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WHAT
A FALLING STONE MEANS?
The laws of physics
are mathematical expressions of how the universe operates
The laws of physics are
mathematical expressions of how the universe operates. The events taking place
in the universe and the relations between them and the laws ‘governing’ the
universe have drawn the attention of people from ancient times.
Scientists have tried to
explain whatever takes place in the universe, such as the movements of heavenly
objects, tides and the floating of ships on the water. However, according to
the thinkers of ancient Greece, scientists had to concentrate on man himself,
rather than on the natural world. They believed that natural phenomena and the
laws governing them could be explained through mental operations like deduction
and analogical reasoning. The Quran calls the attention of human beings to
the Divine manifestations on creatures such as the honeybee, ant, gnat and
spider, and invites them to reflect on and study phenomena like the movement of
air, the alternation of day and night and the seasons, and the movements of
heavenly bodies.
The importance the Quran
gives to the study of natural events inspired Muslim scientists to undertake
investigations using observation and the experimental method-long before these
came into use in Europe.
How did science pass
to Europe?
Science passed to Europe
through the two centuries of the Crusades, through the universities in al-Andalus
and Sicily and the translations made there from Arabic. This was the main
factor behind the Renaissance in Europe. Building on (without ever openly
acknowledging) the works of Muslim scientists, Western scientists led the way
to the birth of modern science. Until correct conclusions were reached about
phenomena through observation and experimental methods, the assertions of the
ancient Greek philosophers had been accepted as the basic laws of nature. For
example, it had been asserted as true without question from the time of
Aristotle that the speed of an object’s falling is proportionate to its
weight. However, the experiments done by Galileo and Newton proved this to be
false. Those experiments showed that-so long as the resistance of air is
negligible in proportion to the weight of the object and its vertical
cross-sectional area-the unhindered movement of an object on the earth is not
dependent on its mass. This means that objects of different weight dropped from
the same point reach earth at the same time. Such developments in physics led
scientists to approve observation and experiment as a basic rule in
establishing natural facts. It was the job of scientists to try to discover the
laws and basic truths prevalent in the universe through observation and
experiment-empirical methods- while it was the task of philosophers to reflect
on and comment on them. In other words, in order to have true conclusions about
the universe and the events taking place in it, we had to discard all of our
preconceptions about them and study nature through empirical methods and then
comment on the natural events and the relations between them.
To have a clearer
understanding of modern science
In order to have a
clearer understanding of modern science and what it can give us of truth about
the universe, let us consider the law of general gravity, which is an
undeniably established scientific fact:
Various observations and
experiments have shown that any two objects attract each other or exert force
upon each other proportionately to their masses and in inverse proportion to
the square of the distance between them.
The force of attraction
or gravity is the force which is in effect in events such as the falling of an
object and the revolving of the earth around the sun. Science presents gravity
as if it were the cause of such events. However, what we call the force of
gravitation is only a notion which we use to explain those events. That is,
there is an attraction observed between objects. In order to explain this
attraction, we give it a name like the law or force of gravitation and then
think that we have explained the event of attraction.
Science does not know
the nature of what it calls the force of gravitation but, starting from the
assertion that we have already successfully explained many events whose causes
were unknown in the past, claims that it will be explained in the future.
Nevertheless, science is unable to explain the real cause of all the events in
the universe. What science in fact does is, starting from the recurrence of an
event under the same conditions, to make a generalization and call it a law.
Then it proceeds to assert that the same event will take place again and again
under the same conditions. For example, after observing the falling of objects
thrown into the air, it makes a generalization that all objects thrown into the
air fall, and then expresses this event of falling by a mathematical formula.
It can serve as a simple
example to see how science works to calculate and state beforehand how long it
takes for an object thrown into the air with a certain force and at a certain
angle to fall and at what distance it falls. Since events take place in a
cause-and-effect series, knowing what effect or event will take place in the
next step does not require understanding why it takes place in that way.
Therefore, although we suppose that the law of gravity will be understood as,
say, dependent on an exchange between certain particles or the obliquity of
spatial time, it will nevertheless remain unexplained through scientific
methods why such an exchange takes place or why the spatial time becomes
oblique and why that exchange or obliquity occurs according to certain
mathematical formulations and thereby objects attract each other. In addition
to the fact that why objects attract each other remains unknown, it is also a
mystery (and a wonder) that this event of attraction takes place according to a
mathematical formula. Because of our familiarity with the events taking place
in nature, we ignore the important fact that every thing, every event in nature
is a miracle. In order to see why the event of gravitation is a dazzling
miracle, we should consider it more closely:
How does the law of
gravity work and what does it mean?
As an example to
understand the law of gravity, let us consider the falling of a stone dropped
(and then allowed to fall unhindered) from a certain high point. Left
unhindered, that stone will realize a certain trajectory as the result of
gravity affecting it. It will move faster and faster and finally hit the
ground. How the stone will accelerate, how long it will take it to reach the
ground and how it will move at every second of its trajectory depends on the
stone’s distance from the center of the earth, the mass of the earth and the
constant of gravity. This means that the stone does not move at random, rather
each of its movements during its fall is calculable by mathematical formulas.
This is an extremely regular movement. From this we inevitably conclude that if
the stone does this movement of falling by itself, without an agent directing
or determining its trajectory, then the stone must know accurately the constant
of gravity, the mass of the earth and its distance from the center of the earth
at each moment of its trajectory and then move in conformity with that
knowledge. Whoever has a bit of intelligence will not attribute to the stone
itself such a trajectory, simple in appearance but extremely complex in
reality. Indeed, the falling of a stone is so complex a movement that during it
all the objects in the universe, every thing with a certain mass, exerts on it
certain force of attraction and the stone moves under the influence of all
those forces. (Here we do not consider other essential forces such as the
electro-magnetic and nuclear ones, which have determining effect on the
movement of things. Expressed, again, with certain mathematical formulas, these
forces make the movements in the universe even more complex.) That is, in order
to determine its trajectory, the stone must know the exact distance between
itself and each of about 1080 particles in the universe, calculate accurately
at each moment of its trajectory the force of the attraction exerted on it by
each of those particles according to the mathematical formula of gravity-a
force which changes every moment-and focus all those forces to a single point
in consideration of the direction of each. Let alone a stone, even the most
advanced computer the size of the universe could not accomplish that. For the
position of each of the particles with respect to the stone changes at every
moment during its fall. Thus, the simplest-seeming movement in the universe
like the falling of a stone requires comprehensive knowledge and mastery of an
infinite number of interrelated processes.
Any event taking
place in any part of the universe has connection with each of the particles
in the universe and the whole of the universe itself
Since any event taking
place in any part of the universe has connection with each of the particles in
the universe and the whole of the universe itself, only one who has perfect
knowledge of each of those particles and the universe as a whole, one who sees
the whole of the universe with each particle in it, can determine and direct
all the movements in the universe. Also, since the law of gravity and all the
other physical laws are the same and have the same uniformity throughout the
whole of the universe, the one who makes these laws operative in the whole of
the universe must be an absolutely powerful one, who dominates each and every
thing therein. Otherwise, each atom in the universe must have an eye seeing the
whole of the universe at the same time, know the position, mass, electrical
charge, in short, all the physical features, of each particle in the universe,
be aware of all the physical laws and obey the laws itself originated.
Every event and every
thing in the universe is interrelated to every other and whatever takes place
in the universe takes place according to certain laws. Therefore, it is
impossible for even the smallest, most insignificant-seeming event to take
place without one with an absolute, perfect knowledge of the universe with all
its particles and an absolute power governing it. Said Nursi expresses this
fact as follows:
If the existence and
operation of the universe is not attributed to God Almighty; then it requires
admitting that each particle has the attributes of the Necessarily Existent
Being, and that each particle should both dominate and be dominated by all
other particles. Again, each particle should have an all-encompassing will and
knowledge, for the existence of a single thing is dependent on all things and
one who does not own the universe cannot rule a single particle.
After explaining how
complex a phenomenon gravitation is, we can go a little further to see the real
cause of that phenomenon. The relation sensed between the fall of a stone and
the rotation of the moon around the world in a fixed orbit led Newton to
discover the law of gravity. Ever since this law received a general welcome,
the cause of the falling down of an object thrown into the air has
unquestionably been accepted as gravity. However, it is not necessary that the
real cause of this movement is the force of the attraction of the earth or the
existence of another material cause.
Consider this:
Let us imagine some
animate beings living on a two-dimensional table. These living beings are aware
of only the table on which they live and completely unaware of the
three-dimensional world around them. Someone from the three-dimensional world
fires at the table in equal frequencies and makes holes at equal distance from
each other. Seeing the holes at equal distances, the animate beings living
completely unaware of the three-dimensional world will inevitably conclude that
each hole causes another one to be made. Whereas it is some other firing from
the outside world who made the holes.
What do we know about
the reality of causality?
This is how the
scientists attributing every thing and event in the universe to the law of
causality think about the working of the universe. It is questionable whether
the attraction of an object toward another near it (for example, the attraction
of a falling stone toward the ground) is because of the objects themselves or
there is some other source forcing the objects to such a movement. (The event
of attraction is the simplest of the events occurring in the universe. You may
consider how a honeybee makes honey or a cow gives milk, events which contain a
much greater number of physical interactions, chemical reactions and cause and
effect.) In short, since the movement of an object according to the law of
gravity is one each moment of which is mathematically described and requires as
many masses and distances as the articles in the universe and the distances
among them to be known in their mutual, complex relations, there must be One
Who is the All-Knowing. This One must also have an absolute will to choose and
assign for each event a law out of innumerable ones. The uniformity of the law,
that is, all the laws being prevalent throughout the universe, calls for the
unity of that All-Knowing and All-Willing One, and the obedience of all things,
small or great, to those laws demonstrate that that One is also the
All-Powerful. Again, the unchangeability or stability of the laws and the
magnificent, unchanging order and harmony of the universe show that that One is
Self-Subsistent and the All-Subsisting. That means it is that All-Knowing,
All-Willing, All-Powerful, Self-Subsistent and All-Subsisting, Single One Who
causes a stone to fall. For no one and nothing in the universe has the
knowledge, will and power absolutely necessary for the falling of a stone.
Every thing and event in the universe is too complex and magnificent for any
material cause to bring it about. There is then no way for man other than to
admit and recognize the existence and Unity of God.
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