Conversations Beyond Science & Religion

It seems that everyone, from Oprah Winfrey to Robert Murdoch to Sam Harris, is getting on the meditation bandwagon.  Amazon lists thousands of books on meditation, each one offering another method to connect with the Inner Self, or describing profound experiences and revelations produced through meditation.  But is meditation all that it cracks up to be?  Is it really the panacea  for all that ail...

The discoveries of science continue to show that the universe is riddled with mysteries that continue to elude even the most power instruments of modern technology.  The more one looks, the broader and deeper the mysteries seem to become.  One of these little advertised mysteries is known as the faint young sun paradox.  According to what science knows about the development of stars such as the su...

In this show from the archives, I speak with best-selling author, Larry Dossey, M.D., about his newest book, One Mind: How Our Individual Mind is Part of a Greater Consciousness and Why it Matters.  In this show, Larry and I discuss how all signs are pointing to the truth of the age-old spiritual teaching that behind the veil of the physical world rests a united mind, that some people call God.  T...

Everyone wants to find their true self, if only they had the time and the directions for getting there. Connecting the higher self with the lower self or the ego with the soul sounds like a good idea but it also has the air of the mystical.  What do these words mean and what good will this all do? In his new book, Discover Your Purpose: How to Use the 5 Life Purpose Profiles to Unlock Your Hidden...

Since the publication of his seminal book, The Self-Aware Universe in 1993, theoretical physicist and quantum activist, Amit Goswami, has been a pioneer in integrating the findings of quantum physics into our modern world.  In his latest book, Quantum Economics: Unleashing the Power of an Economics of Consciousness, Amit argues that modern economic theory must include the vital energies of our int...

The notion that there is one mind underlying reality is as old as thought itself.  The early Upanishads, written thousands of years ago, say that “Truly the self is mind.  Truly the world is mind.  Truly Brahman is Mind.”  If we are connected to One Mind, that means our natural disposition is to be part of a whole.  When we break from this emotional and mental stance, we become out of alignment wi...

At some point science may find God, and then things will really change.  We are accustomed to believing in God based on faith and revelation; the instruments of science, it is said, show no signs of God.  But then again, maybe they do. In his new book, God's Blueprint - Scientific Evidence that Earth was Created for Humans, this week's guest, Christopher Knight, marshals scientific and logical evi...

The modern mind seeks a new story and this story will need a new language.  The story will not be told in the language of materialism -- random particles, impersonal forces, and a world without purpose -- but instead in the language of consciousness.  Phrases such as "connecting with your soul" and "evolving to a higher level of consciousness" will not be considered new age mumb-jumbo, but instead...

We are accustomed to encountering the concept of evolution in the biological sense, but it is growing increasingly evident that consciousness also evolves across generations.  If so, then at some point a generation will arise that, in the words of this week's guest, Kingsley Dennis, will "be born as change" not "into change."  This new generation will not face the current dichotomy of science and...

As Yogi Berra once said, predictions are very difficult, particularly ones about the future.  The difficulty of predicting the future has not stopped many people from trying their hand at crystal-ball gazing: from stock picking, to sport betting, to weather predictions, and astrology, seeing into the future has continued to mesmerize the mind.  If only it were real.  The 16th century French divine...

"I pass through the roof of the building as if it's not even there and then I see that the ordinary scene of the concert below that I'm part of, is now bathed in an all-encompassing light."  So writes this week's guest, Patricia Walker, in her new book, Dance of the Electric Hummingbird: An Ordinary Woman's Accidental Journey to Enlightenment, the Supernatural, and Rock Star Sammy Hagar.  We are a...

To reach a new worldview, a new way of thinking, we will need to go beyond what we now know as science and religion; both today are immersed in their own misconceptions. One unique feature of the new book, Delusions in Science and Spirituality: The Fall of the Standard Model and the Rise of Knowledge from Unseen Worlds,  written by this week's guest, Susan Martinez, Ph. D., is that it identifies d...

The subject of life after death brings with it mystery, enchantment --- and disbelief.  Although many of the world’s great religion speak of a life after death, another realm and dimension where the spirit passes upon bodily death, the topic has not fared well in modern scientific circles.   But standing against the doubts of modern science are an increasing number of first-person accounts of the...

In at least one way, the path to success in science is the same as that in the corporate world.  Einstein famously said that "you cannot solve a problem with the same level of consciousness that created it."  Corporate America, meanwhile, teaches that we must think "outside the box" to achieve superior performance.  Ironically, both disciplines, on opposite ends of the cultural spectrum, are sayin...

In the governing world model, the body is a machine made up of genes.  These genes, like parts to a car, control the performance and destiny of the body.  The so-called central dogma ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vghLxGAkft8 ) of genetics, authored by Francis Crick, one of the discoverers of the DNA molecule, holds that genes are fixed information-generating particles that tell proteins how to...

Behind the brain is the mind, witnessing the brain -- and the rest of the world -- in action.  Unfortunately, we usually let the brain take control, chasing fears, wrapping ourselves into stressful predicaments, and ruminating upon the negative. So what is the solution?  According to this week's guest, Joseph Emet ( http://www.mindfulnessmeditationcentre.org/) , author of Buddha's Book of Meditati...

The ultimate dichotomy is science and religion; two ends of the spectrum; opposite ends of the playing field; two separate disciplines; two separate ways of looking at the world.  One says evidence, reasoning,  and repeatability of test results find truth; the other says revelation; personal experience; an inward connection with the divine.  Two separate ways of viewing the same world.  And here i...

Since the publication of his seminal book, The Self-Aware Universe in 1993, theoretical physicist and quantum activist, Amit Goswami, has been a pioneer in integrating the findings of quantum physics into our modern world.  In his latest book, Quantum Economics: Unleashing the Power of an Economics of Consciousness, Amit argues that modern economic theory must include the vital energies of our int...

Probabilities rule our lives. We choose jobs, mates, investments, college majors, driving directions, and countless other things based on probabilities. But when it comes to choosing fundamental worldviews, we throw caution to the wind, and simply go along with whatever the leading figures of science tell us to believe in. Today, that worldview is materialistic science. When we look at probabiliti...

To the mystic, the world is an illusion, what Hinduism calls maya ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya) . A world made of nothing;a figment of the imagination. In the famous double-slit experiment, often considered the foundation of quantum theory, particles are shown to have properties of waves and waves of particles. The substance of the world, quantum theory teaches, is not those hard-and-fast t...

The early scientists, represented by Issac Newton, were mesmerized by the magic of reality. They studied the heavens and discovered a clockwork universe, one operating according to the laws of mathematics.  Bedazzled by this physical world, they then formulated theory after theory describing the movement of the clockwork-like world.  But then these scientists separated the world from themselves an...

The notion that there is one mind underlying reality is as old as thought itself.  The early Upanishads, written thousands of years ago, say that "Truly the self is mind.  Truly the world is mind.  Truly Brahman is Mind."  If we are connected to One Mind, that means our natural disposition is to be part of a whole.  When we break from this emotional and mental stance, we become out of alignment wi...

his show consists of a thought experiment: imagine we are not machines but spiritual creatures, beings of light and energy.  Einstein said that matter is really condensed, slowed-down energy, but imagine that the source of the energy comes from an internal wellspring, not from the forces of nature.  If this is true, then dying can be viewed as the dissipation of energy as we wander off-course from...

Law and science are both based upon evidence: you can only prove a case in law if you have credible and probative evidence to support your side of the story.  In the same way, a scientific theory rises or falls based upon the degree of evidence -- and repeatable tests -- supporting it. Interestingly, the evidence continues to mount that a spiritual world, residing in another dimension, another pla...

Few people bring the authenticity to the notion of spiritual awakening as this week's guest, Simran, award-winning publisher of 11:11 Magazine and host of the top-rated, syndicated 11:11 Talk Radio show.  Life is  synchronistic hologram, an unfolding of the self, an outpouring of inner meaning.  It begins, as Simran writes in her new book, Journey to Love - Discover the Path to Your Soul's True Ma...