Talks On Einstein,Relativity,Science,Atoms-Part2

26-12-1939
Disciple : N. was puzzled about time and space because it is not clear whether time and space are properties of matter.
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Sri Aurobindo : Time and space can't be properties of matter, at least time is not material. Space and time are the extensions of the Brahman. For instance, you feel when you go deep in meditation that there is an inner space, – cidākāśa, which extends to infinity, and our material space is only a result of it. So time also is extension of Brahman in movement.
You can see that time and space both are not the same for man every time. When your mind travels from Calcutta to London it is not in the material space and not in the time that you feel with the outer mind. It is in the mind itself that you move.
Space also is a movement of the Brahman inasmuch as it is an extension, but there is a difference as far as time is concerned.
Disciple : We are conscious of the movement of Brahman as time because we live from moment to moment and we can feel time only by events. So also the world is an extension.
Sri Aurobindo : In that way everything is an extension – expression, projection, manifestation, – of the Brahman. It is only a way of saying.
Disciple : Some say that time does not exist at all.
Sri Aurobindo : Who says it? It depends upon the point of view and state of consciousness from which you say it; i.e. whether one says it only intellectually, or from an experience,
Disciple : Time may not exist in a consciousness where the universe does not exist.
Sri Aurobindo : Quite so.
Disciple : The scientists define gravitation as only a curvature of space – and, as we know matter only by weight, matter is a curvature of space.
Sri Aurobindo : But what about matter being the same as energy ?
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Disciple : Einstein admits their identity and says that energy has weight.
Disciple : How can energy have weight ?
Disciple : If you wound your watch and unwound it – there would be a difference in the weight ? (Laughter)
Sri Aurobindo : But what you have to ask is : "what is Energy ?"
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17–9–1940
Disciple : According to science there is no empty space anywhere, that is to say, there is no emptiness in space. There are two schools of physicists: Some believe that there is what they call "cosmic dust” in all space. Others say that the ray of light being material can pass through nothing – there is no necessity to imagine anything between.
Sri Aurobindo : "Nothing" means what ? Does it mean non-existence, or nothing that we can, or do, sense ? If you say it is non-existence then nothing can pass through it, you empty a tube or a vessel of the air or gas it contains and say it is a vacuum. But how do you know there is nothing in it ?
Disciple : If there was anything in it, there would be resistance.
Sri Aurobindo : Why should you assume that everything must offer resistance ? If 'nothing' means non-existence then if anything enters non-existence it becomes non-existence. If you enter non-existence you cease to be. A ray can arrive only at nowhere through nothing.
Disciple : That may be occult knowledge.
Sri Aurobindo: It is not merely occult knowledge but occult knowledge and common sense.
Disciple : What is space ?
Sri Aurobindo : The question remains : either it is a conception
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or any entity. If it is a conception only, then your observations can also be only conceptions, that is to say, they happen in you only. Then you come to Mayavada : nothing but you exists.
Disciple : The latest idea is that space is curved.
Sri Aurobindo : What is the meaning of space being curved? Einstein speaks of curvature of space round the Sun and when a body gets near it, it goes down the curve. But the question is: what is that curve and in what does it exist?
For instance, some say the universe is expanding, in what? There must be something in which it is expanding. And why is a ray of light deflected in the sun's neighbourhood ? You say : because there is a curve. But why is there a curve ? And in what is that curve?
And then, what is expanding? Is it Matter ? You will say : No. Then Energy ? You say : yes. But the energy is expanding into what? You say space is bent: the question is : is matter bent or space ?
Disciple : The amount of Matter in the universe is limited – it is finite.
Matter has weight arid the weight of all matter is known.
Sri Aurobindo : But what is matter ? Is it a wave or a particle?
Disciple : According to the quantum theory it is a particle which is matter and energy at the same time.
Sri Aurobindo : If you say that matter is finite then there must be some medium which supports matter and which is infinite. You say matter has weight, – what is weight?
Disciple : Some of the scientists say that the sun is losing weight at a certain rate and the time when it will be exhausted is calculated !
Sri Aurobindo : How do you know that the sun is not renewing its weight ?
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Disciple : What else can science do ? It must take the data and make a hypothesis.
Sri Aurobindo : In the real science :
i. You must have the right data.
ii. Then you should draw the right inference. The difficulty is that you can never be sure of having all the data for any phenomenon.
Disciple : There are so many calculations : earth's age, the rate of the expanding universe, the sun's birth, the age of the sun etc.
Sri Aurobindo : I sympathise with Shaw who says: "they don't know what it really is." Something escapes from their calculations like the fish from the fisherman's net.

Talks On Einstein,Relativity,Science,Atoms-Part1

Einstein's notes on relativity

25-12-1939 (Evening)
Disciple : According to Einstein there is no gravitation.
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That is to say, there is no force of attraction exerted between objects. He says that what we call gravitation is due to curvature of space.
Sri Aurobindo : What is all that ?
Disciple : He says that Euclidian geometry is not applicable to the material world. That is to say, space is not flat, a three-dimensional analogue of a two-dimensional flat surface. Euclidian figures like the square and solids and straight lines are abstract, not real or actual. He also says that material space is "boundless but not infinite".
Sri Aurobindo : How do you know ? Perhaps it is not space that is limited but our capacity to measure space that is limited. Besides, how can you say that space is limited to Matter ? There is a non-material space beyond this material universe. A being can leave behind our material space.
Disciple : Einstein began his contribution by proving that simultaneity of events, constancy of mass and length etc. are all relative and not absolute. If the same length is measured from a body moving with great velocity at a distance the length would change. Besides, he showed that in a system of reference if the whole frame of reference moves uniformly then no measurement within the system can give you the proof of the uniform motion.
He has also shown that time is an indispensable factor in the measurement of dimensions of an object.
Sri Aurobindo : Time is not an indispensable factor of dimension. Movement is absolutely necessary to feel time. When an object is stationary the consideration of time does not enter in measuring the dimensions unless you move it to some other point. Really speaking, one has to know space as the extension of being and time as an extension of energy.
Disciple : According to science everything is moving. Earth is going round the Sun and revolving on its axis.
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If we tap on the same place twice Einstein would say we have not tapped on the same place, for the earth has moved 18 miles per second in the meantime.
Sri Aurobindo : But the taps do not change the dimensions of the board ! only, you can say that a consideration of time is necessary to complete your measurements of space.
Disciple : Einstein has introduced a fourth dimension of time, in addition to length, breadth, and height; their combination he calls the time-space continuum. It can be conceived as a cylinder over which a spiral is wound.
Sri Aurobindo : It is only a phrase ! Time cannot be relegated to the position of a mere dimension of space, it is independent in its nature; Time and space may be called the fundamental dual dimensions of the Brahman.
Disciple : Ouspensky has an idea in his Tertium Organum that our three-dimensional world is a projection from a subtler fourth-dimension which is suprasensual but real. He means to say that to each solid form we see here there corresponds a subtler form of it which is in the fourth dimension.
Sri Aurobindo : That is perfectly true, the cube would not be held together and therefore would not be a solid if something in the subtle dimension did not maintain it. Only, it is not visible to the physical eye but can be seen with the subtle eye.
Disciple : Sir Arthur Eddington in his Gifford Lectures (1934) says that science began with the aim of reducing the complexity of the material world to a great simplicity. But now, it seems, science has not been able to keep its promise and no model of the material universe is possible. A good deal of mathematics and specialisation is necessary now to understand what science says about the material world. Eddington says that the table on which he is writing is not merely a piece of wood. Scientifically
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speaking, it is a conglomeration of electrical particles, called Electrons, moving at a very great velocity, and even though the particles are moving, his hands can rest on the surface and not go through.
He has also argued against the scientists who insist that the so-called objective view is the only view that is permissible or intended. The rainbow is not intended I .only to give man the knowledge, or experience, of the difference in the wave-lengths of light. The poet is equally entitled to his experience when he says, "My heart leaps up when I behold a rainbow in the sky".
So also a 'ripple' in water is not meant only to give man the knowledge of the pressure of the air, and the force of surface-tension.
Sri Aurobindo : Validity of human knowledge is not dependent on physical science alone. Physical science is only one side of knowledge. The poet's and the mystic's and the artist's experience have equal validity.
Disciple : Eddington argues that even in so-called objective scientific knowledge it is mind that is asked to judge ultimately. 8x4 is 32 and not 23, why?
Sri Aurobindo : It is:, by an intuition and repetition of experience and not merely by reason that man finds that one is right and the other wrong
Now even the scientists have been forced to admit that their conclusions are not all based on reason. Their formulas have become like magic formulas.
Disciple : They say that they can demonstrate their conclusions.
Sri Aurobindo : Yes, demonstration to the mind again...