Some Similarities Between Science and Eastern Thought

                                             In Memoriam: Clifton White (1953-2019)

On May 24, 20019, one of the most prominent physicists of the twentieth century, Murray Gell-Mann, died in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His achievements were numerous. For instance, he, with another physicist, devised a classification of elementary (quantum) particles which he called The Eightfold Way, a nomenclature inspired by the Eightfold Path of Buddhism. As reported in the Times obituary, he didn’t have “a mystical bone in his body” and objected to those who believed in any correlation between modern physics and Eastern teachings.

I do, however, see some consistencies between modern science, particularly physics, with Eastern teaching. That this makes me a mystic I seriously doubt. I leave the subject of levitation, for instance, to those who have feathers between their ears instead of gray and white matter.

I will briefly discuss in this essay five areas of convergence between science and Eastern philosophy, only one of which, I think, is controversial.

1. Anicca, Impermanence

Buddhism, as well as Hinduism, teaches, since time immemorial, that no phenomenal existence lasts forever. It is only recently that Western science is in agreement with this view.The Greeks taught that change occurred only on earth, and everything else, namely the moon and the stars, were immutable and lasted forever. Einstein, after he devised his seminal theories of Special and General Relativities, believed, despite what this own theories indicated, that the universe was eternal. He, in fact, committed what he called the greatest blunder of his lifetime, by theorizing that there was a repulsive force, lambda, that prevented the eternal universe from imploding. (That there is a repulsive force, responsible for the accelerating expansion of space, confirms the universe’s impermanence, not its eternity. Stars will eventually cease to exist; there will be nothing left except so-called "empty space." T.S. Eliot was quite prescient when he wrote, in another context, regarding the end of things: This is the way the world ends/ this is the way the world ends/ Not with a bang but a whimper.)

One can understand why Western ancients concluded that the universe was eternal, since they saw little evidence of cosmic impermanence, limited as they were to the use of their eyes, and not telescopes, as the means of gathering data. Comets and occasional supernovae were thought to be evidence of divine intervention, not mutable phenomena.

Another factor why it was thought that stars never changed is due to the awesome discrepancy between the lifespans of humans and stars. We know now that galaxies began to form shortly—by cosmic standards—after the universe came into existence over thirteen billion years ago. We know now that Shakespeare was more correct than he probably knew when he wrote that “We are the stuff that stars are made of.” Supernovae, the death events of massive stars, ejected heavier elements, formed by the immense pressure of collapse, into space, Some of these elements became the clouds which formed our solar system. Some of these heavier elements, notably carbon, became the stuff of  life on our planet. From birth to death, we carry around this ancient stellar material in our bodies.

Regarding time, the West had been wrong fora very long time. Since the twentieth century, however, science is in complete accord with Eastern teaching in this respect, namely, that everything we know, or know of, including the entire universe, is subject to change; everything, from the oldest galaxy to the youngest child, is born and will eventually die.

2. Anatta, No Abiding Self

This is the second characteristic of existence according to Buddhism; the doctrine that there is no soul has been part of Buddhism since Buddhism began. You are your thoughts; you don’t have thoughts, Science is in complete agreement. Recently, in the New Scientist an article discussed the great “illusion of the self.” Scientists have found areas of the brain that correlate with conscious experiences, such as recognizing colors or even having an 'out-of-the body experience,' yet never an area of the brain that could in any way be considered as the center of the self.

I have come to the conclusion that a sense of self, a.k.a. the soul, whether considered to be mortal or immortal, is a wonderful trick of evolution. Once the nervous system attained a high degree of complexity, it is “natural” that the brain imagined a Wizard behind the Oz of neurons. This had a great biological advantage for the survival of the species. Once one imagined oneself as separate from nature, one could remove oneself temporarily from society and create things, such as tools, weapons, and music. Without this ability to separate in order to think and create, Mozart—and, alas! Hitler, would not have been possible. This sense of self needs to be, and indeed is, extremely strong. I find it amazing that Buddha came to the knowledge of anatta millennia ago, while science has only come to this conclusion recently.

In the motor, as well as the sensory cortex, there is a neurological map of motor and sensory areas called the homunculus, Latin for “little man.” The poor guy is not only upside-down, but downright freaky. The lips, for instance are heavily represented, as well as are the hands. But the little man is as real as the constellation of Orion depicts an actual hunter. There are stars, but no hunter. There are neurons, but no little wizard.

Although, as I mentioned, this ‘trick' of evolution is very deeply seated, the knowledge that there is no such thing as the self defies common sense. (So do the actions of photons, which are nevertheless real entities.) It leads to discussions that get nowhere. For instance, I find debates about the existence of God wastes of time. If self is an illusion, God is doubly non-existent, an illusion of an illusion. First figure out what the self is, that is, a concatenation of thoughts, which will stop such debates before they begin.

If there is no self, free will is an illusion as well. But one can’t live without this illusion. As creatures of evolution, we must live with our "selves” even though we know, upon analysis, that the self is not a real entity, The knowledge of no-self, however, provides balance and keeps one humble, two qualities which are very much lacking today.

The self is a great illusion—here science and Buddhism are in complete agreement.

Dukkha

Dukkha (suffering, or better, insufficiency) is, after anicca and anatta,  the third characteristic of phenomenal existence according to Buddhism. It is here included for completeness’ sake, since it has more to do with inner psychology than scientific objectivity, the concurrence of the later with certain Buddhist principles being the subject of this analysis. 

Evolution has equipped the human individual with sexual desire, as it does with most animals; it also provides humans with imagination and  egoism. Desire in humans, unlike desire in animals which is balanced and in equilibrium with the environment, can know no bounds. Much of human suffering—wars, poverty, defalcations, etc. etc, have their root in unbalanced human desire. Buddhism teaches that egotistical desire—not desire per se—is unsatisfactory and can lead to suffering. Acceptance of life as it is and not how we want it to be is a good antidote to the poison of psychological suffering.  Buddhist doctrines that have psychological meaning and, sometimes, no scientific counterpart or corroboration, include karma, rebirth, and an absolutist sense of causality. These are what scientists call “unfalsifiable” doctrines, which have more in common with religion than with science, and, for obvious reasons, will not be discussed further here.

3. Cosmic Time

As Carl Sagan pointed out, Hinduism (and its derivative, Buddhism) were the only cultures on earth with a sense of cosmic time. Ancient sages did not come to their conclusions through experimentation and scientific proof, but through insight. It remains a truly stellar achievement and is roughly in accord with modern cosmology.

I think the main reason why the East was right and the West for so long was wrong is due to the fact that Eastern ways of looking at the world are characterized by wisdom, the idea that everything is connected, which is much more impersonal than the more human-scale assessment of time, current in the West until fairly recently, and still accepted by creationists.

The comparisons are staggering. Ussher, a 17th century Irish bishop, concluded, through careful analysis of scripture,  that creation occurred in 4004 BCE. The current Jewish year of 5779 commemorates, supposedly, the time elapsed since creation. Compare this with Hindu reckonings in kalpas, each 4.32 billion years, two of which constitute a day of Brahma. We are currently thought to be in the 51^st year of Brahma! According to Buddhism, if you take a mountain, taller than Mt. Everest, and brush it once every hundred years with a silk cloth, the lapse of time it would take to completely wear down the mountain would be less than one kalpa!

These calculations are not meant so much to be accurate, rather than to indicate a near-infinite age of the cosmos, which is in accord with modern calculations. Science dates, with remarkable accuracy the date of the Big Bang to have occurred 13.4 billion years ago. However, the theory of eternal inflation, not provable at this time but quite plausible, posits that universes come into and out of existence eternally. The age of the multiverse, according to this theory, is indeed infinite and an infinite lapse of time is indeed what the Buddhist/Hindu calculations indicate.

These estimates of the age of the universe are fairly new to science. Lord Kelvin in the nineteenth century estimated the age of the sun to be about 400 million years, a  challenge to Darwinism, since evolution demanded that the earth was much older than that. (Die-hard creationists still quote Lord Kelvin, who was unaware of the nuclear source of stellar energy!)

Kelvin was wrong, Buddha was right!

4. No Creator God

Buddhism denies the reality of a creator god. It bears repeating that, since the self is an illusion, the concept of god is nothing more than an illusion of an illusion. Science finds no indication of a creator external to consciousness as well. When Napoleon confronted the scientist Laplace with the comment that god had no place in his worldview, Laplace replied that he had no need for that hypothesis. Among the majority of scientists, nothing has changed since then in this regard. 

Hinduism, at first glance, and due to the devotional nature of a large section of current Hindu practice, seems to permit many gods. But in the highest form of Hinduism, Advaita Hinduism, gods are merely representations of internal realities.

To paraphrase Tina Turner’s hit song, What’s God Got to Do With It? Buddhism, Hinduism and science respond: Very little. Very little indeed.

5. Consciousness

There are other aspects with which Buddhism and science are in accord; even greater accordance is found between Buddhism and wisdom. Just a mention of the three hindrances, greed, hate, and delusion, gives a good indication of what is to be avoided in all situations and in all cultures. This is, of course, the realm of ethics, which is 'beyond' science.

A further agreement, at least a partial one, exists regarding consciousness. The East, especially Hinduism, teaches that consciousness is the key to everything. According to Hinduism, consciousness, not science, is primary. Ramana Maharshi, for instance, taught that consciousness and science equals science; stones, for instance, do not have science!

John Wheeler, the noted physicist, thought that consciousness might indeed be the center of reality. Information (the so-called Its from Bits theory) is, according to Wheeler, the very basis of reality—and there is, of course, no knowledge of information without consciousness—at least as far as we know!

This world-view is best addressed in another article. Suffice it to say here that the ancient East and modern science are in agreement regarding many basic concepts. This is astounding, since the ancient Indians came to their conclusions through insight alone.

Was Murray Gell-Mann aware of this concordance? If he wasn't, an ancient proverb can be paraphrased to characterize his genius: even Gell-Manns nod.