I am a biologist and I am also interested in spiritual explorations and sacred places. These books discuss some of the most interesting issues in science, and the nature of ultimate consciousness - the primary subject of theology, consciousness. I am also very interested in spiritual practices that have measurable effects, as discussed in my books Science and Spiritual Practices and Ways to Go Beyond and Why They Work.
I wrote...
The Science Delusion: Freeing the Spirit of Enquiry
By
Rupert Sheldrake
What is my book about?
The Science Delusion is the belief that science already understands the nature of reality. The fundamental questions are answered, leaving only the details to be filled in. In this book, Dr. Rupert Sheldrake, one of the world's most innovative scientists, shows that science is being constricted by assumptions that have hardened into dogmas. The 'scientific worldview' has become a belief system. All reality is material or physical. The world is a machine, made up of dead matter. Nature is purposeless. Consciousness is nothing but the physical activity of the brain. Free will is an illusion. God exists only as an idea in human minds, imprisoned within our skulls.
Sheldrake examines these dogmas scientifically, and shows persuasively that science would be better off without them: freer, more interesting, and more fun.
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The Books I Picked & Why
Britain's Pilgrim Places
By
Guy Hayward,
Nick Mayhew-Smith
Why this book?
This is a truly wonderful guide, lavishly illustrated to hundreds of holy places in Britain, together with pilgrim routes on foot that connect them. This book includes ancient sacred sites, holy wells and springs, sources of rivers, cathedrals, medieval village churches and ancient trees. This is a book that literally opens new horizons and magical doorways, complete with practical details on how to get there.
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Double Blind
By
Edward St Aubyn
Why this book?
I read very few novels, but Edward St Aubyn is my favourite contemporary novelist. His writing is brilliant, funny and always intelligent. Of all his books, this new novel is my favourite because it not only tells a good story but also explores the very frontiers of contemporary science and of the paradigm shift going on within it. And it is amazingly well informed scientifically. In some cases it may be anticipating scientific advances that will occur in coming years; it does not simply describe what has already happened.
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The Fourth Phase of Water: Beyond Solid, Liquid, and Vapor
By
Gerald H. Pollack
Why this book?
One of the best science books I know, at the same time profound, stimulating and accessible. Pollock describes discoveries made in his own laboratory and by others about a highly ordered state of liquid water that can be revealed in very simple experiments, that can lead to the generation of energy in new ways, and that plays a major role in all living cells. Pollack also opens extraordinary new areas for investigation through imaginative speculations, each with an “out on a limb” index to indicate how far it goes beyond established orthodoxy.
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Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures
By
Merlin Sheldrake
Why this book?
This is a brilliant book about the nature of life, starting from the largely hidden world of fungi. No doubt I am biased, because Merlin is my son. However, I am not alone in my high regard for this book. It was one of Time magazine’s must-read books of 2020 and described by the Wall Street Journal as “food for the soul”; by the Guardian as “brilliant and entrancing”; by the Observer as “wondrous”; by the Spectator as “truly astounding”; by the Telegraph as “mind boggling”; and by The Mail on Sunday as “dazzling”.
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The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss
By
David Bentley Hart
Why this book?
Deep ideas, indeed some of the deepest ideas possible. This is state-of-the-art theology by one of the greatest living theologians who brings together essential insights from the Hindu, Christian, Sufi, Buddhist, and other religious traditions showing how all have much more in common than separates them. Essential reading for anyone interested in the nature of consciousness, because the fundamental subject matter of theology is none other than ultimate consciousness, the source of all other forms of consciousness in the universe, including our own. Hart’s writing is lively and engaging.
