In Search of Divine Reality: Science as a Source of Inspiration

Preface

PREFACE In this book I share my conclusions from a lifelong search for evidence—from quantum science—of the existence of a transcendent part of physical reality, combining disciplinary thought from science, philosophy, religion, and ethics. When modern science adopted objectivity and experimental testing as operational principles, the ensuing advances in the physical sciences first clashed with, and then destroyed, the worldview of the ruling religions. A general disorientation resulted and a schism evolved in society, disconnecting the world of facts from the world of values. In a disastrous way the covenant was broken which religious teaching claimed existed between humanity and nature, and it seemed to many that life itself was rendered meaningless in the process. Thus it is an important development that twentieth-century science has discovered—in the quantum phenomena—a part of physical reality which, in contrast to the mechanical world of classical science, has all the attributes of a transcendent reality. Now the foundation of the material world is found to be nonmaterial ; the constituents of real things are found not to be real in the same way as the things that they make; and non-local, faster-than-light influences are found to pervade a universe whose nature is mind-like. Based on these findings the book guides the reader to the proposition that the quantum phenomena make it possible to establish a new covenant—between the human mind and the mind-like background of the universe—one that provides a home again to the homeless and meaning to seemingly pointless life. In this new understanding of the world, the universe must be assumed to have a moral as well as a physical order, and facts and values derive, again, from a single source. In addition to describing the suggested connections, this book will explain, outside of the mathematical context in which they evolved, the scientific concepts relevant for its purpose. Particular attention will be given to the quantum phenomena; that is, the elementary phenomena that are now the domain of quantum 1SCHÄFER_PAGES:SCHÄFER PAGES 4/29/10 11:14 AM Page xv mechanics. To be comprehensible to the educated generalist and layman, any information was included in the appendices that seemed essential, even that which experts in a given field might find rather elementary. The explanatory material presented in this book is not part of its creative effort but builds on the inspiring sources quoted in the list of references—in addition to the historic classics, particularly those by Eccles, Gribbin, Heisenberg, Herbert, Küng, Magee, Margenau, Monod, Polkinghorne, Popper, Russell, and Stapp—masterpieces who have left a lasting impression on this author. Their ideas and statements have served as a framework around which my own ideas and this book were able to evolve. Every author has probably made the shocking discovery that, as the words rushed from the mind easily, at times fragments from other texts inadvertently blended in, studied years ago and long since cleared from active memory. Every possible effort has been made to quote, to the extent that they were remembered, the sources of the material used in this book. However, after teaching a course on the subject for decades, combining personal notes with abstracts from the quoted references, all collected over a large span of my life, I am afraid that the origins of many specific formulations have been lost from memory and cannot be found again. All of them are herewith referenced collectively, and the citations listed at the end of this book are acknowledged as sources in toto and with modesty; they are strongly recommended as continuing reading material. If proper acknowledgment for the use of any material is missing, I would greatly appreciate being informed. Those encountering the phenomena of the quantum world for the first time should be told now that a different person will leave this book than first entered it, because this is meant to be a healing book. The mechanical lawfulness of nature, originally postulated by classical science, now emulated by all the pseudosciences, and mindlessly reiterated by an educational system that tries to be popular rather than instructive, is often depressing to us. The discovery of the quantum world is a liberating experience. Things are not as inescapable as conventional wisdom implies; there is room for the unexpected, for adventure, for what Kundera called the unbearable lightness of being. 1SCHÄFER_PAGES:SCHÄFER PAGES 4/29/10 11:14 AM Page xvi [18.117.183.150] Project...