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By Root 705 0

atoms. Each had a different shape, allowing them to fit together neatly to build large objects. So, iron was made of one type of atom, water of another, human flesh of another, and so on. They thought atoms possessed the properties of their real-world substances – water atoms were slippery, while metal ones were shaped so that they locked together to produce very hard substances. We now know that this is not only wrong, but a gross overcomplication. While their hypothesis correctly stated that the world is made from smaller pieces, you don’t need an infinite number of atom types to build the complexity around us. A human is made of the same stuff as a rock; a fish of the same stuff as the Earth; the sky of the same stuff as the oceans. Enumerating the basic building blocks and understanding how they fit together is the province of the science of particle physics, and this quest continues at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, in Geneva.

By early 2011, we had discovered that the Universe is composed of twelve basic building blocks, only three of which are required to build everything on our planet, including our bodies. These three components, known as the up and down quarks and the electron, can be assembled into the more familiar protons and neutrons – two up quarks and a down quark make a proton, and two down quarks and an up make up a neutron. In turn, the protons, neutrons and electrons make up the chemical elements – ninety-four of which are known to occur naturally – including the basic chemical elements hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, iron, gold and silver

THE CYCLE OF LIFE

Fifteen miles northeast of the Nepalese capital city of Kathmandu, three small streams come together to mark the beginning of one of the holiest rivers in the world. At its source the Bagmati is a fast-running mountain stream, but by the time it winds through the Kathmandu valley and enters the great city of the Himalayas it has become a wide and majestic river.

In the eastern part of the city, where the river’s mythical power is at its greatest, stands the fifth-century Pashupatinath Temple, one of the most sacred sites in the Hindu world. Pilgrims come from all over India and Nepal to worship there and pay their respects to the god Shiva.

I have always found the Hindu faith fascinating; it is rich and complex, a disorientating mix of mythology and philosophy, a continual and jagged juxtaposition of temples, holy sites, rituals and everyday life that produces a joyful assault on the senses. Pashupatinath is no exception. It is at once vibrant and ethereal, a place where the colours and noise of India meet the gentle philosophy of Tibet and the hybrid dissolves into the crystal-clear, high Himalayan air in the smoke of a thousand burning bodies on the funeral pyres lit at this holy place. The scent of burning flesh mixes with incense and tinkling bells, and the sound of chanting Monkey Gods continually interrupts the calls of market traders.

A central tenet of Hindu philosophy is the concept of the Trimurti – the triad of the three fundamental aspects of the Supreme Being, represented as the great gods Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. Lord Brahma is the creator of the Universe, Lord Vishnu the preserver, and Lord Shiva the destroyer. Shiva represents darkness, as an angry god who will eventually bring an end to Earth, yet in Hinduism this destruction is seen as an essential part of the cycle of life, because in order for new things to be created, the old order must first be destroyed. Shiva is therefore also a regenerative or reproductive power, part of the endless cycle of death and rebirth that is central to the Hindu belief system. This is why the Pashupatinath Temple and the river it stands beside are revered as places to die.

The Bagmati River is lined with funeral pyres burning the bodies of the deceased.

For Hindus, the passing of a loved one is a stage in the endless cycle of death and rebirth that is central to their beliefs. Cremations are a familiar sight along the holy Bagmati River; the body is dipped in the river three times before