In this enlightening episode, Brian Smith interviews Dr. Erik Deumens, a nuclear physicist whose life journey bridges the realms of science and spirituality. Erik shares how his early fascination with quantum mechanics eventually led him to a deeper understanding of human consciousness, sparked by the practice of yoga and the personal growth that followed the loss of his wife. Listen as Erik explains the balance between the physical and spiritual worlds, and how grief can be a powerful catalyst for transformation.
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Guest Bio: Dr. Erik Deumens was born and raised in Antwerp, Belgium. He studied physics and mathematics at the University of Antwerp before earning a PhD in computational nuclear physics. Moving to the U.S. in 1985, Erik became part of the Quantum Theory Project at the University of Florida, where he’s spent decades advancing research in chemical reactions through computer modeling. He now serves as the Director of Research Computing at the University of Florida. Alongside his scientific career, Erik has studied Hatha yoga since the age of 17, delving into spiritual texts and philosophies. His spiritual path deepened after the loss of his wife, leading him to integrate emotional and spiritual practices into his life.
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https://grief2growth.com/community
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52:33 - [Ad] BACK TO PARANORMAL PODCAST
53:24 - (Cont.) When Quantum Physics And Spirituality Collide with Erik Deumens
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Close your eyes and imagine
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what are the things in life that causes the greatest pain,
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the things that bring us grief,
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or challenges,
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challenges designed to help us grow to ultimately become what we were always meant to be.
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We feel like we've been buried.
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But what if like a seed we've been planted
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and having been planted,
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we grow to become a mighty tree.
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Now,
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open your eyes,
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Open your eyes to this way of viewing life.
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Come with me as we explore your true
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infinite eternal nature.
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This is grief to growth. And I am your host, Brian Smith.
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Eric Dumas grew up in Antwerp, Belgium and studied physics and mathematics at the University of Antwerp. He's been a student of hatha yoga since he was 17.
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He studied philosophical religious texts on world religions,
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including the yoga sutras of Patanjali
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from for which he learned Sanskrit.
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That led to a practice of Asanta yoga until today.
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After his PhD in computational
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nuclear physics, he moved to Florida in 1985 to study at the quantum theory project at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Georgia.
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He ended up working there for several decades building computer models of chemical reactions.
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Since 2011, he's a director of the department of University of Florida,
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the information technology research computing,
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which supports all high performance research computing activities
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and research and educational
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University of Florida's supercuter computer,
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Hypergator.
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So Eric has been studying quantum mechanics since 1976.
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So when people talk about quantum mechanics,
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this is the guy, doctor Dumas, who knows what he's talking about.
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But even after all that studying of yoga,
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of of the physical world, quantum mechanics, etcetera,
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he had a big change when his wife passed away a few years ago, and he realized that he wasn't really well rounded in terms of his life. And that's what we're gonna talk about in this interview.
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The the idea of
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spiritual versus physical
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and how we bring those two things together
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and how we need both to be a well rounded person. So with that, I'm gonna introduce you to the vid the the interview
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with doctor Eric Dumas.
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Well, I saw, your interview. I forgot who it was with, and I really was, intrigued by what you said. So I appreciate you coming on. Ken Marks. Ken Marks. Yeah. Ken Marks. Yeah.
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I really appreciate your your perspective, so I'm, looking forward to sharing that with my audience today.
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Yeah. I'm I'm happy to do that. The these are things,
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that I've been working on
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all my life.
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Somehow, I got on this two track
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pursuit.
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1 is physics and math, and the other one is spiritual
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exploration.
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That's awesome. I love that. And the spiritual exploration
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started
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really you know, I grew up in Belgium,
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Catholic environment,
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and I was an altar boy. And
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but
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I I just by the time I was 9, 10 years old, I felt that
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they didn't have the right answers. They weren't asking the right
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questions, and they didn't have the right answers. Sort of like, well, do this and shut up.
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Mhmm.
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And so that's how I got open to investigate
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other things.
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And that happened,
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at the same time that I was also scientifically
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intrigued.
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Somehow my my mom or my,
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godmother
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bought me a really nice book,
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in that time. So that was around the early 1964,
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1963
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or something.
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Mhmm. About the
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the
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the universe,
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and it had lots of beautiful pictures. And and at that time, there was a lot of advance in
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astronomy and astrophysics.
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Things because we had some new satellites,
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Mount Palomar
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came online. And
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so that book then
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summarized
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for the general public, including
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kids like myself
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Mhmm. What what stuff was happening, and I was just totally fascinated by that. And then, of course, we also had the the space
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exploration,
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you know, going on.
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So I was just totally fascinated
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by the science, and and I wanted to be an astronaut
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and and,
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go and travel to the planets. You know? Make a fast spaceship.
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And and then
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I learned
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in one of these books
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about,
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Einstein and the special theory of relativity that you couldn't go faster than light.
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And so that's where
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I sort of decided,
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wow. That's that's not good. Because if I wanted to go to any of these other stars, my dream was to go to the Andromeda and Nebula because I thought it was a beautiful
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Milky Way, and it was 2,000,000 light years away. Oh. That means it takes 2,000,000 years even at the speed of light. You know? That's just
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not gonna happen.
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So I I determined that I was gonna investigate and prove Einstein wrong and make a spaceship that could go faster than the speed of light.
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That would be cool.
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So that's that's how I got on that that track sort of.
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Yeah. And then you, you majored in physics. Right? Yeah. I I I went to college, and I I took
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a
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physics, and I also took math.
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And and then I did my masters in in physics, general theory of relativity,
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and then I did my PhD
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in
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quantum chemistry
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in in nuclear physics, actually
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Wow. And
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computational nuclear physics. And that's how I fell in love with computers.
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And so
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my professional life has been science and computers.
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Mhmm. But at the same time, I was always
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exploring this yoga path
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of figuring out spiritual
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you know, what's the truth here? And you have all these people
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saying things.
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And I also felt because I was very familiar with science and how how you do the scientific thinking and making your argument,
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it always sort of struck me that some of the people
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who are talking about spiritual matters
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like to call in scientific
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things that they heard or read about in the popular press
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as evidence
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and support for their spiritual
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views of the world. Mhmm. And I always felt that they were off the mark. The majority of them are, like, totally off the mark. And and that that is,
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something that I always wanted to figure out more precisely. Well, how do you explain this better
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so that the general public
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and the people who are in spiritual matters, but not licensed physicists or mathematicians,
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can understand that there is a a big difference and that these things that sort of from a sign in the scientific
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popular
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literature
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are described
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that they don't match
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to the spiritual. And you can't say, oh, that's evidence that this is, you know, like like, some of the stuff in quantum mechanics
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happens, and then people say, oh, this is evidence that the world is the spiritual worldview is is correct or is is supported by
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this scientific thing. And there's a lot it doesn't work that way because
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people use the same words,
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but the people who use them
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within the field of expertise
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attach very different meanings to them. Mhmm. Okay. Can you give me an example?
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Yeah.
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Well,
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we we can get into some examples, but
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one of the things that I want to sort of
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put is that
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communication,
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and there are people who who
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study the theory of of of communication.
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But when it really comes down to it, it's just a matter of tokens. When you have a language
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and you have words,
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it's a token.
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And
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we agree that that token
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means something, and what it means has to be connected to your personal experience.
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Mhmm.
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If
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you don't have any experience
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of being
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weightless,
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and I try to explain to you what weightless means,
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then
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it's not
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going to be
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very well understood. Or if you've never eaten something that's really sour
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and I talk about it something that's sour,
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you're just going to make some extrapolation. And I can make some analogy. I can come up with some
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roundabout description,
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but you're never really gonna get it until you have that experience.
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And that's where
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you have an example. So let me talk about an example, and it's the word energy.
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Yeah.
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Right? So energy
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has
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is used in in a lot of
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context. But for our discussion, there are two meanings that or two uses that are important. 1 is in the scientific community,
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there is definitely
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energy.
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Physics has a very clear definition of energy,
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and it's called kinetic energy, potential energy. There's a formula for it.
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And what it means is that
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if you have something like a car that's driving,
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you need energy to get it moving.
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And then once it is moving, it has energy that gets released when it runs into, like, a tree or something else.
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And then
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in in sort of human life, we also talk about energy.
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And clearly, some of that energy is the same. Like, if you
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are
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picking up a glass
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with your arm,
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your body has to supply energy to the muscles. And there are all kinds of chemical reactions that happen and and things in your muscles, they contract.
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And energy
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gets conveyed to that glass, and the glass then
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really fights against the force of gravity that wants to keep it down, and you manage to lift it up and you can drink. Mhmm.
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That is the correct
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meaning of energy
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that
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relates directly
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to the way energy
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is used in physics or science or engineering.
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Mhmm. But at the same time,
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you can wake up in the morning
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and just feel like,
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wow. I'm tired. I don't have any energy today.
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And that energy
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is very different
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from
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the there's some relation
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that if you have been running a marathon,
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at the very end, your body is depleted of energy and you're tired, and it's the physical energy that's gone. Mhmm. But as a matter of fact,
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many of the runners,
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when they get their runner high,
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they they just finish their run-in the morning.
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They are tired. Their energy
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reserves in their body are depleted, and they need to eat some and drink some.
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But they actually feel really good. So they actually feel all energetic, and many of them actually say, I'm now ready for the day. Mhmm.
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That notion of energy is very different,
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and that is what
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eastern philosophies
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are calling chi or prana. Right? Right. But they're not the same, and they and they and we have some awareness of them. We can feel them, and there are people who can more expertly control them in their bodies and and and you can use them in Reiki to do some healing and all that kind of stuff. But it's not
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the energy of physics, and it's not the energy of engineering. It's not the energy of cars. It's not the energies that take the spacecraft
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to
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launch and get into space. Mhmm.
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And
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but then when these spiritual people talk about energy, they say, oh, there's this statement being made in the physics
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literature, and they didn't really study. They don't have a degree in physics.
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And they say, oh, it sounds just the same as what I was saying that I feel really good after I meditate. I said, yeah. But they really they should they shouldn't use the same word. But, of course, in language, we cannot be that
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precise and invent a new word. Right? So Right. We we give double meanings to multiple words, and the context is important.
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So that's the what I'm trying to say. And energy is a beautiful example, but there are multiple things like that. Yeah. But people then makes extrapolations
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because something sounds like a really nice catchy sentence.
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And then they say, oh, that catchy sentence sounds exactly like the catchy sentence in this completely different domain of spiritual
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awareness.
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And then you equate them and you say they're the same seed. They now prove that it's the same. It was like, well, you can't say that. You're just misleading everybody.
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It's not helpful.
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Well, that's a really good point because, we've I think we've all heard in the spiritual community that they'll say, well, science says energy can be neither created nor destroyed. Therefore, we are eternal beings because we are energy.
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And that's that's the way I've heard it. And I and I agree. My degree is in chemical engineering, not nearly as as deep as you, but, yeah, these are 2 different types of of energy.
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But I think there is some things, I think and I think you might agree there's some things in quantum mechanics that do indicate that the universe is not as as simple as our materialist friends have told us it is.
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I
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don't agree with that. Okay.
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Because
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there is actually a problem with quantum mechanics
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or with the way we talk about quantum mechanics. And this is an interesting year to do this
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because the
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all the physics
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societies in the world have agreed that 2025
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next year is the 100 year
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anniversary of quantum mechanics. Mhmm.
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So there's gonna be a lot of people talking about it.
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What happened in 2025 and 2026
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in in 1925
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and 1926
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Mhmm. Is that people came up with a mathematical
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formalism
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of how to do calculations
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about the quantum world.
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But somehow,
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because of the dominant role that Bohr had,
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people did not investigate
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as deeply as they should
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how do we talk about these mathematical
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formulas. So people now memorize these formulas or
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they work with them, and and it takes a lot of study.
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And they still use
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essentially
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words
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from classical physics
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that were created and refined since Newton
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without
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really recognizing
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that we need to do this more deeply and more precisely. But Bohr was so eager to try and get
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the final saying and agreement among the physicist
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community
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that we have
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it's done. The theory is done.
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Because with
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Einstein's accomplishment of special relativity and general relativity, he came up with some brand new concepts,
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but they were so clear and they were not as
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disruptive as the quantum concepts.
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So within a very short time after people discussed about it, they all agreed, yep. This is the way it is. Mhmm. In quantum mechanics, that was not the case. And and, actually, the young Heisenberg has if you read some of the literature or or and some of the letters that he said and the discussions he had with Einstein and Bohr and others,
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he was open. He said, look, we have this mathematics,
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and this mathematics is not clear. And and some of the way that we talk about it
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doesn't really
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accurately
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map to what we do mathematically. So there are 2 different they're a little bit disconnected,
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and that leads to all kinds of misunderstandings.
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But somehow
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in
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the 2 years after
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1925,
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he
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because he was a young student, PhD student,
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and was his mentor, and
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and sort of talked him out of it. And then he basically fell in line and followed
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dogma and and never argued with it again.
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But what has happened over in the 100 years since, there are several occasions where we found that people said, okay.
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If you think about it and use the the
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the concepts
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and the words that Bohr tells us to use, we're gonna
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expect this to happen.
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And then they did the experiment, and it didn't happen that way. Then people started to look at it more carefully and and more deeply, and they did the mathematical calculations and they went, oh,
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actually, the mathematics doesn't say it. It's just our words misled us,
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and the mathematics
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comes out exactly the way the experiment is.
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But somehow that dichotomy
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has never been resolved, and people are still
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trying to use the words in the concept because it's easier and quicker,
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then you have to sit down and do all these mathematical calculations. And even in the last decade when people are building these quantum computers,
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there are several things. Now you have to do some very fine,
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engineering of equipment and pieces of machine, and they all have to work exactly like
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like they need to work in order to make it be a quantum computer. Right. And
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they start out with some vague concepts because that's typically the way we start. And then they go to the lab, and they try to make it, and it doesn't work. And then they need to go back to the drawing board and do some more math. And then finally, they figure out how to do it. And it's been a challenge. And that is because
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we're not talking about it correctly. Now that's
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that talking about quantum mechanics
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is what is reflected
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in the popular press. And that is why
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people who have these spiritual visions saying, oh, there is a match. But that match is disconnected
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from the mathematical
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formulation
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and is not in agreement with experiment.
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And so it's not it sounds good, but it's just some interpretation
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that somebody makes up, and it has no substance.
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Interesting. So is there anything quantum mechanics can tell us about spirituality? Is there any connection at all?
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In some ways, the way you have to think of it is you have
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the world
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is
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realized in awareness or consciousness.
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Mhmm.
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And
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everything
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that is sort of the material
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realization, the world that we live in, is governed by the laws of physics, including quantum mechanics, and that's just the mechanics
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of
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of the world that we live in. Okay. So very much by by
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by definition or by construction
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almost,
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it is not consciousness. It comes out of consciousness,
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but it's not consciousness.
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Consciousness
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is is realized and incarnates
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in the physical world, which has these laws.
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And the laws provide some restriction, but they're not fully
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restrictive so that you can still act out and and do the thing that we are supposed to do as as awareness and as souls,
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which is learning.
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So the way you should think of it is that physics
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and the material world is like a building,
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and the souls and the people
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are
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going into these buildings to learn stuff,
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like going to a school. Mhmm.
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And
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all the laws
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of quantum mechanics
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and classical physics and electrodynamics
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and chemical physics, all these laws
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are basically
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the engineering specs of that building.
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It's like, okay. If I go and I push the button on the elevator, the elevator will come. I can then the doors open. I can go in, and and and it describes how the elevator works. Mhmm. And the elevator and and
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using the elevator to go from one floor to the next is useful as part of your learning
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expertise because you need to go to this class that's on the 2nd floor or whatever.
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And the air conditioning comes on, and the air conditioning is important to to make sure that the building is livable so that you can actually
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pay attention while you're learning or something like that. Just think of it that way. Mhmm. But
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that doesn't mean that the function of the elevator
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or
365
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the function of the air conditioner is in and of itself
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a spiritual
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activity, but it is created
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just like in human society.
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We have nature, and we built these buildings in order for us to have our society be more efficient and and, you know, be protect from the elements so that we can concentrate on certain things and right? So so that's how you should think of it. And so physics
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and quantum mechanics
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is part of that
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aspect,
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which is important,
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but in and of itself, it's not spiritual.
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Interesting. It's out of it it's created out of the spirit creates it because we need it. Mhmm. Like, we build buildings in our society because that's
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gonna make our society
377
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work better. Mhmm.
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But it is not you cannot say, oh, because
379
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elevators work this way,
380
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you know, it it it
381
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makes human society
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a better society. You know? If you have better elevators,
383
00:22:34,135 --> 00:22:35,915
you're not gonna get fundamentally,
384
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morally
385
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and better people or happier people or people that are,
386
00:22:43,320 --> 00:22:47,580
you know, more friendly to each other or less violent or whatever. The elevator
387
00:22:48,280 --> 00:22:55,880
helps create a better environment. It's useful. But in and of itself, it is not going to make people better or more loving or
388
00:22:56,725 --> 00:23:01,365
you know what I'm trying to say? I think I do. So what I ought to hear you saying is that,
389
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there's been and and it's really I'm trying to kinda wrap my head around this because,
390
00:23:06,884 --> 00:23:09,304
you know, for many years or for millennia,
391
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people have been spiritual beings. We we knew that we were spirits we knew that we were spirit. We knew that we came here for a purpose. We knew that we we went on, etcetera.
392
00:23:18,280 --> 00:23:22,060
And then I think it's about 400 years ago, we got really caught up with our science
393
00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:27,475
and said, okay. Science now science is everything. So we have to look every everything is material.
394
00:23:28,175 --> 00:23:34,275
And you're saying, I think, that it's actually science is great for what it does, but spirituality is a different thing.
395
00:23:35,455 --> 00:23:39,340
Exactly. And and, actually, Mona Sobhani actually surprise is is
396
00:23:39,640 --> 00:23:40,539
in her book,
397
00:23:42,519 --> 00:23:47,820
describes that very much because she's describes her her journey from being a
398
00:23:48,600 --> 00:23:49,100
convinced
399
00:23:50,885 --> 00:23:52,105
scientific materialist
400
00:23:52,725 --> 00:23:54,985
to seeing that that doesn't cover everything.
401
00:23:56,164 --> 00:23:57,284
Yeah. And,
402
00:23:57,845 --> 00:23:58,725
and and that's
403
00:23:59,445 --> 00:24:00,184
so so
404
00:24:01,525 --> 00:24:02,905
science is very important,
405
00:24:03,550 --> 00:24:05,650
but then make the extrapolation
406
00:24:06,430 --> 00:24:09,170
that, okay, now we have managed to
407
00:24:09,630 --> 00:24:10,130
understand
408
00:24:10,910 --> 00:24:13,410
so much of the world around us,
409
00:24:14,350 --> 00:24:15,490
we can make this
410
00:24:16,605 --> 00:24:17,105
glib
411
00:24:17,485 --> 00:24:17,985
extrapolation.
412
00:24:18,925 --> 00:24:23,185
We got it all. Yeah. We we the brain is so complicated.
413
00:24:24,285 --> 00:24:30,945
Everything that the brain does and everything that we see people do, including all their spiritual
414
00:24:31,405 --> 00:24:31,905
aspirations,
415
00:24:33,299 --> 00:24:34,520
are just emergent
416
00:24:35,140 --> 00:24:38,120
things that happen in the brain. The brain is like a big computer,
417
00:24:38,660 --> 00:24:47,080
and it can do all these things and they and and it's so complicated that it can do all these complicated things, all these emotions, all these feelings, all these
418
00:24:47,415 --> 00:24:48,555
spiritual insights,
419
00:24:49,255 --> 00:24:50,715
all that is just
420
00:24:51,175 --> 00:24:53,675
emergent. So the only thing we need is
421
00:24:54,055 --> 00:24:55,275
we have this clockwork
422
00:24:56,055 --> 00:24:59,995
Right. Of of material foundation. It's described by science,
423
00:25:00,510 --> 00:25:02,130
and everything else is just
424
00:25:02,430 --> 00:25:10,770
consequence of that. You know? And it's the same thing with AI. Right? We we make this machine, and AI now has this stuff. And and that's also what leads to,
425
00:25:11,550 --> 00:25:14,050
currently, the debate. Is AI really
426
00:25:14,804 --> 00:25:16,024
artificial intelligence
427
00:25:16,725 --> 00:25:18,105
where we have this again,
428
00:25:18,485 --> 00:25:20,825
the word is going to be mixed up.
429
00:25:21,764 --> 00:25:28,504
Is that true intelligence? Is that, like, human awareness? Is that Right. So that people start getting in these fuzzy
430
00:25:28,804 --> 00:25:29,304
conversations.
431
00:25:29,990 --> 00:25:32,410
Is it intelligence? Well, it is intelligent
432
00:25:32,710 --> 00:25:41,850
in some sense that if you define an intelligence test of being able to write an essay that when you read it is correctly grammar
433
00:25:42,230 --> 00:25:47,905
of English or or French or whatever, then you could say, yeah. It's intelligent because it passes that test.
434
00:25:48,445 --> 00:25:51,185
But when we sort of talk about intelligence,
435
00:25:52,525 --> 00:26:01,230
we have a much broader feeling that, yeah, we can write a text that is correct grammar, but there are all kinds of other things that we can do and can
436
00:26:02,430 --> 00:26:04,450
and, again, people make this extrapolation.
437
00:26:04,990 --> 00:26:13,365
Right. Well, you know, analogy I I use when people would talk about AI is, like, when I was in in high school, I had a calculator that did math really, really well,
438
00:26:14,625 --> 00:26:18,965
much better than I could. Right? But nobody ever said your your calculator is conscious.
439
00:26:19,345 --> 00:26:30,000
But because these large language models can do that same thing with language, we say, well, then they therefore, they must be conscious, and I think that is a that's a mistake. That's a that's a leap that we don't it's not really justified.
440
00:26:30,780 --> 00:26:31,920
But the thing is,
441
00:26:32,460 --> 00:26:36,640
and going back to the spiritual people trying to use quantum mechanics and
442
00:26:36,940 --> 00:26:42,575
you think about you said, well, why are they doing this? Well, because we come we become so we worship science.
443
00:26:43,195 --> 00:26:49,695
And so the spiritual people feel like we've been squeezed out. We're called woo woo. We're called, you know, delusional.
444
00:26:50,394 --> 00:26:51,934
We are wishful thinking.
445
00:26:52,394 --> 00:27:01,900
So we're grasping to try to say, look. Science shows that we're right. I think that's where that motivation comes from. No. I fully understand that, but you see, this is where
446
00:27:02,520 --> 00:27:04,140
I think those teachers
447
00:27:04,840 --> 00:27:06,540
are missing the true mark.
448
00:27:07,304 --> 00:27:11,565
Because what they are doing is they're trying to explain to other people
449
00:27:12,264 --> 00:27:14,605
like, I'm not I'm not a fully spiritual
450
00:27:14,985 --> 00:27:20,524
realized kind of person. I've thought about this a lot, but I know I'm not fully there, for sure. Mhmm.
451
00:27:22,059 --> 00:27:24,399
So some of those real realized
452
00:27:24,700 --> 00:27:25,200
masters,
453
00:27:25,500 --> 00:27:26,559
they have a particular
454
00:27:26,940 --> 00:27:27,919
state of awareness,
455
00:27:28,779 --> 00:27:32,399
and they're not talking about it, and then they wanna convey this to you and I.
456
00:27:33,515 --> 00:27:37,375
And then they sort of say, well, what analogy can I use?
457
00:27:37,995 --> 00:27:41,534
And then they find that some words are published in the literature
458
00:27:42,235 --> 00:27:48,174
about science that sort of resonate with that. And then they say, oh, you know, if you think of science or if you think of that,
459
00:27:48,730 --> 00:27:51,710
it's the same thing. Mhmm. But that's where, again,
460
00:27:52,409 --> 00:27:56,429
they are trying to con they're using a word or or a sentence,
461
00:27:57,289 --> 00:27:58,750
and they're trying to convey
462
00:27:59,850 --> 00:28:02,590
call up an awareness inside you
463
00:28:02,970 --> 00:28:09,045
that you don't have or I don't have because I never had that experience. So they're talking about the quietness
464
00:28:09,345 --> 00:28:11,285
or whatever, the the bliss
465
00:28:11,825 --> 00:28:18,005
of pure awareness or something. Let's take that as an example. Right. I've never aware been aware of that.
466
00:28:18,960 --> 00:28:24,100
So now they're gonna say, oh, we can we can have this analogy. But what they should do is like, okay.
467
00:28:24,400 --> 00:28:25,860
Let's try and find
468
00:28:26,960 --> 00:28:27,700
a prescription
469
00:28:28,160 --> 00:28:29,140
and a process
470
00:28:29,840 --> 00:28:32,260
where I can teach you, Eric,
471
00:28:33,245 --> 00:28:39,345
to go through all these steps, and then you will have that awareness. And then we can say, okay. That awareness,
472
00:28:40,125 --> 00:28:47,745
I call with this word. Mhmm. And then when the future, when I use that word, you can call up that memory of that awareness, and you're fine.
473
00:28:48,350 --> 00:28:52,130
So if we're trying to map all these other concepts and these old concepts
474
00:28:52,830 --> 00:28:53,890
are very close,
475
00:28:54,350 --> 00:28:57,170
then that's helpful. But if they're not very close,
476
00:28:57,550 --> 00:28:58,690
they're not that helpful.
477
00:28:59,390 --> 00:29:01,250
And because these spiritual leaders
478
00:29:01,774 --> 00:29:04,674
don't really know enough about science
479
00:29:05,534 --> 00:29:09,715
and it sort of sounds good to use that, they sort of make that extrapolation,
480
00:29:10,735 --> 00:29:12,914
and it's not helpful. Yeah.
481
00:29:13,375 --> 00:29:19,890
So so how do we help people understand what what you're describing, the fact that the material is actually derivative
482
00:29:20,270 --> 00:29:24,929
from consciousness as opposed to the other way around? How do we how do we talk to people about that?
483
00:29:27,245 --> 00:29:30,544
Well, that that's where you have to sort of get
484
00:29:31,005 --> 00:29:31,505
people
485
00:29:32,205 --> 00:29:35,184
into some practice. You have to say, look. Intellectually,
486
00:29:35,565 --> 00:29:38,625
we're not gonna do this. And and and, actually, this is
487
00:29:39,005 --> 00:29:40,625
what happened in my case.
488
00:29:41,370 --> 00:29:42,030
I grew
489
00:29:42,810 --> 00:29:43,950
up as a complete
490
00:29:44,810 --> 00:29:45,630
brain geek.
491
00:29:46,090 --> 00:29:47,710
You know? In my life,
492
00:29:48,650 --> 00:29:49,150
everything
493
00:29:49,530 --> 00:30:00,795
was the brain was first. And and and Mhmm. I had a reasonable brain. Anything that I wanted to study, I could just put attention to, and Mhmm. I could learn it, and it was good.
494
00:30:01,575 --> 00:30:06,395
And I have a reasonable awareness of my body in the sense that my body
495
00:30:06,695 --> 00:30:07,675
works well,
496
00:30:08,660 --> 00:30:09,559
And I,
497
00:30:10,100 --> 00:30:12,679
you know, I didn't do massive,
498
00:30:13,860 --> 00:30:14,360
sports,
499
00:30:14,980 --> 00:30:20,280
but I've been a scuba diver. I did lots of swimming and and scuba diving.
500
00:30:20,740 --> 00:30:22,360
So I'm physically active
501
00:30:22,660 --> 00:30:23,480
doing things,
502
00:30:24,405 --> 00:30:27,465
and I've been doing Hatha yoga all my life.
503
00:30:27,925 --> 00:30:32,825
So my body just works fine for me. You know? I have reasonable strength and whatever.
504
00:30:33,205 --> 00:30:35,385
But I never really had this
505
00:30:36,480 --> 00:30:36,980
interest
506
00:30:37,520 --> 00:30:38,420
to explore
507
00:30:39,280 --> 00:30:40,100
what sensations
508
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:43,860
do I get from the world
509
00:30:45,280 --> 00:30:48,500
from my body to really focus on my body.
510
00:30:50,005 --> 00:30:50,745
And then
511
00:30:51,365 --> 00:30:52,184
the third
512
00:30:53,365 --> 00:31:01,225
component of, I think, a human being is emotional life. My emotional life was, like, totally quiet. I never had any massive,
513
00:31:03,044 --> 00:31:03,544
things
514
00:31:04,390 --> 00:31:06,250
going on. No big traumas.
515
00:31:07,350 --> 00:31:09,530
I'm sort of a very quiet person,
516
00:31:09,990 --> 00:31:10,890
little shy.
517
00:31:12,070 --> 00:31:13,049
I I remember
518
00:31:13,590 --> 00:31:22,225
one time in my life now, I'm 69 years old, where I was really mad at something, and it turned out it was unjust. I was mad at a particular guy,
519
00:31:23,085 --> 00:31:27,664
for doing something, and he was just doing his job. And and I got it wrong, and then
520
00:31:28,284 --> 00:31:30,304
I was so I that was
521
00:31:30,605 --> 00:31:35,184
the maddest I was ever was. And and to the rest, you know, I just don't get mad.
522
00:31:35,520 --> 00:31:39,620
I try to help people. I'm just nice. But, again, I don't have any deep,
523
00:31:40,400 --> 00:31:40,880
emotional
524
00:31:41,200 --> 00:31:42,580
rich emotional life.
525
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,820
And it wasn't until after my wife died,
526
00:31:47,200 --> 00:31:48,980
now two and a half years ago,
527
00:31:49,515 --> 00:31:50,015
that
528
00:31:50,315 --> 00:31:56,495
I was guided by her to to explore things differently and with some of my friends, including Debbie.
529
00:31:56,955 --> 00:31:57,455
Mhmm.
530
00:31:58,235 --> 00:31:59,455
I I got
531
00:32:00,475 --> 00:32:00,975
much
532
00:32:01,620 --> 00:32:02,120
into,
533
00:32:03,380 --> 00:32:05,880
exploring these other aspects, and it's only
534
00:32:06,340 --> 00:32:07,960
in the last 6 months
535
00:32:08,260 --> 00:32:09,480
that I really
536
00:32:10,020 --> 00:32:11,720
could feel my heart
537
00:32:12,260 --> 00:32:14,520
Mhmm. Open and and that emotional
538
00:32:14,900 --> 00:32:15,400
thing.
539
00:32:16,020 --> 00:32:16,520
So
540
00:32:17,235 --> 00:32:26,455
that is to give you an answer to there are things that I would read about in the spiritual philosophical texts. You know? And and I I even
541
00:32:26,915 --> 00:32:29,655
studied Sanskrit to try and read some of the
542
00:32:30,550 --> 00:32:31,370
yoga sutras
543
00:32:32,310 --> 00:32:32,970
and other,
544
00:32:34,390 --> 00:32:35,690
texts to really
545
00:32:36,070 --> 00:32:37,050
understand them.
546
00:32:37,510 --> 00:32:40,090
And so I have a good intellectual, but
547
00:32:40,550 --> 00:32:47,985
these words never meant anything because I had no I didn't know what they were talking about. I didn't have a personal experience emotionally
548
00:32:48,685 --> 00:32:52,645
or the sensation, the detailed sensation in my body or or
549
00:32:53,085 --> 00:32:58,065
because I just use my body like a machine, and it was fine. And I I didn't have any complaints.
550
00:32:58,365 --> 00:33:10,620
So I was like, okay. Yeah. You know, it's like, I buy a car. I drive the car. The car gets me where I want to know, and I have no interest whatsoever in figuring out how the car works or what details of the car. There are some things that I've never used
551
00:33:11,160 --> 00:33:12,620
in my car. Mhmm.
552
00:33:13,095 --> 00:33:17,434
And then there are some other things that like, this emotional life I never had.
553
00:33:17,815 --> 00:33:20,794
And that is where I think if you wanna get to
554
00:33:22,534 --> 00:33:23,755
convey to people
555
00:33:24,455 --> 00:33:27,595
what spiritual is, you have to work towards
556
00:33:28,150 --> 00:33:30,410
creating that balance. You have to have some
557
00:33:30,870 --> 00:33:31,370
intellectual
558
00:33:31,750 --> 00:33:40,170
acuity and awareness with the concepts, but they are not gonna be the answer. And that can take you there. For some people, they may be the path in
559
00:33:40,835 --> 00:33:41,895
to get started,
560
00:33:42,195 --> 00:33:47,095
and then they go but for other people, it might be emotion, and then you have to guide them
561
00:33:47,715 --> 00:33:49,255
to work on this emotional,
562
00:33:50,115 --> 00:33:50,615
awareness
563
00:33:51,315 --> 00:33:59,040
and teach them some intellectual concepts that they can talk about these emotional rather than just feel them and be all puzzled.
564
00:33:59,420 --> 00:34:08,080
Right. And and the same, you have to get to your body and be aware of your body and that that that it's a very important and unique instrument,
565
00:34:09,865 --> 00:34:14,285
to learn. Because the the whole basic thing is that if you're pure awareness,
566
00:34:15,945 --> 00:34:19,085
you can't feel anything. You know? You you just have this bliss,
567
00:34:19,545 --> 00:34:22,365
and we need the body and the brain and emotions
568
00:34:22,745 --> 00:34:28,469
and that are to to to get to this experience and then get the message and and get the lesson.
569
00:34:28,770 --> 00:34:39,935
Mhmm. So in instead of just talking about it, which is, of course, the way you start doing it if you wanna publish it in a book. Right. Right. A book is not enough. You need the books,
570
00:34:40,315 --> 00:34:48,014
but you also need the places where you get together and then you do some exercises. And they can be all kinds of exercises. It could be yoga. It could be,
571
00:34:48,474 --> 00:34:56,120
some sport. It could be whatever. Mhmm. And then you have to also do the emotional thing. One of the things that I never in my did my life did
572
00:34:57,140 --> 00:34:59,400
was reading romantic levels novels.
573
00:34:59,780 --> 00:35:00,840
Mhmm. And so
574
00:35:01,380 --> 00:35:01,880
recently,
575
00:35:02,715 --> 00:35:07,215
I found on my wife's Kindle, which I inherited, there was one book that was recommended
576
00:35:07,515 --> 00:35:11,215
to her. And there was another one that I saw she had started
577
00:35:11,755 --> 00:35:13,135
reading the first eight pages
578
00:35:13,515 --> 00:35:14,815
before she died.
579
00:35:15,390 --> 00:35:19,250
And I decided or I have this inkling, which I never would have done before.
580
00:35:19,710 --> 00:35:30,369
I said, I need to read that. And I read it, and and I felt that for the first time, it sort of really resonated with me, and it gave me an experience that I had never had before, a depth
581
00:35:30,865 --> 00:35:34,165
of of engagement with the characters, and it was a romance.
582
00:35:34,945 --> 00:35:37,665
You know? I I would read books that were,
583
00:35:38,225 --> 00:35:38,725
scientific
584
00:35:39,585 --> 00:35:40,085
or,
585
00:35:41,585 --> 00:35:42,085
historical
586
00:35:42,865 --> 00:35:43,860
record kind of,
587
00:35:44,580 --> 00:35:45,400
things about
588
00:35:45,780 --> 00:35:49,160
how did America get discovered and how did, you know,
589
00:35:50,980 --> 00:35:52,680
but not this
590
00:35:53,220 --> 00:35:54,520
romantic feeling.
591
00:35:56,180 --> 00:35:59,480
And and so that's a a new experience that I never had before.
592
00:36:00,234 --> 00:36:07,855
The reason I'm just saying that is that people talk about stuff, but if that if the words don't match a true experience,
593
00:36:09,035 --> 00:36:17,930
then they're just words, and they're very easily distorted. And now in retrospect, one of the things that I think was wrong about my Catholic education
594
00:36:18,470 --> 00:36:27,769
is they came up with these words, and they didn't mean anything. And they weren't even trying to tell them what they meant. It's like, you just gotta do it. Yeah. And and they were just it was just, like,
595
00:36:28,095 --> 00:36:28,835
totally empty. And, I
596
00:36:29,215 --> 00:36:30,435
mean, they they could've
597
00:36:30,815 --> 00:36:31,955
instead of using
598
00:36:32,415 --> 00:36:33,475
the Dutch words,
599
00:36:33,935 --> 00:36:36,994
they could've used some other gobbledygook words
600
00:36:37,695 --> 00:36:43,720
and say, well, that means you do this, and that means you do that, and that's it. You know? Yeah.
601
00:36:44,020 --> 00:36:46,359
So so tell me about your wife. What's her name?
602
00:36:47,060 --> 00:36:48,359
Elizabeth. Elizabeth.
603
00:36:48,740 --> 00:36:51,000
And was she a spiritual person?
604
00:36:52,740 --> 00:37:03,325
Yeah. She and I I mean, not as intense as I was, but she was very, very spiritual, but more sort of in a natural flowing way. And actually, there's a lot of thing that that she taught me
605
00:37:03,705 --> 00:37:06,685
about life and spiritual and many of the things
606
00:37:07,200 --> 00:37:16,579
she was engaged in my spiritual quest too. She would basically say, oh, I found this, and and we would go to a meditation session together with Debbie for many years.
607
00:37:17,040 --> 00:37:23,055
And she pointed out, so, oh, I found this. Maybe that's something of interest to you because she knew that I was working
608
00:37:23,755 --> 00:37:26,175
on this and and and was very supportive
609
00:37:26,475 --> 00:37:27,935
of me doing it.
610
00:37:28,475 --> 00:37:30,015
And she did some of it herself.
611
00:37:31,035 --> 00:37:32,015
She did not
612
00:37:32,395 --> 00:37:33,775
she was always amazed,
613
00:37:34,795 --> 00:37:35,295
by
614
00:37:36,190 --> 00:37:37,070
the fact that,
615
00:37:37,790 --> 00:37:39,010
if I decided
616
00:37:39,870 --> 00:37:40,770
to do something
617
00:37:41,150 --> 00:37:48,290
or if she convinced me that something needed to be done, I could sort of turn a flip flip a switch. It's like you need to go
618
00:37:48,590 --> 00:37:49,090
exercise
619
00:37:49,935 --> 00:37:51,955
more because you're not exercising enough.
620
00:37:52,415 --> 00:37:58,035
And then I would say, okay. I'll sign up, and then I would start this routine 3 days a week,
621
00:37:58,975 --> 00:38:12,150
the next day, and I would just do it. Mhmm. And and it's like I flip. I said, if if it's rationally necessary, I'll do it. And I would did it. And it frustrated the hell out of her because she was trying to do certain things and and,
622
00:38:14,210 --> 00:38:15,110
get into
623
00:38:16,715 --> 00:38:22,795
a new habit, and it was hard to get into that establish a rhythm for doing that. And then she will always
624
00:38:23,435 --> 00:38:25,295
it's just unfair that you just
625
00:38:25,755 --> 00:38:30,015
say you have to do this, and then you just do it. Right. Yeah. I I understand that.
626
00:38:30,380 --> 00:38:44,400
So, but it sounds like you you you're saying until until she passed, you didn't really feel this this rich emotional life. And I think I heard you say that she's teaching you that. So is she your is she guiding you now? Yes. Yes. Awesome. Yeah.
627
00:38:45,335 --> 00:38:49,755
So in in some ways, I feel she's with me all the time. It's not that I hear her voice,
628
00:38:50,135 --> 00:38:56,394
but there are these thoughts that pop in my head that I know are not the thoughts that I would have had,
629
00:38:56,694 --> 00:39:03,560
you know, more than 3 years ago in in my life before. They they're not direct thoughts. Yeah. So I don't know where they come from,
630
00:39:03,860 --> 00:39:07,960
but I think they come from her because they are aligned with what she would say
631
00:39:08,500 --> 00:39:22,975
and do, and then I do them. Mhmm. I've learned to pay attention to them. Yeah. Well, it's, you know, it's really interesting. I my my path has been actually very similar. You know, I I was raised in a fun in a Christian fundamentalist background and didn't make a lot of sense to me.
632
00:39:23,470 --> 00:39:28,610
I'm a very rational kind of person, so I was like, I wanna study engineering. I wanna figure out how this thing works.
633
00:39:29,150 --> 00:39:32,290
And this conversation has been really interesting for me because
634
00:39:32,830 --> 00:39:38,795
I have realized that we are a lot of times as people in the spiritual community are trying to prove to the scientific community
635
00:39:39,255 --> 00:39:41,275
using their language and their methods
636
00:39:41,735 --> 00:39:46,795
to say this is this is scientific, and I hear you saying this goes beyond that.
637
00:39:48,369 --> 00:39:52,070
Yeah. And, actually, one of the things that that I find so valuable about,
638
00:39:52,609 --> 00:40:01,744
Mona Sobhani is do you are you familiar with her book? I'm not. No. I have to check that out. No. I rec I rec I recommend that you read that. So she she is a neuroscientist,
639
00:40:02,444 --> 00:40:04,865
and she was doing her
640
00:40:05,404 --> 00:40:08,145
PhD work or maybe just finished. She was a researcher
641
00:40:08,765 --> 00:40:11,424
trying to do things. But then there were some things that happened
642
00:40:12,365 --> 00:40:12,865
that,
643
00:40:13,690 --> 00:40:15,310
sort of made her question
644
00:40:15,770 --> 00:40:16,590
this material
645
00:40:16,890 --> 00:40:18,830
scientist, but she was very reluctant.
646
00:40:19,210 --> 00:40:24,430
So she was not gonna give in and and give up on that material scientist principle.
647
00:40:24,810 --> 00:40:26,190
So as far as she was concerned,
648
00:40:26,655 --> 00:40:31,315
she was an expert on the brain, what the brains brain can do. Mhmm. Everything
649
00:40:32,575 --> 00:40:37,075
that is claimed to be spiritual by all those other guys, by the woo woo people,
650
00:40:38,655 --> 00:40:40,595
she was gonna prove that that follows.
651
00:40:41,730 --> 00:40:42,390
And then
652
00:40:43,010 --> 00:40:46,950
it it just she started to investigate, and more and more
653
00:40:47,970 --> 00:40:55,110
things came up that just didn't jive. And then she found that there actually is a group of people across the world
654
00:40:55,905 --> 00:40:57,125
who had similar
655
00:40:57,745 --> 00:41:00,965
things, and they started to investigate using scientific methods,
656
00:41:02,065 --> 00:41:06,725
and and establish that these spiritual phenomena are really not explainable
657
00:41:07,760 --> 00:41:12,579
as as a consequence of of just the normal mechanics of scientific materialism.
658
00:41:13,040 --> 00:41:13,540
Mhmm.
659
00:41:14,160 --> 00:41:15,859
And what happens is actually
660
00:41:16,559 --> 00:41:17,059
the
661
00:41:17,760 --> 00:41:20,099
methods so since she is a neuroscientist,
662
00:41:20,735 --> 00:41:24,675
she is very familiar with the rigor of what you have to do in order
663
00:41:25,135 --> 00:41:28,195
to establish a science paper or or an observation
664
00:41:28,895 --> 00:41:29,955
about, you know,
665
00:41:30,815 --> 00:41:37,780
the mental behavior or the the activity of the brain associated with some mental behavior or whatever. So she knows how rigorous it is.
666
00:41:38,320 --> 00:41:44,580
What she reports in her book and what she found is that the community of all the people who are trying to prove spiritual phenomena
667
00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:47,140
are using
668
00:41:47,440 --> 00:41:52,805
the same methods, but to a standard that is, like, at least an order of magnitude more rigorous.
669
00:41:53,185 --> 00:42:04,240
Right. Ten times more rigorous. And the reason they have to be so much more rigorous is because whatever they say is always discarded by the scientific the regular scientific community as bogus.
670
00:42:04,780 --> 00:42:11,840
So they have to be extremely careful. The least mistake they make would immediately be called out, and then everything they say will be discarded.
671
00:42:12,220 --> 00:42:15,105
Right. So it turns out that that body of of
672
00:42:15,645 --> 00:42:18,305
results is more rigorous and more
673
00:42:18,845 --> 00:42:19,985
clearly established
674
00:42:20,525 --> 00:42:21,665
than anything else
675
00:42:21,965 --> 00:42:23,905
that we have in the current,
676
00:42:24,765 --> 00:42:25,745
research field.
677
00:42:26,125 --> 00:42:30,920
And and that then eventually sort of convinced her. I was like, yep.
678
00:42:31,460 --> 00:42:37,000
We don't know everything. There is that there is that thing, which is essentially what I was saying.
679
00:42:38,020 --> 00:42:48,045
You have the world. The world is governed by these laws, which we are now understanding quite well, not not a 100%, but quite well. Right. There is this gap between,
680
00:42:50,185 --> 00:42:57,405
that and the spiritual reality of our experience if you pay attention. Now there's a lot of people who go through life
681
00:42:58,740 --> 00:43:06,520
from beginning to end, and they never need to get to any of these spiritual features. They they're never fully aware of it. And to them,
682
00:43:06,820 --> 00:43:08,040
the whole paradigm
683
00:43:08,420 --> 00:43:12,760
of scientific materialism is perfectly fine. You know? It gives them all satisfactory
684
00:43:13,060 --> 00:43:13,560
answers
685
00:43:14,025 --> 00:43:15,005
that they would ever
686
00:43:15,665 --> 00:43:16,165
need.
687
00:43:16,825 --> 00:43:19,065
Yeah. There I guess there are those people.
688
00:43:19,625 --> 00:43:21,724
It's interesting to me, though, that
689
00:43:22,025 --> 00:43:24,765
it seems like at some point that tends to break down,
690
00:43:25,145 --> 00:43:31,850
like, when we have a crisis. Yes. When when we lose somebody or when we when we when we have an illness or something,
691
00:43:32,150 --> 00:43:34,810
that that works until it doesn't, just like religion.
692
00:43:35,190 --> 00:43:44,375
Religion works until it doesn't. You know? A lot of times people will come to me and say, I'm a I'm a Christian. I believe in God. I'm a good person, but my my daughter died. And
693
00:43:44,755 --> 00:43:47,095
how could there be a God? How could he let this happen?
694
00:43:47,555 --> 00:43:48,835
So those things,
695
00:43:49,635 --> 00:44:03,650
yeah, some people do seem to skate through to the end, and they're okay, but it's interesting. Some of them even, you know, toward the very end, they're like, maybe I need to think about this a little bit. Yes. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. One thing I do wanna ask you about not to,
696
00:44:05,170 --> 00:44:08,630
try to have science prove religion again, but or spirituality.
697
00:44:09,250 --> 00:44:16,815
But you mentioned at the very beginning, nothing could travel faster than the speed of light, and that's a big limitation if we wanna try to travel to
698
00:44:17,195 --> 00:44:19,295
anywhere because everything's so far away,
699
00:44:20,075 --> 00:44:23,295
but quite an entanglement. Okay. So how does
700
00:44:23,675 --> 00:44:24,735
is there any
701
00:44:25,200 --> 00:44:29,859
thought as to how that works? Because that would have to be faster than the speed of light. Right?
702
00:44:31,040 --> 00:44:35,060
Yeah. You see, this is one of those big disconnects between the way we talk
703
00:44:35,520 --> 00:44:36,020
about,
704
00:44:36,800 --> 00:44:37,700
quantum mechanics
705
00:44:38,000 --> 00:44:39,619
and the way it
706
00:44:40,194 --> 00:44:41,414
is described mathematically.
707
00:44:41,954 --> 00:44:43,414
Mhmm. Okay. And,
708
00:44:44,994 --> 00:44:45,494
so
709
00:44:47,155 --> 00:44:48,615
there is some fine print
710
00:44:48,994 --> 00:44:50,295
to quantum entanglement
711
00:44:51,155 --> 00:44:52,615
that all the physicists
712
00:44:53,635 --> 00:44:54,375
know about
713
00:44:55,440 --> 00:44:58,020
sort of, and they are aware of it. Mhmm.
714
00:44:59,520 --> 00:45:01,220
But that in the popular press
715
00:45:02,160 --> 00:45:03,940
is not talked about
716
00:45:04,480 --> 00:45:05,859
or is not made clear.
717
00:45:06,320 --> 00:45:08,260
They sort of leave off the fine print
718
00:45:08,865 --> 00:45:10,965
or the footnote that explains this
719
00:45:11,425 --> 00:45:12,965
because it's just too complicated.
720
00:45:13,505 --> 00:45:14,005
Mhmm.
721
00:45:14,465 --> 00:45:16,005
So quantum entanglement
722
00:45:16,545 --> 00:45:19,045
means that if you do certain things
723
00:45:19,585 --> 00:45:22,245
a certain way, you will see correlations
724
00:45:22,785 --> 00:45:24,245
between certain activities.
725
00:45:26,810 --> 00:45:27,710
That immediately
726
00:45:28,170 --> 00:45:38,750
and Einstein, when it when it was first brought to his attention, he said that is called spooky action at a distance. Right. And because he was fully aware of the special theory of relativity since he invented it,
727
00:45:39,210 --> 00:45:39,950
he said,
728
00:45:40,375 --> 00:45:42,555
what is that how how can that,
729
00:45:43,655 --> 00:45:44,795
communication happen?
730
00:45:45,255 --> 00:45:48,555
So then the physics community immediately started to investigate,
731
00:45:50,215 --> 00:45:54,075
well, is there anything communicated between these two things?
732
00:45:54,900 --> 00:45:56,440
So if if you measure
733
00:45:57,059 --> 00:46:02,119
so the the way quantum entanglement work just as a quick summary Mhmm. Is you you basically
734
00:46:03,140 --> 00:46:03,640
create,
735
00:46:04,339 --> 00:46:06,599
a quantum mechanical system like,
736
00:46:07,140 --> 00:46:09,960
you have an atom and it ejects 2 photons.
737
00:46:10,505 --> 00:46:15,565
One goes one way and one goes the other way. And because they were created at this initial point,
738
00:46:16,105 --> 00:46:22,365
there is a correlation between them. Like, one has spin up and the other one or one has polarization up and the other one has polarization,
739
00:46:23,225 --> 00:46:23,725
orthogonal
740
00:46:24,025 --> 00:46:25,245
to it. Mhmm.
741
00:46:26,120 --> 00:46:27,260
But you don't know
742
00:46:27,560 --> 00:46:29,340
which polar which direction
743
00:46:29,720 --> 00:46:31,820
polar you just know that the 2 of them
744
00:46:32,120 --> 00:46:35,660
have orthogonal polarizations, but you don't know whether it's, like,
745
00:46:36,120 --> 00:46:40,700
up in the lab, in my lab, or whether it's up in your lab. We don't know that.
746
00:46:41,475 --> 00:46:47,735
So then these photons travel at the speed of light, and they could travel very far. We've done experiments where they
747
00:46:48,035 --> 00:46:55,095
they travel tens of kilometers. And even in space, you can do hundreds of kilometers. You can have communication like that between satellites.
748
00:46:56,580 --> 00:47:01,460
And so then the the mystery of of entanglement is that if I
749
00:47:02,420 --> 00:47:06,040
if if if I receive the photon in one satellite
750
00:47:07,380 --> 00:47:09,960
and I find out that the polarization
751
00:47:11,535 --> 00:47:12,674
since it it wasn't
752
00:47:12,974 --> 00:47:16,755
clear what it was before it at it hit the satellite,
753
00:47:17,214 --> 00:47:24,275
but now it's in the satellite, it's up. Like, it's pointing towards the sun, say Mhmm. But vertical up.
754
00:47:26,250 --> 00:47:29,710
Then we know that if I go and measure
755
00:47:30,010 --> 00:47:34,590
the photon in the other satellite that is, like, a 100 miles on the other side,
756
00:47:35,770 --> 00:47:41,150
I will find orthogonal. So that means it's not going to point to the sun, but it's going to point to a direction
757
00:47:41,885 --> 00:47:43,185
to the sun. Mhmm.
758
00:47:43,805 --> 00:47:44,545
And so
759
00:47:46,445 --> 00:47:47,565
people have this
760
00:47:47,885 --> 00:47:50,464
so once I make this measurement, it instantly
761
00:47:51,964 --> 00:47:58,640
is now known on the other and then you can do the measurement on the satellite and you find, yeah, indeed. It's like that. Mhmm.
762
00:47:59,420 --> 00:48:04,560
So then people have the question, well, is the the it must be that there's some information being sent
763
00:48:04,860 --> 00:48:05,600
that way.
764
00:48:06,460 --> 00:48:08,160
And if there's that information
765
00:48:08,805 --> 00:48:13,385
being sent to determine the outcome of that other experiment in the other satellite,
766
00:48:14,085 --> 00:48:16,744
well, then maybe we can use that to send some messages.
767
00:48:17,925 --> 00:48:19,625
Well, now the mat the physicists
768
00:48:20,005 --> 00:48:22,984
figured out all the math and they could prove
769
00:48:23,440 --> 00:48:24,260
that you cannot
770
00:48:24,880 --> 00:48:26,980
use this mechanism to send information.
771
00:48:27,520 --> 00:48:28,980
And that is never
772
00:48:29,280 --> 00:48:35,860
explained in the popular press. They basically say, oh, we measure it here, and then we immediately know that it happens on the other side.
773
00:48:36,865 --> 00:48:39,765
But we can prove that it cannot
774
00:48:41,025 --> 00:48:41,605
be made
775
00:48:42,225 --> 00:48:49,365
that cannot that experiment cannot be made, and you cannot modify it or make it a more elaborate or make it more sophisticated
776
00:48:50,079 --> 00:48:52,819
to actually violate the principle of
777
00:48:53,200 --> 00:49:01,299
special relativity that nothing can travel faster than light and that you can use it to send communication. You cannot do that. We know that. Interesting. Okay.
778
00:49:02,160 --> 00:49:06,645
But the way we talk about it, we talk about it as if there is something being sent.
779
00:49:07,425 --> 00:49:07,925
Yeah.
780
00:49:08,225 --> 00:49:14,245
And that and that produces then in normal people who read this, they say, oh, why can't I send this
781
00:49:14,625 --> 00:49:15,365
as a signal?
782
00:49:15,665 --> 00:49:22,820
This it is a signal because people talk about it as a signal. And and so then they make all kinds of conclusions on their own, which
783
00:49:23,200 --> 00:49:24,260
by that footnote
784
00:49:25,040 --> 00:49:26,180
in all the scientific,
785
00:49:26,960 --> 00:49:32,815
papers or in the education of the physicists is like, no, we've proven that you can't send any. So don't even go there.
786
00:49:33,115 --> 00:49:38,095
But then the question naturally asked, well, if it can't be done, how does it how does it work?
787
00:49:38,474 --> 00:49:42,575
And that's where Bohr's dogma comes in. It's like, well, there are some questions
788
00:49:43,035 --> 00:49:44,255
you cannot ask
789
00:49:45,110 --> 00:49:48,650
or you can ask them, but there's no answer. You're not allowed to.
790
00:49:49,190 --> 00:49:54,170
And that is and there are a significant number of physicists that that sort of
791
00:49:55,270 --> 00:50:03,635
object to that. In some ways, they say, well, that's really a a outwardly and unscientific situation to sort of say, hey. There are some questions you can't ask. And so
792
00:50:03,935 --> 00:50:06,835
that's not scientific. You know? There's something missing.
793
00:50:07,295 --> 00:50:08,195
Right. Right.
794
00:50:09,375 --> 00:50:10,915
So when it comes to
795
00:50:12,290 --> 00:50:13,350
the the materialistic
796
00:50:13,890 --> 00:50:16,390
paradigm that we that we live in and you
797
00:50:16,850 --> 00:50:18,310
being such a
798
00:50:18,770 --> 00:50:24,790
student of of physics and fit fit physical and the way things work, also but also being a spiritual person,
799
00:50:25,895 --> 00:50:29,035
how is your spirituality received in your community?
800
00:50:32,535 --> 00:50:33,035
Well,
801
00:50:34,455 --> 00:50:35,275
most physicists
802
00:50:36,214 --> 00:50:36,714
have
803
00:50:37,255 --> 00:50:38,234
have a spiritual
804
00:50:38,775 --> 00:50:39,275
awareness,
805
00:50:40,140 --> 00:50:41,540
but we make it very
806
00:50:42,299 --> 00:50:47,039
and many of them like Einstein, they have strong opinions about this because they know
807
00:50:47,500 --> 00:50:49,119
because they practice physics
808
00:50:50,059 --> 00:50:51,915
every day. They sort of know
809
00:50:52,475 --> 00:50:56,895
that you cannot get all the answers that way. But it's part of the
810
00:50:57,275 --> 00:50:57,775
scientific
811
00:50:58,715 --> 00:50:59,215
paradigm
812
00:51:00,395 --> 00:51:01,935
and being a good scientist
813
00:51:02,475 --> 00:51:03,455
that you cannot
814
00:51:04,170 --> 00:51:08,349
let yourself be guided by these external things. They are considered as external.
815
00:51:08,730 --> 00:51:12,910
Mhmm. And and they're not part of it. Sort of the same thing as as saying,
816
00:51:14,650 --> 00:51:18,670
you're working as an engineer in a factory. You're building cars.
817
00:51:19,785 --> 00:51:21,484
Well, your emotional
818
00:51:22,345 --> 00:51:27,565
life and your relationship with your family and your kids or whatever should not influence
819
00:51:27,865 --> 00:51:28,845
your job
820
00:51:29,145 --> 00:51:30,845
at the factory and and
821
00:51:32,640 --> 00:51:40,579
modify in any way the way you do your job making these cars and making sure that they are safe and and sound and whatever. You know? So they
822
00:51:40,960 --> 00:51:42,339
they keep that in a separate
823
00:51:43,119 --> 00:51:44,819
part. You know? Obviously,
824
00:51:45,714 --> 00:51:51,974
if something happens at their home and they need to take them, they ask for sick leave, and they don't come up to work. Right.
825
00:51:52,355 --> 00:51:55,494
But that is that's the way you should think of it. So physicists,
826
00:51:56,035 --> 00:52:05,970
they all have opinions. There are some that are total materialists, and they they say, I don't believe in any God, but it doesn't guide the way they do their steps. They cannot,
827
00:52:06,750 --> 00:52:08,770
as part of a scientific publication,
828
00:52:09,150 --> 00:52:09,650
say,
829
00:52:10,350 --> 00:52:10,850
oh,
830
00:52:11,175 --> 00:52:11,675
we,
831
00:52:12,855 --> 00:52:14,555
are now drawing this conclusion
832
00:52:15,175 --> 00:52:16,555
because there's no god.
833
00:52:16,935 --> 00:52:20,715
Now there are some papers where you can have a discussion
834
00:52:21,015 --> 00:52:21,515
on
835
00:52:22,135 --> 00:52:26,760
the connection between science and and and spirituality in some philosophical
836
00:52:27,460 --> 00:52:28,440
journals, professional
837
00:52:28,740 --> 00:52:34,440
philosophical journals. But in general, in the in the physics and chemistry, the pure science journals,
838
00:52:34,900 --> 00:52:35,400
that's
839
00:52:35,780 --> 00:52:36,599
not done.
840
00:52:37,365 --> 00:52:42,265
Yeah. And I I I it's interesting to to hear you say that because the perception
841
00:52:42,565 --> 00:52:47,385
from from me and a lot of people is that most of the scientific community are materialists,
842
00:52:47,845 --> 00:52:53,670
that they are fundamentally like and I've I've had conversation with people where they'll say literally, well, that's impossible.
843
00:52:55,090 --> 00:52:55,590
Mediumship
844
00:52:56,050 --> 00:52:56,790
is impossible.
845
00:52:57,090 --> 00:52:58,230
Near death experiences,
846
00:52:58,610 --> 00:52:59,750
they don't happen.
847
00:53:00,770 --> 00:53:05,510
All these things that that you were saying, like, I I guess that maybe that Mona Sabani was looking at
848
00:53:06,065 --> 00:53:11,285
that that then not only will I say, well, we don't study that. That's outside of our field of expertise.
849
00:53:11,665 --> 00:53:13,525
They'll say it's not it's not possible.
850
00:53:14,465 --> 00:53:20,165
So you haven't run into to that, or have you? Yeah. Yeah. But but but you see, this is
851
00:53:21,200 --> 00:53:24,660
the the people who are advocating for scientific materialism
852
00:53:25,760 --> 00:53:33,645
are the ones who really want to make that case. They're the ones that are most vocal, and they're the ones that you therefore hear about.
853
00:53:34,525 --> 00:53:37,505
There's a whole group of other people who basically say,
854
00:53:38,045 --> 00:53:48,065
you know, I have my doubts. I don't but it doesn't matter because it doesn't influence the way I do physics. I can build my career. I have these thoughts. I keep these thoughts to myself. I'm not gonna
855
00:53:48,410 --> 00:53:51,150
talk about it and say I have this religious belief,
856
00:53:52,010 --> 00:53:52,970
and it colors
857
00:53:53,370 --> 00:54:09,475
no. No. People like Einstein made some comments about that. There are some others that made some comments about it. But the majority of the people are either quiet about it, and then they have their own opinion and you don't know it. Mhmm. Or they're the ones that have an axe to grind, and they wanna really prove that scientific materialism
858
00:54:09,775 --> 00:54:10,435
is it,
859
00:54:10,895 --> 00:54:19,230
and and they use that. Yeah. Well, I would say and this is coming from a layperson because those guys that you talked about, Bohr Bohr, Heisenberg,
860
00:54:19,609 --> 00:54:20,109
Einstein,
861
00:54:20,569 --> 00:54:27,710
all the guys up in up until that point, I think a lot of people were like, they were spiritual people, you know, maybe not religious, but spiritual.
862
00:54:28,250 --> 00:54:32,745
And they said, we're gonna study the physical and but we're not gonna bring try to bring God into the lab.
863
00:54:33,205 --> 00:54:42,105
There seemed to be a break at around that time where science said, no. It is they they they don't realize it's a philosophy. They became materialists,
864
00:54:42,940 --> 00:54:46,540
and they're like, there is no spirituality. There is nothing beyond.
865
00:54:47,260 --> 00:54:55,280
And maybe those are just the vocal ones, but that's that's what's coming No. No. Actually and and Bohr Bohr was definitely like that because Bohr made some statements
866
00:54:55,980 --> 00:54:57,280
that he believed
867
00:54:58,425 --> 00:55:00,765
that quantum mechanics was going to explain
868
00:55:01,305 --> 00:55:02,765
all of eastern mysticism.
869
00:55:03,145 --> 00:55:05,085
He made that claim in 1926
870
00:55:06,025 --> 00:55:08,445
or whatever he Mhmm. Around that time,
871
00:55:08,905 --> 00:55:10,505
he made that claim and
872
00:55:11,600 --> 00:55:12,500
but then because
873
00:55:12,800 --> 00:55:13,860
quantum mechanics,
874
00:55:17,360 --> 00:55:18,500
as part of his
875
00:55:19,440 --> 00:55:20,660
final conclusion,
876
00:55:21,600 --> 00:55:24,580
left this there are some questions that are not
877
00:55:25,365 --> 00:55:27,145
askable or not answerable.
878
00:55:27,445 --> 00:55:27,945
Mhmm.
879
00:55:28,645 --> 00:55:29,545
That basically
880
00:55:30,645 --> 00:55:31,145
put,
881
00:55:32,405 --> 00:55:36,105
a very strong damper in the scientific community. So if you
882
00:55:36,965 --> 00:55:38,265
would, as a scientist,
883
00:55:38,725 --> 00:55:40,265
question that this
884
00:55:40,619 --> 00:55:42,400
way we talk about quantum mechanics
885
00:55:43,259 --> 00:55:48,799
and the way we do the mathematics are not fully aligned. If you try to question that, if you wanted to do some investigation
886
00:55:49,099 --> 00:55:49,759
on that,
887
00:55:50,460 --> 00:56:00,015
people would consider you as a heretic because you were going against Bohr. And so people who were trying to work on a PhD thesis or publish some papers,
888
00:56:00,875 --> 00:56:04,895
they were essentially told, well, if you wanna have a career, if you wanna get tenure,
889
00:56:05,520 --> 00:56:06,740
just stick to these
890
00:56:07,120 --> 00:56:09,620
material scientific materialist activities
891
00:56:10,080 --> 00:56:13,540
Mhmm. And don't talk about any of that other or connection to spirituality
892
00:56:14,000 --> 00:56:14,660
or whatever.
893
00:56:15,200 --> 00:56:17,700
And that kept on going until
894
00:56:18,535 --> 00:56:20,395
the 19 sixties, where in 1965
895
00:56:26,135 --> 00:56:27,195
what's his name?
896
00:56:31,359 --> 00:56:33,780
I'm drawing a a senior moment.
897
00:56:34,240 --> 00:56:37,220
He was he worked at CERN, and he had the
898
00:56:43,615 --> 00:56:49,875
Let me see. Well, anyway so so so he he he he worked at CERN. He was a particle physicist.
899
00:56:50,175 --> 00:56:55,875
Okay. And as his hobby, he worked on the foundations of quantum mechanics. And then he basically,
900
00:56:57,135 --> 00:57:03,420
established, which is now known as a as a theorem, and I, you know, forgot forgot to name that. Mhmm.
901
00:57:03,960 --> 00:57:04,460
And
902
00:57:04,920 --> 00:57:05,740
that's when
903
00:57:06,359 --> 00:57:08,940
people started to think about this, and there was a graduate
904
00:57:09,319 --> 00:57:09,819
student
905
00:57:10,520 --> 00:57:11,020
aspect
906
00:57:11,985 --> 00:57:12,485
working,
907
00:57:13,585 --> 00:57:14,085
he
908
00:57:14,705 --> 00:57:20,165
wanted to test that thing. And his professor allowed him to to do this,
909
00:57:20,865 --> 00:57:22,245
and they established
910
00:57:22,625 --> 00:57:25,770
entanglement for which they gave the Nobel Prize 2 years ago,
911
00:57:26,730 --> 00:57:33,230
because people and that was for the first time that, it became a little bit more legitimate to do this kind of thing because
912
00:57:34,730 --> 00:57:35,950
he asked the question
913
00:57:36,970 --> 00:57:37,470
and
914
00:57:38,265 --> 00:57:44,525
connected it to an experiment that could actually be carried out, and that made it accessible and not just speculation.
915
00:57:44,904 --> 00:57:47,164
When it As long as people were just speculating
916
00:57:48,025 --> 00:57:50,365
and talking about, we need to investigate
917
00:57:50,810 --> 00:58:01,390
the clarity of how quantum mechanics is formulated and why there are these strange paradoxes. We wanna understand them. That was all taboo for many, many years. Right.
918
00:58:02,410 --> 00:58:03,550
Now it is still
919
00:58:04,244 --> 00:58:06,025
considered a little bit sidetracked,
920
00:58:06,325 --> 00:58:10,904
but at least it's allowed and it's considered legitimate, and somebody got an and the group got the,
921
00:58:11,365 --> 00:58:14,664
Nobel Prize for it. So so so there is a
922
00:58:15,765 --> 00:58:17,545
what what what you're saying is true.
923
00:58:18,005 --> 00:58:19,785
There there there definitely is
924
00:58:20,220 --> 00:58:24,240
this feeling that, yeah, if you wanna have a good scientific career,
925
00:58:24,619 --> 00:58:35,680
don't dabble in that connection between spirituality and physics. Well, I I I I work with doctor Gary Schwartz, who you may know from, University of Arizona, and he's been working on consciousness
926
00:58:36,805 --> 00:58:37,385
for decades.
927
00:58:37,765 --> 00:58:57,920
And, you know, and it's interesting to see how he gets blackballed in certain places because just because of the work that he's doing. Even though he's bringing extreme scientific rigor to it, like you said, you've gotta you've gotta do it 10 times better. You've gotta repeat the experiments over and over again, and that and what a lot of people don't understand, lay people, is that
928
00:58:58,220 --> 00:59:00,160
some of these things have been proven, like,
929
00:59:00,460 --> 00:59:07,395
you know, present presentience where they would do an experiment where people will have a feeling before they have a, they see something
930
00:59:08,035 --> 00:59:09,255
or, you know, psychokinesis
931
00:59:09,795 --> 00:59:12,775
or remote viewing. I mean, these things have been proven
932
00:59:13,075 --> 00:59:13,575
scientifically
933
00:59:14,355 --> 00:59:30,200
to the point where it's, as you said, more than some things that we accept is generally accepted, but they're still considered woo woo. Yeah. Yeah. So so the guy that I was trying to remember the name is John Bell. John Bell. Yes. Okay. I've heard the name. Yeah. So he is the he is the one who established his Bell inequalities,
934
00:59:31,300 --> 00:59:35,675
which then allowed somebody to make an experiment to actually verify
935
00:59:35,975 --> 00:59:38,235
what he was what people were asking.
936
00:59:38,615 --> 00:59:39,115
Mhmm.
937
00:59:39,415 --> 00:59:44,475
And and then that led to this whole notion of entanglement and the proof that entanglement exists.
938
00:59:45,255 --> 00:59:54,180
But still, the way we talk about entanglement has not been clarified. But now at least you can do an experiment, and you can say, yep. It works. And and it's currently being used
939
00:59:54,880 --> 01:00:03,540
for quantum cryptography and and all kinds of things. So so it it really works. Okay. But but we don't understand it, and there's no good way to explain it.
940
01:00:04,075 --> 01:00:04,575
And
941
01:00:05,515 --> 01:00:07,215
you can't use it for communication.
942
01:00:07,515 --> 01:00:17,535
But you can use it for other things. Well, that's interesting. So just to go down the rabbit hole a little bit more because I don't I'm gonna make sure I understand it. You can't use it for communication, but you said you can use it for quantum cryptography?
943
01:00:18,315 --> 01:00:19,375
Yes. Okay.
944
01:00:20,310 --> 01:00:21,050
So, basically,
945
01:00:21,670 --> 01:00:24,330
the way you can use it is you can
946
01:00:24,950 --> 01:00:27,450
communicate because of that correlation.
947
01:00:27,910 --> 01:00:29,290
Mhmm. You can communicate
948
01:00:30,070 --> 01:00:31,530
a a key
949
01:00:32,685 --> 01:00:33,505
to another,
950
01:00:35,005 --> 01:00:35,505
thing
951
01:00:35,885 --> 01:00:42,945
and verify whether you accept it or not. Okay. So you have to use a classical signal to send the information
952
01:00:43,965 --> 01:00:46,145
to to the other person,
953
01:00:46,539 --> 01:00:49,039
and then you use this entanglement thing
954
01:00:49,579 --> 01:00:50,319
to establish
955
01:00:50,779 --> 01:00:51,519
the key
956
01:00:52,059 --> 01:00:53,279
for decryption.
957
01:00:53,819 --> 01:00:57,920
Okay. Wow. But but, actually, you don't send the information using entanglement.
958
01:00:58,380 --> 01:01:02,160
The information has to be sent separately on a separate channel.
959
01:01:02,484 --> 01:01:07,785
Okay. Wow. Like over the Internet or something. Yeah. Interesting. Wow. Okay. That's fascinating.
960
01:01:08,645 --> 01:01:18,025
Well, we're coming to the end of our time. I really appreciate you you having this conversation today. It's been, it's been fascinating. So is there anything you'd like to say as we wrap up?
961
01:01:19,420 --> 01:01:32,845
No. I'm I'm very grateful for you to have this conversation with me. I thought it was was great fun. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Eric, good to meet you. Enjoy the rest of your day, and, I'll see you later. Yes. You
962
01:01:33,145 --> 01:01:34,365
too. Have a great day.