Sunday, 24 July 2022

The Scientific Edge - Book Review

Padma Bhushan and UNESCO’s Kalinga Award awardee, Prof. Dr. Shri. Jayant V. Narlikar, an eminent Cosmologist, Scientist, Professor, Writer, Visionary and Founder Director of Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai has made his landmark achievement, by putting his thoughts in words and made it available to the lay man with this book. Before making any remarks on his book, I would like to mention how fortunate we are to get his thoughts in the form of a book. He has authored several books in both fiction and non-fiction categories in English, Hindi as well as Marathi languages.

Over here, I am going to write about the book that I just finished reading, “the Scientific Edge”, published by Penguin Random House India Books, well published in 2003 i.e., two decades back. The book is an excellent collection of thoughts about science from Vedic to early 21st century.

The book is divided into three categories namely: (i) India’s Science in a Historical Context; (ii) Learning to Live in the Age of Science; and (iii) The future of Science in India.

The book begins with, the Science in India through ancient times and dates to the era, while Science was an important aspect of life for Indians. The author has given enormous, elaborate quotes and examples from the ancient texts and manuscripts while discussing this section. There are quotes from Bhagwat Gita, Vedas, Samhitas and many more. While reading these pages it gives a lucid picture of authors insight through these texts. And the way he has reviewed through, gets the reader on toes as he reveals his thoughts one after the other. He has also stated that in the past Indians were passing the legacy of knowledge via oral methods and thus, lack of written documents lags India behind in claiming the legacy of the same. Further, most texts are written in poetic or literary form rather than pellucid phrases, which causes ambiguity while outlining the meaning of the same.

In the next section, the author has critically discussed about the hurdles that has impeded progress in science over the ages in India along with pointing out on the serious misconceptions that has been seeded regarding what belongs to India and what has been inherited from the west, along with how science fiction and superstitions has overruled the real essence of science. He has asserted many instances on how other civilizations flourished during the contemporary times in comparison to India and vice-versa at other times. In these chapters he has advocated for the Britishers and other foreign invaders for making India achieve a few milestones during the era in science. He has also given instances on how science always evolves on needs of mankind, rather than just curiosity.

In the last section of the book, the author discusses about the current scenario of science in India as compared to globe. I would like to accord here that despite the book is written a couple of decades back, most of the hurdles are still as prevalent as then and few of them has been even worse. However, not being a book spoiler over here, I won’t mention any of the author’s key thoughts and I believe as Prof. Narlikar has left, and I too will leave the end thought about the book as open ended and will welcome thoughts from people who have either already read the book or will after reading the review. Additionally, too few as a disclaimer I will mention that this book might look anti-religion, but one must understand and even as author tries to put Science and Religion can’t go hand in hand and while reading a book on science one must be incredibly open minded.  

PS: This is my first ever blog on Book Review and I know that being an amateur in review as well as blog writing and this isn’t great. But I am open to all the suggestions about my writing skills, so please do mention them in the comments. Also, please mention the thoughts on books and authors in the comments section too.

Link to purchase the book via Amazon: https://www.amazon.in/Scientific-Edge-Indian-Scientist-Modern/dp/0143030280

Book Cover Page Picture Courtesy: Amazon India

J. V. Narlikar's Image Courtesy: Getty Images 

3 comments:

  1. A well written book review. Gives a bird's eye view of what to expect from the book and is informative. In future book reviews it will be better if you can take some key portions and put in your own interpretations. It will give you more satisfaction. All the best.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much sir for your suggestion. I will try to implement it in my next review.

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  2. Very well written. Each your another effort will enhance your skills to write more and write better. Keep it up

    ReplyDelete

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