Consciousness - transpersonal psychology versus quantum physics

So let us talk about consciousness.

Although we all know we are conscious, we seem to be unable to define what consciousness is.

Knowing consciousness, in the sense of experiencing it, is something we can do. But knowing it, in a scientific sense (what, how, when) seems extremely complicated.

In fact consciousness is so much part of how we are looking at something to know it, that we seem unable to get enough distance from it to describe it . The fact that we need to distance, separate ourselves from something to “know” it, is in itself a problem. We are faced with our way of perceiving reality; apart from the “experience” aspect of awareness we discover the “what-we-make-of-it” aspect of our consciousness.

Consciousness does not fit into a model in terms of time and space, nor into our normal scientific notions about matter. To explore our experience of consciousness we will have to look beyond our scientific ways of knowing.

Peter Russell suggests that instead of trying to explain consciousness within the current superparadigm, we need a major “paradigm shift”. He wants us to accept that consciousness is as fundamental as matter – in some ways, even more fundamental. In his view, as far as the reality we experience is concerned, consciousness is primary. Time, space and matter are secondary; they are aspects of the image of reality manifesting in our minds. They exist within consciousness; not the other way around.

It is amazing how many un-explainable pieces of our experience’s puzzle suddenly fall into place when we make this mental shift to consciousness as the essence of everything in the known universe. Russell points to striking similarities between the qualities of light and the qualities of consciousness, and suspects some deeper significance to these similarities. It seems a logical step to look at what quantum physics has come up with.

Willis W. Harman (Institute of Noetic Science) also talked of an emerging new worldview. In his view the “trans-modern” picture of reality should shift the locus of authority from external to “inner” knowing. Instead of separating ourselves from the experience of reality to describe it, he invited us to realize we are part of it. He points to the fact that in the case of consciousness, the mapmaker, the self, the thinking and knowing subject, is actually a product and a performance of that which it seeks to know and represent. He saw the need for a participative epistemology, a real partnership between the researcher and the phenomenon.

Quantum physics presents us with such an epistemology. It offers new perspectives to look at reality and thus at consciousness.

It introduces the principle of complementarity, claiming that the physical universe can never be known independent of an observer’s choices of what to observe. With that quantum physics uncovered reality’s own subjective nature; it found everything connected and joined in identity, this ultimately pointing to a unity of all matter. It also showed that a deeper, non-material reality seems to play a significant role in determining how objective matter behaves.

The quantum perspective on reality seems more appropriate to explore consciousness than traditional science.

Fred Alan Wolf, proposes that we first look at what consciousness does on his words at the Fundamental Act of Consciousness (FAC): the action in which something is perceived.

In ordinary, classical science perception is taken to be outside the realm of physicality: if you perceive something, you know that you see something.

In quantum physics however we’ve learned that somehow the act of seeing affects what you see. Wolf says that by using the action of consciousness, this fundamental act, we touch what we perceive in a way that fundamentally transforms it.

Let us realize for a moment that what we perceive as reality is indeed a creation of what we call “mind”. (Mind being a process, not a “thing”).

We “interpret” what we receive with our senses into a brain-made image of the world. At the same time, to be able to do so, with this primary act of discernment we separate ourselves from that world. It is basically how we describe our physical world in notions of time, space and matter. We do this by separating us - the observers, the ones who are conscious - from what we observe.

Again this split between knowing and knowing; the experience of reality and the what-we-make-of-it of reality.

Wolf suggests that the fundamental act of consciousness is the act of creation. The act of observing unites the experience of consciousness with the interpretation of it, and becomes a process in which reality indeed becomes what-we-make-of-it in terms of time, space and matter. *

It is important to notice here that this act of consciousness is an (act of) interaction between observer (us) and what is observed (reality). Here the “touching” and “affecting” between observer and observed occurs. No longer an external knowing; consciousness seems to be about inner knowing, as Harman suggested.

No model of the world that uses only local connections can explain this interaction according to Bell’s theorem.

As new physics studies interactions between “scientifically” non-related events, it is interesting to look how the models quantum physics comes up with fit consciousness and what we know of it. As we saw quantum physics works with the notions of a deeper, non-material, non-local reality. Studying consciousness we could translate this into a holistic model of a reality underlying the physical reality we created with our minds.

In this model this underlying reality is no longer subjective, nor dependent of choices made, but absolute and the same for all observers.

The next step is the hypothesis that it is this underlying reality that gives rise to what we experience as our reality. In other words: the material world is created by and out of it.

Although this seems a quite logical step (to me as a transpersonal psychotherapist), we must realize that the assumption that matter is not the primary stuff our world is made off, is an enormous leap from the traditional scientific worldview. The solidity of matter is dissolving away in the light of this new theory, and this is very confusing in our basically time-space-and-matter oriented world.

From a more spiritual worldview however, this model is really not new at all. Eastern religious traditions carry the notion of this underlying reality as does the perennial philosophy.

However, as soon as we want to explore this underlying reality, this absolute dimension beyond our what-we-made-of-it material world, we are in trouble. We encounter both our separateness from it, and our unitedness with it. The only way to step out off this paradox seems to transcend time, space and matter and to accept that consciousness itself is the intrinsic quality of this underlying reality.

As light penetrates and interconnects everything in the physical realm of quantum physics, consciousness does in the realm of our experience.

And thus a new vision is born that recognizes that everything is one; that there is just one basic being, one basic consciousness and that everything is basically consciousness.

Wolf invites us to an ecology of global consciousness in which we have a moral obligation and sense of commitment to create our world from this different perspective. In my view this could also work the other way around. Once we truly change our perception and accept that we are indeed interrelated, interconnected, and ultimately one in a “larger” holon, our stance in life will fundamentally change. We will automatically make a shift towards an ecology in which we feel more responsible for, and committed to the wellbeing of our universe.

Nick Herbert, quantum physicist, acknowledges that there are resemblances between quantum theory and “what the mind looks like from the inside”. He comes to similar conclusions about the non-local (= transcendent, underlying) nature of our reality in a slightly different way.

His starting point is Bell’s theorem, which proves that the interconnectedness of everything actually exists, even though the connection goes faster than light, which implies that distance (in time and space) does not exist/is an illusion.

Herbert introduces the idea of two separate types of observation, two types of phenomena going on in quantum theory.

On the one hand there are overall patterns, which he compares with computer data – patterns of dots and as such quantifiable by quantum physics. None of these patterns are ever connected faster than light.

On the other hand there are individual events, the dots themselves. These individual events seem to be tied together, connected faster than light, instantaneously.

In Herbert’s model the patterns preserve space and time, yet the bricks that make up these patterns don’t know anything about space and time. This means they are non-local and that explains why they are connected instantaneously. When translating this model to the functioning of human consciousness he finds the overall patterns in the facts that we know about ourselves and our reality (in time, space and matter). The individual events he compares with the non-data type of our experience, with our awareness.

He believes that the non-local quantum level - consciousness - is a reality beyond our material reality. We tap into this level, thus into consciousness, using a sensitive system in our brain.

This model could explain most of the paranormal experiences of humans beings that could not be explained by any scientific model before.

Karl Pribram, neuropsychologist, studied brain data and discovered similarities between the characteristics and patterns he found and quantum ideas. Quantum-like phenomena and rules of quantum mechanics seem to apply to what is going on in our nervous system. He talks about the holonomic brain theory which claims that there is a relationship between what we ordinarily experience (the explicate level) and some other process or some other order (implicate level, or potential). The spiritual aspect’s of man’s nature – man’s sense of relationship to a larger order – seem to spring from this implicate level.

In Pribram’s view, mental phenomena; the reality as we perceive it, arises through the interaction between body (our senses), brain and environment. Through the lenses of our awareness we can make an image out of the holographic (distributed, potential) underlying reality. The act of consciousness transforms potential into actual, non-local into local and non-material into what we perceive as material. Again consciousness creates.

For me these theories of consciousness are much more comprehendible than quantum physics, maybe because I experience consciousness myself. Any explanation/theory is of course a construct, but as a human being I think we have the ability to chew on what is presented to us and to swallow and assimilate only what suits us best. The notion of consciousness as ground of our being suits me.

I noticed that, although my studies in the fields of transpersonal psychology and religious experiences gave me a good sense of these theories, the background information from quantum physics and neurophysiology give my image of them more dynamic and depth.

It is indeed interesting to look at how a shift in (super)paradigm affects our being in the world. I expect that, once this paradigm accumulates momentum, it could conquer the world much faster than for instance Christ’s Good News. *

E.F. Schumacher was probably right when he claimed that “the modern experiment” to live without religions had failed and that the world was in need of a science for understanding (vs. for manipulation).

To keep in contact with and develop toward higher levels of being humankind needs a new philosophy of life in which not matter but consciousness and self-awareness determine our choices.

Last Saturday I was at a workshop with Eckhart Tolle with his “Power of Now”. He confronts us with the fact that we, most of us, are not very conscious at all.

I interpret his teachings as lessons in awareness. Tolle points out that we spend most of our time and energy outside the now-moment; struggling (and suffering) to be somewhere (in time, space and matter) where we are not.

As most other thinkers he also talks about the need for a shift in perception away from the traditional worldview to an acceptance of what is in a more holistic perspective. A meditative stance, or “presence” in his terms, helps to quiet our minds and gives us an opening to perceive of and tune into an underlying unity, not only in meditation but also in moment-to-moment daily life.

The experience/insight that we come to creative solutions by allowing ourselves to tune into this non-local underlying reality we call consciousness - (get into a wave - or distributed form in QF) is intriguing and certainly in line with the assumption that consciousness creates reality.

Amit Goswami proposes a new holistic worldview he labels Monistic Idealism. He says that the universe, in order to exist, requires a conscious sentient being to be aware of it.* Goswami beliefs that the universe finds its meaning through us (and other sentient beings). Consciousness and not matter is the foundation of everything that is; the ground of all being.

The fact that he was able to solve most of the paradoxes of quantum physics with this hypothesis gives it potential to drastically change our perception of reality and become the new superparadigm.

In a similar way we could explore how psi experiences can be explained through a new model of our psyche in line with the primacy of consciousness. The occurrence of psi could then become a catalyst in the necessary shift in perception.

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* It is fascinating to realize that we “create” images also in our dreams, thoughts and fantasies. I suppose we do not “materialize” these realities but it is interesting to explore how these creations interact with what we perceive as reality. What makes one mind-image more real and “reality” than another? Is it the interaction that produces an emergent?

( it entered my mind that it is no coincidence that a book like The DaVinci Code, or a movie like “The passion of Christ” is getting so much attention right now

* This reminds me of Heidegger who came to the same conclusion in his work. With Hussler he already presented consciousness as “transcendental subjectivity” and “the sole absolute being”.