Sadāpūta: Śrīla Prabhupāda? Is matter generated within a given body, like the body of a human being? While it's living, is matter generated and annihilated within that body during the time of life?
Prabhupāda: Body is matter. Whole body is combination of matter.
Sadāpūta: Right. But does the living entity within or the Supersoul...
Prabhupāda: Yes, within.
Sadāpūta: Does it generate matter, so say the body could get heavier or lighter because of that?
Prabhupāda: Because the living entity is there, matter is generated. Just like a tree, living entity is there, and big log, wood is generated.
Rūpānuga: Like that stone. That stone is increasing it's weight, so when someone goes to see the stone he sees, ah, the stone is bigger and heavier also. So that increased material or matter that makes up the bigger size of the stone, is that matter being generated from the soul?
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Rūpānuga: From the spirit soul. So spirit soul has power...
Prabhupāda: Mattaḥ sarvaṁ pravartate. Similarly, from the spirit soul everything has come out.
Rūpānuga: So spirit soul can create matter.
Prabhupāda: Actually, from life matter is generated.
Rūpānuga: Jaya.
Prabhupāda: Not from matter life is generated. That is wrong.
Sadāpūta: There are some people who have done measurements and...
Prabhupāda: Measurement is there in the Vedic literature, Upaniṣad.
Rūpānuga: Is it that the living entity, when he creates this matter to expand, like the stone is growing, does he manufacture this material from the etheric platform, or does he...
Prabhupāda: According to his desire he can.
Rūpānuga: Simply by desiring.
Prabhupāda: What is that verse? Icchā dveṣaḥ samutthena sarge yānti.
Rūpānuga: There have been some..., modern scientists have done some experiments showing that in the soil there are organisms, micro-organisms and earthworms that can produce chemicals, increasing just simply by their presence.
Prabhupāda: Yes. I have given that example, already he has mentioned.
Rūpānuga: Pasteur?
Prabhupāda: No, no, this lemon.
Rūpānuga: A lemon tree.
Prabhupāda: A lemon tree is producing chemicals.
Sadāpūta: Some people would say the lemon tree was simply taking food and rearranging it.
Prabhupāda: Yes. But the tree is the source, but everything is there in the earth. But God's creation is so nice that through the tree the chemical is coming. The chemical is there in the earth, but the seed of the lemon tree, when it grows, it extracts the particular type of chemical.
Sadāpūta: We were wondering then if also it could produce matter, instead of taking from the earth and rearranging it.
Prabhupāda: No, earth is the source of everything. Sarva-kāma-dughā mahī, you get from... Actually you are getting all chemicals from the earth.
Rūpānuga: So they are already there.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Rūpānuga: Created by Kṛṣṇa.
Prabhupāda: Yes. The driver(?) is there.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: He's trying to mention an experiment in science, there's a man called...
Prabhupāda: That is your duty, mention...
Svarūpa Dāmodara: He tries to show that the living system...
Prabhupāda: No, if we can see practically different seeds are exacting different color, different flavor, different chemicals. Everything is coming from the earth, sarva-kāma-dughā mahī, everything is coming.
Rūpānuga: So the plant...
Prabhupāda: Simply outside arrangement, how to take it.
Rūpānuga: So in other words the tree or the plant in agriculture takes the chemicals from the soil...
Prabhupāda: The seed, as soon as come in touch with the earth, the seed exacts particular chemical and everything from there. This is the arrangement.
Rūpānuga: So that spirit soul in the seed, he is not creating anything; he is taking.
Prabhupāda: Spirit soul, according to his karma, takes shelter of the situation. But the seed, the chemical composition, exacts the desired.
Rūpānuga: All Kṛṣṇa's arrangement.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Hari-śauri: Can the seed do that without the spirit soul being present within the seed?
Prabhupāda: Huh?
Hari-śauri: Can the seed extract anything without the spirit soul being present there?
Prabhupāda: No. Seed is instrumental. Just like you have to do something, you require an instrument. Actually, according to the desire of the living entity, he's given instrument, bhrāmayan sarva-bhūtāni yantrārūḍhāni māyayā (BG 18.61). Yantra. You require something, you require a particular yantra or machine. So seed is practically the machine, and the living entity is using it to satisfy his desires.
Hari-śauri: So that growth of matter, that's the matter is coming from outside, and the spirit soul is simply taking it and expanding his body.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Sadāpūta: Is earth still being manifested from ether? Like the description in Bhāgavatam is from sound and then through different elements finally down to earth. Is that still happening today?
Prabhupāda: Every, always happening. Nature's law is going on.
Sadāpūta: Yes. So what I was wondering, is like earth still being manifested in living bodies from sound and so on, like the chemists...
Prabhupāda: No, no. The process is going on. I've described. That is going on.
Rūpānuga: So the spirit soul is in the seed, and the seed interacts with the other chemicals to make growth. So if the chemicals are not there in the earth, then that seed cannot make those chemicals.
Prabhupāda: No, chemical is there in the earth. According to the seed it is exacted. Just like a chemist will analyze or they separate the ingredient, so much this percentage, so much that percentage, so much that. Everything is there. Similarly within the earth, everything is there. The seed is the instrument and the living entity is the exactor—what is that? Exactor?
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes. He's executor.
Rūpānuga: He takes, utilizes.
Prabhupāda: Utilizer. Bhuṅkte prakṛti-jān guṇān
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Extracts.
Rūpānuga: Extracts from.
Prabhupāda: Extracts.
Rūpānuga: Suppose like now, just like this Vedic injunction against artificial fertilizers in the soil, suppose, as modern farmers are doing, they use this artificial fertilizer and the soil becomes depleted in minerals.
Prabhupāda: That means artificial is the same principle. You are living entity; by artificial fertilizer you are exacting something from the earth, the same principle.
Rūpānuga: Now suppose we take so many chemicals from the earth and they may become a little depleted. Can those chemicals be replaced by the earth itself as the ongoing process of nature?
Prabhupāda: Everything is coming from the earth.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: That is..., Sadāpūta has an interesting point in science itself, that somebody tried to show that in the living body, when life is within matter, the ah, it doesn't follow the conservation of matter. Science, one of the basic principles of science is that...
Prabhupāda: No, no. All the living conditions are there in the matter, provided there is the living being, that's all. Just like a dead body, it is not that the living condition is finished, no. The living conditions are there. That particular soul has left that body. But the dead body is also full of ingredients of living condition. So many germs are coming out when the body is decomposed. You say decomposition, but even in that decomposed condition there is living condition. So the living conditions are already there, matter in any form. So how these rascals say there is no life in the moon planet? That is not possible. The living conditions are always there in the matter. This is the example. Now, a decomposed body, the living being has left, now it is dead matter, but still, the living beings are coming out. How it is? That means matter has always the potency to give shelter to the living entity. So it is impossible that there is no living being in the moon planet. It is bogus. We cannot accept it. Any condition there is provision for the living beings. We see actually, in the earth, in the air, in the water, in the fire, these five elements. Whatever you take, these five elements in different proportions. So the living..., just like from perspiration living entities come out. It is impossible there is no living entities. That is bogus complete. You can challenge like that.