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Sheldrake's Morphic Fields
and the TGD View about Quantum Biology
Dr. Matti Pitkänen
August 7, 2011
Postal address:
Köydenpunojankatu 2 D 11
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I received 2 books of Rubert Sheldrake as a gift from Mark McWilliams who has for years helped me by reporting about problems at my homepage and sending links to interesting articles. The titles of the books of Sheldrake are A New Science of Life: the Hypothesis of Formative Causation and The Presence of the Past: Morphic Resonance and Habits of Nature. The titles reveal the 2 basic notions underlying the vision of Sheldrake.
What makes the study of the books so rewarding is that Sheldrake starts from problems of the existing paradigm, analyzes them thoroughly, and proposes solutions in the framework provided by his vision. There is no need to accept Sheldrake's views. Just the reading of his arguments teaches a lot about the fundamental ideas and dogmas underlying recent-day Biology and forces the reader to realize how little we really know. Not only about Biology but also about so-called “established” areas of Physics such as condensed matter physics. These books are precious gems for anyone trying to build an overall view.
Instead of explaining the ideas of Sheldrake and their connection with the TGD-based view about living matter here, I recommend the pdf article Sheldrake's Morphic Fields and TGD View about Quantum Biology at my homepage. Also the chapter “Quantum Theory of Self-Organization” of Bio-Systems as Self-Organizing Quantum Systems contains the article.
Comments
1. At 8:20 AM, ThePeSla said...
Matti,
I am on board with you here and have been since19 95 or so. But since my online life, I have observed that this area rapidly causes the moderators to classify it and related theories as suspect and even pseudo-science.
One problem is the old (what you know is essential) “action at a distance”. This in a way means there is also action across generations as if at a distant time. Of which now there is some physical as well as social evidence.
Of course,Quantum is part of the picture. But I suspect that a little more is involved here beyond the quantum and relativistic formalism as you know. What organizes the quantum system?
But it was a most interesting and excellent paper you linked to and I do see better where you have tried to add to the coherence of this Morphogenesis idea.
Now, if we can shore up things a little more convincingly when it comes to applying the number theories to all this :-)
The PeSla
2. At 8:54 AM, ThePeSla said...
Matti, I just found this which may be of use to you (considering the relation to water in your essay):
3. At 9:27 AM, Ulla said...
At last, I want to say!
I have thought of this quite a bit and I think we think wrong again. So typical of us humans.
The habitual fields are behind the quantum jump and free will. Usually we follow our attitudes, memories etc., or past history. But sometimes we jump to the side. You have much on this, too. This much follow the thermodynamics.
In Biology, this phenomenon is well known and interpreted as increase of chaos, which is wrong. Instead, it must be increase of uncertainty. Constraints from environment narrows this cone as Einstein showed us, so our choices diminish. This is epigenetics and normal body regulation. Some of this information is still secre, because of ongoing work. I am really thrilled of this :-)
Look at . Maybe you see where it went wrong.
We will crack this secret, will we? Yes! Biology will show the quantum world how it goes! Fancy pictures will fall!
4. At 9:26 PM, said...
Dear Pesla,
What is attractive in Sheldrake's idea that it separates one big piece of theory (morphic resonance) and concentrates on it. I believe that this kind of factorization is real. Morphic resonance is not all that is needed it is only part of the story. The results are impressive but the reader must of course be ready to get rid of the usual dogmatism.
The answer of Sheldrake is that morphic fields are the tool making possible the organization. Think of a collection sending and receiving antennas which spontaneously tune to common antenna frequencies.
Why would this tuning occur spontaneously? I think this is an important question and I do not know of a satisfactory answer in standard Physics framework (assuming, for instance, that morphic fields can be identified as electromagnetic fields).
My proposal for the answer is based on what I have used to call the Negentropy Maximization Principle (analogous to Second Law of Themrodynamics and implying it at the level of ensembles). Getting tuned means that you start receive conscious information. Negentropy increases so that the tuning occurs spontaneously. Tuning is forced by a law of Nature. Even clocks tend to entrain (to say nothing about brains) so that the tuning would be a very general phenomenon.
Tuning to certain frequencies is essential for the modern society. Radio, TV, web, etc. -- everything. We have hunger for conscious information!
5. At 9:44 PM, said...
To Ulla,
I would reformulate Sheldrake's idea using TGD by saying that habitual fields reflect the presence of collective levels of consciousness. The Geometric(relativistic)-Past is present and affects the Geometric-Now(Present). Societies (be they cell or neuron societies, ant nests, or human civilizations) are 4-dimensional.
Take the notion of dominating/recessive trait (say color of flower) as an example. We all have probably taken this notion as granted without asking what makes the trait dominant.
Both members of the chromosome pair contain corresponding gene and the second one is expressed when dominance occurs. It can also happen that dominance varies from cell-to-cell so that mixed situations can happen. What determines which gene is expressed in the case of dominance?
According to Sheldrake, the decision which allele of the gene determining phenotype (say red or white flower) is a democratic decision in 4-D society. Previous generations participate to the decision using morphic signals to communicate their desire. This creates the habit forced by the social pressures of 4-D society;:-). This is, I think, the core of Sheldrake's beautiful idea.
Sheldrake suggests that even crystallization to a particular crystal form is a habit of condensed matter physics. It is astonishing to learn that we still are not able to understand why only particular crystal form is selected. Protein folding would be a biological habit.
Very stimulating to read a real thinker after all the aggressive blog stuff trying to create the illusion of authority.
6. At 6:47 AM, Ulla said...
You are blind and deaf, Matti, and listen only to your own brain chat. I mean this text IS marvelous. But you miss the main point! Have you even read Dickaus paper? (sent you too many links?)
WHAT is collective consciousness? And compare it to NM, and the paper.
What is the opposite to protein folding and crystal structure? Why must proteins be in the nerve membrane? Cellular flux tubes -- what drives them? Think! And I don't want any nonsense answer :)
7. At 9:01 PM, said...
Dear Ulla,
Concerning your claim about my sensory handicaps (visual and auditory):
(1) I have written about connections between NMP and the Second Law. NMP implies the Second Law at ensemble level when one restricts the consideration to non-living systems.
(2) I have talked about number theoretic entropy and about Life residing in the intersection of real and p-adic worlds. Life is in the intersection of matter and cognition.
(3) I have talked about the connection between Zero Energy Ontology and possibility of local reversal of the Geometric-Time forcing a more general formulation of the Second Law allowing apparent reduction of entropy such as occurring in the self assembly of biomolecules and for phase conjugate laser beams.
(4) I have talked about the breaking of the Second Law below at a given level of scale hierarchy because quantum decoherence implying Boltzmann's equations and the Second Law does not hold below this characteristic length scale and also about observation of this breaking in 0.1 second timescale -- the fundamental time scale of Living matter (alpha rhythm for instance).
(5) I have talked about how the Second Law generalizes also in the sense that Living systems are able to generate genuine negentropy. Not only reduce their entropy as in the Standard view but also that for what I call the pessimistic option. This is always accompanied by a production of entropy to satisfy the Second Law. For pessimistic option, Living systems seem to be unavoidably polluters. All this technological advancement seems to have unavoidable negative effects. No paradise without hell. (My life experience in market economy strongly supports this view;-)
(6) I have talked about the possibility that quantum jump allows to escape the pessimistic view. Quantum jump h represents the creative aspect of quantum. A kind of “moment of mercy” using religious terminology. The system which has performed the state function reduction cascade is like civilization at the top of its development both in good and bad. Moment of mercy could mean the collapse of the civilization meaning also that everything begins again in 4-D world. This would a kind of reincarnation of civilization. Life cycle of organism is analogous process beginning with quantum jump (birth) and proceeding as cascade of state function reductions to biological death (which at same time is the moment of new birth).
(7) I have also talked about the emergence of the arrow of Geometric-Time and proposed an explanation for why our sensory experience is about so narrow interval of Geometric-Time. Here, NMP in strong form appears as also in the argument explaining why Living systems tune to each other spontaneously (morphic resonance).
From this, it is clear that giving up the self-contradictory identification of Geometric- and Experienced-time, flood gates for ideas open.
Jonathan Dickau's proposal is very interesting and can be assigned to the 4th item in the above list. I do not claim that you are blind or deaf. But if you had perceived my messages, you would not be claiming that I am blind and death.
I am a physicist and my goal is to identify the quantum physical correlates of consciousness and understand Life in terms of new physics provided by one particular theory since I happen to have just this particular life available for this purpose.
I appreciate your attempts to understand. But the problem is that you do not have the conceptual understanding of Physics which only a good education in Physics can give. No wonder that you fail to see the big picture and everything looks to you just a random collection of isolated weird ideas. The road to understanding is tortuous.
Sorry for adopting this paternal sounding tone. It has nothing to do with gender.
8. At 1:13 AM, Ulla said...
The big picture and everything doesn't look to me just a random collection of isolated weird ideas, as you should know. I have nothing against a paternal sounding tone either and my handicap-claims was only to make you wake up. The paternal tone tells me I failed again. Is it only because I don't have the proper physical language? Or me? This is NOT about ego. Sorry that I cannot articulate the question better. But there are other interests too.
I know what you have done, dear Matti. Marvelous things. I am your big supporter. Sick, maybe you say?
Remember, it is many years since I talked about these things. I have only one of his books. You didn't listen then. Maybe I am too bad articulating or you too busy listening to yourself. Remember Kea. Maybe I am just stupid. But I tried. I will try.
I have talked too many stupid things? Yes,I have. Come down from your heaven. Please.
This bothers me. I did NOT mean to sound aggressive and you went offensive at once. I just wanted to give you a big insight. Maybe it could change much of what you have said?
Look, you have not considered one single of my proposals, only your ev. handicaps ;) I can tell you that your other characters widely overrun this ev, shortage :) I did not mean to upset you, only wake you up.
It was you who thought about the role of BIG proteins (and crystals) in membranes. What would be their opposites? What about the flux tubes? I thought you would see this. It was meant as a gift. Plus that I have no proper physical education as you said. Sorry. I should drag something old over me.
9. At 10:46 AM, ThePeSla said...
Ulla,
Of course our human tendencies may misunderstand our intentions. I am sure there is no problem here. It is not that your challenges are taken as not helpful and they do have an effect. But they can be distracting at least in my case (not that I mind).
I am not sure that I have that formal education myself in any language. But it is commendable that we want to find a way to whatever understanding there is.
10. At 10:56 AM, ThePeSla said...
Matti,
I went a little further in the consideration of some of the higher and deeper uses of dimensions where they are after all rapidly complex even in the low numbers.
I am interested in what you might think of Lee Smolin's new book about what I think are theories that we have played with all along.
See my pesla.blogspost.com today on the 24 cell and depth Conway matrices mentioned asking this of your and other reference frames.
Odd thing for me is I have not attempted to promote my blog and its audience nor monetize it. You should look into this.
Why indeed would the exact mirror image of a large organic molecule have different energy? It is a good question. And in what context TGD?
(I was referring to this article:
[SS: archived asdoc pdf URL-doc URL-pdf] )
11. At 8:38 PM, said...
Dear Pesla,
You probably mean Smolin's book about string and M-theories around 2006. I have a gist about the message of the book since there was a lot of debate about it in blogs. Although I have not read it, I agree with the view that the sociology of the Big Science tends to silence genuinely new ideas.
Loop Gravity looks to me as too limited an approach and doubly special relativity with 8-D curved phase space rather unattractive. The Riemann metric defines notion of length and angle for vector fields in tangent bundle- 8-D for space-time (phase space). Making tangent bundle curved would mean replacing 8-D tangent bundle of space-time (phase space) with its 16-D tangent bundle. Tangent bundle of tangent bundle. This is possible but looks to me ugly and quantum theorists would start to worry about the breaking of the Uncertainty Principle.
I have concluded from the postings of Lubos that double special relativity is more-or-less excluded by the findings of the Fermi satellite demonstrating that the light velocity does not depend on energy of the photon. A couple of days ago, however, I saw a New Scientist article in which the proponents of curved phase space make an opposite claim. I did not find any reference.
In the Standard Model, parity breaking in Living matter is mystery because it is quite too large. The length scale of weak bosons is 10-17 meters and predicts extremely small weak parity breaking.
As you might guess;-), the TGD-inspired proposal is inspired on the hierarchy of Planck constants explaining the dark matter. The Compton length of weak boson scales as hbar and for large enough hbar, it can be of the order of cell membrane thickness, cell size, and even larger. One would have unbroken electroweak symmetries for the space-time sheets with large enough hbar (effectively massless weak bosons below Compton length of weak boson). This would give rise to large parity breaking even in cell length scale. Dark matter would induce the large parity breaking.
12. At 9:00 PM, said...
Dear Ulla,
I am by no means irritated or aggressive. Rhetorical aggression is something different from a real one. Blog writing is a kind of role game and rhetoric aggression a kind of emotional boldface. 15 years in the Web makes us virtual world actors;-).
In the Web, people are usually too busily explaining to have time for listening. Anyone feeling of having some important message can commit this sin. It is, however, very useful to listen to those who really have something important to say. Sheldrake is a good example.