Today the public is bombarded with books promoting a New Age metaphysics ostensibly based on the most recent developments in physics and astronomy. A new holistic paradigm has become popular, one that claims an intimate spiritual connection between individual mind and the fabric of the universe. The term quantum, taken out of its original scientific context, has become the mantra of this new metaphysics. which purports to find a convergence between the picture of reality presented by physics and the world view of traditional Eastern mysticism.
What do the great discoveries of physics in this century tell us about the ultimate structure of reality? Are mystical interpretations of the universe supported by such concepts as the big bang, anthropic coincidences, black holes, and chaos theory?
As the research of physicists becomes ever more sophisticated, the average person finds the significance of the latest findings increasingly difficult to comprehend. And this lack of understanding in the public mind is made worse by the misleading claims of persuasive lecturers and popular authors, whose interest is mainly to capitalize on trendy ideas rather than to consider scientific evidence objectively.
In this fascinating and accessible book, physicist Victor J. Stenger guides the lay reader through the key developments of quantum mechanics and the debate over its apparent paradoxes. In the process, he critically appraises recent metaphysical fads popularized by such authors as Deepak Chopra and Fritjof Capra. Dr. Stenger's knack for elucidating scientific ideas and controversies in language that the nonspecialist can comprehend opens up to the widest possible audience a wealth of information on the most important findings of contemporary physics.
Stenger makes it clear that current scientific hypotheses about the material nature of reality are all we need to explain the available evidence and that mystical notions say more about the human need to believe than about the fundamental makeup of the universe.
Victor J. Stenger is professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Hawaii. He is the author of Not By Design: The Origin of the Universe and Physics and Psychics: The Search for a World Beyond the Senses.
"What distinguishes the Stenger account is the attempt - unusual and inherently difficult - to mix popular exposition with criticism of the physics community's interpretation of the material being exposed."
Brian Rotman - Times Literary Supplement
322 pages Publication date 30th May, 1996