Off the shores of Costa Rica, scientists study a stronghold of whales that once hovered near extinction…

The blue whale, Balaenoptera musculus, is the largest creature ever to live. Linnaeus derived the genus name from the Latin balaena, "whale," and the Greek pteron, "fin" or "wing." His species name, musculus, is the diminutive of the Latin mus, "mouse"—apparently a Linnaean joke. The "little mouse whale" can grow to 200 tons and 100 feet long. A single little mouse whale weighs as much as the entire National Football League. Just as an elephant might pick up a little mouse in its trunk, so the elephant, in its turn, might be taken up by a blue whale and carried along on the colossal tongue. Had Jonah been injected intravenously, instead of swallowed, he could have swum the arterial vessels of this whale, boosted along every ten seconds or so by the slow, godlike pulse.

The great swimming speed of the blue whale, together with the remoteness of its stronghold—where three of Earth's oceans merge in the ice-cold waters around Antarctica—protected most of the species until early in the 20th century. With the invention of explosive harpoons and fast, steam-powered catcher boats, the stronghold was breached. Through the first six decades of the 20th century 360,000 blue whales were killed. The population around South Georgia Island was extirpated, along with those that once fed in the coastal waters of Japan. Some blue whale populations were reduced by ninety-nine one-hundredths, and the species tipped at the very brink of extinction…

For Bruce Mate and John Calambokidis, the head scientists aboard Pacific Storm, the irony is deep and poignant. The blue whales they study, the 2,000 animals that summer off western North America, once just a splinter group, now make up a significant population.

Mate, director of the Marine Mammal Institute at Oregon State University, is the world's most inventive and prolific satellite-tagger of whales. The dome first caught his attention in 1995, when a blue whale he had tagged off California in summer began transmitting from off Costa Rica in winter. Calambokidis, a co-founder of Cascadia Research, in Olympia, Washington, is the West Coast's most prolific photo-identifier of whales. A tall, lean biologist with a Quaker seaman's beard and monomaniacal dedication to bringing back diagnostic images, Calambo¬kidis was tantalized by the reports from the satellite. In 1999 he made a reconnaissance of the dome by sailboat. The voyage was plagued by bad weather, and the sailboat was too small for its mission, yet at the dome Calambo¬kidis managed to photo identify ten whales that he had photographed off California.
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… If we have to mark a few important stages in the process of physical transformation, here are these: Sri Aurobindo’s descent into death, 1950; supramental manifestation in the earth’s subtle physical, 1956; realization of the surhomme consciousness, 1958; consent for collaboration from the material Nature, 1958; the descent of the surhomme consciousness in 1969; the psychic being itself getting materialized, 1970; supramental body, 1972. It is the psychic being which will materialize itself and become the supramental being, she told on 1 July 1970. It is precisely the psychic being which survives death. So, if it materializes itself, it means the abolition of death. That is the central importance of the psychic being. Whatever is not in accordance with the Truth thus just disappears. Materialization of the psychic being gives continuity to evolution. In the material world immortality therefore means the materialization of the psychic being. The New Body makes it possible. Perhaps that is the process. Now it is the New Body which will do whatever is to be done. It is not an inert lump of matter, but is charged with the luminous dynamism of the Divine. It is going to exert pressure upon the material in the evolutionary process.

Sometimes people ask if the Mother really succeeded in her work. Did she complete it? It is said that she did not achieve all that she was to achieve. They even say that her work of physical transformation has been postponed. Is it believable? But all that sounds rather strange. The statement that the work has been postponed is an incomplete statement. There is an obligation that those who speak of “postponed” must tell us when it will be resumed. Otherwise what will be its validity? But if the work of physical transformation has been postponed in the Will of the Lord, then that becomes a greater achievement for the Mother, that now whatever has to happen will happen in the Will of the Lord. Isn’t that glorious?

The Supramental Presence is a sufficient, a necessary and sufficient basis for that to happen. That surely is a greater gain than perhaps the transformation itself—the working of the Will of the Supreme in this Creation.

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In Sanjnana there is an action of the sense-mind which is superior to the particular action of the senses and is aware of things even without imaging them in forms of sight, sound, contact, but which also as a sort of subordinate operation, subordinate but necessary to completeness of presentation, does image in these forms. There is in it a vaster action which is not limited by the action of the physical sense-organs; it is this which senses everything perfectly. There is also associated with it a corresponding vaster action of Prajnana, Ajnana and Vijnana that are not limited by the smaller apprehensive and comprehensive faculties of the external mind. It is this vaster Prajnana which perceives the proper relation of the words to each other, perception that is inherent in the right reproduction of the words. The Ajnana or Knowledge-Will originating all these actions is also vaster, not limited by the faltering force that governs the operations directed by the surface mind. The action of the vaster Vijnana is evidently there working through them and ensuring their co-ordination. We have nothing of the sort in The Lives of Sri Aurobindo which is what makes it a farce.
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This is the sunset at the North Pole with the moon at its closest point.
You also see the sun below the moon.
An amazing photo and not one easily duplicated.   more »

The connection to the house snaps you don’t know when, and you call the electricity serviceman; on restoring it you are obliged to pay him a pretty generous tip. ...   more »

Live always as if you were under the very eye of the Supreme and of the Divine Mother.
Do nothing, try to think and feel nothing that would be unworthy of the Divine Presence.

Sri Aurobindo

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Immortal rhythms swayed in her time-born steps;
Her look, her smile awoke celestial sense
Even in earth-stuff, and their intense delight
Poured a supernal beauty on men's lives,
A wide self-giving was her native act:
A magnanimity as of sea or sky
Enveloped with its greatness all that came
And gave a sense as of a greatened world:
Her kindly care was a sweet temperate sun,
Her high passion a blue heaven's equipoise. …   more »

15 August 1872 Thursday: Sri Aurobindo’s Birthday; 21 February 1878 Thursday: The Mother’s Birthday; 4 April 1910 Monday: Sri Aurobindo’s Arrival at Pondicherry; 29 March 1914 Sunday: The First Meeting of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo …   more »

Bhabha was elected president of the First United Nations Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy in 1955. There he predicted the unavoidable result of the spread of nuclear technology when many nations acquire the capability to make nuclear weapons. He warned the advanced nations to restrain themselves at that stage to prevent nuclear weapon proliferation. Due to the Cold War these words fell on deaf ears, and a discriminatory Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) came into being…

Often in my career, when problems arose, I would ask myself what Bhabha would have done under the circumstances. One of the toughest was in 1990, when Prime Minister VP Singh decided to implement the Mandal Commission recommendations. The DAE had enjoyed exemption from reservation in its recruitment and promotion policies, to support merit and excellence and to make sure that the personnel would have the highest standards. However, the government order directed that all departments implement the recommendations of the Mandal Commission. I took up the matter with the Prime Minister. I started off by saying that I was asking for a waiver to which he may have strong reservations. I explained that in the interests of what we have built-up at BARC, and to preserve standards, it is necessary to get a waiver. After 20 minutes of discussion, he agreed, and signed the file exempting the Department. If I had not drawn moral strength from the principles of Bhabha, I would not have attempted to do this. …    more »

Ask Good Questions
We have to look at the prospects of an Indian science in the spirit of its creativity. We have to ask good questions, worthwhile questions and not titillating or just utilitarian questions. We have to ask questions that come from deeper perceptions.

For instance, we do not know why at every stage of aggregation or disaggregation of matter newer properties appear. We have descriptions but not knowledge. Thus water is not simply the sum of hydrogen and oxygen. It is altogether a different new substance. In fact we should call it an atom because its properties cannot be derived from anything else. So also is the earth, so too the sun, and so and so forth. How do new properties appear? The answer is not available. Is it an aspect of the substratum that enters into it? Is that substratum a participative medium? If this should be true, then we would be entering into a wonderful domain where matter and space-time interact. Is that what the General Theory of Relativity trying to propose?

Similarly, if Matter, Life, and Mind are entities independent of each other, then they form irreducible dimensions, that is, one cannot be expressed in terms of the other. In that case how could Life arise out of or enter into Matter? And this will happen at every higher stage also. On the other hand, if Life is to be viewed as a product of Matter, how does it at all acquire the characteristics which are not there in the material state? In that eventuality, will not the proposition sound paradoxical? As we have seen, we do not know how the combination of hydrogen and oxygen gives rise to an altogether different substance with altogether different properties, it will be strange to think of Matter giving rise to Life by some mysterious process. Matter occasioning Life is one thing and producing it is another. It would be a creation out of vacuum, ex nihilo, as if the vacuum were seething with an intense activity. The mystery gets further confounded as we go up on the invisible ladder to higher propositions. To science it can prove very embarrassing and it should be its concern to resolve the issue.

But to the practising researcher these questions may appear rather intractable; they may even be called inanities. Such could be a sufficient reason to dismiss them immediately. On the contrary, perhaps such could be the reasons to set him on the inquiry. Indeed, if meaningful researches are to be pursued, we may have to invent altogether novel techniques of approach. Not only idea-tools but also much subtler physical apparatuses and probes for investigation. Only then we may be able to say that there is Indian science.

If the quality of a culture depends upon the kind of questions it asks, then we should ask questions worthy of that culture. Just when the questions are raised is there a good possibility of getting their answers. Instead of following the existing methods of analysis and deduction, approaches based on synthesis ought to be thought out and initiated. For this to happen new concepts of, and relationships in, space and time may have to be proposed and discovered. …   more »

EPISTLE DEDICATORY
To The King.

Sir,

OF all the Kings of Europe, Your Majesty was the first, who confirmed this Noble Design of Experiments, by Your own Example, and by a Public Establishment. An Enterprize equal to the most renoun’d Actions of the best Princes. For, to increase the Powers of all Mankind, and to free them from the bondage of Errors, is greater Glory than to enlarge Empire, or to put Chains on the necks of Conquered Nations.

What Reverence all Antiquity had for the Authors of Natural Discoveries, is evident by the Diviner sort of Honor they conferred on them. Their Founders of Philo-sophical Opinions were only admir’d by their own Sects.

Their Valiant Men and Generals did seldome rise higher than to Demy-Gods and Heros. But the Gods they Worshipped with Temples and Altars, were those who instructed the World to Plow, to Sow, to Plant, to Spin, to build Houses, and to find out New Countries. This Zeal indeed, by which they expressed their Gratitude to such Benefactors, degenerated into Superstition: yet has it taught us, That a higher degree of Reputation is due to Discoverers, than to the Teachers of Speculative Doctrines, nay even to Conquerors themselves.

Nor has the True God himself omitted to shew his value of Vulgar Arts. In the whole History of the first Monarchs of the World, from Adam to Noah, there is no mention of their Wars, or their Victories: All that is Recorded is this, They lived so many years, and taught their Posterity to keep Sheep, to till the Ground, to plant Vineyards, to dwell in to work in Brass and Iron. And if they deserved a Sacred Remembrance, for one Natural or Mechanical Invention, Your Majesty will certainly obtain Immortal Fame, for having established a perpetual Succession of Inventors.

I am
May it please Your Majesty
Your Majesties most humble, and most obedient Subject, and Servant,

Thomas Sprat
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It is often said that science transcends all national boundaries. The properties of water or electron or the quark are the same wherever these are measured in a scientific way. There is nothing like an Indian neutron or American or Russian neutron. The sun and the stars are not going to alter their character from whatever point in space they may be observed. Observational data are the sole basis for interpretative understanding of the objective world. That truly becomes a secure foundation on which the theoretical edifice of science is built. Indeed, in it is the high prestige of science.

We have here a procedure to make progress in our understanding of things in a surer detached way. It is likely that the quality of observation may differ from place to place or it may improve with the passage of time. But the basic approach remains the same. In the sequel, thought and proficiency augment each other.

Observation and rational thinking are taken for granted as the fundamental character of science. Yet the assertion of a national science need not be a rhetorical claim or affirmation, a misplaced enthusiasm for things that are our own. Still certain characteristic national or civilisational features could enter into the study of the physical world. Possibly objectivity itself could have those surer bearings. It could be participative also. ...   more »

Related to Rationalism and Devotion or, to put it a little differently, Reason and Faith is in a way the question of Biography and Hagiography; in fact to stretch the argument from a certain point of view, they are in that context just two representations of the same. But if hagiography is biography revering its saint, then any non-hagiographic biography of a saint will be a contradiction in terms which will land us into a messy or irresolvable paradox; it will only deprive him of his sainthood. And this is precisely what the author of The Lives of Sri Aurobindo is doing in his presentation of a Saint and a Rishi and a Yogi, and a Yogi par excellence at that. Posted at the Columbia University Press, the author himself gives the following summary introduction to us. He poses a question to himself and sets to answer it: “How do you write about a man who is known to some as a politician, to others as a poet and critic, to still others as a philosopher, and to a not inconsiderable number as an incarnation of God? This is one of the problems a biographer of Sri Aurobindo has to face.”

The answer is simple: ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to the sainthood of Sri Aurobindo. If he is not a saint or spiritual guide then it is absurd to speak of being a practitioner of his path, the Path of Integral Yoga given by Sri Aurobindo, precisely that which the author of the Lives maintains, that he is one of its long-standing followers, for almost forty years now. But if he is a saint, then any denial of sainthood in the biography will give rise to abundant irrationality of the author as much as of the publishers also who, it seems, didn’t look into these details carefully enough. Not presenting the aspect of sainthood of a saint will thus amount to falsehood. That is the plain truth of the matter. ...   more »

It augurs well for the cultural unification of mankind that India has begun to pay back the great cultural debt it owes to Europe by her new creations in the English language. It was therefore a phenomenon of very great significance when Sri Aurobindo turned his remarkable poetical capacity to the creation of an epic in English to embody his grand vision of the Spirit. It is well-known that Sri Aurobindo had devoted himself to the pursuit of spirituality which is the foundation of the Indian culture. He is not merely a revivalist, his spirituality is not of the type of a traditional repetition, it is a resurgence, a reorientation, which carries the tradition many steps forward by his spiritual discovery of the Supermind. In him the Indian spirit finds its greatest exponent. The Divine, the sense of that living Reality, the need of bringing the influence and the presence of the Divine in all human activities and the consequent transformation of human nature and life into an expression of the Divine,—these are some of the fundamental concepts of his great vision of man's future…   more »

Although Amal might have written This Errant Life in a psychological state of glumness and pensive contemplation as if the entire future of his soul was going to be decided in it, although in it there might be a direct connection with his personal condition at the time, it stands quite independent of all these immediate associations. In fact the individual’s individuality had turned into such evocative poignancy that it at once acquired the character of spiritual universality. That is why it becomes accessible to us—even if we are not to know the causes of its appearance, what gave rise to its birth. Perhaps they are not important if there is the authentic inspiration behind the creation, the inspiration that can touch any kindred soul. The wonderful truth, the truth of a mystic or a sufi or a bhakta’s life is that “the human cannot become the divine unless and until the divine becomes the human”. In it there is also the power to render the psychic utterance into a deep philosophy of the spirit, on which a whole system of metaphysics can be erected. The fulfilment of the transient is in the eternal which also gets enriched by stepping into it. ...   more »

I just looked at my friend with disbelief as he told the first day we met.

He had planned to kill himself over the weekend. He talked of how he had cleaned out his locker so his Mom wouldn't have to do it later and was carrying his stuff home. He looked hard at me and gave me a little smile. 'Thankfully, I was saved'. My friend saved me from doing the unspeakable.    more »