The Holographic Universe
Read The Holographic Universe Online
Authors: Michael Talbot
THE
HOLOGRAPHIC
UNIVERSE
MICHAEL TALBOT
CONTENTS
3
The Holographic Model and Psychology
8
Traveling in the Superhologram
The new data are of such far-reaching relevance that they could
revolutionize our understanding of the human psyche, of psychopathology, and of
the therapeutic process. Some of the observations transcend in their significance
the framework of psychology and psychiatry and represent a serious challenge to
the current Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm of Western science. They could change
drastically our image of human nature, of culture and history, and of reality.
—Dr. Stanislav Grof on |
In the movie
Star
Wars
, Luke Skywalker's adventure begins when a beam of light shoots out of
the robot Artoo Detoo and projects a miniature three-dimensional image of
Princess Leia. Luke watches spellbound as the ghostly sculpture of light begs
for someone named Obi-wan Kenobi to come to her assistance. The image is a
hologram
,
a three-dimensional picture made with the aid of a laser, and the technological
magic required to make such images is remarkable. But what is even more
astounding is that some scientists are beginning to believe the universe itself
is a kind of giant hologram, a splendidly detailed illusion no more or less
real than the image of Princess Leia that starts Luke on his quest.
Put another way, there
is evidence to suggest that our world and everything in it—from snowflakes to
maple trees to falling stars and spinning electrons—are also only ghostly
images, projections from a level of reality so beyond our own it is literally
beyond both space and time.
The main architects of
this astonishing idea are two of the world's most eminent thinkers: University
of London physicist David Bohm, a protege of Einstein's and one of the world's
most respected quantum physicists; and Karl Pribram, a neurophysiologist at
Stanford University and author of the classic neuropsychological textbook
Languages
of the Brain.
Intriguingly, Bohm and Pribram arrived at their conclusions
independently and while working from two very different directions. Bohm became
convinced of the universe's holographic nature only after years of
dissatisfaction with standard theories’ inability to explain all of the
phenomena encountered in quantum physics. Pribram became convinced because of the
failure of standard theories of the brain to explain various neurophysiological
puzzles.
However, after arriving
at their views, Bohm and Pribram quickly realized the holographic model
explained a number of other mysteries as well, including the apparent inability
of any theory, no matter how comprehensive, ever to account for all the
phenomena encountered in nature; the ability of individuals with hearing in
only one ear to determine the direction from which a sound originates; and our
ability to recognize the face of someone we have not seen for many years even
if that person has changed considerably in the interim.
But the most staggering
thing about the holographic model was that it suddenly made sense of a wide
range of phenomena so elusive they generally have been categorized outside the
province of scientific understanding. These include telepathy, precognition,
mystical feelings of oneness with the universe, and even psychokinesis, or the
ability of the mind to move physical objects without anyone touching them.
Indeed, it quickly
became apparent to the ever growing number of scientists who came to embrace
the holographic model that it helped explain virtually all paranormal and
mystical experiences, and in the last half-dozen years or so it has continued
to galvanize researchers and shed light on an increasing number of previously
inexplicable phenomena. For example:
• In 1980 University of
Connecticut
psychologist Dr.
Kenneth Ring proposed that near-death
experiences could be explained by the holographic model. Ring, who is president
of the International Association for Near-Death Studies, believes such
experiences, as well as death itself, are really nothing more than the shifting
of a person's consciousness from one level of the hologram of reality to
another.
• In 1985 Dr. Stanislav
Grof, chief of psychiatric research at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center
and an assistant professor of psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins University School
of Medicine, published a book in which he concluded that existing
neurophysiological models of the brain are inadequate and only a holographic
model can explain such things as archetypal experiences, encounters with the
collective unconscious, and other unusual phenomena experienced during altered
states of consciousness.
{3}
• At the 1987 annual
meeting of the Association for the Study of Dreams held in Washington, D.C.,
physicist Fred Alan Wolf delivered a talk in which he asserted that the
holographic model explains lucid dreams (unusually vivid dreams in which the
dreamer realizes he or she is awake). Wolf believes such dreams are actually
visits to parallel realities, and the holographic model will ultimately allow
us to develop a “physics of consciousness” which will enable us to begin to
explore more fully these other-dimensional levels of existence.
• In his 1987 book
entitled
Synchronicity: The Bridge Between Matter and Mind
, Dr. F. David
Peat, a physicist at Queen's University in Canada, asserted that
synchronicities (coincidences that are so unusual and so psychologically
meaningful they don't seem to be the result of chance alone) can be explained
by the holographic model. Peat believes such coincidences are actually “flaws
in the fabric of reality.” They reveal that our thought processes are much more
intimately connected to the physical world than has been hitherto suspected.
These are only a few of
the thought-provoking ideas that will be explored in this book. Many of these
ideas are extremely controversial. Indeed, the holographic model itself is highly
controversial and is by no means accepted by a majority of scientists.
Nonetheless, and as we shall see, many important and impressive thinkers do
support it and believe it may be the most accurate picture of reality we have
to date.
The holographic model
has also received some dramatic experimental support. In the field of
neurophysiology numerous studies have corroborated Pribram's various
predictions about the holographic nature of memory and perception. Similarly,
in 1982 a landmark experiment performed by a research team led by physicist
Alain Aspect at the Institute of Theoretical and Applied Optics, in Paris,
demonstrated that the web of subatomic particles that compose our physical
universe—the very fabric of reality itself—possesses what appears to be an
undeniable “holographic” property. These findings will also be discussed in the
book.
In addition to the
experimental evidence, several other things add weight to the holographic
hypothesis. Perhaps the most important considerations are the character and
achievements of the two men who originated the idea. Early in their careers,
and before the holographic model was even a glimmer in their thoughts, each
amassed accomplishments that would inspire most researchers to spend the rest
of their academic lives resting on their laurels. In the 1940s Pribram did
pioneering work on the limbic system, a region of the brain involved in
emotions and behavior. Bohm's work in plasma physics in the 1950s is also
considered landmark.
But even more
significantly, each has distinguished himself in another way. It is a way even
the most accomplished men and women can seldom call their own, for it is
measured not by mere intelligence or even talent It is measured by courage, the
tremendous resolve it takes to stand up for one's convictions even in the face
of overwhelming opposition. While he was a graduate student, Bohm did doctoral
work with Robert Oppenheimer. Later, in 1951, when Oppenheimer came under the
perilous scrutiny of Senator Joseph McCarthy's Committee on Un-American
Activities, Bohm was called to testify against him and refused. As a result he
lost his job at Princeton and never again taught in the United States, moving
first to Brazil and then to London.
Early in his career
Pribram faced a similar test of mettle. In 1935 a Portuguese neurologist named
Egas Moniz devised what he believed was the perfect treatment for mental
illness. He discovered that by boring into an individual's skull with a
surgical pick and severing the prefrontal cortex from the rest of the brain he
could make the most troublesome patients docile. He called the procedure a
prefrontal
lobotomy
, and by the 1940s it had become such a popular medical technique
that Moniz was awarded the Nobel Prize. In the 1950s the procedure's popularity
continued and it became a tool, like the McCarthy hearings, to stamp out
cultural undesirables. So accepted was its use for this purpose that the
surgeon Walter Freeman, the most outspoken advocate for the procedure in the
United States, wrote unashamedly that lobotomies “made good American citizens”
out of society's misfits, “schizophrenics, homosexuals, and radicals.”
During this time Pribram
came on the medical scene. However, unlike many of his peers, Pribram felt it
was wrong to tamper so recklessly with the brain of another. So deep were his
convictions that while working as a young neurosurgeon in Jacksonville,
Florida, he opposed the accepted medical wisdom of the day and refused to allow
any lobotomies to be performed in the ward he was overseeing. Later at Yale he
maintained his controversial stance, and his then radical views very nearly
lost him his job.
Bohm and Pribram's
commitment to stand up for what they believe in, regardless of the
consequences, is also evident in the holographic model. As we shall see,
placing their not inconsiderable reputations behind such a controversial idea
is not the easiest path either could have taken. Both their courage and the
vision they have demonstrated in the past again add weight to the holographic
idea.
One final piece of
evidence in favor of the holographic model is the paranormal itself. This is no
small point, for in the last several decades a remarkable body of evidence has
accrued suggesting that our current understanding of reality, the solid and
comforting sticks-and-stones picture of the world we all learned about in
high-school science class, is wrong. Because these findings cannot be explained
by any of our standard scientific models, science has in the main ignored them.
However, the volume of evidence has reached the point where this is no longer a
tenable situation.
To give just one
example, in 1987, physicist Robert G. Jahn and clinical psychologist Brenda J.
Dunne, both at Princeton University, announced that after a decade of rigorous
experimentation by their Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research Laboratory,
they had accumulated unequivocal evidence that the mind can psychically
interact with physical reality. More specifically, Jahn and Dunne found that
through mental concentration alone, human beings are able to affect the way
certain kinds of machines operate. This is an astounding finding and one that
cannot be accounted for in terms of our standard picture of reality.
It can be explained by
the holographic view, however. Conversely, because paranormal events cannot be
accounted for by our current scientific understandings, they cry out for a new
way of looking at the universe, a new scientific paradigm. In addition to
showing how the holographic model can account for the paranormal, the book will
also examine how mounting evidence in favor of the paranormal in turn actually
seems to necessitate the existence of such a model.