Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist, author (The Selfish Gene, The God Delusion, etc) is founder of the Foundation for Reason and Science. He campaigns against the teaching of religions in schools. Deepak Chopra is a physician, alternative therapist, author (Quantum Healing, The Third Jesus). Chopra relates quantum mechanics to the body’s healing processes. (He sets out his theories in Quantum Healing). Dawkins, in this debate (see above video) argues against Chopra’s theories, referring to them as pseudoscience. You could say that Dawkins = Science and Chopra = Consciousness. (Best I can do to describe the seeming opposite poles of thought the two represent).
English: Picture of Eric Whitacre conducting (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I came to this video via Eric Whitacre‘s Facebook page (Eric Whitacre is a composer and creator of his Virtual Choirs. Eric thinks Dawkins won the argument. I don’t think the argument can be won either way until we understand the reasons why, for example, someone is diagnosed with a massive terminal cancer one day that disappears entirely overnight. I don’t think the argument can be won either way until we have the answers to the universe, largely consisting of the mystery of dark matter. We live in the Post-Newtonian Era. I think it’s time for a Post-Newtonian approach to scientific reasoning that includes an investigation of non-falsifiables (such as experiences deemed psychic/spiritual).
And while I’m ranting, this Big Bang thingy? Why is the Big Bang equated with an accident? Why can’t it have been a controlled explosion? Meant. Take my cake-making. I get the ingredients together, merge them according to my recipe and stick the resulting pap into the oven. I then subject my concoction to high temperatures, knowing full well that my pap will change into a cake. Voila! My cake universe comes to life. It will probably be a chocolate one. Or burnt offering – I’m not God, after all.
It is generally considered that the universe had a beginning, (I cite Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time). Whether this is about 15 billion years ago or later, I’m not going to argue about. But until I know how the ingredients to bake the cake of the universe got themselves created and together, all approaches and all phenomena, including the (so-called) non-falsifiables, are worthy of observation and investigation.
I’m hungry now. Time for another fresh, delivered today, organic mince pie.
Ann
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Poetic Mapping: Walking Into Art 
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Oh Ann what a fascinating argument you make. I am with you on all this. I have a friend with pancreatic cancer who saw a Chinese dr and was treated and the cancer shrunk.However in the past week or so she has become ill and the tumour appears to be active again. Dr can’t explain the tumour shrinking. Like you say there are things happening that are beyond the understanding of the ‘experts’.
Baking a cake, or in my case my own biscuits, a friend once told me cooking is basically about a whole bunch of chemicals that react together to produce whatever it is we are cooking, including the burnt ones. I know that for one biscuit if I allow the dough to sit for about an hour then the end result is far different than cooking them straight away and I don’t understand that, but it works.
There is so much we don’t understand and I agree with the notion that the big bang could have been a controlled experiment by someone mucking around with chemicals again, and look what happened.
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I’m sorry to hear about your friend. I believe in positive thinking and would only say that if ‘the impossible’ (the shrinkage) happened once, it can happen again. We know about this in our household. The Big Bang thing – I’m not a scientist, but it seems to me that such precise ingredients can’t have been ‘experimental’. I’m on a high horse! Thanks for reading.
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Interesting view 🙂
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“I don’t think the argument can be won either way until we understand the reasons why, for example, someone is diagnosed with a massive terminal cancer one day that disappears entirely overnight. ”
We don’t have to answer each instance of this definitively, we just have to offer more reasonable and likely natural explanations than “God diddit.” Equipment or human error, misread results, mislabeled tests… In terms of not-overnight remission of cancer, some forms do shrink themselves over time with very little treatment. It’s not a miracle, but something we need to be understanding much better to see if we can learn something why those cancers are different than the more savage ones.
Despite Deepak’s post hoc ergo proctor hoc, you might want to ask yourself some questions about the nature of your universe pie-maker. Perhaps, if it really is removing tumors from certain people, what criteria is it using to choose them while thousands of other suffer? Or, if you can’t explain something as complex and mysterious as the universe without a “higher” being, then what do you use to explain this higher being, assuming he’s a complex being himself (otherwise what’s the point in worship?)
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Thank you for taking so much time to respond to my blog post. I think the thrust of my ‘argument’, after watching this ‘debate’ (the video) between Chopra and Dawkins was that, as we are living in the Quantum Era (since about 100 years) then it should be acceptable that phenomena considered anomalous, let us say – under the umbrella of ‘consciousness’ – should be accepted as worthy of observation. Addressing your comments, neither filling science gaps with ‘God’ nor with ‘it’s just science we haven’t discovered yet’ is reasonable. We don’t know who or what ‘diddit’ and debunking/ridiculing the God Squad or the anomylous phenomena of the vanishing tumour example is rational. (My example of vanishing cancers would obviously exclude any proven to have been the result of clerical error). As far as the piemaker is concerned (by the way, it was a chocolate cake, not a pie, so patissier applies rather than piemaker) your question is not difficult to answer. If the alleged great patissier in the sky is able to run backwards and forwards through time, and is making all his decisions based on the question ‘what is the loving thing to do?’ it’s a cinch. However, this patissier (me) cannot do this sort of running about (usually). Living on a fractal of the whole, I am not able to fathom the logic of any alleged great patissier in the sky who lives above the whole. A better analogy is probably the ‘Flatland’ one (Abbott), if you are familiar with this? However, it would still be a good idea to have a go at making decisions determined by the love thingy. But that would cause serious world problems, including in the field of science and in religion. Anomalous phenomena like me, are neither welcome in science or religion, though of course, there IS serious investigation going on now here and there in the consciousness field (Anil Seth e.g.).
This is the best response I can do on such a huge topic. The debate served no purpose. Dan Dennett (you know, the Darwin lookalike) is far more entertaining.
I knew I’d get ‘stick’ about this blog post!
Kind regards
Ann
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