The Dancing Wu Li Masters (44 page)

While it would be naive to overstate the similarities between Bohm’s physics and eastern philosophies, it would be foolish to ignore them. Consider, for example, the following sentences:

Taken out of context, there is no absolute way of knowing whether these statements were made by Professor Bohm or a Tibetan Buddhist. In fact, these sentences were excerpted from different parts of two
physics
lectures that Professor Bohm gave at Berkeley in April, 1977. The first lecture was given on the campus to physics students. The second lecture was given in the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory to a group of professional physicists. Two of these three statements were taken from the
second
lecture, the one given to the advanced physicists.

It is ironic that while Bohm’s theories are received with some skepticism by most professional physicists, they would find an immediately sympathetic reception among the thousands of people in our culture who have turned their backs on science in their own quest for the ultimate nature of reality.

If Bohm’s physics, or one similar to it, should become the main thrust of physics in the future, the dances of East and West could blend in exquisite harmony. Physics curricula of the twenty-first century could include classes in meditation.

The function of eastern religions (psychologies) is to allow the mind to escape the confines of the symbolic. According to this view,
everything
is a symbol, not only words and concepts, but also people and things. Beyond the confines of the symbolic lies that which is, pure awareness, the experience of the “suchness” of reality.

Nonetheless, every eastern religion resorts to the use of symbols to escape the realm of the symbolic. Some disciplines use symbols more than others, but all of them use symbols in one form or other. Therefore, the question arises, if pure awareness is considered distinct from the content of awareness, in what ways specifically does the content of awareness affect the realization of pure awareness? What types of content prompt the mind to leap forward? What enables it to activate the self-fulfilling capability to transcend itself?

It is very difficult to answer this question. Any answer is only a point of view. A point of view itself is limiting. To “understand”
something is to give up some other way of conceiving it. This is another way of saying that the mind deals in forms of limitation. Nonetheless, there
is
a relationship between the content of awareness and the ability of the mind to transcend itself.

“Reality” is what we take to be true. What we take to be true is what we believe. What we believe is based upon our perceptions. What we perceive depends upon what we look for. What we look for depends upon what we think. What we think depends upon what we perceive. What we perceive determines what we believe. What we believe determines what we take to be true. What we take to be true is our reality.

The central focus of this process, initially at any rate, is “What we think.” We at least can say that allegiance to a symbol of openness (Christ, Buddha, Krishna, “the infinite diversity of nature,” etc.) seems to open the mind and that an open mind is often the first step in the process of enlightenment.

The psychological gestalt of physics has shifted radically in the last century to one of extreme openness. In the middle 1800s, Newtonian mechanics was at its zenith. There seemed to be no phenomenon which could not be explained in terms of mechanical models. All mechanical models were subject to long-established principles. The chairman of the physics department at Harvard discouraged graduate study because so few important matters remained unsolved.
²⁰

In a speech to the Royal Institution in 1900, Lord Kelvin reflected that there were only two “clouds” on the horizon of physics, the problem of black-body radiation and the Michelson-Morley experiment.
²¹
There was no doubt, said Kelvin, that they soon would be gone. He was wrong. Kelvin’s two “clouds” signaled the end of the era that began with Galileo and Newton. The problem of black-body radiation led to Planck’s discovery of the quantum of action. Within thirty years the entirety of Newtonian physics became a special limiting case of the newly developing quantum theory. The Michelson-Morley experiment foreshadowed Einstein’s famous theories of relativity. By 1927, the foundations of the new physics, quantum mechanics and relativity, were in place.

In contrast to Kelvin’s time, the allegiance of physicists today is to a symbol of extreme openness. Isidor Rabi, Nobel Prize winner and Chairman Emeritus of the Physics Department at Columbia University, wrote in 1975:

Stapp wrote in 1971:

The “What we think” of physicists today is that the physics of nature, like human experience itself, is infinitely diverse.

Eastern religions have nothing to say about physics, but they have a great deal to say about human experience. In Hindu mythology, Kali, the Divine Mother, is the symbol for the infinite diversity of experience. Kali represents the entire physical plane. She is the drama, tragedy, humor, and sorrow of life. She is the brother, father, sister, mother, lover, and friend. She is the fiend, monster, beast, and brute. She is the sun and the ocean. She is the grass and the dew. She is our sense of accomplishment and our sense of doing worthwhile. Our thrill of discovery is a pendant on her bracelet. Our gratification is a spot of color on her cheek. Our sense of importance is the bell on her toe.

This full and seductive, terrible and wonderful earth mother
always
has something to offer. Hindus know the impossibility of seducing her or conquering her and the futility of loving her or hating her; so they do the only thing that they can do. They simply honor her.

In a particular story, Kali, the Divine Mother, is Sita, the wife of God. Ram is God. Ram, Sita, and Laksaman, who is Ram’s brother, are walking along a jungle trail. The path is so narrow that most of the time Laksaman can see only Sita, who walks between him and
Ram. Every so often, however, the path turns in such a way that Laksaman can see his brother, God.

These powerful metaphors have application to the developing drama of physics. Although most physicists have little patience (professionally) with metaphors, physics itself has become a powerful metaphor. Twentieth-century physics is the story of a journey from intellectual entrenchment to intellectual openness, despite the conservative prove-it-to-me nature of individual physicists. The realization that the discoveries of physics
never
will end has brought physicists, as well as those who have followed the story of physics, to an extremely fertile plateau. This realization invites the intellect to leap forward, although at great risk to its present hegemony.

The Wu Li Masters know that physicists are doing more than “discovering the endless diversity of nature.” They are dancing with Kali, the Divine Mother of Hindu mythology.

Buddhism is both a philosophy and a practice. Buddhist philosophy is rich and profound. Buddhist practice is called
Tantra. Tantra
is the Sanskrit word meaning “to weave.” There is little that can be said about
Tantra
. It must be done.

Buddhist philosophy reached its ultimate development in the second century
A.D.
No one has been able to improve much on it since then. The distinction between Buddhist philosophy and
Tantra
is well defined. Buddhist philosophy can be intellectualized.
Tantra
cannot. Buddhist philosophy is a function of the rational mind.
Tantra
transcends rationality. The most profound thinkers of the Indian civilization discovered that words and concepts could take them only so far. Beyond that point came the actual doing of a practice, the experience of which was ineffable. This did not prevent them from progressively refining the practice into an extremely effective and sophisticated set of techniques, but it did prevent them from being able to describe the experiences which these techniques produce.

The practice of
Tantra
does not mean the end of rational thought. It means the integration of thought based on symbols into
larger spectrums of awareness. (Enlightened people still remember their zip codes.)

The development of Buddhism in India shows that a profound and penetrating intellectual quest into the ultimate nature of reality can culminate in, or at least set the stage for, a quantum leap beyond rationality. In fact, on an individual level, this is one of the roads to enlightenment. Tibetan Buddhism calls it the Path without Form, or the Practice of Mind. The Path without Form is prescribed for people of intellectual temperament. The science of physics is following a similar path.

The development of physics in the twentieth century already has transformed the consciousness of those involved with it. The study of complementarity, the uncertainty principle, quantum field theory, and the Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics produces insights into the nature of reality very similar to those produced by the study of eastern philosophy. The profound physicists of this century increasingly have become aware that they are confronting the ineffable.

Max Planck, the father of quantum mechanics, wrote:

We are approaching the end of science. “The end of science” does not mean the end of the “unresting endeavor and continually progressing development” of more and more comprehensive and useful physical theories. (Enlightened physicists remember their zip codes, too.) The “end of science” means the coming of western civilization, in its own time and in its own way, into the higher dimensions of human experience.

Professor G. F. Chew, Chairman of the Physics Department at Berkeley, remarked, in reference to a theory of particle physics:

We need not make a pilgrimage to India or Tibet. There is much to learn there, but here at home, in the most inconceivable of places, amidst the particle accelerators and computers, our own Path without Form is emerging.

Al Huang, the Tai Chi Master who created the metaphor of Wu Li, once wrote “…sooner or later we reach a dead end when we talk.”
²⁶
He could as well have said that sooner or later we go round in circles when we talk since going round in a circle is one kind of dead end.

As we sat in a cabin at Esalen and talked late into the night, my new friend, David Finkelstein, spoke to us softly.

Q
UESTION:
So what is it that makes events at that level?

A
NSWER:
Who are the dancers and who the dance? They have no attributes other than the dance.

Q
UESTION:
What is “they”?

A
NSWER:
The things that dance, the dancers. My God! We’re back to the title of the book.
²⁷

Epigraphs

1. Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld,
   The Evolution of Physics
   , New York, Simon and Schuster, 1938, p. 27.
   
2. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Philosophy
   , Harper Torchbooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1958, p. 168.
   
3. Erwin Schrödinger,
   Science and Humanism
   , Cambridge, England, Cambridge University Press, 1951, pp. 7–8.
   

Big Week at Big Sur (pp. 3–18)

1. Al Chung-liang Huang,
   Embrace Tiger, Return to Mountain
   , Moab, Utah, Real People Press, 1973, p. 1.
   
2. Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld,
   The Evolution of Physics
   , New York, Simon and Schuster, 1938, p. 31.
   
3. Isidor Rabi, “Profiles—Physicists, I,”
   The New Yorker Magazine
   , October 13, 1975.
   

Einstein Doesn’t Like It (pp. 19–45)

1. Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld,
   The Evolution of Physics
   , New York, Simon and Schuster, 1961, p. 31.
   
2. Ibid.
   , p. 152.
   
3. Werner Heisenberg,
   Across the Frontiers
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1974, p. 114.
   
4. Isaac Newton,
   Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica
   (trans. Andrew Motte), reprinted in
   Sir Isaac Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy and His System of the World
   (revised trans. Florian Cajori), Berkeley, University of California Press, 1946, p. 547.
   
5. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London
   , vol. 54, 1893, p. 381, which refers to
   Correspondence of R. Bentley
   , vol. 1, p. 70. There is also a discussion of action-at-a-distance in a lecture of Clerk Maxwell in
   Nature
   , vol. VII, 1872, p. 325.
   
6. Joseph Weizenbaum,
   Computer Power and Human Reason
   , San Francisco, Freeman, 1976.
   
7. Niels Bohr,
   Atomic Theory and Human Knowledge
   , New York, John Wiley, 1958, p. 62.
   
8. J. A. Wheeler, K. S. Thorne, and C. Misner,
   Gravitation
   , San Francisco, Freeman, p. 1273.
   
9. Carl G. Jung,
   Collected Works
   , vol. 9, Bollingen Series XX, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1969, pp. 70–71.
   
10. Carl G. Jung and Wolfgang Pauli,
    The Interpretation of Nature and the Psyche
    , Bollingen Series LI, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1955, p. 175.
    
11. Albert Einstein, “On Physical Reality,”
    Franklin Institute Journal
    , 221, 1936, 349ff.
    
12. Henry Stapp, “The Copenhagen Interpretation and the Nature of Space-Time,”
    American Journal of Physics
    , 40, 1972, 1098ff.
    
13. Robert Ornstein, ed.,
    The Nature of Human Consciousness
    , New York, Viking, 1974, pp. 61–149.
    

Living? (pp. 49–73)

1. Victor Guillemin,
   The Story of Quantum Mechanics
   , New York, Scribner’s, 1968, pp. 50–51.
   
2. Max Planck,
   The Philosophy of Physics
   , New York, Norton, 1936, p. 59.
   
3. Henry Stapp, “Are Superluminal Connections Necessary?”
   Nuovo Cimento
   , 40B, 1977, 191.
   
4. Evan H. Walker, “The Nature of Consciousness,”
   Mathematical Biosciences
   , 7, 1970, 175–76.
   
5. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Philosophy
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1958, p. 41.
   

What Happens (pp. 74–97)

1. Max Born and Albert Einstein,
   The Born-Einstein Letters
   , New York, Walker and Company, 1971, p. 91. (The precise wording of this statement varies somewhat from translation to translation. This is the version popularly attributed to Einstein.)
   
2. Henry Stapp, “S-Matrix Interpretation of Quantum Theory,” Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory preprint, June 22, 1970 (revised edition:
   Physical Review
   , D3, 1971, 1303ff).
   
3. Ibid.
   
4. Ibid.
   
5. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Philosophy
   , Harper Torchbooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1958, p. 41.
   
6. Henry Stapp, “Mind, Matter, and Quantum Mechanics,” unpublished paper.
   
7. Hugh Everett III, “‘Relative State’ Formulation of Quantum Mechanics,”
   Reviews of Modern Physics
   , vol. 29, no. 3, 1957, pp. 452–62.
   

The Role of “I” (pp. 101–127)

1. Niels Bohr,
   Atomic Theory and the Description of Nature
   , Cambridge, England, Cambridge University Press, 1934, p. 53.
   
2. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Philosophy
   , Harper Torchbooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1958, p. 42.
   
3. Werner Heisenberg,
   Across the Frontiers
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1974, p. 75.
   
4. Erwin Schrödinger, “Image of Matter,” in
   On Modern Physics
   , with W. Heisenberg, M. Born, and P. Auger, New York, Clarkson Potter, 1961, p. 50.
   
5. Max Born,
   Atomic Physics
   , New York, Hafner, 1957, p. 95.
   
6. Ibid
   ., p. 96.
   
7. Ibid
   ., p. 102.
   
8. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Beyond
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1971, p. 76.
   
9. Niels Bohr,
   Atomic Theory and Human Knowledge
   , New York, John Wiley, 1958, p. 60.
   
10. Born,
    op. cit
    ., p. 97.
    
11. Heisenberg,
    Physics and Philosophy, op. cit
    ., p. 58.
    

Beginner’s Mind (pp. 131–149)

1. Shunryu Suzuki,
   Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind
   , New York, Weatherhill, 1970, pp. 13–14.
   
2. Henry Miller, “Reflections on Writing,” in
   Wisdom of the Heart
   , Norfolk, Connecticut, New Directions Press, 1941 (reprinted in
   The Creative Process
   , by B. Ghiselin (ed.), Berkeley, University of California Press, 1954, p. 186).
   
3. KQED Television press conference, San Francisco, California, December 3, 1965.
   
4. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Philosophy
   , Harper Torchbooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1958, p. 33.
   

Special Nonsense (pp. 150–178)

1. Albert Einstein, “Aether und Relativitätstheorie,” 1920, trans. W. Perret and G. B. Jeffery,
   Side Lights on Relativity
   , London, Methuen, 1922 (reprinted in
   Physical Thought from the Presocratics to the Quantum Physicists
   by Shmuel Sambursky, New York, Pica Press, 1975, p. 497).
   
2. Ibid
   .
   
3. Ibid
   .
   
4. Albert Einstein, “Die Grundlage der Allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie,” 1916, trans. W. Perret and G. B. Jeffery,
   Side Lights on Relativity
   , London, Methuen, 1922 (reprinted in
   Physical Thought from the Presocratics to the Quantum Physicists
   by Shmuel Sambursky, New York, Pica Press, 1975, p. 491).
   
5. Einstein, “Aether und Relativitätstheorie,”
   op. cit
   ., p. 496.
   
6. J. Terrell,
   Physical Review
   , 116, 1959, 1041.
   
7. Isaac Newton,
   Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica
   (trans. Andrew Motte), reprinted in
   Sir Isaac Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy and His System of the World
   (revised trans. Florian Cajori), Berkeley, University of California Press, 1946, p. 6.
   
8. From “Space and Time,” an address to the 80th Assembly of German Natural Scientists and Physicians, Cologne, Germany, September 21, 1908 (reprinted in
   The Principles of Relativity
   , by A. Lorentz, A. Einstein, H. Minkowski, and H. Weyle, New York, Dover, 1952, p. 75).
   
9. Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld,
   The Evolution of Physics
   , New York, Simon and Schuster, 1961, p. 197.
   

General Nonsense (pp. 179–209)

1. Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld,
   The Evolution of Physics
   , New York, Simon and Schuster, 1961, p. 197.
   
2. Ibid
   ., p. 219.
   
3. Ibid
   ., pp. 33–34.
   
4. David Finkelstein, “Past-Future Asymmetry of the Gravitational Field of a Point Particle,”
   Physical Review
   , 110, 1958, 965.
   

The Particle Zoo (pp. 213–235)

1. Goethe,
   Theory of Colours
   , Pt. II (Historical), iv, 8 (trans. C. L. Eastlake, London, 1840; repr., M.I.T. Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1970).
   
2. Werner Heisenberg,
   Across the Frontiers
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1974, p. 162.
   
3. Werner Heisenberg
   et al., On Modern Physics
   , New York, Clarkson Potter, 1961, p. 13.
   
4. David Bohm,
   Causality and Chance in Modern Physics
   , Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1957, p. 90.
   
5. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Beyond
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1971, p. 41.
   
6. Werner Heisenberg
   et al., On Modern Physics, op. cit
   ., p. 34.
   
7. Victor Guillemin,
   The Story of Quantum Mechanics
   , New York, Scribner’s, 1968, p. 135.
   
8. Max Born,
   The Restless Universe
   , New York, Dover, 1951, p. 206.
   
9. Ibid
   .
   
10. Ibid
    .
    
11. Kenneth Ford,
    The World of Elementary Particles
    , New York, Blaisdell, 1963, pp. 45–46.
    

The Dance (pp. 236–279)

1. Louis de Broglie, “A General Survey of the Scientific Work of Albert Einstein,” in
   Albert Einstein, Philosopher-Scientist
   , vol. 1, Paul Schilpp (ed.), Harper Torchbooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1949, p. 114.
   
2. Richard Feynman, “Mathematical Formulation of the Quantum Theory of Electromagnetic Interaction,” in Julian Schwinger (ed.)
   Selected Papers on Quantum Electrodynamics
   (Appendix B), New York, Dover, 1958, p. 272.
   
3. Kenneth Ford,
   The World of Elementary Particles
   , New York, Blaisdell, 1963, p. 208 and cover.
   
4. Sir Charles Eliot,
   Japanese Buddhism
   , New York, Barnes and Noble, 1969, pp. 109–10.
   

More Than Both (pp. 283–311)

1. John von Neumann,
   The Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics
   (trans. Robert T. Beyer), Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1955.
   
2. Ibid
   ., p. 253.
   
3. Werner Heisenberg,
   Physics and Beyond
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1971, p. 206.
   
4. Max Born,
   Atomic Physics
   , New York, Hafner, 1957, p. 97.
   
5. Transcribed from tapes recorded at the Esalen Conference on Physics and Consciousness, Big Sur, California, January 1976.
   
6. Albert Einstein, Boris Podolsky, and Nathan Rosen, “Can Quantum-
   Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?”
   Physical Review
   , 47, 1935, 777ff.
   
7. Werner Heisenberg,
   Across the Frontiers
   , New York, Harper & Row, 1974, p. 72.
   
8. Esalen Tapes,
   op. cit
   .
   
9. Garrett Birkhoff and John von Neumann, “The Logic of Quantum Mechanics,”
   Annals of Mathematics
   , vol. 37, 1936.
   
10. Esalen Tapes,
    op. cit
    .
    

The End of Science (pp. 312–348)

1. Longchenpa, “The Natural Freedom of Mind,” trans. Herbert Guenther,
   Crystal Mirror
   , vol. 4, 1975, p. 125.
   
2. Albert Einstein, Boris Podolsky, and Nathan Rosen, “Can Quantum-Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete?”
   Physical Review
   , 47, 1935, 777ff.
   
3. Erwin Schrödinger, “Discussions of Probability Relations between Separated Systems,”
   Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical Society
   , 31, 1935, 555–62.
   
4. Albert Einstein, “Autobiographical Notes,” in Paul Schilpp (ed.),
   Albert Einstein, Philosopher-Scientist
   , Harper Torchbooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1949, p. 85.
   
5. Ibid
   ., p. 87.
   
6. Ibid
   ., p. 85.
   
7. Henry Stapp, “S-Matrix Interpretation of Quantum Theory,” Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory preprint, June 22, 1970 (revised edition:
   Physical Review
   , D3, 1971, 1303ff).
   
8. Stuart Freedman and John Clauser, “Experimental Test of Local Hidden Variable Theories,”
   Physical Review Letters
   , 28, 1972, 938ff.
   
9. Henry Stapp, “Bell’s Theorem and World Process,”
   Il Nuovo Cimento
   , 29B, 1975, 271.
   
10. Alain Aspect, Jean Dalibard, and Gérard Roger, “Experimental Test of Bell’s Inequalities Using Time-Varying Analyzers,”
    Physical Review Letters
    , vol. 49, no. 25, 1982, 1804.
    
11. John Clauser and Abner Shimony, “Bell’s Theorem: Experimental
    Tests and Implications,”
    Rep Prog Phys
    , vol 41, 1978, 1881; Bernard d’Espagnat, “The Quantum Theory and Reality,”
    Scientific American
    , Nov. 1979.
    
12. Henry Stapp, “Are Superluminal Connections Necessary?”
    Il Nuovo Cimento
    , 40B, 1977, 191.
    
13. David Bohm and B. Hiley, “On the Intuitive Understanding of Non-locality as Implied by Quantum Theory” (preprint, Birkbeck College, University of London, 1974).
    
14. Henry Stapp, “S-Matrix Interpretation,”
    op. cit
    .
    
15. Werner Heisenberg,
    Physics and Philosophy
    , Harper Torchbooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1958, p. 52.
    
16. Lecture given April 6, 1977, University of California at Berkeley.
    
17. Ibid
    .
    
18. Ibid
    .
    
19. Ibid
    .
    
20. Victor Guillemin,
    The Story of Quantum Mechanics
    , New York, Scribner’s, 1968, p. 19.
    
21. Lord Kelvin (Sir William Thompson), “Nineteenth-Century Clouds over the Dynamical Theory of Heat and Light,”
    Philosophical Magazine
    , 2, 1901, 1–40.
    
22. Isidor Rabi, “Profiles—Physicist, II,”
    The New Yorker Magazine
    , October 20, 1975.
    
23. Henry Stapp, “The Copenhagen Interpretation and the Nature of Space-Time,”
    American Journal of Physics
    , 40, 1972, 1098.
    
24. Max Planck,
    The Philosophy of Physics
    , New York, Norton, 1936, p. 83.
    
25. This quotation was given to the Fundamental Physics Group, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, November 21, 1975, (during an informal discussion of the bootstrap theory), by Dr. Chew’s colleague, F. Capra.
    
26. Al Chung-liang Huang,
    Embrace Tiger, Return to Mountain
    , Moab, Utah, Real People Press, 1973, p. 14.
    
27. Transcribed from tapes recorded at the Esalen Conference on Physics and Consciousness, Big Sur, California, January 1976.