dkb@cs.brown.edu (Dilip Barman) (03/18/90)
One thing that impresses me about eastern philosophy is its surprisingly advanced and free-thinking attitude toward science. Recently I compiled the following description of endless time in Hinduism; dogmatists argue the beginning and end of time, but the following model that I sketch seems more in line with a steady state universe and in any case shows humbleness to that undefinable concept, time. Re: Hindu cyclical concept of time Wednesday March 14, 1990 There are an infinite number of worlds, and each passes through 4 yugas, or periods, over and over. Time itself has no beginning or end. The names of the yugas come from dice throws, perhaps implying nondeter- minism. The first age is krita yuga (lasting 1,728,000 years), then comes treta yuga (1,296,000 years), dvapara yuga (864,000 years), and finally our current one, Kali yuga (432,000 years). The yugas are of decreasing length, mirroring a decrease in virtue. But that's just the beginning! One cycle of the four yugas is 4,320,000 years and is called a mahayuga. One thousand mahayugas equals ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF BRAHMA (the creator)!!!! This is called a kalpa. After each mahayuga, there is a minor dissolution of the world and the next mahayuga the universe is cosmically nondifferentiated potential. After each kalpa there is a major dissolution that lasts another kalpa. But even that's the beginning! Brahma lives for 100 Brahma years of Brahma days and Brahma nights -- i.e., 311,040,000,000,000 human years (3x10**14)!!! What happens when he dies? Everything, including he, dissolve and nothing but potential substance exists for another Brahma century. Then we start the whole cycle again! There's no beginning or end! {From Kinsley, David. R. "Hinduism: A Cultural Perspective". Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1982, page 86} Dilip Barman dkb@cs.brown.edu U.S. mail: Brown University Home: 19 Elton Street Dept. of Computer Science, Box 1910 Providence, RI 02906 Providence, RI 02912 (401)863-7666 (401)521-9731