Amit Goswami, Ph.D.

Can Science and Religion be Integrated?

Can science and religion be integrated? What comes to mind immediately is that religions themselves cannot agree with one another whereas science is basically monolithic. How can there even be trade between the two, let alone integration?

First, it is only a perception that religions are pluralistic and science is not. Science is monolithic only so far as science of matter–physics and chemistry–is concerned. Psychology, the science of the psyche, has three different paradigms–behavioral-cognitive consisting of hard science orientation, depth psychology consisting of Freudian psychoanalysis and Jungian analytical psychology and their derivatives with psychotherapy orientation, and humanistic-transpersonal-yoga psychology with positive mental health orientation. Both the later paradigms of psychology acknowledge downward causation and subtle bodies in some form or other. Medicine has the conventional allopathic medicine and also alternative medicine practices that complement it. A prominent part of alternative medicine is Eastern medicine that emphasizes subtle energies called variously as prana, chi, and ki. And biology is in transition right now. The materialist biology is highly developed but with some unsolved (maybe unsolvable) problems. Alternative biology is biology that sees life as the handiwork of a purposive designer with the power of downward causation; but at present it is so poorly developed that hardly anyone can call it a genuine alternative biology. Continue reading…

The Power of One

I just came back from an important conference called The Power of One that took place in Washington, D.C.   I know, those words evoke all kinds of questions: what is the power of one?  How do we access it?  Everybody wants power, right?

I will tell you, but first a preamble.

As we embark on this wonderful movement of consciousness that we call quantum activism, I am constantly amazed to meet people who are already quantum activists in the true sense of the words.  One such person is Steven Lovink whom I first met at a conference in The Hague last March on the subject of the new science of spirituality.  At the last day of the conference, Steven and I had a delightful breakfast together in which we contemplated on how to propagate the worldview change from the current primacy-of-matter to the primacy-of-consciousness that the new science is predicating.

Naturally, I was not particularly surprised that Steven, being a very capable visionary, would organize a conference, but the nature of the conference and the people he brought together captured my surprise and imagination.  There were Swami Veda Bharati of the Hindu tradition and Sister Jenna of the Brahmakumaries—these are people you expect in a conference of this sort.  But there were also Mrs. Harriett Fubright, the wife of the famous late senator, who spoke of the importance of the arts and Dr. Claes Nobel, a relation of Alfred Nobel, who advocated environmental awareness.  A true meeting of people of the inner and the outer that quantum activism aims to integrate.

Steven’s ultimate goal is to organize a huge gathering at the Lincoln Memorial on 10-10-10 (Oct 10, 2010) to unleash the power of one to bring change beginning with the worldview change that we so badly need.  Agreed, it may be just symbology, but who says symbols are not important?

Finally, what is the power of one?  It is the idea that even one individual has the power to disturb the universe, to bring about real change.  How do we access it?  Quantum physics says that we become empowered with the power of one when our individual intention resonates with the movement of the cosmic consciousness, the cosmic One. Continue reading…

Quantum Physics: New context for Medicine – Live!

A new live  lecture and course series will be available August 19-23 through the Integrative Quantum University of Integrative Medicine (IQUIM)

In this course, we explore the issues confronting the development of an integrative medicine that integrates conventional and alternative or complementary medicine practices. Currently, conventional allopathic medicine is based on Newtonian physics and a biology based on scientific materialism – the metaphysics idea that matter is the ground of all being. We begin our exploration with studying the incompleteness of this approach and the anomalies and paradoxes that go unaddressed. Next we develop ideas of quantum physics and how it leads to a science within the primacy of consciousness – the metaphysics that consciousness, not matter, is the ground of all being. We show that once medicine is formulated within the primacy of consciousness, it becomes clear how to make the practice of medicine truly holistic. We end the course with a discussion of the future outlook of the integrative medicine that results. Continue reading…