Introduction :
Over the past two millennia or more, man has been concerned with the great mysteries of existence. He has formulated many theories to answer the question: “How and when did this universe or the world come into existence?” Most of the major religions have also tried to solve this cosmic riddle in their own respective way. Similarly, over the last four or five centuries, astronomers, astrophysicists and geologists also have attempted to tackle this question in their own typical ways and have formulated many theories or hypotheses. Many modern scientists believe that the universe originated from a ‘Cosmic Egg’ by a catastrophic explosion called ‘Big Bang’. They rule out its creation by God. On the contrary, many religionists believe that originally, God created the world. The question is which one of these two hypotheses is more rational? Can anyone of these be sustained on the basis of reason or scientific proof? Was the universe created at some point of time or it is eternal?
Present research paper is an analytical review on the scientific perspective of the creation of the world i.e. the ‘Big-bang Theory’ from Brahmakumaris Spiritual Perspective, especially through the scientific and spiritual writings of Rajyogi B.K Jagdish Chander Hassija, a magnificent personality with extra-ordinary power of divine knowledge, to create a clear conception of the cosmological principle. How far this theory of cosmology is applicable for true justice or it is merely a hypothesis, not really a fact, although it has influenced almost all branches of knowledge-system and all human thinking and conduct.
Scientific Perspective on Cosmology :
• Big-bang Theory
The most popular ‘Big-bang theory’ was first proposed by the Belgian astronomer Georges Edward Lemaitre, adopted and popularized by a famous English scientist Sir Arthur Eddington and later, Russian-American astrophysicist George Gamow upheld and propagated enthusiastically and gave it the name as ‘Big-bang Theory’ . In 1927, Lemaitre suggested that at a point of time in the remote past, there existed only one large lump. At that point of time i.e. ‘Zero Time’, the matter and energy of the universe were literally squashed or compressed together into one huge mass, perhaps no more than a few light years in diameter. He called that huge mass the ‘cosmic egg’ because, according to him, the cosmos was born out of it.
Originally, the Matter which formed the cosmic egg was hydrogen gas. Later the sub-atomic particles of hydrogen gas became condensed to form a compressed mass of neutrons called ‘neutronium’. Then that mass of Matter became unstable and at ‘zero time’ the cosmic egg exploded. According to this theory, the fragments of that catastrophic explosion which were sent hurtling out in all directions, became the galaxies. Not only did portions of cosmic egg form the present-day galaxies; but on a more subtle level, the cosmic egg broke up to form various atoms and 103 elements we know today. Here it is not considered whether the theory, concerning the formation of all the 103 elements from original hydrogen or neutronium was possible; but B.K Jagdish has made attempts mainly to shed light on it whether the formation of ‘cosmic egg’ and its subsequent explosion or ‘big-bang’ and the consequent formation of galaxies from it was possible!
Does this theory or hypothesis solve the question of origin?
But here the question arises how did hydrogen or its electrons and protons or neutronium originate?” To answer this question, scientists take support of the concept of Eternity and the Law of Conservation of Mass and Energy. They say that Matter, making up the cosmic egg, was always there because Matter is Eternal and is always conserved; it never gets annihilated.
B.K Jagdish Chander, showing Brahmakumaris’ spiritual perspective says that if Matter forming the cosmic egg was always there; the crucial question is whether the Matter was there in the form of the cosmic egg? If one says : it was always in the form of cosmic egg”, then one would like to ask : In that case, the cosmic egg should have remained stable in that form for, there was nothing else there to disturb it; why did it suddenly (at ‘zero time’) cease to be stable? What led to its explosion after billions of years of stability? What were the forces which, originally, had been keeping it stable and what new forces now, suddenly, brought about explosion? Scientists have no satisfactory answer to these questions on which depends the validity or credibility of this theory.
Is the scientists’ answer satisfactory?
Scientists have tried to solve these and such other problems but the question is whether these have been satisfactorily answered to give it credibility. Scientists render a common answer related to this matter that as mentioned by B.K Jagdish- “Before the ‘cosmic egg’ came into existence, there was an exceedingly thin gas, this gas had its own vastly diffused gravitational field. Gradually, over billions of years, the gas collected and the mass of the gas grew close together. As the substance of the Universe grew more compact, the gravitational field became more intense until, after many billions of years, the Universe went on contracting at a greater and greater speed. In this process of contraction it produced higher and higher temperature as the gas compressed into smaller and smaller volume. This temperature-rise increasingly countered the gravitational contraction and began to slow down the process of contraction. However, the inertia of Matter kept it contracting more and more, till it was past the point where the temperature effect had just balanced gravitation. Finally, the universe contracted to a minimum volume, represented by the cosmic egg. At some point, the outward push of the temperature and of gravitation, finally overcomes the gravitational force and this builds up into a force that results in the ‘big-bang’. In this view, the cosmic egg becomes a momentary object.”
How the ‘cosmic egg’ was first formed?
Newton’s first Law of Motion states that “everything keeps in its state of rest or motion unless there is an external force which is applied to it.” B.K Jagdish puts a series of questions before scientists : “Since there was nothing else besides the thin gas. What led the gas to collect and draw close? Since the force of gravitation was the same as it had remained ‘for billions of years’; how did it increase so as to contraction of the gas-substance? And according to the first Law of Thermo-dynamics or Law of Conservation of Mass or Energy, the total mass and energy in the universe remain the same; they neither increase nor decrease. So again he asks question: what additional force or energy outside the gas-mass originally led the gas-particles to draw closer and closer? No scientist, to this day, has solved this riddle.”
Moreover, none has ever stated specifically the actual size of the cosmic egg or its total mass or the force of explosion that rent it into fragments, so that its pieces hurtled away and managed to attain ‘the escape velocity’ to form galaxies. Also, the question is “If the cosmic egg hurtled its segments to form galaxies, wherefrom did the matter in the space between these galaxies come?” Further, the universe being infinite or of very vast expanse, did the hydrogen gas fill the whole universe or the thin cloud occupied only a part of it? If it filled a part of it, why did it occupy only that much density or thinness and neither more or less? If it filled an infinite space, how could, then, its so weak gravitational field, especially at its farther parts lead it to contraction?
Another question, stated by B.K Jagdish is whether the parts of the cosmic egg that hurtled out and formed galaxies will continue receding from each other forever or their velocity of recession will slowly decline with time and will reach a momentary zero mark? And then, will the galaxies finally begin to come together again, slowly at first and then more and more rapidly and will finally. Condense to form something like the cosmic egg, constituted of hydrogen again? Following the formation of the cosmic egg, will there be another big-bang and will the whole process start over again, in the fashion of the egg giving to the hen and the hen laying an egg and the egg again breaking to give birth to another hen, the series extending to infinity.
If the relationship between the cosmic egg and the universe is as between an egg and a hen, then, where is the question of origin or ‘the beginning’? Where is the irreversible change and the final ending? As the universe is right now, so will it be again an indefinite or infinite number of times, each time after explosion, according to this theory. Thus, it fails to explain any origin in the actual meaning of the term.
• Cosmological Principle
Famous astrophysicists such as Hermann Bondi, Thomas Gold and Fred Hoyle considered ‘big-bang’ to be impossible. After some modifications, they adopted a new model of universe, suggested by an English cosmologist Edward Arthur Milne. Milne assumed that the general scheme of appearance of the universe would be the same from any point in space from where an observer saw it. An observer may be on any galaxy, from there he would find all the galaxies distributed symmetrically about him in all directions. He would find the general density of Matter also the same everywhere. He would find himself at the centre of an observable universe. He termed this concept as the ‘Cosmological Principle’. The Cosmological principle seems to require an infinite universe, for, otherwise one could not imagine himself or herself at its centre by being anywhere. If the universe were finite, one would imagine himself or herself transported on one side and nothing at all on the other. Einstein also assumed only one aspect of the Cosmological Principle when he considered that Matter was distributed evenly in the universe, but he considered the universe to be finite though the finite universe could have in it, infinite galaxies. But a concept of an infinite universe following the Cosmological Principle, could not fit well with the notion of the cosmic egg as possessing a finite size and as exploding into infinite number of galaxies. So, what was the solution to this problem? The scientists got stuck at this point. It would be interesting to know that George Gamow was ready to consider the cosmic egg as of infinite size! But how could then other postulates such as extensive gas cloud etc. fit well with this theory?
• Perfect Cosmological Principle
Hermann Bondi, Thomas Gold and Fred Hoyle favoured the Cosmological Principle but they thought that it was incomplete. For, while it allowed the universe to be unchanged with the observer’s position in space, it did not say anything about his position in time. So, these three scientists believed it logical to suppose that the universe would have to be essentially the same for observers at all times as well as in all places. They termed this the ‘Perfect Cosmological Principle’.
B.K Jagdish here, draws attention of ours regarding the science-based changing of the universe in two important aspects. Firstly, the distance between the galaxies is growing steadily larger, for the galaxies are receding. So, an observer, two billions years afterwards, would not see the galaxies where we see them today. Secondly, hydrogen in the stars is steadily fusing into helium and other complicated atoms, so it means that a time will come when all hydrogen gas will get converted into helium. At least, in these two aspects, the universe cannot be considered steady. These two points are strong evidence against the ‘Perfect Cosmological evidence’, proposed by these three scientists.
• Steady State Theory
To remove this lacuna, the above-mentioned three astronomers advanced a solution in the year 1948. They suggested that hydrogen was continually being created out of nothing. They called this ‘The Continuous Creation Theory’ or ‘The Steady-state Theory’ by assuming that, by the time a galaxy will recede into oblivion, another galaxy in its place would have come up and by the time some hydrogen would be converted into helium, an equal quantity of hydrogen would have been created out of nothing to take place its place, so that to an observer, the universe would always look to be steady or in a ‘steady state’.
Is this Theory Scientific and Rational?
Referring to the First Law of Thermo-dynamics, B.K Jagdish gives comments on the scientists’ justification. He says: No more energy can be ‘created’ so as to be added to it nor can any part of it be ‘destroyed’, to be lessened from it. Over and above this, the assumption that ‘hydrogen is being continually created out of nothing’ seems to be like a fairy tale or a tale of magic. How could something be created out of nothing? The world-famous spiritual text Bhagavad Gita also emphasizes upon the truth of the law of conservation where it is said : “A thing cannot be created out of nothing nor can that which exists be annihilated out of existence”
Again, it is strange that the proponents and protagonists of this theory say that hydrogen can be created out of nothing! Then any other thing also could come out of nothing? The above-named astrophysicists say that ‘the Law of Conservation of Mass and Energy’ is merely as assumption based on the fact that mankind has never observed energy created out of nothing. They say that the requirements of ‘the continuous creation theory’ or ‘steady state theory’ are very small indeed, for, the creation of even one atom of hydrogen per year in a billion litres of space is enough and the creation at this rate will be too small to be detectable by any instrument man possesses.
Obviously, they want to change the Law of Conservation from ‘Energy cannot be created’ to ‘Energy has never been observed to be created’. They do not want to answer the question: “How can hydrogen or any other thing be created out of nothing”. They side-track a very important and fundamental law without any verifiable evidence and a laboratory-proof. The real issue involved is not whether a small or a big quantity of Matter can be created or not, nor the issue is whether the rate of creation is small or great; the very solid issue, it must be noted, is whether something can be created out of nothing. By accepting this proposition, science would change into fantasy or fiction.
Again, they say that the Law of Conservation is merely an assumption based on the fact that mankind has never observed energy to be created out of nothing. In fact, this comment applies to their theory, for that is based on mere assumption and no one has ever observed something being created ‘out of nothing’. Moreover, the question of creation raises so many other questions, connected with it, such as: “Who creates it? How does it get created? And wherefrom does the energy required for carrying out the act of creation come?” All these questions in regard to creation of hydrogen are left unanswered.
Furthermore, the theory of Hoyle at el does not solve the problem of origin of the universe and the galaxies and of hydrogen even if this last be assumed to have been formed out of nothing.
Unproved Assumption
Besides the arbitrary assumption that hydrogen is being continually created out of nothing, there is another assumption of the scientists who propounded the steady-state theory. It is that the galaxies are separating or receding from each other not as a result of some explosion but as a consequence of some more subtle effect. Scientists Hermann Bondi and Raymond Arthur Lyttleton assumed that the positive charge on the proton might be slightly larger than the negative charge on the electron. They thought that if the positive charge of the proton were larger only by a billionth of a billionth of the size of the electron’s negative charge, it would suffice to build up a generally positive charge on all galaxies. But because of being too small, it would not be detectable even by the most sensitive of instruments that man now has. This positive charge on all the galaxies, they thought, would cause the galaxies to repel each other and thus would cause them to undergo a steady mutual recession. As has been pointed out earlier, these scientists have said, in regard to their first assumption, that the rate of creation of hydrogen would be so small that man, with the best available instruments, will not be able to observe it and now, in regard to the positive and negative electric charges also they say that the difference would be so small that, with the best available instruments man would not be able to observe it. Is this scientific way to get a theory accepted? This is the exploitation of man’s weak position because of lack of extremely sophisticated instruments in this field. Simply because man would not be able to detect it, therefore, they want him to accept it! The theory should stand on firm grounds.
As admitted by them, this assumption also is not based on any observation as to the positive charge being slightly greater than the negative charge. This is just a speculation so as to replace the unbelievable ‘big-bang’ theory.
Further, as earlier said, Hoyle and other scientists say that by the time the present galaxies have receded outside the visible universe, new galaxies would have appeared in their place. These new or young galaxies would have been formed from the hydrogen created continually, out of nothing. And, so to an observer, the universe would always look to be same; it would not look empty because of some galaxies having receded out of view because, by the time the old galaxies disappeared, the new ones would have appeared, in their place. But how hydrogen, created out of nothing, would condense and form galaxies? - none of the scientists has explained this. Isn’t this like counting the chickens before the eggs have been hatched?
Here, B.K Jagdish gives the concluding note relating to this cosmological principle based on spiritual knowledge of Brahmakumaris that it would seem that the theory aims at an eternal universe in which things were not created in the remote past by a big-bang but are being created continually. The big-bang theory also, as shown earlier, leads to the concept of an eternal universe where a cosmic egg explodes into galaxies etc and where galaxies contract into a cosmic ball and the cosmic ball explodes again to form galaxies and the universe. And, yet both these theories do not explain any origin, in real sense of term. Why not, then, believe that the world is eternal and things are continually changing their form so that, after a cycle, they come back to have the form and the position from where they started? Would not that be more rational and more scientific, for we practically find this cyclic recurrence of the ecclesiastical phenomena and of many other natural phenomena? The world in that concept would be a cosmic drama which repeats itself after having occurred and re-occurred. It would thus be eternal. Astrophysicists and cosmologists are now coming closer to the belief that the world has no beginning.
Prof. Jayant V. Narlikar has also ruled out the concept of a ‘beginning’ for the universe. Commenting on the belief in ‘the continuous creation out of nothing’- on which Steady State Theory rests- he presented the picture of cow and grass in a blank frame to ridicule such scientists. He said : “Out of nothing, these scientists said there was grass. When asked where was grass, they said the cow ate it. Asked about the cow, they said it was not there as the cow has already eaten the grass and gone.”
Conclusion :
From the above critical analysis it may be concluded that though Science has explored many material mysteries and has given the transparent pictures for the benefit of mankind, but sometimes it shows some missing points to create a sound understanding. At that time ‘Meta Science’ or ‘Spirituality’ is required to deal with that matter. B.K Jagdish, a spiritual and scientific personality as he analyzed the cosmological big-bang theory in such a proper manner that it seems as a purely science-based method of justification and quite rational. To say, Science has developed many advanced equipments to incorporate in its findings, but it should make collaboration with Spirituality to unveil such mysteries. That’s why it should be noted that Science and Spirituality both are the two sides of same coin. Spiritual Science controls the invalid directions of Material Science and channelizes it on a right track to demystify the enigma.
References :
1. The Eternal World Drama (Part-II of the series, titled ‘Eternal Drama of Souls, Matter and God’), B.K. Jagdish Chander Hassija, Prajapita Brahma Kumaris Ishwariya Vishwa Vidyalaya, Pandav Bhavan, Mount Abu, Rajasthan, 1985, 1st Edition.
2. The Evolutionary Universe, George Gamow, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1970.
3. The Universe : From Flat Earth to Quasar, Isaac Asimov, Penguin Books, New York, 1967.
4. Galaxies, Nuclei and Quasars, Fred Hoyle, Harper and Row Publishers, New York, 1965.
5. Astronomy, Fred Hoyle, Doubleday and Co. Inc, New York, 1962.
6. Bhagavad Gita, Gita Press, Gorakhpur, 2000.
7. Einstein’s Universe, Nigel Calder, The Viking Press, New York, 1979.
8. Science and Spirituality, B.K. Jagdish Chander, Brahmakumaris World Spiritual University, Pandav Bhawan, Mount Abu, 1988.
9. The Exploding Universe, Illustrated Weekly of India, J.V. Narlikar, Nov.6-12, 1983.
10. Ancient Indian Insights And Modern Science (A UGC Project), Kalpana M. Paranjape, Bhandarkar Oriental research Institute, Pune, 1996, 1st print.
