Choosing Human and Animal Lives
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human society. All societies can take advantage of Vedic knowledge to perfect human life. As pointed out before, human life is not meant for sense gratification, but for understanding God, the universe and our own identity.
From Vedic literatures we can understand that this material world is only a partial manifestation of the complete creation of God. The larger portion of God's creation is found in the spiritual world of the Vaikuṇṭhas. Above and beyond this material nature there is a superior spiritual nature, as Śrī Kṛṣṇa states in  Bhagavad-gītā :
bhūmir āpo 'nalo vāyuḥ khaṁ mano buddhir eva ca ahaṅkāra itīyaṁ me bhinnā prakṛtir aṣṭadhā
apareyam itas tv anyāṁ prakṛtiṁ viddhi me parām jīva-bhūtāṁ mahā-bāho yayedaṁ dhāryate jagat
“Earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intelligence, and false ego—altogether these eight comprise My separated material energies. Besides this inferior nature, O mighty Arjuna, there is a superior energy of Mine which is all living entities who are struggling with material nature and sustaining the universe.” (Bg. 7.4,5)
There are many material universes clustered together, and all these universes constitute the material