The Global Consciousness Project
What I find to be one of the most interesting scientific experiments being conducted today is named "The Global Consciousness Project", also called "The EGG Project", based in Princeton but conducted throughout the world. It involves a global network of machine-driven, random event generators which record randomly generated numbers on a second by second basis. The experiment demonstrates that coherent thoughts, emotions, and/or intentions shared by a large group of people (which typically arise as reactions to the occurrence of major global events) actually affect the outcome of the random number generators, despite the fact that the machines run entirely independently of human contact and they have no physically apparent link whatsoever with the people reacting to these events.
Statistically, one would expect a normally distributed set of numbers to be generated over time and indeed this is usually the case. But, when global events have occurred in the past, such as September 11 and the embassy bombings of 1998, the resulting data are skewed, at times to the degree that the odds that the fluctuations were random were one in a million. (Please visit http://noosphere.princeton.edu/ to learn more about this ongoing project.)
Such findings suggest that consciousness can have a direct effect on our reality, that the participation of our consciousness extends beyond mind and body to affect the world about us in a seemingly acausal manner.
Acausal Phenomena
The outcomes from this experiment add an interesting new perspective to other acausal phenomena such as the meaningful and highly unlikely coincidences we call synchronicities, in addition to mysteries of the quantum world such as the baffling observation of synchronous behaviour between quantum particles that are displaced at great distances from each other.
Since I am no quantum physicist, I have much to read and study before I get enough of an awareness of the quantum world to start theorizing about acausal phenomena in that realm. Instead, I usually concentrate on the world of synchronicities, especially since I've experienced so many of them in my day. I am, however, very fascinated with how many analogies can be made between psychology, if not the very nature of our existence, and Einstein's theories of relativity and related scientific observations. Specifically, the way black holes or large bodies of mass warp space and time can be used to construct analogous theories of how we psychologically move over time in addition to providing a background to understanding the nature of synchronicities.
Due to the limitations of human consciousness, it is difficult to truly pinpoint the general mechanics behind the various types of synchronicities. However, it is worthwhile to come up with theories which one can test over time. Over the years I have found increasing subjective evidence that a synchronicity typically does not occur as an isolated instance which by itself expresses an underlying order behind life's events. It is more as if life temporarily warps to take on a deeper meaning. A blatantly obvious synchronicity is sometimes clearly accompanied by other synchronicities which are meaningful to a lesser degree. Similarly, a group of synchronicities may also come as a self-referential cluster.
If one were to visualize the events in our everyday lives as arbitrarily scattered about an existential matrix, then synchronicity demonstrates the bending and stretching of this matrix so that the randomness is skewed to take on an orderly from. Life is no longer random and haphazard but suddenly seems to be driven by a hitherto undetected force, a new pattern of existence that straddles the usual cause-and-effect flow of our daily lives to form seemingly acausal relationships that actually make philosophical sense, at times profoundly so.
One of the main, burning questions behind synchronicities in general is: when and why do synchronicities occur? I believe that taking a look at the nature of space-time in our physical reality can lend some light on this subject.
A Space-Time Analogy
Let us take, for example, a spacecraft floating in outer space somewhere very far away from any solar system or black hole. Due to the lack of gravity, the spacecraft moves entirely according to the volition of its captain.
Let us now imagine there is an entire society of spacecrafts going about their business in the same vicinity of space. Although there are underlying reasons why each captain may decide to pilot her/his ship in the direction it is going, such as going to visit other spacecrafts for a celestial coffee break, the overall patterns of movement of all the spacecrafts combined would seem for the most part to be arbitrary and random, just as how one witnesses a haphazard traffic of pedestrians at a busy square in a city.
If, however, the society of spacecrafts were heading towards the vicinity of a black hole, we would suddenly find a new order behind their movement, which would at first seem to be acausal, and this orderly skewing of the overall random patterns of movement is caused by the pull of gravity towards the black hole. Just as gravity is an invisible force, so is the underlying order which threads together various sets of experiences in our lives so that they appear to us as synchronicities.
A black hole is essentially a tiny point of mass whose density is so great that the space-time matrix around it is warped to the point that objects within its vicinity cannot escape its pull. A black hole can be compared to what occurs in consciousness when one develops a high level of concentration upon a single object of focus. Especially with the help of meditation which clears away dissonant distractions, the act of concentration can produce a regularized, single-pointed state of mind which enables a transformation in consciousness, or a psychological movement towards a point of singularity.
The Global Consciousness Project has shown that after the occurrence of a global event, the coherent reactions of a large and wide-spread group of people affect the outcomes of random number generating machines. Thus, we can infer that there is a warp in the existential matrix when so many people are all focused upon a specific point of singularity, which is in this case the global event and its derivative mental/emotional reactions.
Synchronicity Clusters by Example
In my personal experiences of synchronicity, I have witnessed that synchronicities cluster about areas in my life upon which I am intensely focused, especially when the subjects at hand are related to my personal growth or evolution.
In Synchronistic Conditioning and an Emerging Portrait of Vitality, I wrote about a synchronicity cluster I experienced over several weeks. Such a cluster demonstrated how synchronicities can come inter-related to one another and how the power of concentration held over long periods of time cause a cluster to occur. You may wish to read this post in its entirety to get a better view of the underlying order, but I shall summarize my experiences here for the sake of brevity.
My life at the time (August 2007) was centered around the pursuit of understanding a vision which came to me after a dream about a group of orange-robed monks. These monks were portrayed as extremely masculine and assertive, almost relentlessly dominating, which is generally untrue of their character in reality, although I now wonder if there is any connection with the latest uprising in Tibet as the monks try to fight for their independence from China.
The vision directly proceeding the monk dream said to "achieve micro-buoyancy" and this message addressed the question of how to deal with the mundane, or micro, aspects of life such as my job and other superficial portions of everyday existence. Specifically, it urged me to achieve buoyancy even when my attention was held by the mundane, and thusly retain the higher states of mind I typically enjoy during my spiritual and creative pursuits. I knew that the masculine/feminine polarity was involved and the dream at first seemed to suggest a very masculine, domineering or unmovable attitude.
One night, during a visit to New York City, I was sitting at a bar which had a loud television blaring from a corner. I have always regarded the realm of television as that which glorifies the superficial and the mundane. I found myself forcefully trying to tune it out when I noticed a large red painting against the wall with the title "Gentleman", depicting a bunch of men in a bar. I found the coincidence to be rather meaningful and I decided to take a picture to document the synchronicity. By the time I readied the camera and clicked the button, the bartender had suddenly come into view, picked up the remote control, and pointed it at the television, symbolizing control over it and thus accentuating the synchronicity.
This was the first synchronicity which was linked with the orange-robed monk dream. The second synchronicity occurred the day after. I was eating breakfast in a restaurant while a couple of girls sat next to me who were discussing their love lives with great animation. Again, I found myself in a similar situation as with the television the previous evening and I was forcefully trying to tune them out. I picked up a book and started reading. I was surprised to find that the story depicted an orange-robed monk who picked up a remote control and used it to turn on the television as a way to demonstrate the existence of magic!
These three "events" were the essential building blocks of the synchronicity cluster, but for weeks afterwards I experienced synchronistic events which dealt with the same subject, focusing on the proper configuration of the masculine/feminine polarity. (The resulting insights generated ideas I have been focused upon till now, regarding what I like to call "the convergence of polarity".)
In summary, I was focused upon the "achieve micro-buouyancy" dream/vision with a level of intensity that was unusually strong because it had developed into the basic skeleton of my blog post and the subject became a point of singularity in my consciousness. Life took on order and my experiences revolved around this subject.
1 comment:
This is interesting! Lots to think about and mull over.
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