A body never evolves. It is the soul within the body–he evolves, transmigrates from one body to another.

Bushy Science: Darwin and more missing links

Elevation or degeneration

HAYAGRIVA: This is Darwin. Darwin's conception of evolution rests on the contention that there is a real genetic change from generation to generation. In other words, Darwin rejects the platonic igos. Igos is the Greek for idea, type or essence. There is no human igos, human type or essence. There are no fixed species. This is in contradistinction to the platonic idea that the species exist in essence or, as Krishna says in Bhagavad-gita, bijam, "I am the seed of all existences." Darwin would not recognize any bijam, or seed, particular type for any species. Rather, he sees shifting, evolving physical forms constantly changing.

PRABHUPADA: The different forms are already there. Just like the form of monkeys also there, the form of man is also there, other animals, other birds, beasts. So he has no clear conception how the evolution is taking place, neither he has any idea about whose evolution. He simply takes account of the body. A body never evolves. It is the soul within the body–he evolves, transmigrates from one body to another. Just we see that a child becomes a boy. The..., if the child is dead, it no more evolves. So it is the soul that is concerned. The soul is within the body, and he desires and evolves. That is Vedic conception and that is life. For example, if a man is within an apartment, the man desires to change the apartment to another apartment, it does not mean that the apartment evolves, but the man desires a change, and he goes to different apartment. That is the idea. So Darwin has no such conception. He has described the idea of evolution from the Vedas in his own way.

HAYAGRIVA: At first Darwin was a Christian, but his faith in the existence of a personal God dwindled, and he finally wrote, "The whole subject" — that is the subject of religion, or God — "is beyond the scope of man's intellect. The mystery of the beginning of things is insoluble by us, and I for one must be content to remain an agnostic. I have steadily endeavored to keep my mind free, so as to give up any hypothesis, however much beloved, as soon as facts are shown to be opposed to it." So he didn't argue against Plato or Descartes or Kant or any other philosopher, but he simply presented what evidence he had amassed during a five..., only a five-year voyage, on a British freighter, oh, from 1831 to 1836. But what is considered important is that his book, The Origin of Species, marks what they call the emancipation of science from philosophy.

PRABHUPADA: What is that, emancipation?

HAYAGRIVA: That is to say he simply presented what material he found — that is the fossils. He investigated certain life forms on these island during this trip and theorized about evolution.

PRABHUPADA: That is philosophic; that is not scientific. He found something and he based his thesis on that. He cannot find out all the bodies, because there are, at the end, some section, some sect they burn the body. So how he can get information of their body, burned? So his theory is not at all scientific. It is always defective.

HAYAGRIVA: He spent the rest of his life writing about the material he gathered during this five-year voyage, which is a very short time. And according to his theory of natural selection, the best and the fittest survived. If this is the case, the race will necessarily steadily improve.

PRABHUPADA: What does he mean by survive? What is the meaning of his dictionary, "survive"? Nobody survives. HAYAGRIVA: Well, by that he means that the strong pass on their hereditary characteristics to their offspring, and that the race..., no individual survives, but that the race improves. But isn't this contradicted by the Vedas? In the present Kali-yuga... For instance, Arjuna's physical powers, prowess, was much greater, and that was, what, five thousand years ago. So isn't, instead of improving, instead of the race improving in strength and other qualities, isn't it actually...

PRABHUPADA: They are degrading.

HAYAGRIVA: ...degenerating. What is the cause of man's physical, mental and spiritual deterioration in the succeeding yugas?

PRABHUPADA: That is education. Every individual person, he is a soul, and he has got a particular type of body. Especially in the human body he requires education. What is this animal and what is higher than human race, these are Vedic description. So there are 8,400,000 different forms of life, and the body is being evolved. The body is machine, and the individual soul desires and he gets a suitable body made by material nature under the order of God. This is Vedic idea, as it is said in the Bhagavad-gita, ishvarah sarva-bhutanam hrid-deshe arjuna tishthati [Bg. 18.61]. God is existing within the core of everyone's heart, and the individual soul is desiring something, and upon the order God he is given a machine made by material nature. So this is evolution, and even a man, although he is human form of body, he can again degenerate to animal form of body according to his desire. Tatha dehantara-praptih [Bg. 2.13]. He has to change the body, and the body is changed according to his work and desire. In the animal kingdom they have also desires, but they are under the laws of nature changing body, and one is given the chance to become a human being, and then he may desire, and according to his desires he gets the next body. If he likes, he can go higher forms of life, and if he degenerates he goes lower form of life.

HAYAGRIVA: But as the yugas progress, the human body itself, doesn't it become more degraded?

PRABHUPADA: What do you mean by degraded? He has got human body, but by his work and by his desire he can get next life a demigod's body or a dog's body. That will depend on his activities. Human body is meant for understanding God and act accordingly to go back to home, back to Godhead. But if he does not utilize this human form of body properly, if he remains on the platform of animal propensities and degenerates, then he goes..., he can become next life a dog, a cat. There are two things: elevation or degeneration.

HAYAGRIVA: In The Descent of Man Darwin writes, "The belief in God has often been advanced as not only the greatest but the most complete of all the distinctions between man and the lower animals. It is, however, impossible to maintain that this belief is instinctive in man. The idea of a universal and beneficent creator does not seem to arise in the mind of man until he has been elevated by long, continued culture."

PRABHUPADA: Yes. The culture is important. If he gets the chance of cultured association, then he elevates. That is explained in the Bhagavad-gita: yanti deva-vrata devan [Bg. 9.25]. If he, according to his cultural life, he can go to the higher planetary system, he can remain where he is, he can degrade, and he can go back to home, back to Godhead. Therefore culture is very important in human form of life.

HAYAGRIVA: He further writes, "He who believes in the advancement of man from some low organized form will naturally ask, 'How does this bear on the belief in the immortality of the soul?' " He says, "At what precise period does a man become an immortal being?" That is to say, he doesn't know at what stage the immortal soul inhabits the species.

PRABHUPADA: Yes, soul is always important. He is put into different bodies. That is the defect of Darwin's knowledge. He does not know about the soul. So the existence of soul, to understand this is the first education. One who does not know this, he remains animal, sa eva go-kharah [Srimad-Bhagavatam 10.84.13], if one continues the bodily concept of life without any understanding of the soul. And it is very easy to understand that the child is becoming boy, a boy is becoming young man. So the soul is there, and we remember that "I was a child, I was a boy, I was a young man." So I continue to exist, the bodily changes, and this is confirmed in every Vedic scripture, and that is the beginning of knowledge. If one does not understand how the soul is changing body, he remains on the level of cats and dogs.

HAYAGRIVA: He does..., he says he doesn't know at what point the soul enters, but the soul is in anything that moves. Is that correct?

PRABHUPADA: Hm?

HAYAGRIVA: Even a...

PRABHUPADA: The soul moves.

HAYAGRIVA: ...bacteria for instance, or an ant.

PRABHUPADA: So ant moves because there is soul; the bacteria moves there because there is soul. Similarly, the man moves because there is soul. An animal moves because there is soul.

HAYAGRIVA: And every soul is immortal.

PRABHUPADA: Yes.