人們是不會那麼細心地去看兩者是否是一致。他們只會滿意又熱切地說：「這兩者夠相似了，就隨它們去吧。」佛教徒熱衷於轉變美國人信佛教；急於尋求現代科學與他們受挑釁的信仰相契合的基督徒很高興地說：「對了，對了，兩者相似之處甚近，就這麼說罷。佛教與印度教都講理事的相互依存；萬物皆如一張網一一眾緣和合之物。你看，古代東方宗教早已看到了我們現代的科學。」

這種似是而非的說法跟科學的理論契合得很好，開始為逐漸抬頭的生物學、地質學、物理學以及為維多利亞時代的人所堅持的自以為是的「一如的真理」舖路。他們認為事相的本性、科學與宗教的真理，一定得合而為一。例如，佛教中所提的空和色；生和滅的不二性。一部經上這樣講：「空即是色；色即是空。」兩者互動互應。有一些人說：「聽起來還不錯，可就太深了些。」在愛因斯坦之後，人們在佛教中看到其與尖端物理學觀念有著驚人的相似之處。有些人觀察後說：「喂，你看看那個熱動力原理：能量的守恆定律。能量是不生也不滅的；能與量之間、色與空之間，只是互相轉換而已。」  

這一道理我不細講，但要緊的是許多人聽到佛教與科學之間這種吻合之處都很興奮。雖然一些舊的神學理論在「崇尚科學不惜犧牲一切」的態度之下粉碎了，但是佛教不但沒垮，反而更興盛。不只早期，即使現代的佛教詮釋者也在做這方面的努力。這個領域很有前途，也很有趣，但也充滿困難。  

在這裡我想我得潑點冷水。我不是有意打斷，或是故意拆臺，只是因為我認為我們需要很認真地檢查一下這兩者之間的關係。若是過度簡化地來講，印度教、佛教與現代科學有許多相合之處，但是也有很多相異之處。我們對相同處當了了然，對相異處也當了了然。我現在想對相異之處提提我的看法。我不是頭一個人這樣做的。說來很有趣，鈴木大拙初到美國與卡勒斯共事，他是最為倡導佛教與l科學之間的關連的人之一。如果你看看鈴木的早期作品，那裡面是看不見科學與佛教有什麼區別的。對鈴木來說，佛教非常摩登、進步，且與西方心理|學、哲學上的新發展很相適，換言之，佛教很正確，很合乎科學。

當鈴木在五十年代回到美國時他的論調變了。他寫說他早期與別人如卡勒斯的共同觀點一一宗教必須以科學為根據，而基督教是以神話傳說為依據一一之立論有所謬誤。他說：「我錯了，太天真了。」這是怎麼回事？首先，是因為經過了兩次世界| 大戰，正如現代作家克特﹒奧內咖說：「我們拿那些科學原理去扔到廣島人民的頭上。」身為日本人的鈴木，當然是首當其衝受到現代科學的負面影響。有了這樣的經驗，他對於本世紀初自己在宗教與科學之間所做的理想化的聯姻，自是不再那麼充滿自信了。  

鈴木的話是一種後知之知，但不光是他，別人|也是這樣。在上世紀與本世紀之交，人們都天真地認為所有的知識都近在咫尺，科學就是我們的救星、我們的道、我們的真理、我們的光；宇宙之謎、社會之病，都會在科學之前迎刃而解。科學實際上   已經成為一種新的宗教。事實上卡勒斯稱他的新思!想體系為「科學的宗教」；麥克﹒姆勒稱他的神學理論為「宗教的科學」。1959年鈴木來美國的時候 ，他說：「如果我能再回去與我當時的朋友交談的話，我會告訴他們我現在的思想與我們當時的思想l已經有所不同了。現在我認為宗教完全以科學為基礎是不夠的。我們每個人都有一些神秘成份，不能因著科學而加以抹殺。這是我現在體悟到的。」  

自從1959年鈴木的改變以來，科學與宗教之間的關係，受著更進一步，更深的挑戰。問題分兩方面。第一，社會方面：現代科學帶來的福利及前景， 其在社會心理方面引起的沖激，我們應該重新估l量。我看到最近有一篇文章寫說：「在人類憧憬著科學能夠帶來福利的同時，卻也做著科學所能造成的傷害的噩夢。」這種甜苦交加的認知已成為一種標準的現代心態。正當我們做著科學能為我們帶來 種種美事的同時，我們也做著科學可能帶來可怕的災禍的噩夢。此種愛畏交集之情日甚一日，而非日減一日。確實也應是這樣，隨著科學知識開拓到生物科技或生物工程的領域中，人類對生命的掌控與擺佈已擴及到根本處，細微的基因上了 。我想這個噩夢已經日益成真了。科學家現在所談的是結束進化論，結束創造論。換言之，人類 即將造化之奇由自然界的手中奪取到自己手中，從此自行創造。這使人想起科學發生意外時引起的焦慮，如人所熟知的法蘭肯因斯坦的故事，及日本版科幻小說中的猩猩一一「金剛」。這些「怪物」是哪來的？所有這些都是人類將自己想像中最深的恐懼的具體表現。這都是人類心理上對科學能給我們帶來的褔禍交雜的一種反應；是由恐懼產生出來的，這種恐懼確也有根據。

第二個對科學懷疑之處來自科學界自身，比較微妙，是科學界內部的一種危機。科學正對其自身的基礎及對真理之獨霸有所懷疑。我們正在重新調整我們的模範之中，結果如何尚不得而知 。或跟科學已失去了其在本世紀初的所享有的正面作用有關，特別是在物理學方面；生物學及基因學也有份。有許多新知識都使原有的科學理論及其對事物的瞭解難立住腳。科學，正處於其自己的一種瓦解狀態之中。

在奈爾斯﹒伯爾、海申伯格與阿瑟﹒愛丁頓爵士的突破性的作品之下，隨著第二次世界大戰之後新科學逐漸抬頭之際，古典思想中堅固如磐石的假想終於分崩離析了。這種將主體與觀察者完全隔絕於外而對這個世界做獨立描述的思想，已經不再是那麼理所當然的了。

傳統科學中將「主」、「客」加以明顯區別之特色亦已逝去。例如，海申伯格指出測量過程本身就已在影響測量值。實驗者與受實研者實不可分。如果科學家從本質上改變了事物的性質，那麼對外部世界的解釋也就無法確定了。新物理學中的量子理論，不再精量描述客觀世界，而只是作概量的描述。新物理學探索的只是可能的現象；如此閃爍不定，乃至於無法以一固定模式涵括一切。這種飄忽性取代以前的確定性。

所以這是為什麼!說「我們現在所處的時代是：什麼事都是可能的，沒有一樁事是確定的。」這是我們所稱的『後現代之樂』。 

待續

Most people did not examine very closely the supposed identity of Darwin's evolution and the Buddhist concept of karma; they were content, even eager, to imagine them the same. Buddhists eager to convert Americans to Buddhism, and Christians eager to find some correspondence between modern science and their beleaguered faith were happy enough to say, "Yes, the similarities are close enough; let's let it ride. Buddhism and Hinduism both talk about the interdependence of all noumena and phenomena. Everything is a web---a woven-together thing ... Look, how the ancient Eastern religions anticipated our modern science!"

This facile view accorded nicely with the principles of science that were beginning to map out the interconnectedness between the emerging disciplines of biology, geology, and physics; and the presumed "unity of truth" that Victorians held to so dearly. The very nature of matter and form, the truth of science and religion, must somehow be one and the same, they believed. For example, Buddhism describes the underlying nature of reality as a non-duality of form and emptiness, of creation and destruction. One Sutra states, "Form is emptiness; emptiness is form." They mutually interact and respond to each other. Some people say, "That's too heavy for my little brain to hold, but it sounds good." After Einstein, however, people saw in these Buddhist concepts a view that bore uncanny resemblance to cutting-edge physics. Some observed: "Hey, look at the laws of thermodynamics: the conservation of matter and energy. Nothing's produced; nothing's destroyed. It's just a transformation of mass and energy, form and emptiness."

I am not going to belabor this idea, but the point is that many people got excited about this apparent match-up between Buddhism and science. Where the old theologies crumbled under the juggernaut of science, Buddhism seemed to hold its own, even thrive. The early (and even contemporary) exponents of Buddhism pushed this idea. It remains an area of great promise and interest; but it is not one without difficulties.

It is here that I want to throw a little wrench into the works. I don't do this intentionally to disrupt or debunk, but because I think we need to seriously re-examine this relationship. I would say as a way of overview: there are fascinating correspondences between Hinduism and Buddhism and modern science; and there are also important differences. And we need to be aware of the differences as well as the correspondences.  

Let me reflect a little bit on the differences. I am not the first to do this. Interestingly, D.T. Suzuki who came to the U.S. and worked with Paul Carus, was one of the most outspoken advocates of the link between Buddhism and science. If you look at Suzuki's early writings, you will see that he virtually makes no distinction whatsoever between Buddhism and science. For Suzuki, Buddhism was eminently modern and progressive, compatible with the latest discoveries in Western psychology and philosophy. It was, in a word, scientifically sound.

When Suzuki returned to the United States, however, in the 1950's, he had experienced a change of heart. He then wrote that his early modern agreement with people like Carus-that religion must be based on scientific grounds and that Christianity was based on too much mythology-was a little ill-founded. "I was wrong; a little too naive." What had changed? First of all, two world wars. As Kurt Vonnegut, a contemporary writer has said, "We took scientific truth and dropped it on the people of Hiroshima." Suzuki was of course Japanese; he felt directly the negative weight of modern science. Having come from that experience, he was now less sanguine about this idyllic marriage with religion and science that he had heralded at the turn of the century.

Suzuki was enjoying the wisdom of hindsight; but in fairness to Suzuki, so were many other people. At the turn-of-thecentury, people naively believed that everything that could be known was right around the corner, and that science was our salvation; our way, truth, and light. Soon all the riddles of the universe and the ills of society would yield to science. Science was, in fact, for all practical purposes, the new religion. In fact, Carus called his new system of thought ''the Religion of Science," and Max Muller called his new theology "the Science of Religion." Well, Suzuki came back to America in 1959 and said, "If I could talk to my friends back around the turn of the century, I would tell them that my ideas have changed from theirs somewhat. I now think that a religion based totally on science is not enough. There are certain mythological elements in every one of us that cannot be altogether lost in favor of science. This is a conviction I have come to."  

Since Suzuki's turnabout in 1959, there has been even further, deeper challenges to this relationship. Questions have arisen in two areas. One, as a society we have come to reassess the blessings and the promise of modern science in terms of the socio-psychological impact. I was just reading an article lately that pointed out that while people are still mesmerized by science and dream about what science can do for them, they also have nightmares about what science can do to them. This bittersweet realization is by now a standard fixture in the contemporary psyche: we have these dreams about all the wonderful things science is going to do for us; at the same time we have nightmares about the horrible prospects of what science could do to us. This concern, this ambivalence is growing; not becoming less. And for good reason. I think it's becoming even more pronounced today due to the entry of scientific knowledge into what we call biotechnology or bio-engineering the actual manipulation of life at the subtle and primary level of genes. Scientists now talk of the end of evolution, the end of creation, in the sense that humans will soon take over nature and direct the course of creation. This brings to mind of course the anxieties over science-gone-wrong evoked in such popular motifs like the Frankenstein story, or the Japanese version in science fiction movies like Godzilla or King Kong. Where do these "monsters" come from? They come from the human imagination's attempt to give form to some of humanity's deepest fears. These are all responses of the human psyche to this mixed blessing/curse of what science has in store for us. They are born of fear, and perhaps rightly so.  

The second area of doubt regarding modern science comes from within the scientific community itself. This phenomenon is a little more subtle and has to do with an internal shift or even crisis that is going on within science, as it starts to question its own foundations and exclusive claims to truth. We are in the midst of perhaps a major paradigm shift, the outcome of which still remains unclear. It has to do with the loss of positivistic certainty that science enjoyed at the turn of the century. Especially in the areas of physics, and increasingly in biology and genetics, a growing body of knowledge is beginning to strain existing models of explanation and understanding. Science is going through its own kind of deconstruction, to use another overworked word like "paradigm."

With the ground-breaking work of Niels Bohr, Heisenberg, and Sir Arthur Eddington, the rock-solid presupposition central to that classical thought crumbled under the new science that started to emerge in the post World War II era. The idea of achieving descriptions of a world independent of the means by which it was investigated, was no longer taken for granted.  

The observer and the observed could not be presumed as separate and distinct. Gone, too, is the neat subject/object distinction that had come to define classical science. For example, Heisenberg pointed out that the very act of measurement interfered with what one was attempting to measure. You cannot separate the subject from the object of the experiment. So if the scientist changes the very nature of the truth, then that external world is really up for grabs. Now we have the new physics with quantum theory, which is no longer describing "reality." It is describing probable realities. The new physics looks for possible realities, and they are so elusive that no one model can exhaustively account for everything. The indeterminancy of models has replaced earlier certainties. Thus, it grows increasingly difficult to believe in an external world governed by mechanisms that science discloses once and for all.  

Thoughtful people find themselves with this very up-in-the-air kind of feeling regarding the most basic facts of life. Thus it is now said that "we live in an age when anything is possible and nothing is certain." This is what we call the "post-modern delight."  

~ To be continued