New Ways to Knowledge
Author: Prof. Dr. Markolf Niemz
Category: Physics
Issue No: 85
The physicist Prof. Dr. Niemz shows on the basis of three comprehensible examples how scientific knowledge and spiritual inspirations mutually fertilize each other and both support humans to explore the connections of the inner and outer cosmos and possibly to understand them a little better. A plea for the connection of science and spirituality.
Again and again I am asked what moves me as a physicist to write spiritual books. The answer can be summarized in one sentence:
Natural science and spirituality are not mutually exclusive. On the contrary – they advance each other.
I would like to explain this in this article using three examples: the theory of evolution by Charles Darwin, the quantum theory co-formulated by Werner Heisenberg, and the process philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead.
With which enthusiasm the author deals with the inner and outer cosmos, you will find in the complete article. ? Below you can order!
EVOLUTIONARY THEORY
With the help of Darwin’s theory of evolution, we are now able to solve an ancient philosophical puzzle: Which came first? The chicken or the egg?
.
.
.
.
But in fact there is a solution, and this solution is amazingly simple once you get the hang of it. It’s this: There is no such thing as the chicken or the egg. Chickens of today are genetically different from those that lived a hundred or a million years ago. The same is true for eggs. Chickens and eggs evolve with each generation. That’s why, in my new book Die Welt mit anderen Augen sehen (Gütersloher Verlagshaus), I suggest talking about the verb forms “huhnend” and “eiend.” Our nouns have one major drawback – they obscure the fact that life unfolds!
.
QUANTUM THEORY
But not only our knowledge changes permanently as long as we live, but also our body. Almost all of our cells renew themselves every few years without us noticing. So basically I am not a who at all, but a process, a verb form – a “Menschend”. What we learned earlier about chickens and eggs also applies to us humans, because we too are part of the evolution of life. Unfortunately, we are too often the victims of our own languages, which focus on nouns and know only the words “chicken” and “egg” and “human being,” but neither “huhnend” nor “eiend” let alone “menschend.”
.
.
.
.
A great philosopher has formulated his own theory from what we have just realized. Unfortunately, many of us do not even know his name: Alfred North Whitehead.
Whitehead’s theory is often called “process philosophy”, but this term obscures its most important feature: liveness. Whitehead himself speaks of a philosophy of organism. Indeed, he conceives the unique qualities of an organism – experiences – as basic building blocks of the cosmos. Whitehead does not call them elementary particles, but drops of experience. “Objects” such as people, animals, plants, sand, or atoms did not exist in themselves. In fact, verbs would first create and form what we call “objects”.
Everything is relational, that is, it exists merely in a felt relation to everything else.
According to this, also every electron can feel: By “feeling” an electromagnetic field in the atom, it is directed to its orbit. Only “feeling” makes it an electron.
.
About the author :Prof. Dr. Markolf H. Niemz
Prof. Dr. Markolf H. Niemz is a physicist and holds a chair in medical technology at the Mannheim Medical Faculty of the University of Heidelberg. His research on laser medicine was awarded the Karl Freudenberg Prize by the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences in 1995. Niemz studied physics and bioengineering in Frankfurt a. M., Heidelberg and San Diego. He was a Research Fellow at Harvard Medical School with a grant from the German Research Foundation. His books are spiritual bestsellers and enliven the dialogue between natural science and religion.
This article appeared originally on the German Homepage of Tattva Viveka: https://www.tattva.de/das-markenzeichen-von-spiritualitaet/
