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SUTRA 5.
69
School, sound would be still heard for aether or äkāśa is present in the vacuous space also.
The view of science is expressed by R.S. Willows in his Text-book of Physics :
"It is a common experience that a source of sound is in a state of vibration. For example, the prongs of a tuning-fork, a bell, the strings of a piano and the air in an organ pipe are all in a state of vibration when they are producing sound." 162
Again he says “Light waves can travel through vacuo but sound waves require a material medium."
We now take up the discussion of another form of pudgala known as karmic matter. It is regarded as a subtle form of matter which is drawn in towards the soul as a result of our desires, passions and other thought activities. It is well-known that our thoughts and deeds affect our character and modify the tendencies of our souls. Therefore karma should be regarded as some form of vital force, for it would be quite illogical to think that the soul could be influenced by something which has no substantiveness. Since force is unthinkable apart from matter, karmic matter has been regarded as the agent through which our thoughts and actions affect the soul.
The existence of karmic matter is partly established by the recent investigations of scientists in America. We reproduce below certain portions of the reports !64 recently presented before the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology:
The activities of mind and matter constituted a super-radio, with the quintillions of living cells sending out their individual waves to be tuned in quadrillions of receiving sets in the brain...... Professor Hallowell Davis of Harvard Medical School described five different kinds of waves that have now been found
162. Text Book of Physics, p. 249. 163. Ibid., p. 261.
164. In the issue of the 'Discovery' (London) for December 1973 the apparatus for measuring brain-waves has been described as a valve amplifier "which is regular during normal thought but erratic if any sudden shock disturbs the mind. Mr. Grey Walters has found it possible with this apparatus to measure the normal and abnormal intensity of thought..."
--Recent Advances in Biophysics by F.W. Britton, D.Sc. Today brain waves are being freely recorded on paper and the record is called encephalogram.
