TALKING POINT : Einstein and Tagore on Music - 19th August 1930

“The difficulty is that the really good music, whether of the East or of the West, cannot be analyzed.” Einstein

I have had posted Nobel Laureate Rabindra Nath Tagore’s meeting with Einstein earlier where he talked about Truth, Reality and Beauty. (Click here to read it) and the talk below is his second meeting with Einstein, on 19^th August, 1930. 

In the first instance, the meeting has Einstein questioning Tagore on his belief on divine and whether God is isolated from the world, to which Tagore replied, “When our universe is in harmony with man, the eternal, we know it as truth, we feel it as beauty”. Where as the second, as excerpted below, mainly centered around Modern Physics and Music.

Einstein and Tagore Curtsy Mokta Mona

“In creation we follow the central law of existence, but if we do not cut ourselves adrift from it, we can have sufficient freedom within the limits of our personality for the fullest self-expression.” Tagore

Bertrand Russel said once for Tagore, “I regret I cannot agree with Tagore. His talk about the infinite is vague nonsense. The sort of language that is admired by many Indians unfortunately does not, in fact, mean anything at all.”

And I believe that people like him, are governed by the five senses for perception and when those sense perception fails in perceiving truthfully (Like a spoon in a glass of water seems to be broken) they go around finding the reason behind it and sometimes find it (As in case of broken spoon – Laws of refractions) but if they don’t, they refuse to acknowledge it the truth (That the spoon is actually not broken) till the time another person comes with another set of laws.

Scientists and logicians are handicapped by the limitations of sense perception. I am happy that someone like Einstein has the humility to accept it and some like Stephen Hawking (He went on to famously proclaim, “God Does Not Exist” click here to read… )feel that what they know, is absolute truth.

Divine is nothing but collective consciousness of the Universe, including mine. To know that Universal consciousness, one has to go within to up-link  that’s what I believe in, whether it means anything to people like Bertrand Russel, Stephen Hawking etc. or not.

Anyways, here is the part of the talk curtsy Mukto Mona… on Music.  To read the full talk, please click here…

EINSTEIN AND TAGORE ON MODERN PHYSICS, MUSIC ETC.

Excerpted from "Three conversations: Tagore Talks with Einstein, with Rolland, and Wells"  (ASIA 3/1931, p.139-143,196 f.)

Einstein and Tagore Curtsy Ms. Sabina Choudhary

EINSTEIN: I believe that whatever we do or live for has its causality; it is good, however, that we cannot see through to it.

TAGORE: There is in human affairs an element of elasticity also, some freedom within a small range which is for the expression of our personality. It is like the musical system in India, which is not so rigidly fixed as western music. Our composers give a certain definite outline, a system of melody and rhythmic arrangement, and within a certain limit the player can improvise upon it. He must be one with the law of that particular melody, and then he can give spontaneous expression to his musical feeling within the prescribed regulation. We praise the composer for his genius in creating a foundation along with a superstructure of melodies, but we expect from the player his own skill in the creation of variations of melodic flourish and ornamentation. In creation we follow the central law of existence, but if we do not cut ourselves adrift from it, we can have sufficient freedom within the limits of our personality for the fullest self-expression.

…
EINSTEIN: It requires a very high standard of art to realize fully the great idea in the original music, so that one can make variations upon it. In our country, the variations are often prescribed.

TAGORE: If in our conduct we can follow the law of goodness, we can have real liberty of self-expression. The principle of conduct is there, but the character which makes it true and individual is our own creation. In our music there is a duality of freedom and prescribed order.

EINSTEIN: Are the words of a song also free? I mean to say, is the singer at liberty to add his own words to the song which he is singing?

TAGORE: Yes. In Bengal we have a kind of song-kirtan, we call it-which gives freedom to the singer to introduce parenthetical comments, phrases not in the original song. This occasions great enthusiasm, since the audience is constantly thrilled by some beautiful, spontaneous sentiment added by the singer.

…

EINSTEIN: Can the Indian music be sung without words? Can one understand a song without words?

TAGORE: Yes, we have songs with unmeaning words, sounds which just help to act as carriers of the notes. In North India, music is an independent art, not the interpretation of words and thoughts, as in Bengal. The music is very intricate and subtle and is a complete world of melody by itself.

…
TAGORE: Melody and harmony are like lines and colors in pictures. A simple linear picture may be completely beautiful; the introduction of color may make it vague and insignificant. Yet color may, by combination with lines, create great pictures, so long as it does not smother and destroy their value. 

EINSTEIN: It is a beautiful comparison; line is also much older than color. It seems that your melody is much richer in structure than ours. Japanese music also seems to be so.

…
EINSTEIN: The difficulty is that the really good music, whether of the East or of the West, cannot be analyzed.

TAGORE: Yes, and what deeply affects the hearer is beyond himself.

EINSTEIN: The same uncertainty will always be there about everything fundamental in our experience, in our reaction to art, whether in Europe or in Asia. Even the red flower I see before me on your table may not be the same to you and me.

TAGORE: And yet there is always going on the process of reconciliation between them, the individual taste conforming to the universal standard.

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Shashi

ॐ नमः शिवाय

Om Namah Shivaya

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A discussion of Einstein and Tagore 14th July 1930

Close Encounter with Science : God Particle - Proud To Be an Indian

IN SEARCH OF GOD PARTICLE - HIGGS BOSON

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In a ‘quantum’ leap in physics, CERN scientists on Wednesday, 4th July, 2012, claimed to have spotted a sub-atomic particle “consistent” with the Higgs boson or the “God particle”, believed to be a crucial building block that led to the formation of the universe.

The name Higgs Boson came from a British scientist Peter Higgs and Bose (Satyendra Nath Bose after whose name thesub-atomic particle boson is named). The work done by Bose and Albert Einstein, later added by Higgs, lead to this pioneering day.

“India is like a historic father of the project,” Paolo Giubellino, CERN spokesperson had said back in October last year when PTI visited the facility.

SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTION BY KOLKATA INSTITUTE

The Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (SINP) said in Kolkata on Wednesday that its scientists had made significant contributions to the development of the CMS experiments at CERN.

“This is an important moment for the development of science and I am very happy that our institute, this city and our country is part of the science revolution,” Mr. Sanyal said.

He said that the core CMS team of the SINP had five faculty members — group leader Prof. Sunanda Banerjee, Prof. Satyaki Bhattacharya, Prof. Suchandra Datta, Prof. Subir Sarkar and Prof. Manoj Saran.

Most of the team members, he said, had worked for more than a decade with the CMS experiment with notable contributions in the development of the experiment right from the early stage and were actively participating in the analysis of the incoming data.

To read the full detail ... click here... http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/article3602468.ece
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ॐ नमः शिवाय
Om Namah Shivaya

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Genius Mathematician Monk

TALKING POINT: "GOD does not EXIST" says Brilliant scientist Stephen Hawking

Recently, I came across a beautiful documentary by Discovery Channel hosted by Stephen Hawking asking a question that has remain unanswered since the beginning of mankind, “Does a "God" or a "Celestial Dictator" exist? In this documentary, as described in the write up, Stephen Hawking dissects the science of the universe in answering this very fundamental question.

I liked the documentary... (must see it as its beautifully crafted though its more than 42 minutes long) and enjoyed the simple explanation Stephen Hawking gave for Non-existence of GOD (Or the creator of Big Bang)... but I do not quite agree to it. His explanation refuting the existence of God on the basis of “Human perception of Cause and Effect" was not convincing enough for me. May be its because I am just a layman - not a scientist, as every one else is who are supporting this theory. But then what is human perception. Its just something that our senses keep our mind wondering and in constant chaos, decieving us all the time?

At the 37^th minute into the documentary, Stephen Hawking says, “"The role played by time at the beginning of the Universe is, I believe, the final key for removing the need for a Grand Designer, and revealing how the universe created itself. You can't get back to the time before Big Bang, because there is no BEFORE" and then goes on to say, “We have finally found something that does not have cause because there is no time for cause to exist in. For me, this means there is no possibility of a creator, because there is no "time" for a creator to exist in"

But in my opinion, why there has to be a 'time', as perceived by scientist now, to create a cause?

Well personally I don't think so as

1)    The word "TIME" is not the Time, just like the word "Tree" is not the tree.

2)    Time is a concept created by man to understand the physical laws governing nature. And as the very nature of concepts is, that it can and will change over time by new discoveries, new insights and new human endeavours. So time per se cannot be a constant thing as constant as Mass, Energy and Space, in definition, and cannot be used as an argument to declare God's existence or not, just by declaring that TIME does not exist beyond Big Bang, as Stephen Hawkins has declared in this documentary.

I believe in the "Cyclic model” which means that Universe is constantly expanding and contracting. More recent work has suggested the problem (That Cosmological constant is not actually constant) may be indirect evidence of a cyclic universe possibility as allowed by string theory. With every cycle of the universe (Big Bang then eventually a Big Crunch) taking about a trillion years. Just like Einstein many scientists assume some things like Cosmological Constant (To which Einstein later referred to his failure to predict the expansion of the universe from theory as the "Biggest Blunder of his life". Well a very interesting read at Wikipedia – Click here to read) or let’s say, as Stephen Hawking say, Time = 0 at big bang.

My brother Animesh has shared an another beautiful documentary by Carl Sagan "Hindu Concept of the Beginning and End of Universe" where he says "Hindu religion is the only religion in the world dedicated to the idea that the cosmos itself goes under an immense infact infinite number of deaths and re-births" (Its a lovely short Video, must see if not to hear what he says, but to see one of the beautiful temple architecture from South India)

Yes, conclusive evidence is lacking but it does not mean that it’s cannot be true. Given all the best thoughts that this century’s genius scientist, Stephen Hawking could put forth and some little bit of instinctive understanding that I have, I believe in, is the fact that “we have not reached that state of scientific progress, where it can be proved scientifically and conclusively the Existence of GOD or His Non Existence”. So I will leave aside the question whether “GOD” or as Stephen Hawking says, “CELESTIAL DICTATOR” exist or Not. But I will continue to firmly believe that GOD exists and will do so, until its proven wrong.

Unlike Stephen Hawking declaring at the end of the documentary, 
“My view is that there is "No god", "No one created Universe" and "No one directs our fate", 


I just have belief that
 – There is GOD - The supreme consciousness
- And some Universal Consciousness has created the Universe 
- and yes there is fate but only in this ‘now’, which is the result of Free Will governed by our 'present' Karma.

________

ॐ नमः शिवाय

Om Namah Shivaya

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Nature of Reality – Einstein and Tagore

TALKING POINT : A discussion of Einstein and Tagore 14th July 1930

Einstein and Tagore July 14th, 1930

This is a transcription of the conversation between world’s two great minds, Albert Einstein and Rabindranath Tagore, both Noble laureates working on two different fields of human aspects, come together on 14^th July, 1930 and discussed some common question facing mankind since the beginning of thoughts, philosophy and science. When Einstein met Tagore at his residence at Kaputh, the first question he asked was about isolation of divinity. The discussion later went on to discuss the nature of reality … 

So here it is for you to read, what these two great minds, thought about Divine, Truth, existence of beauty without the seer and the world as Illusion…

Source:

Published in the January, 1931, issue of Modern Review

Transcript Curtsey: Boloji.com / Kumud Biswas

Image: Wikipedia

The Nature of Reality

(A transcript of the conversation between Noble Laureate Poet Rabindranath Tagore from India and Professor Albert Einstein on 14th July, 1930, at the latter's residence in Kaputh)

Einstein : Do you believe in the Divine as isolated from the world?

Tagore : Not isolated. The infinite personality of Man comprehends the Universe. There cannot be anything that cannot be subsumed by the human personality, and this proves that the truth of the Universe is human truth. I have taken a scientific fact to explain this. Matter is composed of protons and electrons, with gaps between them, but matter may seem to be solid without the links in spaces which unify the individual electrons and protons. Similarly humanity is composed of individuals, yet they have their interconnection of human relationship, which gives living unity to man's world. The entire universe is linked up with us, as individuals, in a similar manner - it is a human universe. I have pursued this thought through art, literature and the religious consciousness of man.

Einstein : There are two different conceptions about the nature of the universe -the world as a unity dependent on humanity, and the world as a reality independent of the human factor.

Tagore :  When our universe is in harmony with man, the eternal, we know it as truth, we feel it as beauty.

Einstein: This is the purely human conception of the universe.

Tagore : There can be no other conception. This world is a human world - the scientific view of it is also that of the scientific man. Therefore, the world apart from us does not exist; it is a relative world, depending for its reality upon our consciousness. There is some standard of reason and enjoyment which gives it truth, the standard of the Eternal Man whose experiences are through our experiences.

Einstein : This is a realization of the human entity.

Tagore : Yes, one eternal entity. We have to realize it through our emotions and activities. We realized the Supreme Man who has no individual limitations through our limitations. Science is concerned with that which is not confined to individuals, it is the impersonal human world of truths. Religion realizes these truths and links them up with our deeper needs; our individual consciousness of truth gains universal significance. Religion applies values to truth, and we know this truth as good through our own harmony with it.

Einstein : Truth, then, or beauty is not independent of man?

Tagore : No.

Einstein : If there would be no human beings any more, the Apollo of Belvedere would no longer be beautiful.

Tagore : No!

Einstein : I agree with regard to this conception of Beauty, but not with regard to Truth.

Tagore : Why not? Truth is realized through man.

Einstein : I cannot prove that my conception is right, but that is my religion.

Tagore : Beauty is in the ideal of perfect harmony which is in the Universal Being, Truth the perfect comprehension of the Universal mind. We individuals approach it through our own mistakes and blunders, through our accumulated experiences, - through our illumined consciousness - how, otherwise, can we know Truth?

Einstein : I cannot prove that scientific truth must be conceived as a truth that is valid independent of humanity; but I believe it firmly. I believe, for instance, that the Pythagorean theorem in geometry states something that is approximately true, independent of the existence of man. Anyway, if there is a reality independent of man, there is also a truth relative to this reality; and in the same way the negation of the first engenders a negation of the existence of the latter.

Tagore : Truth, which is one with the Universal Being, must essentially be human; otherwise whatever we individuals realize as true can never be called truth, at least the truth which is described as scientific and which only can be reached through the process of logic, in other words, by an organ of thoughts which is human. According to Indian philosophy there is Brahman, the absolute Truth which cannot be conceived by the isolation of the individual mind or described by words but can only be realized by completely merging the individual in its infinity. But such a truth cannot belong to science. The nature of truth which we are discussing is an appearance, that is to say, what appears to be true to the human mind and therefore is human, and may be called Maya or illusion.

Einstein : So according to your conception, which may be the Indian conception, it is not the illusion of the individual but of humanity as a whole.

Tagore : In science we go through the discipline of eliminating the personal limitations of our individual minds and thus reach that comprehension of truth which is in the mind of the Universal Man.

Einstein : The problem begins whether truth is independent of our consciousness.
Tagore : What we call truth lies in the rational harmony between the subjective and objective aspects of reality, both of which belong to the super-personal man.

Einstein : Even in our everyday life, we feel compelled to ascribe a reality independent of man to the objects we use. We do this to connect the experiences of our senses in a reasonable way. For instance, if nobody is in this house, yet that table remains where it is.

Tagore : Yes, it remains outside the individual mind but not the universal mind. The table which I perceive is perceptible by the same kind of consciousness which I possess.

Einstein : Our natural point of view in regard to the existence of truth apart from humanity cannot be explained or proved, but it is a belief which nobody can lack - no primitive beings even. We attribute to truth a superhuman objectivity, it is indispensable for us, this reality which is independent of our existence and our experience and our mind - though we cannot say what it means.

Tagore : Science has proved that the table as a solid object is an appearance and therefore that which the human mind perceives as a table would not exist if that mind were naught. At the same time it must be admitted that the fact that the ultimate physical reality is nothing but a multitude of separate revolving centres of electric force, also belongs to the human mind. In the apprehension of truth there is an eternal conflict between the universal human mind and the same mind confined in the individual. The perpetual process of reconciliation is being carried on in our science, philosophy, in our ethics. In any case, if there be any truth absolutely unrelated to humanity, then for us it is absolutely non-existing. It is not difficult to imagine a mind to which sequence of things happens not in space but only in time like the sequence of notes in music. For such a mind such conception of reality is akin to the musical reality in which Pythagorean geometry can have no meaning. There is the reality of paper, infinitely different from the reality of literature. For the kind of mind possessed by the moth which eats that paper literature is absolutely non-existent, yet for man's mind literature has a greater value of truth than the paper itself. In a similar manner if there be some truth which has no sensuous or rational relation to human mind, it will ever remain as nothing so long as we remain human beings.

Einstein : Then I am more religious than you are!

Tagore : My religion is in the reconciliation of the Super-personal Man, the universal human spirit, in my own individual being. This has been the subject of my Hibbert Lectures, which I have called "The Religion of Man."

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ॐ नमः शिवाय

Om Namah Shivaya

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Man's Search for Meaning

Dr. Viktor Frankl