Science and Religion

There has always been disputes, differences and layers of mistrust between the two ideologies-one called Religion and another called Science.The former is generally identified as a practice,believe or set of daily life activities passed on to a new generation by an old one from the times unknown whereas Science is generally associated with future, something new and not archaic, something more contemporary,directly involving current generations and so very universal in appeal.Also we have many religions followed in the world but there is only one Science followed.

But are the above generalizations( I won't call definitions) adequate or correct or further are both ideologies contradicting in nature so that the existence of one can not accept the existence of other and so we often have to make a choice between the two.

Let me take Science first.

Our believe in Science in undoubtedly one of the greatest achievements of human race which has helped us in breaking the age old shackles of ignorance and false believes and so has helped us in overcoming our greatest worries of poverty,misery, diseases and security. And still is helping us in unlocking many more frontiers which looked beyond our reach so far.It is science which is helping us in understanding all the mysteries in the tangible/real world and helping us in making this world a more comfortable place. Most importantly it has helped us in being prosperous; something without which we couldn't think of any other development of any kind.It would be apt to quote Vivekananda here who said that all growths in a society can be attained  only after the society becomes prosperous.Unless that is achieved the society can't strive for higher growth be it in field of spirituality or be it in the field of materialism.We need to feed the poor first rather than bring new ideas to him.Only a healthy mind and healthy body can be a recipient of higher knowledge. And it is where Science has done wonders. So it can't be our enemy but a great friend.So how can we ever question its service to us.     


But is that all? Have all our questions got answered? Well, I don't think so.

There are many other questions we still need answer of.Like why was this Universe created and by whom and why is it in this current form and what will happen in the future? Who controls all this? Why do we continue in our current form? Why different people think differently? What is the purpose of this life and so on...the questions seem to be endless.Well,is it possible that this status quo is just a coincidence and there is no source behind it or is it all structured, already some plan in place for all of us, just we could not comprehend it. By the theory of Science it can be said that this whole setup can't be just a coincidence because whenever there is some effect there must be some cause behind it.Every state of an object has a causal relationship for its existence in that state. 
So what is it we don't know or need to know...

Let me come to the Religion now...Let us see whether it provides any solution or just imagines to provide some solution..
We will also see whether it is in loggerheads with Science or it is just another wrong notion... 
What is basically a religion? Is it a social phenomenon, defined by the society in which it's practiced and therefore generally remain confined only to that society? And therefore we have different religions practiced in different parts of the world. Is it just a rule setup in the name of God by few people in their own times and gets carried forward as a part of tradition or civilization in the new times? Can such practices be called a true religion? Further why a religion, as perceived by many cease to continuously evolve like Science and generally does not appeal to the young people?

Well, if we look a little deep in the making of these religions we will find that they did not thrive for so many centuries only by their zealous followers but by few thinkers and philosophers who with their own understanding and experiences time and again established the basic philosophy of these religions among masses. Further many of these religions got started with a rejection of the prevalent rituals and practices at their time.So to say that religions didn't have any reasoning or theory behind them will be a little naivete.There must have gone a lot of research and personal experiences in the formation of what we know as a religion.It is a privilege here to take some examples from India and and what is commonly known as Hinduism - the religion practiced by people on other side of Hindukush mountains, that's how it got this name. Gautam Buddha was a prince in Hindu kingdom. But he didn't endorse any of the rituals in Hinduism and decried them. Unless he experienced the knowledge or truth himself he kept looking for it.Also he said the same to his disciples that not to follow his teachings blindly but experience it first.And Buddha was not alone, there have been many other thinkers also who had their own interpretations and who  never believed in any ritual or practices of their times, but still were very much part of Hinduism because they were against those mis informed practices but not to the essence of Hinduism. Be it Shankaracharya, Ramkrishna Paramhansa,Vivekananda or Aurvindo Ghosh, they always described the religion as per their own experiences and not going by what people around them perceived it.

So it can be said that the way a religion is presented and practiced in its present form may not represent it's core essence , what we get to see may be a muti layered structure which need to get investigated first by the self and then only we can either contradict it or accept it.So basically a true religion can't be a social phenomenon rather it's a very personal experience. For me the true religion is that which compels you to question and then to find answers and not the one which just enslaves you intellect.

Now the question is whether the religon has answers to the complex questions and does it really stand against Science?

Well, I think that these questions are big enough to be answered in this blog.. will try to answer them in a new blog...here I have just tried to discuss about the legitimacy of both these ideologies and their subsequent contributions to the mankind.