0:01 if the general picture however of a big
0:04 bang followed by an expanding universe
0:06 is correct what happened before that was
0:10 the universe devoid of all matter and
0:12 then the matter suddenly somehow created
0:16 how did that happen in many cultures the
0:20 customary answer is that a God or Gods
0:24 created the universe out of nothing but
0:27 if we wish to pursue this question
0:29 courageously
0:30 we must of course ask the next question
0:33 where did God come from if we decide
0:36 that this is an unanswerable question
0:39 why not save a step and conclude that
0:41 the origin of the universe is an
0:43 unanswerable question or if we say that
0:47 God always existed why not save a step
0:50 and conclude that the Universe always
0:53 existed there's no need for a creation
0:55 it was always here these are not easy
0:57 questions cosmology brings us face to
1:00 face with the deepest Mysteries with
1:03 questions that were once treated only in
1:06 religion and
1:09 [Music]
1:19 myth who knows for certain who shall he
1:22 declare it whence was it born whence
1:25 came
1:27 creation the gods are later than this
1:30 world's
1:31 formation who then can know the origins
1:34 of the
1:37 world none knows whence creation arose
1:41 or whether he has or has not made it he
1:44 who surveys it from the lofty Skies only
1:48 he
1:49 knows or perhaps he knows
1:54 [Music]
1:56 not these words are 3,500 years old
2:00 they're taken from the rig Veda a
2:02 collection of early Sanskrit hymns the
2:05 most sophisticated ancient cosmological
2:08 ideas came from Asia and particularly
2:10 from India here there's a tradition of
2:14 skeptical questioning and
2:16 unselfconscious humility before the
2:18 great Cosmic
2:21 Mysteries amidst the routine of daily
2:23 life in say the harvesting and winnowing
2:26 of grain people all over the world have
2:28 wondered where did the universe come
2:33 from asking this question is a Hallmark
2:36 of our
2:37 [Music]
2:43 species there's a natural tendency to
2:46 understand the origin of the cosmos in
2:48 familiar biological terms the mating of
2:51 cosmic deities or the hatching of a
2:54 cosmic egg or maybe the intonation of
2:56 some magic
2:58 phrase
2:59 [Music]
3:07 the Big Bang is our modern scientific
3:09 creation myth it comes from the same
3:12 human need to Solve the cosmological
3:16 Riddle most cultures imagin the world to
3:19 be only a few hundred human Generations
3:21 old hardly anyone guessed that the
3:24 cosmos might be far older but the
3:26 ancient Hindus
3:28 did
3:30 [Music]
3:34 they like every other Society noted and
3:37 calibrated the Cycles in
3:40 nature the rising and setting of the sun
3:43 and
3:46 stars the phases of the
3:52 moon the passing of the
3:55 [Music]
3:58 seasons
4:00 [Music]
4:06 all over South India an age-old ceremony
4:09 takes place every January a rejoicing in
4:12 the generosity of nature in the annual
4:14 harvesting of the crops every January
4:17 nature provides the rice to celebrate
4:22 pangal even the draft animals are given
4:24 the day off and garlanded with
4:28 flowers
4:32 [Music]
4:38 colorful designs are painted on the
4:40 ground to attract Harmony and good
4:43 fortune for the coming
4:46 [Music]
4:58 year
5:00 [Music]
5:08 [Music]
5:13 pangal a simple porridge a mixture of
5:16 rice and sweet milk symbolizes the
5:19 Harvest the return of the
5:22 [Music]
5:28 seasons
5:32 [Music]
5:34 however this is not merely a Harvest
5:36 Festival it has ties to an elegant and
5:40 much deeper cosmological
5:42 [Music]
5:53 tradition the pungle Festival is a
5:56 rejoicing in the fact that there are
5:58 Cycles in nature
6:00 but how could such Cycles come about
6:02 unless the gods will them and if there
6:04 are Cycles in the years of humans might
6:08 there not be Cycles in the eons of the
6:11 Gods the Hindu religion is the only one
6:14 of the world's great faiths dedicated to
6:16 the
6:17 idea that the cosmos itself under goes
6:20 an immense indeed an infinite number of
6:24 deaths and
6:28 rebirths
6:31 [Music]
6:42 it is the only religion in which the
6:44 time scales correspond no doubt by
6:46 accident to those of modern scientific
6:49 cosmology its Cycles run from our
6:51 ordinary day and night to a day and
6:54 night of Brahma 8.64 billion years long
7:00 longer than the age of the Earth or the
7:02 Sun and about half the time since the
7:05 big bang and there are much longer time
7:08 scales
7:09 [Music]
7:18 still there is the deep and appealing
7:21 notion that the universe is but the
7:24 dream of The
7:26 God Who after a hundred Brahma years
7:31 dissolves himself into a dreamless
7:34 sleep and the universe dissolves with
7:37 him until after another Brahma Century
7:42 he
7:42 stirs recomposes himself and begins
7:46 again to dream the great Cosmic Lotus
7:54 dream
7:56 meanwhile
7:57 elsewhere there are an infinite number
8:00 of other
8:01 universes each with its own
8:04 God dreaming the cosmic
8:09 dream these great ideas are tempered by
8:14 another perhaps still
8:16 greater it is
8:18 said that men may not be the dreams of
8:21 the Gods but rather that the gods are
8:26 the dreams of men
8:30 [Applause]
8:31 [Music]
8:32 oh
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