Because a truly skeptical position would be a very uncertain one. Rupert Sheldrake More Quotes by Rupert Sheldrake More Quotes From Rupert Sheldrake The universe is not in a steady state; there's an ongoing creative principle in nature, which is driving things onwards. Rupert Sheldrake naturecreativechange What you do, what you say and what you think can influence other people by morphic resonance. There is no immoral filter in morphic resonance, which means that we have to be more careful about what we are thinking if we are concerned about the affect we have on others. Rupert Sheldrake meanpeoplethinking Bad religion is arrogant, self-righteous, dogmatic and intolerant. And so is bad science. But unlike religious fundamentalists, scientific fundamentalists do not realize that their opinions are based on faith. They think they know the truth. Rupert Sheldrake religiousselfthinking The science delusion is the belief that science already understands the nature of reality in principle, leaving only the details to be filled in. Rupert Sheldrake filled-inleavingreality In practice, the goal of skepticism is not the discovery of truth, but the exposure of other people's errors. It plays a useful role in science, religion, scholarship, and common sense. But we need to remember that it is a weapon serving belief or self-interest; we need to be skeptical of skeptics. The more militant the skeptic, the stronger the belief. Rupert Sheldrake truthselfdiscovery Basically, morphic fields are fields of habit, and they've been set up through habits of thought, through habits of activity, and through habits of speech. Most of our culture is habitual. Rupert Sheldrake speechfieldsculture Creativity gives new forms, new patterns, new ideas, new art forms. And we don't know where creativity comes from. Is it inspired from above? Welling up from below? Picked up from the air? What? Creativity is a mystery wherever you encounter it. Rupert Sheldrake creativityairart The idea is that there is a kind of memory in nature. Each kind of thing has a collective memory. So, take a squirrel living in New York now. That squirrel is being influenced by all past squirrels. Rupert Sheldrake new-yorkmemoriespast The morphic fields include all kinds of organizing fields...: The organizing fields of animal and human behaviour, of social and cultural systems, and of mental activity can all be regarded as morphic fields which contain an inherent memory. Rupert Sheldrake behaviouranimalmemories Contemporary science is based on the philosophy of materialism, which claims that all reality is material or physical. Rupert Sheldrake materialismphilosophyreality At the moment of insight, a potential pattern of organized behavior comes into being. Rupert Sheldrake patternsbehaviormoments In no other field of scientific endeavor do otherwise intelligent people feel free to make public claims based on prejudice and ignorance. Yet in relation to psychic phenomena, committed materialists feel free to disregard the evidence and behave irrationally and unscientifically, while claiming to speak in the name of science and reason. They abuse the authority of science and bring rationalism into disrepute. Rupert Sheldrake intelligentignorancescience Science at its best is an open-minded method of inquiry, not a belief system. Rupert Sheldrake inquiryopen-mindedbelief I think that creativity depends on having sufficient indeterminacy around for a new pattern to arise up within it. Rupert Sheldrake patternscreativitythinking I went through the standard scientific atheist phase when I was about 14. I bought into that package deal of science equals atheism. Rupert Sheldrake phasesatheismatheist The Gaia Hypothesis of James Lovelock [and Lynn Margulis] puts forward a scientific view of the living Earth, which in one respect is modern, empherical, scientific, in another respect re-awakens an ancient archetype, which in fact is so clearly suggested by the very name of the hypothesis, Gaia, the Greek name for Mother Earth. Rupert Sheldrake viewsmothernames For more than 200 years, materialists have promised that science will eventually explain everything in terms of physics and chemistry. Believers are sustained by the faith that scientific discoveries will justify their beliefs. Rupert Sheldrake beliefdiscoveryyears Matter is merely mind deadened by the development of habit to the point where the breaking up of these habits is very difficult. Rupert Sheldrake developmentmattermind So there’s a kind of resurgence of the sense of freedom and spontaneity in nature. From nature being bound into a rigid, deterministic model, freedom, spontaneity and openness are emerging once again. It’s now recognized the future is open, not determined by the past. And this is true in many realms, the astronomical realm, the human realm, the meteorological realm in many ways. Rupert Sheldrake determinedwaypast I have been a scientist for more than 40 years, having studied at Cambridge and Harvard. I researched and taught at Cambridge University, was a research fellow of the Royal Society, and have more than 80 publications in peer-reviewed journals. I am strongly pro-science. Rupert Sheldrake cambridge-universitypeersyears
