The
Next Talking Points for Sam’s Saturday Stag – March 22
- Church Without Walls
- Beyond the Physical
- This is a Two Way Cosmic Street
Church Without Walls
I want to take this opportunity because,
in our study of the history of the Judeo/Christian religious tradition, we have
arrived at this Intertestamental period. We have gotten to this idea of
mysticism, or the direct connection that human beings have to absolute reality,
without reference to the institutions that have cropped up around that direct
connection; the idea that we can all access the sacred without the benefit of
stained glass windows.
That does not mean that we shouldn’t
value the institutions and the symbols that have grown up around religion. We
need to honor that, recognize it, respect it, and also have our own personal
connection to the Sacred. It is your personal connection to the Divine that is,
to me, more satisfying and more significant. The two are kind of hard to
separate, one from the other.
We have talked about how community, the
whole idea of community; to get together with other people who are seeking the
Sacred, is part of what all that is about. So I guess you could call what we’re
doing a church, although I would be aghast at the idea. That is why we call
this gathering Church WOW! (With Out Walls)
Beyond the Physical
So what I wanted to do here is to share
with you folks the conclusions of a lifetime. I’ve been working on this stuff
for a long, long time, ever since I was a young boy. People frequently see
seminary as an experience that gets you the training and the education you
need, but that wasn’t the case for me at all. Seminary didn’t answer a pauper’s
part of the questions that I had, and I’ve gone on studying and learning from
that point forward. I was on a quest for ultimate
truth. Seminary gave me particular
truth.
I have joked with folks that I came
into the church through the back door. What I mean by that is that it wasn’t
until I became acquainted with subatomic physics and astrophysics that I was
able to allow, (notice how arrogant that is) a God into “my” universe. I am
more a philosopher, theologian and behavioral scientist than a physicist. I
have no formal training as a physicist, but I am an interested amateur.
In other words, like so many people, it
was in studying God’s creation that God’s face finally showed through for me in
such a way that I could then start looking at, ‘What is the nature of that
which lies beyond the seeable reality?’
Metaphysics is one of the ways of
looking at that. Metaphysics investigates principles of reality transcending
those of any particular science. Cosmology and ontology are traditional
branches of metaphysics.
· Cosmology is the branch of astrophysics that studies the universe as the totality of all phenomena in space and time.
Metaphysics
is concerned with explaining the
fundamental nature of being and the universe. The word metaphysics means ‘beyond
the physical.’ So in many ways metaphysics transcends the physical sciences.
Let me put it this way: At the subatomic level, the physical and the non-physical
are even interchangeable, so we can’t really talk about a physical reality as
opposed to a non-physical reality. I think most of you know that Einstein’s
famous theory, E=mc2, E is energy, M is mass, and c2 is the speed of light
times itself. What that formula represents is that energy and matter are
interchangeable. Another way of looking at it is that matter is just thick
energy, compressed energy, because when you crack a uranium atom, energy is
given off which is non-tangible, so we are converting the tangible into the
non-tangible with nuclear fusion and nuclear fission.
Then there is the reverse of that process,
which is also demonstratable. In a Wilson cloud chamber, (which is a device
that you can build, believe it or not, it’s that simple) a gaseous atmosphere is
created, through which you can see visible contrails - not the particle or the
wave itself - but you can see the condensation of the particle passing through
a Wilson cloud chamber, or the condensation trail of a wave passing through the
Wilson cloud chamber. You can see it with the naked eye. But when you start
looking, sometimes the particle trail turns into a wave trail right in the
middle of the chamber; right in front of your eyes, matter turns into energy. Likewise,
you’ll watch a condensation trail come in on one side as a wave and turn into
energy as it exits. At the subatomic level there is this constant interplay
between the tangible and intangible; between energy and matter.
Now, there is a third element in this
process that has not yet been formulated.
This is what Einstein was talking about
when he spoke of the Unified Field Theory. That, if we have two variables,
energy and matter, which are interchangeable, then what science says about any
kind of variable, is “look for the constant.” There can’t be two variables
without there being a constant which underlies those two variables. I know what
that is. The rest of the scientific world has not yet discovered it.
Let me be honest about what I’m saying
here. This whole conversation is about the degree to which knowledge comes
through revelation. Most of the things I’m going to talk to you about tonight
are things that have been revealed to me. They are not things that I can prove
scientifically.
One of the things that I get annoyed
with scientists about is the phrase “Well, there’s no scientific evidence for
that.” They use that phrase, ‘There’s no scientific evidence for [fill in the
blank],’ to put down speculative thinking. I turn it around the other way,
‘Well if there is no scientific evidence, that only shows how inadequate the
scientists are. Go out there and find some evidence because I know it’s
true. Just because you, Mr. Scientist,
have not yet found evidence to support my hypothesis, does not mean that my
hypothesis is inadequate. Your gathering of scientific information is
inadequate.’ Scientists would not agree. They would say that knowledge through
revelation is not possible. Do you know why they say that? “Because there’s no
scientific evidence….”
So what we’re left with when we start
studying the outer reaches of scientific knowledge, the outer reaches of
astrophysics or subatomic physics, is the conclusion that we’ve got a far more
flexible universe than we think. One of the ways I like to say it is, “Reality
is really there, but then again, it’s just barely there; because it can shift
from one expression of reality to another expression of reality. ” Believe it or not, it
can shift depending upon whether or not you are observing it.
Individual human consciousness (we have
these little consciousness generators up here in our brain) has the ability to
interact with absolute consciousness. Consciousness IS that which underlies all
existence. Consciousness is the constant that underlies the two variables of
energy and matter. We have the ability as sentient beings, self-aware beings,
to interact with that sea of consciousness in which we live, and move and
derive our very being. “Consciousness is the ground of all being” is another
way to think about it.
Now, theologians will talk about that,
philosophers will talk about that, and scientists are beginning to talk about
it. The main reason that they’re not able to quantify or put it into a formula
is that the only thing science has available is finite instruments. You cannot
measure the infinite with finite instruments. So, science is always going to be
‘a day late and a dollar short’ when it comes to understanding the fundamental
nature of reality. They’re not able to do it with a finite scientific paradigm
or finite scientific instruments.
There are some people who overdo
mankind’s ability to influence reality through the manipulation of collective
consciousness. There are those who say that the world really was flat until
people started thinking of it as round. In other words, they’re way over on the
other side of the influence of human consciousness. These are tiny little
influences; this human consciousness that we have. All of us put together can
only slightly influence the outcome of events or reality, as we perceive it. If matter is extremely concentrated (thick)
energy, then energy and matter are concentrated (thick) consciousness to a
degree that is unknowable. Our puny
personal consciousness generators (our brains) are less than a drop in the
ocean. Our collective human
consciousness, what Pierre Teilhard de Chardin called the “noosphere” isn’t a
thimble full in the ocean
of Absolute Being Consciousness .
Don’t get me wrong, we do make a
difference! I think that God actually functions mostly in the area of barely
perceptible phenomenon. That’s where all the really neat stuff happens, where
it’s trembling on the brink anyway. It is the influence of spiritually minded
people that can affect the outcomes that are trembling on the brink of going
one way or the other. Our collective
consciousness has just enough influence to tip the scales of reality. For example, if it is in God’s nature to
sustain life and health, our prayers and healing thoughts will add influence to
what God is doing anyway.
That brings me to the whole idea of
subatomic physics and what that has to do with our understanding of the nature
of God. Essentially, what Heisenberg’s principle of uncertainty says is, “Things
can change location or can change their nature, depending on whether or not
they’re being observed.” What the whole thing boils down to is that all reality
is suspended in many potentialities, unlimited possibilities. And those
unlimited possibilities are all inherent in every moment. When you start
observing that moment, you influence those many infinite possibilities, and the
so-called probability wave, or possibility wave if you want to call it that,
“collapses” - that’s the phrase the physicists use - and the reality manifests.
Of all of the infinite probabilities built into a moment, there are all kinds
of ways the moment could turn out, but your feeding into that probability is
the thing that makes it turn out the way it finally manifests in perceivable
reality. In other words, the universe is visibly living up to our expectations
every moment that we exist. We have an influence on the probability wave collapsing,
and for reality to manifest the way it does.
Our consciousness influences reality as
we experience it to an unknowable degree.
In
thermodynamics for example, a standard mercury-in-glass thermometer must absorb
some thermal energy to record a temperature, and therefore when withdrawn it
changes the temperature of the body which it is measuring. Granted, the influence is small; however, we
know that we do influence reality by measuring it.
There’s a joke based on Heisenberg’s
principle of uncertainty. Here is the joke intended for subatomic scientists:
“You might be a subatomic physicist if you’re afraid to look at your life for
fear the probability wave might collapse and you’re really someone else.” It’s
just a joke to illustrate the idea that if you involve yourself in it, you are
changing the outcome of it. There is no pure experiment! The scientist always affects the outcome of
the experiment he’s working on. There really is no such thing as objective
observation of anything. If we’ve
observed it, we’ve already lost all objectivity. And, of course, you can’t know what’s going
on without observing. Once we become involved, the whole experiment becomes
subjective rather than objective. Not only that, our influence and our
consciousness is affecting the outcome of something, either in the process of
observing it, or in making whatever it is to happen. That is the basic idea
behind Heisenberg’s Principle of Uncertainty.
The idea of things popping in and out
of existence depending on whether or not they are being perceived is a
metaphysical problem more than a century old and predates quantum theory. George Berkeley (March 1685 – 14
January 1753) in the 18th century developed
subjective idealism, a metaphysical theory to respond to these questions,
coined famously as "to be is to be perceived" or “If a tree falls in
the forest and there is no one there to hear it, is there a sound?”.
If you want to see a confident Quantum
Physicist blanch with fear mention the “measurement effect: or the “observer
effect”. Click here if you want a
technical discussion on the Observer Effect. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observer_effect_(physics)
The problem was cleverly solved by
means of a limerick found in Bertrand Russell’s “History of Western Philosophy.
God
in the Quad
By
Ronald Knox
There
was a young man who said, “God
Must
think it exceedingly odd
If
he finds that this tree
Continues
to be
When
there’s no one about in the Quad.”
REPLY
Dear
Sir:
Your
astonishment’s odd:
I
am always about in the Quad.
And
that’s why the tree
Will
continue to be,
Since
observed by
Yours
faithfully,
GOD
Later
developments like Fynman’s (Richard Feynman May 11, 1918 – February 15, 1988) Quantum
electrodynamics (QED)
posit a universe with matter popping in and out of existence even in the vacuum
of outer space.
Now, when you know scientists think
like that, is it really that much of a stretch to think that your own individual
consciousness is influencing events and circumstances to be attracted to your
life? Does your individual consciousness act like a reality magnet, which draws
the circumstances and situations into your life because of the nature of your
consciousness? Is that which we have in our minds, attracting into our lives
the reality that eventually manifests itself? Is it that hard to think that way,
when you know how flexible, how indeterminate, reality really is at the
subatomic level, and how reality is affected by human consciousness and human
interaction with that reality?
Our premise is that our individual
human consciousness can influence absolute consciousness, the ground of all
being. Now let’s just let that one sit there for a minute. For now, we’ll leave
the topic of this kind of indeterminate reality that is subject to all kinds of
influences and subject to different outcomes, depending on our involvement.
This is a Two Way Cosmic Street
Now I want to take on another piece of
information about what goes on at the subatomic level. Absolute Being Consciousness influences our individual human consciousness.
Bunny and I deal with brain science a
lot. It is important for a good therapist to understand brain science - at
least the beginning of it, to know what brain function is, and, for the matter
of diagnosing a patient who might be having a problem, deciding “How we are going
to find a solution for that problem.” If we know brain science, we might find
out that the symptoms that are manifesting from that client might have
something to do with brain function.
For instance, thoughts cause
emotions. Every thought we think releases neuropeptides (emotional chemicals)
that affect every cell in our body. Patterns of thinking cause emotional
patterns. This is what causes most of the emotional problems people have.
Cognitive therapists teach their patients to adopt habits of thinking that make
them happy, healthy, and whole. That is my job. I do it every day with
demonstrable long lasting results.
These emotional chemicals also affect our immune systems and our overall health. Epidemiologists can solidly track specific diseases to specific thinking patterns. So it really is true that we can think ourselves sick or we can think ourselves well.
Other people's thinking can also make us sick or well because of the "empathy" effect. Second hand thoughts can hurt our health just like second hand smoke.
These emotional chemicals also affect our immune systems and our overall health. Epidemiologists can solidly track specific diseases to specific thinking patterns. So it really is true that we can think ourselves sick or we can think ourselves well.
Other people's thinking can also make us sick or well because of the "empathy" effect. Second hand thoughts can hurt our health just like second hand smoke.
But Bunny and I were fascinated enough
with the whole subject of the brain that we went a few steps further, taking it
well beyond what we needed to know about the brain as psychotherapists, and
began looking at it as a phenomenon we simply wanted to study.
The first thing I want you to know about is the so-called
synaptic gap. “Gap” is really a pretty inaccurate word for it, because when you
think of a gap, you think of the Look guys, I want you to understand this; the so-called “gap” is indistinguishable by the naked eye, and only barely distinguishable under an electron microscope. The distance of the so-called synaptic gap is 250 angstroms and smaller. As you know Fahrenheit was a scientist, and when you come up with something good, you get to put your name on it. The angstrom is named after the Swedish physicist Anders Jonas Ångström and is an internationally recognized unit of length equal to 0.1 nanometre or 1 × 10−10 metres. The ångström is often used in the natural sciences for expressing the sizes of atoms, lengths of chemical bonds and the wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation.
Angstrom is a unit of measure that is
used in very small measurements of distance. The place where quantum affect
would begin to happen is down at the smallest level. Most physicists will tell you that there is
one set of rules about how the universe works with things that are bigger than
an atom, and another whole set of principles for how the universe deals with
things that are smaller than an atom. And when we get down to 250 angstroms,
some of these really strange things that happen in the quantum or subatomic
level begin to manifest themselves even though 250 Angstroms is larger than an
atom. For comparison, visible light may
have a wavelength of 4,000 angstroms.
So what I’m saying is that every one of
your brain cells is separated from every other brain cell by a gap that is less
than 250 angstroms. What that means is that, from my point of view, and again
this is one of those things that I know from revelation, the Holy Spirit as an
aspect of Absolute Being Consciousness has the possibility, has the potential,
has the ability, to influence the human mind by hooking up neuron pathways that
otherwise would not be hooked up if the person were left with nothing but the
faculties of their own biological brain with which to hook up those neuron
pathways. That is how God talks to us, which is how peak experiences happen.
Basically what happens with a peak
experience is that a whole bunch of neuron pathways get hooked up, because of
the Holy Spirit quickening the human mind, and we have experiences, insights
and awarenesses that would simply not be
available to us with the normal biological mind.
That is the next thing that I wanted to
make clear; the ability of the Holy Spirit to quicken the minds of humans by influencing
activity at the synaptic gap. So we have God speaking to us, we have us
influencing reality, the underpinnings of which is God, and we’ve got this
interface going on between human beings and the ultimate reality. That spirit
of which we live and breathe and move and derive our very being is not some
static reality to which we are subject; it is a dynamic reality with which we
interact and which we influence. We are
co-creators with God to a greater extent than most of us realize.
Taking it one step further, I want you
to know that it is also the conclusion of my knowledge through revelation that,
when we start talking about peak experiences, these mystical experiences, and
the ability that God has to stimulate the human mind to hook up neuron pathways
that otherwise would not hook up, that this is the basis of all the major religions.
Absolute Being Consciousness affects individual human consciousness. We now
know, I now know, so do you if you believe it, that this is the basis of all
religions. Essentially, it is this God-induced mystical experience that Abraham
Maslow called “the peak experience.”
Someone has a mystical experience, and
they have to share it, they have to do something with it. They’ll write stories
about it that become holy books, they’ll build a temple or a shrine, and if it’s
the kind of revelation that catches on, soon you have other people accepting
that peak experience that you had, and there is now a collective consciousness
surrounding and sustaining that premise. That is what most of us call
“religion.”
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