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Doctrine of natural selection - Darwin's theory

Expressions researched:
"natural selection"

Lectures

Philosophy Discussions

Philosophy Discussion on Charles Darwin:

Śyāmasundara: Darwin is the originator of the doctrine of natural selection, or survival of the fittest. That means that in the course of adapting to the environment one type of animal will develop in a particular way which is best suited for that environment, and he will pass on his superior qualities to his offspring so that that particular species will survive, whereas another, which is not so suitable to that environment, will die out. This is called natural selection. Nature selects different species that can best survive.

Prabhupāda: So what is his explanation of the nature?

Śyāmasundara: Nature is a combination of physical forces in the universe.

Prabhupāda: What does he say about nature?

Śyāmasundara: Nature?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Śyāmasundara: Well, nature is a... All phenomenon can be explained by means of physical laws.

Prabhupāda: Who made these physical laws?

Śyāmasundara: He is not so much concerned with...

Prabhupāda: Why is he not concerned? If he is putting some theory for understanding, why he is not concerned with some primary principles?

Śyāmasundara: He says that we cannot be certain how everything began.

Prabhupāda: Then how he is certain that this natural circumstance is favorable? How he is making certain?

Śyāmasundara: He made many, many tests; he has much evidence...

Prabhupāda: What is that evidence?

Śyāmasundara: ...to show that animals adapt to their environments, just like if you...

Prabhupāda: Why he takes animals first? Why not others?

Śyāmasundara: Animals, trees, plants, insects, men, he examines all the different varieties. For instance if you put a certain animal in a cold climate, he will develop hair to protect his body against the cold, and he will pass on this characteristic to his sons.

Prabhupāda: So why...? The people in Greenland, do they develop hair?

Śyāmasundara: They don't have so much hair, but they develop very fatty tissues. Their eyes are slitted so there is not so much snow and bright light...

Prabhupāda: Then development of hair is not only the existent; there are other many conditions. You cannot say that development of hair is due to the condition as he says, natural condition. That is not a fixed-up...

Śyāmasundara: I was just using that as an example of how a species can adapt to its environment.

Prabhupāda: The question is that this development of body, is there any plan that this body should exist in certain condition of nature, and therefore he must have these equipments, either you say, tissues or veins or hair? Who has made these arrangements? That is the question.

Śyāmasundara: His answer to that is chance variation.

Prabhupāda: That is nonsense. There is no such chance. If he says chance, that means he is a nonsense.

Philosophy Discussion on Charles Darwin:

Śyāmasundara: What we are discussing is this doctrine of natural selection, or survival of the fittest.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That natural selection, that law is made by Kṛṣṇa.

Śyāmasundara: So there is a law of...

Prabhupāda: Yes. Certainly. The scientists say that we do not know wherefrom it is coming. All of a sudden I see something and you say that invention. It is not invention. It is already there. You could not see before, and now you can see. That's all.

Philosophy Discussion on Charles Darwin:

Karandhara: Darwin doesn't accept that there is a fixed number of species. Rather, the number of species may vary at any time, simply according to the natural selection. But he doesn't give any axiom that there are a certain number of species from which all other variations come. We are saying that there are 8,400,000 species to begin with.

Prabhupāda: But if first of all you give account for eight million species—you have no account. We say these are the fixed-up species. But your calculation of species, first of all give us account for eight millions, then you say, "The list is not complete."

Śyāmasundara: Their idea is that there's constant...

Prabhupāda: Whatever it may be, within that eight millions, but you cannot give us list.

Śyāmasundara: They say that there is new species always evolving.

Prabhupāda: That is not new. That is within the eight millions. You could not find the same thing, you could not find, before that; now we are finding. Your species, you could (not) give us a complete list. What is the evolutionary process wherefrom it began and how it's coming? You cannot give any fixed-up list. That is your imperfect knowledge. You are simply imagining. "It may be changed," "It may be chance," or this or that. That's all.

Philosophy Discussion on Charles Darwin:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Actually, in Darwin's concept he used the natural selection, but he doesn't go far enough what that nature is. He used the term "natural," but he does not know how to...

Prabhupāda: Yes. Explain what is nature. That means insufficient knowledge.

Śyāmasundara: He simply observed there are mutations in nature. For instance, he thinks that perhaps at one time...

Prabhupāda: That means nature is working.

Śyāmasundara: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Nature is working, but he cannot explain how nature is working.

Philosophy Discussion on Charles Darwin:

Karandhara: You point out in the introduction to Śrī Īśopaniṣad that deductive conclusions are always imperfect because you have to be able to deduce everything in order to come out to the right conclusion. Just like if you live in a village where everyone is only five feet tall, you may deduct that everyone in existence is only five feet tall; but if you go to the next village you may find someone six feet tall. So you have to search out every village and see every person before you...

Prabhupāda: That is not possible for you. How many millions of villages are there?

Śyāmasundara: No, but see, we're talking about two different things now. He is talking about the doctrine of natural selection or survival of the fittest...

Prabhupāda: But natural selection, that means that is not his selection. Natural selection.

Śyāmasundara: Natural selection.

Prabhupāda: So nature is more powerful than him. So he has not studied nature.

Śyāmasundara: He studies how the bodies change in nature.

Prabhupāda: No. He has not studied. He has studied in a particular place only. But nature means, when you speak of nature, suppose you have studied within this planet, but in nature means there is millions of universes, but he has not studied them.

Śyāmasundara: So you say the doctrine of natural selection is not...

Prabhupāda: Natural selection is there, but how the natural selection is working, he does not know that.

Karandhara: In a sense we know from Vedic information that the species from one end from the smallest germ up to the highest demigod, they are progressively more advanced. So anyone can come along and take out a small eclipsed portion of that sequence and propose the theory that the species is advancing, but that gamut, that range, perspective of higher and lower is existing, but not that it's evolving...

Prabhupāda: It is already there. I am simply changing place, transmigration. That is our theory - transmigration.

Philosophy Discussion on Charles Darwin:

Śyāmasundara: They call it "doctrine of natural selection," not theory.

Prabhupāda: Doctrine. So doctrine, doctrine should be fact, but Darwin's theory, so far... It is called Darwin's theory...

Śyāmasundara: It's not called theory, it's doctrine. It should be doctrine.

Karandhara: What they mean by doctrine is that they can't agree on it and say it's fact. That there's so many short-comings that they will call it a doctrine but they won't call it fact. That's practically the whole story in scientific research: the real scientists, they never call anything a solid fact; it's always a theory or a doctrine because they never find a perfect enough conclusion which takes into account everything and perfectly reconciles...

Prabhupāda: What is that uncertainty? What do you call that?

Śyāmasundara: It's called Theory of Uncertainty. Heisenberg's Theory of Uncertainty.

Prabhupāda: That is also theory.

Philosophy Discussion on Charles Darwin:

Prabhupāda: What is that, emancipation?

Hayagrīva: That is to say he simply presented what material he found—that is the fossils. He investigated certain life forms on these island during this trip and theorized about evolution.

Prabhupāda: That is philosophic; that is not scientific. He found something and he based his thesis on that. He cannot find out all the bodies, because there are, at the end, some section, some sect they burn the body. So how he can get information of their body, burned? So his theory is not at all scientific. It is always defective.

Hayagrīva: He spent the rest of his life writing about the material he gathered during this five-year voyage, which is a very short time. And according to his theory of natural selection, the best and the fittest survived. If this is the case, the race will necessarily steadily improve.

Prabhupāda: What does he mean by survive? What is the meaning of his dictionary, "survive"? Nobody survives.

Hayagrīva: Well, by that he means that the strong pass on their hereditary characteristics to their offspring, and that the race..., no individual survives, but that the race improves. But isn't this contradicted by the Vedas? In the present Kali... For instance, Arjuna's physical powers, prowess, was much greater, and that was, what, five thousand years ago. So isn't, instead of improving, instead of the race improving in strength and other qualities, isn't it actually...

Prabhupāda: They are degrading.

Hayagrīva: ...degenerating. What is the cause of man's physical, mental and spiritual deterioration in the succeeding yugas?

Prabhupāda: That is education. Every individual person, he is a soul, and he has got a particular type of body. Especially in the human body he requires education. What is this animal and what is higher than human race, these are Vedic description. So there are 8,400,000 different forms of life, and the body is being evolved. The body is machine, and the individual soul desires and he gets a suitable body made by material nature under the order of God. This is Vedic idea, as it is said in the Bhagavad-gītā, īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ hṛd-deśe arjuna tiṣṭhati (BG 18.61). God is existing within the core of everyone's heart, and the individual soul is desiring something, and upon the order God he is given a machine made by material nature. So this is evolution, and even a man, although he is human form of body, he can again degenerate to animal form of body according to his desire. Tathā dehāntara-prāptiḥ (BG 2.13). He has to change the body, and the body is changed according to his work and desire. In the animal kingdom they have also desires, but they are under the laws of nature changing body, and one is given the chance to become a human being, and then he may desire, and according to his desires he gets the next body. If he likes, he can go higher forms of life, and if he degenerates he goes lower form of life.

Page Title:Doctrine of natural selection - Darwin's theory
Compiler:Labangalatika
Created:15 of May, 2012
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=7, Con=0, Let=0
No. of Quotes:7