The Universe, Life and Everything : Dialogues on our Changing Understanding of Reality Dialogues on our Changing Understanding of Reality

Our current understanding of our world is nearly 350 years old. It stems from the ideas of Descartes and Newton and has brought us many great things, including modern science and increases in wealth, health and everyday living standards. Furthermore, it is so ingrained in our daily lives that we have forgotten it is a paradigm, not a fact. There are, however, some problems with it. First, there is no satisfactory explanation for why we have consciousness and experience meaning in our lives. Second, modern-day physics tells us that observations depend on characteristics of the observer at the large, cosmic, and small, subatomic scales. Third, ongoing humanitarian and environmental crises show us that our world is vastly interconnected. Our understanding of reality is expanding to incorporate these issues. In The Universe, Life and Everything . . . Dialogues on our Changing Understanding of Reality , some of the scholars at the forefront of this change, from the fields of physics, psychology, and social sciences, discuss the direction it is taking and its urgency. The way we understand the world we live in is changing. Our traditional understanding is being challenged by developments in physics, including quantum mechanics, and our inability to explain certain complex phenomena such as consciousness. In this book, scholars from a variety of backgrounds discuss how our understanding of our world is expanding to include such phenomena. Table of Contents 1. What is reality? 2. Why do we need to expand our understanding of reality? 3. The paradox of language 4. Is reality what we make it? 5. When efficient causation breaks down... Synchronicity and meaning 6. The direction of change 7. Conclusions and possible implications Lexicon Acknowledgements References & further reading Index The scholars in this book, from the fields of physics, psychology, and social sciences, discuss the direction and urgency of the changes in our current understanding of reality.

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