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Scientific Materialism
An extract from my novel to be read as an essay
Shanker just couldn't bear to see Vandana hanging on her father's words
anymore. They were wonderful words said in the most expressive voice he had ever
heard, words which moved him too just much as they did Vandana. But they were
empty words with which he hardly agreed at all. He just had to speak.
Having got his agnosticism, so common in the west but rarely expressed in
the spiritual east, off his chest, Shanker warmed to his subject and got carried
away by the sound of his own voice.
I know that you look down upon science as something empty, something
which deadens spirituality. But to
me science is the only voice of reason that I can really count upon. And I know
that materialism is something that everybody frowns upon as a meaningless quest
for money and pleasure, which itself is enough to condemn it in the eyes of
everyone. Words like money, pleasure , sex , party etc have somehow acquired a
negative reputation, mainly because the really convincing philosophers have all
argued against it. The people who have believed in it have always been more in
number but have been too busy enjoying themselves to put forth arguments in
favour of their beliefs in life except a simple appeal to common sense and left
it at that. Of course there was Epicureus and his followers in the ancient
world. And our own Charvaka. But these philosophers are mainly known by the
vehement refutation of their philosophy than their philosophy itself. Every
Indian philosophy refutes Charvaka and yet all we know of his philosophy comes
from these refutations. Of Charvaka's original philosophy there remains no
trace, simply because it was so unpopular. Why? Because it denies the existence
of God and God is the most popular person in existence. People want to eat drink
and be merry but at the same time they want God as a convenient explanation for
everything. That was fine when there was no explanation but now science has an
explanation for everything. So there is no need to believe in God or any such
supernatural power.'
'Ah! Our Shankar is in full flow tonight, isn't he Vandana? At last his
real beliefs are emerging, no longer bound down by the sayings of what others
have said or written. I would be most interested to know how science can give a
reason for existence, a reason for life or a reasonable ethics other than the
crassest materialism which can only serve to pull down everything mankind has
created so far. Materialism, as he himself has said , is a very easy creed to
believe and follow because it appeals to common sense. But it is a most
dangerous philosophy to follow, for it completely empties out all reason for
goodness. Materialism and science do not recognise the existence of goodness at
all. To a materialist all is one , whether good or bad. What kind of society
would you have if there is no belief in God or Goodness at all? Simply the
chaotic and meaningless existence which the West has achieved, which we here in
India seem hell bent on achieving. That is the way to unhappiness and emptiness,
not the way to salvation.
Shanker was already bursting with arguments to counter what Venkatesh was
saying, but he paused to collect his thoughts and formulate something sensibly
understandable, and realised that if he had to say anything at all, he would
have to start right from the very beginning . The way Descartes had when he had
said ' I think, therefore I am'. This was the time to speak out about all that
he had thought of the day before. He took a deep breath and started off.
To start at the very beginning, I am aware right now that I exist and
that there is a world around me that I can perceive. I do not know what this
world around me is , I do not know that it really exists. For all I know the
world I perceive may not really exist at all, and is all just maya as
Shankaracharya had put it. But if I do not accept that the world exists in
reality, I can go no further, for an imaginary world defies imagination!. I can
go no further, for that assumption is a dead end. If there is no real world at
all, then there is no life , no science , no point to anything , no meaning to
either life or existence. I fully accept the possibility that the real world
doesn't exist at all but the first thing I perceive about the world is a
peculiar consistent in all the things that happen in it. Things go on in
constant repeated patterns, which keep repeating themselves. A ball when dropped
always falls down. If I kick a ball, the ball moves in a certain predictable
way. The sun rises in the east every day and sets in the west. There are people
and objects all around me who behave in certain set predictable ways.
Now people say science gives ''reasons ''for everything. Then they say it
cannot give a reason for the
existence of either life or the universe. But these are people who do not know
what science is. Science does not give a reason for anything. Science is just a
long complex description of the world we see around us. The world which I said
earlier behaves in set and predictable ways. Because it is so repetitive, it is
easily described, and one has to hunt long and hard for things that are not
predictable. People talk about science being right or wrong. But the fact is, it
is not science which is right. Instead it is more correct to say that if
something is right , then it is science. The history of science is just a long
sequence of descriptions of the world which got better and better. As I said, if
you drop a ball, it falls down, and we all know it. but a more complete
description of the phenomenon was given by Newton when he got inspired by a
falling apple.
He
gave the phenomenon the name of gravitation and we like to say that Newton
discovered gravitation. The way I would say it is that he fully described the
phenomenon of falling. And attraction. And the way things move around us. We
have all observed these things but Newton described them with
much more thoroughness than the rest of us.
Scientific words like gravitation are just a short way of representing
ideas, so that one word like gravitation represents a whole sequence of ideas.
The same with mathematics. There is nothing complex or frightening about maths,
it is just a way of representing ideas in figures and symbols instead of in
words. So all science is, just a comprehensive description of the world we
perceive by our senses, using words and symbols to represent long pieces of
observation. Advances in science simply mean a more and more accurate
description of the world that we see with our senses. A world that can be real
or not, but certainly a world that is predictable. Science being the name for
the description of this predictability.
So what we have arrived at so far are - one, I can perceive a world
around me and two, this world I perceive behaves in predictable ways, which are
described by science.
What all does this science tell us about the world we perceive? A lot and
here goes!
Shankar gave a grin and went on . He could see that he had the attention
of both father and daughter and wanted to strike when the iron was hot. He
realised that he had got a little repetitive in his talking about science and he
paused to compose his sentences.
'Science tells us that the world started with a big bang. Or rather, that
the world around us behaves as if everything started with a big bang. In that
big bang, energy ,matter, space and time were created. Please realise that these
are just words that stand for the things we can perceive. Space is what we can
see with our eyes, matter is what we can feel with our hands, energy is a word
that stands for the motion of both ourselves and the objects around us and time
is the memory that we have. It does not give any reason or meaning for what
these things are, but simply describe them and their properties. Very
accurately.
After the big bang, and the creation of these four things , the world
that we see around us today slowly took shape. These four essential things are
interconvertable according to science. We all know after the atom bomb that
matter and energy are interconvertable. Similarly, space and time are
interconvertable, sort of.
Shankar grimaced as he tried to remember Steven Hawkins' A brief history
of time, which he had read some time ago. There was something interesting that
he had read in it , though he couldn't remember all of it. He cudgelled his
brains and went on.
Space and time are interconvertable in as much as the expansion of space
gives us the direction of time. If the universe is expanding, time goes forward
and if the universe contracts and falls in upon itself, then time goes backward.
That is speaking mathematically with positive and negative signs. It wouldn't
make any difference to us if we were in a contracting universe, we would just
call our past our future. As far as we are concerned time has only one way to
move and that is forward. Time is just a way of expressing the fact that things
happen to us, we are aware of these things happening to us and we remember them.
If we did not remember anything, there would be no such thing as time and if we
were not aware of things happening to us then there would be nothing. Just
nothing. The world exists because we perceive it and time exists because we
remember it. In both of these, time and space are actually very personal things,
you could almost say that time and space belong to me. The world is my oyster!
Nobody laughed at this feeble joke. Venkatesh was looking at Shankar with
an encouraging smile on his face and there was a look of concentration on his
eyes. Vandana looked rather lost, but Shankar continued.
The four things which are really one and the same thing, once created,
went along to form the other things that we can see around us. At first matter
consisted of just hydrogen diffusely distributed, but ripples in space time
caused it to be concentrated in some places which subsequently became stars.
Since everything started with a big bang, all these stars were moving away from
each other. The stars which were created lived for around 9 billion years and
converted hydrogen into helium. After 9 billion years there was no more hydrogen
left and so other complex reactions took place inside the stars resulting in the
formation of all the 105 or so elements. When these complex reactions took
place, so much energy got generated that the stars expanded to a huge size to
become red giants. Then when no more reactions were possible any more, they
collapsed with an almighty bang and spewed out all the elements that they had
created. Only a small proportion of the original hydrogen had condensed into
stars . The rest of the hydrogen was still around and was still forming new
stars all the time, throughout the 9 billion years. But after 9 billion years
had passed all these new elements were also available for use, so they were also
included in the formation of new stars. Some of the new stars which were formed
had planet systems and one such was the solar system. This has been around for 4
billion years now, so that the universe is around 13 or maybe a little more
years. The earth, and the other planets were also created at the same time as
the sun and are hence also 4 billion years old.
Shankar paused and went on. Let us now forget about the rest of the
universe and concentrate on what was happening here on earth. No doubt similar
changes have been happening in other star systems which have been created.
On earth a certain proportion of various elements created in some
supernova explosion were present. These combined together to form molecules.
Some of these reacted together to form other combinations of molecules and some
of these reactions were very complex. The earth received energy from the
radiations of the sun and these varied from time to time, which we call seasons.
These are just differential heating of the water, air and land molecules. Many
different seasonal ages came and went, like the ice ages. But the most complex
molecules were those involving carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. The molecules and
their complex interactions are what we call life.
I know that there is a tendency to regard life as something miraculous
and amazing but all they really are is complex molecules interacting. As biology
has unravelled the incredible complexity involved, people have really marvelled
and said life is something unique. But the fact is , life is inevitable given
the atoms which exist. Once these atoms got created , their interaction occurred
by set rules, which followed principle rules created in the big bang. Given
these atoms and molecules, life simply had to exist. It crystallised just as ice
crystallises out of water when the temperature is lowered. To one who doesn't
know the laws of how crystals are forms, looking at the wonderful patterns of
snowflakes never fails to evoke wonder, especially since no two of them are
alike. No doubt they are beautiful and though I have never seen snow, I have
seen pictures, and they really were beautiful. But I know why they form and I
know why life forms. Given the rules of interaction between elements, they are
both inevitable.
Venkatesh interrupted Shankar at that moment. He was loth to put a halt
on such a flow of eloquence as he had never seen Shankar indulge in, but
spotting the flaw in Shankar's arguments, he pounced.
Given the rules of elements reacting together! But who makes those rules?
Is it not God, or if you do not prefer such a word, then some power greater than
the universe itself? Surely your own arguments against God very strongly argue
instead for the presence of God? Who creates all these rules after all, if it
were not God?
Shankar paused and then went on. Once again I must emphasise the meaning
of science. It just describes the world as we see it. I know that I have been
talking about the universe in the form of a story, which is progressing forward.
But what science has done is to work backwards from what we see now in the
present. Science only describes what we perceive. These laws of elements
reacting are just descriptions of what we see around us. We see these laws and
therefore they exist. We see life and therefore it exists. Because what we see
around us is predictable, we assume that they are predictable everywhere, even
in the farthest corners of the universe.. This story that I have been telling is
just application of what we perceive and creating a whole that assumes the form
of a consistent story. Everything that is really and actually perceived by us is
one of its building blocks. What we do not perceive , for example God or ghosts
or aliens, do not form a part of it. In the beginning when man was formulating
together the first descriptions of what we perceive, his observations were not
very accurate. Over the years our observations have become more and more
accurate so that the story we have created explains just about everything we can
observe. Initially we didn't know much, and so everything was earthshaking. The
early part of the 20th century was especially productive because so much of our
observations remained to be fitted together into a whole. But now most of the
things that we need to describe have been described. We have to search high and
low to find an unusual observation that needs to be fitted into our story. A
good example is what the scientists are trying to do at CERN. People say that
what they are doing is testing theory. That is true but another way of looking
at it is trying to find some unusual observation that has not been seen before.
In other words what science has already done is described all the easier
observations and now to go further people are literally smashing atoms together
to create something new to observe.
Again I emphasise ; science is not correct but what is correct is
science. What we observe to be true is science. We observe the laws of elements
reacting together, inorganic and organic. Both are predictable and both are
explained completely by science.
Ah! Again I see that your arguments have come up with an inconsistency.
You say that science explains the laws of elements of and molecules , but how do
you explain consciousness by science? This self awareness , this feeling of
existence, this wonderful thing that we all experience of being alive. Can your
science explain that? Surely you must agree that this consciousness of itself
that only living things possess, is in itself so remarkable that science simply
has no explanation for it? Venkatesh as usual had unerringly laid his finger on
the pulse of the argument. But Shankar was ready for that. In fact he was
waiting for it.
'See how important it is that I keep emphasising that science doesn't
explain anything , but simply describes it? Science doesn't explain
consciousness, it simply describes it. And now, with the advances in scientific
knowledge the descriptions have become more and more accurate. In fact now we
know exactly why we are conscious, to an amazing degree, though there is
research still going on . We now know the exact seat of consciousness and the
exact meaning of it , what consciousness actually is.' He felt a thrill of
victory in his chest as he saw the look of puzzlement in Venkatesh's eyes. Here
was something that the old bookworm hadn't read. And no wonder, it was only
yesterday that Shankar had seen the article in Nature which, when put together
with the physiology book he was reading, had given him what he called his
amazing insight. It had come to him in a flash of comprehension, just as reading
about colour-blindness had made him realise that the entire world is just what
we perceive and man has no knowledge other than what he can perceive. But he put
away stray thoughts and concentrated on the long task ahead. For there was still
a lot of ground to cover.
'I know that consciousness is a sticky wicket for science, or rather,
was. But let me begin my explanations with life's own beginning. It had a long
way to go before it got consciousness!'
As I was saying, the existence of the elements having their own peculiar
rules of interaction automatically leads to the world as we know it including
life. Just like sugar or salt crystallise out of a solution when the conditions
are right, similarly life crystallised out of the primitive cauldrons of our
planet very early on in it's existence, probably 3 billion or so years ago. When
we look at life, we marvel at the incredible complexities and myriad forms but
it is useful to leave our emotions behind and
just look at life as an inevitable consequence of the existence of carbon,
hydrogen and oxygen. Life in the early days was much simpler. of course, but it
got more complex very quickly. The formation of chains of nucleotides into DNA
is understandable , but why it should be used as a code for formation of other
molecules by enzymes which are themselves created by the same DNA is difficult
to understand. Nobody, starting from the elements and the same conditions has
been able to recreate anything like life. Maybe it needs a very long period of
complex organic reactions to constantly take place before chance creates the
right combination of chemicals to be present at the right place and at the right
time. Obviously, if it is possible and you give it long enough time, it will
happen. And it did.
The rules of life were determined just like the rules of chemical
interaction were determined - after all life is nothing but a complex organic
chemical reaction. The rules were those of DNA and it's interaction with
proteins, which is what lies at the core of what life is. Once those rules were
in place then the rest of the mysteries of life become revealed as nothing but a
complex crystal that dazzles everyone by it's brilliant appearance - pretty but
not a mystery. These simple rules have translated themselves into the myriad
interplay of that we call life.
The evolution of life out of the molecules of carbon and friends was as I
said before, inevitable. It was possible and therefore it happened. It was pure
chance, though, or rather all the conditions required for the complex
intermolecular interplay we call life, were only fulfilled in a few places, how
few or how many we dont know. The conditions were right on earth though. The
temperature was right which is a way of saying there were narrow flux in the
range of energy transferred from our star to the earth which allowed the
molecules to exist but also allowed enough changes to engender complexity. The
atoms and molecules were present in the right proportions, or near enough. That
is all that was required for the production of carbon based molecules that we
call organic molecules because they are the building blocks of life.
The next ingredient was time. Because life is not just a collection of
organic molecules, it is far more complex than that. There are two core
definitions which are very important at this point. The first is life and the
other is intelligence. First what is life. My definition is a complex chemical
reaction which is capable of sustaining itself
indefinitely, by means of storing information required for its self
perpetuation within some of the reacting molecules, which increases in
complexity progressively over time. What are the key words here? First it is
complex, not just H and o forming h2o. Second, this complexity increases over a
period of time, which is what we call evolution. Why does that happen? I will
address that in a minute. Third, it involves storing of information which is in
the form of DNA. The second important definition is intelligence. What is that?
It is the culmination of the generation of complexity in life. Intelligence
starts when information of happenings in the environment around is stored within
the complex molecular interaction called life. The culmination of intelligence
is when enough capacity to store and analyse environmental happenings is
achieved so that a unit of life can store all the primary reaction information
secondarily and can manipulate it directionally.
To explain I really have to elaborate, so bear with me. At the beginning of the earth, there were molecules. Because the conditions were right, carbon based molecules were generated. Because the conditions were right, these carbon based molecules started interacting with themselves. Slowly these became more complex. Simple carbon molecules like methane and ammonia reacted to form lipids, simple carbohydrates and simple nucleotides and amino acids. Everything was random and directionless. These these reacted together to form more complex carbohydrates, lipids and short proteins. Still everything was random. The lipids joined together to form micelles with simple hydrophobic and hydrophilic interaction and formed simple membranes. Simple proteins reacted with basic carbon molecules and nucleotides. Some of these associated with lipid membranes and this was when life got created. As I said before in the definition, life is a self perpetuating reaction. Until now all reactions were random, but now it became possible for a self perpetuating reaction to start. This probably started in small isolated areas at first when these molecules started going through the same set of reactions over and over again. Self perpetuation means that once it gets started it does not stop but keeps going on and on and on for long periods of time.. Until now all reactions were random, but once such a self perpetuating reaction starts, it is always preferred over a random reaction, by its very nature, because it does not stop. Once you have many similar self perpetuating reactions, the one with more self perpetuation property is preferred over others with less self perpetuation, because it keeps going for longer. We dont need cells DNA or enzymes or any of the other chemicals associated with life. Just a self perpetuating reaction is enough for the simplest forms of life, because the moment it starts, the principle of evolution takes over. The principle of evolution is what i just stated a moment ago, reactions with more self perpetuation are preferred over others, so that steadily all the molecules arrange themselves into more and more complex interaction, preserving only one property which is self perpetuation.
One important principle still remains to be talked about, which is
something we have only recently understood. We are such egocentric creatures
because we are units of a whole that we miss the forest for looking at
individual trees. If any one reaction was useless and died out, it was of no
importance at all, as long as other reactions continued. Of course it was within
the realms of chance that all the reactions died out, in which case earth would
not have had life. A temperature increase or slight variation n the reaction mix
may have been enough. If the weather changes drastically enough, life ma have
died. out, and if changes drastically enough it may still die out. We dont know
in how many countless planets in countless plane systems, life like reactions
started but never progressed or aborted half way or maybe are still in the
process of progression. Anyway the point is that the important thing for life to
continue is that somewhere in the world these reaction should go on, individual
reactions are of no importance. Also, the entire earth can be thought of as one
giant reaction, incredibly more complex that any individual reaction. In other
words the ecology of the biosphere with the complex interactions between
themselves is the mother of all complex reactions as Saddam would say. The earth
is one life, with its many units interlinked complexly just as the many cells of
the body unite to create a multicellular organism
The earth formed some four billion years ago along with the sun. Since it
takes around 8 billion years or so for enough of different atoms to be produced
inside red giants and the universe is around 14 or 15 billion years old, earth
should be one of the earlier planets which had the right mix of materials and
thus one of the earliest to get life. I obviously cannot argue that there may
have been some earlier ones elsewhere, but earth is definitely one of the early
ones.. Of course, stars are forming continually and so any number of other
planets amy be going through right now what earth went through 4 billion years
ago.
Once life formed, it evolved quickly and life as we know it with genetic
code and protein enzymes and cell membranes and reproduction by dividing and all
the rest of it in bacteria like units was in place within the first billion
years or so. Unicellular organism had arrived. What happened to all the other
types of self perpetuating life forms? They died out lie the dinosaurs, unable
to compete with the more efficient life forms. Some survived, like some early
bacteria or virus. But survivability was the only criteria. Of course chance
also played a role. Why only one genetic code which is nearly universal for all
life on earth? That was the way the cookie crumbled.
Then multicellular organisms evolved out of these. Again only chance and
the principle of evolution got to work to create it. Unicellular organisms have
two principles for survival - eat to become big and divide. Once divided the two
cells were separate and again had only one principle, eat and divide. For
multicellular organisms, it was different, in that the unit should survive,
individual cells could sacrifice themselves for the sake of other genetically
identical cells. In other words the cell has to become altruistic for the sake
of his sister cells. This could have been achieved in many ways but somehow it
was apoptosis which was the mechanism in animal cells. This is a mechanism by
which a cell will die by inherent mechanism within it unless the sister cells
support it by providing a signal permitting it to live. This signals which are
growth factors control the cell. Without it the cell would die so that the
sisters may live. Cells escaping this control mechanism are no longer altruistic
- they are malignant cells. So mutations which produce loss of altruism cause
cancer. So the next step was multicellular organisms which work on the principle
of altruism.
Next big step? Ability to process environmental information. Then the
capacity to store environmental information which is memory. Already much of the
attributes of life have arrived. Only one more step is required for humans. That
is the ability to store and process so much information that it understands the
genetic.
The genetic code is there in every prokaryote and has enough information
for producing itself. Each eukaryotic cell has enough information for
reproducing every cell in its body. But genetic code alone is enough for
survival only in plants and simple animals. As the ability to store and analyse
information developed, survivability requirement increased to genetic code plus
environmental training from parents. Without parenting the most complex of
animals did not have enough information to achieve the full complexity which it
was capable of. Because evolution is a continuous process and one organism
evolved from another, everybody had parents to take care of tem so lack of
parenting was not a problem. If chance separated parents and offspring in
dependency cases, the offspring died.
In the end humans arrived and humans could understand and store all of
the information in the DNA in other more complex forms of data storage, like
computers and machines. The task is still to be finished but hopefully it will
be finished soon.
What is the next step? First we had self perpetuating reactions. That was
life which followed the rules of evolution. Then came a reaction which had all
the information for its self perpetuation stored on the constituent molecules,
in the form of a unicellular organism with a genetic code. This was also
governed by the rules of evolution but as applied with genes and genetics.Then
came the ability to process so much information in a secondary was that all the
of the genetic code could be contained within it. What comes next? To my mind
evolution as carried out by the genetic code has ended, having fulfilled itself.
Now intelligence is here. There will be no more genetic evolution, now
intelligent evolution would take over as the next step. Soon there will be
intelligent evolution the purpose of which would be to increase intelligence by
means of genetic engineering. As intelligence increases, other thins unknown as
yet to my unintelligent mind would happen. but complexity would keep increasing.
The key thing about the arrival of intelligence is that until now, life
could have been wiped out by chance events. But with intelligence, a superior
level of self perpetuation of complex
reactions have arrived. At the same time, other kinds of complexities like
machines and other complex information processing things like computers have
come. These are complexities which can only exist when intelligence is created.
As yet they do not have the property of self perpetuation. But self perpetuation
is possible in machines, therefore ultimately it will happen just by chance.
With intelligent life forms improving themselves with genetic engineering and
inorganic self perpetuating complex structures side by side, again there will be
evolutionary competition and survival of the fittest, only the most survivable
form winning the competition. Such situations are inevitable somewhere in the
universe at some time. It may or may not accur on earth, chance and previous
activities will shape our future. Chance can also bring the entire process back
to square one by completely annihilating life and machines anywhere in the
universe. All I can say is that somewhere in the universe everything which can
happen will happen. It is impossible to predict what the next level of
complexity will be after superintelligent men and machines, because there is not
enough data. There is also not enough data to say why all these complex things
are happening. It is interesting to speculate that the reason for increased
complexity is to ultimately create such a complexity that it encompasses the
entire universe and then the complexity and the universe would be one. You might
say, that complex thing would be the only thing capable of understanding the
meaning of the universe. But that is only speculation based on insufficient
data. We are not intelligent enough to understand such things.
That has been the story of the universe and the story of life, with my
own speculation as to what may happen . Unfortunately none of us can ever know
what will come next, speculation is just futile activity.
Next comes the application of all of this knowledge in our personal life.
I
know I have been talking a long time and the threads of the discussion
invariably run in a less than comprehensive way, so that some things get left
behind. So to summarise what I have been talking about, Analysing the world
around us we can see some whats emerging though not whys. The evidence suggests
that the world started in a big
bang from one point in time and space with nothing but energy. Then we had four
things - time space, energy and matter, all coming from the one point. Being but
one of the constituent parts of that one initial energy, it is not possible to
understand anything about the one energy. We cannot talk about what came before
the energy because time which we perceive was created after the one. Everything
we can perceive was created after that one, there fore anything we can
understand can only be within of that one and not outside of it. Some people
like to think of the primal one as God. In that case, God existed only at the
time of creation and now God is all of the universe. If there are things outside
of this universe then we cannot comprehend it, but it does not matter because it
does not affect us. If something affects our life then it immediately becomes a
part of this universe and a part of science.
Then I talked of science as a description and not an explanation of the
universe. Science is always right because of the simple fact that it is science
only if it is correct. If we can perceive it to be working or correct, and this
occurs persistently, then we take it to be true and thus a part of science.
Nothing is excluded in science, instead everything is described in terms of
probability that something is correct. The probability that the genetic code,
Newtons laws of physics, Einsteins theory of relativity , Maxwells laws of
electromagnetism, and Babbages computers work are high, so high that we use it
in everyday applications all the time. They work and therefore they are science.
The probability of extrasensory
perception, mediums and spirits, life after death, a God interfering in our
everyday life, extraterrestrial life visiting earth and observing us and magical
thing of that sort is low. They are so low that no consistent observations of
such things have been made so far. But that is all science says about them is
that they are unlikely to be true given the current level of observation
possible for us. Further expenditure of time effort and money into these are
unlikely to provide fruitful returns. Unlikely, not impossible.
From the one came the four. From the four came the third event - first
lot of complex reaction in the form of conversion of the first element hydrogen
into Helium and other elements inside stars. The four relied upon the one for
their generation and reacted together in set ways which we call laws. The
first complex interactions were based on these laws. Once atoms were
created, they had also rules of interaction which were derived from the original
laws. They reacted together to form molecules which was the fourth event. The
complexity of these molecules increased progressively to create primitive life,
which is a complex self perpetuating reaction with increasing degree of self
perpetuation which is the principle of evolution. This was the fifth event.
The sixth event was creation of a life form which was complex enough to
have all information for the performance of complexity within it in the form of
a genetic code. The seventh main event was the formation of the principle of
altruism, based upon the rules of self perpetuation and codification. Thus we
see that all new laws and principles are based upon preexisting laws and only
exist because the simpler law came first. Newer laws do not replace existing
laws at all, they simply create greater complexity of operation. So the
principle of altruism created multicellular organisms. This set the stage for
the eighth event - processing and storage of environmental information.
Increasing complexity within the eighth event created the ninth event -
capability to process and store enough information to understand its own
working, which are us humans. We are now in the tenth stage - creation of
increasing complexity without the need for the fifth event which is self
perpetuation. Thus we have complexities like computers and machines which could
only be created when the previous nine things had occurred. We also have the
ability to modify the self generated complexity which we call life, since the
principle of its working is understood.
I like to give names to these events. Thus they are
1]
The big bang as beginning = The one
2]
The creation of energy, time, space and hydrogen matter
= The four
3]
More complex matter = Atoms
4]
Interaction between atoms =Molecules
5]
Evolutionary self perpetuating molecular reaction = Life
6]
Genetically coded molecular reaction = Unicellular organism
7]
Altruistic partnership between unicellular organism = Multicellular organism
8]
Processing and storage of environmental information = Nervous system and Memory
9]
Understanding the working of itself
= Intelligence.
10]
Intelligence based generation of complexity = Machines and Genetic engineering.
11]
? = Future
What
can we say about the future universe? More and more complexity will be
generated.
From
all of this we can only say that the purpose of the universe is not
understandable but the only possible reason for it all is generation of
increased complexity for some unknown end. We as humans are most recent advance
in level of complexity in this part of the universe, and are bound to be
superceded by the next level of complexity to get generated. In all probability
this will either be genetically engineered and augmented organic machines or
electronic machines capable of self
perpetuation and higher complexity.
What
comes after that can only be determined by the 11th complexity which is yet to
arrive in this part of the universe, we only have the power to determine the
11th complexity after which the role of humans would be over, except to provide
a stable fabric for the future generation of complexity.
The
first few events are so important that they form the very fabric of the
universe. They will remain relevant for many of the subsequent events.It is
impossible to say at what time atoms and molecules will become irrelevant. So
far only two events have become irrelevant and disappeared - The first which
gave the four and rules of interaction and the fifth which were intermediate
life forms in the generation of genetically coded life. The sixth, seventh and
eight levels which are the lower life forms are still relevant in providing the
proper environment for he survival of the ninth stage which is humans. But they
are fast becoming unnecessary and soon may not be needed. Sometime in the
future, humans will also become unnecessary, as superior complexity with self
perpetuating properties are created.
The
other thing to understand about the universe is that all things are random.
Things happen by chance and can get undone by chance. If all life on earth gets
wiped out on earth, it is not a disaster. It is a chance occurrence of no
consequence. It is just another possibility and therefore may happen, depending
on the chances of probability. Given the self perpetuation principle and the
principle of altruism and the newly generated principle of intelligence, it is
unlikely to happen. But given the intermediate complexities based on survival,
like aggression to increase survivability of the species, it might happen. If it
happens, then it happens and that is the end of it.
Secondly,
all events which occur are just occurrences without meaning, only the patterns
can be recognised, not the end point of the pattern. It is possible that as time
progresses, the complexities which form will get destroyed and degenerate into
the fourth stage and then into the second stage and then the first. Thus the
generation of complexity would have been without any purpose whatsoever. In
fact, given the current level of analysis we are capable of, this seems like the
most likely possibility. All these things are just happenings and have no
purpose behind them at all.
Thirdly,
the universe is so huge that all things which can happen will happen somewhere
or the other. If it does not happen on earth, it will happen somewhere else. So
if we kill off everybody on earth, it is not a disaster but just a chance
happening. Collision with an asteroid, an explosion, changes in weather pattern
can all wipe out life on earth at any time. The generation of intelligence is
very important here. Until this stage, we were at the mercy of random chance.
Now with intelligence our survivability has increased because random events can
be anticipated and technology used to change the anticipated disaster. Therefore
an intelligent organism is more likely to survive that unintelligent ones. Thus
the survival of intelligent organisms somewhere on the universe is reasonably
certain until for long periods of time, say a few billion years at least.
Complexity generation is becoming faster. It took around around 3 or four
billion years to generate complex atoms, and around 8 to 10 billion years for
generation of molecules at least on earth. I guess theoretically it is possible
that many molecules were made even as long ago as say 5 or 6 billion years ago,
but it takes a lot of time to form second generation of stars, time for atoms
generated in big bangs to come together at the right temperature and gravity to
form molecular objects like planets. It takes time for enough random events to
occur before the right set of circumstances come together to form life
sustainable planets. It is unlikely, that such planets formed much earlier than
the earth. Definitely possible, given the vastness of the universe, but
unlikely. Similarly, it would take time for the random generation of life from
molecules. It is possible that intelligent life got generated much faster on
some other planet, but given the number of unrelated random events that are
required for the generation of intelligence, it is unlikely that too many
planets got intelligent life before us. Because it is a possibility, therefore
life will form on other places where it is possible. Given the right conditions,
generation of life is inevitable. But as of now, we have insufficient data to
say how many life sustainable planets there are. One thing is for sure, the
right conditions are not going to be easy to come by, because a lot of
fantastically improbable events have to happen before life and intelligence get
generated.
First,
planets have to form, . Say one in ten stars have planets. Second they should be
of the right density so that there are not too many collisions between them.
Another one in ten chance. Third it should be the right size and consistency. 1
in 10 again. Fourth it should have the right mix of carbon , water and oxygen on
the surface. Say one in ten chance again, though it is likely to be rarer. Fifth
it should have the right density of gases
on the surface. Say another 1 in 10. Sixth it has to be the right temperature
and energy transfer from the sun to the planet has to be just right for
prolonged periods of time, so that stable climate is there, a sort of incubator
for life to get generated. This would depend on the size and distance from the
sun. Say another one in ten, though this is the crucial one and most likely to
be a rarer event. Seventh a self perpetuating reaction has to generate itself.
Given time and the right conditions, it is inevitable.
So
assuming a one in 10 chance for most of these things, it would seem that one in
a million stars would have life, assuming all of these events are independent of
each other. So even if only a one in a million star system has life, there
should be a million stars in our galaxy with life. Those are enormous numbers.
The key thing here is how many stars in the galaxy have earth like
planets. That is the one thing we do not know. Assuming one in a million was a
guessestimate, it may be one in a thousand giving a billion stars in our galaxy
with life, or one in a billion, which
mean only a hundred or thousand stars in the galaxy with life.
How far has life advanced on other planets? I would like to think that
planet formation occurred mostly around 10 billion years or so ago when earth
formed. There may have been some earlier ones, but chances are that any life
supportable planet formed around the time of earth itself. It has taken 4
billion years of incubation to generate intelligence on earth, but intelligence
is very recent, just a million years old. Formation of the right cultural
environment for intelligence to function properly took a million years. Once the
right cultural environment was there it took ten thousand years to understand
the principles of the universe. Once the understanding was there, it took 100
years to make intelligent machines and genetically
engineered organisms.
Assuming these are average and not extreme figures, if intelligence
formed on another planet in 3 instead of 4 billion years, then there may be
organisms which are a billion years ahead of us in terms of technical
development. Possibly 2 billion or even 3 billion years. One thing is for sure,
if not in our galaxy, then at least somewhere in the universe, at least one
planet should be there which is one billion years ahead of us. If not one
billion years, one million years most definitely. Human beings have been around
for a million years, in the infinities of space there should be at least one
planet where people have been in the technological age for a million years more
than us. Frightening isnt it? We have been technological for 100 years they for
one million. And there can be no
life without the principle of self perpetuation and that inevitably leads to
evolution and survival of the fittest. So no matter how advanced they may be,
somewhere in their past they had survivability programs built into them just as
we have. Maybe they are aggressive colonisers. Maybe they have found that there
are millions of planets with life and so we are insignificant. If they are so
advanced, they would consider us to be like the lowly microbe and treat us like
we do the microbe and the lower organism. If they are so advanced, they are
unlikely to preserve emotional stupidities like we do. Understanding the
universe, they would not e bothered about such silliness as good and bad, god,
peace, sanctity of life and other such survivors from our primitive evolutionary
past to which many of the humans still cling to.
All
of this is frightening, but the most frightening of all is that creatures have
already passed into the next levels of complexities, being many tiers advanced
over us, complexities beyond our current levels of understanding. So we are just
abortions of no consequence at all in the attainment of complexity which is the
only purpose we see in the universe.
Those
were the possibilities. which we cannot convert into probabilities due to
insufficient data. But I have certain gut feelings which are not founded on
fact. First, there is no purpose in the universe, it is just happening randomly
and will slowly fizzle out in the vastness of space. Second, life is rare
because planets capable of supporting life are very rare. I dont know this but
assume it thinking of all the accidental chance requirements which are required
to come together. Third, the chances of life forming are itself rare, the main
problem being the generation of self sustaining coded reactions. Looking at the
complex reactions which have to take place, even though I said life is
inevitable, somehow my gut says it is not inevitable but a rare miraculous
accident. Logic is against my gut on this, it says life is inevitable, if
something happens once, it s likely to happen again and again and again. But my
gut is against this, it says life is unique to earth.
Third,
I do not believe that creatures will advance beyond the intelligence stage.
Logic of evolution says it will advance but to me, it seems that intelligence is
an end point. Before intelligence, the inexorable process of evolution created a
driving force. But the acquisition of intelligence dissipates this driving force
when we realise that everything is without purpose. The universe just is, and we
on it are as insignificant as the stars and the planets and the neutrons and all
the rest of everything on the universe is pointless. So we cannot go further
than this, we already know everything there is to know, on a conceptual level
anyway. To deny the pointlessness of the universe is to slp backwards in
intelligence to a more primitive intelligence. From that primitive level, the
only way forward would be the stage we have already reached. There is nothing
more to life except creating better machines and exploring the universe which we
already understand well enough. The more primitive parts of our evolutionary
mechanisms which ensure survivability will impel us to do new technological
feats and exploration, but I do not think we can become more intelligent than we
are. I know I said higher forms of intelligence will evolve and bigger
complexities will get created, but I doubt my own words. I do not think we can
become more intelligent because we already understand everything there is to
understand.
More
intelligence would just mean faster and more efficient machines, better than the
human machines and the computers we have. But none of them will have more
understanding, because everything is already understood already.
That
has been my belief for long, though
a more thorough understanding of the workings of the universe has prompted the
analytical parts of me to propound a more optimistic view earlier. Just because
I cannot conceive a better understanding of the universe and nobody else on the
earth so far has been able to understand the universe better does not mean
humans or machines with better capability cannot evolve. Since there has been a
driving force for complexity, logic dictates that new levels of complexity will
be generated and these may know more. My brain and that of all current humans
cannot go further, but future intelligences might . That is why I am so much in
favour of scientific advancement. I want new kinds of humans with superior
intelligence to be created, bigger computers with unusual programs made. That is
the way of the future and our only hope. When I see all this primitive fear in
everybody over machines taking over or genetically engineered humans taking
over, I get livid with rage. These people who are in a preintelligent stage of
evolutionary drive forces of fear and incomprehension are holding back the
chances of me being able to see superior intelligence in my life time. People
are wasting their time creating weapons of war, religion and magic and such
junk, ecology nuts who want to hold on to our evolutionary past, and so much
time being wasted on the health of people. If all of this effort were to be
directed at producing superior intelligence, at least something might happen in
the next 30 or 40 years when I am likely to be alive. Then at least I can see
something new and unanticipated, not just better computers and video cameras and
such junk. The other thing I wish we would do is more space exploration so that
we can see the rest of the universe, not die in planet earth and its environs.
These are the only two things which are worth doing on the earth, beside
creating better machines. They would at least create some interest and maybe
hope that superior intelligences would understand the universe better than
humans. I am not too keen though, because if I wont have knowledge, then I dont
care whether after I die and cease to exist something else gets what I know I
can ever have.
What
do we know about humans?
Venky's Note: I wrote this in one sitting on a free Sunday, when I was alone in UK. The beginning is along lines I had previously covered many times in my own mind, but the latter was a single thread of thought along new lines. I am leaving the entire extract as it is and un edited, mainly because it would take too much time to rewrite. I apologise for an irritating amount of repetition of words like perpetuation and complexity! I'll write a much better essay later on!