I have been reading and even more so watching a lot of Rupert Sheldrake these days. One of his key ideas is that of morphic fields, which he posits as being similar to other fields such as gravitational and magnetic fields.
Schools of fish, flocks of birds and packs of wolves, so his theory goes, are bound by these fields and this allows them to stay in touch with each other both while in close proximity and stretched over great distances. How else, he suggests, could these groups behave in such complex physical and social ways without being connected by some kind of overarching structure?
The prevailing explanations, a kind of domino theory that fish and birds in huge groups turn tightly in perfect unison by simply responding visually and tactilely to their immediate neighbors, or that wolves maintain contact by scent or hearing are, he reports, not supported by evidence or experience. (One of his favorite methods of investigation, in addition to formal experiments, is to talk to people such as hunters, wildlife photographers and security personnel who are frequently immersed in situations in which something like a morphic field seems to be present). So he has developed this idea that all animals, including humans, but also plants, because his formation as a biologist is principally in botany, and even much smaller entities such as atoms and molecules, reside in a morphic field that stretches over space and time, even globally and even in deeply historical ways.
He is highly erudite and is a wonderful speaker, so I find it easy to generate enthusiasm for his ideas. This is not to say that the nature of his ideas is wanting for empirical evidence; many or most of them exist in a well-substantiated but still, it seems, partial and tentative form. Because or in spite of this, they are highly provocative and very stimulating.
The idea of a morphic field fits well into contemporary studies on plants. The sensitivity of plants to gravitational and magnetic fields, as well as sonic and chemical influences in and through soil, air and water, supports the idea of the existence of a field that connects beings across great distances, and which forms the structure of complex ecologies.
He is well worth searching for online. You will be delighted and excited by his ideas.
Schools of fish, flocks of birds and packs of wolves, so his theory goes, are bound by these fields and this allows them to stay in touch with each other both while in close proximity and stretched over great distances. How else, he suggests, could these groups behave in such complex physical and social ways without being connected by some kind of overarching structure?
The prevailing explanations, a kind of domino theory that fish and birds in huge groups turn tightly in perfect unison by simply responding visually and tactilely to their immediate neighbors, or that wolves maintain contact by scent or hearing are, he reports, not supported by evidence or experience. (One of his favorite methods of investigation, in addition to formal experiments, is to talk to people such as hunters, wildlife photographers and security personnel who are frequently immersed in situations in which something like a morphic field seems to be present). So he has developed this idea that all animals, including humans, but also plants, because his formation as a biologist is principally in botany, and even much smaller entities such as atoms and molecules, reside in a morphic field that stretches over space and time, even globally and even in deeply historical ways.
He is highly erudite and is a wonderful speaker, so I find it easy to generate enthusiasm for his ideas. This is not to say that the nature of his ideas is wanting for empirical evidence; many or most of them exist in a well-substantiated but still, it seems, partial and tentative form. Because or in spite of this, they are highly provocative and very stimulating.
The idea of a morphic field fits well into contemporary studies on plants. The sensitivity of plants to gravitational and magnetic fields, as well as sonic and chemical influences in and through soil, air and water, supports the idea of the existence of a field that connects beings across great distances, and which forms the structure of complex ecologies.
He is well worth searching for online. You will be delighted and excited by his ideas.
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