Human Cosmos - A Complementary Work to Carl Sagan’s 'Cosmos'

In Yogic Psychology there are two ‘nadis’ or energy channels - ida and pingala.

The Human Cosmos, a new book by science writer Jo Marchant, explores in detail how twelve important domains, from mythology to mind, which define us as species, have been shaped deeply by the kaleidoscopic celestial dome.

Throughout the book there is a subtle, even nuanced sense of melancholy over the loss of soulful connectivity that humanity felt with the universe at large.

The very first mythological symbol inspired by the stars, cutting across cultures, from ‘holes pierced into the gourd rattle of a Navajo tribe to a painting on a Siberian shaman’s drum. ... even … in the logo of the Japanese car manufacturer Subaru’ (p. 11) is the group of six dots associated with Pleaides.

Apart from the much-debated topic of astronomical symbolism in Paleolithic art, she also brings in the novel analysis of the works of the archaeologist and statistician Julien d’Huy who employs the phylogenetic tree method of evolutionary biology to the 93 mythemes or myth-components of 47 versions of the Cosmic Hunter Myth – that of the hunter and the stag, which involves constellations like Ursa Major, Orion, Pleaides etc.

He concludes that the basic myth motif, which has also spread to Amerindians as well, originated in the Steppes and originated 15,000 years ago.

Indic Alert: Despite Vedic literature having the most vivid and the longest continuous vibrant living Hunter-Stag element in Rudra, who is shown shooting the arrow at Prajapati, the Vedic aspect is left out both in the book and in the Julien d’Huy paper.

In this connection one should also read The Orion or the antiquity of the Vedas by Lokmanya Tilak and the related passages in Stella Kramrisch’s The Presence of Shiva.

If we accept Julien d’Huy's thesis of the Hunter-Stag astronomical myth coming from the steppes 15,000 years BP, then the fact that the mature Harappans had these iconographic representations well established in their seals (Ref: Pakistan Archaeology – Iss.10-22, 1986, pp. 149-52) creates some problems for the standard IE-migration theory.

Dr. Marchant goes through various aspects of primordial religion and the strands that continue to this day – shamanism, sacred-herbs-induced altered states of consciousness and how all these are intertwined with the vision of the celestial sky.

Then Marchant narrates how we slowly moved away from the close relations to the cycles of nature.

To her, while the hunter-gatherers of the Paleolithic were ‘an integral part of the natural world’, the people of ‘Neolithic revolution … cut those ties and became farmers, controlling and exploiting the land.’ (p.30)

The transition to agriculture creates a shift in the perception of cosmos.

In this context, Göbekli Tepe, the famous temple complex excavated at Turkey is discussed.

To her, it represents the period just before transition to agriculture. She notes two important features: that the human ancestors increasingly replace the animal spirits in the spirit realm; the narrow spaces of the temple structure suggest that they had started creating artificial spaces imitating the caves (pp. 35-36).

If the relation to celestial universe is unproven in Göbekli Tepe, it is the defining feature in the monuments of Neolithic farming communities who built the Stonehenge.

With priests coming up with systematic observations along with the invention of writing, the record keeping of observations also emerged.

Soon, Strassmaier along with Joseph Epping, a Jesuit mathematician whom he got to collaborate with, ended up discovering that the tablets contained rich data on astronomical cycles.

The Zodiac had been invented by the Mesopotamian priests and soon they had also discovered methods to compute planetary cycles and eclipses.

While for us today observing omens is superstitious, then it was more empirical and more in tune with the spirit of science than theorising. After all, did not the obsession that theory should be supreme to facts lead to the suppression of irrational numbers and countless other tragedies in the history of science?

Indic Alert: Prof. Subash Kak’s study of the connection between ancient Indian astronomy and Babylonian is of course another dimension we need to look into.

Astrology was an impetus for astronomy which with scientific revolution became a strong material science. Galileo used to write the horoscopes for his illegitimate daughters (p.59). However, both had to part ways: with astronomy 'making sense of the universe based on objective measurements' and astrology 'emphasising intangible connections and subjective meaning'.

Then she makes an important observation:

With respect to religions, the focus of the book is on the rise of monotheist religions with one extra-cosmic God .

There is a significant observation: the ‘Yahweh-only’ monotheism itself emerged only after the Babylonian sack of Israel, around 550 BCE, that too as a fringe view. It was when the Persians conquered Babylon, they helped Jews rebuild Jerusalem and the sect that resonated with Persian monotheism seemed to have had its ascendancy. Zoroastrianism with its binary view of the universe made its own impact on Judaism.

While Jesus blurred boundaries and identity with the Solar Deity the Mary cult was identifying the mythical virgin mother of God with the moon.

There are other contributions as well – the Egyptian to religious metaphysics; Plato’s concept of soul etc.

Indic Alert: One cannot but think of the possibility of Hindu influence as well. The Vedic Sapta-Rishis to the Puranic Duruva Hindu tradition has a conceptual continuity that could have got into worldview of the writers of the Bible.

The concept of time as it evolves through the European enlightenment era, makes clock building an important civilisational feature.

And it is a poetic mind that first captures and expresses this vision – Dante! In his Paradiso, written in the 14th century, describing his journey through the spheres when reaching the sphere of sun, he ‘compares it to a monastic clock striking the hour for morning prayer.’

In the oceans, as we humans started navigating, the stars were the guides.

Here, Marchant writes in detail about ancient Polynesian voyages. Voyages of the ancient Polynesians have been subjected to considerable debates.

How did they accomplish this without astronomical instruments of navigation?

She says that the Polynesian navigators got trained right from childhood through the creation of ‘complex memory maps using chants, stories and dances, mixed with visual metaphors … as well as religious beliefs’ (p.117).

One important aspect, of their cosmology, is that at the dawn of creation the stars sailed in their canoes to all corners of the sky.

Then she simply points out how Polynesians could navigate millions of square miles without technology but with the help of their sacred song and cosmological myths and senses and instincts.

Indic Alert: Vedic imagery saw the terrestrial and celestial oceans as mirroring each other – the two thighs of Varuna with the stars being the sacred fishes.

Our study of the light through the instruments – light from the sun as well as the stars – have opened up hitherto unknown secrets of the universe and nature. She points out:

Indic Alert: Both Kandinsky and Malevich had significant Hindu influences among other things.

Marchant does mention in some detail the theosophical influences including that of Annie Beasant. However, the Hindu influence is not discussed much.

Malevich was highly influenced by Swami Vivekananda. In fact, while she does not mention it, the Indian-spirituality inspired Russian art movement Amaravella triggered some of humanity’s loftiest space dreams.

The example given here is the observations made by biologist Frank Brown in 1954, which suggested the ability of oysters to be sensitive to lunar gravitation.

The scientists strongly disagreed.

Chronobiology made rapid progress. After detailing this progress, Marchant marshals quite a lot of facts from recent studies that show the influence of moon on various phenomena from eco-systems to possible molecular processes in organisms.

What Brown suggested as a possible mechanism to explain his observations was a ripple effect due to the gravity of the moon on the magnetic field of earth.

This should have sounded even more atrocious back then.

Jürgen Aschoff, the physiologist, one of the co-discoverers of circadian rhythm in humans who considered Brown his rival, had devised an experiment along with physicist Rutger Wever in which the human subjects were put in a bunker shielded from all disturbances and showed that their sleep-wake pattern followed a 24 hour cycle.

One was insulated from electromagnetic interferences as well. Only the subjects in that bunker had 24 hours cycle while electro-magnetically non-insulated bunker subjects followed a cycle of 24.8 hours. Wever published these results.

Despite the heavy criticisms and humiliation from his colleagues Brown stood his ground and his vision was rooted in a view of the universe that was non-dual.

Indic Alert: Marchant points out the relationship between lunar and fertility cycles which had been observed and recorded by Paleolithic artists. And also points to the continuity of the notion prevalent in all cultures of the relation between the moon and the biological phenomena on the earth. Yet it is in Bhagavat Gita that a connectivity between all-pervading Consciousness and this relation has been probably the most clearly stated [BG 15:13].

Today, with the resurfacing of a possible proof of life on Venus, a planet once ruled out as hostile for life, this chapter makes an interesting read.

Indic Alert: Among the world religions the Hindu family of religions, Vedic, Buddhist and Jain in particular, have conceptualised various realms and planets.

One of the most popular epithets for the Goddess used all over India is ‘Aneha Kodi Brahmanda Janani’, She who gives birth to infinite number of universes.

While Arthur C Clark considered discovery of an alien intelligence a ticking time bomb for the geo-centric exclusive monotheisms and Carl Sagan brought out the conflict that such a religion might face in his novel ‘Contact’, the Hindu religions have embraced the possibility of the universe teeming with lives of all forms and each with their own consciousness – all sacred.

Dacher Keltner, a psychologist, in an important work identified awe ‘as the feeling we get when confronted with something vast, that transcends our normal frame of reference and that we struggle to understand’ (p. 233).

Studies have shown that those subjected to the feeling of awe are more ethical and empathetic. They had a vanishing notion of ego-self

She also brings in William James and the variety of expansive experiences of consciousness he had collected not only from religious practitioners but also poets etc. She also mentions the sudden mystic experience that Canadian psychiatrist Richard Maurice Bucke had when he ‘saw that the universe is not composed of dead matter, but is on the contrary, a living Presence’ (p. 237).

Indic alert: It is well known today the love Schrodinger had for the Upanishadic Vedanta.

More importantly, the unity in duality – a substance that conserves itself through generations at the same time producing diversity- could be conceived by him at least partly because of the very similar Vedantic view of life.

Nevertheless, there is an alternative emerging from some of the best minds of science to this highly reductionist view of us and our place in the universe. She cites among others string theorist Brian Greene's book Until the End of Time (2020).

Indic Alert: In this book, Brian Greene mentions about Hinduism. He is very careful with respect to what he considers as the Hindu-Buddhist seeking of a reality beyond the illusions of everyday perception, a characterization that also describes many of the most surprising scientific advances of the last hundred years'.

Two things he mentions here are important for Hindu readers here. One is his conversation with Dalai Lama where the venerable Lama differentiates between science of the matter and science of consciousness - a Dharmic equivalent of Stephen Jay Gould's Non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA).

The other is his encounter with the Ramtha school of enlightenment which was promoting feats like blindfolded reading, blindfolded archery etc.

Today in the field of philosophy also concepts like panpsychism are beginning to emerge in fresh ways. She cites Freya Mathews, ‘a cosmopsychist philosopher of nature’ who uses the metaphor of a great ocean coursed by currents and waves.

Thus, the multiform is real like the waves but the Brahman is the ocean itself. There are conceptual differences between the panpsychism of Freya Mathews and the Vedantic simile but the similarity is nevertheless striking. ('Shankara and Indian Philosophy', N.V.Isaeva, 1992)

In essence, this book is history of science told in a refreshingly different way. It approaches science from a deep psychological perspective and creates space for all creative human interactions with the cosmos, not just scientific but also artistic and spiritual.

It also shows how they are interrelated and inspire each other. Dr. Marchant has shown a new and fascinating way of looking at the evolution of human creativity in general and science in particular.

It is a brilliant book that transcends narrow boundaries of academia. Yet even as Persia and China are mentioned India is bypassed in the grand narrative the book weaves. One hopes the author will be open-minded enough to rectify this deficiency in this path-breaking book.

I started the review intending to write a conventional 750 to a maximum 1,500 words review. But this book is as important and classic a book as Carl Sagan’s Cosmos and is a healthy complementary book to Cosmos, whether the society including the academia at large recognises this or not. Hence this very detailed review.