consciousness – Western Tantra

Time

Professor Andrei Pimenov and associates at the Institute of Solid State Physics at the Vienna University of Technology recently discovered a way to directly measure the fine structure constant that relates to the strength of electromagnetic fields. Their method involved interacting a polarized laser light with a thin film. They determined that the thin film rotated the polarization of the laser light in quantized angles exactly equal to the fine structure constant.

This research shows that this rotation in the physical world is not smooth and continuous but rather happens in a series of tiny angles, the way a movie is not continuous movement but rather a sequence of still images. But what transmits the quality of rotation from one angle to the next? In a movie, there is a mechanism that turns off the image, selects the next image, and paints the next image on the screen. Taking a conceptual quantum leap, this suggests that in our world, everything at the quantum level is like this, a series of static moments of reality connected in some way from the past moment to the present, then to the next moment in a series of tiny quantum leaps.

If so, what transmits the information defining the present moment to the next moment of time? Something fluid and invisible happens between each moment and the next and seems to be related to consciousness. Intuition suggests that if we could insert ourselves into that fluid interval between one moment and the next, we could alter reality more profoundly than if we just watch life passively like the audience for a movie. Our physical bodies and senses always lag behind reality by the few tenths of a second it takes our sensors and nerves to transmit to the brain and process the information. We are always reacting to the past. Our deeper consciousness that we call the Soul does not seem to have this limitation.

In meditation, we are told we can access this dynamic fluid moment between each quantum of static reality. In Buddhism, we call this “catching up to the present moment” or “going with the flow.” It takes mental stillness or “no thought” to be in this mental state. It’s what we call wow or aha moments that are difficult to achieve and even harder to maintain for any length of time. When we can do this, magic happens. When I try to conceptualize this process, my brain gets boggled and shuts down. But intuition let me write a poem about this:

When we live within our heart,

We dwell within the cracks of time,

Between the tick and the tock,

Where anything is possible.

This idea of fluid moments connecting quantum leaps is a bit rough and speculative, but aligns with what advanced meditators say to be true. It feels like here may be a key to understanding reality, if only I had the intelligence to put the pieces of the puzzle together. What do you think? Can you clarify, expand, or refute this?

Reincarnation–Scientific Support for Immortality

Consciousness is awareness. Computers spawned the new branch of science known as information theory. A key aspect of information theory is, of course, Information. Information is that which reduces uncertainty. Computers manipulate bits of Information to do work, like calculate rocket trajectories. In an effort to replicate human thinking, computer scientists study the manipulation of Information to create artificial intelligence. Artificial intelligence appears to resemble human thinking. Some modern scientists have theorized that consciousness is related to Information, and Information organized in a way that is able to do work that resembles thinking can be considered Sentience. This opens the possibility that non-living things can have at least a rudimentary consciousness. A proton may be aware of its “proton-ness.”

Note that the conventional definition of Sentience is the ability to feel sensations. But how do we know if something can feel sensations? We know if the thing responds to a sensory input, like a tap. If we tap a cat, it reacts. In this way we know that the cat feels the tap. If we tap a rock, nothing overt happens, so we conclude that the rock feels nothing. But we do not know what the rock feels from its inside. All we know is that it did not react. The difference between the cat and the rock is the cat has an internal organization that allows it to process the tap and decide on a response, to bite or purr or leap. The rock may sense the tap (e.g., vibration passing through the atoms), but has no way to process the sense and decide on a response. So, the definition we will use here for Sentience (capitalized) is that which is consciously aware and able to process and respond to sensations; the ability to do mental work. It may reflect how well Information is integrated. The cat is Sentient by this definition. The rock’s atoms are defined by Information which may give the rock a rudimentary internal consciousness, but it cannot respond externally. The rock may feel the energy of a tap passing through its atoms, but cannot think or overtly respond, so we say it is not Sentient.

Switching scientific disciplines to physics, physicists define the aspects that make up reality as Information. Spin, charge, and mass/energy are the Information that define particles, and particles make up reality, including people. In collider experiments, physicists can smash particles together and form new particles. But when the spin, charge, and mass/energy of the particles entering and leaving the experiment are examined, they find that the spin, charge, and mass/energy of the entering particles always add up to exactly the same as the particles leaving the experiment. In other words, although the original particles are destroyed, the Information making up the particles is not destroyed, merely transformed into new particles having exactly the same total Information. Information can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed into different combinations. This is a fundamental law of physics. The Information defining that which makes up reality is physical, real, and eternal.

Switching back to computer science, the smallest possible amount of Information is called a bit, that which reduces uncertainty by half. The zero or one state of a binary computer transistor is one bit of Information. Recent experiments in computer science have demonstrated that in a binary computer circuit, there is a small difference in mass between a binary component set to one versus the same component set to zero. In other words, the bit of Information residing in that binary circuit is physical, it is real. Since everything in the universe is defined by the Information it contains, some information scientists theorize that the entire universe is conscious, and if the Information is arranged in a way that it can process the Information to do work, those parts of the universe may even be Sentient. This is known as panpsychism.

If consciousness is related to Information, and Information is physical, and organized Information is Sentience, then consciousness may be eternal. It is possible that consciousness, like the Information defining reality, can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed into different forms. The consciousness we experience as humans may endure beyond the death of the body. Buddhism, Hinduism, and my personal experience say that it does.

We know that the matter-energy universe has evolved over time to become the complex structures of galaxies, suns, planets, and the living things that populate this planet, including people. For some reason, probably because we cannot see it, we have always assumed that space-time is bland and uniform. Space-time is invisible. However, recent scientific experiments have discovered that space-time also has structure. Space-time crystals have been demonstrated. What if space-time evolved over time to become complex structures and even invisible living creatures constructed entirely out of space and time just as the matter and energy of the universe evolved into the living creatures we see around us? Why do we assume space and time are bland and featureless, unlike the matter and energy we can all see?

If Information is consciousness and eternal, and complex, invisible beings made only of time and space are possible, then the existence of immortal, invisible Souls is at least possible. And if everything in the universe is conscious, then there may be one or more Sentient supreme beings. If space-time has structure, there may be heavens and hells invisible to our matter-energy senses. If Souls are made of the same invisible Information and space-time structure as a supreme being, our Souls may be able to become one with our supreme being, just as the Mystics say. That is a lot of “ifs,” and these theories certainly do not prove that our Souls are real, immortal, and can reincarnate and evolve to become one with the universe, but science has uncovered evidence that this view is possible.

(Excerpted from the upcoming book, Western Tantra, The Red Path of Meditation)

New Cover Promotion

The book cover showing Rodin’s sculpture “The Kiss” was deemed too erotic for use by Amazon ads, so a new cover has replaced it. The new cover features a stairway into the sky, symbolizing a spiritual path to higher realizations. To introduce and celebrate the new cover, the price for both the paperback and Kindle editions has been temporarily reduced. Now is a great time to purchase extra copies as gifts and to recommend the book to friends.

Miracles

On the spiritual path we encounter miracles, if we understand what they are and are not afraid to see them. I have seen every miracle described in the New Testament, including turning water into wine (in a chemistry class). Doctors see the sick cured and the dead revived daily. In Michigan, we walked on water every winter. So let’s be clear about what a Miracle is. This concept was explored in depth in the book Western Tantra, the White Path of Ethics.

Many people think Miracles are impossible events, but quantum mechanics shows us that nothing is impossible, though some events are extremely improbable. So impossibility is not a criterion. Only natural and possible events can occur. Webster’s dictionary defines a miracle as an extremely unusual event. For use on the spiritual Path, Western Tantra defines a Miracle as a natural occurrence that is either so rare or so improbable in its timing and beneficial in its outcome that it suggests the presence of Divine intervention. When you consider the number of stars and habitable planets in the universe and the odds that one particular sperm and egg would join to make your body, it is a Miracle that you are here on earth at this time and place reading these words.

I was a skeptical atheist as a young scientist in my teens and early twenties. But I was also open-minded and willing to test my ideas with evidence from my own life experience and the experience of others. Early on, I learned that logic and reasoning unsupported by evidence can lead to wrong conclusions. This was brought home by my Reed College freshman year humanities teacher, Marvin Levich. In a memorable lecture using a long series of logical steps, each step of which was irrefutably true, Professor Levich proved logically that black is white.

There is nothing logical about a belief in benevolent Divine beings or an afterlife. Logically, we are only very smart animals, biological machines powered by chemistry, and when the biochemical processes animating us stop, we decay and should cease to exist as humans. Our consciousness should stop. Unfortunately for this theory, evidence contradicts this idea. I’m not alone in remembering past places and events that do not belong to the life I am living. We now know that DNA can transmit memory, but the people, places, and events that people remember do not belong to their genetic lineage. Some of them can provide credible evidence. The only way to retain the belief that when we are dead we no longer exist is by ignoring evidence to the contrary. This cherry-picking of evidence to support one’s views is known as “investigator bias” or “prejudice.”

Once one has accepted the possibility that the essence of our being, consciousness, may continue without a physical body, it then opens the possibility that other conscious entities may exist independent of physical bodies. That in turn opens the possibility that conscious entities superior to ours may exist (Judging by how stupid we humans can be, the existence of superior intelligence is almost a certainty!). Once we admit the possibility of superior intelligence independent of physical form, we can ask the questions, “Does at least one superior consciousness know that we are here, and does that consciousness care about us? Is there a sentience in the universe that tries to help us?” That is where Miracles become important.

It is hard to differentiate between intended events and random events. I had to learn statistical analysis in both my Masters in Psychology and Masters in Safety programs, both for research and risk assessment. I have a good sense of probability and how to calculate statistical significance. I was cured of a disease that was resistant to all medical treatment by means of an improbable series of events. The events immediately followed my first true prayer, were the ordinary actions of people, but were unusual in their timing, frequency, duration, and results. It felt like a Miracle.

I started paying attention to the ways that beneficial events happen in the world. This lead to my observation that there appears to be a superior intelligence in the universe that manifests through timely natural events, and often through the unselfish actions of sentient beings (people and animals) to produce beneficial results in a manner that cannot be explained by chance. I call them Miracles, and I have seen many. Have you seen Miracles in your life?

Formlessness

There are three realms of existence, domains that affect the world. Let’s walk through them. Look around and tap things. That’s the Material world, the Physical Form realm. Form means having characteristics that can be described. Look in a mirror–that is your Physical Form Body. Hold up some fingers. Most people around you would agree on how many fingers you are holding up. Obvious, right? Almost everyone can perceive the Material realm.

Now close your eyes and imagine your face and body. Notice that your mental image of yourself has shapes and other characteristics. That is also Form, Mental Form. Imagine a letter. That visualized symbol has a characteristic Form that you can see in the “mind’s eye” and can be described. Imagine hearing a word. That is an auditory Mental Form. Imagine walking. That is a visualized action, a series of Mental Forms. This is the second realm of existence, the Mental Form realm, or Spirit Realm, the non-physical things you can see, feel, and hear with your inner perceptions.

This Mental Form realm also exists, because much of what you can visualize, with effort you can make Real, you can manifest your vision in the Physical Form world. Even if you can’t bring an idea into Physical reality, there are engineers, artists, animators, or scientists who can. Almost everything humans have created first existed as ideas or plans in someone’s mind.

But where do these ideas come from? Many, like the benzene ring, spring into people’s minds in a vision, fully formed. Artists, like my mother, describe this source of ideas as a well that never runs dry. There is a source of potential that contains everything that could exist, awaiting our mental and physical effort to visualize it and bring it into existence. Potential has not yet taken Form, it is Formless.

Many things that exist in the world have no Form: space, time, love, hate, fear, joy, beauty, consciousness. Every one of these “things” influence the world, therefore exist, even though they are invisible and have no shape, color, size, or other describable characteristics. They have no Form. Yet we experience them. We know they exist. This is the Formless realm of existence.

All three realms of being have power in the world, thus they all exist. People have experienced inhabitants of each realm. We all perceive the creatures of the Material world. Some people experience ghosts, angels, and other spirits as Mental Forms, the Spirit world. Fewer people experience invisible forces and beings without form, the Divine dimension. Atheist scientists who perceive the beauty of the invisible laws of nature, relationships among forces, and mathematics are touching Divinity, the Formless reality underlying all-that-is.

People have differing capacity to perceive and master the three realms, depending on their Spiritual maturity. Everyone has at least some access to physical perception, what we call the Material world. Those of us who are limited to the five senses, or fear what lies beyond them, or have limited imagination, often deny that the other realms exist. They dismiss the Spirit realm as mere fantasy, and say they only believe what they can see and touch. It is possible to be a master of the Material world and have no perception of worlds beyond. Such people can become leaders and “stars,” wealthy and admired by many. But without access to creativity, they must rely on helpers or subordinates who perceive possibilities beyond the mundane. Some masters of the Material world may be Spiritual cripples. This is sad.

Leaving the mundane world of the five senses behind, many people are able to visualize things that other people cannot perceive. In the arts and sports, we say these people are “creative,” they can manifest what they imagine into forms that others can perceive, clay into sculpture, emotion into music, words into story, movement into performance. In the sciences, we call those who have access to the Spirit realm of Mental Form “gifted.” They can perceive relationships among matter, energy, time, space, and forces to create technology that generations ago would have been called “magic.” In the religions, there are people with access to the Spirit realm of thought and deep perception who can see and hear beings and realms without Physical Form. We call them teachers, gurus, psychics, meditators, shamans, and prophets. We say they have the third eye or sixth sense. These are our masters of the Spiritual world. Many of these people, especially those with large egos, regard being a master of the Spirit world as the ultimate attainment. But this is merely a step along the Path to ultimate experience.

Delving deeper than the visualized characteristics of religious images, of gods and demons, beyond even the limits of human imagination, lies the realm of ecstatic religious experience. The realm that can only be experienced, because it is beyond the power of words to describe. The Tao. The one. The unitive experience. Emptiness. The Ultimate. The Divine. The Formless.

This Formless realm can be accessed by anyone, but few make the effort to perceive the reality that is the foundation of our experience. It can be found with stillness meditation into the Heart of Reality. It can be reached through devotional prayer. It can be given as the gift of solace from adversity. It can be the karmic effect from selfless service. It can be found after years of diligent practice, or the blinding flash of insight in an instant. There are as many different ways as there are people, and many ways yet to be discovered. We call masters of the Formless Divine realm Mystics, and they are hidden everywhere. How would you find one, or better yet become one?

Ego

Known in Buddhist practice as self-grasping, in psychology as personality, and by writers as persona, Ego is considered to be our chief obstacle to spiritual practice. Western Tantra will use this term to designate our life plan for interacting with our environment, which includes our characteristic ways of relating to other people, the methods we use to do things, our “style,” the ways we see ourselves and the ways we hope other see us. It can include even our homes, cars, family and country identification. But Ego especially focuses on our physical body and the way we clothe and care for it. Think of Ego as our self-concept and its habitual way of relating to the world. Ego interferes with our spiritual progress in three primary ways.

First, the physical body belongs to the material realm, and its demands tie us to the material world. We then focus on the material world as the solution to our problems. It’s great to have a comfortable material life, but we should keep in mind that our physical body will eventually die, leaving all our material wealth behind. So to be realistic, we should use our time on earth to find our pathway to the eternal.

The second way our Ego interferes with our spiritual progress is by draining our Soul of its power. Our Ego is merely a mental concept, how we view ourselves, and the habitual ways we relate to the world, our personality. Our personality usually conflicts with the way others see us. We try to help others and people accuse us of selfish motives. If we think of ourselves as tough-minded, we are criticized for showing weakness. Wherever we go and whatever we do, we have to defend ourselves and our actions. This takes energy. On a purely physical level, the brain works hard to correct dissonance between personal and external perceptions, and this expends neurotransmitters. Threats to our self-concepts take mental work which exhausts us.

On a spiritual level, maintaining Ego also takes energy. If you are in tune with your inner mental realm, you realize that challenges to our self-concept weaken our Ego, and the Ego must draw consciousness energy, life force, from its source, the Soul, in order to restore the Ego. The more our Ego’s life plan fails to supply our needs, the more Ego drains our Soul of energy to maintain our image of ourselves in the face of reality. We experience blows to our Ego as Soul crushing.

Those of us with awareness of our life force, the energy of consciousness, realize how essential this life force is to our wellbeing. In different cultures, this life force is called: prana, chi, qi, kundalini, juju, esa, medicine, breath, light, love, and many other names. The spiritually aware can feel this energy and where it flows. Your life force flows to the focus of your attention. It’s why we say pay attention. It costs us something, our juju.

When the Ego hurts, we pay attention to ourselves, and life energy flows from our source of divine energy, our divine Soul, to heal our hurt Ego. The more the Ego is out of step with reality, the more wounds our Ego takes from the world, and the more energy it takes from the Soul to support itself. The Ego is a fixed self-concept that is trying to deal with an ever-changing reality, so our Egos are constantly draining our Souls of energy, leaving little of no energy for other uses, including healing our body or discovering our gateway to the beyond.

The third way our Ego interferes with our spiritual progress is by sabotage. We mistake our Ego as our true nature. We think the ways we see ourselves and all our support mechanisms that maintain the Ego are our true state of being. They are not. Our true nature is pure consciousness in union with all-that-is, what some call Soul in union with God, Consciousness dwelling in Emptiness, Enlightened consciousness, Nirvana, Satori, Paradise, and many other terms. Many people have described the ecstasy of discovering their true nature in the universe.

However, when we discover our true nature, we naturally abandon our false nature, our Ego. We stop feeding it our life force energy, and Ego dies. Our Ego knows it lives only by means of the consciousness energy it draws from the Soul. Because Ego thinks it is us, it thinks we will cease to exist without the Soul’s life energy, so Ego enslaves our Souls. When our Souls eventually discover this subterfuge as part of the spiritual path, we discover we do not need a concept to exist. We exist beyond concepts, and the Ego dissolves. We become selfless.

Ego is terrified of losing its life energy and will do anything to sabotage progress on the spiritual path to discover reality, that we are not our mental concepts of ourselves. That is why the Ego is known as the enemy we carry around inside us. As described in Western Tantra, the White Path of Ethics, Chapter 6 “The Enemy Within,” the Ego will even kill its host body to escape from the reality that Ego must surrender and dissolve in order to liberate the Soul. That is why most spiritual traditions forbid suicide. They realize that surrender of the Ego is an essential step on the spiritual journey.

As traumatic as losing your concept of self can be, there are great benefits. One is the feeling of freedom. You no longer need to feed your Ego, and it can no longer be hurt, because it is gone. The other great benefit is that without the need to feed your life energy to your self-concept, you now have energy for other uses. You can heal your body with your own life energy, you can heal others, and wishes backed by the power of your unselfish, divine Soul now have the power needed to manifest. Magic becomes real. Really.