By Mike Soika

Science has caught up with what mystics and religions have been saying for hundreds of years: that there is a singular consciousness unifying everything and that death is no more than a transition from one perspective to another.

Quantum theory – through decades of propositions and experiments –  has upended scientific thinking about how the universe operates at both the micro and the macro level.  Here are just a few of the revolutionary ideas that have now become accepted fact among many in the world of physics:

• Matter and Light remain as waves until they are observed, at which point they collapse into electrons or  photons.  In other words, perception births reality.
• Science can only predict the probability of where or how these electrons or photons will show up.  Until they are observed they remain in a state of superposition, or said differently – in a state of multiple probabilities (or multiple universes) where “everything that can happen actually happens”.
• Time and Space may not exist as an object or thing, and perhaps was conceived in our minds as a way to measure progress.
• The Universe is “monistic” and everything is part of a unified whole.

One of the fundamental experiments upon which Quantum Theory rests is the double slit experiment which comes to the confounding conclusion that waves become electron or photon particles when they are observed and measured. When a light wave passes through the double slits, it continues to act like a wave.  However, if there is an attempt to measure the wave, then it somehow turns into matter (a photon particle) and ceases to act like a wave.

A similar experiment split the wave into two pathways, one shorter than the other.  At the end of the longer path is a meter to measure the wave.  A lab assistant randomly turns the meter on and off.  As expected, when the wave that had taken the longer path is measured, it turns into a particle.  Amazingly – the partner wave that split and took the shorter path – retroactively turned into a particle, as well.  The split waves are said to be “entangled” and the two act as one entity – doing so even when they are hundreds or thousands of miles apart.  When one changes, the partner particle matches the change and seems to do so instantaneously, calling into question the actual nature of space and time.

A couple of quotes from the famous physicist Stephen Hawking may be helpful…or not:

“ There is no way to remove the observer – us – from our perceptions of the world…the past, like the future, is indefinite and exists only as a spectrum of possibilities.” 

“..One day there may well be proof of multiple universes. It would not be beyond the realms of possibility that somewhere outside of our own universe lies another different universe…”

So, here is what we have so far:  entangled waves in superposition wait – possibly in multiple universes – for an observer to birth them into existence as matter.  One has to remember this isn’t science fiction, but rather it is a set of proposals supported by a growing number of leading physicists, three of whom won the 2022 Noble Prize for their experiments on this very topic.

This raises all kinds of vexing questions, not the least of which is: what is the role of consciousness in these developments?  And, even more fundamentally – what is consciousness?

Dr. Robert Lanza – hailed by Time Magazine as one of the world’s 100 most influential people – has written several books on Biocentrism that weaves together the concepts of quantum theory with the idea that it is consciousness that created the universe and not the other way around.  And if there is no universe without a conscious presence to perceive it, then the only logical conclusion is that there must be a universal consciousness beyond our individual sense of self.

Lanza is one of many proponents of the Multiple Universe Interpretation of quantum theory, suggesting  – like Stephen Hawking – that possible alternatives of life may be occurring now in multiple universes.  For example:  In one universe Russia succeeded in sweeping through Ukraine in a matter of days, while in another universe there was no war at all and Ukraine won back its occupied territory through diplomatic initiatives.

Finally, Lanza speculates that consciousness never ends, and quite possibly we just transfer our conscious self into another alternate universe.

There is so much of quantum theory that I find baffling and have a difficult time to comprehend fully.  Kind of like religion or spirituality.  There is a great deal that can be read about the individual soul and the Divine, but at some point, belief comes down to a quiet faith.  Now that, I think, I can handle.