Your book is titled The Sage Age: Blending Science with Intuitive Wisdom. Is there common ground between the worlds of physics and metaphysics?
MaAnna Stephenson: There is an amazing amount of common ground between physics and metaphysics. Many collaborative studies have been conducted ever since the discoveries of electricity and electromagnetism in the 1600s and especially since experimentation by Michael Faraday in the early 1800s. The advent of quantum physics in the early 1900s spawned a renewed interest in blending science with intuitive wisdom simply because the early founders of quantum physics lacked an appropriate context for the philosophical underpinnings of their discoveries. Many of them began consulting ancient texts such as the Vedas for perspective.
Another blending occurred in the early 1900s during the debates concerning light as both a particle and a wave. It’s important to remember that this particular debate originated among ancient Greek philosophers and was taken up by both Arabic and Chinese philosophers during that time. Galileo, Newton and Einstein all grappled with it as well. But it wasn’t until the twentieth century that technological advancements allowed for direct experimentation. It was found that light was both a particle and a wave and that you find what you set up the experiment to find. This duality and the role of the observer in quantum level equations demanded that physicists take a philosophical interest in the wisdom of metaphysics derived by intuitive practice to explain how these things could be so.
How important is education to these two long isolated communities to sharing and learning about one another, and how their ideas can be united?
MaAnna Stephenson: It’s not only important, it is mandatory. Now is the time of the Da Vinci’s and those willing to value all ways of knowing. Science, as we now consider it, is a relatively new invention of rational thought. It is mainly a construct of Western thinking. Humans lived by intuitive practice for far longer than they have adhered to the known laws of physics.
If we consider the advancement of human intellect to be like the swinging of a pendulum across a continuum, we lived for eons on the side of intuitive practice and only a short while on the side of rational science. To move forward, we must stop this dualistic motion and go together in a new direction. We can no longer value one way of knowing to the exclusion of any other way.
History is as much about our future is it is about our past. It’s important to remember how these communities became isolated. Religions and religious leaders rose to power from eons of intuitive practice. The emergence of science threatened that power structure and was effectively squelched by threat of death or excommunication. One of the greatest gifts to science was given by the acts of Kepler and Newton, who were both very religious men, and who found a way to use their knowledge of the religious power structure to lift the heavy hand of the church off the throats of Western scientists.
Today, the pendulum is swinging the other direction. Science facilities are now in a state of power. Although researchers who wish to incorporate an element of intuitive wisdom to their findings are no longer put to death, they are still threatened by excommunication from academia or loss of their profession. Finally, enough scientists have come forward to slow this trend and are willing to meet with intuitives to learn their culture and language in an effort to combine that knowledge with scientific research and findings.
Western thinking has long been compartmentalized into different and often very siloed disciplines with little contact or common ground between them. How is the modern age taking a more holistic approach to thought?
MaAnna Stephenson: Both Eastern and Western thought sprang from a common source, which was ancient Mesopotamia. This common root developed into two ways of thinking. Western tradition was greatly affected by Hellenistic thinking, which was an either/or mindset. Eastern philosophy held to a both/and way of thinking and perceiving. Mainly due to its closed door policy to outsiders, China has remained truer to its root. This allowed both ways of thinking to expand without influence of one another and come to fruit. The politics we see today are a reflection of a much bigger shift toward combining these matured elements into a new way of perceiving, knowing and being.
Western science is a reflection of the either/or mindset and the compartmentalization of thinking. Da Vinci (self portrait shown left) was willing to investigate everything. He brought the knowledge of multiple disciplines to every project. Today, western science encompasses a broad field of specialized disciplines. The left hand doesn’t even know that the right hand exists, much less what it is doing. Many higher education facilities focus solely on technology and give no credence to the value of the liberal arts.
In the early 1900s, Heisenberg, who was one of the founders of quantum physics, lamented this trend by stating, “I believe that certain erroneous developments in particle theory…are caused by a misconception by some physicists that it is possible to avoid philosophical arguments altogether. Starting with poor philosophy, they pose the wrong questions. It is only a slight exaggeration to say that good physics has at times been spoiled by poor philosophy.”
In many ways, the advancement of modern science has caused as many problems as it has solved. Because of this, there is an urgent need to bring philosophy and intuitive wisdom to the forefront to balance the trend. In the very near future, breakthroughs in physics, biology, and chemistry will be so revolutionary as to be ethics shattering. We must begin now to think holistically. For example, what burden will be placed on countries and governments with limited resources if we suddenly find a way to all live to be 200 years old?
How do you solve the age old debate of the separation or the union of mind and body?
MaAnna Stephenson: We exist as mind, body, and spirit simultaneously and we cannot escape that fact. Although he is not the originator of the idea, Plato’s writings solidified this notion in Western thought and it has been exploited by science ever since. However, experiments like those at the PEAR lab at Princeton demonstrate that the intangible component of intent has a quantifiable effect on the physical realm.
Armed with that evidence, as more people lose faith in a purely scientifically based health care system, due to a perception of greed and incompetence, they are more willing to take responsibility for their physical well-being by seeking alternative care that focuses on how they actually feel, not just the response their body is having. This trend alone reinforces the fact that they can change their body by how they think.
Advancements in the philosophy that underpins quantum physics is also contributing to this turn of events. The research suggests that there is an invisible realm of energy which upholds and manifests the visible realm. Our mind and spirit are part of that invisible realm that directly effects the body.
How is the body really an antenna to both the rational and scientific world and to the metaphysical world?
MaAnna Stephenson: The body is a multi-faceted antenna system that consists of the physical body, the subtle energy bodies and various processing centers. The first four chapters of the book cover these topics in detail including the physical body antenna, the mind-body antenna, the subtle energy bodies and thought.
The human body is a crystalline lattice that forms a dipole antenna, similar to those used for Ham radios. Piezo crystals, which convert electrical energy into mechanical energy and vice versa, are found in the bones, intestines, ligaments, tendons, and cartilage. The body is also full of liquid crystals and minerals that make up the lattice. Placing the body in different positions, such as those used in the ritual postures of prayer, yoga, and Tai Chi, changes how the crystalline lattice is oriented to the Earth plane, affecting which frequencies it transceives. Changing positions also affects the length of the antenna, which is an important parameter in frequency selection. These are the same principles used for the design of broadcast and receiving antennas in telecommunication.
Cell membranes are liquid crystal structures. A single cell in the body is a very small, very short antenna. Because it is so short, the frequency it transceives is very high and loaded with energy. Individually, each cell is either acting as a broadcast antenna and transmitting its status or acting as a receiving antenna to obtain what it needs. Collectively, similar cells transmit their own unique signal. For example, liver cells differ slightly from spleen cells. Individually, each liver cell would transceive its own signal, but collectively, all liver cells transceive as if they are one large antenna operating on the same frequency. This is the basic principle used in acupuncture.
In ancient Chinese medicine, the liver is not considered to be just one specific organ located in just one place inside the body, as Western anatomy would picture it. In ancient Chinese medical philosophy, “liver” is considered to be a specific energy, or vibration, radiating within and through the entire body system.
Some of the subtle energy bodies provide an energetic template for the physical body. Other subtle energy bodies provide supersensory perception of frequencies which the physical body cannot interpret directly but are loaded with information the body can use. Perhaps an analogy will help clarify this idea. Visible light is only a small fraction of the entire electromagnetic (EM) spectrum.
Radio broadcast signals are carried on a higher frequency of light that is beyond our ability to see or interact with directly. We must have a device outside our physical body to receive those signals and translate them into something we can perceive physically. In other words, a radio receiver converts high frequency light waves into sound waves that our physical body can perceive. Several of the subtle energy bodies provide this same function by transceiving signals beyond what our physical body can interpret directly.
Your book includes sections on quantum physics, relativity, chaos theory, and string theory. How are these sciences connected to the intuitive thought process?
MaAnna Stephenson: In recent years, many books and articles have surfaced which attempt to explain the philosophical implications of advancements in quantum physics and related disciplines to ancient tradition and thought. This trend has been very helpful to establish a bridge for dialogue between the two cultures. However, there is a lot of confusion about terminology and a lack of perspective from a holistic point of view. For instance, the term dimension is used very differently between the rational sciences and the intuitive arts. In science, the word dimension refers to a plane of measure, such as length.
In the intuitive arts, the word dimension describes a realm of existence. So, some of the literature draws conclusions that don’t actually exist. For instance, a point on a Cartesian grid is described by the two dimensions of length and height, or x,y coordinates. To describe the momentary position of a jet flying through the sky, a minimum of three spatial dimensions is necessary and four dimensions are needed to describe its changing position.
String Theory requires a minimum of ten dimensions to be described and eleven dimensions for the equations to be truly understood. String Theory, which is now a subset of M-Theory, does not suggest that there multiple universes running parallel to our own. That is described in another theory that was devised to eliminate the necessity of an observer from quantum equations.
Many folks don’t know that relativity consists of three separate theories that impact science and intuitive thought in different ways. Most also don’t know that chaos theory is not about chaos, but an underlying order to a system that is too complex to comprehend. So, the book demystifies and clarifies these concepts with easy to understand analogies in order to give the reader a baseline of knowledge to help them truly understand the concepts and discern the truth in whatever else they read.
There is also a chapter on alternative medicine practices for those who come from a more scientific background to help them with confusing terms, like why you don’t actually get touched during a Touch Therapy session. All of these chapters include a bit of history on each topic because it gives a holistic perspective to the progress of human thought. An advancement in one discipline opens doors to advancements in all other areas.
Are we seeing a blending of the rational scientist and intuitive practitioner as the holistic science of the future?
MaAnna Stephenson: To move forward together, folks from the rational sciences and intuitives sciences must be willing to learn each other's culture and language. To do that, we must first quit pointing fingers at one another and saying, “You don’t know what we are talking about”, or worse, “You don’t know what you are talking about.” When that issue, and the ensuing power struggle is resolved, yes, I think that we will be able to have a holistic science that values all ways of learning and knowing.
If you’ve ever seen an episode of Star Trek you’ve likely seen a device called a tricorder. It reads the energy signature of things without physically touching them. We are much closer to having that device than most may realize. I am dedicated to being a bridge builder that fosters a community of cooperation through education because it will take a rational scientist to build the device and an intuitive to calibrate it.
MaAnna Stephenson (photo left)
What is next for MaAnna Stephenson?
MaAnna Stephenson: Having The Sage Age: Blending Science with Intuitive Wisdom published required me to take a crash course in marketing so, I’m putting my technical writing skills to use by creating eBooks detailing the basics of using online marketing venues such as blogs and websites. They are written for the non-techie with no geek-speak and will be published in late 2008.
My wood carvings will be featured in two national magazines in late 2008 as well, and I have been asked by the publisher to write a book on the carving technique. That project will begin in spring of 2009. My illustrator is drawing up the slides for a class on acoustics for energy workers that’s already written, which I will begin presenting in early 2009 and hope to develop into a webinar format so folks from all over the country can attend without traveling. Publishing the book also required me to postpone recording a new music CD of melodic New Age material. I hope to return to that project sometime in 2009 and record a smooth jazz CD right behind it.
My book review of The Sage Age: Blending Science with Intuitive Wisdom by MaAnna Stephenson
