The Physics of Angels. Rupert Sheldrake

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СКАЧАТЬ arrange marriages—and many marriages are still arranged—an astrologer consults the charts of the prospective bride and bridegroom to make sure they’re compatible. If they are, the astrologer will then select the time that they should be married. When I first started living in India, I was surprised to receive wedding invitations from Indian friends and colleagues stating, for example, that the marriage of Radha and Krishnan will be celebrated at 3:34 A.M., or some such outlandish time. And although Indians are late for almost everything, they got it right for such an important event. The tying of the knot linking the two together in marriage would happen at the exact moment when their union was in harmony with the heavens.

      Elective astrology, choosing the right dates and times for important events, was still practiced in England up until the eighteenth century. And it was even practiced in the White House by President and Mrs. Reagan!

      The relation of the heavens and the earth was very important in the old cosmology. But because astrology and astronomy have split apart, astronomers see no meaning in what’s happening in the stars; they see no life, intelligence, or consciousness in the heavens. Astrologers see meaning, pattern, and a relationship between what happens in the heavens and what happens on earth, but unfortunately most never look at the sky. I know very few astrologers who can actually identify the stars and planets. Astrology is done from books, or nowadays, from computer programs. I hope someone will soon start giving courses on astronomy for astrologers. I think it is important to bring these two traditions together again.

      In many traditional cultures, myths tell of the way that the people are either inspired by or actually come from particular stars. For example, the Dogon in West Africa have a strong relationship with Sirius, the Dog Star. And to my mind it’s perfectly possible that by looking at stars and connecting with the intelligence that’s there, by forming a direct link to stars and their spirits, some influence or inspiration could pass from the star to the person consciously opening to it. This has certainly been the belief of people through the ages.

      The implications of this tradition are staggering. When we look at the stars, we can consider the possibility not only that some may have planets around them with living beings on them, which I think very probable, but also that the very stars themselves may have a kind of life, intelligence, or spirit.

      The stars are organized in larger units, galaxies, each of which contains billions of stars and has a galactic nucleus at its center with unknown properties. There are billions of galaxies in the heavens. And there may be a governing intelligence for each galaxy. And galaxies usually come in clusters, which may in turn have an organizing spirit.

      Thus there may be hierarchies of organizing intelligences. Galactic clusters include galaxies; galaxies include solar systems; and solar systems include planets. And at each level there’s a wholeness, which is included within a higher level of wholeness. So we have many levels of organization, all of which can be thought of as associated with some kind of intelligence or mind.

      In the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), which some scientists like discussing, they usually concentrate on the possibility that intelligent beings on other planets will transmit signals by radio that are mathematically meaningful, such as the sequence of prime numbers, and from these signals we will be able to infer the existence of intelligent beings wishing to communicate with us.⁴ But it may be that communication with other forms of intelligence could be far more direct. It may not rely on radio transmissions. It may not need spaceships. It may not depend on UFOs. Direct mental contact with these celestial intelligences maybe possible through a kind of telepathy.

      Matthew: For me, there’s no doubt that previous civilizations that we call indigenous knew much more than we do about communicating over large distances without technology. It’s there too in the lore of some of our Western saints who were psychics.

      Rupert: And technology may in any case be of very limited use in communicating with intelligences in other parts of the universe. The SETI program, intermittently funded by the U.S. government, shows up these limitations quite clearly. The standard assumption is that the inhabitants of a solitary planet would broadcast radio signals of a mathematically meaningful kind in the hope of finding another intelligent species somewhere in space. This is what astronomer Timothy Ferris calls the lonely-heart scenario: “Lonesome, technically proficient species seeks same. Object: Communication.”⁵

      Even if we were to receive and recognize such messages from a planet around a nearby star, communication would be very slow. The nearest star is about 4.2 light-years away, so even if we reply immediately, it will take 8.4 years between their sending a message and receiving our reply. Our galaxy is 100,000 light-years across, so it would take 100,000 years for radio messages to pass from one side of the galaxy to another, and 200,000 years before replies could be received. What civilization would have a life span and record-keeping system adequate to communicate over periods such as that? And as for communication with inhabitants of planets in other galaxies, forget it! The nearest regular galaxy to our own, the Andromeda galaxy, is 1.8 million light-years away, so replies will take 3.6 million years to arrive. For galaxies a billion light-years away, replies will take two billion years.

      If the transfer of thoughts can happen faster than the speed of light, then the whole question of interstellar and intergalactic communication looks very different, as it does when we broaden our thinking about intelligences elsewhere in the cosmos. Instead of confining our attention to minds of biological organisms, such as ourselves, living in technological civilizations, we can explore the possibility that planets, stars, galaxies, and galactic clusters also have a kind of consciousness. This is where the traditional understanding and experience of cosmic intelligences may be able to help us, and especially the angelology of Dionysius the Areopagite, Hildegard of Bingen, and Thomas Aquinas.

      Consider, for example, the possibility that the sun is conscious. This is not a very far-fetched idea, even in terms of the standard materialistic assumptions of orthodox science. Materialists believe that our own mental activity is associated with complex electromagnetic patterns in our brains. These patterns of electromagnetic activity are generally assumed to be the interface between consciousness and the physical activity of our brains. Consciousness is somehow supposed to emerge from these patterns. But the complex electromagnetic patterns in our brains are as nothing compared with the complexity of electromagnetic patterns in the sun.

      The sun is a fireball of plasma assumed to be fuelled by nuclear fusion reactions. A plasma is an ionized gas, and it is highly sensitive to electrical and magnetic influences. The sun is the theater of extremely complex, rhythmic patterns of electromagnetic activity, with an underlying cycle about twenty-two years long. About every eleven years the magnetic polarity of the sun reverses: its north magnetic pole switches to the south, or vice versa; after another eleven years, the poles return to their previous positions. These reversals correspond with cycles of sunspot activity, great flares on the surface of the sun. This reversal of polarity is connected with complex harmonic cycles of vibration, swirling resonant patterns of electromagnetic activity.

      If people are prepared to admit that our consciousness is associated with these complex electromagnetic patterns, then why shouldn’t the sun have a consciousness? The sun may think. Its mental activity may be associated with complex and measurable electromagnetic events both on its surface and deeper within. If there’s a connection between our consciousness and complex, dynamic electromagnetic patterns in our brains, there’s no reason that I can see for denying the possibility of this connection in other cases and especially on the sun.

      If the sun is conscious, why not the other stars too? All the stars may have mental activity, life, and intelligence associated with them. And this is, of course, precisely what was believed in the past—that the stars are the seat of intelligences, and these intelligences are angels.

      Matthew: I’m surprised to hear you say this. You are really sticking your neck out. I’ve never heard you speak of the sun and stars like this before. СКАЧАТЬ