Stephen
Hawking
Quest for a Theory of
Everything
The story of his life and
work Kitty Ferguson 1991
Page 95 " A few
physicists like to make a connection between an
observer-dependent universe and some of the ideas in Eastern
mysticism: Hinduism, Buddhism, and Tao-
/
Page 96 /
ism. They get no
encouragement from Hawking, who says "The universe of
Eastern mysticism is an
illusion."
Every one thought
that quite a turn up for the
book.
When they parted
from Brother Reanney they did so with great sadness, knowing
his work was coming to an end. They had talked
well into the night, and, unless you had actually been there
you would never have known the joy of it all. Remember how
they had laughed, oh my goodness me, how they had laughed,
cried their eyes out.
Then he was gone.
Hence the
sadness.
The scribe writ
dog spells god backwards
Page 218
" The father of the
so-called 'Copenhagen interpretation'of quant-um mechanics ,
Niels Bohr speculated as far back as 1958 that key points in
the regulatory mechanisms of the brain might be so
delicately balanced that they could be affected by quantum
me-chanical events. Significantly, eminent brain biologist
John.C.Eccles seems to agree. As Eccles has observed :
If one uses the expressive terminology
the
'ghost' (the quantum mechanical event ) operates a 'machine'
(the brain), not of ropes and pulleys, valves and pipes, but
of microscopic spatio-temporal patterns of activity in
the neuronal net woven by synaptic connexions of ten
thousand million neurones, and even then only by operating
on neurones that are momentarily poised close to
a just-threshold level of
excitability.
This
means that the Y node choices that are almost
evenly
/
Page 219 /
balanced between two
outcomes are most likely to be susceptible to quantum
influences because it is only in these near-equipoise
situations that the quantum flunctuations are the 'feather
on the scale' that tips the balance one way or the
other."
"
Quantum
fluctuations could also express those thoughts that come to
us 'in a flash'or 'out of no where'. I wonder what role, if
any, they play in intuition. It is possible that the neural
centre that 'sees' unity, no matter how much it is
'perfected' by unselfishness, is incapable of determining
when it will have its deeper insights. That may well still
be a matter of complete chance, or, on the above hypothesis,
of quasi-chance and non-causal cross-linkaging. If some Y
node choices were quantum in nature, a profound
and enduring link would be established between the
dynamics of con-sciousness and the structure of
the cosmos itself. It is not in the sense of a
presently available scientific
theory that I intuitively sense a 'rightness'
in Hoyles idea but in the sense of a song of truth, an
insight. It may take science years to formulate such a
concept in a mathematical way that will win
acceptance.
However one
prediction does seem possible now. The con-straints placed
on quantum events by the need to maintain
consistency in
the loop must constitute one of the great ordering
principles of nature. Such an ordering principle could
require a profound modi-fication of the laws of quantum
mechanics which are rooted in and dependent on the
statistical principals of probability and randomness. (It
was this indeterminate character of quantum mechanics that
caused Einstein to complain that God 'did not play dice with
the world'.) To maintain consistency in the loop, many
quantum events could not be random: they would have to be
linked, in the non-local way so characteristic of quantum
mechanics. Could this linkage correspond to (and explain)
the principle of synchronicity formulated by
psychologist Carl Jung and quantum physicist Wolfgang Pauli
and others ? "
The scribe felt
like writing Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
.
Page 219
" Synchronicity
refers to the apparently inexplicable coincidences that crop
up from time to time. We all have experiences of this type.
Page 220
For no apparent
reason you may suddenly think of a friend you have not seen
for years at the very moment
When the phone
rings and you discover he/she has just landed in town and
wants to visit The quantum event that caused you
to think of the person at the very instant he/she was
thinking of you may result from the need to preserve the
internal consistency of a quantum world closed back upon
itself to form a loop of
time.
The
self-consistency concept may also help to explain what
scientists call the anthropic principle. This refers
not just to the coincidences of human life, but to cosmic
coincidences.
"
If the
fundamental constants of physics were readjusted by just a
tiny fraction, the universe would become inhospitable to
life
"
"Physicists from
Paul Dirac to Paul Davies have also pointed
out that the cosmos seems to be sensitively built on a
number of quite amazing coincidences. In particular, the
large number10/40 crops up in some of the most basic
relationships in physics."
"
The letters
and numbers on the left refer to qualities or relation-ships
that have fundamental importance in physics; their meaning
need not concern us - it is the fact that the number
10/40 crops up so regularly in the context of the parameters
which determine the structure of the universe that is so
remarkable.
The anthropic
principle says that all these 'coincidences'create the
special kind of cosmic conditions needed to produce us.
The puzzle this presents dissolves, however if
consciousness inter-
/
Page 221
/
acts with matter by means
of quantum events in the brain because the spacetime loop
can then only maintain its self- consistency by creating and
preserving just those conditions which permit consciousness
to flourish.
Consciousness, in
this context, does not mean the average mode of human
consciousness at this moment in evolution, it means whatever
completed limit consciousness may reach in future time.
The cosmos then emerges as the ultimate feedback loop
and consciousness is a created product of its own antecedent
activity.
This idea has many
similarities to the bootstrap principle formu-lated by
physicist Geoffrey Chew (which defines all basic
constituents of the real world in terms of their mutually
self-consistent relation-ships) It is also a cousin of John
Wheeler's concept of the universe as a 'self-exited circuit'
in which the cosmos comes into being by retroactive
causation, that is by events in the future propagating
backwards in time to cause events in the
past.
This is a very bold,
almost rash speculation and it invites the obvious criticism
from a scientific cynic, 'if these synchronicities which
underpin consistency are real, if they exist they must show
up somewhere as mathematical regularities. OK where are they
?'.
To explore this
issue, we must look at the mathematics of randomness. And up
front, we encounter a suprising
fact.
It is difficult, if
not impossible, to say with confidence that a given number
sequence that appears random in any one context is in fact
random in an absolute sense Most seemingly random numbers
when compared, for example by adding or subtracting, would
give further numbers which themselves would seem to be
random.
However, consider the
sequence 31415926535897
(1)
This passes all
currently-available tests for
randomness.
Now com-pare it with the sequence 20304815424786
(2)
Which also qualifies
as a wholly random number. On the face of it, we
simply have two random numbers. However, if we
subtract the lower sequence (2) from the higher (1), with
the 'wrinkle' that if we get a negative number we add 10 to
the result, we obtain the
sequence 111111111111111
This is strikingly
non-random.These two 'random' numbers thus have a special
property. Heinz Pagels,who gives this example in his book
The Cosmic Code, draws from this illustration a
conclu-
/
Page 222 /
sion that goes to the
heart of my argument about synchronistic cross-linkaging .
He says:
This illustrates that two random sequences can be
correlated-
each is individually chaotic
but, if properly compared by
using
some rule, then a non-random
pattern appears.
As Brother
Reanney continued his tale the scribe looked on in some
amaze though not as mazed as
some
If I am right,
analgous cross-linkages at the quantum level may be the fine
gossamer threads, fragile in themselves, but indestructible
in their collective strength, that hold the cosmos in a
self-consistent loop of
becoming.
Y nodes, choices,
thus emerge as the determinants of the pattern of our
psychological development. Because of them,
we create our own
heaven, our own hell, we create ourselves, we create the
very fabric of the world."
With this discussion
of synchronicity and self- consistency, we have arrived at
the point where we can begin to see the strange
relation-ship between consciousness and the universe,
between the 'thought' within and the 'thing'
without.
We have established
that consciousness cannot be treated sepa-rately from the
'reality' it observes. We can assert this confidently. It is
now a (virtually) unchallengeable maxim of quantum mechanics
that each act of observation
causes the ripple of
possibilities of the quantum wave to 'concretise into
entities with an observable and measureable existence. In
Chapter 9, I postulated that consciousness is that unifying
activity in the brain that 'sees' one in
many.
However,
conscious-ness is not just a passive reciever. By its
choices, it creates unities. Indeed, its very essence is
that it acts as a nodal integrator between the quantum
ripples of possibility that emanate from both past and
future. It is if you like, the reality slit into which
multiple ripples
/
Page 223 /
of possibility enter,
leaving the temporally symmetric quantum world and 'falling'
into the one-way world of matter which decays with
time.
Wolf has summarised this viewpoint
admirably:
Our minds
[i.e. consciousness] are thus tuned
to
multiple realities. The freely associating mind is able to
pass across time barriers, sensing the future and
reap-raising the past. Our minds are time machines, able to
sense the flow of possibility waves from both the past and
the future. In my view, there cannot be anything like
existence without this higher form of quantum reality.
All this sounds
highly abstract, remote from the kind of consciousness you
and I experience now. So let
me
bring the message
closer to home. Think back again to a moment when you
suddenly felt you really understood something you had not
understood before.It may have been a mathematical problem
you had been a mathematical problem you had been wrestling
with for days. Suddenly, after hours of frustration, the
answer was there-complete and perfect.
This is the essence
of insight. Things hitherto separate and unconnected
suddenly 'click together'. The pieces of the jigsaw slide
into place. As I have stressed, this integrative
faculty is the hallmark of consciousness The understanding
that follows a 'Eureka' moment is not a surface
comprehension; it is a 'deep knowing' with you
for life precisely because it is part of a wider multiform
consciousness, of which your mind is but a single unit. In
deep knowing you become part of the self unfolding of the
cosmos.
Think about this in
terms of time.The answer you sought existed prior
to your discovery of it. What happened in your
flash of understanding was that your individual
consciousness suddenly 'caught up'with a truth already
'known'. It tapped into the completed, unitive consciousness
that underpins the closed feedback loop of becoming . What
you experienced was a faint fore-taste of the final act in
the evolution of consciousness, a memory of total
togetherness, when the distinction between observer and
observed vanishes
completely.
One of the founding
fathers of quantum mechanics, Werner Heisenberg, said of his
subject 'The common division of the world into
subject and object, inner world and outer, body and soul, is
no longer adequate'. In saying this he, a scientist
found himself using
/ Page 224 /
the language of
mysticism. Compare Heisenberg's words with those of the
Dominican monk Meister Eckart, 'the knower and the known
are one'. or the words of the Indian philosopher
Krishnamurti, 'consciousness is its content'and '
there is neither the outer nor the inner but only the
whole. The experiencer is the experienced
the thinker
is the thought'.
"
Here then is the
longed -for end of the age old road. Here science and
religion speak with the same voice, each subtending and
validating the other. Here confusion ends and contradictions
cease. All things are
one.
Even the distinction
between the inner and outer, singer and song fades in the
full light of completed
consciousness.
Even now, today,
here, still trapped in time, if we strain our ears to
their limit, we can just hear the strains of that
different music'from the far shore the final chorus
sounding' as Whitman said Awhisper of tomorrow reaching into
today. More than a beacon of hope, more than a promise of
things, a commitment from our higher selves to their lowlier
foundations, a conviction that the creative evolution which
fashioned man from microbe will fashion God from man, no,
has fashioned God from man.From round the closed
arc of time, the time free God speaks to his time trapped
children, who are both his parents and his
heirs.

TIMELESS
EARTH
Peter
Kolosimo
Chapter
NINETEEN
Page / 192
' The Indians say that
thousands of years ago their an-cestors travelled on great
golden discs which were kept airborne by means of sound
vibrations at a certain pitch, produced by continual
hammer-blows. This is not so absurd as it may seem.
Vibrations of a set frequency may have had the effect of
increasing the atomic energy of gold, thus re-ducing the
weight of the disc and enabling it to overcome
gravity.'
'
To quote
Pauwels and Bergier (op. Cit.,p. 197: ' The U.S.
archaeologist Hyatt Verrill spent thirty years investigating
the lost civilizations of Central and South America. . . In
his fine novel, The Bridge of Light, he described a
pre-Incaic city protected by a rocky defile which could only
be crossed by a bridge con-structed of ionized matter which
could be made to appear and diappear at will. Verrill,who
died at the age of eighty, insisted to the last that this
was much more than a legend, and his wife who survives him,
is of the same
opinion.
The Death Of
Forever
A New Future for
Human Consciousness
Darryl Reanney (1995
Edition)
Page 33
" The laws of physics
have no inbuilt time asymmetery.They work just as well in
the future-to-past sense as the past-to-future sense. We
see this clearly when we look at the quantum wave .The wave
is a ripple of possibility, not a real thing It has
neither past nor future;it can be described as travelling
forwards in time and backward in time with equal
validity. This is true not just of the quantum wave.
Subatomic particles exhibit the same disregard for time. "
When the thats
away the how's will play said Zed Aliz to
the scribe .
The scribe writ
simply A cat is said to have nine
lives.
The Elixir And
The Stone
A history of Magic and Alchemy 1998
Michael Baigent And
Richard Leigh
Page 43
" The most famous,
important and influential of Arab
alchem-ists
Jabir ibn
Hayyam was also a Sufi
"
Page
44
"It was in Jabir's
books that the earliest extant text of the Emerald Tablet
appeared, though it is ascribed to much older sources. At
the same time ,Jabir and his circle wrote on a multitude of
other subjects-on mathematics, on magic
,on astrology and astronomy, on medicine, on
mirrors,
"
The Lure and
Romance of Alchemy.
1990
C. J.
S.Thompson
Page 31 / 32
note 1
Julius Ruska ,Tabula
Smaragdini 1926
"A translation from
an Arab collection of commentaries of the early
twelth century known as
"
"The Emerald
Table of Hermes:"
"True
it is, without falsehood certain most true.That which
is
above is like to that
which is below, and that which is below is
like
to that which is
above, to accomplish the miracles of one
thing.
And as in all things
whereby contemplation of one, so in all
things
arose from this one
thing by a single act of
adoption.
The father thereof is
the Sun the mother the
Moon.
The wind carried it
in its womb,the earth is the source
thereof.
It is the father of
all works throughout the
world.
The power thereof is
perfect.
If it be cast on to
earth, it will separate the element
of earth
from that of fire,
the subtle from the gross.
With great sagacity
it doth ascend gently from earth to
heaven.
Again it doth descend
to earth and uniteth in itself from
things superior and
things inferior.
Thus thou wilt
possess the brightness of the world , and
all
obscurity will fly
far from thee.
This thing is the b
fortitude of all strength, for it
over-
cometh every subtle
thing and doth penetrate every solid
substance.
Thus was this world
created.
Hence will there be
marvellous adaptations achieved of
which
the manner is this.
For this reason I am
called Hermes Trismegistus because I hold
three parts of the wisdom of the whole world.
That which I had to
say about the operation of Sol is
completed."

The Lure and Romance
of Alchemy
A history of the
secret link between magic and
science
C. J. S.
Thompson
Page 33
" In the account of
the emerald tablet given by Roger Bacon in the Secretum
Secretorum it is stated that
These precious
sentences of Hermes were found by Galienus Alfachim the
physican, on a plaque of emerald in a cave,clasped in the
hands of the corpse of that mysterious legendary
figure
Hermes
Trismegistus, The Thrice Great" The reader is
exhorted "to preserve the strictest secrecy from
all except men of good will, this treasured text, even as
Hermes himself had hidden it within the cave."
Page 33 /
34
"It may be well to
quote another and freer translation of this historic text;"
I speak not
fictious things, but that which is most certain and
most
True.
What is below is like that which is above , and what is
above
is like that which
is below to accomplish the miracles of
One
Thing. And as all
things were produced by the One Word
of
One Being , so
all things were produced from the One Thing by
adaptation, Its
father is the Sun , its mother the Moon , the wind
carries it in its
belly, its nurse is the earth. It is the father of
all
perfection
throughout the world. The power is vigorous if it
be
changed into
earth. Separate the earth from the the fire , the subtle
from the gross,
acting prudently and with judgement.Ascend
with
the sagacity
from the earth to heaven , and then again descend
to
the earth and
unite together the power of things superior
and
things inferior.
Thus you will obtain the glory of the whole world
and obscurity
will fly far from you.This has more fortitude
than
fortitude
itself,because it conquers every solid thing and
can
penetrate every
solid . Thus was the world formed . Hence
pro-
ceed wonders
which are here established .Therefore I am
called
Hermes
Trismegistus, having three parts of the philosophy of the
whole world.That
which I had to say concerning the operation
of the sun is
completed.
Page
205
"As above, so
below," is an expression which refers to
cosmoses.
Thus spake the
prophet
Gurdjieff.
Page 214
"Now you have some idea
of the laws governing the life of the macrocosmos and have
returned to the earth. Recall to yourself: "as
above, so below" I think that already, without any
further explanation, you will not dispute the statement that
the life of individual man - the microcosmos - is governed
by the same laws - "Glimpses of
Truth."
Thus spake the
prophet
Gurdjieff.
|