Erwin Schrodinger has been called the father of quantum theory. In 1933 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics for "the discovery of new productive forms of atomic theory." He said, "The subject and the object are one. It does not mean that the dimension separating the two has crumbled with the recent findings in physics. Why this is so is because the dimension never existed in the first place."
I have often thought how insignificant we human beings really are. We have about as much chance of understanding our universe and beyond as did our prehistoric ancestors in understanding a GPS System.
In addition to our relative primitive state of development, we are further hindered by a variety of afflictions that we acquire on our own such as greed, jealously, hate, attachments and cravings. Included in this array of afflictions is our false sense of our true “self” or “ego” embodied in “I”, “me”. We are all conditioned from birth to hear our parents tell us and anyone else who will listen how cute or smart we are. In school we are told how smart we are or how athletically talented we are or just how cool we are. If we go into the military we are told how noble, elite and brave we are and when we go to college we are told how intellectually superior we are. If we can’t first conquer these personal afflictions, how can we ever hope to conquer our universe and beyond.
Often times when someone experiences one of the inevitable sufferings of life they say “Why me?”. Well another question might be “Why not you?”. We seem to see ourselves as special and immune to the sufferings of life that are experienced by others. This all relates to a sense of a false ego or self as used with the “I”, “me”, “my” way of thinking. When you are able to see yourself and things around you as they really are including the impermanence of "everything", you will not be as surprised by what life offers. Ironically, the people most susceptible to this are the rich and famous including celebrities, politicians because they have been additionally conditioned to believe that they are immune from the reality of life’s impermanence. One of the best books I have read on the concept of "Self" and "I" is "How to see yourself as you really are" by his Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama.
As we go through life, there is always someone we can look down on to regain that all important feeling of "self" and superiority regardless of our station in life. We are constantly inundated with media content telling us that unless you are rich, beautiful and of the right political party or religious faith, you simply can not be part of that all important superior class of human beings. This of course causes people to strive for an even greater false sense of who they are.
Our current stage of development is so primitive that, we are currently little more than a single cell organism in our development. We talk about “the universe” as though there is only one universe. Our universe is probably about as unique and significant as a drop of water in the ocean.
Everything we think we know is dictated by our five corporal senses of sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste. Of course our physical brain is the receptor of impulses from these five senses. Depending on your particular belief you may consider as Descartes did that there is a sixth sense known as the mind/sole. He went on to say that the mind/sole does not die with the physical body. Of course the 14th Dalai Lama recently said the mind is dependent on the physical brain. This is consistent with the Buddhist belief of non-duality. However, we know that the “mind” perceives thoughts that never entered the brain through any of the five corporal senses. In fact, Descartes said in the 15th century that he could “prove’ the existence off “God” because of the existence of the “mind” and it’s ability to “perceive God” in addition to the existence of the physical “brain”. Of course at the same time he was applying for a grant from the queen to continue his work who just happened to be of the same opinion.
As an example of the limitations of our brain and five senses all we have to do is go outside on any clear and sunny day and look up at the sky and enjoy the “clear” blue sky. Of course the sky is not clear and empty as our five senses tell us. It’s actually full of gases, radio, television, and microwave signals and even sounds that we can not hear unless they are in a specific frequency. So we are constantly surrounded by activity that we can not perceive because our “receiver” has only evolved to a limited capacity. The fact that we can’t perceive these things doesn’t mean they are not there, it simply means that we are not able to perceive them with our five corporal senses. In another example you can think of flying in an aircraft and looking around the cabin, you would say you are surrounded by empty air. Yet if there were an explosive decompression, that same air would instantly turn to a “condensed” fog that is clearly visible and filling the air. The water vapor was always there but it wasn’t visible until acted on by the decompression.
Everything we see and touch with the use of our five corporal senses is much like the “condensed” fog in the airplane. The only difference is the amount of condensing that takes place in the object. As an example, scientist say we are not really solid bodies but rather a combination of compressed atoms. If you talk to a quantum physicist, he will tell you that if you take one cell out of your body and keep cutting it in two until you get down to an atom and then keep cutting that in two you will simply get down to a positive and negative electrical charge or energy. So in effect we and everything around us are nothing more than a mass of tightly compressed electrical energy. If you were to blow up a building the atoms of the building are not gone but rather simply not visible to us and could easily be restored if the event could be played in reverse as in the case of a video. The fact that we no longer see the electrical energy of the atoms that make up the building doe not mean that the electrical energy is not there.
There was a case a few years ago when a person drowned in a frozen lake and it took several hours to recover his body. Of course he had stopped breathing and his heart had stopped and by the time they got him to the hospital he was so frozen that they could not insert lines in his body. Not only was he frozen with no heart beat or breathing, they were unable to detect any brain activity. In effect, he was brain dead. After several hours they were gradually able to thaw him out to the point they could warm him up with a heart lung machine and ultimately bring him back to life. So in this instance not only was he perceived as dead by using the physical senses of the doctor, but he was also brain dead without a detection of any “electrical energy” in the brain using state of the art equipment.
The concept of everything being broken down into simple “electrical energy” as explained by quantum physics is not new to Chinese people thousands of years ago who would have called the positive and negative (+ -) charges of the sub-atomic particles simply as “Yin and Yang”. In other words it simply explains the duality of “everything”. The duality of everything includes everything from the positive and negative of the sub-atomic particles to things we see in everyday life like “hot and cold”, “good and bad”, “off and on” “sick and healthy” etc. In other words you can’t have one without the other. Buddhist believe in “cause and effect” and not some magical power controlling events. Buddhist are trained to transcend the dualistic concept, to understand things in totality or in "oneness". In Buddhism this concept of "oneness" is explained as a part of "Right Understanding". In other words while there is duality, it comes together to form a "oneness" and not just "this or that", win or lose", or "either or". In the 1940s, the German scientist were the first to prove a scientific connection between smoking and lung cancer. As the Buddhist would say, if you smoke and get lung cancer don’t blame the cigarettes because it’s cause and effect or yin and yang. A wise person once said, "if your head hurts stop hitting it with a hammer and see if that helps". In other words if you’re in a situation that is causing some harm, get out of it and see if that helps.
Current science fiction talks about the ability to transport people from one point to another. Studies in Quantum Teleportation have only scratched the surface of future possibilities. In reality, this will be a common day activity in the future as proven by the fact that we can conceive it with the current development of our conscious mind. In other words if we and everything else are composed of essentially compressed electrical energy, it no great leap to envision a future ability to transmit that electrical energy via laser at the speed of light to any point on earth and beyond. According to Einstein, nothing can be faster than the speed of light (186,000 miles per second) but of course that is subject to change.
What is exciting are the concepts that our minds are currently not capable of grasping which will include concepts far beyond the current concept of physics. As we evolve, we will come to see other dimensions and probably realize that people and things we though were long gone are all around us in another dimension in the form of a currently undetectable electrical energy as in the case of the frozen drowning victim mentioned earlier who had no signs of electrical energy in his brain yet came back to tell them of his trip even though scientifically, he had a brain incapable of thinking or feeling anything.
Of course, all of our "perceptions" are "relative". While you read this you are probably sitting still at your computer but you are not motionless. In fact you and everything around you is spinning at around 1,000 miles per hour as the earth rotates while at the same time traveling around the sun at 67,000 miles per hour. In a "relatively" short time ago you would have been burned alive at the stake by the church for suggesting this fact.
If you believe in reincarnation you have to believe in “duality” which means that the mind/soul is separate from the brain so that when the body and brain die, the mind/soul still remains somewhere. This also was the point that Rene Descartes tried to make in proving the mind/soul was separate from the brain and was therefore proof of God. He said our ability to perceive God is something we acquire through the mind/soul and not through our five corporal senses. Not all Buddhist believe in a physical reincarnation and rebirth but rather an “awakening” of the mind here and now.
If we can't even agree on how we got here, how can we hope to agree on where we are going.
"We don't know one millionth of 1 % about anything."
Thomas Edison
I have often thought how insignificant we human beings really are. We have about as much chance of understanding our universe and beyond as did our prehistoric ancestors in understanding a GPS System.
In addition to our relative primitive state of development, we are further hindered by a variety of afflictions that we acquire on our own such as greed, jealously, hate, attachments and cravings. Included in this array of afflictions is our false sense of our true “self” or “ego” embodied in “I”, “me”. We are all conditioned from birth to hear our parents tell us and anyone else who will listen how cute or smart we are. In school we are told how smart we are or how athletically talented we are or just how cool we are. If we go into the military we are told how noble, elite and brave we are and when we go to college we are told how intellectually superior we are. If we can’t first conquer these personal afflictions, how can we ever hope to conquer our universe and beyond.
Often times when someone experiences one of the inevitable sufferings of life they say “Why me?”. Well another question might be “Why not you?”. We seem to see ourselves as special and immune to the sufferings of life that are experienced by others. This all relates to a sense of a false ego or self as used with the “I”, “me”, “my” way of thinking. When you are able to see yourself and things around you as they really are including the impermanence of "everything", you will not be as surprised by what life offers. Ironically, the people most susceptible to this are the rich and famous including celebrities, politicians because they have been additionally conditioned to believe that they are immune from the reality of life’s impermanence. One of the best books I have read on the concept of "Self" and "I" is "How to see yourself as you really are" by his Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama.
As we go through life, there is always someone we can look down on to regain that all important feeling of "self" and superiority regardless of our station in life. We are constantly inundated with media content telling us that unless you are rich, beautiful and of the right political party or religious faith, you simply can not be part of that all important superior class of human beings. This of course causes people to strive for an even greater false sense of who they are.
Our current stage of development is so primitive that, we are currently little more than a single cell organism in our development. We talk about “the universe” as though there is only one universe. Our universe is probably about as unique and significant as a drop of water in the ocean.
Everything we think we know is dictated by our five corporal senses of sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste. Of course our physical brain is the receptor of impulses from these five senses. Depending on your particular belief you may consider as Descartes did that there is a sixth sense known as the mind/sole. He went on to say that the mind/sole does not die with the physical body. Of course the 14th Dalai Lama recently said the mind is dependent on the physical brain. This is consistent with the Buddhist belief of non-duality. However, we know that the “mind” perceives thoughts that never entered the brain through any of the five corporal senses. In fact, Descartes said in the 15th century that he could “prove’ the existence off “God” because of the existence of the “mind” and it’s ability to “perceive God” in addition to the existence of the physical “brain”. Of course at the same time he was applying for a grant from the queen to continue his work who just happened to be of the same opinion.
As an example of the limitations of our brain and five senses all we have to do is go outside on any clear and sunny day and look up at the sky and enjoy the “clear” blue sky. Of course the sky is not clear and empty as our five senses tell us. It’s actually full of gases, radio, television, and microwave signals and even sounds that we can not hear unless they are in a specific frequency. So we are constantly surrounded by activity that we can not perceive because our “receiver” has only evolved to a limited capacity. The fact that we can’t perceive these things doesn’t mean they are not there, it simply means that we are not able to perceive them with our five corporal senses. In another example you can think of flying in an aircraft and looking around the cabin, you would say you are surrounded by empty air. Yet if there were an explosive decompression, that same air would instantly turn to a “condensed” fog that is clearly visible and filling the air. The water vapor was always there but it wasn’t visible until acted on by the decompression.
Everything we see and touch with the use of our five corporal senses is much like the “condensed” fog in the airplane. The only difference is the amount of condensing that takes place in the object. As an example, scientist say we are not really solid bodies but rather a combination of compressed atoms. If you talk to a quantum physicist, he will tell you that if you take one cell out of your body and keep cutting it in two until you get down to an atom and then keep cutting that in two you will simply get down to a positive and negative electrical charge or energy. So in effect we and everything around us are nothing more than a mass of tightly compressed electrical energy. If you were to blow up a building the atoms of the building are not gone but rather simply not visible to us and could easily be restored if the event could be played in reverse as in the case of a video. The fact that we no longer see the electrical energy of the atoms that make up the building doe not mean that the electrical energy is not there.
There was a case a few years ago when a person drowned in a frozen lake and it took several hours to recover his body. Of course he had stopped breathing and his heart had stopped and by the time they got him to the hospital he was so frozen that they could not insert lines in his body. Not only was he frozen with no heart beat or breathing, they were unable to detect any brain activity. In effect, he was brain dead. After several hours they were gradually able to thaw him out to the point they could warm him up with a heart lung machine and ultimately bring him back to life. So in this instance not only was he perceived as dead by using the physical senses of the doctor, but he was also brain dead without a detection of any “electrical energy” in the brain using state of the art equipment.
The concept of everything being broken down into simple “electrical energy” as explained by quantum physics is not new to Chinese people thousands of years ago who would have called the positive and negative (+ -) charges of the sub-atomic particles simply as “Yin and Yang”. In other words it simply explains the duality of “everything”. The duality of everything includes everything from the positive and negative of the sub-atomic particles to things we see in everyday life like “hot and cold”, “good and bad”, “off and on” “sick and healthy” etc. In other words you can’t have one without the other. Buddhist believe in “cause and effect” and not some magical power controlling events. Buddhist are trained to transcend the dualistic concept, to understand things in totality or in "oneness". In Buddhism this concept of "oneness" is explained as a part of "Right Understanding". In other words while there is duality, it comes together to form a "oneness" and not just "this or that", win or lose", or "either or". In the 1940s, the German scientist were the first to prove a scientific connection between smoking and lung cancer. As the Buddhist would say, if you smoke and get lung cancer don’t blame the cigarettes because it’s cause and effect or yin and yang. A wise person once said, "if your head hurts stop hitting it with a hammer and see if that helps". In other words if you’re in a situation that is causing some harm, get out of it and see if that helps.
Current science fiction talks about the ability to transport people from one point to another. Studies in Quantum Teleportation have only scratched the surface of future possibilities. In reality, this will be a common day activity in the future as proven by the fact that we can conceive it with the current development of our conscious mind. In other words if we and everything else are composed of essentially compressed electrical energy, it no great leap to envision a future ability to transmit that electrical energy via laser at the speed of light to any point on earth and beyond. According to Einstein, nothing can be faster than the speed of light (186,000 miles per second) but of course that is subject to change.
What is exciting are the concepts that our minds are currently not capable of grasping which will include concepts far beyond the current concept of physics. As we evolve, we will come to see other dimensions and probably realize that people and things we though were long gone are all around us in another dimension in the form of a currently undetectable electrical energy as in the case of the frozen drowning victim mentioned earlier who had no signs of electrical energy in his brain yet came back to tell them of his trip even though scientifically, he had a brain incapable of thinking or feeling anything.
Of course, all of our "perceptions" are "relative". While you read this you are probably sitting still at your computer but you are not motionless. In fact you and everything around you is spinning at around 1,000 miles per hour as the earth rotates while at the same time traveling around the sun at 67,000 miles per hour. In a "relatively" short time ago you would have been burned alive at the stake by the church for suggesting this fact.
If you believe in reincarnation you have to believe in “duality” which means that the mind/soul is separate from the brain so that when the body and brain die, the mind/soul still remains somewhere. This also was the point that Rene Descartes tried to make in proving the mind/soul was separate from the brain and was therefore proof of God. He said our ability to perceive God is something we acquire through the mind/soul and not through our five corporal senses. Not all Buddhist believe in a physical reincarnation and rebirth but rather an “awakening” of the mind here and now.
If we can't even agree on how we got here, how can we hope to agree on where we are going.
"We don't know one millionth of 1 % about anything."
Thomas Edison
