Dr. N.L. Kachhara
Biological structures are physical structures composed of organic compounds that form constituent life support systems. The simplest types of structures are amino acids, which form the polymeric building blocks of life. Advances in biology and medical sciences have made it possible to create artificial biological structures like cells, tissues, meat, organs and clones. Some scholars see this as a challenge to the doctrine of karma and hence to the existence of the soul. This is not correct. All of these advancements have in fact been made by the power of the human mind, which is the embodiment of the soul's intelligence. The intelligence of the soul is ingeniously used to manipulate the organizing capacity of pudgala (matter) to create useful artificial biological structures, which otherwise are created naturally by the faculties of the soul in the development of the bodies of organisms. These structures, artificial or natural, are the products of the intelligence of the soul and should not raise any doubt about the existence of the soul or the doctrine of karma. The quality of the structures, however, is dependent on the efficiency of the utilization of the manifested soul intelligence, which is very high in natural processes compared to artificial processes.
Based on the mode of the application of intelligence, we can classify biological structures into the following three categories:
1. Simple structures formed without human intelligence. The amino acids formed spontaneously in the environment under appropriate conditions, as shown by the Miller Urey experiments[1], are structures formed without the application of human intelligence. These are said to be essential conditions for the development of life. These chemical compounds are the result of the organizing capacity of material molecules under specific conditions. This kind of organization of molecules cannot be considered an intelligent act, as it does not require human intervention.
2. Biological structures obtained with the application of the human mind. All of our mental acts are the consequences of the application of a psychical faculty. The human mind is the carrier of psychical intelligence and can be employed in various ways to produce complicated biological structures out of simple structures. These structures are of four kinds:
a. Structures such as nucleic acids and proteins synthesized in a laboratory starting from simple organic compounds. In the limit it is possible to synthesize a cell and produce agglomerates of cells as artificial meat. Producing a synthesized cell has been a long journey for scientists because it requires a high order of intelligence that is not possible in the first attempt; our mind functions in an incremental way, improving a bit each time.
b. Structures produced externally starting from a cell. Living cells, which are part of a body, possess some biological intelligence (of the soul). Starting from this level, more complicated structures can be produced with the application of psychical intelligence. All in vitro stem-cell research falls in this category. With the further application of psychical intelligence, the cells could be assembled to form organs or other parts of the life system. Note that a minimum amount of biological intelligence contained in the stem cell is essential for this purpose; psychical intelligence alone is not enough to produce results.
c. Biological structures produced internally from stem cells. Such structures are produced in vivo by employing stem cells. The structures developed inside a body for the purpose of regeneration or repair has the input of the biological intelligence of the soul in addition to the psychical intelligence of the scientists employed in the process. By this process, stem cells can be used to develop tissues, organs and other parts of body systems in vivo.
d. Cloning. Clones of a particular species have been produced using several techniques. In this process, the cells of the chosen species are placed in a womb (or similar environment) for further development, after necessary modifications. According to Jain philosophy, a soul must enter the object cell to produce the required body structure using its biological intelligence. Note that the soul of the cloned organism is different from the soul of the parent organism, and therefore it will have a different psychical intelligence. It is obvious that as the two souls will have different sets of karma, it is not possible to produce clones with a psychical personality exactly similar to the donor soul.
3. Biological structures produced naturally by biological intelligence alone. These structures are the bodies of organisms produced naturally by the manifested biological intelligence of the soul without any input from psychical intelligence as happens in all normal beings. We find that such natural structures are far superior to artificial structures produced by the application of the human mind. This indicates that the manifested biological intelligence must be of a very high order in comparison to the manifested psychical intelligence, as matijnana and srutijnana of soul, in respect to biological functions. The body structure is maintained in the living state because of the intelligence of the soul. When death occurs, the soul leaves the body, which is then without intelligence. In the absence of intelligence, the structure disintegrates, and the body decomposes.
