Science or the Mind - Do we have control over the fate of our world ?

Unconscious incompetence - realizing we do not know there is so much we do not know - humbles us as we may just not have the mental bandwidth to understand this universe.  Self awareness through quiet time and reflection may give us the mindfulness to accept this with humility.   Yet, we are explorers and seekers, so the journey continues, but let us beware of the maya - the illusions and the mirages.....

Glenn Kibble my wonderful Thermodynamics lecturer at the Seneca College Mechanical Engineering program in North York, Ontario back in 1980 said there are three “T”s in life.   Thermodynamics, Tennis and the other “T”, he got away with as it was an all male class.  

With Kibble's passion for teaching it, I took the fundamental nature of the thermodynamic laws to the existence of our physical universe for granted as true.   

However, as I live a life of inquiry, study human nature and spirituality, I am beginning to question the laws of thermodynamics as final scientific truths - or is it all in the mind?.

The Second Law

The second law of thermodynamics is said to be basic to every physical process in our universe.   The second law introduces the concept of entropy, which is a measure of disorder that equals the loss of information and usefulness.   

Entropy increases with time in the universe as a whole.    There is no physical way possible for us to decrease entropy, so this seems like a one-way no return process like our life.  

Science tells us that the sun, which gives us all our energy and sustenance, also has a life followed by death.  We may not see this in our life time, but it is slowly flaming itself out.  

Entropy will see the sun get hotter and hotter before it finally burns up into darkness.  This is the disorder, the chaos at a grand scale, which mirrors what happens in the minutest detail of our physical being.   

This means, even if we lived like our ancestors, with minimum damage to nature, this process of entropy - disorder and destruction will continue.   It appears that we have added a tremendous amount of fuel to this destruction in the last 500 years trying to create some ‘order’ in our lives.   

By ‘order’ I mean, the comforts we seek through the use of technology that actually harm the delicate balance of this earth.  The way in which we seek this ‘order’ - by burning fossil fuels, cutting forests and encroaching on nature’s balance - seem to create more disorder on the whole.  

Disturbing the delicate balance of nature may exacerbate the entropy spiral dictated by the second law.   Our selfishness and greed speeds up this process.   At least, this is what appears to the naked senses in our current state of mind. 

On the other hand, can we blame ourselves that we need food, clothes, shelter, heat from the cold and cold from the heat, to go places, to explore new worlds ?.   As cosmologist, George F. Smoot - University of California, Berkeley says, “One cannot live by the dictum - do no harm.  The best one can do is - do minimal damage”.   

If that is the case, we may as well make merry while the sun shines.  In such a doomsday scenario, values, ethics, justice can go out the window.   If it is all going to end anyway, why bother trying to save this earth?

That is why I want to question the laws of thermodynamics as truth at a different metaphysical level.   I want to depart from the western scientific rational linear approach and bring in “me” as a feeling, thinking person and my mind in a possible different metaphysical plane into the inquiry.   Then things begin to get grey and mysterious.

Disorder to Oder

Just as I was inquiring on this I came across a chapter called ‘Emergence of New Order’ in Fritjof Capra’s book “The Hidden Connections”.  He introduces the Theory of Autopoieses which identifies patterns of self generating networks as a defining characteristic of life.   

Self generation is about emergence of ‘order’ through new forms of creativity and generation, which is recognized as a property of all living systems.   Self generation is about survival.   So, maybe there is a natural process to bring about ‘order’ to our universe after all.   This may make our deliberate actions to find ‘order’ through linear processes redundant.  If that is the case, how can I subscribe to the second law of thermodynamics and its conclusion of ‘disorder’ and final disintegration ?

All this is complex and requires some mental gymnastics to comprehend. 

This is where the mind comes in. 

Consider what the Nobel prize winning Physicist, Max Planck said in his speech as he accepted his award;

“As a man who has devoted his whole life to the most clear-headed science, to the study of matter, I can tell you as the result of my research about atoms this much; There is no matter as such.  All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particles of an atom together…..We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind.  This mind is the matrix of all matter”.  

If mind is the matrix of all matter, we better learn more about our minds and consciousness. 

Self generation naturally involves humans as we have the ability to use our senses to feel, understand and to think.   Thinking and knowing is the mind in action.  Our ability to reason and communicate through language differentiates us from other animals.  So, when we observe anything our culture and consciousness comes into play and we are able to know, think, communicate and act.  This enables us to respond to any situation by changing our thoughts and behavior based on the basic need for survival.

Our evolving mind also realizes that thought and the thinker are separate entities, contradicting Descarte's wisdom of "Cogito ergo sum"- I think, therefore I am.  

The link between thought and action then departs from the old linear paradigm of mind and matter separation, taking us to the realm of knowing.  We then realize there are different ways of knowing and how our mind may limit the way we think based on our bandwidth of knowledge, experience and conditioning. 

There is a mystery to the exact relationship between mind and matter or even mind and the brain itself and I doubt we will ever solve that.  We have to forget chasing the mind as a thing and accept it as a process which is connected to our body and the universe.   How it is all physically linked is the mystery we have to accept, as somethings are best left alone.   

Bringing mind and body together gets ‘me’ or ‘self’ into the equation, so I become the observer and the observed.    

This is where spirituality comes in.

Mystery of Spirituality

Spirituality is our deep cosmic beliefs in self, the universe and the energy that arises from that.  Yet spirituality is a mysterious phenomenon to most of us rational beings. 

There are so many unknowns and we are scared of this uncertainty.  As curious beings we are looking for answers and seek a meaning of life.  In the process we may be looking in the wrong places as these questions may not have answers using the current level of the mind.   

Maybe there is room for increasing the power of the mind like we have seen with the yogis and other spiritual sages.   There are people who have devoted their lives to cultivating their minds who can perform miracles like levitate, read other people’s minds and more.  They are defying nature as we see from a linear view.   

Buddha, through his path of learning realized that there no self and that attachment to self is what brings pain and suffering.  

How do all three laws of thermodynamics fit into this "truth" ?.  

Our life force manifests itself as different forms of energy, even though the 1st law says that, this energy is finite and conserved, no matter what form it takes - ice to water to vapor, for instance - in this universe.   

When we go Quantum, it may not be possible to measure this energy in terms of speed and the size of a wave or a particle, as human being is an integral part influencing this process. 

We do feel this energy around us at a deeper level, but the mystery arises from not being able to physically catch it, see it and measure it.     

Being spiritual is to acknowledge the mysterious forces around us and to accept gracefully that science does not have all the answers and that there is a deeper cosmic force at work in this universe.  

At that higher level, we seek comfort and "order" in a universal intelligence which permeates space and sustains life.  

Wendy Palmer, an Aikido and Conscious Embodiment teacher says; “The spiritual path offers a reference point, a vision of mystery as a source of support and comfort”.   So, the spiritual path may offer us the "order" we are looking for in a different way. 

Countless sages like the Buddha, Krishnamurti, Osho all give us similar messages on the mystery of spirituality and to focus on the mind.  They have all told us to become mindful of the present, to meditate and train the mind to see a different reality - other ways of knowing - based on love and compassion on the path to happiness.  Maybe there is another reality if we develop our minds, a reality that could even alter the laws of thermodynamics.    

These sages also tell us not to follow other people’s paths blindly.  Learn from them but find our own truth by developing the mind through , reflection, yoga, meditation and inquiry.  

The Buddha illustrated this through an analogy of a raft.  He said, “Use my teaching like you use a raft to get across a river.  You don’t have to lug the raft with you on your onward journey on land”.   Therefore, the responsibility to inquire, think, find our own path to discover, to learn and live accordingly is ours.  

As such, I continue to inquire one of Kibble’s three “T”s. 

So, I ask; Do I have control over the entropy that science tells us is a universal truth ?.  

Is there another parallel reality based on the mind and self organizing mechanisms or should I just be content with the mystery of it all and let my lives unfold and enjoy the ride through the realms?.

Lalith Ananda Gunaratne

Originally published in Ode Magazine Blog 2009