B.HEMA KUMAR

At the very centre of Auroville one finds the 'soul of the city', the Matrimandir, situated in a large open area called 'Peace', from where the future township will radiate outwards. The atmosphere is quiet and charged, and the area beautiful, even though at present large parts of it are still under construction. As yet incomplete, the Matrimandir emerges as a large golden sphere which seems to be rising out of the earth, symbolising the birth of a new consciousness seeking to manifest. Its slow and steady progress towards completion is followed by many. While walking through the lovely green Matrimandir Gardens with their great variety of flowers, shrubs and trees, one's attention is greatly drawn by this important and powerful feature at the heart of the city which was seen by the Mother as the "symbol of the Divine's answer to man's aspiration for perfection" and as "the central cohesive force" for the growth of Auroville. Evolutionary...

Intuition and science are not mutually exclusive. They are about synthesis. One way of thinking about these is to imagine putting discovery or invention into a test tube and analyzing it. Each would yield intuition and science. Well-known true stories about intuition and science, though, demonstrate that they often occupy different points on the timeline. Eli Howe, the inventor of the sewing machine, needed to figure out a better place to put the eye of the needle than in the middle of it. It took years to do it, but one night he dreamed he had been threatened with death by a group of people carrying spears. The spears were shaped like the needles, but they had holes near the spear blades. Immediately, he made a model of this new version of the needle, and then used the model to create a sewing machine that worked well. In a dream, Einstein was sledding with friends at night. His sled starting going faster and faster, and he knew in the dream that it was going about the speed of light...

It is said that Knowledge is Power. All knowledge is based upon experience. Inferential knowledge, the knowledge in which we go from less to more general or from the general to the particular, has experience as its basis. In acquiring knowledge we make use of generalization, and generalization is based upon observation. We first observe facts, then generalize, and then draw conclusions or principles. Similarly, in science, people easily find the truth, because it appeals to the particular experiences of every human being. The scientist does not tell anyone to believe in anything, but he has certain results, which comes from his observations and experiences, and on the basis of these observations and experiences, he asks people to believe him. In every science there is a basis which is common to all humanity, so that one can at once see the truth or fallacy of the conclusions drawn from there. It is comparatively easy to observe facts in the external world, for many instruments have bee...