Summing up the G.O.D. Experiments—The Emerging Case for Intelligent Evolution
SEEING THE BIG PICTURE, AND NEVER FORGETTING IT
Einstein calls on us to use not just our rational mind but our intuition. As we review the evidence presented in these pages, that’s a worthwhile admonition to keep in mind: remember not only to honor your rational mind as a “faithful servant” but to also envision your intuitive mind as a “sacred gift” from the Source—even if you see the Source simply as your own mind. Tap into your intuitive side as well as your rational side.
THE BIG QUESTION
Is there something fundamental that needs to be explained in nature and the universe? The answer is clearly yes. The far-reaching question has to do with the overabundant evidence of evolving orders in the universe. Everywhere we look, from photons and chemicals, through flowers and people, to galaxies and superclusters, we witness dynamically unfolding orders. And the majority of these evolving orders are indescribably complex as well as breathtakingly beautiful.
Order appears to be the rule, and not the exception, in nature. Some of the orders have been termed by Tyler Volk, Ph.D., “metapatterns”; these replicate themselves at every level in the universe. They are universal.
One of the most ubiquitous metapatterns in nature—a pattern that follows the “Golden Ratio” called phi—is the universal spiral shape that appears in the trails made by subatomic particles, in the double-helix molecule DNA, in seashells, in the movement pattern of the heart, in tornadoes, in galaxies.
Over the past two centuries science has catalogued a dizzying array of exquisite orders. Scientists have created optical microscopes and telescopes that enable researchers to witness orders that are too small or are too far away to be seen unaided. Electrical engineers have created supersensitive sensors that measure electromagnetic fields vibrating at frequencies other than the restricted band of frequencies visible by the human eye. Researchers can now examine a myriad of invisible orders—using microwaves, infrared waves, ultraviolet waves, radio waves, X rays, gamma rays—manifesting from subatomic particles to superclusters of galaxies.
It is also possible to witness the evolution of complex orders that are created by humans. Scientists of the twenty-first century function in a veritable sea of intelligently guided experimental designs expressed in architecture, art, music, science, and technology. The evidence from history convincingly demonstrates that it is possible for us to function brilliantly in the human role of being an extraordinary Guiding-Organizing-Designing species.
Science can be described as a formal process of discovering—through intelligent trial-and-error experimentation—the existence of order where previously we thought there was no order. Science discovers new patterns and then attempts to explain them.
The question is, does the ubiquitous existence of these evolving orders reflect the expression of a random evolutionary process, or an intelligent evolutionary one?
ORCHESTRATED ORDERS IN OUR PERSONAL LIVES
How wide and how deep does order extend in the universe? Does it extend all the way to the orchestration of our daily lives? If order is the rule in the universe, and not the exception, does complex ordering apply to our personal lives as well? You have already encountered in these pages a few detailed examples of extraordinary synchronicities in human life that illustrate the kind of amazing evidence that can be obtained on this profound question.
The unanticipated findings from the Chris Robinson experiment illustrate how contemporary precognitive parapsychology research can uncover uncanny patterns in the coordination and sequencing of our daily lives that seem utterly incomprehensible to most of us. The unanticipated synchronicities or coincidences revealed in the “Remember the diamond” story provide compelling evidence of everyday orchestration that can be observed not only in controlled parapsychology experiments (Part Two) but in our personal lives as well (Part Three). And a truly exceptional avalanche of synchronicities is revealed in Appendix C.
However, we will never discover such synchronicities in the laboratory or in our lives unless our minds are open to seeing them and we are willing to systematically record the observations. This is a case where belief in the possibility of order is a prerequisite for seeing evidence of order in science as well as daily life.
THE UBIQUITOUS NATURE OF ORDER
If we accept the evidence not only from physics, chemistry, biology, ecology, and astrophysics, but from controlled parapsychology experiments as well as personal exploratory experiments, that order is the rule, not the exception, in nature, then how do we explain it? Where does all this order come from?
As we have discussed, the simplest explanation is to suggest that orders can occur and evolve by chance alone. Sometimes called blind chance, this is the generally accepted explanation from conventional science. It is generally assumed that randomness allows for all possible orders to occur, and by chance, evolution—including natural selection—will unfold.
It is further generally assumed that the universe is becoming more disordered over time, as described by the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Science generally assumes that the emergence and evolution of pockets of order existing in the universal sea of increasing disorder are due to the operation of chance combined with what is termed “self-organization.” Self-organization is presumed to be the capacity of certain systems to self-assemble without the aid of an external organizing force. Darwin’s natural selection explanation combines chance mutation with self-organization. But is the blind chance explanation necessarily the correct explanation? No, not necessarily.
The alternative explanation involves some sort of creative intelligent, trial-and-error ordering process—what I term an Experimenting Guiding-Organizing-Designing (G.O.D.) process. This explanation proposes that what Darwin termed “natural selection” is an intelligently guided experimenting process—the G.O.D. process—that promotes the creative expression and evolution of ever more complex and interconnected systems. What Darwin termed “natural selection” may actually reflect the operation of “intelligent selection.”
Why would I propose that people consider entertaining an alternative hypothesis to the blind chance explanation? Remember, the question being asked is: can scientific evidence combined with careful reasoning lead us to conclude that some sort of an Experimenting G.O.D. process exists in the evolving universe?
There are three primary reasons for seriously questioning whether the conventional, generally accepted chance explanation is correct. As noted earlier, Reasons 2 and 3 are provided for the first time in this book.
REASON 1: THERE IS TOO MUCH PRECISE ORDER IN THE UNIVERSE TO HAVE OCCURRED BY CHANCE.
The combined evidence spanning physics and chemistry to ecology and astrophysics suggests that there is too much order in the universe. Recall how microscopes and telescopes reveal a previously unseen wealth of order. This wealth of order is organized in too precise a manner to plausibly be explained as occurring by chance. The balance of forces necessary to sustain the universe and ultimately sustain biological life is too precarious and precise to have come into existence simply by chance alone. The evidence and the reasoning for this position are provided in a number of recent books, such as The Anthropic Principle. The interested reader is encouraged to review this emerging abundance of evidence. (Recommended readings are included at the end of this book.)
REASON 2: THE CHANCE EXPLANATION IS NOT SUPPORTED BY EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE.
When experiments are conducted that actually test predictions made by the chance hypothesis, compelling evidence is discovered to indicate that the chance explanation does not work in practice. The simple physics experiments presented in Part Two of this book—focusing on a simple sand painting experiment—convincingly demonstrate that chance by itself cannot explain all of the order that is observed in the universe as well as in everyday life.
But the skeptic may wonder whether sand paintings (or clothes folding) might happen given enough time—say, billions of years. When you examine the data from the experiments carefully, you find no evidence whatsoever to support such a speculation. In the same way, watches, buildings, symphonies, computers do not come about by chance. These things require a sophisticated planning and implementing ordering process—that is, human designers and builders—to come into existence.
Such obvious simple physical observations are complemented by more complex but easily understood computer modeling experiments. Recall that when conditions for producing random sampling are in place, in the absence of a specific ordering process, numbers always create what is termed a “normal” distribution, a bell-shaped curve. And the more numbers used in the calculations, the more perfectly formed becomes the bell-shaped curve.
The combination of evidence in Part Two from the simple physics experiments, plus the more complex computer modeling experiments, conclusively disproves the key prediction. Contrary to well-accepted popular belief, when we actually conduct the experiments, we discover that replicated organizations do not emerge by chance. It is sometimes said that only a donkey makes “ass-umptions.” I too once ass-umed that the chance explanation must be true; I never tested whether it actually worked in the real world.
REASON 3: THE CONDITIONS FOR CREATING CHANCE DO NOT EXIST IN THE UNIVERSE.
Do the conditions necessary to produce random sampling exist in the universe? The answer to this fundamental question is never, and I emphasize the word “never.” When we carefully consider the conditions necessary to produce random orders in the first place, we are reminded that a prerequisite for random sampling is independence of events.
If events are not independent, random distributions of events are never observed. Again: never. This is a well-accepted fact in science. Computer programs have been designed that intelligently model the creation of complex orders requiring the use of feedback loops. The loops in the program carefully connect the output of a given equation to the input of another equation. The equations are therefore interconnected; they are not independent. One equation feeds the other, and depending upon the program, this can happen hundreds of times or millions of times. Then, and only then, can replicable evolving orders be observed. So this does not meet the test for randomness. No ifs, ands, or buts.
Even what is termed “self-organization” only occurs when feedback loops exist and function in an organized fashion. Organization can create organization; however, randomization does not in and of itself create organization. So-called artificial-life programs require intelligence to program them and intelligent operating systems to carry out the instructions.
Does independence exist in real life? When we carefully look for the existence of independence in the universe, what we find instead is interdependence and interconnectedness. Contemporary physics tells us that everything that exists in the material universe is interconnected with everything, to various degrees, by invisible force fields of information and energy. These invisible physical fields include gravitation and electromagnetism. In other words, interconnection (like order) is the rule, not the exception, in nature.
What physics calls the “vacuum” or “void” is actually filled with incomprehensibly complex dynamic networks of highly organized—and organizing—fields of force. Though physicists do not understand the origin and organization of these invisible force fields, they are convinced that these invisible fields definitely exist and play a regulating or guiding role in all physical systems. Wireless communication by cell phones is one example that illustrates this. In the chapter titled “Can G.O.D. Play Dice with the Universe?” I discussed the typically ignored discrepancy between what statistics and physics tell us (randomness requires independence, but everything is in fact interdependent) and how we therefore erroneously apply the randomness explanation to the origin and evolution of order in the universe.
When we accept this fact, there is no longer a justifiable reason to expect that, given enough time, chance alone could create something as simple and beautiful as a Native American sand painting, let alone a single living cell, or a V-shaped formation of flying geese each composed of billions of organized cells.
In fact, the combination of evidence and logic leads to the paradigm-shifting conclusion that there is no such thing as pure randomness in the universe.
What we perceive as randomness may instead reflect a degree of complexity of order that we have yet to decode (and in some cases, as proved mathematically by Gödel—mentioned below—we may never be able to decode).
IF CHANCE IS NOT THE EXPLANATION FOR ORDER, THEN WHAT IS?
Once you fully accept Reasons 1 through 3 above—that the existence of ubiquitous order in the universe (Reason 1) does not (Reason 2) and cannot (Reason 3) occur by chance—you are led inexorably to consider the possible existence of some sort of universal, invisible, intelligent Guiding-Organizing-Designing field process in the universe.
It follows that what I am calling an invisible Experimenting G.O.D.-field process (or simply the G.O.D. process) must somehow, to some degree, be playing a fundamental Guiding-Organizing-Designing role in everything that expresses order—from subatomic superstrings, through personal coincidences that are too unexpected to be by chance, to superclusters of galaxies.
Moreover, it follows that even when we observe apparently self-organizing systems—such as the formation of individual raindrops containing billions of atoms, or spiraling galaxies containing billions of stars—they too must involve, to various degrees, an invisible Experimenting G.O.D.-field process. This leads to the conclusion that all evolution, from the micro to the macro, must involve an expression of some sort of intelligent evolution.
Why do I say “must involve”? I choose these words using the identical reasoning that leads us to conclude that the spontaneous falling of apples to the ground must involve some sort of invisible guiding field, the one we call gravity.
Remember, no one has ever seen a gravitational field or ever measured one (except indirectly). We cannot hear, smell, taste, or touch gravity. What we do is logically infer the existence of a gravitational field from the behavior of apples falling to the ground, from planets revolving around suns, and light bending around the sun.
In the same way, no one has ever seen an Experimenting G.O.D.field or measured one (except indirectly). We cannot hear, smell, taste, or touch an Experimenting G.O.D.-field. What we can do is logically infer its existence from everyday experiences such as the making of a sand painting or the folding of clothes (which we can prove requires an external, purposeful, intelligent process that can be seen by the naked eye) and, at another extreme, from the spiraling of galaxies and the creation of superclusters (which to the uninformed eye seem folded into spirals as if by magic). This leads to the conclusion that all evolution, from the micro to the macro, must involve an expression of some sort of intelligent evolution.
ASSUMPTIONS OF CONVENTIONAL SCIENCE AND OF THE SKEPTICS
The well-educated conventional scientist will be quick to retort that contemporary science operates on the premise that the evolution of order observed in the universe reflects a combination of (1) the operation of natural laws, plus (2) randomness, and therefore they see no need to hypothesize the existence of an invisible intelligence guiding the entire process. Such scientists will typically treat the sand painting and computer program examples described in Part Two as trivial (and will ignore them, since the examples clearly require the presence of intelligent Guiding-Organizing-Designing processes, human or other-wise). Instead they will focus their attention on the apparent “self” (species) evolution of plants and animals.
However, these scientists must assume that the discovered collection of so-called natural laws somehow came into being “by chance” (a presumption that is not based on any evidence—it is based on an implicit bias against intelligence rather than a careful analysis of intelligence) and that randomness, as in “inherently unpredictable,” can somehow magically occur even in the absence of independence as is required for random sampling. I use the word “magically” only partly tongue-in-cheek, because such scientists simply assume that “inherent unpredictability” can occur; they do not say how it can occur.
If you are such a scientist (or a skeptic), we encourage you to remember that as explained earlier, the observation of “unpredictable” as in “I can’t discover a pattern in these numbers” does not automatically justify your interpretation of the existence of an “unpredictable process” creating order out of “randomness.” Humility about our assumptions, especially about randomness, is in order. The important lesson of the number pi is that it can remind all of us—skeptic, agnostic, and believer alike—that a seemingly “unpredictable” number can nonetheless be 100 percent replicable and reflect a complex, yet-to-be deciphered pattern of universal importance and application.
FROM INTEGRATION TO PREDICTION—CAN WE COMMUNICATE WITH AN INVISIBLE EXPERIMENTING G.O.D. PROCESS?
For an alternative theory to be valid it should first of all integrate diverse evidence, including evidence that seems anomalous to the conventional theory (for example, how the mind can literally organize seeming random electron flow, discussed in Chapter 15). The alternative theory should also make new predictions that can be confirmed or disproven (scientists prefer the term “disconfirmed”) through future research.
When we integrate the concept of organizing fields from physics with the concepts of hierarchy and interconnections from systems science—what I have playfully termed “the All in the Small”—we come to the novel prediction that it is theoretically possible to receive information from a G.O.D. process, since the universal G.O.D. process is inside everything. In straightforward language, what this means is that both evidence and reasoning lead to the prediction that people can, to various degrees, receive information from “God.” This includes you and me.
To the best of my knowledge, no credible researcher in the history of science has been brave enough to conduct a formal research program testing this prediction. The closest anyone has come, as far as I’m aware, was Emanuel Swedenborg, arguably Sweden’s most successful and celebrated scientist. At age fifty-six he shifted his focus from the physical sciences to the spiritual sciences. The series of books he wrote in the 1600s were based upon the extensive personal exploratory experiments he conducted in his mind as he explored realms that could be experienced by human consciousness.
Swedenborg’s personal exploratory experiments, shared through his numerous writings, have had a major influence on a select group of distinguished scientists and writers in the twentieth century, including William James and Helen Keller. However, no scientist has formally accepted the challenge of trying to test this prediction in the laboratory.
Swedenborg conducted theological experiments in his head for almost two decades. Einstein conducted thought experiments in his head beginning as early as his childhood. My personal exploratory experiments testing whether it is possible, in principle, to receive information from the universe that can be independently verified integrates Swedenborg’s and Einstein’s model of being open to exploring nature and the universe in one’s mind.
The findings are not in and of themselves definitive, since by definition they are clearly exploratory. However, they are, as the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Wigner used to say, certainly “amusing” and “absolutely worth thinking about.”
These preliminary findings provide proof-in-principle evidence—they demonstrate that it is possible to design controlled experiments in the laboratory testing the G.O.D. communication prediction. That is, if someone is brave enough to perform them. In part, the reason for writing this book is to provide the groundwork for bringing the Experimenting G.O.D. field process explanation into mainstream science so that an academic discipline that we might call “experimental theology” can be launched.
OTHER KINDS OF EVIDENCE—APPRECIATING THE EXTRAORDINARY SCOPE OF THE HUMAN MIND
There is a mathematical proof known as Gödel’s Theorem that says, in essence, that certain mathematical assumptions can never be formally proven because of their complexity. Using the language of complexity theory, Gödel’s Theorem concludes that to fully understand a complex system requires an even more complex system. A corollary of this idea from systems theory, as any youngster might say, is “It takes one to know one.”
If human beings are composed of the very stuff of the Experimenting G.O.D. process itself—and therefore, if in principle we have its infinite potential to learn and evolve—then we should be able to find evidence in psychology and consciousness studies documenting that the human mind is at least as big in scope as the universe itself. (It is amusing that probably the most important mathematical proof of relevance to the Experimenting G.O.D. process is by Gödel, whose name happens to contain the word “God.”)
In Chapter 12, I took you through a simple psychology experiment that convincingly demonstrates how even the mind of a young child can envision holding objects that vary in size from the infinitely small (a photon of light) to beyond the All (the entire universe) in the palm of their hand. The human mind has the power to learn how to invent technologies that can enable us to see the paths made by subatomic particles, on the one hand, and superclusters of galaxies, on the other hand. The human mind has the power to conceive of imaginary numbers and even infinities of numbers.
The history of science and technology reminds us that the potential of the human imagination goes beyond anything we can currently imagine. Thus far, no one has explained the origin of human consciousness in physical terms. Moreover, as described in Part Four, the experiments that purportedly support the thesis that the brain creates consciousness equally support the thesis that the brain is a receiver for consciousness. Experiments that distinguish between these two competing explanations—the brain as the creator of consciousness versus the brain as created by consciousness—are coming curiously from areas such as parapsychology and afterlife science that up to now have not been part of mainstream science.
It doesn’t take a Nobel laureate physicist to reason that just as a raindrop is composed of billions of water molecules, and a lake is composed of billions of drops of water, and a galaxy is composed of billions of stars, and a universe is composed of billions of galaxies, so the universal Experimenting G.O.D. mind—if it exists as this book says it does—would be composed of billions of little experimenting Guiding-Organizing-Designing minds (little g.o.d.s) using human brains.
Part Five reviews evidence leading to the conclusion that just as invisible fields are universal, consciousness itself is universal. Moreover, asking questions of the universe may be a universal process of intelligent trial-and-error questioning that exists at every level of the universe.
Evolution at all scales, from superstrings to superclusters of galaxies, and everything in between, including us, may not simply be “bottom up.” It may well be “top down”—an example of “All in the Small” intentional and intelligent evolution of infinite scope and creative potential.
G.O.D. AND MATHEMATICS
Physicists have a passion, if not reverence, for mathematics. So, too, do deeply spiritual people, especially those who happen to have an affinity for math.
Einstein had a deep appreciation for the beauty and power of mathematics, as well as its limitations and his own limitations in dealing with it. He’s quoted as saying “I don’t believe in mathematics,” as well as “Don’t worry about your problems in mathematics; I assure you mine are greater.”
On the other hand, there’s some suggestion that Darwin may not have been a fan of mathematics. He has been quoted as saying, “A mathematician is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that isn’t there.” As someone who has two cats, I appreciate both the utility and limitations of formulas and numbers—I appreciate both Einstein’s and Darwin’s complex opinions about math.
I love logic and mathematics, and I seem to have some degree of aptitude for both (despite receiving math awards in grade school, getting near perfect scores in new math when I was in high school, performing in the ninety-ninth percentile on the mathematics graduate record examination, and getting a hundred in a graduate course in complex analyses of variance, my strongest critics after reading this book would question whether I have a few mathematical screws loose—and I sometimes wonder this myself).
Some of my mathematically inclined colleagues, after reading early drafts of this work, have asked, “Where’s the math?” They have argued, in various ways, that in order to believe that intelligence truly operates in physics, chemistry, and biology, they want to see the formulas. For them, words are ultimately fuzzy, whereas formulas are precise. When you transform an idea into an equation, the fuzzy speculation becomes a potentially testable premise.
(I will never forget when my agent, William Gladstone, who as an undergraduate at Yale was a math wizard, told me that what convinced him my theory of systemic memory had validity was not the three hundred pages of logic and data presented in The Living Energy Universe, but a single formula I included.)
So I offer a summary formula that speaks to the creation and evolution of feedback memory in systems—from superstrings to super-clusters of galaxies, and everything in between, including us. It also speaks to the existence of intelligence and evolution in systems, since memory is a fundamental component of intelligence.
If you are not mathematically inclined, you can skip this formal equation and move on to a more verbal, poetic one; the abstract equation is included for those who are mathematically inclined. In the oversimplified formula described below:
• A and B stand for two parts of any system
• t stands for time (t+ stands for the time it takes information to travel from part A of the system to reach part B, or B to reach A)
• r stands for recurrence (repeating in a circular fashion, from A to B and back to A, over and over)
• “aba …” represents the evolving systemic (interactive) memory (a1b2a3, etc.). The existence of nonlinear information circulating within a system allows for intelligence and creative emergence to operate within recurrent feedback processes.
Using these terms, the formula is: (At + Bt+)r = (at+bt++at+++ … )r
To those who seek additional mathematical support (for example, how concepts of intention and purpose can be modeled as well), rather than offer it here in a book intended for the general reader, my colleagues and I will present the details in appropriate scientific publications, in the form of some novel equations and associated research.
A BIT OF POETRY
For those who prefer to skip the mathematics, I’d like to offer a related idea as a poetic formula, “a poetry of logical ideas”—a playful equation that expresses, in everyday language, the essence of the conclusion of this book. As Einstein said, “Pure mathematics is, in its way, the poetry of logical ideas.” Physicists are often playful and poetic; the term “Big Bang” is a case in point.
In that vein, my playful expression of these concepts is:
Evolution = motivation • creativity Infinitely recurring
The take-home message of the intelligent evolution hypothesis is that motivation (another term for intention) and creativity (a component of infinite intelligence) together function as universal natural recurrent feedback processes that propel the origin and evolution of the order of everything—be it physical, chemical, biological, psychological, social, ecological, astrophysical, or whatever.
I’m not proposing that universal intention (motivation) and infinite intelligence (creativity) are human-like. I am not anthropomorphizing. What I’m proposing is that human intention and intelligence are universal-like, in the sense that our minds reflect the implicit infinite mind and feedback-guiding potential of the cosmos. Intention and intelligence may be as ubiquitous and universal as feedback. As stated previously, my proposition does not represent bottom-up logic (as below, so above) but rather top-down (as above, so below—a “meta” analysis).
As we’ve seen, order does not occur by chance; ordering mechanisms are presumed to manifest the replicable patterns we observe in the universe. Moreover, the apparent underlying complex order that defines the precise pattern of laws we have discovered in the universe implies the existence of a “meta-ordering” or “macro-ordering” process—what we have termed G.O.D.—that reflects a degree of extraordinary creativity and sense of purpose.
For the intelligent evolution hypothesis to be true, it must be sufficiently inclusive to (1) handle both the currently explainable as well as seemingly inexplicable observations (often termed anomalies) in nature and the laboratory, and (2) make new predictions that can be confirmed in future research.
As Einstein reminds us, there is more to reality than described by formulas: “As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality.”
SEEING THE BIG PICTURE
In Stephen Sondheim’s haunting musical Sunday in the Park with George, about the Pointillist painter George Seurat, one of the songs includes the telling line “She saw all of the pieces, but none of the whole.”
The pieces are all in place—from physics and statistics to psychology and parapsychology—and they are ready to be integrated. Will you be able to see the whole picture? And will you accept it when you see it? Compelling evidence for intelligent evolution and an experimenting G.O.D. process is staring at us from all directions; it is waiting to be integrated and witnessed as a whole. It appears that we no longer need historical religious figures to come to know God. We just need our rational and educated twenty-first-century minds, aided by the sacred gift of our innate intuitive potential.
TOLSTOY
All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists, only because I love. Everything is united by it alone. Love is God, and to die means that I, a particle of love, shall return to the general and eternal source.