Toward a philosophical reconstruction of the dialogue between Modern Physics and Advaita Vedanta

328 Pages·2011·2.08 MB·English

Universit´e de Montr´eal
Towards a Philosophical Reconstruction of the Dialogue between Modern
Physics and Advaita Ved¯anta: An Inquiry into the Concepts of a¯ka¯´sa,
Vacuum and Reality
par
Jonathan Duquette
Facult´e de th´eologie et de sciences des religions
Th`ese pr´esent´ee `a la Facult´e des ´etudes sup´erieures
en vue de l’obtention du grade de
Philosophiae Doctor (Ph.D.)
en sciences des religions
Septembre 2010
c Jonathan Duquette, 2010
(cid:13)
Universit´e de Montr´eal
Facult´e des ´etudes sup´erieures et postdoctorales
Cette th`ese intitul´ee:
Towards A Philosophical Reconstruction of the Dialogue between Modern Physics
and Advaita Ved¯anta: An Inquiry into the Concepts of ¯ak¯a´sa, Vacuum and Reality
pr´esent´ee par:
Jonathan Duquette
a ´et´e ´evalu´ee par un jury compos´e des personnes suivantes:
Patrice Brodeur, pr´esident-rapporteur
Trichur S. Rukmani, directrice de recherche
Normand Mousseau, codirecteur de recherche
Solange Lefebvre, membre du jury
Varadaraja Raman, examinateur externe
Karine Bates, repr´esentante du doyen de la FESP
ii
Abstract
Towardtheendofthe19thcentury, theHindumonkandreformerSwamiVivekananda
claimed that modern science was inevitably converging towards Advaita Ved¯anta, an
important philosophico-religious system in Hinduism. In the decades that followed,
in the midst of the revolution occasioned by the emergence of Einstein’s relativity
and quantum physics, a growing number of authors claimed to discover striking “par-
allels” between Advaita Ved¯anta and modern physics. Such claims of convergence
have continued to the present day, especially in relation to quantum physics. In this
dissertation, an attempt is made to critically examine such claims by engaging a de-
tailed comparative analysis of two concepts: ¯ak¯a´sa in Advaita Ved¯anta and vacuum
in quantum physics. What is examined is the claim that both concepts would refer
to the same reality — an enduring, subtle and all-pervading physical substratum out
of which the constituents of the world come into existence and to which they ulti-
mately return. Based on this study, the dissertation argues that comparisons relying
on conceptual affinities alone generally fall short of establishing a productive dia-
logue between Advaita Ved¯anta and modern physics. Another approach is to bring
into focus the epistemological limits respectively encountered by these systems when
attempting to define the content of “reality-in-itself” or “ultimate reality.” Emphasis
is given to epistemology and the problem of reality in Advaita Ved¯anta, and scientific
realism and philosophical implications of nonseparability in quantum physics.
Keywords: Dialogue;NaturalSciences; EasternSpiritualTraditions; AdvaitaVed¯an-
ta; Modern Physics; Philosophy of science; ¯ak¯a´sa; Vacuum; Reality; Epistemology.
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R´esum´e
Vers la fin du 19`eme si`ecle, le moine et r´eformateur hindou Swami Vivekananda
affirma que la science moderne convergeait vers l’Advaita Ved¯anta, un important
courant philosophique et religieux de l’hindouisme. Au cours des d´ecennies suiv-
antes, suite aux apports scientifiques r´evolutionnaires de la th´eorie de la relativit´e
d’Einstein et dela physique quantique, unnombrecroissant d’auteurssoutenaient que
d’importants “parall`eles” pouvaientˆetretrac´es entre l’Advaita Ved¯anta et la physique
moderne. Encore aujourd’hui, de tels rapprochements sont faits, particuli`erement en
relation avec la physique quantique. Cette th`ese examine de mani`ere critique ces
rapprochements `a travers l’´etude comparative d´etaill´ee de deux concepts: le concept
d’¯ak¯a´sa dans l’Advaita Ved¯anta et celui de vide en physique quantique. L’´enonc´e ex-
amin´e est celui selon lequel ces deux concepts pointeraient vers une mˆeme r´ealit´e: un
substratum omnipr´esent et subtil duquel ´emergent et auquel retournent ultimement
les divers constituants de l’univers. Sur la base de cette ´etude comparative, la th`ese
argumente que des comparaisons de nature conceptuelle favorisent rarement la mise
en place d’un v´eritable dialogue entre l’Advaita Ved¯anta et la physique moderne. Une
autre voie d’approche serait de prendre en consid´eration les limites ´epist´emologiques
respectivement rencontr´ees par ces disciplines dans leur approche du “r´eel-en-soi” ou
de la “r´ealit´e ultime.” Une attention particuli`ere sera port´ee sur l’´epist´emologie et le
probl`eme de la nature de la r´ealit´e dans l’Advaita Ved¯anta, ainsi que sur le r´ealisme
scientifique etlesimplicationsphilosophiques delanon-s´eparabilit´eenphysique quan-
tique.
Mots-cl´es: Dialogue; Sciences naturelles; Traditions spirituelles orientales; Advaita
Ved¯anta; Physiquemoderne; Philosophiedessciences; ¯ak¯a´sa;Vide; R´ealit´e; E´pist´emo-
logie.
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Contents
Abstract ii
R´esum´e iii
Contents iv
List of Figures vii
Abbreviations viii
Acknowledgments ix
Preface xii
1 Introduction 1
2 Eastern Spiritual Traditions and Quantum Physics 15
2.1 Nature of the Parallels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2.1.1 The Role of the Observer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2.1.2 Holism in Quantum Physics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
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2.1.3 Ak¯a´sa, Fields and Quantum Vacuum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
2.2 Hopes and Pitfalls of Parallelism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
CONTENTS v
2.2.1 Parallelism in Practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
2.2.2 Convergence, Conflict or Independence? . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
3 The Vacuum in Modern Science 61
3.1 The Vacuum: From the Milesians to Einstein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
3.1.1 Greek Speculations About Vacuum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
3.1.2 Vacuum as a Physical Entity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
3.1.3 Vacuum as a Medium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
3.1.4 Vacuum in the Theory of Relativity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
3.2 Vacuum in Quantum Field Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
3.2.1 The Wave-Particle Duality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
3.2.2 Interpretations of the Wavefunction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
3.2.3 Ontology in Quantum Field Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
3.2.4 The Quantum Vacuum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
3.3 Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
4 A¯ka¯´sa in Hindu Schools of Thought 115
4.1 Textual Sources in Vedic Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
4.1.1 Early reflections about bhu¯tas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
4.1.2 A¯k¯a´sa in the Upani.sads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
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4.2 Ak¯a´sa in the Hindu dar´sanas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
4.2.1 The Vai´ses.ika dar´sana . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
4.2.2 The S¯am. khya dar´sana . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
4.3 The Advaita Ved¯anta dar´sana . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
4.3.1 Nature and Knowledge of Brahman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
CONTENTS vi
4.3.2 Cosmological Insights into Advaita Ved¯anta . . . . . . . . . . 175
4.3.3 A¯k¯a´sa in Advaita Ved¯anta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
4.4 Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
5 Analysis and Proposal for Dialogue 211
5.1 Comparative Analysis: Quantum vacuum and ¯ak¯a´sa . . . . . . . . . . 212
5.1.1 Analogies and Parallels: A Critical Analysis . . . . . . . . . . 214
5.1.2 Epistemological Boundary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
5.2 Modern Physics and Advaita Ved¯anta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
5.2.1 Scientific Realism and Limits of Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . 250
5.2.2 Nonseparability and d’Espagnat’s Ontological Reality . . . . . 259
5.2.3 An Integral Perspective to Dialogue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
Conclusion 287
Bibliography 293
1. Primary Sources in Indian Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
2. Indian Philosophy and Eastern Spiritual Traditions . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
3. Modern Science and Eastern Spiritual Traditions . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
4. Science, Religion and Western Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
5. Physics and Philosophy of Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
6. Orientalism and Comparative Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
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List of Figures
3.1 The experiment on vacuum made by Torricelli . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
3.2 The double-slit experiment in quantum physics . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
3.3 Example of a Feynman diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
4.1 The evolution process in S¯am. khya . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
4.2 The pan˜c¯ıkaran.a model in Ved¯anta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
5.1 Bernard d’Espagnat’s scheme for his “veiled reality” thesis . . . . . . 267
5.2 Two ways of relating physics and Advaita Ved¯anta . . . . . . . . . . 275
5.3 The Great Chain of Being . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
5.4 Map serving as a dialogical basis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
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Abbreviations
AitBr Aitareya Br¯ahman.a RV R. gveda
AU Aitareya Upani.sad SB Siddh¯antabindu
BhG Bhagavad-G¯ıt¯a S´Br S´atapatha Br¯ahman.a
BS Brahmasu¯tra SK S¯am. khyak¯arik¯a
BrU Br.had¯aran.yaka Upani.sad SPB S¯am. khyapravacanabh¯a.sya
BSB Brahmasu¯trabh¯a.sya TU Taittir¯ıya Upani.sad
ChU Ch¯andogya Upani.sad Upad Upade´sas¯ahasr¯ı
KaU Ka.tha Upani.sad VP Ved¯anta Paribh¯a.s¯a
KsU Kau.s¯ıtaki Upani.sad VS Vai´se.sikasu¯tras
MaU M¯an.d.u¯kya Upani.sad
MtU Maitr¯ı Upani.sad
NS Nya¯yasu¯tras
PD Pan˜cada´s¯ı
PaU Pain˙gala Upanis.ad
PDS Pad¯arthadharmasam. graha
PU Pra´sna Upani.sad
QFT Quantum field theory