WHO KNOWS?:

Between Science and Spirituality (JOHN HORGAN, November 29, 2002, Chronicle of Higher Education)

Can mystical spirituality be reconciled with science and, more broadly, with reason? To paraphrase the mystical philosopher Ken Wilber, is the East's version of enlightenment compatible with that of the West? If so, what sort of truth would a rational mysticism give us? What sort of consolation?

There are many claimed convergences between science and mysticism. Cognitive psychology supposedly corroborates the Buddhist doctrine that the self is an illusion. Quantum mechanics, which implies that the outcomes of certain microevents depend on how we measure them, is said to confirm the mystical intuition that consciousness is an intrinsic part of reality. Similarly, quantum nonlocality, which Einstein disparaged as "spooky action at a distance," clinches mystics' perception of the interrelatedness, or unity, of all things. I see a different point of convergence between science and mysticism: Each in its own way reveals the miraculousness of our existence.

Several years ago in The New Yorker, there was a profile of a physicist--unfortunately I can't recall which one--who also has a fascinating perspective on probability. He notes that it is the height of hubris for any of us to assume that our lives happen to be taking place at a key moment in the long stretch of history. It's more likely that we're at a rather insignificant point on a continuum that will eventually stretch for tens of thousands of years. So when we look down upon the poor benighted ancestors who thought the Earth was flat and that it was the center of the Universe, we ought to consider the likelihood that our descendants will find our cosmologies to be equally deluded. That's why one must find the credulousness of the rationalists and of those who believe in modern science to be so touching. Posted by Orrin Judd at December 17, 2002 2:50 PM