A MANUAL OF "KHSHNOOM" - Traditional Zoroastrianism: Tenets of ...

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great scientists of our century, says, after describing some of the
stratling discoveries of the Atomic Physics :-
"It means that we have been aiming at a false ideal of a
complete description of the world. There has not yet been time to
make serious search for a new epistemology adapted to these
conditions. It has become doubtful whether it will ever be possible
to construct a physical world solely out of the knowable, the
guiding principle in our macroscopic theories. If it is possible, it
involves a great upheaval_ of the present foundations. It seems
more likely that we must be content to admit a mixture of the
knowable and unknowable. This means a denial of determinism,
because the data required for a prediction of the future will include
the unknowable elements of the past. I think it was Heisenberg
who said: the question whether from a complete knowledge of the
past we can predict the future does not arise, because a complete
knowledge of the past involves a self-contradiction'.
"It is only through a quantum action that the outside world can
interact with ourselves and knowledge of it can reach our minds. A
quantum action may be the means of revealing to us some fact
about Nature, but simultaneously a fresh unknown is implanted in
the womb of Time. An addition to knowledge is won at the
expense of an addition to ignorance. It is hard to empty the well of
Truth with a leaky bucket".
"Nature of the Physical World" by
Sir Arthur Eddington
This is not the-place to explain in details the quantum of
action. It is a ghost which has walked into physics at the beginning
of our century and has since then baffled it. It has indicated in no
uncertain terms that it is not possible for ordinary man to go
beyond a certain limit in the quest of nature. In his very art of
looking at nature, he disturbs it and is unable to know how was the
undisturbed nature!
The mystery of the quantum of action is not yet solved. There
are explanations, of course, but each goes on confounding the
mystery. I quote here from another science writer: -
"In the evolution of scientific thought, one fact has become
impressively clear : there is no mystery of the physical world
which does not point to a mystery beyond itself. All highroads of
the intellect, all byways of theory and conjecture lead ultimately to
an abyss that human ingenuity can never span. For man is
enchained by the very condition of his being, his finiteness and
involvement in nature. The farther he extends his horizons, the
more vividly he recognizes the fact that, as the physicist Niels Bohr
puts it, 'we are both spectators and actors in the great