Review of Two Books by the Astrophysicist, Bernard Haisch

Review of Two Books by the Astrophysicist, Bernard Haisch The God Theory: Universes and Zero-point Fields Published by Red Wheel/ Weiser, 2006 The Purpose Guided Universe: Believing in Einstein, Darwin and God Published by New Age Books, 2010 After a period as a seminarian in Idaho, Bernard Haisch's early love of science led him first into astronomy and then to become a world-class astrophysicist doing high level research with N.A.S.A. and editing prestigious peer reviewed journals. He is married with three children. In his books, Haisch doesn't limit his theorising to astrophysics or science in general except for findings in the area of quantum physics from which he accepts that consciousness precedes and creates/created matter. He sees great value in the works and philosophies of Einstein, Darwin, Meister Eckhart, Teilhard de Chardin, the Kabbalists, the Dalai Lama, Eckhart Tolle, the Quaker astrophysicist, Sir Arthur Eddington and particularly in Aldous Huxley's work on the foundations of all religions and belief systems, The Perennial Philosophy. In The God Theory, Haisch places great emphasis on the fundamental importance of light, in particular in part of the Jewish Kabbala, in an ancient text from the Haggadah which says “The light created at the very beginning is not the same as the light of the sun, the moon and stars which appeared only on the fourth day-a final sentence being, “But let me tell you there is a different light.” Haisch sees a connection to the statement in Genesis, “Let there be light.” However in The God Theory, he sees the connection to be to an entirely different form of light: the electromagnetic zero-point field. He says that no energy ever completely disappears and makes comparison with the continuing movement of a pendulum after it is no longer seen to move and the ceaseless electromagnetic jiggling after the Big Bang which is still measurable forming a background sea of light in many forms whose total energy is enormous. He believes this generates a force that opposes acceleration making matter seem solid and stable. In collaboration with noted physicist, Alfonso Reuda, he had a paper published to acclaim in prestigious scientific journals, but interest declined over time and both took on heavy workloads elsewhere. However research is continuing. Much of Haisch's work in The Purpose Guided Universe is centred on quantum theory. He suggests that an energy often now called the Godhead created matter in the form of one particular universe whose laws of science are tuned so that it is friendly to life. This energy [God] is still creating and is the life energy of all creatures including us. Life is God made manifest. In meditation, letting all thoughts of transient things pass, the mind experiences its fundamental nature. It experiences pure white light the nature of which it experiences as love. Haisch finds the concept of good and bad difficult. He believes that ultimately actions are judged by whether they advance our [God's] existential purpose. Compassion and love are moral imperatives since to inflict pain on a fellow being is to inflict it on the universal consciousness and therefore on ourselves. This opens the door to an unprecedented world peace based on universal self-interest. We want to look after the world because the world is us. Such a change would be none too soon because, although mankind's cruelty to each other is bad enough, we are now facing the first unmistakable signs of planet wide environmental disaster on our present course. Unfortunately such a transformation seems unlikely to come through religion although it has long been at the core of religious beliefs - usually misinterpreted through self-interest. In fact Haisch sees religions as presently part of the problem. He believes humans have freedom of choice and that probably karma is a multi-lifetime process of re-education, rehabilitation and inescapable balance. One particularly nice point that's made is that, since the essence of both genders come from God, they must both be attributes of God. Haisch's books are both quite easy to read although I needed to read them a number of times to get his drift and I'd need to read them more times still to remember the content properly. The absence of an index in The God Theory makes studying the book more difficult. Reading the books brought to mind something the poet William Blake wrote. Roughly put: He needed to understand a wide range of beliefs and thus avoid becoming a slave to any one of them. Peg Walsh, 2014 .

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