How does scripture explain evolution?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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so how does religion explain evolution see again evolution is a theory which is based on observing material phenomena and that matter changes is something which is we can see by observation and it is talked about in scripture also matter keeps changing but there is there is valid observation and there is invalid extrapolation from that observation so what this means is there can be certain mechanisms by which certain things may change in the material world but those mechanisms don’t necessarily explain reality exhaustively I’ll give two examples to illustrate this that suppose somebody plays billiards when they are playing billiards somebody hits the ball one ball hits another ball and then the final ball goes into the hole now I can explain all of this purely in terms of the laws of physics because this ball hit this ball at this angle with this velocity with this momentum that’s how this ball went into the hole that’s a valid, that’s a correct explanation but somebody else may say oh you know this player who hit the ball, this player is an expert billiards player and it was because of the expertise of the billiards player that the ball went into the hole so now this is also correct these two explanations are not contradictory they are complementary the expertise of the player and the action of the, and the laws of physics both are explanations for why the ball went into the hole so like that science may come up with certain material mechanisms based on observing how the world functions now the material mechanisms they explain the interaction of objects they don’t explain the origin of the objects, they don’t explain the origin of motion, now once somebody hits, then ok, by the laws of physics it will go into the hole, suppose you know most of us, most of you are Indians, say you are a cricketer last ball is the India Pakistan match and you know you have to hit a sixer to win the match and the batsman just hits powerfully and hits a sixer oh, how did you win the match? by the laws of motion that doesn’t make sense, the laws of motion are true we could say that the batsman hit the ball with adequate force, that’s why the ball went over the boundary but the laws themselves are not causes laws simply describe the interconnectedness between events or interconnectedness between cause and effect laws are themselves not causes so science can explain how events, how things interact with each other and there can be various theories, I won’t go into the specifics of any theory because that becomes a very technical subject I’ll stick to principles over here so in principle, scientific investigation and the spiritual understanding they don’t have to be contradictory now in some cases science extends its jurisdiction beyond its valid realm so for example especially when we go to origins generally we think if you are opposing science I can see how my phone works so well, I just click a few buttons and I can talk with anyone in the world how can you say that science is wrong? how can you say that scientific theories are incorrect? you feel like that but all science is not created equal so when we look at the laws of semiconductor effect or laws of physics or laws of electromagnetics by which much of our digital world works for this science uses one method and when it goes to origins, it uses an entirely different method so normally how does science work? it uses inductive reasoning Newton observed a fruit falling and then afterwards he had this fell, why? because there is some force which attracts particles to each other then he got many other particles to fall and many other people did the same experiment so here repeatability is possible repeatable experiments can be done and this form of reasoning is called as inductive reasoning so most of science operates either on deductive reasoning which is mathematics or inductive reasoning which is inference from observed phenomena so we observe certain phenomena and we infer from that but when science goes to origins, it cannot do inductive reasoning because how the universe came about science cannot say oh universe please recreate yourself, I want to observe it so how does science does not use inductive reasoning it uses another form of reasoning which is called as abductive reasoning abductive reasoning means basically it is a inference to best explanation it is a inference to best explanation, suppose crime investigators are there, they have found that the owner of a house has been murdered with a knife in his stomach now they have a security camera over there, so our friend went to meet him at 2 o’clock and then at 10 o’clock when somebody went to meet him he was murdered between 2 to 10 who all went into the room there is a 5 year old child who went there he did not have the strength to put a knife like that then you know a 70 year old house maid went over there she also did not have the strength then he found ok, a 25 year old young man went over there, he must be the murderer now this, it is not that they investigate, they can actually replicate what happened over there this is an inference to best explanation this is to a large extent a guess now in that same house in that same room there might be some trap door hidden under some closet or under some bed and a thief might have come through that trap door but if the trap door is not detected they will say based on this evidence this is the best explanation but there can be some other factor involved which is not known just like in a who done it mystery novel the detective detects based on an inference to best explanation and this is never conclusive, this is never definitive like that when science goes to origins it actually cannot replicate, it cannot do experiments, so it is an inference to best explanation and this inference to best explanation is often based on a lot of guess work, because lot of guess work because we really don’t know how the universe was at the beginning how the universe was at the beginning and that’s why we need to take scientific theories as far as scientific theories are dealing with how matter works right now so there is micro evolution and there is macro evolution micro evolution is change within species, like you can have cauliflowers of this size, you can have cauliflowers of this size this is change within species this is an observed fact of nature and there is no denying that, but from this observed fact of nature when the theory is made, that actually all life came from matter this is a huge extrapolation and that extrapolation is actually based on a lot of chain of inferences, much of which is unreliable so when we talk, when science goes into origins it becomes very very speculative and it is a different genre of science so science which is based on repeatable experiments and science which is talking about origins, they are two different kinds of science and that’s why when we as scientists, if you are a biologist working in biology there are observed observable phenomena and micro evolution is well observed but the survival of the fittest is a principle of nature but survival of the fittest does not explain the arrival of the fittest we are not explaining origins by this we are looking at observed features in nature and explaining them but where it all came from that is something which is a whole different genre so overall rather than getting into technicalities in this question answer forum, if you want to discuss about evolution, maybe we can discuss some other time but suffice it to say that we have the scientific and spiritual explanations complementary, not contradictory we have no issues with science discovering laws which govern nature Krishna says that material nature works under my supervision and things change in the material world under the laws of material nature so that there are laws of material nature we have no issues with that and science can discover those laws but from the discovery of laws based on observable, repeatable phenomena when science makes inferences about origins it’s a far less reliable body of knowledge, it’s based on abductive reasoning not inductive reasoning and that’s why it needs to be taken with a grain of salt thank you