Do we need to research beliefs?

Do we need to research beliefs?

“Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who sets the planets in motion.” ― Isaac Newton

This was the statement of perhaps the one man who changed our perception of everything, from why the apple fell down instead of up and why planets moved in circular pathways around the sun. As a believer, Newton could never bring himself to believe that a course of natural events could put the cosmos functioning the way it does now. His belief was that science could discover only as much as the Power of God would allow and not a step further.

Science has hence moved on. Three hundred years later another changer of times quoted – “Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.” This was what Albert Einstein had to say about beliefs. From the simplistic understanding of Gravity as a force that kept planets in tow to a deeper understanding that everything consists of particles, including light, put mankind on a pathway of deeper understanding of the workings of the Universe. However even Einstein had difficulty in discounting the belief system.

Today, three years after Stephen Hawking, passed away, our beliefs system still holds. The big bang is well understood by even youngest and science has gone a long way in explaining gravity as a curvature in space time. Yet belief systems prevail, perhaps stronger than before. This is what makes subject for the most interesting debate of the times.

A cursory look at the progress of science and the depth of religious belief looks contradictory. How could mankind, with clear picture of the hows, whys, and whats of the mechanisms of the Universe still be bound to archaic belief systems, centuries old?  The answer perhaps lies in the fact that science never seeks beyond what is seen, heard or felt physically. Essentially it needs to be measurable.

Science, with its methodology, has come up with answers of why your body reacts to different illnesses, but it can never really explain the feeling of helplessness or pain of a patient. It can bring you images of the man on the moon, but never the reason for the tears of pride that welled up in human eyes on that momentous achievement. Science perhaps explain what life is but never the purpose of it.

It is difficult for any person to believe that he is just an occurrence in space time, with no reason to exist or with no consequence. Belief give you a purpose to live, to see beyond the graveyard.

Today, the spirit of research has taken on the quest to research beliefs and religious history. Science in a bid to disprove, beliefs that mankind thrived on, keeps on trying to put all trust in Him to question.

What it sees are only quantifiable elements. It does not understand or can ever seek to prove or disprove the feel of the touch of Divinity. In short the Man on the Cross, is still dearer to me than the groggy eyed scientist and fact that He rose from His death is still more believable than all scientific papers in the world. Research those particles and rays not the waves of belief in my heart.