Soul Research
Srīla  Prabhupāda writes a letter to noted cardiologist Dr. Wilfred G. Bigelow: “The central question, you say, is ‘Where is the soul, and where does it come from?’ That is not difficult to understand. . . .”
In 1968, speaking before a gathering of students at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Śrīla Prabhupāda points out an important lag in technological research. “Although you have so many departments of knowledge,” he says, “there is no department aiming to find the difference between a living body and a dead body.”
Although advanced in understanding the mechanical workings of the physical body, modern science gives but little attention to studying the spiritual spark that animates the body. In the  Montreal Gazette  article reproduced below, we find world-famous cardiologist Wilfred G. Bigelow urging systematic research to determine what the soul is and where it comes from. Reproduced next is Śrīla Prabhupāda’s letter in response to Dr. Bigelow’s plea. Śrīla Prabhupāda offers substantial Vedic knowledge on the science of the soul and suggests a practical method for scientifically understanding the spiritual spark.
Gazette Headline:   Heart Surgeon Wants to Know What a Soul Is
WINDSOR—A  world-famous Canadian heart surgeon says he believes the body has a soul which departs at death and theologians ought to try to find out more about it.
Dr. Wilfred G. Bigelow, head of the cardiovascular surgery unit at Toronto General Hospital, said that “as a person who believes there is a soul,” he thought the time had come “to take the mystery out of this and find out what it is.”
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