Science: A Double-edged Sword
Science is a double-edged sword. It cuts both ways. It gives, but it also takes away. On the one hand, it points us towards a greater reality. Ever since Fritjof Capra’s The Tao of Physics appeared in the mid-1970s, there have been books that draw striking parallels between the realities described by the new physics and those described by mystics. Both speak about interconnectedness, wholeness and the “dance of energy”. On the other hand, science is blocking the way to that greater reality. This is because science, as currently understood and practised, has limited itself to knowledge of the physical. To be fair, there are good historical reasons for this. When scientists discovered more accurate ways of observing and measuring physical phenomena, it was only a short step from being able to observe and measure physical things to believing that if something was not physically measurable or quantifiable, it was not really important, or might not even exist. A whole range of human experience, including the intuitional and non-physical, was relegated to the status of the doubtful or non-existent.
While it is true that some scientists have tried to take science beyond reductionism, and into holism, science as a whole remains firmly rooted in the physical. It continues to claim that physical reality is the only reality. This is a very powerful belief and it has led a lot of people to believe that the universe began for no apparent reason, that life evolved by chance on this planet, that there is no intrinsic meaning to life except to survive, propagate and enjoy, and that we have no existence before conception and after death. If this is what people really believe, it is little wonder that there is so much existential anxiety in the world and that so many people are drawn to beliefs and lifestyles that promise more meaning. That said, I want to be clear that there is nothing wrong with science as such. Knowledge of the physical aspects of the world, and the technology that flows from this, will always be useful. The problem is that scientists focus only on the physical aspects of the universe and the human being, while believing that they are focusing on all possible aspects. So long as we continue to believe that physical reality is the only reality, our knowledge about who we really are, where we came from and why we are here, will remain partial.
It was because I had long-standing concerns about the limitations of science, and about where this was taking us, that in 2016 I initiated a project that came to be known as the Galileo Commission. It was given this name because I felt we were living in a “Galileo moment”, a moment when some of our core beliefs about the nature of the world and the human being are changing fundamentally, just as some core beliefs changed in Galileo’s time.
My colleagues David Lorimer, Richard Irwin and I wanted to communicate our belief that, despite the many benefits it brings, science is both limited and limiting. It is limited, in the sense that it limits itself to the exploration and explanation of certain aspects of the world and the human being — the physical aspects. These are evidently important aspects, but they are not the only ones. We and the world also have non-physical aspects, which we are just beginning to discover and explore. At present, these aspects are beyond the scope of science. At the same time, science is limiting because it has persuaded many people, including the mainstream institutions of academia, government and the media that the physical aspects are the only possible aspects, and that any experiences or phenomena that suggest otherwise should either be ignored or will eventually be shown to be physical in nature.
As a consequence of its exclusive focus on the physical, science today seems unwilling or unable to accommodate a whole range of important topics and questions, including:
The paranormal, such as telepathy, precognition and near-death experiences
Unusual states of consciousness, such as the ability to perceive non-physical (“spiritual”) aspects of the world and the human being
Inherent purpose in the universe
Non-local connections, i.e. instantaneous connection regardless of distance and with no apparent physical cause
Consciousness beyond the brain
The real nature and implications of spiritual and mystical experience
To express the situation more formally, science remains a relatively limited form of exploration for two main reasons: its core assumptions (its ontology); and what it counts as evidence (its epistemology). This probably needs a little explanation.
Its ontology is based primarily on its core assumption of separateness — this is the assumption that the observer is separate from the observed; that man is separate from nature; that mind is separate from matter; and that science is separate from spirituality. This assumption flies in the face of our personal experience of being intimately connected to each other and to the world. It also flies in the face of the many advances in systems thinking, which suggests that everything influences, and is influenced by, everything else
Its epistemology is based on its almost exclusive reliance on physical sense perception, i.e. our five senses and extensions to these senses, such as telescopes and microscopes. Other forms of direct experience tend to be excluded or devalued. It is because science limits itself to exploring the physical aspects of the world and the human being that it gives us an incomplete and one-sided picture of what the world is and who we are. This is important, because this picture represents the “truth” for many people, whereas the truth is almost certainly much richer and larger.
Just to be clear, I am not particularly interested in scientists studying consciousness. Many are already engaged in that activity. I am interested in very conscious people doing science! It seems clear to me that science will break out of the strait-jacket in which it finds itself only when scientists themselves become more conscious. This will happen only when they work regularly and systematically on developing their consciousness. Ideally, they would work on their inner senses. Only then would they be equipped to explore those aspects and the world and the human being that are currently beyond the scope of science. Conscious scientists, with the full use of their inner senses, would revolutionise our understanding of the nature of the world and the human being. That, in turn, would precipitate a paradigm shift that we can only barely imagine.
If we learned how to go beyond the physical, we would see that there is much more to the world and to human beings than science is telling us. If we were to widen and deepen the range of human faculties in the pursuit of knowledge, knowledge itself would widen and deepen accordingly. Were our pursuit of knowledge to widen and deepen, our fundamental beliefs about the nature and history of the universe and ourselves would be transformed. It is our fundamental beliefs that inform much that we do in life — our economics, our politics, our education, our culture, our relationships, our purpose, our lifestyle, and so much more.
We have spent a lot of time developing those forms of experiencing and understanding that have their roots in our physical senses. This is why science is such an advanced form of knowledge within its own terms. It has given us a lot to be grateful for. However, while acknowledging our continuing debt to science and scientists, we must also be prepared to address the negative side of the equation. We are paying an increasingly high price for the fact that we have allowed a partial view of the world to dominate our understanding, our values and our behaviour. Civilisation is now based largely on materialistic values, with all that this implies. It is not as if we can look to our political leaders for guidance. They seek to inspire us with a vision of low inflation, low interest rates, more cash in our pockets, and eternal material growth, as if these were the only things we really wanted out of life. Such a vision bears very little relation to our deeper nature. We are so much more than mere machines for producing and consuming goods and services.
If there is to be a fundamental transformation of our values, there must first be a transformation of the beliefs that underpin these values. Until our basic beliefs about the nature of the human being and the world change, there is unlikely to be a deep transformation in society as a whole. If our beliefs, knowledge and understanding remain limited because we have limited ourselves to certain forms of perception and experience, would it not be a good idea to develop and use other forms of perception and experience, and thus gain access to other aspects of the world and ourselves? That would surely herald a significant advance in human knowledge, and would almost certainly transform our core beliefs about what is true and what is possible.
Author - Chris Thomson