What the Bleep Do We Know

In the Victorian era, the "new science" was the extraordinary new theory of electromagnetism. Maxwell's equations were every bit as revolutionary as relativity or quantum mechanics would be later. The new age religion of the era was spiritualism, the belief in the afterlife and the ability to cross into it.

As surely as snow falls, religion will appropriate the prevailing cosmology for its own ends. A century ago that was science and so it is today. Then, the appropriation of Maxwell's insights on electromagnetism was an amazing confabulation of "animal magnetism" and vibrational resonance. We don't use the term "Mesmerism" any more, but in any new age bookshop, you'll still see references to vibrations. The notion of "auras" is from this era.

Every time science produces new tools, it gets swallowed by folks hungry for some "explanation" of what they would believe in any case. So when there was a new notion of relative time, you had a slew of religious notions woven around it. You can trace the main ones to Ouspensky and Gurdjieff. In that case, psychism and reincarnation found scientific explanations.

Quantum mechanics affords much greater flexibility for the next generation of appropriators, the era we are now in. That's because it has intrinsic mystical features even for the staid physicists who use it.

This movie has three parts. The first merges quantum physics with ordinary life. The second introduces a theory of consciousness that enfranchises individual cells (here shown in animation) with intent and agency. And the third part merges the two in a way that suggests you can control at least your own body and perhaps the physics of the space around you. Its all linked to QM.

The problem is that these folks start with the convincing notion that we live in a world of inadequate models. That's a good insight. Then they introduce QM as if it really was the way the world works. It isn't, folks. Its just another model, and a very, very problematic one at that. In physics, it doesn't even work in the most common force in physics, gravity.

It has absolutely no utility or meaning in the fields of chemistry, biology, and all the social and cognitive sciences that are the lions share of where we actually live. And even where it applies, it applies at scales that are so tiny the notion of "observer" becomes laden with artificial baggage.

There are very serous scientists who are dedicated to eliminating it as a theoretical tool because it reduces the world to numbers, the most ridiculously blunt abstraction. Just because you find a physicist with a PhD, doesn't mean you've found someone who understands the limits of the method.

The real sadness about this is that there really is a mystical vision to be had here. Its one that works with the notion of notation always being ephemeral. These smoothtalking purveyors of happiness are our worst enemy because they simply substitute one mythology for another. You owe it to yourself to study the issues here well enough to discard them.

Otherwise, you might as well just give up and do what the man wants.

I usually like watching movies made by religious zealots. They are often about fighting the devil, and the makers really believe the movie itself fights the devil. Its a cool fold. But this is just dangerous nonsense.

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.