EFTA01062428.pdf

From: Deepak Chopra To: Jeff Epstein <jeevacation®gmail.com> Subject: Fwd: Scientific American Letters to the Editor Date: Fri, 11 Nov 2016 19:57:11 +0000 FYI Deepak Chopra 2013 Costa Del Mar Road Carlsbad, CA 92013 New Book: Begin forwarded message: From: "Shattuck, Aaron" Date: November 10, 2016 at 6:19:52 PM EST To: Deepak Chopra Cc: Carolyn Rangel Subject: Scientific American Letters to the Editor Dear Dr. Chopra, We will be publishing your letter sent in response to the September issue of Scientific American in the January issue. Due to space and style constraints, some editing was necessary. I have pasted our current version below. Please let me know if we have created any errors. Thank you for your time, Aaron Shattuck Scientific American In "At the Boundary of Knowledge" [Skeptic], Michael Shermer argues that physics disproves, or reduces to the vanishing point, the possibility of paranormal phenomena. Instead of beating the dead horse of scientific atheism, he should have considered a far EFTA01062428 more amazing current trend that places so-called supernatural phenomena on the same playing field as natural events: that in physics and biology, a crisis ofknowledge has developed when attempting to account for the fundamental definitions of time, space, matter, energy and life. In a cosmos ruled by dark matter and energy, where no empirical evidence exists about the origin of time, the multiverse is pure conjecture and no one knows how the fundamental physical constants emerged from the big bang, Shermer's stubborn physicalism is not true to the current situation in science. A growing cadre of investigators has opened the door to a once forbidden subject: consciousness. Until we understand how consciousness comes about, both nonnal and paranormal events are equally mysterious. Two observers, one claiming to see angels, the other to see nebulae and galaxies, derive their experience from totally unknown processes by which the brain, using completely ordinary electrochemical activity, produces a three--dimensional world. Max Planck declared, "All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force.... We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Mind. This Mind is the matrix of all matter." Werner Heisenberg asserted, "The atoms or the elementary particles themselves are not as real [as phenomena in daily life]; they form a world of potentialities or possibilities rather than one of things or facts." It's time for Shermer to read these seminal physicists so that instead of relying on a primitive belief that all phenomena come down to the interaction of particles, he gets into the game when it's finally becoming interesting. Deepak Chopra University ofCalifornia, San Diego, School ofMedicine EFTA01062429