect bodily function to the point it provides a survival advantage)

I would specifically address this point now as it has been made by several people. A gene consists of thousands of triplets that code for specific amino acids. A protein is a very very long chain of thousands and thousands of amino acids (like a short story made from words). So if a mutation changes one (or many) of these triplets, the amino acid sequence that is built the protein will be altered and hence the protein will change, altering what it does. This is how novelty is generated.
Now, you would think that if you change word and sentences in a short story blindly, the story will get incoherent. In biology talk, the protein will loose functionality. However, in nature, this is not the case, and this is where the analogy between human codes and biological code breaks down. Human codes (programs, language etc.) are brittle, change something randomly and you will make it incoherent 100% of the time. But since nature's codes (in DNA for example) are not simply random symbols and sounds that are artificially "glued" with meaning, but are rather themselves products of regularities and laws of chemistry/physics in actual chemical networks, all nature's codes are resilient and malleable. Almost all mutations have no impact on functionality at all, and the probability that a random mutation will cause novel or improved functionality is small but significant, and only somewhat smaller than the probability that the mutation is harmful. This is not some theoretical analysis, this is the result of exhaustive experiments where millions of DNA strands and proteins and genes were experimentally tested by altering them randomly and testing functionality. And these lab results have been complemented by even more extensive simulations of how alterations would affect gene, proteins or regulatory networks. (I will present you with sources if you want to read about it http://www.ieu.uzh.ch/wagner/research.html).
One of the remarkable findings of the experiment is this. Take any protein from any living organism at random and any other protein from any other organism at random, and there is over 90% probability that you will find a path of moving one step at a time from protein A to protein B by changing/adding/subtracting an amino acid while always retaining functionality. Its like having the ability of changing mahabharata into ramayana one word at a time while it being always the case that all intermediate stages make meaningful stories of their own! Such a powerful discovery is strong evidence for the inference common ancestry of at least majority of organisms and refutation of the idea that organisms have existed as independent creations from the beginning. No matter how different they look, all these organisms are different renditions of the same original song. And this is just one piece of evidence by which one can infer common ancestry through processes that conform with the pramana theory.
Isn't the diversification of One to Many one of the consistent themes of the Upanisads?
In the beginning, son, this world was simply what is existent- one only, without a second.... (Chandayoga 6.2:1)
And it thought to itself: "Let me become many, let me propagate myself."....(Chandayoga 6.2:3)
Here is also the fact that Upanisadic writers thought that the mind is material like all other,
"When one eats food it breaks down into three parts. The densest become feces, the medium becomes flesh, and the lightest becomes mind." ..(Chandayoga 6.5:1)

 

[von bek]

I see no need to reconcile Buddhism with evolution as they in no way conflict. I see the diversification of physical forms over time as reflecting the increasingly complex desires that organisms will generate after repeated sense stimulation over a long period.

 

[sayak83]

#1 If the theory of evolution
was true, we should have discovered millions upon millions of transitional fossils that show the development of one species into another species. Instead, we have zero.

#6 If “evolution” was happening right now, there would be millions of creatures out there with partially developed features and organs. But instead there are none.

http://thetruthwins.com/archives/44-reasons-why-evolution-is-just-a-fairy-tale-for-adults

Darwin and his monkey gang can't keep people in the dark in this internet age ......Its waste of time to spend much more on this topic for evolution is debunked by science itself

/EndThread

1) This seems like rhetoric. First the inaccuracy. Because fossilization is rare, the total number of fossils found till modern times number much less than a million. Of the total number of fossils found, a significant % of them ARE transitional, contrary to the rhetoric in the link. Eg. bird-like dinosaurs, transitional forms between fish and land animals, transitional whales. The fossil evidence is so rich now that entire books have been written on single transitions like that of land mammals to whale.
https://books.google.com/books?id=rSEtBAAAQBAJ&dq=whale+and+dolphin+evolution&source=gbs_navlinks_s
2) Complete misunderstanding of evolution. Since evolution at every stage is functional, all organs of an organism that lives will be functional and adaptive to the habitat they live in. Only if the climate or habitat changes will there be differential selection causing the organs to change. For example, the urban environment is a recent one created by humans and animals that are settling there are facing selection pressures that are changing their organs.
http://www.macleans.ca/society/life/how-cities-are-making-our-rats-smarter-and-spiders-bigger/
Refuted.

 

[kalyan]

1) This seems like rhetoric. First the inaccuracy. Because fossilization is rare, the total number of fossils found till modern times number much less than a million. Of the total number of fossils found, a significant % of them ARE transitional, contrary to the rhetoric in the link. Eg. bird-like dinosaurs, transitional forms between fish and land animals, transitional whales. The fossil evidence is so rich now that entire books have been written on single transitions like that of land mammals to whale.
https://books.google.com/books?id=rSEtBAAAQBAJ&dq=whale+and+dolphin+evolution&source=gbs_navlinks_s

you are admitting that there is NO proof of any fossil of such existence which paramounts to admitting that no one can prove evolution and read the 2nd point in the link..When Charles Darwin came up with his theory, he admitted that no transitional forms had been found at that time, but he believed that huge numbers certainly existed and would eventually be discovered which has NOT happened

2) Complete misunderstanding of evolution. Since evolution at every stage is functional, all organs of an organism that lives will be functional and adaptive to the habitat they live in. Only if the climate or habitat changes will there be differential selection causing the organs to change. For example, the urban environment is a recent one created by humans and animals that are settling there are facing selection pressures that are changing their organs.

Read the 2nd point again....If evolution existed in first place, it is a process and now we should have seen different species like monkeys with human face and what not which clearly has NOT happened

 

[atanu]

Here is also the fact that Upanisadic writers thought that the mind is material like all other,
"When one eats food it breaks down into three parts. The densest become feces, the medium becomes flesh, and the lightest becomes mind." ..(Chandayoga 6.5:1)

Antahkarana, the inner instrument of which mana-mind is one aspect, is said to be material but atman is not.

 

[sayak83]

you are admitting that there is NO proof of any fossil of such existence which paramounts to admitting that no one can prove evolution and read the 2nd point in the link..When Charles Darwin came up with his theory, he admitted that no transitional forms had been found at that time, but he believed that huge numbers certainly existed and would eventually be discovered which has NOT happened

Ok, I read my sources again. There are indeed Billions of fossils and millions of of these fossils are transitional. Darwin was right after all! I was thinking only of the major transitions (the origin of phyla, land to water, land to air etc.). Since only a 20 or so transitions are considered major, they represent only a small portion of total history of life and therefore the fossils representing those number several thousands.
So, are you going to ignore the huge number of transitional whale fossils that have been found and depicted in the book I linked. Do you want me to link other books on transition from dinosaurs to birds, water to land etc.? Happy to do so. Have lots of fossils with lots of books describing them.

Read the 2nd point again....If evolution existed in first place, it is a process and now we should have seen different species like monkeys with human face and what not which clearly has NOT happened

Umm what? Why? What is so special or adaptive about the human face. The difference in facial feature between two different ape species is same as the difference between an ape and a human face. The sense that the features look very different is an illusion created by the brain...the same kind of illusion that makes it appear as if faces of a different ethnic group are far more similar than your own ethnic group.

 

[sayak83]

Antahkarana, the inner instrument of which mana-mind is one aspect, is said to be material but atman is not.

What scientists mean by consciousness is the mind and the lesser ego-self, not the Atman. This is abundantly clear simply by reading about the features they ascribe to consciousness and the features the Indian philosophers ascribe to the mind. One of the problems with translations are category-matching. Much of the English translations were done when cognitive science was in infancy (its till very immature), so the translators could not figure out what to make of the many many categories of "mind" you find in Indian and Buddhist philosophical literature. Using words like consciousness and self is simply insufficient and leads to misunderstandings. There are several modern philosophers that are trying to correct these problems.
http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/part-two-self-and-consciousness

 

[atanu]

What scientists mean by consciousness is the mind and the lesser ego-self, not the Atman. This is abundantly clear simply by reading about the features they ascribe to consciousness and the features the Indian philosophers ascribe to the mind. One of the problems with translations are category-matching. Much of the English translations were done when cognitive science was in infancy (its till very immature), so the translators could not figure out what to make of the many many categories of "mind" you find in Indian and Buddhist philosophical literature. Using words like consciousness and self is simply insufficient and leads to misunderstandings. There are several modern philosophers that are trying to correct these problems.
http://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/part-two-self-and-consciousness

I agree and thank you for the link. I believe that there is mostly no confusion in those who follow Hinduism through valid teacher.

 

[sayak83]

I agree with the Dalia Lama's quote:

"My confidence in venturing into science lies in my basic belief that as in science so in Buddhism, understanding the nature of reality is pursued by means of critical investigation: if scientific analysis were conclusively to demonstrate certain claims in Buddhism to be false, then we must accept the findings of science and abandon those claims."

~Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama, The Universe in a Single Atom: The Convergence of Science and Spirituality (2005)​

Your mileage may vary.

Great

 

[sayak83]

Sayakji, please see post #18 - it does not reject the 5th veda i.e. purAN, and also accepts the basic general idea of the biological evolution as a partial material side-effect of the spiritual evolution. The details of scientific reports may have to be improved, as the change is not linear but multi-dimensional. e.g. homo-erectus ---> homo-sapiens may be an over-simplification of the reality.

As you would know, different schools of Indian thought weigh scripture differently. That is not a problem.I have no issues with anyone believing in things science is silent on as science works with only observable phenomena and inferences from such observations. But science has definite conclusions from what it has observed so far in the world, and as long as you are happy that those conclusions were arrived at using correct principles of logic and inference, there is no difference of opinion between you and me.

 

[shivsomashekhar]

I will repeat what I said in the other thread. There is a misconception that Madhva agrees with the ISKCON/Hare Krishnas view of Pramanas - that Shabda overrides other Pramanas. This is not true with any system other than the Hare Krishnas. To quote Madhva from http://www.dvaita.org/shaastra/article.html -

na cha anubhava virodhe Agamasya prAmANyam.h |

Scripture is not valid when opposed to direct experience.

and from the same page -

While pratyaksha is supreme in its own field of valid world experience, on concepts and entities beyond its ken, such as sin, heaven and hell and the nature of the divine being, its relationship with the soul etc., Agama has to be conceded its own unique and rightful authority. But when an Agama text is interpreted in such a manner as to be in total opposition to world experience, such a meaning has to be given up for being totally unacceptable to world experience.

That should hopefully settle it. The idea of Shabda being superior to Pratyaksha for historical information does not come from Tattvavada. Therefore, these dogmatic assertions on history based on Bhagavatam allegory instead of science should not be taken as a generic Vaishnava position as has been claimed on this thread. It is also the same dogmatic approach which prevents the Hare Krishnas from rational thought as they have no freedom or room to think and analyze beyond what their Gurus tell them.

In that sense, this debate will offer little value as they really cannot afford to even consider the alternative that the other schools and science may be right - for that would be a sin. All they are allowed to do is to defend their own position and if not, just agree to disagree.

 

[निताइ dasa]

Because fossilization is rare, the total number of fossils found till modern times number much less than a million. Of the total number of fossils found, a significant % of them ARE transitional, contrary to the rhetoric in the link. Eg. bird-like dinosaurs, transitional forms between fish and land animals, transitional whales. The fossil evidence is so rich now that entire books have been written on single transitions like that of land mammals to whale.

I would argue that there is no clear example with the fossil record today that shows a clear transitional link between two species. I also further argue that fossils of "transitional' species that a found today are nothing more than extinct species which were originally separate. Anyway Sayak83ji I have made my position very clear, and I believe it is quite logical why Vaishnav schools reject evolution (from a epistemic position). May Ratikalaji can comment further, but I don't want this debate to turn into a "evolution vs creation" fight, because this is not the Dir to do it.

na cha anubhava virodhe Agamasya prAmANyam.h |

Scripture is not valid when opposed to direct experience.

I agree, if direct experience contradicts shastra, then the secondary meaning of shastra must be taken, or the pratyuksha must be concluded as incorrect. The two must be reconciled. The thing is, evolution evidences are not based upon pratyuksha at all. They are is simply sabda or at most a usage of anumana. When there is a contradiction between 2 sabdas, agama is accepted. Anyway as I quoted Ananda Tirtha before, a validity of a pramana depends only on the source. Pratyuksha as a conditioned soul is imperfect, therefore it must be rejected when it wieghs against perfect pramana. If you look at experience in its basic stage it contradicts evolution, because we individuals in our life span will never observe a species evolve into another.

Therefore, these dogmatic assertions on history based on Bhagavatam allegory instead of science should not be taken as a generic Vaishnava position as has been claimed on this thread

You can keep thinking that. I hold that this is the generic vaishnav positions. Kalyanji is a Sri Vaishnav and he also agrees with us, about the superiority of Shastra over everything. This epistemic basis comes from Jiva Goswami's analysis (in Sat Sandarbhas) and he heavily follows the pramana portion from Madhavacharya. I think Jiva Goswami knows Madhvacharya a bit more than you. Anyway, I would like an actual Tattvavadi to weigh in here, because we have presented evidence for both our sides.



.

 

[ameyAtmA]

As you would know, different schools of Indian thought weigh scripture differently. That is not a problem.

Namaste Sayakji and Shivsomshekharji
Just want to clarify that post #18 does not give any less weightage to the BhAgvat PurAN. It demonstrate how the BhAgvat and Science can and do co-exist at once.
BhAgvat is very important to me and I call it the crown jewel of PurANa , and sAkshAt vAN~gmay-mUrti of Shri KRshNa. (the literature form of KRshNa).

By the grace of ShyAmsundar, do not feel the need to discard pieces of shAstra, but can tell that it is all a matter of seeing and absorbing the kaleidoscopic truth told.
Shloka in the BhAgvat do not tell me that the biological evolution theory is wrong. It may at the most have misplaced a few details.

I am trying to say that we should not be quick to dismiss pieces of the shAstra on perception, but see them in the correct light with an open heart (pray to paramAtmA. He gives us the right buddhi) and then everything fits like a jig-saw-puzzle.

I have no issues with anyone believing in things science is silent on as science works with only observable phenomena and inferences from such observations. But science has definite conclusions from what it has observed so far in the world, and as long as you are happy that those conclusions were arrived at using correct principles of logic and inference, there is no difference of opinion between you and me.

Yes, I agree that science is sincere in what it undertakes with whatever it has available. Extrapolations made by science are also ok as long as we know they are that.

----
Shiv, see my comments on how Vedas (and Tansen's raag malhAr) bring rain --- in the DIR.

 

[sayak83]

I would argue that there is no clear example with the fossil record today that shows a clear transitional link between two species. I also further argue that fossils of "transitional' species that a found today are nothing more than extinct species which were originally separate. Anyway Sayak83ji I have made my position very clear, and I believe it is quite logical why Vaishnav schools reject evolution (from a epistemic position). May Ratikalaji can comment further, but I don't want this debate to turn into a "evolution vs creation" fight, because this is not the Dir to do it.
.

I would argue that there are clear examples of transitional fossils, which along with lots of other evidence clearly show that speciation is a justified inference. If this is simply a matter of putting faith on the exegesis of the texts you hold to be true, then its ok. But if you think that the science itself is wrong (on this and other areas) then I would like to have a discussion about its reasons and see if they are valid.
I think that this is the correct forum to have this as evolution vs creation section deals with Abrahamic creationists that have little to do with Dharmic beliefs and philosophies.

 

[LuisDantas]

The evidence for evolution goes far beyond fossils. Darwin did not have access to anything close to the current biological resources that can examine the actual genetic composition of beings, among other less direct techniques.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence_of_common_descent

I have a hard time attempting to believe that the people who have access to those techniques are so ideologically attuned to each other as to refuse to bring any inconsistent findings to light. Besides, it is not like the theory has been lacking in productive applications either. Or like there would be a shortage of opportunity for fame for any people who found those supposed inconsistencies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selective_breeding

People who "doubt" (more like deny) evolution are simply not well aware of the available evidence, and in most cases have not really understood the general outlines of the theory either.

 

[atanu]

I will repeat what I said in the other thread. There is a misconception that Madhva agrees with the ISKCON/Hare Krishnas view of Pramanas - that Shabda overrides other Pramanas. This is not true with any system other than the Hare Krishnas. To quote Madhva from http://www.dvaita.org/shaastra/article.html -

na cha anubhava virodhe Agamasya prAmANyam.h |

Scripture is not valid when opposed to direct experience.

and from the same page -

While pratyaksha is supreme in its own field of valid world experience, on concepts and entities beyond its ken, such as sin, heaven and hell and the nature of the divine being, its relationship with the soul etc., Agama has to be conceded its own unique and rightful authority. But when an Agama text is interpreted in such a manner as to be in total opposition to world experience, such a meaning has to be given up for being totally unacceptable to world experience.

That should hopefully settle it. The idea of Shabda being superior to Pratyaksha for historical information does not come from Tattvavada. Therefore, these dogmatic assertions on history based on Bhagavatam allegory instead of science should not be taken as a generic Vaishnava position as has been claimed on this thread. It is also the same dogmatic approach which prevents the Hare Krishnas from rational thought as they have no freedom or room to think and analyze beyond what their Gurus tell them.

In that sense, this debate will offer little value as they really cannot afford to even consider the alternative that the other schools and science may be right - for that would be a sin. All they are allowed to do is to defend their own position and if not, just agree to disagree.

In that case, the shruti "Mind and word return from it" is to be shelved.

In that case, the whole idea of Ishwara is untenable from tattvavAd perspective. The whole of the knowledge of Turiya non dual atman will fail.

Actually there is more to it. Direct experience of no two individuals will match. There is a pithy statement in Yoga Vasista that in my opinion summarises this. "What is true in consciousness is true since the Consciousness is true."

All schools agree on highest authority of Shruti and in fact schools other than advaita point out presence of Bheda shruti to refute Shankara.

The advaita position will be reduced to absurdity if sensual experiences are used to reject shabda pramana.

Science is my profession. I do my work as a necessity -- as a result of prArabdha. But it is shruti that reminds me again and again "The turiya atman must be known". Now, there is no way for the sensual apparatus or for science to experience Turiya directly.

However, we must all note that the purAna-s are not shabda pramana. They are smriti and not shabda.

 

[sayak83]

Thank you for the post Sayak83 ji, You have given a good overview of evolutionary principles. You also have yet to provide evidence for the ideas presented above (which no doubt you will later) and when you do, we can critically evaluate it . I cannot criticize a theory alone, evidence must be presented first. biological findings.

Evidence of Major Evolutionary Changes:- Through Lab Experiments
While fossils are well and good, direct results form lab experiments, when available, provide a much surer basis on which to justify a theory. Now if any transition counts as a major transition in evolutionary history, it must be the emergence of multicellular organisms from single celled ancestors. This is a major event in the history of life, leading to the emergence of big plants and animals made of millions of cells working together. It is also something that is clearly depicted in the fossil record (which I will come to later). The evolution of multicellularity was thought to be a significant theoretical challenge to evolution because, as one biologist puts it,

Since evolution acts on individual cells, it pays off for a cell to be selfish. By hogging resources and hindering neighbors, a cell can increase the odds that more of its own genes get passed into the next generation. This logic is one of the reasons it has been challenging to imagine how multicellularity arose; it requires the subjugation of self-interest in favor of the group’s survival.

"Traditional theories make this out to be a difficult transition because you have to somehow turn off selection on the individual cells and turn it on for the collective," says Carl Simpson, a paleobiologist at the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin,

However, evolutionary biologists have been able to evolve unicellular yeast into new multicellular yeast in just 60 generations

They dumped unicellular yeast into a tube of liquid food and waited a few minutes for the cells to settle. Then they extracted the lowest fraction of the liquid and allowed whatever cells it contained to form the next generation. Because the cells had to cluster together in order to sink to the bottom and survive, the artificial selection made it more advantageous for yeast to cooperate than to be solitary.

After just 60 generations, all of the surviving yeast populations had formed snowflake-shaped multicellular clusters. "Hence we know that simple conditions are sufficient to select for multicellularity," says biologist Michael Travisano, who led the research.

But clusters of cells do not make a multicellular organism. They have to function in the world as a unit and should react to evolutionary pressures as one unit and not simply as individuals in a loose colony. Further research showed that these snowflake mutant yeasts are indeed acting as one organism and not merely as a colony.

So the researchers set out to determine whether artificial selection would act on the snowflake yeast as if they also were multicellular organisms. To test it, one batch of the multicellular yeast was allowed only five minutes to settle in a tube (representing a strong selection pressure), whereas another batch was given 25 minutes (a weaker selection pressure). After 35 generations, the yeast that were exposed to stronger selection evolved to have larger cluster sizes, whereas those in the weak selection group actually shrank in size. This indicated that each cluster of cells was evolving as one organism.
In addition, time-lapse photography (video below) revealed that, in order to reproduce, the multicellular yeast divides itself into branches that develop into the multicellular form as well. The daughter clusters did not create their own offspring until they had reached a similar size as their parents. The presence of this juvenile stage shows that the snowflake yeast had adopted a multicellular way of life,

Not only that they were beginning to show functional differentiation between different cells based on location, just like specialized cells on multicellular organisms do in their various organs.

Although the experiment's artificial selection favored large clusters, a large cluster required more time to grow before it could reproduce. That meant that smaller clusters, which divide in half more quickly, could soon outnumber the larger clusters. But after many generations of selection, the large clusters evolved a solution: nonreproductive cells which served as points where offspring could break away from the parent cluster. By providing more break points, these specialized cells allowed the clusters to break into more pieces, to produce a greater number offspring quickly.

“The discovery that there are cells specialized to die in order for the structure to reproduce is suggestive of the first steps toward cellular differentiation,” Grosberg says.

All of this happened in just 2 months of experiments starting with yeast that lived as single lonely cells. Since none of us deny that the earth is billions of years old, the rapid mutability of organisms top create such significant alterations to their behavior and form under the correct kind of selection pressure makes evolution, speciation and diversity nearly inevitable and illogical to argue against.

LINK
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/test-tube-yeast-evolve/

 

[kalyan]

I read my sources again. There are indeed Billions of fossils and millions of of these fossils are transitional. Darwin was right after all! I was thinking only of the major transitions (the origin of phyla, land to water, land to air etc.). Since only a 20 or so transitions are considered major, they represent only a small portion of total history of life and therefore the fossils representing those number several thousands.
So, are you going to ignore the huge number of transitional whale fossils that have been found and depicted in the book I linked. Do you want me to link other books on transition from dinosa

Give me sources or It did not happen

Umm what? Why? What is so special or adaptive about the human face. The difference in facial feature between two different ape species is same as the difference between an ape and a human face. The sense that the features look very different is an illusion created by the brain...the same kind of illusion that makes it appear as if faces of a different ethnic group are far more

Is it a fact or opinion?