Question: You communicate with scientists a lot. What is your impression: Do people feel the transition to a new integral system?

Answer: Sure! Plenty of people write about this on their own without any prompting. They express correct, although, in a sense, fragmentary thoughts because they lack generality. They lack our integral method that talks about general nature and general management.

So, of course, not having this method, it is difficult for them to see globality, but many of them still see it, and the rest talk about it mostly in their areas. In general today, we even cannot say that there are people who would not agree with it at least partly.

There is plenty of material online on this topic. We have compiled a huge database of statements from and communications with these people. Basically, they are Western and American scientists, but I am sure that we can find the same in Russia.
[83821]
From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/31/12

Related material :
When Did The Integration Begin?
A Real Transition
The Transition To the Global World

Filed under: Education, Integral Upbringing, Q&A, Science - No Comments →

Question: Part of our audience is scientists who study the world. These are people who try to comprehend, understand, and feel at what stage our world is today and what happens to it. What information would it be best to convey to this segment and in what form should it be?

Answer: As a rule, scientists are accustomed to charts, tables, opinions of others, excerpts, peer reviews, and so on. They need material in a book form. That is why we need to present our work like this.

In principle, we did this in the past. Our two books have been published. Now, as a result of our talks on integral education and upbringing, we need to publish one more.

It will be more practical, almost like a textbook with appendices, with the description of the work in the master classes and focus groups, and so on. It should be a practical guide based not only on the discussions, but also on the work done.

I believe that this is very important material. It will become the basis for many studies that will begin in the near future in connection with the development toward the integral community.
[83760]
From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/31/12

Related Material:
A Practical Guide For The Integral Method
A Guide To Solving Problems
Disseminators Of Integral Ideas

Filed under: Education, Integral Upbringing, Q&A, Science - No Comments →

Opinion (Nikita N. Moiseyev, prominent Soviet and Russian mathematician, full member of the Soviet and Russian Academies of Sciences): “Setting the task: We need to explain that people are also part of Nature, and we follow its laws, its logic. And a violation of this logic is destructive to society. Already at the first lecture, we should explain that a person has free will that may open the future for him, and at the same time, it can be deadly for him. And we need to learn to just talk about this duality, this contradiction, which is the essence of the science about man and his behavior in nature, the ambiguity of its reactions, the essence of intelligence.

“There should be different views: The difference between people, their living conditions, produces a difference of interpretation. And these differences should not be feared. They help to see the subject from different angles.

“The human being belongs to the system: The Universe is a system, that is, a collection of interconnected elements. The solar system, Earth, and the Human Being are part of this system. This human being, belonging to the system, can study its properties only from the inside, just what is available around him.

“That’s why people are able to comprehend only some of the properties of the Universe. And it will always be so: No matter how science advances, only the smallest facts about it will be available to us. We will always know only a fraction of what the Universe means, only the finite part of an infinite set.

“Periods of calm replace inevitable catastrophes: To understand the present, let alone look beyond the horizon, is possible only by knowing the process of formation of human species, as a biological type, its culture and civilization in general. We need to know the origins and characteristics of self-organization processes of the biosphere, which have created a man. And we already know a lot. We know, for example, that the periods of calm replaced inevitable disasters that direct development to new channels.

“Mowgli would not become a man: The phenomenon of the spiritual world is the effect of evolutionary development, not biological, but social. I would specifically analyze an example like Mowgli and explain why he could never become a man. Did Freud understand this?

“The multiplicity of society: It is important to explain the phenomenon of multiculturalism as a guarantee of the stability of society, as an analogue of biological diversity. For this purpose, it is convenient to use the example of Rousseau’s argument and show where he was right and where he was wrong.”
[83481]

Related Material:
The Next Phase Of Human Development
All Of Nature Is One Organism
The Earth Might Get Rid Of Humanity

Filed under: News, Science - No Comments →

Question: Today we already see that in order to raise the level of research, a scientist has to change; will he agree to that?

Answer: Will he have a choice? It refers not only to scientists but to other professionals as well, for example, teachers or businessmen. Because otherwise, businessmen will not be able to make deals. Today they suddenly discover that they cannot do it. This is why the middle class is disappearing, because people don’t know how to run a business and how to work integrally. They have not found the reason for the crisis yet.

Today the weak remain weak and don’t feel any meaningful changes; the rich take every opportunity, even in a time of crisis, to increase their profits, and the middle class suffers. But eventually people will understand that they have to change, because there is simply no other way. It will be clear to them that it is impossible to go on using the old methods of business management.

Today the big reliable commercial mechanisms cease to work. The elite are losing control and eventually it will force everyone to think about how to regain control of things. Then it will be clear: The only way to regain control is to switch to bestowal. Only then will you control the situation.

Everyone will feel the need for that, including scientists who will understand it more than others—on the basis of scientific data. Actually every scientific field has reached a dead end, and scientists already understand the need for radical changes. In a short while they will admit that these changes have to be made internally.

Thus they will recognize evil, but they won’t be able to switch to goodness by themselves. Here we have to introduce the force of correction to them.

What is more, a scientist himself is drawn to this force and will do the right thing if he sees the need for the integral approach. This is because the totally connected integral nature is revealed to him. He sees that he will not be able to come to any results since he encounters Ein Sof (Infinity), the unknown. There is an integral picture in front of him and all its parts are connected by infinite interrelations, and he cannot explain all that, he cannot “digest” this wholeness and work by it. He cannot build a model of the general unified picture inside him.

In the meantime, it is impossible to manage without such an internal model. Even known scientific concepts, like Einstein’s theory can be deeply understood by very few people. So what can we say about phenomena that are being revealed today that do not stem from our world and can only be understood by the integral mind.

Therefore, scientists will understand that they have to change their approach, themselves, their perspective. But how? The answer to this question will not be found without our help. We have to be the ones who explain to people how to fulfill the internal changes.

Question: But our method operates only within a group and scientists are used to working and discovering things individually. Will they agree to the principle of collective work as a means for the integral revelation?

Answer: They have no other choice. Of course, they will agree to that. Furthermore, the great scientists do recognize the need to connect. They feel it.
[83199]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/16/12, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”

Related Material:
The Brain: A Secret That Is Inaccessible To Science
Why Should We Quote Scientists?
Which Businesses Will Succeed?

Filed under: Crisis, Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Q&A, Science - No Comments →

Question: Current studies show that the neurons in the brain become flexible when they connect. The “matter” remains the same, but the mutual connections in it change. Is it possible to draw an analogy between the “matter” of the brain and the “matter” of the desire to receive?

Answer: We will never be able to understand the way the brain operates by using the standard “corporeal” scientific tools. I suppose that scientists already understand this. The brain depends on its current state, and so the data in this field hardly allows researchers to arrive at any statistical rules, or to find some consistency. The brain isn’t just “a kilo and half of gray matter.” It constantly changes and although we classify the functions of all its parts, they can still perform totally different functions.

At the “head” of the spiritual Partzuf, where the decisions are made, there is a Direct Light and a Returning Light, the connection between the Creator and the created being. It is the same in our brain, but on a different level. So if we don’t discover the Creator part in us, we will not be able to discover the principles of the brain’s work. This is because half of the picture can hardly be seen in the fog and we don’t know what operates it.

On the whole, we can compare our brain to a detector, to a receiver that receives signals from space around us. So there is no great significance to examine it detached from this space. If we study only the brain itself and leave its connection with the source of the data out of the picture, we will never know anything. This is because our brain perceives important external information from some field.

We are built in a definite way: Our nature is divided into the still, vegetative, animate, and speaking levels, we divide ourselves into Partzufim, Sefirot, to parts according to the thickness of the desire and the purity of the Masach (screen), but actually in spirituality it is all one, and everything is one wholeness where we exist. It is where the past, the present, and the future are, the three stages of our development, everything is there.

The brain activity is like a receiver or a mutual activity within a system, which I perceive only to the extent of my own bestowal. We may say that the brain is part of the general system. But actually the brain, the mind, is spread over all of Ein Sof (Infinity), which a person has to actually attain. In the meantime we only feel bits of it.

I don’t think that science will continue to follow the old approach. There will come a time when scientists will stop, change their approach, and begin to discover an upper level, just as in the past humanity moved from using a steam engine to using an internal combustion engine. Brain researchers will want to rise to the “layer of information” that is above our world. It is only from there that they will be able to carry on with their studies, whereas the current approach will lead to nothing.
[83203]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 7/16/12, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar”

Related Material:
The Brain Distinguishes Between The Sacred And The Profane
Science Confirms That Mind Is Independent From Brain, But Is The Mind Material?
A Brain Cell of the Universe

Filed under: Body and Soul, Daily Kabbalah Lesson, Q&A, Science - 3 Comments →

Opinion (Fritjof Capra, Ph.D., physicist and systems theorist, is a founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, California, the author of five international bestsellers): “Symbiosis is so widespread throughout the living world that it has to be considered a central aspect of life. … Similar patterns of coordination exist in tightly knit animal societies of higher complexity. Extreme examples are the social insects – bees, wasps, ants, termites, and others – that form colonies whose members are interdependent and in such close contact that the whole system resembles a large, multicreatured organism.

“Bees and ants are unable to survive in isolation, but in great numbers they act almost like the cells of a complex organism with a collective intelligence and capabilities for adaptation far superior to those of its individual members. This phenomenon of animals joining up to form larger organismic systems is not limited to insects but can also be observed in several other species, including, of course, the human species.

“Close coordination of activities exists not only among individuals of the same species but also among different species, and again the resulting living systems have the characteristics of single organisms. Many types of organisms that were thought to represent well-defined biological species have turned out, upon close examination, to consist of two or more different species in intimate biological association.

“This phenomenon, known as symbiosis, is so widespread throughout the living world that it has to be considered a central aspect of life. Symbiotic relationships are mutually advantageous to the associated partners, and they involve animals, plants, and microorganisms in almost every imaginable combination. Many of these may have formed their union in the distant past and evolved toward ever more interdependence and exquisite adaptation to one another.”

My Comment: A human being broke away from nature and that is why he does not follow its laws instinctively, but has to learn them consciously and follow them. In this case, following the laws of nature takes him to the next level of knowledge—above it, to its source, its root, the Creator, according to the principle: “By Your actions I will know You.”
 [82816]

Related Material:
Cooperation Over Competition
Collaboration: A Property Inherent In Nature
The Future Lies In A Good Mutual Connection

Filed under: News, Science - 1 Comment →

By uniting with others, a person becomes similar to nature, which is entirely unified like a single organism. And when one puts oneself in balance with nature, in union with it, that person begins to feel the inner force that maintains all of nature, to sense its program and its course.

He begins to attain the laws that are hidden in nature, which could not be discovered with our previous egoistic sciences and research capabilities, since now he becomes different: integral. He begins to feel this, and a new sensory organ of integral perception awakens in him.

Through this sensory organ, a person enters a new state that fills him completely; moreover, it gives him an opportunity for infinite fulfillment, because here he is interfacing with the common force of the entire universe, with nature.

By the way, physicists and astronomers are already talking about it, since they feel this while working with the cosmic voids, laws, and motions. Just as a person who lives in the woods feels the forest and nature, similarly, many researchers begin to sense the overall force of nature. They are saying, “We feel that the entire universe is a thought, a conception, it is an inner program!” They cannot translate their sensations into the language of numbers and formulas, but they feel it.

And this program really does exist in nature since we’re developing and living within it, and it created everything around us. In other words, within nature is the force, which on the one hand, evokes all of development, and on the other, through its cause-and-effect influence on all parts of nature, it leads it towards a specific purpose, meaning that we can reveal this goal. And because now a person is no longer a passive element as it was before the present time while evolving inside nature as its still, vegetative, and animate parts, we are now entering a level of conscious development.

Thus, our whole challenge now is to discover the next level of existence. Then we will come to a completely new dimension, to a state where we’ll feel being above time and space; that is, we’ll come in accord with those forces that govern all of matter. We’ll discover them and be able to interact with them.

This is possible only through integrality, when we’ll join nature itself as its integral part, not devouring everything like a cancer, but interacting with it in balance and harmony. And because we’ll be included in nature by our own desire, deliberately, I would even say tenderly, striving to feel all of its hidden plans and forces, our mind will begin to develop now in accordance with the attainments that will be revealed to us. This is the next phase of human development.
[82117]
From a “Talk on Integral Education” 5/25/2012

Related Material:
In Anticipation Of Happiness
Facing A Choice
Nature’s Commandments = the Creator’s Laws

Filed under: Education, Integral Upbringing, Science, Unity - No Comments →

Opinion (Giulio Tononi, psychologist, the University of Wisconsin-Madison): “Without sleep, humans become irritable, inefficient and accident prone – but how sleep heals us still isn’t fully understood.

“Psychologist Giulio Tononi of the University of Wisconsin-Madison thinks he has the answer to what our brains are doing as we sleep.

“His theory is that the brain ‘resets’ itself – breaking connections made during the day so that the brain wakes up ‘fresh’ and ready to learn and process more information.

“Brain wave activity is particularly strong during sleep – a sign, Tononi thinks, that the brain is ‘wiping out’ unnecessary impressions.

“The brain literally ‘unwinds’ during sleep – wiping itself clean in much the same way as a computer reboots. …

His understanding of the brain and how it ‘rewires’ itself may also lead to a deeper understanding of what consciousness itself is.

“‘Sleep may be the price you pay so your brain can be plastic the next day,’ says Tononi in one of his papers on the subject.

“His hypothesis is that sleep allows the brain to regroup after a hard day of learning by giving the synapses, which increase in strength during the day, a chance to damp down to baseline levels.

“Sleep may also be important for consolidating new memories, and to allow the brain to ‘forget’ the random, unimportant impressions of the day, so there is room for more learning the next day.”

My Comment: Kabbalah has talked about this work of the brain during sleep for several thousand years. In addition, it explains how the process of wiping off, processing, and storing of information occurs, the reason for dreams as experiences during the day (fast-forwarding of information) and other resets
[81985]

Related Material:
The Perception Of Life: A Dream Or Reality?
Wake Up In The Spiritual World
This Life Is A Dream

Filed under: News, Science - No Comments →

Opinion (Lynn Margulis, was an American biologist and University Professor in the Department of Geosciences at the University of Massachusetts Amherst): “Lynn Margulis claims that symbiotic relationships are a major driving force behind evolution. According to Margulis (1996), “Life did not take over the globe by combat, but by networking” (i.e., by cooperation, interaction, and mutual dependence between living organisms). She considers Darwin’s notion of evolution driven by competition to be incomplete.

“In 1981, Margulis published Symbiosis in Cell Evolution in which she proposed that the eukaryotic cells originated as communities of interacting entities that joined together in a specific order. The prokaryote elements could have entered a host cell, perhaps as an ingested prey or as a parasite. Over time, the elements and the host could have developed a mutually beneficial interaction, later evolving in an obligatory symbiosis.

“Symbiogenesis is a theory of evolution. It argues that symbiosis is a primary force of evolution, because acquisition and accumulation of random mutations or genetic drift are not sufficient to explain how new inherited variations occur. According to this theory, new cell organelles, new bodies, new organs and new species arise from symbiosis, in which independent organisms merge to form composites. This challenges some standard textbook ideas of how evolutionary change occurs. To some degree, Darwin emphasized competition as the primary driving process of evolution, symbiogenesis emphasizes that co-operation can also be important to the process of evolution.

“Margulis’ theory of symbiogenesis: Lynn Margulis claimed that microorganisms are one of the major evolutionary forces in the origin of species, endosymbiosis of bacteria being responsible for the creation of complex forms of life.

“Margulis emphasizes that bacteria and other microorganisms actively participated in shaping the Earth, and helped create conditions suitable for life (e.g., almost all eukaryotes require oxygen, and only developed after cyanobacteria have produced enough atmospheric oxygen). She also argues that these microorganisms still maintain current conditions and that they constitute a major component in Earth biomass.”

My Comment: To the extent of the transition from the levels of instinctive, controlled matter, from the levels of still, vegetative, animate, to the information level a “Human Being,” from linear development of egoism to the integral world, we are increasingly revealing the full interconnection of all parts of the world, their mutual dependence.

Our penetration into the information layer of the world will reveal its greatness and authority over the lower levels of nature. A “Human Being” is not an animal body, but information which in principle will be able to exist in any carrier and even without it, in any space, dimension. As Norbert Wiener, the founder of cybernetics, argued, a “human” can be passed at any distance (meaning that a human being is information, not protein formation).
[81428]

Related Material:
Evolution Is Based On Cooperation Rather Than Competition
Collaboration: A Property Inherent In Nature
Unknown Laws Of Nature Are Responsible For The Self-Organization Of The Biosphere

Filed under: Science - No Comments →

Question: Can we bring scientists into the system of integral education?

Answer: I think so, but the problem is that it is rather difficult to work with well-known people: to pick a time convenient for them, provide transportation, and create special conditions. That is why the best and most practical solution is to make clips with them that will be accessible to instructors and could be shown on screen whenever needed.

It is preferable to make everything portable and easy. Today, you can put any amount of information in a small notebook and use a little overhead projector because everything there is processed and organized clearly, concretely, with all the data about the people whom you present. That’s enough.
[80953]
From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/22/12

Related Material:
Preparing High Level Experts
Roundtable: A Tool For Integration
An Inspiring Teacher

Filed under: Education, Integral Upbringing, Q&A, Science - No Comments →