The Tao of Physics: A Book Summary
The Tao of Physics, an exploration of the parallels between modern physics and eastern mysticism by Fritjof Capra, blew my mind.
Ph.D. Fritjof Capra has conducted research at the University of Paris and Stanford. Some people resist a scientist who mentions God or the spiritual world, yet these two worlds are inextricably intertwined. Spirituality and science do not need to exist independently; we’ve only made it that way. Why can’t we ask spiritual leaders to use science to back up their philosophies? Why can’t we ask science to investigate hypotheses on mysticism?
Capra says it’s happening, “...this attitude is now changing. As Eastern thought has begun to interest a significant number of people, and meditation is no longer viewed with ridicule or suspicion, mysticism is being taken seriously even within the scientific community.”
Capra’s book explores modern physics and the religious and philosophical traditions of the Far East. The Far East includes traditions seen by a Hindu, Buddhist, or Taoist. Modern physics focuses on quantum theory and relativity theory.
As neither a Hinduist, Buddhist, Taoist, nor a scientist, I connected with this book as a spiritually curious and lifetime learner. With an open mind, this content and other modern physics books like The Order of Time and Reality Is Not What It Seems stretched my understanding of the nature of the universe. This post contains many of the author’s quotes as I am careful not to overstep my knowledge. However, much of this book makes sense in an intuitive, deep sense, and a felt sense, which I will do my best to describe.
Separate from Nature
The roots of physics, as of all Western science, is found in the first period of Greek philosophy in the sixth century B.C., where a culture of religion and science were not separated. Only later did the dualism of the separation of spirit and matter become characteristic of Western philosophy. Capra explains that Western culture and science led to a separation of mind and body, I Think Therefore I Exist. The identity with the mind instead of the whole organism flourished. This thinking led to a “world out there, separate from me” and a “me versus anything out there” view. It leads to a view of I Am Important and Separate From Nature. This tree is a tree, and it’s not connected to me. (In my opinion, this way of divisive thinking has led to the destruction of our earth and climate change). Eastern traditions, however, emphasize the basic unity of the Universe – an aim to become aware of all things and the mutual interrelational aspect of all things, to transcend the notion of an isolated reality.
Throughout history, it’s been acknowledged that the human mind is capable of two kinds of knowledge: the rational and the intuitive, and have traditionally been associated with science and religion, respectively. In the West, the intuitive is devalued, whereas the traditional Eastern attitude is generally the opposite.
Classical Physics
Before we dive into quantum physics, let’s back up to classical physics, which quantum physics is built upon. The stage of the Newtonian universe was the three-dimensional space, always at rest and unchangeable. All changes in the physical world were described in terms of a separate dimension, called time, which again was absolute, having no connection with the material world and flowing smoothly from the past to the present to the future. Newton stated that mathematical time was absolute and true and flows universally, without regard to anything external. The material particles moved through absolute time, and absolute space and Newton saw these as small, solid, and indestructible objects which all matter was made of. Newton said these particles were created by God and not subject to further analysis. The universe was set in motion and continued to run ever since, like a machine, governed by immutable laws. This is a mechanistic view of nature, rigorous determinism. Everything had a definite cause and gave rise to a definite effect with absolute certainty.
Yet it was less than a hundred years later that a new physical reality was discovered which showed the limitations of the Newtonian model apparent and showed that none of its features had absolute validity.
Michael Faraday and Clerk Maxwell discovered a force called the field. When looking at the interaction between a positive and a negative charge, they found each charge creates a ‘disturbance’ or a ‘condition’, in the space around it so that the other charge, when it is present, feels a force. The condition in space which has the potential of producing a force is called a field. It exists whether or not another charge is brought in to feel its effect. Today we know that radio waves, light waves or X-rays, are all electromagnetic waves, differing only in the frequency of their oscillation, and that visible light that we see is only a tiny fraction of the electromagnetic spectrum (see image below).
Then came Einstein with his relativity theory that space is not three-dimensional and time is not a separate entity: both are intimately connected and form a four-dimensional continuum, ‘space-time’. We could no longer talk about space without talking about time and time is not a universal flow. Different observers will order events differently in time if they move with different velocities relative to the observed events. Time is relative. Now we understand that mass is nothing but a form of energy, and even an object at rest (like a rock) has energy stored in its mass.
Rutherford came along and discovered that atoms consist of vast regions of space in which extremely small particles - the electrons - moved around the nucleus, bound to it by electric forces. It’s not easy to get a sense of how small atoms are, so here’s a mindblowing visualization:
Imagine an orange blown up to the size of the Earth. The atoms of the orange will then have the size of actual cherries. Myriads of cherries tightly packed into the globe of the size of Earth – that’s how small atoms are. But, wait. Atoms, these previously described insanely small particles, are HUGE compared to the nucleus in its center. In the cherry-sized atom, the nucleus of an atom will be so small we couldn’t see it. To see the nucleus, we would have to blow up the atom to the size of the biggest dome in the world. In an atom the size of St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome, the nucleus would be the size of a grain of salt! And in and between that grain of salt and the dome is vast space. Most atoms are made of an insanely large amount of space.
Neils Bohr, Werner Heisenberg and a few others shaped one of the most exciting periods in modern science, when they brought into our knowledge - the strange and unexpected reality of the subatomic world. They kept asking questions and nature answered with a paradox.
The subatomic units of matter are very abstract entities which have a dual aspect. Depending on how we look at them, they appear sometimes as particles, sometimes as waves; and this dual nature is the same for light – which can be a wave or a particle. At the subatomic level, matter does not exist with certainty at definite places, but rather shows ‘tendencies to exist’, and atomic events do not occur with certainty at definite times and in definite ways, but rather show ‘tendencies to occur’. This is mindblowing: nothing was definite. Matter, made up of subatomic particles, couldn’t exist with certainty but just had a tendency to exist.
Quantum theory said objects dissolve into wave-like patterns of probabilities, and these probabilities are interconnected. Remember at the beginning of this essay, the Far East traditions stated everything was interconnected. More on that later.
Quantum theory reveals a basic oneness of the universe because we cannot decompose the world into small units, nothing is isolated building blocks, but rather appears as a complicated web of relations between the various parts of the whole. Everything is interrelated. On top of everything being interrelated, these relations always include the observer in an essential way. The human observer affects these interactions. Therefore the “I and the World” view is no longer valid because nature cannot be spoken about without speaking about ourselves: it’s all interconnected.
Quantum physics shows that the properties of a particle can only be understood in terms of its activity – of its interaction with the surrounding environment – and that the particle, therefore, cannot be seen as an isolated entity, but has to be understood as an integrated part of the whole. There exists nothing independently, it’s all part of the whole.
In modern physics, the universe is thus experienced as a dynamic, inseparable whole which always includes the observer in an essential way.
So, we’ve learned the tenets of quantum theory: everything is interconnected, the observer affects the interactions, there exist only probabilities and tendencies. Now, let’s turn our focus to the Far East traditions and see what the ancient texts have revealed and how that relates to modern physics.
Far East Traditions
From Hinduism to Taoism to Buddhism, these traditions are based on mystical experience – on a direct non-intellectual experience of reality. It is the awareness of the unity and mutual interrelation of all things and events, the experience of all phenomena in the world as manifestations of a basic oneness. In these traditions, all things are seen as interdependent and inseparable parts of this cosmic whole; as different manifestations of the same ultimate reality.
But in our lives, we lack awareness of this unity of all things and divide the world into separate objects and events. While helpful for our brains in many ways, it’s not an actual feature of reality. The principal aim of the Eastern mystical traditions is to readjust the mind by centering and quieting it through meditation. The Sanskrit term for meditation – samadhi – translates to ‘mental equilibrium’. It’s where the insight emerges that one is conscious of the absolute oneness of the universe. While I have not experienced absolute oneness in meditation, I have felt the tiniest glimpses of my ever-so-important Self melting away.
Everything is Interconnected
Modern physics shows that matter and the basic phenomena involving them are interconnected, interrelated, and interdependent; that they cannot be understood as isolated entities, but only as integrated parts of the whole.
In quantum theory, probability is a fundamental feature of the atomic reality which governs all processes, and even the existence of matter. Subatomic particles do not exist with certainty at definite places, but rather show ‘tendencies to exist’, and atomic events do not occur with certainty at definite times and in definite ways, but rather show ‘tendencies to occur’. Quantum theory thus reveals an essential interconnectedness of the universe: it shows that we cannot decompose the world into independently existing smallest units.
David Bohm says, “inseparable quantum interconnectedness of the whole universe is the fundamental reality, and that relatively independently behaving parts are merely particular and contingent forms within this whole.”
Objects dissolve into patterns of probabilities, and these patterns represent probabilities of interconnections. The universe is a complicated web of relations between the various parts of a unified whole. Eastern mysticism harps on this universal interwovenness.
From Observer to Participator
The crucial feature of atomic physics is that the human observer and his or her consciousness is always included. As John Wheeler says, “to describe what has happened, one has to cross out that old word ‘observer’ and put in its place the new word ‘participator’. In some strange sense the universe is a participatory universe.” We are not observing; we are participating.
Lama Anagarika Govinda says, “The Buddhist does not believe in an independent or separately existing external world, into whose dynamic forces he could insert himself. The external world and his inner world are for him only two sides of the same fabric, in which the threads of all forces and of all events, of all forms of consciousness and of their objects, are woven into an inseparable net of endless, mutually conditioned relations.”
Opposites
While Eastern mystics tell us that all things and events are manifestations of a basic oneness, that does not mean they pronounce all things to be equal. They recognize the individuality of things, but they are aware that all of the differences and contrasts are relative within an all-embracing unity: The Unity of Opposites. Lao Tzu says, “When all in the world understand beauty to be beautiful, then ugliness exists; when all understand goodness to be good, then evil exists.” Mystics are aware of the relativity and polar relationship of all opposites. Good and bad, pleasure and pain, life and death, are not absolute experiences belonging to different categories, but merely two sides of the same reality; extreme parts of a single whole. There is always the interplay between the two sides. It is not to strive for the good and eliminate the bad, but maintain a dynamic balance between good and bad.
How do opposites in mysticism relate to modern physics? Particles are both destructible and indestructible; matter is both continuous and discontinuous, and force and matter are but different aspects of the same phenomenon. We can never say that an atomic particle exists at a certain place, nor can we say that it does not exist. Being a probability pattern (as we learned earlier), the particle has tendencies to exist in various places and thus manifests a strange kind of physical reality between existence and non-existence. We cannot, therefore, describe the state of the particle in terms of fixed opposite concepts. The particle is not present at a definite place, nor is it absent. What changes is the probability pattern.
The second theme recurring throughout physics and Eastern mysticism, the first being the unity of all things and events, is the awareness that space and time are intimately connected and interpenetrating.
Not only are all measurements involving space and time relative, depending on the state of motion of the observer, but the whole structure of space-time is inextricably linked to the distribution of matter. Space is curved to different degrees and time flows at different rates in different parts of the universe. Our notion of linear flowing time are limited to our ordinary experience of the physical world and have to be completely abandoned when we extend this experience. Eastern mystics emphasize they go beyond ordinary 3D space in meditation, and they also transcend time. They experience – so they say – an infinite, timeliness, and yet dynamic present.
“The absolute tranquility is the present moment. Though it is at this moment, there is no limit to this moment, and herein is eternal delight.” - Hui-neng
Space and time are fully equivalent; they are unified into a four-dimensional continuum in which the particle interactions can stretch in any direction. In fact, it’s been said that Eastern mysticism is a liberation from time. In a way, the same may be said of relativistic physics.
“It is believed by most that time passes; in actual fact, it stays where it is. This idea of passing may be called time, but it is an incorrect idea, for since one sees it only as passing, one cannot understand that it stays just where it is.” -Zen master Dogen
So far, Eastern mysticism and modern physics have shown us that all things are interconnected, that awareness goes beyond our three-dimensional world where time is relative. Next, we look at how the religious and philosophical texts of the Hindus, Buddhists and Taoists, show how the world is conceived in terms of movement, flow and change. This dynamic quality of Eastern philosophy seems to be one of the most important features: the universe is an inseparable web, whose interconnections are dynamic and not static. The cosmic web is alive; it moves, grows, and changes continually.
Modern physics, too, has come to conceive of the universe as such a web of relations and, like Eastern mysticism, has recognized that this web is intrinsically dynamic. The properties of subatomic particles can only be understood in a dynamic context; in terms of movement, interaction and transformation. The tendency of particles to react to confinement to a small region of space is by moving around and ‘jiggle’ in it. This implies a fundamental ‘restlessness’ of matter which is characteristic of the subatomic world. Matter is thus never quiescent, but always in a state of motion. The big boulder resting on the mountain is not restless, we just can’t see the subatomic particles moving around. It’s full of activity. It has been shown that the activity of matter is the very essence of its being. The existence of matter and its activity cannot be separated. The closer we look at it, the more alive it appears. All material objects next to you right now are made up of atoms which link up with each other in various ways to form an enormous variety of molecular structures which are not rigid and motionless, but oscillate according to their temperature and in harmony with the thermal vibrations of their environment. Neutrons and protons race about with unimaginable velocities. The universe as a whole is expanding and not static. Like modern physicists, Buddhists see all objects as processes in a universal flux and deny the existence of any material substance. Chinese thought developed a similar view of things as transitory stages in the ever-flowing Tao.
What are subatomic particles?
In classical physics, particles were solid and indestructible. Modern physics shows that material objects are not distinct entities at the macroscopic level, but inseparably linked to their environment; their properties can only be understood in terms of their interaction with the rest of the world. This interaction reaches out to the universe at large, to distant stars and galaxies. The basic unity of the cosmos manifests itself, therefore, not only in the world of the very small but also in the world of the very large.
Fred Hoyle says, “Our ideas of space and geometry would become entirely invalid if the distant parts of the Universe were taken away. Our everyday experiences even down to the smallest details seems to be so closely integrated to the grand-scale features of the Universe that it is well-nigh impossible to contemplate the two being separated.”
Particles are both emptiness and form. Particles can come into being spontaneously out of the void, and vanish again into the void. Particles form out of nothing and disappear into the vacuum. The vacuum is far from empty, it contains an unlimited number of particles which come into being and vanish without end. Like the Eastern Void, the ‘physical vacuum’ – as it’s called in field theory – is not a state of nothingness, but contains the potentiality for all forms of the particle world. As the sutra says, ‘Form is emptiness, and emptiness is indeed form.’ This emptiness is not devoid of life. On the contrary, it’s the source of all life. Buddhists express the same idea when they call the ultimate reality Sunyata– ‘Emptiness,’ or ‘the Void’ – and affirm that it is a living Void which gives birth to all forms in the world. The Taoists ascribe a similar infinite and endless creativity to the Tao, and again, call it empty. Lao Tzu compares the Tao to a hollow valley, a vessel which is forever empty and thus has the potential of containing an infinity of things. It is infinite creative potential, and gives birth to an infinite variety of forms which it sustains and reabsorbs. Modern physics says the field is a continuum which is present everywhere in space and yet in its particle aspect has a discontinuous ‘granular’ structure. The two apparently contradictory concepts are thus unified and seen as different aspects of the same reality.
So, we’ve learned particles emerge from the void – nothingness – and become form, only to be absorbed back into it. They also dance. Modern physics has shown that the rhythm of creation and destruction applies to all living creatures, and is also the very essence of inorganic matter. All material particles ‘self-interact’ by emitting and reabsorbing virtual particles – an energy dance, a pulsating process of creation and destruction. According to Hinduism, Shiva, the dancing god, represents the cosmic dance that all life is part of a great rhythmic process of creation and destruction, of death and rebirth, and this eternal life-death rhythm which goes on in endless cycles. Different particles develop different patterns in their dance, requiring different amounts of energy. They are also created and destroyed by the vacuum, the void, which participates in the cosmic dance, creating and destroying energy patterns without end.
The subatomic world is one of rhythm, movement, and continual change. It is not, however, arbitrary and chaotic, but follows very definite and clear patterns. Particles of a given kind are completely identical; they have exactly the same mass, electric charge, and other properties. His book goes into detail about the symmetries that exist in the particle world. The discovery of symmetric patterns in the particle world has led many physicists to believe that these patterns reflect the fundamental laws of nature. It seems that in the Far East traditions, symmetry is another feature of the mind, and not the reality of nature. Some physicists as part of the bootstrap theory believe that fundamental laws of nature do not exist, and this is a leftover need to have a divine lawgiver, deeply rooted in the Judaeo-Christian tradition. Even the concept of fundamental laws of nature may just be another feature of the human mind, rather than of reality itself. The Eastern sages are generally not interested in explaining things, but rather in obtaining a direct non-intellectual experience of the unity of all things. This shares in the Bootstrap theory of the mutual interrelation and self-consistency of all phenomena, but also the denial of fundamental constituents of matter. In a world where all forms are fluid and ever-changing, there is no room for any fixed fundamental entity.
New world view
In the new world view, the universe is seen as a dynamic web of interrelated events. They all follow from the properties of the other parts, and their overall consistency of their mutual interrelations determines the structure of the entire web. To explain all natural phenomena, which are ultimately interconnected, we would need to understand all the others. All of these laws are creations of the human mind; a conceptual map of reality, rather than of reality itself. Even quantum theory cannot be fully explained, with its own unexplained features.
Joseph Needham discusses how the Western concept of fundamental laws of nature, with its original implication of a divine lawgiver, has no counterpart in Chinese thought. In the ‘Chinese worldview’, he writes, the harmonious cooperation of all beings arose, not from the orders of a superior authority external to themselves, but from the fact that they were all parts in hierarchy of wholes forming a cosmic pattern, and what they obeyed were the internal dictates of their own natures.’‘ The Eastern sages are generally not interested in explaining things, but rather in obtaining a direct non-intellectual experience of the unity of all things. To free the human mind from words and explanations is one of the main aims of Eastern mysticism.
Quantum theory has made it clear that these phenomena can only be understood as links in a chain of processes, the end of which lies in the consciousness of the human observer. Physicists are not arguing that the explicit inclusion of human consciousness may be an essential aspect of future theories of matter, since our consciousness is at the end of the link of these process. Some day, the scientific framework will go beyond science, no longer able to express its results in word or rational concepts.
As Lao Taz said, “He who knows does not speak, He who speaks does not know.”
Niels Bohr acknowledged the profound harmony between ancient Eastern wisdom and modern Western science. It will be interesting to watch modern Western science unfold and to see if and how that relationship grows stronger. Until then, I believe in both science and ancient texts and the mystery that lives between them. What about you?
