FIVE ELEMENTS AND THEIR INTERRELATIONSHIP

A link between physical and biological sciences.

Physical and biological sciences differ from each other for the simple reason that an entity as yet ill-understood or not understood called “life” is there in biological sciences and is absent in physical sciences. However the biological sciences may try they can never come close enough to the rigorous methodology and verifiability of physical sciences. This is the result of the so called “life force”.

All the scientists who work in physical sciences have a life form and this life form generates the physical science. Thus a life form generates some great insights into secretes of nature without understanding its own life form. Spiritual sciences if they can at all be called “sciences” try and bridge this gap between biological and physical sciences by understanding the inside and outside of the living organism continuously, simultaneously, non-judgmentally and totally if possible. They are really spiritual disciplines than sciences.

People down the ages have tried to simplify the reality by calling it an interplay of matter and energy. This energy is variously called as “Prana” or “Chi”. Energy is what makes the matter move. So any movement visible in matter is the result of this energy, be it the movement of electrons or the movement observed in any life form like plants or animals.

The five elements represent a graded transition from matter to space. Earth, water, fire, air and space represent those five elements. Any matter which generates, changes, moves, expands, or increases its heat content is seen as having energy in it.

The forms of matter have a special relationship with each other. All forms of matter coexist in all forms of matter in however minute quantity. For example the air will occupy some space and it will contain some water, some dust, some heat. The forms of matter close to each other may act to obstruct the quality of that element. Thus water will be obstructed by earth but water can dissolve earth.
Some energy structures have to prevent the elements from interacting with each other to the detriment of living structures. These elements also represent Prana or universal energy.

QUALITIES AND REPRESENTATIONS OF ELEMENTS
Earth represents solidity, heaviness, gravity, sense of smell, lower limbs, strength Water represents fluidity, ability to occupy any shape, surface tension, stickiness, flexibility, taste, part between umbilicus and groin Fire represents ability to transform, desiccate, speed, vision, part between umbilicus and xiphisternum Air represents ability to, endurance, touch, part between xiphisternum and neck Space represents ability to accept, sound, it holds the primordial sound of big bang represented by many sounds particulary om, amen, represents the part above neck.

Physical sciences are apparently going from gross to the subtle and the Spiritual disciplines evolved by biological forms start with the subtle and find out the behavior of the gross. Both apparently exclude each other and a comprehensive view of nature remains illusive.

If the nature has to be appreciated comprehensively the internal and external environments must be investigated simultaneously. If science now accepts that there cannot be a really “outside” observer and that every single experiment is a “participatory” experience then it is mandatory that the participant manages his or her “internal environment” as rigorously as the experimental model. Any changes in the “internal environment” are bound to affect the experiment as the experiment is “participatory” and not “observational”.

Any scientist must therefore discipline himself to become more and more aware of the internal as well as the external environment. The link between the external and internal environment is the alive body. The body is alive because it breathes. Breath is the connection between the universe and the self. Alterations in breath happen through physical or mental activity. Alterations in breathing patterns can influence mind and body.

The five elements which form the body go from gross to subtle. The elements in the periodic table become more and more unstable with recent heaviest metal having a half life of 1/1000 of a second. A gross interpretation is that matter is unable to contain the energy for longer that 1/1000 of a second and it disintegrates.

It is thought that matter at -273 degrees centigrade will have no intra-atomic movement and the space will appear in its place.

The ability to smell is related to earth element because some molecules have to actually enter the nose and stimulate the nerve endings. If we imagine how this may be actually happening it becomes confusing after certain steps. The molecule enters the nose. The nerves are formed of molecules so is the nerve ending. This molecule touches the molecule in the nerve ending. Molecules are formed of atoms. Atoms have their shells of electrons. Thus what actually touches is the shell of one electron to the shell of another electron. Now even shells are not considered instead “electron clouds” are supposed to be there.

Molecules are supposed to have their own vibrations. This property is made use of in atomic clocks using ammonia molecules. Thus one vibrating molecule meets another vibrating molecule in the above mentioned fashion. Thus one molecule “recognizes” another molecule as of some particular smell. This is true of sense of taste touch. However for vision and sound some molecules emanate vibrations which are electromagnetic in nature in case of vision and in the form of waves in the air in case of sound.

Electromagnetic waves are able to carry sound with them thus audio visual transmissions can take place but taste, touch and smell cannot be transported because actual “earth” element in the form of molecules has to be there for cognition.

Scientific observations are exactly that; ”observations”. Many a times observations are taken as explanations. For example why does the sun look red while setting. It is observed that air scatters the blue element in light. The light of the setting sun passes through lot of air thus all the blue light gets more or less completely scattered and it looks red. Anybody who takes this as an explanation misses that air scatters blue light is an observation and not an explanation. We must immediately start investigating why air scatters blue light. With this investigation we may observe some more fact which needs to be investigated so on and so forth. This line of investigation is infinite. The observations accrued can be integrated with other lines of observations for some fruitful combinations. Thus asking “why” repeatedly leads us deeper into the mysteries of Nature.

Biological sciences have tended to be extremely violent for the answers to question like how the food is digested etc. This is because the objectivity of physical sciences was directly applied to biological sciences with total disregard to the fact that some thing called “life force” is added to all these chemicals, molecules and atoms of physical sciences making the observable object completely different in its behavior vis-à-vis any stimulus from outside. This biological object can generate internal stimuli like pain and pleasure which may totally alter the result of “objective” experiments. Thus were the atrocious experiments conducted in Nazi concentration camps under the name of science.

It would have been easier to observe one’s own organism without being violent to other organisms for experimental observations. Some people have behaved violently with themselves to find out the “source”. Trying to extract some knowledge from the body by being very violent to it.

The organ for the sense of smell, nose, can know only the molecules which have let themselves loose from a given substance. Some molecules do not have any smell. That is although they enter the nose they do not evoke any smell response.

The organ for the sense of taste, tongue, knows the molecules which have let themselves from the substance under consideration, it can know the number, surface, shape and size of the substance and all the senses available to skin.
The organ for the sense of vision, eyes, can understand size, shape, surface, color, distance, number, speed, The organ of touch, skin, can understand surface, size, shape, number, pressure, temperature.

The organ of hearing sound, ears, knows the quality and quantity of sound, the source of that sound, distance of that source, direction.

All the senses can be represented by a straight line except touch, smell and sound where you can be surrounded by them.

Any scientist in the physical sciences uses these senses to observe. He uses logical calculations, inferences, Nobody has as yet seen an atom. All we see are photographs and thus our knowledge about atoms and subatomic particles is inferential and not direct.

The funny part is even if we cognize something with our senses it is still deemed indirect knowledge as the perceiver is utilizing the sense organs to sense it. Thus seen in this light the observations about atoms and subatomic particles is tertiary indirect knowledge.

The research in specifics has to be balanced by research in generalities. The cosmic and the subatomic scales are just two ends of a scale. Finally their realities have to be complimentary. The investigating agency is the human organism which is arguably exactly in the middle. The specializations in various fields are taking the investigators apart from each other at remarkable speed. This is going to make the comprehensive and composite nature of reality difficult to understand.

Any experiments conducted ostensibly to understand the secret of nature must encompass the internal and external, tangible and intangible. Biologists tend to dissect some other body alive or dead or some cells alive or dead. Understanding the function of certain organs as a function of the shape of that organ is almost always impossible. One organ and many animals of same species will show great variations.

The life force endows “individuality” to the atoms and molecules it occupies. No two men or women are alike except uniovular twins and they too differ as far as time and space is taken into account. The investigations into any physical phenomena do not face this problem of individuality. The atoms and molecules in given set of circumstances behave in a specific way even if the experiment is repeated hundreds of times. The same atoms and molecules once endowed with life force behave differently each and every time one conducts the experiment.

The continuous interaction between life forms and the five elements is very interesting. All the five elements continuously pass through the living organism some stay for some time and leave after some time. Food which represents the earth element nourishes the body and leaves in the form of shed cells and products of metabolism. Water leaves the body even faster with sensible and insensible loss in the form of urine and sweat. Air leaves the body even faster. With every breath carbon di oxide leaves the body. Fire element is leaving the body continuously. Its rate changing with activity. The life forms change the space they occupy even at rest through breathing best observed in mammals.

Anytime this passage of elements is obstructed or accelerated the organism suffers.