Essays on Science & Religion, Leisure Time & Wonder of Science
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Science and Religion
Today we live in an age dominated by science. Science is admired greatly, because it gives us power over nature. Scientific technology has incredibly powerful effect on society It has given us a new technique in industry and war and a means to control environment. It has brought about fundamental changes in social, political and economic spheres.
It has brought into existence its great prosperity and great destruction. Science has given us a new type of outlook which does not believe in anything till it is proved. Thus science has an unsettling influence on traditional beliefs. It has taught us inquiry and belief and finished dogma and superstition.
It believes in intuition and divine inspiration. In ancient times religion was nothing but superstition because the man was constantly afraid of Nature. He was dominated by the powerful forces of Nature and he worshipped her. By and by better and purer types of religion were developed.
In its purest form, religion satisfies the deepest urge of man. As George Bernard Shaw has said, “Men think that they can do without religion; they do not know that religion is indestructible.” All through the ages, most of the human beings have been following one religion or the other.
With the passage of time, every religion suffers from corruption and perversion: By then new prophets come forward to purify the muddy stream. The Vedic religion got mixed up with a number of elaborate ceremonies and caste system became very rigid. As a result, Buddhism came forward to purify this.
Later on, A powerful movement started against Buddhism when it got corrupted and preached weakness. Christianity arose as an antidote to the corruption of Judaism. The Roman Catholic priests in Europe had to be pulled up by Martin Luther and others when they started living a life of luxury and immorality.
Religion in various countries has also been responsible for conflicts and violent quarrels. The Crusades between the Christians and Muslims continued for over a century. In Sub-Continent, also the conflict between Islam and Hinduism has taken a violent shape many times. These things have made religion unpopular with some people.
The narrow-minded religious priests and preachers do a great disservice to the pure spirit of religion by spreading falsehood in the name religion: For their own self-interests, they have kept the people in ignorance. They have exploited the blind faith of the people in the teaching of great religious leaders.
For a long time in Europe, the Christian priests opposed the idea that the earth is round and moves around the sun. They considered such new knowledge as hearsay. They dubbed the scientists as a magician and called them the agents of the Devil.
Darwin had to face great hostility because he gave his theory that man has descended from an ape. He was criticized because his scientific theory went against the Biblical account of the creation of this earth and the fall of man.
The continuous pressure of new knowledge has shaken the old forms of religion: But it has failed to destroy the basic human need for religion. religion in its true sense in not a set of dogmas or rituals. It is not true to say that religion has no place in this era of science.
Science has overthrown spiritual view of the universe, man and creation. Science emphasizes the importance of reason, observation and experience. Religion is based on obedience, acceptance and authority. But scientists know the limitations of science.
Science is not the key to the whole mystery of life. We find scientists like Einstein, Tyndall and others who were deeply religious. These scientists rightly believed that science and religion are complementary as well as supplementary.
The spreading of scientific ideas has made the modern man skeptical: It is not possible to make an educated man of today believe in myths and superstitions. But it does not mean that the urge for religion is dead. The modern man needs a scientific religion.
He does not want useless ceremonies and vulgar shows in the name of religion. Truly speaking science has increased faith in God by pointing out the wonderful mysteries of nature. The religious experience and experience of the highest scientific research tend to be similar.
The man in the laboratory is now regaining faith in God. Scientists are no longer proud of their great discoveries and inventions though some scientists in the 19th century declared that God was dead.
Science has given limitless material power to modern man: It is going on inventing ever new things for a comfortable and luxurious life. At the same time, it has created baffling problems. It has created a big gulf between the rich and the poor.
It has brought about great dissatisfaction. there is a mad race for material prosperity everywhere. Human beings are getting more and more money-minded and crazy after material prosperity. There is an immoral race in which human beings have become the enemies human beings.
The terrible atom and hydrogen bombs threaten to kill the entire humanity. Only fear of God and respect for moral and religious value can bring about peace and order in human life. So the need is that religion should be more scientific and science should be more religious. As Einstein has said,
“Religion is blind without science and science is lame without religion”.
Einstein
Leisure Time
What is this life if full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?
So sang the poet W.H. Davies. Leisure means the free time that we have after the day’s hard labor. It means the time for rest and recreation after our routine professional work is over.
Life is worthless if we have work cares and anxieties only and no time to stand and stare i.e. to look at the beautiful objects of Nature. Most of the work that we do is dull and tiresome. We need rest to recoup our lost energy and to give rest to our tired body and mind. So leisure is highly essential for a busy man.
Today we live in a machine age. We have to live and work like a machine otherwise we cannot make both ends meet in this competitive world. But the Pakistani workers have not got enough money to enjoy their leisure like their brethren in the western countries the U.S.A. England West Germany, etc.
Many of them spend their leisure in enforced idleness. The problem of leisure is closely connected with the problem of money. Surely you need money to spend your free time or leisure in reading an interesting book or going on a picnic or excursion, or paying for a seat in a cinema hall, or purchasing a ticket at a football match in a stadium, etc.
As a poor worker has no money to enjoy his leisure more often than not he is forced to sit at home and sleep on his holidays.
Leisure can be profitably used in adopting some hobby, such as gardening, mountaineering, boating, swimming, riding, collection of stamps and coins, photography, singing and dancing and playing upon a harmonium and so on. Taking part in games and sports is also a useful hobby.
In the West people also use their leisure for self-improvement. In short, one should spend one’s leisure in such pursuits as are both interesting and instructive and refresh your mind and strengthen our body. Most of the great men of the world spend their free time in useful hobbies.
The famous scientist Einstein spent his leisure in playing upon a sitar. Free time can also be usefully spent in meditation.
But some people misuse leisure. They spend even their free time in earning money. Day in and day out they are after the material gains. As they work hard without any rest, they often suffer from a nervous breakdown, blood pressure and many other ailments. They have no time to look after their body, mind and soul. In their search for material prosperity, they lose their peace of mind.
Then there are people who spend their leisure in evil practices. They indulge in drinking and gambling, litigation and anti-social activities. Some idle away their leisure.
An empty mind becomes a devil’s workshop in their case. “I have seen men come into a fortune.” says G.B. Shaw, “and lost the happiness, their health and finally their lives because of excessive smoking drinking and indulging in wasteful habits.”
So you must have money to enjoy your leisure, but the money must be well spent. It is not at all easy to know what to do with leisure unless we Have been brought up to it.
On the whole, we shall have to admit that leisure is of utmost importance in our life. Time spent on leisure is generally well spent. It is the time for rest, recreation and cool thinking.
It makes your tired mind and body fresh and active. We can enjoy the beauties of Nature, art and life in our free time only. Hence life without leisure is a life without pleasure. The world has not yet realized the importance and value of leisure.
Wonder of Science
Science today is just like Aladdin’s Lamp which could perform wonders After wonders. The Lamp was a faithful servant so long as it was rubbed on the right side, but its satanic power became apparent as soon as it was rubbed the wrong way.
The same is the case with science which is itself neither good nor bad. If it is used in a proper way, it is a faithful servant But if it is misused it becomes a bad master, a tyrant who is out to destroy humanity.
Time and distance have been shortened. The cinema, the radio and the television provide entertainment and break the monotony of life. The Telegraph, the telephone and the wireless carry our messages from one end of the world of another.
Some of the latest discoveries and inventions of science have enabled man to cure almost incurable diseases. X-rays enable the modern physician to search out a hidden fracture or displacement within the body. Ultraviolet rays are applied to cure certain serious ailments.
Many strange and novel methods of inoculation and surgery have been developed. Many of the epidemics are now preventable. We all benefit from these achievements of science.
In many countries today all the agricultural operations are performed by machinery. As for industrial operations, machines are found everywhere. What a number of articles of daily use are produced by scientific methods of production.
That is why such commonplace things as needles, lead pencils, spectacles, watches, etc. are so cheap and yet have so much perfection and fineness about them. There is yet another way in which science serves as a faithful servant.
Science affects our thoughts. We no longer think in terms of faith and superstition. A fact is not a fact to us until it is tested by science. Besides providing amusement, science has dispelled ignorance and superstitions. It has added to our knowledge and widened our outlook. Newspapers are printed in millions overnight.
Science has changed the dreams of yesterday into the realities of today. Man can fly in the air and in space, dive in the water and go into the recesses of the earth. He has crossed deserts, scaled mountains, flown to the moon gauged oceans, investigated the heavens with the help of science.
We switch on the radio and hear the running commentary on a Cricket Test Match. Television has enabled us not only to hear the distant voices but also to see the distant objects, say, on the Moon or the Mars. Science has really beaten the old magicians hollow.
But if science is a blessing, it is not an unmixed blessing. When it gets complete mastery over men, it does incalculable harm. Today we have no more than faith in science which we had in the past. With the inventions of A and H Bombs and a host of other deadly weapons.
Science has made modern war very destructive. Today war has become a naked dance of death, a cruel carnage (murder) of mankind and a period of national and international sufferings. The busiest center of modern warfare is not the battle-front but the laboratories of scientists where deadly weapons are prepared with the utmost speed possible.
The wholesale destruction wrought by modern warfare shows the miraculous (wonderful) but satanic powers that science wields today. A and H Bombs are among the fatal gifts of science to Mankind.
Another evil effect of science is that it has made people irreligious and skeptical. Their belief in God is shaken. Science lays emphasis on the matter and not on the spirit. Breathless hurry is the keynote of the modern scientific age.
“Vain is your science” was not the useless cry of men . There are many other philosophers of great repute who condemn science because it has made life complicated and increased our wants. Man is proud of his scientific inventions but science is proud of having conquered even the soul of man.
The control of vast forces of Nature has been inversely proportional to the expansion of the human heart. The greater the forces of Nature which man has conquered, the narrower has grown his heart.
If you have a thunderbolt or Atomic bomb in your hand, you require the strength of an angel to control yourself. Science has dethroned God and signed the death warrant of humanity. It has enslaved man.
It has made him a machine without a heart to feel. So it is easy to conclude that science is a useful servant, but a bad master. We cannot say what science has in store for us- a death ray or an elixir of life.
