Impressions About India

General Impressions of India - An Astronomer's Perspective
I was absolutely delighted with Tamil Nadu. First of all, there was the sense of an intact cultural framework. I did not have the sense of people greatly alienated from their society - you certainly see a great deal of that in the West. I had a sense of people caring for each other, an intact social fabric, and technology coming along quite fast. Not just large industrial parks.

In a way what impressed me most was the widespread use of the bicycle, not only for carrying agricultural products and manufactures from one place to another, but also as a means for young people to visit neighbouring villages, and a sense of exuberant communication, because now people are not closed in a small village. They have a much wider range of places that they have access to.

We spent some time in Madras and in Bombay. But these were slow stages to get us to Tamil Nadu. We saw mainly tourist things which were certainly pleasant, but we did not have the sense of getting to know the people. We could have, but it did not work out that way, whereas in Tamil Nadu we got to know the people.

I will give you an example. Here we are at 6:30 or 7 in the morning - a group of us consisting of cameramen, soundmen, writers, directors, producers and me, who go marching single file by a pond in which there are lovely lily and lotus blossoms. Going to two small temples of the bull god (Nandi). A boy, less than 10 years old, saw us coming, looked at us, dove into the pond and came up near a lotus flower. He then swam back with it, climbed out of the pond, went up to my wife, gave her the lotus blossom and introduced himself, saying "Hello, my name is…" I forget what his name was. It was done with such elegance and charm and with no thought of reward, but just a sensibility which I found very impressive. Anyway we loved it. How colorful it was…

I must also say the sari is a kind of work of art, especially seeing hundreds of them all together. Also, women washing the saris gives a kind of swatch of color to the landscape… I thought it was wonderful… I had a sense of a healthy society. I didn't know to what extent this is characteristic or not, but I was very impressed and would love to have a chance to go back…

Any guess on who this scientist is? No Googling :-P!

The Divisions of Time

Carl Sagan, in his book, Cosmos writes:

"Hinduism is the only religion in which the time scales correspond... to those of modern scientific cosmology. Its cycles run from our ordinary day and night to a day and night of the Brahma, 8.64 billion years long, longer than the age of the Earth or the Sun and about half the time since the Big Bang"

Indeed, the divisions of time propounded by the ancient sages is incredible, and the life span of different classes of living beings as described in the various Puranas appears unbelievable- human life does not even form a tiny part in the affairs of the universe according to this world view.

We may start with the description of the Yugas - there are 4 yugas in the this timescale which repeat themselves cyclically.These 4 Yugas are called Satya, Treta, Dvapara and Kali Yuga - which last for 12,000 years of the demigods.Different classes of living entities dwell in these Yugas on earth according to their level of consciousness. These 4 Yugas are experienced by only those living entities who are in the earthly planetary systems - there is no effect of these Yugas on the demigods

A year of the demigods is 360 years of human beings. Taking this into account, the duration of various Yugas

Satya Yuga - 4,800 x 360 = 1,728,000 years Treta Yuga - 3600 x 360 = 1,296,000 years Dvapara Yuga - 2,400 x 360 = 864,000 years Kali Yuga - 1200 x 360 = 432, 000 years

So, combined these yugas last for 4.32 million or 43.2 lac human years.One cycle of the Yugas is known as a Catur Yuga.

One thousand Catur Yugas combine to form Brahma's day and Brahma's night is of the same period - a night and day of 4.32 billion years! Thus, Brahma's day lasts for 8.64 billion years. Brahma's months also have 30 days, and Brahma thus lives on for 100 years. The lifespan of Brahma comes out to be an astounding 311 trillion 40 billion human years.

Creation of the planetary systems begins at the start of the Brahma's day and these creations continue to exists throughout the fourteen Manus - thus each of these Manu's have a lifetime of 71 catur-yugas, which is nearly 305 million years. The various posts in heaven, such as that of Indra, the seven sages and his followers, simultaneously come in the reign of Manu.

There's an interesting point to note, however, that one's life endures only for hundred years, in terms of lifespans in different planets - which means although Brahma lives for trillions of years according to human beings. he lives only for hundred years according to his perception. Time is relative to the consciousness of the living entity - 100 years of human beings amount to only 3 months of the demigods in the higher planetary systems, and in Brahma's timescale - it does even count up to 1 second!

These figures are astronomical - and as such they might be brushed off as "fictitious" or "mythological". However, we need not be conditioned by our own experiences of lifetimes while judging the correctness of such figures.A hundred year lifespan of human beings does not imply the non existence of living entities who may have such extraordinary life spans.If we go by such logic, then we might end up being the "frog in the well"!