top of page
Jul 27, 20218 min read

Science & Miracles - Bridging Science and Spirit - Part 1 of 3 Parts

We might ask: ‘does present-day science and physics provide an important contribution to our understanding of the nature miracles performed by Jesus?’ This blog, “Bridging Science and Spirit”, is part 1 in a series of three contributions. Part 2 looks at ‘Consciousness and Subtle Energies,’ and part 3 considers ‘Experimental Evidence for Applied Human Intention, Spiritual Mindset and Miracles’.

Such an evaluation of Jesus’ nature miracles, and particularly, if the principles of physics provide enhanced understanding of the integrity within the nature miracle: then we can understand the Psychoenergetic factors (i.e. purported links between the human psyche and mystical forms of energy) that can explain the role of human intention to influence nature. Such understanding will not make these nature miracles any less miraculous. ( Cartoon Gallery, copyright Sidney Harris, www.sciencecartoonsplus.com). Indeed, any such finding will show Jesus and his message as even more relevant and truthful by demonstrating Jesus‘ influence of the natural processes and, significantly - the timing of the events.


Introduction:

For over one hundred years, and generally ignored by the scientific establishment, psychics, healers, meditators, and their associated experiments and observations have suggested that human intervention as human intention can influence physical reality. This apparent blindness to consider potential new knowledge is not a recent phenomenon. Indeed the establishment of new theories and their demonstrable observations/experiments have experienced secular (e.g. Einstein) and church (e.g. Galileo) resistance and particularly so when matters of physics and spirit are concerned in agreeing on truth.

Science Theory and Physical Observations:

Following the findings of Sir Isaac Newton (1642 – 1727), a mathematician, physicist, astronomer, and theologian,(described in his time as a "natural philosopher"), a key figure in the scientific revolution that brought a new and greater understanding of the universe at that time challenged the traditionalists and theology of the day. Significantly, such discoveries were not accepted universally and were ignored or argued over for many decades. Again, following Albert Einstein’s (1879-1955) development of the theory of relativity and important contributions to the theory of quantum mechanics, these contributed directly to the current understanding of our universe and physical reality and enabled dramatic progress in human control of the lived environment and universe. As in Newton’s time, it took decades for Einstein’s theories and mathematics to be fully accepted by the scientific community and applied universally. Significantly, and not surprisingly, the ground-breaking, fundamental, theoretical, and experimental work of Emeritus Professor William Tiller, (from 1970 to now), to understand human consciousness and its relationship to the discovered Psychoenergetic factors is the next step towards a fuller understanding of the spiritual dimension of our beings. During this period, and using the power of mathematics, physics, and simple, independent, and replicated experiments, as reported in his many books, Tiller and his team have demonstrated unequivocally that: in inanimate material; in-vitro biological matter; and in-vivo living systems; human intention can indeed affect physical measurements and reality.[1] [2] Kinney collaborates these findings.[3]

In support of the research of Tiller is that of Dr. Francis Collins, a leading geneticist and long-time head of the Human Genome Project. He is a world-respected and distinguished scientist who has reviewed the scientific evidence that is compatible with a belief that the God of ‘Creation’ cares about us humans and “can interfere in human affairs—and on rare occasions, even miraculously.” This relates directly to the deeper considerations of a spiritual relationship with God.[4]


Science of Human Behaviour:

Such an approach to extending the science and understanding of human behaviour is based on observation of the external world and theoretical models of how these observations can be accounted for. Each observation is linked to a theoretical model describing our world and the predictions such a model makes. This approach is reflected in the work of Tiller (see parts 2, 3).

Building on the work of philosopher Thomas Nagel, Robert Pepperell claims one of our greatest intellectual challenges is how to explain mental processes as physical processes, using the principle that consciousness can be explained as a physical process. Such processes can be explicable in terms of energy, forces, and work. Energy is a physical property of nature that is causally efficacious and, like forces and work, can be conceived as actualized differences of motion and tension. This organization results in a pattern of energetic activity (Tiller calls ‘human intention’) that blossoms to a degree of complexity sufficient for consciousness.[5]


In a recent article, Graziano and Kastner hypothesise that human consciousness is more than an emergent property of information processing in the brain. They say, “when we introspect about our own awareness or make decisions about the presence or absence of our own awareness of this or that item, we rely on the same circuitry whose expertise is to compute information about other people’s awareness.”[6] Such a model fits well with Tiller’s mathematical model for human intention. (Part 3)

Before leaving this short review, it is opportune to introduce the concepts of Ontology and Epistemology as they relate to our concepts of reality and distinguish between them. In an extensive examination, Walach first describes epistemology, as our understanding of the nature of knowledge and ways we arrive at knowledge and learning about the world and social reality, and ontology, as our understanding of what sort of things exist and consist of in the social world and assumptions about the form and nature of that social reality. They are intimately tied together. He goes on to say, “our scientific model of understanding the world has been very successful if we consider the progress we have made in understanding our natural world around us. This is partly due to the fact that this scientific model has originally restricted itself to understanding the material world. In order to arrive at reliable knowledge, the scientific epistemological model has started from the assumption that the material world consists of material particles only and has restricted itself to discovering the forces that act on these and the laws that govern these forces.”[7] This was, by and large, the success of the approach used by the research theorists over the past three centuries and is followed in Tiller's published works on forces in other dimensions of reality.

It is worth noting, each of Tiller’s observations was a purposeful and essential outcome to his studies. As such, these studies were experiments to test the nature of being and existence as suggested from his theoretical equations. Wallach describes such ‘ontological’ assumptions behind each experiment as ‘observations of the world outside, in contrast to the inner world of our dreams and fantasies. “Thus, our observations refer to objects in the world, nature outside. Therefore, the subject matter of science or the object of interest is nature, the world outside, and its constituents. There might have been invisible things out there as well, such as spirits, ghosts, or suchlike things. But the progress of science and its associated program of ontological reduction has led us to believe that invisible things if they exist, can always be traced and reduced to material objects or their reverberations.” 7

This summary emphasises the importance of Tiller’s research to open up a type of ontology that sees consciousness and matter as two complementary aspects of one reality, and our fuller understanding of human intention.


Awareness and Human Reality:

From our information about Jesus, and up to the time when he was led into the wilderness, we are not aware of his performing any miracles or healings. The period of miracles is during his public ministry (30-33 CE) after emerging from his period of forty days of isolation, meditation, and prayer he demonstrated an ability to use miracles and healing that added ‘authority’ to his mission. So, what changed? He certainly went into the wilderness experience as ‘fully man’ and he emerged still as ‘fully man’ but with the capacity to interact with humans and nature in a way that facilitated an observable change to the natural order.

It is thus timely to consider a ‘spiritual’ dimension to reality compared to that of traditional science reality and discussed above. This spiritual awareness of reality in humans is usually defined as knowledge that something exists or understanding of a situation at the present time based on information or experience perceived by thinking less of themselves less as an individual, but more as being part of a wider system as in a relationship. Such a perceptual model. “is not merely a cognitive or semantic proposition about ourselves that we can verbalize. Instead, it is a rich informational model that includes, among other computed properties, a spatial structure, with spatial localization.” 6

As discussed in part 2 of this series, consciousness-related phenomena involve new categories of energies (subtle energies) beyond those of the four fundamental forces of traditional science. The term consciousness, as used by Tiller, means a unique quality of nature that is ultimately convertible to energy although it also conforms to the typical dictionary usage of being awake, aware, etc.;


Many accounts in the Gospels show Jesus as understanding (or being aware) of the people’s concerns, even before addressing an individual or community group. In other situations, Jesus was a step ahead of what they were saying, ready to take the conversation to the next level. He had an awareness of people’s needs that enabled Him to communicate in ways that truly spoke to the moment.


Material and Immaterial Reality:

Humans are a mix. They have a physical body—the stuff of flesh and bones and matter—which medicine pays attention to, mostly. When we think in terms of a substance or a physical body constructed of atoms and molecules, we also must think about an energy part, an information part, and a consciousness part. They are all part of us.’ [8]

How does this awareness affect our understanding of connecting with the power source—God the Creator? It is generally acknowledged that we are made in God’s image which implies we are not simply made from the dust of the earth (chemicals) but also with a spirit that connects us to the energy/power which gives us life.

These immaterial aspects -- the spirit, soul, heart (wisdom), conscience, mind, and emotions -- make up the whole personality, are intangible and exist beyond the physical lifespan of the individual. Human beings have a spirit, but we are not spirits. “This immaterial part of man reflects God, and it is going to be housed in a material body that has to be the best possible expression of that which is the representative and the reflection of God. We are to represent God and reflect His character in ruling the creation.”[9]

It is this perspective we see in Jesus’, post forty days in the wilderness, a reflection and reality of his moral, spiritual, and intellectual essence. It is these unique qualities that make humans different from all other creatures: rational understanding, creative liberty, the capacity for self-actualization, and the potential for self-transcendence.’[10] The Catholic catechism (item 1705) says, ‘By virtue of his soul and his spiritual powers of intellect and will, man is endowed with freedom, an ‘outstanding manifestation of the divine image.’ [11]

In part 2, I will consider how consciousness and subtle energies work together to demonstrate spiritual power, intuition, and human intention as a function of science and miracles.

In part 3, I will present experimental evidence that can elucidate the role of human intention in the nature miracles of Jesus.

[1] William Tiller, William Dibble, and Michael Kohane, 2001, “Conscious Acts of Creation: The Emergence of a New Physics,” Pavior Publishing.

[2] William Tiller, 2007, Psychoenergetic Science: A Second Copernican-Scale Revolution, Pavior Publishers, ISBN 978-1-4243-3863-4

[3] Douglas Kinney, 2014, Framework of Reality: Understanding Our Subtle Spiritual Nature, Mira Digital Publishing

[4] Francis Collins, 2006, The Language of God, Free Press, New York, NY

[5] Robert Pepperell, 2018, Consciousness as a Physical Process Caused by the Organization of Energy in the Brain, Frontier Psychology, 9: 2091.

[6] Michael Graziano l and Sabine Kastner, 2011, Human consciousness and its relationship to social neuroscience: A novel hypothesis, Cognitive Neuroscience, Jan 1; 2(2): 98–113.

[7] Harold Walach 2020, Inner Experience – Direct Access to Reality: A Complementarist Ontology and Dual Aspect Monism Support a Broader Epistemology, Frontier Psychology, 11: 640

[8] William Tiller, 2019, Quoted in Nisha Manek, Bridging Science and Spirit, pp.63


Comments

bottom of page