Toward Scientific Cosmologies in Africa

Cosmology is the quantitative study and analysis of the universe in its totality, including humanity's place in it. Recently, physics and astrophysics have come to play a central role in shaping cosmology by bringing observations and mathematical tools to analyze the universe as a whole. Modern cosmology is the understanding of the universe through scientific observation and experiment. From its violent beginnings to its various speculative ends, scientists believe that the history of the universe is governed entirely by physical laws, which can be mathematized.

The study of the universe has a long history involving science, philosophy, esotericism and religion.  Science has reconstructed the universe -its age, form, size, frontier and beginning- many times, particularly during the last 500 years.  With these reconstructions, science has often entered into conflict with many religions, notably the Abrahamic religions, which rely on pre-scientific or pre-modern narratives, mythologies, superstitions, prejudices and faiths to characterize the universe, including its origin and destiny.

The importance of cosmologies for reaching modernity cannot be over-emphasized.  Modernity is governed by modern or scientific cosmologies.  This is an area where science can deliver the greatest bang for scientific progress in Africa.  No modernity can be revealed with mythological cosmologies based on faith or ancestors’ stories.  In modernity, faith is replaced by the scientific method and static cosmologies are replaced by living or evolving cosmologies.

To which extent do pre-scientific, divine, dualistic (this world and the ‘other’ world), immutable, extra-empirical, fractured, fallacious or traditional cosmologies that guide the understanding and influence how most Africans perceive the African reality contribute to a 'scientifically- castrated' and divided Africa?  To which extent are pre-scientific cosmologies responsible for the current state of affairs in the African region?

Traditional African cosmologies could grow into unifying modern empirical (observed) cosmologies, thus bridging or narrowing important regional divides and facilitating regional integration – an essential cornerstone for accessing modernity.

Modern times have sometimes been referred to as the “Golden Age of Cosmology”. Indeed, there is no possibility of reaching modernity without embracing this golden age.  It cannot be by-passed or leapfrogged.