Advancing Biotechnology, Moral Crossroads and Religion: A Window through Hinduism

Abstract

Today’s world is, technological and market driven. Our moral convictions are exposed to emerging imperatives of scientific promise and commercialisation, threatening our long cherished assumptions of morality. In the prevailing milieu, the concepts of right and wrong have to be interpreted in the context of individual and community perspectives, keeping intact the interests of heterogeneous groups as well as the present and future generations. Diversity needs to be blended with pluralism. At times, it reflects a unique conflict of equity and legitimacy. The roots of orderly human conduct lie in human virtues, which are innate and universal, providing a chaste and candid tool to determine moral content of human pursuits. For centuries, religion has been a bastion of human virtues, opening a divine path of wisdom and orderly conduct. Religion has a unique property of convergence to truth. Religion is thus a profoundly enabling institution providing insights in to phenomena, which lie beyond our knowledge and control. In this paper, I explore the positive reflections as enshrined in the Indian perception, known as Hinduism, a way of life blending spirituality and belief, blessed with unique wisdom and insight, rooted in intrinsic human virtues, having the capability to provide direction and clarity in today’s world of technological turbulence, expanding human personhood, evolving scientific promise and growing moral ambiguity.