posted on Oct, 5 2007 @ 04:22 PM
About the universe, God and the assumption that technology will save us: I'm reading a very interesting trilogy right now, "My Big TOE" by Tom
Campbell -- TOE standing for Theory of Everything. He's a physicist who actually tries to combine the physical with the nonphysical reality... and in
doing that, he explains the nature of reality a heck of a lot better than any mainstream scientist I've ever seen.
He says, for example, that consciousness -- in the form of an Absolute Unbounded Oneness (AUO) -- was here first, before physical matter, and all
individual forms of consciousness gradually evolved from this original consciousness. He also says that our physical reality is a subset of a larger,
nonphysical reality, which, in turn, is probably a subset of another, even larger reality. It's like an onion with lots of layers.
To us, he says, AUO -- what you could call a pantheistic form of God (although he doesn't talk about God at all, it's all very neutral/scientific)
-- and its beginnings are mystical to us, and thus we see AUO as infinite, with no beginning and no ending. Which it may not be, since it could have
its origins in the next higher layer.
He compares the situation to that our intestinal bacteria (were they as intelligent as we) are in: to them, the source of the food they receive has to
be mystical, since they don't know where it's coming from. And even if they could grasp the idea of the food source, they would never understand
things like grocery stores or the stock market motions, which might indirectly affect them, but is so removed from their experience that it is outside
their means of comprehension. It's the same with us, he says -- we just cannot grasp the outermost layers of the onion.
About technology, he says that we don't lack intellectual power but QUALITY of consciousness, because it hasn't grown in lockstep with what we can
do technologically. Thus, every individual should strive to increase the quality of its consciousness; otherwise it is almost assured that we will
blow ourselves up at some point (through viruses, nanotechnology, genetic meddling, new weapons, or what have you).
I love his theory... still in the middle of reading, but I'll keep you updated.