Why ISRO scientists don’t find visiting temples antithetical to scientific temperament

In the run up to the launch of Chandrayaan-3, a team of scientists from Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) visited the Tirupati Venkatachalapathy temple in Andhra Pradesh. They also took a miniature model of Chandrayaan-3 with them. This was not the first time the scientists from ISRO visited a temple before the launch.As expected a section of influencers and media personalities ridiculed the scientists accusing them of being irrational and abandoning their belief in science in favour of the unknown. Such ridicule has happened before and is likely to happen again in the future, as ISRO scientists will probably visit temples before major missions, and people will continue to ridicule them for doing so.One can argue that a scientist visiting a temple is an irrational behaviour and science alone should be paramount. Religious elements are regressive and fit for ridicule. These reactions, like many other ‘progressive’ ideas trace their origins in the Western world. The soft power of the West, especially the US, influences the rest of the world, propagating Western ideas as the only truth in the third world. The same influence contributes to the ridicule of anything religious. But why does the West harbour such strong opposition to religion? To understand the ridicule of ISRO scientists, we first need to delve into the Western thought process behind the ridicule of religion.In the year 325 CE, the Roman emperor Constantine supported the first council of Nicaea, which was called to settle theological disputes between various Christian groups. It also devised a way to separate the celebration of Easter from the Jewish calendar. This was the time when many Christian theological issues were being settled. Shortly afterwards in the year 382 CE, the Council of Rome was held, which provided a list of ‘authentic’ Christian texts and rejected many texts as ‘false’. This standardised the Bible as Christians know it today.With the standardisation of the Bible many unscientific concepts like the flat earth theory, geocentrism and creation of earth ~6000 years ago, became part of the gospels. Any scientific find which contradicted the gospels was considered heresy and was fit for punishment. Suppression of science eventually pushed Europe in the Dark Ages.With scientific advancements and knowledge transfer from the East, the Europeans rediscovered many things. Spherical nature of earth and a heliocentric model of the universe became accepted in the scientific communities. Then in the year 1610 (ten years after the formation of the East India Company), Church charged Galileo with heresy. His crime was to propose that earth and other planets revolve around the sun. Galileo’s proposal was in direct contravention of the Biblical fact, where earth was the centre of universe and sun revolved around earth. He was tried and sentenced to house imprisonment for life. Copernicus’ work on the heliocentric model was banned by the Church.It was such blatant oppression and persecution of science and scientists that the West started to ridicule the Church and by extension Christianity. The rational minds started questioning the Christian dogma and the authority of the Church over the lives of Christians. The Church continued to oppose scientific finds and refused to accept scientific facts. It took the Church 350 years to accept Galileo was right.It was natural for the Western rationalists to reject the Church as an unscientific institution and public opinion was shaped by the irrational past of the Church. Naturally religious practices were seen as a subject fit for ridicule. The Church after all was in a perpetual war with science. But is the same thing true for India?From texts and archaeology, we know that science and religion in India were never opposed to each other. In fact, people depended a great deal on science to practice their religion. From building the altars to finding the right time to perform a ritual, the people depended on astronomers and their astronomical tables. Imagine having to build a square altar and then a circular one with the same area as that of the square altar. This could only be possible if one knew the value of Pi. Then comes the right time or the muhurta to perform the ritual. The position of nakshatras, the time of the day, the day of the month, planetary positions, etc. have to be calculated to arrive at the right time. All this requires knowledge of astronomy.Unlike in the West where science was considered heresy, Indians promoted it so that they can perform the rituals with utmost precision. So, when astronomers described how an eclipse is a result of planetary motion and not some mysterious cosmic act, they were not prosecuted and sentenced to house arrest. Their work was reviewed by their peers, much like in the modern times. Some peers agreed with the hypothesis while others refuted it, like people do in a civilised society.Time keeping and by extension the entire science of astronomy was crucial for performing the rituals. The astronomers who improved their understanding of planetary motion and came up with some amazing discoveries like diameter of earth and moon, the sine values to calculate planetary motion, were regarded as great scientists. Their work was followed by others who then wrote commentaries on them and improved upon the old findings.Today we have apps to find out the auspicious time or the muhurata for a ritual. We have the reference of the Gregorian calendar with fixed dates to know on what date Diwali will be celebrated. Now imagine a time when the Gregorian calendar was unknown and people only had the traditional Vikram Era calendar. With a complex system of missing tithis or tithis spilling over to the next day, adding the leap month, calculating the eclipse date and time, knowing the duration of nakshatras and many other astronomical events would have been a full-time job. Those keeping track of the calendar and the astronomy associated with it were no less than scientists themselves.In this background, is it strange that an ISRO scientist is comfortable visiting a temple and doesn’t find themselves in conflict with their scientific beliefs? The comfort doesn’t come from being religious, but it comes knowing the fact that their religion and science are not two opposing forces. They know that by accepting one they don’t have to reject the other. They know this because for them both are complementary, both serve each other, both are at ease with each other.The writer is a business consultant by profession and a history enthusiast by passion. He has published a book on ancient Indian history titled Essays on Indic History. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News,India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.