Evolution

[wundermonk]

In that case people who are vegetarian should equally feel guilty as people who eat non-vegetarian foods.

I believe you have drawn the WRONG conclusion from my posting - especially the Brahmasutras and Chandogya commentary.

Additionally, being beholden to Hindu/Jain scriptures are not the only reasons for being a vegetarian. There are many non-Hindu/non-Jain/non-Indian vegetarians BY CHOICE.

[philosoraptor]

'Old' and 'neo' are diametric opposites.

Just sayin'.

I know. I deliberately chose my words for maximum irony. :-)

Ancient hindu sages did a stellar job by compiling Vedopanishads, puranas, itihasas, Panchatantras and the like. They were not merely religious but were scientists and scholars and much more as well. But after that, stretching over a few millennia their descendents froze, stopped wondering about anything. They didn’t put their thinking cap on ever again and didn’t raise big navies, didn’t make gunpowder and the like. They were content further immersing themselves in dhyana. As for as the rest of the story, we all know it very well. The trend continues even now.

Not to detract, so lets carry on with the OP… Namaste.

Pranams,

I never met any modern scholars who had to use an extensive series of metaphors to describe scientific truth. Nor have I yet to hear the logical reason why such great Vedic scholars would fail to describe creation via evolution, when they spend so much time describing the details of creation from its constituent elements. Nor have I yet to hear from the Neo-Hindu theoretician how dashavataras can be a coded way of explaining evolution when the reality is that there are many more than 10 avatars, the appearance of the avatars is cyclical, and there is NOT a linear progression from more animal-like to more human-like forms when considering ALL of the avatars mentioned in the revealed texts.

At the end of the day, the idea that dashavataras = evolution is a quaint but brazenly inconsistent hypothesis whose continued existence owes more to the needs of the faithless Hindu diaspora for Western approval of Hinduism than any basis in fact.

regards,

[dhyandev]

Forbidden Archeology: The Hidden History of the Human Race presents a representative sample of this anomalous evidence suggesting that humans have been on the earth for millions of years, ,just as the ancient Sanskrit writings of the Vedic literatures describe. The Vedic histories inform us that humans have existed since the beginning of the day of Brahma, about 2 billion years ago.

Cremo and Thompson conclude that even the conventionally accepted evidence does not offer a cohesive picture of the missing link; instead, the multiplicity of proposed evolutionary linkages among the hominids in Africa creates a very confusing scheme of human evolution. They call for a drastic revision of the now-dominant assumptions about human origins.
http://www.forbiddenarcheology.com/

[Shuddhasattva]

Namaste

My background is in ecology. I don't see a need to impute a prior purpose or guiding hand in evolution, purpose in my view comes not from outside of life, but self-imputed by the evolutionary spirit in life - that to me is the local representation of God.

In other words, we give ourselves purpose individually and, potentially, as a species. No real limit to where we could take that. Transhumanism is the future.

[Omkara]

Shuddhasattva,have you read Sri Aurobindo's book The Life Divine?He gives an interesting theological explanation for evolution within the framework of nondualism using a very similar argument to yours.

Has anybody read the book dhyandev is citing?I have been thinking of reading it for sometime but I dont want to waste my time on pseudoscience.How strong is the proof they are offering?

[Shuddhasattva]

It's practically Christian Creationism wearing a supposedly Vedic hat.

We think this book says so, oh and here's some hackneyed pseudo-archaeological woowoo. Cremo's a nutjob.

I've not read Sri Aurobindo's book.

[Vasa]

The sad thing is that Cremo was the most "normal" guy on Ancient Aliens.

I haven't read Forbidden Archeology or his other book Human Devolution but from what I've heard from others it's about 50/50 **** vs. "there may be something here.". Wouldn't it be cool though if Brahmastras were really atomic bombs?

[philosoraptor]

I've not read the book, but I'd be more interested in getting some information about the evidence Cremo compiles which was alleged to haven been sifted out of current theoretical paradigms. If that evidence is genuine, then nut-job or not, Cremo has a point. I am referring of course to the claims of archaeological evidence showing human civilization millions of years ago which he says have been covered up or ignored by the mainstream scientific community.

[Jetavan]

I am referring of course to the claims of archaeological evidence showing human civilization millions of years ago which he says have been covered up or ignored by the mainstream scientific community.

The idea that the scientific community would try to hide evidence of Homo sapiens living millions of years in the past, doesn't make sense. Many early scientists were *hoping* to find evidence of such antiquity for Homo sapiens, even to the point that someone decided to do nature's job and created the Piltdown Man/Hoax. Paleontologists in the early 20th century were thinking that humans split from apes more than 15 to 20 million years ago, and would have gladly revealed to the world the discovery of Homo sapiens fossils of that age-range. The fact that none were discovered that old was a big let-down for many, especially when they had to admit the recent origin of the human lineage (6 million years ago, with Homo sapiens only appearing around 200,000 years ago) from an African ape species that also gave rise to the chimpanzees.

[Spiritualseeker]

Namaste,

On the issue of Plants and their validity as a sentient being so to speak, we have the example of Umapati Sivam who 'transferred' moksha to a bush. Plus the many new discoveries about plants. We like to think that we are the only special species, but there are many diverse evolved species. Who knows if perhaps a Dolphin with its high intelligence can ask, "Who am I?". These are mysteries. I also feel that stars, planets, and all celestial bodies are conscious and that even systems such as galaxies and solar systems are alive and conscious. The scientist does not understand consciousness as it does not go deep into it. Luckily the scientist can show us some measuring of the objective world, but we must not get lost in their world, since they neglect the Science of Self Realization.

Om Namah Sivaya