dalvinder45
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- Jul 22, 2023
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COSMOLOGY OF UNIVERSE AS PER PHILOSOPHY, SCIENCE AND RELIGION
Dr Dalvinder Singh Grewal
Professor Emeritus, Desh Bhagat University
Dr Dalvinder Singh Grewal
Professor Emeritus, Desh Bhagat University
Introduction
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The universe has always been a wonder for the man. The more he looks deep, the more he is in wonder. When mothers point their fingers to the sky at night, tell their children about the universe in sky; the Big Bear, the satellites, the planets; the young minds gaze in amazement at the immenseness of the world around. As they grow, they become eager to know the numbers of these stars or their spread. They want to know, ‘Who created these?’ ‘How were these created?’ ‘When were these created?’ ‘What all do these contain?’ etc. Mothers do not have right answers to such questions. No one has! Some guess; others philosophize.
The universe being immensely large and possibly infinite in range and volume, the limits of the boundaries of universe have remained unfathomed. Number of fallacies became prevalent due to lack of knowledge of the universe. A few fallacies include: (a) The present form of man is the result of various biological changes from other beings: (b) The earth is settled on the horns of a bull: (c) The functioning of the universe is not systematic: (d) Not one but there are many Gods: (e) The sun and earth are stationary: (f) The life of universe is only 5000-6000 years: (g) Only human beings have life: (h) Moon has its own light: (j) Man's death is biological: (k) The universe continues due to a continuous set of biological and chemical reactions etc. However, the philosophy, theology and science have tried to give answers to these questions and to remove fallacies in their own ways.
During my research on tribes of Arunachal Pradesh in India, I found Adis, the most populated tribe in the state, believing in Sun-Moon God (Abo-Tani) who created the universe and its people. There are 110 tribes spread over the entire state. Most of them believe in different Creators. The Assamese and Akas being of Royal blood came by a golden ladder; the Tibetan and Monpas were given a ladder of iron; the Daflas and Abhors had to be satisfied with a bamboo ladder; whilst Cacharis and Khowas shared a plantain ladder."[1] Many such Names and stories have been prevalent among other tribes in the world.
What is the truth about the universe and existence? How did these universes come into existence? We have to understand that God does not play dice. (Einstein). There being no speculation, no off the cuff, no haphazard solution, this ought to be be well thought out and prepared design. Since origin or creation is physical processes which are not mechanical but have life in it, it cannot be a mathematical or chemical solution. Just by putting the right kind of ingredients are not produced where life is key ingredient. The design has to be more complicated than a mechanical design.
The word universe is derived from the Old French word ‘Univers’, which in turn is derived from the Latin word Universum.[2] It is the Nature of Things that connects ‘un’ meaning one and versum meaning rotating. An alternative interpretation of Universum is "everything rotated as one" or "everything rotated by one".[3] It can be related to God as the One who rotates the total universe continuously. All the matter and the energy, intergalactic space, the galaxies, the stars and the planets combined are known as universe.[4].It can also be said as the entire visible and invisible; material and living; approachable and unapproachable creation and existence. It also includes all terms like cosmos, the world and nature. [5]
Universe is specified as everything that lies spatially within the outermost limit of matter and energy that has participated in the expansion of space since the very beginning. According to various religions, the beginning of universe is in one single energy source usually called God, Allah, Wahiguru, or Ram. God is a scientific reality. He is the fundamental to all creations; materials and non-materials. If we go on dissecting the atom, we reach at the stage of concentrated energy, which is fundamental to all energies and this is God. This fundamental energy is same every where. There is no difference whatsoever anywhere. Science takes it differently and considers it to have come from a big bag and other such theories
‘Visible and invisible; observable and unobservable through instruments, known or unknown universe are the various concepts of the two types of universe. The unobservable is much more than what is observable. The observable universe is the spatial region within which we can affect and be affected. The location of the observer also is one of the factor of the observable universe. Telescopes extend this visibility. The field of cosmology is the study of the universe.
Cosmology is a Greek word originated from the study of cosmos and is a branch of astronomy. Cosmology of universe as per various religions and scientists is given as annexure 1. The origin and evolution of the universe is studied by Astronomy[6]. As per scientific or astronomical observations, the region visible from Earth (the observable universe) is a sphere with a radius of about 46 billion light years.[7] It is based on the place where from the observation of the expansion of space has been taken and the most distant objects observed. If we compare the diameter of a typical galaxy, it is only 30,000 light-years. On the other hand, the typical distance between two neighbouring galaxies is only 3 million light years.[8] For example, the diameter of our Milky Way Galaxy is roughly 100,000 light years.[9] However our nearest galaxy, the Andromeda Galaxy, is located roughly 2.5 million light years away[10].
There are probably a larger number than 100 billion (1011) galaxies with in the observable universe.[11] Typical galaxies include dwarfs with as few as ten million (107)[12] and giants which have stars up to one trillion (1012) stars[13]. All of them orbit the galaxy's centre of mass. In a 2010 study, the astronomers estimated that the observable universe contains 300 sextillion (3×1023) stars.[14] The known universe is the one that can be known by the man while the unknown universe is the one not known to the man to date. Various multi-verse theories exist in which physicists suggest that our universe is one of many similar universes that exist[15].
Dark energy and dark matter and their properties are yet to be fully explored. Throughout the universe and its observable history, uterium and helium appear to be identical.[16] The universe seems to have much more matter than ante-matter, an asymmetry possibly related to the observations of CP violation.[17] The universe seems to possess far more matter than the anti-matter an asymmetry possibly associated with the observations of CP violation. The universe appears to possess no net charge and thus gravity appears to be the dominant interaction on the cosmological length scale. The absence of net charge and momentum would follow Gauss's law and the non-divergence of the stress-energy-momentum, respectively the accepted physical laws, if the universe were finite.[18]
Thomas Blount's Glossographia used this word in English in 1656.[19] German philosopher Christian Wolff used this word in Cosmologia Generalis in 1731 taken up in Latin.[20] In the study of Big Bang, the present and future universe all fall in this category which involves the scientific study of the origin, evolution, and eventual fate of the universe. The scientific study of the universe's origin, structures and dynamics, and future and the laws of science that govern these areas, is the Physical cosmology.[21] On the other hand, the body of beliefs based on mythological, religious, and esoteric literature and traditions of creation myths and eschatology fall under religious or mythological cosmology. The scientists, astronomers, physicists and philosophers study Physical cosmology. Theories in physical cosmology may include both scientific and non-scientific propositions because of shared scope with philosophy, and may depend upon untested assumptions.
How did the universe come into existence? There are two theories; physical cosmology and religious cosmology or Evolution theory and Creation Theory. According to Evolution theory, the most accepted theory is Big bang theory. [22] According to Big Bang, From a hot, dense sea of matter and energy, concentrated in a region smaller than a dime, the universe emerged some 15 billion years ago began to expand and cool at an incredibly rapid rate. It turned into galaxies, stars, planets and life as the matter expanded and cooled.[23] The theory of evolution by natural selection, first formulated in Darwin's book "On the Origin of Species" in 1859, is the process by which organisms change over time as a result of changes in heritable physical or behavioural traits. Changes that allow an organism to better adapt to its environment will help it survive and have more offsprings. Evolution by natural selection is one of the best substantiated theories in the history of science, supported by evidence from a wide variety of scientific disciplines, including palaeontolog, geology genetics and developmental biology. The term "evolution" usually refers to the biological evolution of living things. Over the years organisms developed and human being formed. But the processes by which planets, stars, galaxies, and the universe form and change over time are also types of "evolution." In all of these cases there is change over time, although the processes involved are quite different.
The Evolution theory has two main points, said Brian Richmond, curator of human origins at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. "All life on Earth is connected and related to each other," and this diversity of life is a product of "modifications of populations by natural selection, where some traits were favoured in an environment over others," he said. The idea of evolution is very old but the modern concept involving natural selection was first set out by Alfred Wallace and Charles Darwin in the 1930s.
This theory is based on the argument that the start of universe is from a single point. By the time the temperature had dropped to 100 million times that of the sun’s core, the forces of nature assumed their present properties, and the elementary particles known as quarks roamed freely in a sea of energy. When the universe had expanded an additional 1,000 times, all the matter we can measure filled a region the size of the solar system. At that time, the free quarks became confined in neutrons and protons. After the universe had grown by another factor of 1,000, protons and neutrons combined to form atomic nuclei, including most of the helium and deuterium present today. All of this occurred within the first minute of the expansion. Conditions were still too hot, however, for atomic nuclei to capture electrons. Neutral atoms appeared in abundance only after the expansion had continued for 300,000 years and the universe was 1,000 times smaller than it is now. The neutral atoms then began to coalesce into gas clouds, which later evolved into stars. By the time the universe had expanded to one fifth its present size, the stars had formed groups recognizable as young galaxies.
In the late 1920s the American astronomer Edwin Hubble made a very interesting and important discovery. Hubble made observations that he interpreted as showing that distant stars and galaxies are receding from Earth in every direction. Moreover, the velocities of recession increase in proportion with distance, a discovery that has been confirmed by numerous and repeated measurements since Hubble's time. The implication of these findings is that the universe is expanding.
Hubble's hypothesis of an expanding universe leads to certain deductions. One is that the universe was more condensed at a previous time. From this deduction came the suggestion that all the currently observed matter and energy in the universe were initially condensed in a very small and infinitely hot mass. A huge explosion, known as the Big Bang, then sent matter and energy expanding in all directions.
Most accepted theory amongst the scientific community now is the Big Bang theory and the inflationary theory of development. One major change in the understanding of how the universe came to be was, when the Big Bang theory was announced. Big Bang Theory argued that approximately fourteen billion years ago, a quantum singularity that contained all matter expanded, it contained the four forces of: strong and weak nuclear forces, electromagnetism and gravity. Then subatomic particles were created followed by hydrogen and atoms. Stars were formed with carbon particles with the influence of gravity.
This Big Bang hypothesis led to more testable deductions. One such deduction was that the temperature in deep space today should be several degrees above absolute zero. Observations showed this deduction to be correct. In fact, the Cosmic Microwave Background Explorer (COBE) satellite launched in 1991 confirmed that the background radiation field has exactly the spectrum predicted by a Big Bang origin for the universe.
As the universe expanded, according to current scientific understanding, matter collected into clouds that began to condense and rotate, forming the forerunners of galaxies. Within galaxies, including our own Milky Way galaxy, changes in pressure caused gas and dust to form distinct clouds. In some of these clouds, where there was sufficient mass and the right forces, gravitational attraction caused the cloud to collapse. If the mass of material in the cloud was sufficiently compressed, nuclear reactions began and a star was born.
Some proportion of stars, including our sun, formed in the middle of a flattened spinning disk of material. In the case of our sun, the gas and dust within this disk collided and aggregated into small grains, and the grains formed into larger bodies called planetesimals ("very small planets"), some of which reached diameters of several hundred kilometres. In successive stages these planetesimals coalesced into the nine planets and their numerous satellites. The rocky planets, including Earth, were near the sun, and the gaseous planets were in more distant orbits.
The ages of the universe, our galaxy, the solar system, and Earth can be estimated using modem scientific methods. The age of the universe can be derived from the observed relationship between the velocities of and the distances separating the galaxies. The velocities of distant galaxies can be measured very accurately, but the measurement of distances is more uncertain. Over the past few decades, measurements of the Hubble expansion have led to estimated ages for the universe of between 7 billion and 20 billion years, with the most recent and best measurements within the range of 10 billion to 15 billion years.
A disk of dust and gas, appearing as a dark band in this Hubble Space Telescope photograph, bisects a glowing nebula around a very young star in the constellation Taurus. Similar disks can be seen around other nearby stars and are thought to provide the raw material for planets.
The age of the Milky Way galaxy has been calculated in two ways. One involves studying the observed stages of evolution of different-sized stars in globular clusters. Globular clusters occur in a faint halo surrounding the centre of the Galaxy, with each cluster containing from a hundred thousand to a million stars. The very low amounts of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium in these stars indicate that they must have formed early in the history of the Galaxy, before large amounts of heavy elements were created inside the initial generations of stars and later distributed into the interstellar medium through supernova explosions (the Big Bang itself created primarily hydrogen and helium atoms). Estimates of the ages of the stars in globular clusters fall within the range of 11 billion to 16 billion years.
A second method for estimating the age of our galaxy is based on the present abundances of several long-lived radioactive elements in the solar system. Their abundances are set by their rates of production and distribution through exploding.
Lemaitre's Big Bang theory suggesting that 'about 15,000 million years ago there was a massive explosion' is the most accepted model by scientists now. All matter in the universe and space and time began at this point of big bang. Over time the universe that we know, and human and animal life, emerged. Taken as the best theory for explaining the origin of the universe, it simply means that the universe was not created by God, but it ‘just happened.’
In 1925, Edwin Hubble provided strong evidence for the Big Bang theory with his discovery that objects like galaxies were much further away than the Milky Waythan previously thought. Universe of Arthur Eddington (1930) is expanding in a flat space. There is no beginning or ending of time. Perpetual cycles of Big Bang are followed by Big Crunch accepted by Einstein's as his first choice after rejecting his 1917 model.
Steady State Theory
This was created by Fred Hoyle in 1948, an atheist and active against religion. He suggested that the universe has no beginning or end and therefore God cannot exist and that the cosmic matter density remained constant. Known as continuous creation, new matter is created at a very slow rate as other matter ceases to exist. However, this theory is not held very highly by scientists due to BMR, and that the universe does not look the same. Big Bang theory is considered by majority of scientists to be a satisfactory explanation to the origins of the universe. However, the main alternative is the Steady State theory.
Genesis Creation
The universe for Israelites was flat disc-shaped earth that floated on the water.[24] Humans lived on earth but after death either went to heaven above or the underworld according to their deeds.[25] God created the universe the Christian believed. This creation occurred over a period of six days as given in the Bible.
Jews began to adopt the Greek idea of Hellenistic times (after c.330 BC) of the universe being a place of punishment for misdeeds where the righteous would enjoy an afterlife in heaven.[26] The Greek concept of spherical earth suspended in space at the centre of a number of concentric heavens was also accepted.[27]
Ex Nihilo
The concept of ‘creatio ex nihilo’ meaning that God created matter was accepted by orthodox Judas and Christians believing that a single, uncreated God was responsible for the creation of the cosmos.
Islam
In Islamic Cosmology, the Earth is considered flat and surrounded by a series of mountains—including Mount Qaf. An ox standing on Bahamut dwelling in a cosmic ocean supports the Earth while the ocean is inside a bowl that sits on top of an angel.[28] God created the universe, including Earth's physical environment and human beings as per Islam.[29]
Expanding on the Christian belief that creation occurred over a period of six days, the Muslim thinker Nasir Khusrow writes that creation occurs in six cycles, demarcated by the arrival of God’s messengers (ṣāḥibān-i adwār).[30]
Buddhism
In Buddhism, there is neither the ultimate beginning nor final end to the universe and there is no creator God and all existence is eternal.[31],[32] The universe is considered to be continuously changing. Gradually, Samsara theory was built on endless cycles of death and rebirth.[33] There were five realms of recycling, including hell, hungry ghosts, animals, humans and gods.[34],[35],[36] Demi-gods were added later.[37],[38] Buddhist traditions have formulated the ritual, literary and moral spheres of many contemporary based on this hungry ghost, heavenly and, hellish realms.[39],[40]
The Buddhist cosmology Akira Sadakata uses extraordinarily larger numbers than those found in Vedic and post-Vedic Hindu traditions.[41] It also shares many ideas and concepts, such as those about Mount Meru.[42], [43] The Buddhist thought holds that the six cosmological realms areinterconnected, and everyone cycles life after life, through these realms, because of a combination of ignorance, desires and purposeful karma, or ethical and unethical actions.[44],[45]
Hinduism
The Hindu cosmology too, considers all existence as cyclic.[46],[47] Hindu culture accepts diversity in cosmological ideas and has lacked a single mandatory viewpoint even in the Rigveda the oldest scripture.[48] Theories built later accept the universe as cyclical universe. However, thoughts vary about its creation and destruction. The universe is considered as created by (a) God, (b) gods/goddess, (c) no creator at all (d) or a golden egg or womb or (e) a self-created multitude of universes with enormous lengths and time scales.[49],[50],[51] The Nasadiya sukta questions the origin theories themselves. (Rig Veda 10. 129) [52],[53],[54] The concept of time is in 4 cyclic Yugas each Yuga being of trillions of years.[55] Mount Meru is considered as a centre in some models.[56],[57] There are varying theories about the structure of the universe, 3 to 12 worlds (multiverses) exist. Theories of samsara (world) karma and rebirth are built on these universes.[58],[59],[60] Hindu cosmology is far complex than that of Babylonian, Greek, Roman, Islamic or other Asian Indian religions were suffering are due to sins increase.[61],[62]
Jainism
According to Jain cosmology, the universe existed since infinity. It was not considered created, hence, has no beginning or end.[63] The shape of the universe as described in Jain texts depicts a man standing with legs apart and an arm resting on his waist. It is narrow at the top, while it is broad at the middle and at the bottom.[64]
Sikhism
God is the Creator.[65] God created the universe in many ways.[66] He created the entire universe including the three worlds smoothly and put light into it.[67] When a question was put as what time, date, day, season, month did creation start? Guru Nanak replied: No meditator (yogi) can tell the date, day, season, month of creation. The creator who set this universe up alone knows when it started.[68]
Contemporary connections between science and religion
The interpretation of multiverse cosmology and the significance of the Big Bang are the most discussed topics these days. Authors like Hudson (2013) spoke of exploring that God created best multiverses. Over view of other topics in discussion is given below
Divine action and creation
Biblical texts (e.g., the first three chapters of Genesis and the book of Revelation) and the writings of church fathers such as Augustine are some of the earlier doctrines of creation with interrelated features of science and religion. These include: (a) an hilio (out of nothing) creation by God as stated earlier. (b) God and the universe are different entities; God is the creator and Universe is its creation. (Jaeger 2012b:3)[69]. (c) Creation is for the good (Genesis 1). Evil is not God’s creation. God however, plays an active role in the creation of universe. (d) Universe has both a beginning and an end to eradicate evil.
Doctrines of creation and Divine action can be distinguished by sustenance of reality due to Divine creation while collections of certain providential acts at a certain time and a place (Wildman 2008: 140)[70]. Every detail of creation is not micromanaged by God. He only intervenes in some form. God’s actions are thus indirect caused without the use of nature while actions by his creation are direct. A related distinction between direct and indirect divine acts has been made by Alston (1989)[71] where he states that direct acts are without the use of nature while indirect causes are through the nature.
How are the Divine Creation and Divine actions compatible with science? Young Earth Creationism is one consistent with scripture. Georges Lemaitre's (1927)[72] theory of Big bang is congenial to the doctrine of creation. The theory also supports creatio ex nihilo since the universe originated from an extremely hot and dense state around 13.8 billion years ago according to this theory (Craig 2003)[73]. Some philosophers however, argue against it saying that it has a temporal beginning (e.g., Pitts 2008)[74].
God has been put to a side by the scientists since 17th century and the territory of religion has been constantly encroached upon by the scientific findings of geology and evolutionary theory specially. Biblical accounts of creation have not only been challenged but are gradually being replaced. Bible remained authoritative even though the time and mode of origin are not found recoded in it. Special divine action has not been left with any space by physics from 17th and 18th century onwards. Difficulties arise in Biblical exegesis (Genesis 1 and 2 and Book of Job specially) because the order of creation differs between these accounts.[75] (Harris 2013)[76] gave the date of beginning of creation as 4004 BCE based on the Bible.
Geology’s finding in 17th century that the earth was older than 4004 BCE put pressure on Doctrine of creation. Evolutionary theories proposed by philosophers Mallet, Lamarck, Chambers and Darwin, proposed philosopher were incompatible with the special creation of species and Doctrine of creation. Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859), started a new discussion on interpretation on the doctrine of creation (e.g., Bowler 2009)[77].
A new outline was created by Ted Peters and Martinez Hewlett (2003) for a divine action spectrum to clarify the distinct positions about creation and divine action[78].The creationists believe God has created the world and its fundamental laws, and that God occasionally performs special divine actions (miracles) that intervene in the fabric of laws. They deny natural selection.
Intelligent Design
On the basis of evidence of Divine intervention in natural processes and intelligent design in organisms’ irreducible complexity, intelligent Design creationists (e.g., Dembski 1998) infer design and purposiveness of creation (see Kojonen 2016) They too deny a significant role for natural selection in shaping organic complexity as they affirm an interventionist account of divine action. They however, do not label their intelligent designer as God [79](Forrest and Gross 2004).
Natural philosophers, such as Robert Boyle and John Wilkins, developed in the 17th century, a mechanistic view of the world. However, this approach confused understanding of divine action. Since scientific laws and natural laws are subservient of Divine laws, God’s acts could not be determined by the other two[80] (Dannenberg, 2002).
Deterministic Model
Pierre-Simon Laplace (1749–1827) outlined deterministic causal laws to make the deterministic understanding of the universe, leaving no room for special divine action. In an addendum to the Principia in 1713, Newton resisted such like interpretations. According to him, the notions of the planets could be explained by laws of gravity, but the positions of their orbits and the positions of the stars cannot be determined through such laws. This required a divine explanation (Schliesser 2012). Alston (1989) found pre-twentieth century physics compatible with divine action and divine free.
The theories of general and special relativity, chaos theory, and quantum theory, of the 20th century overturned the mechanical clockwork view of creation. Later, chaos theory and quantum physics were explored as possible avenues to reinterpret divine action. Chaos theory was proposed by John Polkinghorne (1998). It presents epistemological limits to the world. It also provides the world with an “ontological openness” in which God can operate without violating the laws of nature. He assumed a completely deterministic world and divine omniscience where God could set up initial conditions and the laws of nature in such a way as to bring God’s plans about. According to him, every event is an indirect divine act in such a mechanistic world.
‘God acts in quantum event’, stated Robert Russell (2006). God directly acts in nature without contravening the laws of nature. Hence, it is a non-interventionist model. No natural efficient causes at the quantum level; God is not reduced to a natural cause. Murphy (1995) outlined a similar bottom-up model in the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics where God acts in the space provided by quantum indeterminacy. Lydia Jaeger (2012a) stated “physicalism-plus-God” to locate God’s actions either in quantum mechanics or chaos theory. These have met with sharp criticism (e.g., Saunders 2002, Jaeger 2012a,b) since it does not clear whether the quantum theory would allow for free human action, let alone the least known divine action (Jaeger 2012a).
The above solution is compatible with determinism, but the distinction between general and special divine action is not clear. Idea of the Incarnation idea of God as a cause among natural causes is in conformity with theology that God sometimes acts as a natural cause (Sollereder 2015).
Human Origin
Creation stories about human creation were taken from First book of the Hebrew Bible (Genesis) and the same were adopted by Christianity, Islam, and Judaism with some modifications. The world was created in six day as per Genesis I, where as human beings were created on sixth day. God made his image into male and female. However, in Genesis 2 humans are created earlier than animals creating a man first and the woman later from the rib.
Creation narrative of Islam about human is similar to Genesis 2, Adam was created out of clay only 6400 years ago. In Genesis 3 it is still different. The first human couple lived in the Garden of Eden in a state of innocence but by doing the sin of eating from the forbidden fruit they fell from this heavenly state, to the state of life and death, manual labour, childbirth pains etc. The effects of Adam’s sin are passed on to every human being for sinning. Original perceptual and reasoning capacities are marred due to sin. Religious diversity and non-believing is explained by Plantinga (2000) by appealing to the noetic effects of sin and explaining religious diversity and unbelief in his extended Aquinas/Calvin model. This model was based on answer to question” Even though this belief would be properly basic, why not everyone believes inGod? Explanation to incarnation is given as the way of God to help repair the damage.
The Scientific findings especially from geology, palaeoanthropology, archaeology, and evolutionary biology have challenged traditional religious accounts of humanity. This rejection includes the special creation of humanity, the imago Dei, the historical Adam and Eve, and original sin.
Darwin wrote Origin of Species stating: “Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history” (1859: 487). Huxley (1863) wrote the first book on human evolution from a Darwinian point of view, Man’s Place in Nature, which discussed fossil evidence, such as the then recently uncovered Neanderthal fossils from Gibraltar. (Darwin’s (1871)
Similarities of various approaches:
Philosophy, religion and science are for the benefit for the humanity and their common goal is to have the knowledge of the universe and its components; their origin, development and assimilation. Compatibility or interdependence between religion and science has been shown by scientists, philosophers, and theologians throughout history. The names of Francisco Ayala, Kenneth R. Miller and Francis Collins are in the forefront. Some theologians or historians of science, including John Lennox, Thomas Berry, Brian Swimme and Ken Wilber propose an interconnection between science and religion. There is general acceptance between Philosophies, religions and science that (a) there was a single point of origin; (b) that the energy is the fundamental source of the entire universe; (c) that the universe is continuously changing causing continuous change in the shapes among bodies and (d) this continuous change results in differences among the shapes.
Philosophy, religion and science generally agree that before creation the energy was concentrated and the creation was done from this concentrated energy followed by evolutionary or development process of matter and life and ultimately will be destroyed or assimilated from the source from which it has been created. Hence Creation-evolution-development-assimilation turns out to be the sequence of universal existence.
Creator: According to various religions, the beginning of universe is in one single energy source and now has been generally accepted as a scientific reality as well. According to Einstein it is the ‘fundamental element’ and according to Vedas and Upanishads it is the fundamental soul or Parmatma. He is the fundamental to all creations; materials and non-materials.
Scientifically, atom consisting of electron, neutron and proton is the fundamental unit of universe. Electron rotates around nuclei of the atom and also itself. This rotation is the cause of the fundamental change of the entire universe. This rotation is also the cause of energy creation. This fundamental energy is same everywhere. God is considered as the life giver, developer and protector of the universe. Universe originates from it and assimilates into it finally. God is thus generally accepted as the creator of the universe.
In physics and chemistry, the law of conservation of energy states that the total energy of an isolated system remains constant; it is said to be conserved over time. This law, first proposed and tested by Emilie du Châtelet, means that energy can neither be created nor destroyed; rather, it can only be transformed or transferred from one form to another. For instance, chemical energy is converted to kinetic energy when a stick of dynamite explodes. If one adds up all forms of energy that were released in the explosion, such as the kinetic energy and potential energy of the pieces, as well as heat and sound, one will get the exact decrease of chemical energy in the combustion of the dynamite.[81]
Matter:The Universe is thought to consist of three types of substance: visible matter, ‘dark matter’ and ‘dark energy’. The atoms are the fundamental of matter. These make up stars, planets, human beings and every other visible object in the Universe. Visible matter is only 4% while the dark matter is 24%.[82]
All philosophies and religions agree on five fundamentals elements i.e., air, ether, fire, water and earth. Even Chinese agree with this with minor variation. Atom is considered as the fundamental part of all these elements. The universe was composed of indivisible atoms moving through void (vacuum) proposed Democritus that the Jains more nearly approximated to Democritus by teaching that all atoms were of the same kind, producing different effects by diverse modes of combinations. Vachaspati and Newton, interpreted light as composed of minute particles emitted by substances and striking the eye."[83] Science too considers atom as the fundamental of all matter.
Life: All religions and science are more or less close that water is fundamental to creation of life and the other four elements are essential for formation of bodies. Soul exists in each body. It is also agreed that life is a continuous change process. However, all except Eastern Philosophy and Sikhism consider this change process as birth/death continuum. The fundamental to these theories is that whatever is born has to die. Science considers life as biological and is quiet over rebirth.
Annihilation/Assimilation:There is everything finite in the universe. Whatever is created has to end since nothing remains the same over a period and ends at last. According to Eastern Philosophy there is rebirth of everything while other philosophies and scientists do not ascribe to this view as according to them death of everything is the ultimate end. Scientists consider that the average density of matter and energy in the Universe will keep on expanding forever or gravitationally slowed down resulting in collapse as a "big crunch". The evidence suggests that there is insufficient mass/energy to cause a re-collapse, and the expansion of the Universe seems to be accelerating and will accelerate for the whole of eternity. Apart from Big Crunch, Big Rip, the Big Freeze, and Heat Death of the Universe theory are the other ideas of the fate of our Universe.
Differences among various approaches
Due to this fundamental difference between the study of religion and science their results differ. They have been differing in aspects like the point and time of origin of universe, matter and life, the sequence of formation of universe, matter and life; likely end of these three and many such like answers. But they do not differ that there was dark before the light emerged; that the energy is the fundamental source; that there was a single point of origin; that the universe is continuously changing; that shapes are the results of this continuous change; that no two shapes are the same; that these shapes have rapid changes in the form of death and birth and such like explanations.
According to modern science, the beginning is in Big Bang. In space and time the universe is finite. It had a beginning and someday it will end as well. However, the time of the end is not known. Entities of this Universe are uniform on large scales and homogeneous i.e., the same in all locations. These entities are also isotropic meaning that in all directions they are the same.
Scientists have to know many things and solve many questions. Who gave power to the electrons to revolve? What is at the bottom of these electrons? How did life enter into body cell or the protoplasm? How was the mind-made intelligent from the birth onwards? Who directs and controls the mind? The scientists are still observing and experimenting. They are still groping in dark. However, definite and conclusive answers cannot be provided by the scientists to all the question of nature and God. Defining Origin, Creation, Evolution, Development and Assimilation does not solve the above questions anyway?
Some prominent similarities: The philosophy, religion and science have been differing on various aspects like the point and time of origin of universe, matter and life, the sequence of their formation; likely end of these three and many such like answers. Differences exist because the being is too small to understand the vastness of the nature of the Lord and the darkness spread around. History has records that Lords Rama, Krishna, Buddha, Mahavira and God’s own Christ, Mohammed, Sikh Gurus and some Rishis and Saints are the ones who could realise and know Him and His entire universe. They observe through the ‘third eye’ which the scientists do not have. Scientists have to know many things. The scientists still observing and experimenting are still groping in dark due to their limited ability to reach the extreme depths. Definite and conclusive answers cannot be provided by the scientists to all the questions on nature and God. Due to this reason the philosophy, religion and science differ on the following:
God: Buddhists are quiet on the existence of the fundamental force i.e., the God. The sequence of creation is also not agreed to.
Creation and Development of the Universe: The scientists believe it to be according to big bang explanation while Sikhism does not ascribe to big bang and explains the development to be a smooth process[84]. Life and death are mere rapid changes and not the beginning and end as imagined by human beings. Scientists also believe in new theory of cosmology known as inflationary theory of development which suggests that the observable universe is embedded in a much larger region of space which expanded within a fraction of second after big bang.[85]
Since a number of inflation model predictions have been confirmed by observation, most physicists accept this basic inflationary paradigm;[86] though dissent from this position is found from a few scientists.[87], [88], [89] This hypothetical field is known as the inflation.[90] Physicists Alan Guth of M.I.T., Andrei Linde of Stanford, and Paul Steinhardt of Princeton were awarded the Dirac Prize "for development of the concept of inflation in cosmology".[91]
Recommendations
The plethora of knowledge of universe available at present is from philosophical, religious and scientific point of view about the origin and development of the universe. There are numerous agreements and differences among the three but these three have lot of supplemental material as well. This book has attempted to bring all these points of view together and evolved a common perspective at number of issues given above. There are quite a lot of supplemental knowledge which can help further in this direction. Even where the differences occur, these can be resolved through a multidisciplinary research. It is thus recommended that the detailed inter-disciplinary research be conducted by experts from the fields of philosophy, religion and science where they make use of the supplemental material available and resolve the differences wherever possible and provide a commonly agreed answer to the much vexed problem of ‘creation of universe'.
Conclusion: Christianity, Islam and Sikhism are clear that the universe is created by God while the science accepts Big bang as the source of creation. Search for knowledge about the origin and nature of the cosmos and our relationship with it remain the common purpose of both religion and science. The on-going battle between Darwinian Evolutionists on the side of science and Creationists on that of religion is fruitless in the light of this. The Faith has led till the science has taken the lead. Earlier the faith through scientific approach provided the real direction; now the science with faith is advancing. The existence of galaxies, stars, sun, moon, planets, nature, mountains, seas, and much more are all wonders which human beings watch wide eyed and scientists attempt to explore but it is too much for small scientists to explore so much big. An Astrophysicist like Stephen Hawking described his lifework as an attempt to “know the mind of God”. He was not speaking either of religion or science but the commonality of both.
Dogmas, myths, animistic rites and fanaticism are the one which are in conflict with science and not the real faith. Science can help filtering out these from faith and select out and accept what is verifiable and adopt where they help the scientific research. Leaders representing a multiplicity of faiths, including Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism among others, issued a joint statement on the vital necessity of recognizing the synergy between religion and science. For now we see coronavirus pandemic which spread wildly beyond the imagination of science but within the purview of faith. The solution lies in medicine, hence instead of fanaticism, superstition and contempt for science expressed in the name of religion, religion must be used as the most powerful means of mobilizing the human conscience to face the calamity and this only can serve the common good. Now in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, one of the biggest challenges civilisations has ever faced, it is more imperative that science and religion should join hands to save the humanity from this pandemic.
Sikhism, the latest of religions is based in total truth and exposes dogmas, myths, animistic rites, fanaticism, superstition and contempt. It accepts that the universe was created by God smoothly and naturally, hence even puts big bang to question. Since Sikhism is the newest religion and has the latest details about religious cosmology, it has been dealt in detail in following chapters.
The universe being immensely large and possibly infinite in range and volume, the limits of the boundaries of universe have remained unfathomed. Number of fallacies became prevalent due to lack of knowledge of the universe. A few fallacies include: (a) The present form of man is the result of various biological changes from other beings: (b) The earth is settled on the horns of a bull: (c) The functioning of the universe is not systematic: (d) Not one but there are many Gods: (e) The sun and earth are stationary: (f) The life of universe is only 5000-6000 years: (g) Only human beings have life: (h) Moon has its own light: (j) Man's death is biological: (k) The universe continues due to a continuous set of biological and chemical reactions etc. However, the philosophy, theology and science have tried to give answers to these questions and to remove fallacies in their own ways.
During my research on tribes of Arunachal Pradesh in India, I found Adis, the most populated tribe in the state, believing in Sun-Moon God (Abo-Tani) who created the universe and its people. There are 110 tribes spread over the entire state. Most of them believe in different Creators. The Assamese and Akas being of Royal blood came by a golden ladder; the Tibetan and Monpas were given a ladder of iron; the Daflas and Abhors had to be satisfied with a bamboo ladder; whilst Cacharis and Khowas shared a plantain ladder."[1] Many such Names and stories have been prevalent among other tribes in the world.
What is the truth about the universe and existence? How did these universes come into existence? We have to understand that God does not play dice. (Einstein). There being no speculation, no off the cuff, no haphazard solution, this ought to be be well thought out and prepared design. Since origin or creation is physical processes which are not mechanical but have life in it, it cannot be a mathematical or chemical solution. Just by putting the right kind of ingredients are not produced where life is key ingredient. The design has to be more complicated than a mechanical design.
The word universe is derived from the Old French word ‘Univers’, which in turn is derived from the Latin word Universum.[2] It is the Nature of Things that connects ‘un’ meaning one and versum meaning rotating. An alternative interpretation of Universum is "everything rotated as one" or "everything rotated by one".[3] It can be related to God as the One who rotates the total universe continuously. All the matter and the energy, intergalactic space, the galaxies, the stars and the planets combined are known as universe.[4].It can also be said as the entire visible and invisible; material and living; approachable and unapproachable creation and existence. It also includes all terms like cosmos, the world and nature. [5]
Universe is specified as everything that lies spatially within the outermost limit of matter and energy that has participated in the expansion of space since the very beginning. According to various religions, the beginning of universe is in one single energy source usually called God, Allah, Wahiguru, or Ram. God is a scientific reality. He is the fundamental to all creations; materials and non-materials. If we go on dissecting the atom, we reach at the stage of concentrated energy, which is fundamental to all energies and this is God. This fundamental energy is same every where. There is no difference whatsoever anywhere. Science takes it differently and considers it to have come from a big bag and other such theories
‘Visible and invisible; observable and unobservable through instruments, known or unknown universe are the various concepts of the two types of universe. The unobservable is much more than what is observable. The observable universe is the spatial region within which we can affect and be affected. The location of the observer also is one of the factor of the observable universe. Telescopes extend this visibility. The field of cosmology is the study of the universe.
Cosmology is a Greek word originated from the study of cosmos and is a branch of astronomy. Cosmology of universe as per various religions and scientists is given as annexure 1. The origin and evolution of the universe is studied by Astronomy[6]. As per scientific or astronomical observations, the region visible from Earth (the observable universe) is a sphere with a radius of about 46 billion light years.[7] It is based on the place where from the observation of the expansion of space has been taken and the most distant objects observed. If we compare the diameter of a typical galaxy, it is only 30,000 light-years. On the other hand, the typical distance between two neighbouring galaxies is only 3 million light years.[8] For example, the diameter of our Milky Way Galaxy is roughly 100,000 light years.[9] However our nearest galaxy, the Andromeda Galaxy, is located roughly 2.5 million light years away[10].
There are probably a larger number than 100 billion (1011) galaxies with in the observable universe.[11] Typical galaxies include dwarfs with as few as ten million (107)[12] and giants which have stars up to one trillion (1012) stars[13]. All of them orbit the galaxy's centre of mass. In a 2010 study, the astronomers estimated that the observable universe contains 300 sextillion (3×1023) stars.[14] The known universe is the one that can be known by the man while the unknown universe is the one not known to the man to date. Various multi-verse theories exist in which physicists suggest that our universe is one of many similar universes that exist[15].
Dark energy and dark matter and their properties are yet to be fully explored. Throughout the universe and its observable history, uterium and helium appear to be identical.[16] The universe seems to have much more matter than ante-matter, an asymmetry possibly related to the observations of CP violation.[17] The universe seems to possess far more matter than the anti-matter an asymmetry possibly associated with the observations of CP violation. The universe appears to possess no net charge and thus gravity appears to be the dominant interaction on the cosmological length scale. The absence of net charge and momentum would follow Gauss's law and the non-divergence of the stress-energy-momentum, respectively the accepted physical laws, if the universe were finite.[18]
Thomas Blount's Glossographia used this word in English in 1656.[19] German philosopher Christian Wolff used this word in Cosmologia Generalis in 1731 taken up in Latin.[20] In the study of Big Bang, the present and future universe all fall in this category which involves the scientific study of the origin, evolution, and eventual fate of the universe. The scientific study of the universe's origin, structures and dynamics, and future and the laws of science that govern these areas, is the Physical cosmology.[21] On the other hand, the body of beliefs based on mythological, religious, and esoteric literature and traditions of creation myths and eschatology fall under religious or mythological cosmology. The scientists, astronomers, physicists and philosophers study Physical cosmology. Theories in physical cosmology may include both scientific and non-scientific propositions because of shared scope with philosophy, and may depend upon untested assumptions.
How did the universe come into existence? There are two theories; physical cosmology and religious cosmology or Evolution theory and Creation Theory. According to Evolution theory, the most accepted theory is Big bang theory. [22] According to Big Bang, From a hot, dense sea of matter and energy, concentrated in a region smaller than a dime, the universe emerged some 15 billion years ago began to expand and cool at an incredibly rapid rate. It turned into galaxies, stars, planets and life as the matter expanded and cooled.[23] The theory of evolution by natural selection, first formulated in Darwin's book "On the Origin of Species" in 1859, is the process by which organisms change over time as a result of changes in heritable physical or behavioural traits. Changes that allow an organism to better adapt to its environment will help it survive and have more offsprings. Evolution by natural selection is one of the best substantiated theories in the history of science, supported by evidence from a wide variety of scientific disciplines, including palaeontolog, geology genetics and developmental biology. The term "evolution" usually refers to the biological evolution of living things. Over the years organisms developed and human being formed. But the processes by which planets, stars, galaxies, and the universe form and change over time are also types of "evolution." In all of these cases there is change over time, although the processes involved are quite different.
The Evolution theory has two main points, said Brian Richmond, curator of human origins at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. "All life on Earth is connected and related to each other," and this diversity of life is a product of "modifications of populations by natural selection, where some traits were favoured in an environment over others," he said. The idea of evolution is very old but the modern concept involving natural selection was first set out by Alfred Wallace and Charles Darwin in the 1930s.
This theory is based on the argument that the start of universe is from a single point. By the time the temperature had dropped to 100 million times that of the sun’s core, the forces of nature assumed their present properties, and the elementary particles known as quarks roamed freely in a sea of energy. When the universe had expanded an additional 1,000 times, all the matter we can measure filled a region the size of the solar system. At that time, the free quarks became confined in neutrons and protons. After the universe had grown by another factor of 1,000, protons and neutrons combined to form atomic nuclei, including most of the helium and deuterium present today. All of this occurred within the first minute of the expansion. Conditions were still too hot, however, for atomic nuclei to capture electrons. Neutral atoms appeared in abundance only after the expansion had continued for 300,000 years and the universe was 1,000 times smaller than it is now. The neutral atoms then began to coalesce into gas clouds, which later evolved into stars. By the time the universe had expanded to one fifth its present size, the stars had formed groups recognizable as young galaxies.
In the late 1920s the American astronomer Edwin Hubble made a very interesting and important discovery. Hubble made observations that he interpreted as showing that distant stars and galaxies are receding from Earth in every direction. Moreover, the velocities of recession increase in proportion with distance, a discovery that has been confirmed by numerous and repeated measurements since Hubble's time. The implication of these findings is that the universe is expanding.
Hubble's hypothesis of an expanding universe leads to certain deductions. One is that the universe was more condensed at a previous time. From this deduction came the suggestion that all the currently observed matter and energy in the universe were initially condensed in a very small and infinitely hot mass. A huge explosion, known as the Big Bang, then sent matter and energy expanding in all directions.
Most accepted theory amongst the scientific community now is the Big Bang theory and the inflationary theory of development. One major change in the understanding of how the universe came to be was, when the Big Bang theory was announced. Big Bang Theory argued that approximately fourteen billion years ago, a quantum singularity that contained all matter expanded, it contained the four forces of: strong and weak nuclear forces, electromagnetism and gravity. Then subatomic particles were created followed by hydrogen and atoms. Stars were formed with carbon particles with the influence of gravity.
This Big Bang hypothesis led to more testable deductions. One such deduction was that the temperature in deep space today should be several degrees above absolute zero. Observations showed this deduction to be correct. In fact, the Cosmic Microwave Background Explorer (COBE) satellite launched in 1991 confirmed that the background radiation field has exactly the spectrum predicted by a Big Bang origin for the universe.
As the universe expanded, according to current scientific understanding, matter collected into clouds that began to condense and rotate, forming the forerunners of galaxies. Within galaxies, including our own Milky Way galaxy, changes in pressure caused gas and dust to form distinct clouds. In some of these clouds, where there was sufficient mass and the right forces, gravitational attraction caused the cloud to collapse. If the mass of material in the cloud was sufficiently compressed, nuclear reactions began and a star was born.
Some proportion of stars, including our sun, formed in the middle of a flattened spinning disk of material. In the case of our sun, the gas and dust within this disk collided and aggregated into small grains, and the grains formed into larger bodies called planetesimals ("very small planets"), some of which reached diameters of several hundred kilometres. In successive stages these planetesimals coalesced into the nine planets and their numerous satellites. The rocky planets, including Earth, were near the sun, and the gaseous planets were in more distant orbits.
The ages of the universe, our galaxy, the solar system, and Earth can be estimated using modem scientific methods. The age of the universe can be derived from the observed relationship between the velocities of and the distances separating the galaxies. The velocities of distant galaxies can be measured very accurately, but the measurement of distances is more uncertain. Over the past few decades, measurements of the Hubble expansion have led to estimated ages for the universe of between 7 billion and 20 billion years, with the most recent and best measurements within the range of 10 billion to 15 billion years.
A disk of dust and gas, appearing as a dark band in this Hubble Space Telescope photograph, bisects a glowing nebula around a very young star in the constellation Taurus. Similar disks can be seen around other nearby stars and are thought to provide the raw material for planets.
The age of the Milky Way galaxy has been calculated in two ways. One involves studying the observed stages of evolution of different-sized stars in globular clusters. Globular clusters occur in a faint halo surrounding the centre of the Galaxy, with each cluster containing from a hundred thousand to a million stars. The very low amounts of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium in these stars indicate that they must have formed early in the history of the Galaxy, before large amounts of heavy elements were created inside the initial generations of stars and later distributed into the interstellar medium through supernova explosions (the Big Bang itself created primarily hydrogen and helium atoms). Estimates of the ages of the stars in globular clusters fall within the range of 11 billion to 16 billion years.
A second method for estimating the age of our galaxy is based on the present abundances of several long-lived radioactive elements in the solar system. Their abundances are set by their rates of production and distribution through exploding.
Lemaitre's Big Bang theory suggesting that 'about 15,000 million years ago there was a massive explosion' is the most accepted model by scientists now. All matter in the universe and space and time began at this point of big bang. Over time the universe that we know, and human and animal life, emerged. Taken as the best theory for explaining the origin of the universe, it simply means that the universe was not created by God, but it ‘just happened.’
In 1925, Edwin Hubble provided strong evidence for the Big Bang theory with his discovery that objects like galaxies were much further away than the Milky Waythan previously thought. Universe of Arthur Eddington (1930) is expanding in a flat space. There is no beginning or ending of time. Perpetual cycles of Big Bang are followed by Big Crunch accepted by Einstein's as his first choice after rejecting his 1917 model.
Steady State Theory
This was created by Fred Hoyle in 1948, an atheist and active against religion. He suggested that the universe has no beginning or end and therefore God cannot exist and that the cosmic matter density remained constant. Known as continuous creation, new matter is created at a very slow rate as other matter ceases to exist. However, this theory is not held very highly by scientists due to BMR, and that the universe does not look the same. Big Bang theory is considered by majority of scientists to be a satisfactory explanation to the origins of the universe. However, the main alternative is the Steady State theory.
Genesis Creation
The universe for Israelites was flat disc-shaped earth that floated on the water.[24] Humans lived on earth but after death either went to heaven above or the underworld according to their deeds.[25] God created the universe the Christian believed. This creation occurred over a period of six days as given in the Bible.
Jews began to adopt the Greek idea of Hellenistic times (after c.330 BC) of the universe being a place of punishment for misdeeds where the righteous would enjoy an afterlife in heaven.[26] The Greek concept of spherical earth suspended in space at the centre of a number of concentric heavens was also accepted.[27]
Ex Nihilo
The concept of ‘creatio ex nihilo’ meaning that God created matter was accepted by orthodox Judas and Christians believing that a single, uncreated God was responsible for the creation of the cosmos.
Islam
In Islamic Cosmology, the Earth is considered flat and surrounded by a series of mountains—including Mount Qaf. An ox standing on Bahamut dwelling in a cosmic ocean supports the Earth while the ocean is inside a bowl that sits on top of an angel.[28] God created the universe, including Earth's physical environment and human beings as per Islam.[29]
Expanding on the Christian belief that creation occurred over a period of six days, the Muslim thinker Nasir Khusrow writes that creation occurs in six cycles, demarcated by the arrival of God’s messengers (ṣāḥibān-i adwār).[30]
Buddhism
In Buddhism, there is neither the ultimate beginning nor final end to the universe and there is no creator God and all existence is eternal.[31],[32] The universe is considered to be continuously changing. Gradually, Samsara theory was built on endless cycles of death and rebirth.[33] There were five realms of recycling, including hell, hungry ghosts, animals, humans and gods.[34],[35],[36] Demi-gods were added later.[37],[38] Buddhist traditions have formulated the ritual, literary and moral spheres of many contemporary based on this hungry ghost, heavenly and, hellish realms.[39],[40]
The Buddhist cosmology Akira Sadakata uses extraordinarily larger numbers than those found in Vedic and post-Vedic Hindu traditions.[41] It also shares many ideas and concepts, such as those about Mount Meru.[42], [43] The Buddhist thought holds that the six cosmological realms areinterconnected, and everyone cycles life after life, through these realms, because of a combination of ignorance, desires and purposeful karma, or ethical and unethical actions.[44],[45]
Hinduism
The Hindu cosmology too, considers all existence as cyclic.[46],[47] Hindu culture accepts diversity in cosmological ideas and has lacked a single mandatory viewpoint even in the Rigveda the oldest scripture.[48] Theories built later accept the universe as cyclical universe. However, thoughts vary about its creation and destruction. The universe is considered as created by (a) God, (b) gods/goddess, (c) no creator at all (d) or a golden egg or womb or (e) a self-created multitude of universes with enormous lengths and time scales.[49],[50],[51] The Nasadiya sukta questions the origin theories themselves. (Rig Veda 10. 129) [52],[53],[54] The concept of time is in 4 cyclic Yugas each Yuga being of trillions of years.[55] Mount Meru is considered as a centre in some models.[56],[57] There are varying theories about the structure of the universe, 3 to 12 worlds (multiverses) exist. Theories of samsara (world) karma and rebirth are built on these universes.[58],[59],[60] Hindu cosmology is far complex than that of Babylonian, Greek, Roman, Islamic or other Asian Indian religions were suffering are due to sins increase.[61],[62]
Jainism
According to Jain cosmology, the universe existed since infinity. It was not considered created, hence, has no beginning or end.[63] The shape of the universe as described in Jain texts depicts a man standing with legs apart and an arm resting on his waist. It is narrow at the top, while it is broad at the middle and at the bottom.[64]
Sikhism
God is the Creator.[65] God created the universe in many ways.[66] He created the entire universe including the three worlds smoothly and put light into it.[67] When a question was put as what time, date, day, season, month did creation start? Guru Nanak replied: No meditator (yogi) can tell the date, day, season, month of creation. The creator who set this universe up alone knows when it started.[68]
Contemporary connections between science and religion
The interpretation of multiverse cosmology and the significance of the Big Bang are the most discussed topics these days. Authors like Hudson (2013) spoke of exploring that God created best multiverses. Over view of other topics in discussion is given below
Divine action and creation
Biblical texts (e.g., the first three chapters of Genesis and the book of Revelation) and the writings of church fathers such as Augustine are some of the earlier doctrines of creation with interrelated features of science and religion. These include: (a) an hilio (out of nothing) creation by God as stated earlier. (b) God and the universe are different entities; God is the creator and Universe is its creation. (Jaeger 2012b:3)[69]. (c) Creation is for the good (Genesis 1). Evil is not God’s creation. God however, plays an active role in the creation of universe. (d) Universe has both a beginning and an end to eradicate evil.
Doctrines of creation and Divine action can be distinguished by sustenance of reality due to Divine creation while collections of certain providential acts at a certain time and a place (Wildman 2008: 140)[70]. Every detail of creation is not micromanaged by God. He only intervenes in some form. God’s actions are thus indirect caused without the use of nature while actions by his creation are direct. A related distinction between direct and indirect divine acts has been made by Alston (1989)[71] where he states that direct acts are without the use of nature while indirect causes are through the nature.
How are the Divine Creation and Divine actions compatible with science? Young Earth Creationism is one consistent with scripture. Georges Lemaitre's (1927)[72] theory of Big bang is congenial to the doctrine of creation. The theory also supports creatio ex nihilo since the universe originated from an extremely hot and dense state around 13.8 billion years ago according to this theory (Craig 2003)[73]. Some philosophers however, argue against it saying that it has a temporal beginning (e.g., Pitts 2008)[74].
God has been put to a side by the scientists since 17th century and the territory of religion has been constantly encroached upon by the scientific findings of geology and evolutionary theory specially. Biblical accounts of creation have not only been challenged but are gradually being replaced. Bible remained authoritative even though the time and mode of origin are not found recoded in it. Special divine action has not been left with any space by physics from 17th and 18th century onwards. Difficulties arise in Biblical exegesis (Genesis 1 and 2 and Book of Job specially) because the order of creation differs between these accounts.[75] (Harris 2013)[76] gave the date of beginning of creation as 4004 BCE based on the Bible.
Geology’s finding in 17th century that the earth was older than 4004 BCE put pressure on Doctrine of creation. Evolutionary theories proposed by philosophers Mallet, Lamarck, Chambers and Darwin, proposed philosopher were incompatible with the special creation of species and Doctrine of creation. Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859), started a new discussion on interpretation on the doctrine of creation (e.g., Bowler 2009)[77].
A new outline was created by Ted Peters and Martinez Hewlett (2003) for a divine action spectrum to clarify the distinct positions about creation and divine action[78].The creationists believe God has created the world and its fundamental laws, and that God occasionally performs special divine actions (miracles) that intervene in the fabric of laws. They deny natural selection.
Intelligent Design
On the basis of evidence of Divine intervention in natural processes and intelligent design in organisms’ irreducible complexity, intelligent Design creationists (e.g., Dembski 1998) infer design and purposiveness of creation (see Kojonen 2016) They too deny a significant role for natural selection in shaping organic complexity as they affirm an interventionist account of divine action. They however, do not label their intelligent designer as God [79](Forrest and Gross 2004).
Natural philosophers, such as Robert Boyle and John Wilkins, developed in the 17th century, a mechanistic view of the world. However, this approach confused understanding of divine action. Since scientific laws and natural laws are subservient of Divine laws, God’s acts could not be determined by the other two[80] (Dannenberg, 2002).
Deterministic Model
Pierre-Simon Laplace (1749–1827) outlined deterministic causal laws to make the deterministic understanding of the universe, leaving no room for special divine action. In an addendum to the Principia in 1713, Newton resisted such like interpretations. According to him, the notions of the planets could be explained by laws of gravity, but the positions of their orbits and the positions of the stars cannot be determined through such laws. This required a divine explanation (Schliesser 2012). Alston (1989) found pre-twentieth century physics compatible with divine action and divine free.
The theories of general and special relativity, chaos theory, and quantum theory, of the 20th century overturned the mechanical clockwork view of creation. Later, chaos theory and quantum physics were explored as possible avenues to reinterpret divine action. Chaos theory was proposed by John Polkinghorne (1998). It presents epistemological limits to the world. It also provides the world with an “ontological openness” in which God can operate without violating the laws of nature. He assumed a completely deterministic world and divine omniscience where God could set up initial conditions and the laws of nature in such a way as to bring God’s plans about. According to him, every event is an indirect divine act in such a mechanistic world.
‘God acts in quantum event’, stated Robert Russell (2006). God directly acts in nature without contravening the laws of nature. Hence, it is a non-interventionist model. No natural efficient causes at the quantum level; God is not reduced to a natural cause. Murphy (1995) outlined a similar bottom-up model in the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics where God acts in the space provided by quantum indeterminacy. Lydia Jaeger (2012a) stated “physicalism-plus-God” to locate God’s actions either in quantum mechanics or chaos theory. These have met with sharp criticism (e.g., Saunders 2002, Jaeger 2012a,b) since it does not clear whether the quantum theory would allow for free human action, let alone the least known divine action (Jaeger 2012a).
The above solution is compatible with determinism, but the distinction between general and special divine action is not clear. Idea of the Incarnation idea of God as a cause among natural causes is in conformity with theology that God sometimes acts as a natural cause (Sollereder 2015).
Human Origin
Creation stories about human creation were taken from First book of the Hebrew Bible (Genesis) and the same were adopted by Christianity, Islam, and Judaism with some modifications. The world was created in six day as per Genesis I, where as human beings were created on sixth day. God made his image into male and female. However, in Genesis 2 humans are created earlier than animals creating a man first and the woman later from the rib.
Creation narrative of Islam about human is similar to Genesis 2, Adam was created out of clay only 6400 years ago. In Genesis 3 it is still different. The first human couple lived in the Garden of Eden in a state of innocence but by doing the sin of eating from the forbidden fruit they fell from this heavenly state, to the state of life and death, manual labour, childbirth pains etc. The effects of Adam’s sin are passed on to every human being for sinning. Original perceptual and reasoning capacities are marred due to sin. Religious diversity and non-believing is explained by Plantinga (2000) by appealing to the noetic effects of sin and explaining religious diversity and unbelief in his extended Aquinas/Calvin model. This model was based on answer to question” Even though this belief would be properly basic, why not everyone believes inGod? Explanation to incarnation is given as the way of God to help repair the damage.
The Scientific findings especially from geology, palaeoanthropology, archaeology, and evolutionary biology have challenged traditional religious accounts of humanity. This rejection includes the special creation of humanity, the imago Dei, the historical Adam and Eve, and original sin.
Darwin wrote Origin of Species stating: “Light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history” (1859: 487). Huxley (1863) wrote the first book on human evolution from a Darwinian point of view, Man’s Place in Nature, which discussed fossil evidence, such as the then recently uncovered Neanderthal fossils from Gibraltar. (Darwin’s (1871)
Similarities of various approaches:
Philosophy, religion and science are for the benefit for the humanity and their common goal is to have the knowledge of the universe and its components; their origin, development and assimilation. Compatibility or interdependence between religion and science has been shown by scientists, philosophers, and theologians throughout history. The names of Francisco Ayala, Kenneth R. Miller and Francis Collins are in the forefront. Some theologians or historians of science, including John Lennox, Thomas Berry, Brian Swimme and Ken Wilber propose an interconnection between science and religion. There is general acceptance between Philosophies, religions and science that (a) there was a single point of origin; (b) that the energy is the fundamental source of the entire universe; (c) that the universe is continuously changing causing continuous change in the shapes among bodies and (d) this continuous change results in differences among the shapes.
Philosophy, religion and science generally agree that before creation the energy was concentrated and the creation was done from this concentrated energy followed by evolutionary or development process of matter and life and ultimately will be destroyed or assimilated from the source from which it has been created. Hence Creation-evolution-development-assimilation turns out to be the sequence of universal existence.
Creator: According to various religions, the beginning of universe is in one single energy source and now has been generally accepted as a scientific reality as well. According to Einstein it is the ‘fundamental element’ and according to Vedas and Upanishads it is the fundamental soul or Parmatma. He is the fundamental to all creations; materials and non-materials.
Scientifically, atom consisting of electron, neutron and proton is the fundamental unit of universe. Electron rotates around nuclei of the atom and also itself. This rotation is the cause of the fundamental change of the entire universe. This rotation is also the cause of energy creation. This fundamental energy is same everywhere. God is considered as the life giver, developer and protector of the universe. Universe originates from it and assimilates into it finally. God is thus generally accepted as the creator of the universe.
In physics and chemistry, the law of conservation of energy states that the total energy of an isolated system remains constant; it is said to be conserved over time. This law, first proposed and tested by Emilie du Châtelet, means that energy can neither be created nor destroyed; rather, it can only be transformed or transferred from one form to another. For instance, chemical energy is converted to kinetic energy when a stick of dynamite explodes. If one adds up all forms of energy that were released in the explosion, such as the kinetic energy and potential energy of the pieces, as well as heat and sound, one will get the exact decrease of chemical energy in the combustion of the dynamite.[81]
Matter:The Universe is thought to consist of three types of substance: visible matter, ‘dark matter’ and ‘dark energy’. The atoms are the fundamental of matter. These make up stars, planets, human beings and every other visible object in the Universe. Visible matter is only 4% while the dark matter is 24%.[82]
All philosophies and religions agree on five fundamentals elements i.e., air, ether, fire, water and earth. Even Chinese agree with this with minor variation. Atom is considered as the fundamental part of all these elements. The universe was composed of indivisible atoms moving through void (vacuum) proposed Democritus that the Jains more nearly approximated to Democritus by teaching that all atoms were of the same kind, producing different effects by diverse modes of combinations. Vachaspati and Newton, interpreted light as composed of minute particles emitted by substances and striking the eye."[83] Science too considers atom as the fundamental of all matter.
Life: All religions and science are more or less close that water is fundamental to creation of life and the other four elements are essential for formation of bodies. Soul exists in each body. It is also agreed that life is a continuous change process. However, all except Eastern Philosophy and Sikhism consider this change process as birth/death continuum. The fundamental to these theories is that whatever is born has to die. Science considers life as biological and is quiet over rebirth.
Annihilation/Assimilation:There is everything finite in the universe. Whatever is created has to end since nothing remains the same over a period and ends at last. According to Eastern Philosophy there is rebirth of everything while other philosophies and scientists do not ascribe to this view as according to them death of everything is the ultimate end. Scientists consider that the average density of matter and energy in the Universe will keep on expanding forever or gravitationally slowed down resulting in collapse as a "big crunch". The evidence suggests that there is insufficient mass/energy to cause a re-collapse, and the expansion of the Universe seems to be accelerating and will accelerate for the whole of eternity. Apart from Big Crunch, Big Rip, the Big Freeze, and Heat Death of the Universe theory are the other ideas of the fate of our Universe.
Differences among various approaches
Due to this fundamental difference between the study of religion and science their results differ. They have been differing in aspects like the point and time of origin of universe, matter and life, the sequence of formation of universe, matter and life; likely end of these three and many such like answers. But they do not differ that there was dark before the light emerged; that the energy is the fundamental source; that there was a single point of origin; that the universe is continuously changing; that shapes are the results of this continuous change; that no two shapes are the same; that these shapes have rapid changes in the form of death and birth and such like explanations.
According to modern science, the beginning is in Big Bang. In space and time the universe is finite. It had a beginning and someday it will end as well. However, the time of the end is not known. Entities of this Universe are uniform on large scales and homogeneous i.e., the same in all locations. These entities are also isotropic meaning that in all directions they are the same.
Scientists have to know many things and solve many questions. Who gave power to the electrons to revolve? What is at the bottom of these electrons? How did life enter into body cell or the protoplasm? How was the mind-made intelligent from the birth onwards? Who directs and controls the mind? The scientists are still observing and experimenting. They are still groping in dark. However, definite and conclusive answers cannot be provided by the scientists to all the question of nature and God. Defining Origin, Creation, Evolution, Development and Assimilation does not solve the above questions anyway?
Some prominent similarities: The philosophy, religion and science have been differing on various aspects like the point and time of origin of universe, matter and life, the sequence of their formation; likely end of these three and many such like answers. Differences exist because the being is too small to understand the vastness of the nature of the Lord and the darkness spread around. History has records that Lords Rama, Krishna, Buddha, Mahavira and God’s own Christ, Mohammed, Sikh Gurus and some Rishis and Saints are the ones who could realise and know Him and His entire universe. They observe through the ‘third eye’ which the scientists do not have. Scientists have to know many things. The scientists still observing and experimenting are still groping in dark due to their limited ability to reach the extreme depths. Definite and conclusive answers cannot be provided by the scientists to all the questions on nature and God. Due to this reason the philosophy, religion and science differ on the following:
God: Buddhists are quiet on the existence of the fundamental force i.e., the God. The sequence of creation is also not agreed to.
Creation and Development of the Universe: The scientists believe it to be according to big bang explanation while Sikhism does not ascribe to big bang and explains the development to be a smooth process[84]. Life and death are mere rapid changes and not the beginning and end as imagined by human beings. Scientists also believe in new theory of cosmology known as inflationary theory of development which suggests that the observable universe is embedded in a much larger region of space which expanded within a fraction of second after big bang.[85]
Since a number of inflation model predictions have been confirmed by observation, most physicists accept this basic inflationary paradigm;[86] though dissent from this position is found from a few scientists.[87], [88], [89] This hypothetical field is known as the inflation.[90] Physicists Alan Guth of M.I.T., Andrei Linde of Stanford, and Paul Steinhardt of Princeton were awarded the Dirac Prize "for development of the concept of inflation in cosmology".[91]
Recommendations
The plethora of knowledge of universe available at present is from philosophical, religious and scientific point of view about the origin and development of the universe. There are numerous agreements and differences among the three but these three have lot of supplemental material as well. This book has attempted to bring all these points of view together and evolved a common perspective at number of issues given above. There are quite a lot of supplemental knowledge which can help further in this direction. Even where the differences occur, these can be resolved through a multidisciplinary research. It is thus recommended that the detailed inter-disciplinary research be conducted by experts from the fields of philosophy, religion and science where they make use of the supplemental material available and resolve the differences wherever possible and provide a commonly agreed answer to the much vexed problem of ‘creation of universe'.
Conclusion: Christianity, Islam and Sikhism are clear that the universe is created by God while the science accepts Big bang as the source of creation. Search for knowledge about the origin and nature of the cosmos and our relationship with it remain the common purpose of both religion and science. The on-going battle between Darwinian Evolutionists on the side of science and Creationists on that of religion is fruitless in the light of this. The Faith has led till the science has taken the lead. Earlier the faith through scientific approach provided the real direction; now the science with faith is advancing. The existence of galaxies, stars, sun, moon, planets, nature, mountains, seas, and much more are all wonders which human beings watch wide eyed and scientists attempt to explore but it is too much for small scientists to explore so much big. An Astrophysicist like Stephen Hawking described his lifework as an attempt to “know the mind of God”. He was not speaking either of religion or science but the commonality of both.
Dogmas, myths, animistic rites and fanaticism are the one which are in conflict with science and not the real faith. Science can help filtering out these from faith and select out and accept what is verifiable and adopt where they help the scientific research. Leaders representing a multiplicity of faiths, including Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism among others, issued a joint statement on the vital necessity of recognizing the synergy between religion and science. For now we see coronavirus pandemic which spread wildly beyond the imagination of science but within the purview of faith. The solution lies in medicine, hence instead of fanaticism, superstition and contempt for science expressed in the name of religion, religion must be used as the most powerful means of mobilizing the human conscience to face the calamity and this only can serve the common good. Now in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, one of the biggest challenges civilisations has ever faced, it is more imperative that science and religion should join hands to save the humanity from this pandemic.
Sikhism, the latest of religions is based in total truth and exposes dogmas, myths, animistic rites, fanaticism, superstition and contempt. It accepts that the universe was created by God smoothly and naturally, hence even puts big bang to question. Since Sikhism is the newest religion and has the latest details about religious cosmology, it has been dealt in detail in following chapters.
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