Saturday, March 5, 2016

Is there a God?, is it a scientific question? - (Vedanta and Cloud of Unknowing)



Is there a God?
Is there any way to prove the hypotheses through science ? - presence or absence.
When something similar was put to physicist Dr. David Bohm.
He replied, as a scientist he can't answer the question.
The reason he gave was, scientific questions have a notion of solution.
But, the question of God provides no such thing.
So,the implication is,
it is not a scientific question in the first place, so can't be answered scientifically either way.
May be science can't answer it today, is it possible some time in future?
But, we know knowledge is additive  and ever growing.
Therefore  knowledge at any point of time will remain limited and
with the limited knowledge we can't answer questions of absolute.

Then, it seems question of God/absolute can not be approached with objective knowledge.
If we can't approach it with objective knowledge, then what other tool is there.
The tool could be self knowledge or knowledge of one's own psychological self.

We are all familiar with the phrase 'Know Thyself'.
On the surface,
Knowing oneself would be for behavior modification to become more efficient and successful
in material life.
At the deeper level
Knowing oneself means to transcend the psychologically conditioned self ( Ego) and arrive at
the unconditioned or authentic self.

With the conditioned self called as Ego
What we see is what we want to see and
What we experience is what we think we experience.

According to mystical traditions,
It is the unconditioned self, which will reveal what is actual and will answer the
questions What is God and What is meaning of life.

There are two established traditions that speak about it.
Hindu Vedanta
Christian Cloud Of Unknowing.

Vedanta (Ved -knowledge, anta -end) -
Ending of knowledge (Psychological, not technical) to arrive at unconditioned authentic self.

Cloud Of Unknowing -
Stripping of thoughts (Conditionings) to arrive at  unconditioned authentic self.

How to go about it is another thing.

According to these traditions, answers to question of God and meaning of life is in
discovering one's own unconditioned or authentic self.






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