529 lines
28 KiB
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529 lines
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Plaintext
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(word processor parameters LM=8, RM=75, TM=2, BM=2)
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Taken from KeelyNet BBS (214) 324-3501
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Sponsored by Vangard Sciences
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PO BOX 1031
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There are ABSOLUTELY NO RESTRICTIONS
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on duplicating, publishing or distributing the
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files on KeelyNet!
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February 24, 1991
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REALITY.ASC
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--------------------------------------------------------------------
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This file courtesy of Double Helix BBS at 212 865 7043.
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--------------------------------------------------------------------
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THE UNIVERSE AS A HOLOGRAM
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DOES OBJECTIVE REALITY EXIST, OR IS THE UNIVERSE A PHANTASM?
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In 1982 a remarkable event took place. At the University of
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Paris a research team led by physicist Alain Aspect performed what
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may turn out to be one of the most important experiments of the 20th
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century. You did not hear about it on the evening news. In fact,
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unless you are in the habit of reading scientific journals you
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probably have never even heard Aspect's name, though there are some
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who believe his discovery may change the face of science.
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Aspect and his team discovered that under certain circumstances
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subatomic particles such as electrons are able to instantaneously
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communicate with each other regardless of the distance separating
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them. It doesn't matter whether they are 10 feet or 10 billion
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miles apart.
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Somehow each particle always seems to know what the other is
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doing. The problem with this feat is that it violates Einstein's
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long-held tenet that no communication can travel faster than the
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speed of light. Since traveling faster than the speed of light is
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tantamount to breaking the time barrier, this daunting prospect has
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caused some physicists to try to come up with elaborate ways to
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explain away Aspect's findings. But it has inspired others to offer
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even more radical explanations.
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University of London physicist David Bohm, for example,
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believes Aspect's findings imply that objective reality does not
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exist, that despite its apparent solidity the universe is at heart a
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phantasm, a gigantic and splendidly detailed hologram.
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To understand why Bohm makes this startling assertion, one must
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first understand a little about holograms. A hologram is a three-
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dimensional photograph made with the aid of a laser.
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To make a hologram, the object to be photographed is first
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bathed in the light of a laser beam. Then a second laser beam is
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bounced off the reflected light of the first and the resulting
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interference pattern (the area where the two laser beams commingle)
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is captured on film.
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Page 1
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When the film is developed, it looks like a meaningless swirl
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of light and dark lines. But as soon as the developed film is
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illuminated by another laser beam, a three-dimensional image of the
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original object appears.
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The three-dimensionality of such images is not the only
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remarkable characteristic of holograms. If a hologram of a rose is
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cut in half and then illuminated by a laser, each half will still be
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found to contain the entire image of the rose.
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Indeed, even if the halves are divided again, each snippet of
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film will always be found to contain a smaller but intact version of
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the original image. Unlike normal photographs, every part of a
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hologram contains all the information possessed by the whole.
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The "whole in every part" nature of a hologram provides us with
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an entirely new way of understanding organization and order. For
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most of its history, Western science has labored under the bias that
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the best way to understand a physical phenomenon, whether a frog or
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an atom, is to dissect it and study its respective parts.
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A hologram teaches us that some things in the universe may not
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lend themselves to this approach. If we try to take apart something
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constructed holographically, we will not get the pieces of which it
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is made, we will only get smaller wholes.
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This insight suggested to Bohm another way of understanding
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Aspect's discovery. Bohm believes the reason subatomic particles
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are able to remain in contact with one another regardless of the
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distance separating them is not because they are sending some sort
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of mysterious signal back and forth, but because their separateness
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is an illusion. He argues that at some deeper level of reality such
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particles are not individual entities, but are actually extensions
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of the same fundamental something.
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To enable people to better visualize what he means, Bohm offers
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the following illustration.
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Imagine an aquarium containing a fish. Imagine also that you
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are unable to see the aquarium directly and your knowledge about it
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and what it contains comes from two television cameras, one directed
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at the aquarium's front and the other directed at its side.
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As you stare at the two television monitors, you might assume
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that the fish on each of the screens are separate entities. After
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all, because the cameras are set at different angles, each of the
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images will be slightly different. But as you continue to watch
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the two fish, you will eventually become aware that there is a
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certain relationship between them.
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When one turns, the other also makes a slightly different but
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corresponding turn; when one faces the front, the other always faces
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toward the side. If you remain unaware of the full scope of the
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situation, you might even conclude that the fish must be
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instantaneously communicating with one another, but this is clearly
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not the case.
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This, says Bohm, is precisely what is going on between the
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subatomic particles in Aspect's experiment.
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Page 2
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According to Bohm, the apparent faster-than-light connection
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between subatomic particles is really telling us that there is a
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deeper level of reality we are not privy to, a more complex
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dimension beyond our own that is analogous to the aquarium. And, he
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adds, we view objects such as subatomic particles as separate from
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one another because we are seeing only a portion of their reality.
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Such particles are not separate "parts", but facets of a deeper
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and more underlying unity that is ultimately as holographic and
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indivisible as the previously mentioned rose. And since everything
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in physical reality is comprised of these "eidolons", the universe
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is itself a projection, a hologram.
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In addition to its phantomlike nature, such a universe would
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possess other rather startling features. If the apparent
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separateness of subatomic particles is illusory, it means that at a
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deeper level of reality all things in the universe are infinitely
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interconnected.
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The electrons in a carbon atom in the human brain are connected
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to the subatomic particles that comprise every salmon that swims,
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every heart that beats, and every star that shimmers in the sky.
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Everything interpenetrates everything, and although human
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nature may seek to categorize and pigeonhole and subdivide, the
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various phenomena of the universe, all apportionments are of
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necessity artificial and all of nature is ultimately a seamless web.
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In a holographic universe, even time and space could no longer
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be viewed as fundamentals. Because concepts such as location break
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down in a universe in which nothing is truly separate from anything
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else, time and three-dimensional space, like the images of the fish
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on the TV monitors, would also have to be viewed as projections of
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this deeper order.
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At its deeper level reality is a sort of superhologram in which
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the past, present, and future all exist simultaneously. This
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suggests that given the proper tools it might even be possible to
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someday reach into the superholographic level of reality and pluck
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out scenes from the long-forgotten past.
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What else the superhologram contains is an open-ended question.
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Allowing, for the sake of argument, that the superhologram is the
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matrix that has given birth to everything in our universe, at the
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very least it contains every subatomic particle that has been or
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will be -- every configuration of matter and energy that is
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possible, from snowflakes to quasars, from blu<6C> whales to gamma
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rays. It must be seen as a sort of cosmic storehouse of "All That
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Is."
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Although Bohm concedes that we have no way of knowing what else
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might lie hidden in the superhologram, he does venture to say that
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we have no reason to assume it does not contain more. Or as he puts
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it, perhaps the superholographic level of reality is a "mere stage"
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beyond which lies "an infinity of further development".
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Bohm is not the only researcher who has found evidence that the
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universe is a hologram. Working independently in the field of brain
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research, Standford neurophysiologist Karl Pribram has also become
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Page 3
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persuaded of the holographic nature of reality.
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Pribram was drawn to the holographic model by the puzzle of how
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and where memories are stored in the brain. For decades numerous
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studies have shown that rather than being confined to a specific
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location, memories are dispersed throughout the brain.
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In a series of landmark experiments in the 1920s, brain
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scientist Karl Lashley found that no matter what portion of a rat's
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brain he removed he was unable to eradicate its memory of how to
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perform complex tasks it had learned prior to surgery. The only
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problem was that no one was able to come up with a mechanism that
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might explain this curious "whole in every part" nature of memory
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storage.
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Then in the 1960s Pribram encountered the concept of holography
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and realized he had found the explanation brain scientists had been
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looking for. Pribram believes memories are encoded not in neurons,
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or small groupings of neurons, but in patterns of nerve impulses
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that crisscross the entire brain in the same way that patterns of
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laser light interference crisscross the entire area of a piece of
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film containing a holographic image. In other words, Pribram
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believes the brain is itself a hologram.
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Pribram's theory also explains how the human brain can store so
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many memories in so little space. It has been estimated that the
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human brain has the capacity to memorize something on the order of
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10 billion bits of information during the average human lifetime (or
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roughly the same amount of information contained in five sets of the
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Encyclopaedia Britannica).
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Similarly, it has been discovered that in addition to their
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other capabilities, holograms possess an astounding capacity for
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information storage--simply by changing the angle at which the two
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lasers strike a piece of photographic film, it is possible to record
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many different images on the same surface. It has been demonstrated
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that one cubic centimeter of film can hold as many as 10 billion
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bits of information.
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Our uncanny ability to quickly retrieve whatever information we
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need from the enormous store of our memories becomes more
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understandable if the brain functions according to holographic
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principles. If a friend asks you to tell him what comes to mind
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when he says the word "zebra", you do not have to clumsily sort back<63>
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through ome gigantic and cerebral alphabetic file to arrive at an
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answer. Instead, associations like "striped", "horselike", and
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"animal native to Africa" all pop into your head instantly.
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Indeed, one of the most amazing things about the human thinking
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process is that every piece of information seems instantly cross-
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correlated with every other piece of information--another feature
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intrinsic to the hologram. Because every portion of a hologram is
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infinitely interconnected with ever other portion, it is perhaps
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nature's supreme example of a cross-correlated system.
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The storage of memory is not the only neurophysiological puzzle
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that becomes more tractable in light of Pribram's holographic model
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of the brain. Another is how the brain is able to translate the
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avalanche of frequencies it receives via the senses (light
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Page 4
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frequecies, sound frequencies, and so on) into the concrete world
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of our perceptions.
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Encoding and decoding frequencies is precisely what a hologram
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does best. Just as a hologram functions as a sort of lens, a
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translating device able to convert an apparently meaningless blur of
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frequencies into a coherent image, Pribram believes the brain also
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comprises a lens and uses holographic principles to mathematically
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convert the frequencies it receives through he senses into the
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inner world of our perceptions.
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An impressive body of evidence suggests that the brain uses
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holographic principles to perform its operations. Pribram's theory,
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in fact, has gained increasing support among neurophysiologists.
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Argentinian-Italian researcher Hugo Zucarelli recently extended
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the holographic model into the world of acoustic phenomena. Puzzled
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by the fact that humans can locate the source of sounds without
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moving their heads, even if they only possess hearing in one ear,
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Zucarelli discovered that holographic principles can explain this
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ability.
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Zucarelli has also developed the technology of holophonic
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sound, a recording technique able to reproduce acoustic situations
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with an almost uncanny realism.
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Pribram's belief that our brains mathematically construct
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"hard" reality by relying on input from a frequency domain has also
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received a good deal of experimental support.
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It has been found that each of our senses is sensitive to a
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much broader range of frequencies than was previously suspected.
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Researchers have discovered, for instance, that our visual
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systems are sensitive to sound frequencies, that our sense of smell
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is in part dependent on what are now called "osmic frequencies", and
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that even the cells in our bodies are sensitive to a broad range of
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frequencies. Such findings suggest that it is only in the
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holographic domain of consciousness that such frequencies are sorted
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out and divided up into conventional perceptions.
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But the most mind-boggling aspect of Pribram's holographic
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model of the brain is what happens when it is put together with
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Bohm's theory. For if the concreteness of the world is but a
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secondary reality and what is "there" is actually a holographic blur
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of frequencies, and if the brain is also a hologram and only
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selects some of the frequencies out of this blur and mathematically
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transforms them into sensory perceptions, what becomes of objective
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reality?
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Put quite simply, it ceases to exist. As the religions of the
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East have long upheld, the material world is Maya, an illusion, and
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although we may think we are physical beings moving through a
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physical world, this too is an illusion.
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We are really "receivers" floating through a kaleidoscopic sea
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of frequency, and what we extract from this sea and transmogrify
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into physical reality is but one channel from many extracted out of
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the superhologram.
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Page 5
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This striking new picture of reality, the synthesis of Bohm
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and Pribram's views, has come to be called the holographic paradigm,
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and although many scientists have greeted it with skepticism, it has
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galvanized others. A small but growing group of researchers believe
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it may be the most accurate model of reality science has arrived at
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thus far. More than that, some believe it may solve some mysteries
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that have never before been explainable by science and even
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establish the paranormal as a part of nature.
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Numerous researchers, including Bohm and Pribram, have noted
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that many para-psychological phenomena become much more
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understandable in terms of the holographic paradigm.
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In a universe in which individual brains are actually
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indivisible portions of the greater hologram and everything is
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infinitely interconnected, telepathy may merely be the accessing of
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the holographic level.
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It is obviously much easier to understand how information can
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travel from the mind of individual 'A' to that of individual 'B' at
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a far distance point and helps to understand a number of unsolved
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puzzles in psychology. In particular, Grof feels the holographic
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paradigm offers a model for understanding many of the baffling
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phenomena experienced by individuals during altered states of
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consciousness.
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In the 1950s, while conducting research into the beliefs of
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LSD as a psychotherapeutic tool, Grof had one female patient who
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suddenly became convinced she had assumed the identity of a female
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of a species of prehistoric reptile. During the course of her
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hallucination, she not only gave a richly detailed description of
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what it felt like to be encapsuled in such a form, but noted that
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the portion of the male of the species's anatomy was a patch of
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colored scales on the side of its head.
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What was startling to Grof was that although the woman had no
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prior knowledge about such things, a conversation with a zoologist
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later confirmed that in certain species of reptiles colored areas on
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the head do indeed play an important role as triggers of sexual
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arousal.
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The woman's experience was not unique. During the course of
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his research, Grof encountered examples of patients regressing and
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identifying with virtually every species on the evolutionary tree
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(research findings which helped influence the man-into-ape scene in
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the movie Altered States). Moreover, he found that such
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experiences frequently contained obscure zoological details which
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turned out to be accurate.
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Regressions into the animal kingdom were not the only puzzling
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psychological phenomena Grof encountered. He also had patients who
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appeared to tap into some sort of collective or racial unconscious.
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Individuals with little or no education suddenly gave detailed
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descriptions of Zoroastrian funerary practices and scenes from Hindu
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mythology. In other categories of experience, individuals gave
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persuasive accounts of out-of-body journeys, of precognitive
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glimpses of the future, of regressions into apparent past-life
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incarnations.
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Page 6
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In later research, Grof found the same range of phenomena
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manifested in therapy sessions which did not involve the use of
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drugs. Because the common element in such experiences appeared to
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be the transcending of an individual's consciousness beyond the
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usual boundaries of ego and/or limitations of space and time, Grof
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called such manifestations "transpersonal experiences", and in the
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late '60s he helped found a branch of psychology called
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"transpersonal psychology" devoted entirely to their study.
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Although Grof's newly founded Association of Transpersonal
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Psychology garnered a rapidly growing group of like-minded
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professionals and has become a respected branch of psychology, for
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years neither Grof or any of his colleagues were able to offer a
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mechanism for explaining the bizarre psychological phenomena they
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were witnessing. But that has changed with the advent of the
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holographic paradigm.
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As Grof recently noted, if the mind is actually part of a
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continuum, a labyrinth that is connected not only to every other
|
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mind that exists or has existed, but to every atom, organism, and
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||
region in the vastness of space and time itself, the fact that it is
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able to occasionally make forays into the labyrinth and have
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transpersonal experiences no longer seems so strange.
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The holographic prardigm also has implications for so-called
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hard sciences like biology. Keith Floyd, a psychologist at Virginia
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Intermont College, has pointed out that if the concreteness of
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reality is but a holographic illusion, it would no longer be true to
|
||
say the brain produces consciousness. Rather, it is consciousness
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||
that creates the appearance of the brain -- as well as the body and
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everything else around us we interpret as physical.
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||
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||
Such a turnabout in the way we view biological structures has
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||
caused researchers to point out that medicine and our understanding
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of the healing process could also be transformed by the holographic
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paradigm. If the apparent physical structure of the body is but a
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holographic projection of consciousness, it becomes clear that each
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of us is much more responsible for our health than current medical
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||
wisdom allows. What we now view as miraculous remissions of disease
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||
may actually be due to changes in consciousness which in turn effect
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changes in the hologram of the body.
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||
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||
Similarly, controversial new healing techniques such as
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||
visualization may work so well because in the holographic domain of
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thought images are ultimately as real as "reality".
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||
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||
Even visions and experiences involving "non-ordinary" reality
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||
become explainable under the holographic paradigm. In his book
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"Gifts of Unknown Things," biologist Lyall Watson discribes his
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encounter with an Indonesian shaman woman who, by performing a
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ritual dance, was able to make an entire grove of trees instantly
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vanish into thin air. Watson relates that as he and another
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astonished onlooker continued to watch the woman, she caused the
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trees to reappear, then "click" off again and on again several times
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in succession.
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||
Although current scientific understanding is incapable of
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||
explaining such events, experiences like this become more tenable if
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"hard" reality is only a holographic projection.
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||
|
||
Page 7
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||
|
||
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||
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||
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||
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||
Perhaps we agree on what is "there" or "not there" because what
|
||
we call consensus reality is formulated and ratified at the level of
|
||
the human unconscious at which all minds are infinitely
|
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interconnected.
|
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||
If this is true, it is the most profound implication of the
|
||
holographic paradigm of all, for it means that experiences such as
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||
Watson's are not commonplace only because we have not programmed our
|
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minds with the beliefs that would make them so. In a holographic
|
||
universe there are no limits to the extent to which we can alter the
|
||
fabric of reality.
|
||
|
||
What we perceive as reality is only a canvas waiting for us to
|
||
draw upon it any picture we want. Anything is possible, from
|
||
bending spoons with the power of the mind to the phantasmagoric
|
||
events experienced by Castaneda during his encounters with the Yaqui
|
||
brujo don Juan, for magic is our birthright, no more or less
|
||
miraculous than our ability to compute the reality we want when we
|
||
are in our dreams.
|
||
|
||
Indeed, even our most fundamental notions about reality become
|
||
suspect, for in a holographic universe, as Pribram has pointed out,
|
||
even random events would have to be seen as based on holographic
|
||
principles and therefore determined. Synchronicities or meaningful
|
||
coincidences suddenly makes sense, and everything in reality would
|
||
have to be seen as a metaphor, for even the most haphazard events
|
||
would express some underlying symmetry.
|
||
|
||
Whether Bohm and Pribram's holographic paradigm becomes
|
||
accepted in science or dies an ignoble death remains to be seen, but
|
||
it is safe to say that it has already had an influence on the
|
||
thinking of many scientists. And even if it is found that the
|
||
holographic model does not provide the best explanation for the
|
||
instantaneous communications that seem to be passing back and forth
|
||
between subatomic particles, at the very least, as noted by Basil
|
||
Hiley, a physicist at Birbeck College in London, Aspect's findings
|
||
"indicate that we must be prepared to consider radically new views
|
||
of reality".
|
||
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
||
Vangard notes...
|
||
|
||
This is one of the most fascinating files we have seen since it
|
||
seems to offer a hypothesis which "synthesizes" a multitude of
|
||
phenomena including that generally classed as "paranormal."
|
||
Related files on KeelyNet are the complete MIND series and
|
||
VEDA1.
|
||
|
||
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
||
|
||
If you have comments or other information relating to such topics
|
||
as this paper covers, please upload to KeelyNet or send to the
|
||
Vangard Sciences address as listed on the first page.
|
||
Thank you for your consideration, interest and support.
|
||
|
||
Jerry W. Decker.........Ron Barker...........Chuck Henderson
|
||
Vangard Sciences/KeelyNet
|
||
--------------------------------------------------------------------
|
||
If we can be of service, you may contact
|
||
Jerry at (214) 324-8741 or Ron at (214) 242-9346
|
||
--------------------------------------------------------------------
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Page 8
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