Biocentrism - Revolutionary theory of looking at existence/reality

by TastingFreedom 23 Replies latest jw friends

  • TastingFreedom
    TastingFreedom

    I have been reading a book for some time that I find fascinating. The book is Biocentrism, How Life and Consciousness are the Keys to Understanding the True Nature of the Universe by Robert Lanza.

    It proposes a theory that is certainly different than how we look at the world.
    Basically our reality is only a perception that is not absolute but only relative to our life and existence in this particular coordinates of the universe, meaning that our senses perceive space and time only in relationship to our relative existence. Our brain can decipher all the "strings" and may create the perception of reality. Our existence and observation has influence in how we perceive things, which may not be real objects (absolute).

    This, of course, is an early hypothesis that needs more experiments to be even considered as a well established theory within the science realms.
    Even in its current state, it makes a lot of sense and it is truly a revolutionary idea. It sure makes a lot of people fantasize about its implications. Very interesting reviews and comments from intellectuals.

    Please read below and share your thoughts. If this was in fact proven, I can think of many ways it would demolish many doctrines by JW's like resurrection, etc.

    Here is more from Wikipedia:

    Lanza argues that the primacy of consciousness features in the work of Descartes, Kant, Leibniz, Berkeley, Schopenhauer, and Bergson.[7] He sees this as supporting the central claim that what we call space and time are forms of animal sense perception, rather than external physical objects.[8] Lanza argues that biocentrism offers insight into several major puzzles of science, including Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, the double-slit experiment, and the fine tuning of the forces, constants, and laws that shape the universe as we perceive it.[2] According to a Discover magazine article adapted from Lanza's book, “biocentrism offers a more promising way to bring together all of physics, as scientists have been trying to do since Einstein’s unsuccessful unified field theories of eight decades ago.”[9]

    Lanza's theory of biocentrism has seven principles:[10]

    1. What we perceive as reality is a process that involves our consciousness. An "external" reality, if it existed, would by definition have to exist in space. But this is meaningless, because space and time are not absolute realities but rather tools of the human and animal mind.
    2. Our external and internal perceptions are inextricably intertwined. They are different sides of the same coin and cannot be divorced from one another.
    3. The behavior of subatomic particles, indeed all particles and objects, is inextricably linked to the presence of an observer. Without the presence of a conscious observer, they at best exist in an undetermined state of probability waves.
    4. Without consciousness, "matter" dwells in an undetermined state of probability. Any universe that could have preceded consciousness only existed in a probability state.
    5. The structure of the universe is explainable only through biocentrism. The universe is fine-tuned for life, which makes perfect sense as life creates the universe, not the other way around. The "universe" is simply the complete spatio-temporal logic of the self.
    6. Time does not have a real existence outside of animal-sense perception. It is the process by which we perceive changes in the universe.
    7. Space, like time, is not an object or a thing. Space is another form of our animal understanding and does not have an independent reality. We carry space and time around with us like turtles with shells. Thus, there is no absolute self-existing matrix in which physical events occur independent of life.

  • doofdaddy
    doofdaddy

    Science and philosophy, not long ago combatants, are spiralling ever closer. Jung must be chuckling....

  • Gerard
    Gerard

    Our brain can decipher all the "strings" and may create the perception of reality. Our existence and observation has influence in how we perceive things, which may not be real objects (absolute).

    Science depends on observations, including observation of measurements of physical phenomena. Much of these measurements are made by lifeless and unbiased machines. You can figure the rest. Can you?
  • BurnTheShips
    BurnTheShips

    Lanza heads up research at Advanced Stem Cells Corp, he literally wrote the book on stem cell science.

    BTS

  • BurnTheShips
  • BurnTheShips
    BurnTheShips
    Science depends on observations, including observation of measurements of physical phenomena. Much of these measurements are made by lifeless and unbiased machines. You can figure the rest. Can you?

    Measurements are mediated by human consciousness. Measuring machines do not interpret results and create stories based on them, humans do.

    Anthropos metron.

    BTS

  • ProdigalSon
    ProdigalSon

    I'm not usually the one to debunk mystical theories, and I'm a fan of Deepak Chopra. I started looking into this last night after I saw the OP. It's quite fascinating. I thought I would see Burn going after Lanza here so I'm a little surprised since he seems the have the strongest Bullshit Detector. Anyway, I'm looking at two sides of this, and I came across this article that debunks Lanza's theories, I'm not far into it and it's very long, but so far I think it's valid....

    http://nirmukta.com/2009/12/14/biocentrism-demystified-a-response-to-deepak-chopra-and-robert-lanzas-notion-of-a-conscious-universe/

  • BurnTheShips
    BurnTheShips

    "The universe is not only queerer than we suppose, it is queerer than we can suppose"

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1APOxsp1VFw

    BTS

  • BurnTheShips
  • Caedes

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