Trickster Gods and the Quantum Muse: Creativity and the Multiverse

Trickster Gods and the

Quantum Muse:

Creativity and the Multiverse

Copyright Ian Irvine (Hobson), all rights reserved, 2012. [See also author’s bio at the end

of this document.]

Publisher: Mercurius Press, Australia, June 2012.

Image: ‘Visions of the Multiverse’ designed by Peter Wiseman (of Media Australia,

Bendigo), copyright 2012, all rights reserved. Used with permission.

[This article - part of the8 part series entitled ‘Alchemy and the

Imagination’ - began as the draft of a public talk delivered Monday

4th June, 2012, as part of the ‘Philosophy in the Library Series’

hosted by the Goldfields Library Corporation, Bendigo, Victoria

Australia]

Trickster Gods and the Quantum Muse

The Quantum world is magically unpredictable and marvelously undetermined: what

better conditions for Muses to flex their inspirational muscles in the lives of great

artists? Quantum physics opens up the imagination to a plethora of possibilities where

the possibility of mutually contradictory ways of observing something at the same time

becomes a reality.1

If, as we’ve been suggesting, the phenomena personified in deities and legendary figures like

Thoth, Hermes, Mercury, Mercurius, Hermes Trismegistus, Merlin, etc. (as well as in female

trickster/witch figures like Hecate, Cerridwen, Morganna, Vivian, etc.) exist not only on

earth but throughout the ‘Multiverse’ as theorised by modern astrophysics, astronomy,

physics, etc. then the back-road, the boundaries and in-between zones, that the trickster

figure now haunts have become vaster and stranger (more literally ‘alien’) than at any time in

the known history of the human species.

The old alchemical-Hermetic maxim, ‘as above, so below’ these days demands the

integration into our everyday consciousness of realms and dominions encompassing billions

of galaxies and star systems many of which contain millions, sometimes billions, of stars and

perhaps billions and billions of planets. The Multiverse Hermes traverses (that is ‘mediates’

for us humans) contains exotic phenomena like ‘dark matter’, ‘dark energy’, ‘quasars’, ‘black

holes’, ‘super novas’, ‘cannibalistic galaxies’, ‘anti-matter’ etc. So vast is this domain that

time and space etc. expand beyond the abilities of most of us to even conceptualise in a

meaningful way. The very act of staring up at the night sky is like stepping into a time

machine since the light from distant stars and galaxies has taken many light years (hundreds,

thousands, millions, billions) to reach us. Much of what we stare at is so out of date as to be

grossly misleading. Most systems are much older than they appear to us in the night sky.

The short of it is that this new ‘Multiverse’ governed by laws and phenomena unknown to the

alchemists and Hermetists of old needs to be integrated into any contemporary alchemical-

Hermeticist, indeed Jungian (for our purposes), attempt to re-enchant matter, human

consciousness and the faculty of creativity. Put differently, at the end of the Newtonian-

Promethean era any project that wishes to rebalance matter with the human mind

(consciousness), emotions, etc. must first integrate new discoveries in the realms of Quantum

physics and cosmology.

As Jung developed his up-date on ancient Hermesian notions of the psyche from the 1920s to

1940s he only gradually became aware of the New Physics—largely through a famous

exchange of letters between members of his circle and one of the founders of Quantum theory

Pauli, who underwent analysis with Jung in the early 1930s after a marriage break-down.

Pauli was eventually awarded the Nobel Prize for physics in 1946 and was a colleague of

Einstein, Heisenberg and other innovative physicists of the period. Jung came up with key

parts of his theory e.g. ‘synchronicity’ and ‘psychoids’ during this period. In retrospect he

was clearly looking for ways to liberate his psychological system from what he felt to be the

increasingly narrow version of ‘reality’ proposed by Newtonian-Cartesian thinking (which

remained fundamental to the Freudian approach). As a result of these theoretical

developments, which were also influenced by his studies in occult/paranormal phenomena

and ASCs (altered states of consciousness), Jung gradually developed a non-Newtonian form

of psychoanalysis. The figure of Hermes, trickster god and magician, was at the very heart of 1 Forster, 2007 [Kindle e-book Location: 1579].

this change in Jung’s thinking (as I’ve discussed elsewhere). It is not generally understood

that the trickster-Hermes figure also influenced Jung via Quantum theory. Jung was not alone

among Europe’s intelligentsia in being forced to respond to the strange new pictures of both

the micro (or sub-atomic) and macro (or cosmological) realms surfacing among physicists.

Many disciplines besides psychology started to drift, inevitably, into postmodernism due to

the ontological and epistemological uncertainties unleashed by the New Physics.

To understand the way ‘Quantum Hermes’ helped undermine some of the ontological and

epistemological foundations of modernity we need to explore the difference between versions

of reality as theorised by ‘classical physics’ and versions proposed by Quantum theory. Given

this has primarily been a series of talks about creativity we will eventually focus on the

possibilities these developments open up for the formulation of a post-postmodern ‘poetics’.

NEWTONIAN MIGRAINES IN YEAR 12 PHYSICS

When I studied Physics at Rangitoto College on Auckland’s North Shore back in the early

80s we were taught practical, which is to say Newtonian, models of the physical world. It

was ‘materialist’ physics perfectly suited to the school’s goal which was to turn out young

men and women intent on serving the Gods of industry and commerce. The endless physics

equations, however, gave me migraines and the subject matter bored me to tears. I knew

intuitively that such a version of ‘science’ had no ability to explain life’s deepest mysteries

to me. Luckily for me, the college also gave me a thorough grounding in History and

Literature!

When I returned to university at La Trobe in the early 90s the Humanities lecturers typically

critiqued much of modern science as a Promethean-Materialist phenomenon. I suspected

Cartesian-Newtonian science also gave them migraines and we were united in our view of

the cure: i.e. literature, philosophy and a sacralised perspective on life. There wasn’t a great

deal to argue about! As I studied and eventually taught literature, history, the creative arts,

etc. I came to have less and less to do with modern science. I felt that though it certainly had

its uses, especially in the worlds of medicine, engineering, etc. it reduced to a philosophy of

disenchantment and alienation whenever it sought to monopolize descriptions of: 1) human

consciousness, psyche and soul (though it didn’t even acknowledge soul!) and 2) our

relationships with each other, nature and the cosmos generally.

Until recently this remained, more or less, my position on ‘modern science’.

FROM PROMETHEUS and NEWTON to EINSTEIN and HEISENBERG

In truth, however, science got very weird in the 20th

century. Indeed it could be argued that

it began a slow and painful transition away from the Newtonian (let us say Promethean)

paradigm toward something new, strange and wonderful. Also—and this is important for

the discussion of the trickster archetype that will follow—it became as ‘mind-expanding’,

‘unpredictable’, at times even as ‘chaotic’ as any psychoactive drug or traditional spiritual

regime. Although it is not generally acknowledged by many mainstream scientists, it

became, if anything, stranger, more bizarre, more ‘other-worldly’ than almost any of the

spiritual systems and wisdom traditions known to human history.

In this article I want to argue that the schism between science and the humanities described

by C. P. Snow back in the early 60s, and labeled at the time ‘The Two Cultures Debate’,

originated with Newtonian science’s tendency toward authoritarianism in matters of the

mind/consciousness and the soul—a tendency Romantic poets like Blake and Coleridge had

thoroughly critiqued at the dawn of the Industrial Age. The New Physics, however, is no

longer primarily Newtonian in outlook—does this fact alter the schism between the sciences

and the humanities Snow rightly highlighted? I want to suggest it does and that the signs

that a convergence of interests is emerging may well represent the major hope for the

human species and perhaps, more generally, for life on earth as this undoubtedly tumultuous

century progresses.

At the epicenter of the ‘weirdification’ of science in the 20th

century were, obviously

enough, the astrophysicists, cosmologists and Quantum physicists. After becoming

interested in what was going on in let us call it ‘equation land’ I did what any self-

respecting poet/writer who had been traumatised in his youth by Physics exams would have

done—I consulted Dr Who, Stargate Atlantis, Through the Wormhole, Fringe and any other

popular TV program I could get my hands on that dealt with ‘the New Physics’. Eventually,

I bit the bullet and bought the most recent books and ebooks on the topic2—as well as a

couple of packets of aspirin for the inevitable equation induced head-aches.

Though I’m no physicist, I’m a writer and Humanities/Social Sciences academic, I am very

interested in what the new physics has to say about: a) the nature of reality (i.e. ontology);

b) how we might choose to live our lives (ethics/morality); and c) the purpose and nature of

creativity (aesthetics/poetics).

IN SEARCH OF THE QUANTUM MUSE

Any attempt to outline a quantum influenced ‘poetic/aesthetic’ leads to a number of

questions. What has changed in science to facilitate the convergence of interests suggested

above? How has the New Physics already influenced the creative arts and humanities? Also,

how do the current theories about reality (and the place of creativity within it) proposed by

Quantum physicists and astrophysicists compare with reality as revealed to us by artists,

writers, poets etc. of all ages?3 These are vast questions and obviously a short article like

this can only really explore one or two of the main developments.

As a poet and writer I’m interested in expansive understandings of creativity and I believe

that art and literature reflect the ‘real world’ in important ways, though maybe not the real

world as described to me all those years ago in Yr. 12 physics! ‘Realism’ in literature has

passed its use by date, but so too has the postmodern obsession with ‘meta-fiction’ so

prominent in the 1980s and 90s.

2 Brian Greene’s wonderful summary text The Fabric of the Cosmos has assisted greatly, likewise, David

Bohm’s Wholeness and the Implicate Order. Interestingly Bohm seems to have been quite conscious of the links between his theory of the ‘implicate’ and ‘explicate’ orders (which he in turn links to what he calls ‘the holomovement’ i.e. the infinite ground of all being) and traditional—particularly Eastern—spiritual traditions. 3 A number of commentators—most notably Arthur Koestler (in the 1960s and 1970s) with books like The Act

of Creation, The Ghost in the Machine and The Roots of Coincidence—have attempted to assess how the revolutions in physics have impacted on 20

th century scientific and rationalistic perspectives on ‘creativity’. A

particularly fascinating contemporary reading appears in Julia Forster’s book Muses: Revealing the Nature of Inspiration (2007)—which owes a debt to Leonard Shlain’s book Art and Physics. Forster tries to explain how ancient notions of the Muse might be re-affirmed in some respects by the New Physics. She begins her final chapter by stating that Einstein’s theory of relativity ‘shattered the four tenets of Newtonian physical reality: space, time, mass and energy’.

As an extension of the convergence between the ‘New Physics’ and the Humanities I’d also

like to suggest here (like many others, including the Dali Lama) that there are emerging

parallels between Quantum physics and the world’s major wisdom traditions. Fritjof Capra

and others, of course, argued this in the 80s but science has entered stranger territory since

then. An up-date is in order.

To summarise: what can the Creative Arts and Humanities learn from the Quantum Muse?

“QUANTUM FUZZINESS” DISSOLVES CLASSICAL PHYSICS IN A FIELD

BATH OF MIND-LIKE MATTER

How have 20th

century discoveries related to the ‘new physics’ (here encompassing

cosmological discoveries) undermined the former certainties of the classical model of

science? The simplest response is that uncertainty concerning what we can really

know/discover about reality via the ‘scientific method’ developed by Francis Bacon is

fundamental to the New Physics.

Here I’d like to summarise the main innovations associated with the New Physics very

briefly without complicating proceedings with … well, equations …

* Relativity theory destroyed Newton’s static universe, likewise, the cherished separation

between time and the various dimensions of space. Matter, energy, light and time were

proved to be locked together in the ‘space-time’ continuum and the speed of light became,

as one commentator put it, ‘the policeman of the universe’ … we all know the equation …

E=MC2.

* In the 1920s Erwin Schrodinger, Werner Heisenberg and Niels Bohr further undermined

classical physics (as well as Einstein’s innovations) by suggesting that scientists would

never be able to know all the laws that govern our Universe. Their studies of sub-atomic

particles revealed a fundamental unpredictability to matter at the quantum level (sometimes

termed ‘Quantum fuzziness’). They stated that outcomes can only ever be predicted ‘on

average’ (the so called ‘probability wave’) and that matter at the Quantum level displays a

strange wavelike quality4 that contains ‘all possible outcomes’ at once (i.e. all possible

worlds/universes/presents, pasts & futures?) before ‘collapsing’ into a particular time-bound

present due to the actions of observers. One casualty of such a theory appeared to be the

classical scientific principle of ‘causality’.5

Similarly, the nature of human consciousness, irrelevant to classical theories concerning

‘matter’, became important again (no mere evolutionary epiphenomena). Some

contemporary physicists are even suggesting that in Quantum Mechanics ‘matter’ is ‘mind-

like’ and that the matter/mind duality that haunted Industrial Age science has been seriously

undermined. Likewise, the impartiality of the objective scientific observer, so central to the

scientific method, is challenged by the Quantum approach. Einstein famously—and

4 The ‘wave’ aspect to electrons was first formulated in a famous equation (‘Schrodinger’s equation) by Erwin

Schrodinger in 1925. It led to the development of ‘wave mechanics’ which is central to ‘quantum mechanics’. 5 The psychologist Carl Jung in Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle (p.7) recognized that Quantum

theory undermined the Newtonian principle of ‘causality, when he wrote: ‘In the realm of very small quantities prediction becomes uncertain, if not impossible, because very small quantities no longer behave in accordance with the known natural laws. … the causal principle is only of relative use for explaining natural processes …’

somewhat petulantly—critiqued this new approach by saying ‘My God does not play dice

with the universe!’ (or something to that effect)6

TRICKSTER ON THE BEACH OF THE QUANTUM OCEAN

At this point it is worth discussing the role of the trickster archetype in all of this. Recent

theories of creativity and the paranormal emphasise the role of the ‘trickster’ element in

processes of social and cultural transformation.7 As discussed throughout this series of

articles on Hermes and creativity, the trickster figure— an archetype found world-wide—

displays particular traits, notably:1) the ability to violate social boundaries with relative

impunity (i.e. the trickster is anti-conformist); 2) the ability to resacralise ordinary life (i.e.

trickster ‘magic’ is an antidote to disenchantment and desacralisation); 3) unpredictability;

4) an association with alleged paranormal phenomena (e.g. synchronicity, telepathy and

precognition); 5) a satirical disposition (often in the service of political rebellion); and 6)

prodigious mental agility (often taking the form of immense learning and wisdom in the

senex trickster figure). The trickster also encourages: 7) social leveling (when manifesting at

the social level); 8) consciousness expansion; and 9) creativity. Typically the trickster also

acts as a 10) mediator between ‘worlds in conflict’ during periods of great change.

To paraphrase Hansen (and also Jung), tricksters serve the life force via processes of

constructive ‘destructuring’. Hansen also suggests that Tricksters are usually most active

during periods of personal or collective upheaval and change, i.e. periods of transition.

In many traditions, of course, the creative imagination works in tandem with the life-force.

Which leads to the first part of a central proposal of this particular article: that creativity,

when it is operating effectively in either the individual psyche or the collective psyche, may

be accompanied by signs of ‘constructive destructuring’ i.e. destructuring of inflexible,

oppressive etc. paradigms. The second proposal of this article is that post-Newtonian

science (particularly the science associated with Quantum theory) is better placed to

understand the Tricksterish ‘destructuring’ process we’ve theorized as fundamental to

cultural and economic postmodernism. Why?

Clearly the ‘indeterminacy’ and ‘unpredictability’ associated with matter in the ‘new

physics’—summarised by Heisenberg’s ‘Uncertainty Principle’—uncovers a primeval

‘trickster’ element to the behaviour of all matter at the sub-atomic level. I’m tempted to call

the Uncertainty Principle ‘Heisenberg’s Joker’ or some such thing, for it plays a cruel trick

on all ‘scientists’ who believe that their main task is to explore, describe and control an

independent reality ‘out there’ somewhere in the cosmos. Consistent with trickster’s ability

to blur and violate boundaries in order to further consciousness, the mind observing the

6 ‘In the Quantum paradigm, solid matter is no longer the static stuff we believed it to be—it is moving,

unpredictable and here by virtue of being observed. Space is not empty but full of invisible energy bizarrely buzzing about us.’ [Forster, 2007, Kindle e-book location 1367] 7 G.P. Hanson’s work The Trickster and the Paranormal is particularly interesting since Hansen makes use of

established sociological theories to assess the trickster archetype’s ‘destructuring’ and ‘boundary blurring’ characteristics. Deldon Anne McNeely’s book Mercury Rising: Women, Evil and the Trickster Gods is also relevant. McNeely (p.19) writes: ‘[the] trickster … violates boundaries, ridicules righteousness, and poses ethical questions … [‘Trickster’s purpose is] … to further awareness and communication between all possible factions.’ Elsewhere McNeely extends Trickster’s influence to social phenomena: ‘The continual rise of commercialism, communication explosion, relativity of values, prominence of satirical comedy, high energy, fast pace, and preoccupation with sexual imagery of our times characterise Trickster rising.’

phenomenon of ‘quantum state collapse’ may actually be said to influence the choices made

by matter. The implication is that the minds of classical scientists are spookily ‘making’ (at

least to some extent) the phenomena they believe themselves to be merely observing.

LATER 20th

CENTURY DEVELOPMENTS IN THE NEW PHYSICS:

ENTANGLED MATTER

As it turned out the Quantum physicists were onto something—numerous later experiments

demonstrated the accuracy of their theories.8 The mainstream sciences, however, continued

as though nothing much had changed and the notion arose that though something was

indeed amiss in the sub-atomic realms, at the macro level of matter the laws of classical

physics plus Einstein’s modification i.e. the ‘space-time’ continuum, still prevailed—this

détente, effectively between ‘classical science’ and ‘Quantum physics’, became known as

‘the Copenhagen Interpretation’. It ensured that the triumvirate of Newton, Darwin and

Einstein were at the helm of the good ship ‘Science’ for most of the 20th

century. Quantum

‘spookiness’ (to quote Einstein), was temporarily quarantined and uncomfortable questions

about the mind’s influence on matter were dismissed as largely philosophic in nature. Most

importantly for our purposes, Quantum uncertainty and ‘action at a distance’ phenomena

(e.g. entanglement and the possibility that we inhabit a ‘non-local universe’) were deemed

irrelevant to the functioning of the human brain and nervous system in the macro realm of

large scale objects. The parapsychologists and purveyors of religious superstition were

asked to contain their enthusiasm for the ‘new physics’.

The elephant in the room turned out to be the difficulties associated with resolving this

schism between the macro realms (governed by Relativity etc.) and the micro realms

(governed by ‘Quantum fuzziness’ and the ‘Observer Paradox’).

In the latter part of the 20th

century various discoveries gradually undermined the classical

belief that our macro level universe remains essentially untouched by quantum

unpredictability.

In 1964, John Bell proposed a way to measure the spin of sub-atomic particles/waves.9 By

the 1980s ‘entangled’ photons projected in opposite directions were being tested for like

properties and something earthshattering was discovered – entangled photons (but not un-

entangled photons) were found to be influencing each other’s behaviour at a distance and

faster than the speed of light. The existence of what became known as ‘quantum

entanglement’ phenomena—previously predicted by Schrodinger and rejected by Einstein—

appeared to have been confirmed and the Newtonian vision of reality took yet another body-

blow.10

THE COSMOLOGICAL REVOLUTION – THE MUSE PLUCKS STRINGS

ACROSS 45 BILLION LIGHT YEARS of AUDITORIUM

8 Thomas Young’s famous ‘double-slit experiment’ being one of the most important in it a particle apparently

went through/chose both slits at the same time. 9 Bell was inspired by a troika of physicists, known as the ‘EPR’ (Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen) who had

earlier sought to remove the ‘uncertainty’ inherent in Heisenberg’s picture of the sub-atomic world. 10

Herbert Frolich’s had first proposed the idea of ‘Quantum entanglement’ as a means of interpreting certain

consequences related to general Quantum theory as laid down by Schrodinger, Bohr and Heisenberg.

Meanwhile attempts to merge Quantum theory with Relativity were leading to bizarre new

cosmological theories. Some physicists found that they could only explain the schism

between the two theories of ‘matter’ by positing the existence of other dimensions to the

universe. They proposed that the universe is not composed of the four dimensions proposed

by classical physics and Einstein—i.e. 3 spatial dimensions plus time—but, in M Theory—

the final incarnation of the various String Theories proposed in the 1980s and 90s—eleven.

Thus in order to merge Relativity with Quantum Mechanics a further seven spatial

dimensions, ‘enfolded’, ‘curled’ or ‘nested’ within our everyday world was proposed. Most

of these theorised spatial dimensions are thought to be unbelievably small, others, however,

are thought to be much larger than the three spatial dimensions we all know and cook

breakfast in.

But the physicists were not yet done with inventing dimensions, realities, worlds, universes

etc. Another group proposed that there exists an ‘anti-matter universe’ exactly matching our

own universe though in negatively charged form. (PS: That makes 8 other places to visit in

the summer holidays and counting!). Meanwhile, in 1957 Hugh Everett, emboldened by

experimental confirmations of earlier Quantum speculations, proposed the ‘many worlds’

thesis, i.e. the theory of ‘parallel universes’ so beloved of science fiction writers. After

observer initiated ‘wave collapse’ into a particular moment of our experienced reality the

‘unused’ alternative universes of the moment do not simply cease to exist, Everett theorized

that they actually manifest… somewhere.11

Other somewhat exuberant ‘many universe’ enthusiasts were eventually bolstered in their

thinking by deep space discoveries—e.g. black holes, quasars, dark energy, dark matter etc.

as well as, in the late 1990s, the discovery that our universe appears to be expanding along a

definitive path—perhaps due to the impact of neighboring BUBBLE universes. ‘Dark

energy’ and ‘dark matter’ from other universes are theorized as gravitational evidence of

neighbouring ‘bubble universes’ impacting on our own.

And then there are the multi-dimensional ‘brane universes’ that came into vogue in the

1990s—opposed, as always, by joy-police skeptics who baptized their own theory the ‘no-

brane universe’. When we add in the ‘p-brane’ universe we note that contemporary

physicists retain a sense of humour in among all the monstrously complex equations. All

jokes aside, we may all be living inside a 3-brane bubble universe billions of light-years …

flat.

WHEN THE MUMMY UNIVERSE LOVES THE DADDY UNIVERSE VERY,

VERY MUCH …

One could be forgiven for suggesting that modern physics has become quite promiscuous

(and compulsively so) in its creation of alternative universes, worlds, dimensions etc.. And

when I use the term ‘creation’ here I mean it literally, John Barrow in The Book of

Universes writes:

Could we ‘create’ a Universe in the laboratory by stimulating one of the fluctuations that

produce the same effect in the eternal inflation process?

11

To some physicists it became apparent that observers in a sense unconsciously select worlds out of the

Quantum ocean every moment of every day (bringing in, some say, that hoary old chestnut ‘mind’). In this view

of the implications of quantum physics we collapse out of an infinity of possible worlds each moment of our

lives, into the particular world we inhabit.

Barely missing a beat he continues: ‘Several attempts were made to prove that this

was possible or impossible, none definitive, but there seemed to be dramatic unwanted

by-products.’

Well, yes … there could be … like where to put ‘everything’ if an experiment actually

succeeds! However, Barry is not done with growing cute little baby universes in the

lab:

Imagine very advanced civilisations … that have developed [an] understanding … for

creating special fluctuations in their own part of the Universe, which then inflate rapidly

to create new baby Universes … 12

Barrow’s fascinating book outlines some of the many ‘universe’ shapes theorized by serious

physicists over the past 100 years or so. Just a few examples will suffice to illustrate where

things are headed—apart from the claustrophobia provoking ‘bubble universe’, there have

been equations for fractal universes, undulating universes, a Swiss Cheese universe (though

that theory is full of holes), perturbed universes (Emo/Goth universes?), a table-top universe

(great for putting and table-tennis), chaotic (‘punk/anarchistic?) universes, self-creating

universes, fake universes, home-made universes, wrap-up universes and, Lemaitre and

Tolman’s ‘kinky universe’ … fun for the adventurous!

One of my favourite Universe theories, sees our 3D-(mem)brane Universe as composed of

billions and billions etc. of ‘energy strings’ (some closed, some open and some … loopy)

that ‘stick’ to the outer part of the universal ‘brane’. In M-theory, the 3-brane Universal

consciousness, if she exists, might mischievously be visualized as a cosmic musician

endlessly strumming her ‘superstring’ matter guitar (or harp) across the immense aeons and

vast expanses of space-time. This is one version of the ‘Quantum Muse’. As a poet/song-

writer I find this cosmological development quite appealing!

The above list of universes drawn from Barrow’s research is not exhaustive. And the

cosmological inventiveness evident among astrophysicists is surely augmented by theories

proposing that our universe began as a single electron just prior to the Big-Bang. It is

proposed by some that ‘quantum fluctuations’ of some sort precipitated the ‘expansion’ we

know as the ‘Big Bang’ some 13.7 billion years ago. However, surely such a proposal is no

less fantastic than, well, the Biblical notion that an all-powerful monotheistic God created

the firmament etc. in six days …

In the face of all this we note that three or four years ago those in the Quantum know

stopped talking about ‘the Universe’ and began talking about ‘the Multiverse’. The changed

terminology understates an immense paradigm shift.

OUR BRAINS AND RELATIONAL FIELDS AS GATEWAYS TO THE

QUANTUM OCEAN?

Some mainstream scientists now believe that macro scale ‘quantum entanglement’

phenomena can be activated and sustained in living organisms.13

Researchers assessing

12

John Barrow, The Book of Universes, 2012 p.232-233. 13

As summarised by Dean Radin in his book Entangled Minds, and also by Louisa Gilder in her book, The Age of Entanglement the concept quickly migrated from the relatively safe world of sub-atomic phenomena to

biological systems capable of influencing ‘quantum state collapse’ phenomena in the human

brain believe that we possess biological systems capable of harnessing information etc.

gleaned from beyond the space-time continuum. Rupert Sheldrake fuelled this line of

thinking with his theory that ‘morphogenetic fields’ i.e. biological energy fields that do not

obey the known laws of physics, exist around all organic life-forms. He acknowledged his

proposed morphic fields possessed quantum field characteristics.14

Currently, the so-called Orch-Or theory posits that ‘microtubules’ in the human brain are

capable of processing and amplifying Quantum inputs originating from the ‘freewheeling’

subatomic realms. These microtubules are also capable—via biological amplification

processes—of activating nominally ‘classical’ biological systems through ‘quantum

entanglement’.15

Day to day communication between the ‘indeterminate’, and possibly

‘infinite’ Quantum realms (or what Bohm calls the Holomovement) may also influence

memory storage and retrieval, dreams, reverie, perception, and even cellular

communications between distant brain structures—i.e. some of the fundamental processes

associated with the psyche are possibly influenced by quantum fields. The Quantum

approach to consciousness and the brain is summarized in a recent collection of papers by

leaders in the field entitled Cosmology of Consciousness: Quantum Physics and

Neuroscience of Mind:

‘What is consciousness in our model? We take it as a field phenomenon, analogous to but

preceding the quantum field. This field is characterized by generalized principles already

described in quantum physics: complementarity, non-locality, scaleinvariance and

undivided wholeness. But … we cannot define it from the outside. To extend Wheeler’s

reasoning, consciousness includes us human observers. … In keeping with Heisenberg’s

implication, the universe presents the face that the observer is looking for …’16

Arising out of these speculations (critiqued ferociously, it is true, by skeptics), some

adventurous thinkers since the 1980s have been writing about the ‘holonomic’,

‘holographic’ or ‘Quantum’ brain as well as the emerging field of ‘quantum psychology’.

Paralleling the above developments researchers interested in telepathy, precognition,

synchronicity, remote viewing, etc. started to devise experiments capable of testing the

existence of quantum effects embedded in the human nervous system and brain.17

David

Bohm’s experiments monitoring people’s ability to discern when others are staring at them

from behind is one example. Some of the recent experiments conducted by researchers into

paranormal phenomena have produced ‘anomalous’ results and, if legitimate, collectively

suggest that desire, novelty and survival fears, as well as kinship, friendship and love

explain ‘macroscopic’ phenomena like cell communications, the way flocks of birds appear to know what each other will do next and so on. 14

In The Presence of the Past (p.119) he wrote: ‘Morphic fields may indeed be comparable in status to quantum matter fields. If atoms can be said to have morphic fields, then these may well be what are already described within quantum field theory.’ 15

See Penrose and Hameroff, ‘Consciousness in the Universe: Neuroscience, Quantum Space-Time Geometry and Orch Or Theory’ in Cosmology of Consciousness: Quantum Physics and Neuroscience of Mind (2011) for a relatively technical description of the Orch-Or theory and its implications for consciousness research. 16

Kafatos, Tanzi and Chopra in Cosmology of Consciousness: Quantum Physics and Neuroscience of Mind

[ebook location 140] 17

Dean Radin’s Entangled Minds: Extrasensory Experiences in a Quantum Reality is an accessible introduction

to the impact of Quantum theorising on the field of parapsychology G. P Hansen’s The Trickster and the

Paranormal also has some useful chapters on the topic.

‘entanglements’ can skew experimental data into small but significant divergences from

chance only outcomes. This doesn’t mean that anyone soon will have the ability to mind-

blast evil-doers with archaic spells or levitate. Rather it is suggested that these results point

to innate capacities allowing some individuals to access the ‘timelessness’, say, of the

Quantum realms in order to give them a very slight evolutionary survival edge. The

divergence from ‘chance’ in some of these experiments may be significant but only slightly

so due to the influence of what physicists call ‘decoherence’.

DO POETS, MYSTICS, MUSICIANS & TRANSPERSONAL PSYCHOLOGISTS

FACILITATE THE ‘COLLAPSE OF THE WAVE FUNCTION’?

Seizing on such developments, some excitable thinkers argue that story-telling, music,

dance, meditation, dramatic ritual, art, poetry, etc. as well as strong emotions—especially

desire/love, fear, reverie, love of novelty, affection for kin, etc.—activate the brain systems

etc. that process information originating in the timeless and infinite Quantum realms. The

intuitive ‘leaps’ creative artists and thinkers often describe (as well as the intuitive ‘all at

once’ epiphanies often observed in psychotherapy and elsewhere) may thus be explained by

way of an individual’s sudden access to the quantum dimensions.

A number of thinkers have even suggested that matter may not actually be the fundamental

substance of the Multiverse. Instead mind (rather, the unbounded timeless consciousness

associated with the Quantum realms/Multiverse or Holomovement) may actually prove

fundamental (i.e. mind or consciousness preexists and animates what we understand to be

‘matter’). By this view any particular universe—e.g. ours, to keep things simple!—can be

thought of as a limited time-bound manifestation of an all-pervasive (i.e. ‘multiverse

pervasive’), pre-big bang, non-local consciousness. In a recent paper Kafatos, Tanzi and

Chopra reach precisely this conclusion:

“Consciousness includes human mental processes, but it is not just a human attribute.

Existing outside space and time, it was “there” “before” these two words had any

meaning. In essence, space and time are conceptual artifacts that sprang from primordial

consciousness. The reason that the human mind meshes with nature, mathematics, and the

fundamental forces described by physics, is no accident: we mesh because we are a

product of the same conceptual expansion by which primordial consciousness turned into

the physical world.”18

The same paper describes what amounts to the collapse of the Newtonian paradigm:

‘There is at bottom no strictly mechanistic, physical foundation for the cosmos. The

situation is far more radical than most practicing scientists suppose. Whatever is the

fundamental source of creation, it itself must be uncreated …’19

THE URGENT NEED TO HUMANISE THE MULTIVERSE

Those proposing such radical views of reality still have work to do to convince ordinary

people that this new paradigm has anything to do with their day to day lives. The average

person wants to know how the new physics explains mental processes. They wonder what it

18

‘How Consciousness Becomes the Physical Universe’ [ebook location 144] in Cosmology of Consciousnes:

Quantum Physics and Neuroscience of Mind (2011). 19

ibid [location 133].

has to say about emotion, free-will, suffering, how we should behave towards others

(ethics/morality), our ability to give and receive love, etc. Also, whether it proves or

disproves the existence of God (or the Gods), and so on. Of course these are also the kinds

of questions that interest (and inspire) writers, artists, musicians etc. However, in the

intellectual confusion associated with the slow collapse of the Newtonian paradigm,

definitive answers to many of these questions are difficult to come by.

Many of the ideas proposed by the new physics have only been described by way of

mathematical equations—the approach also favoured by classical physicists due to its

supposed objective, i.e. scientific status. Mathematics, however, may not suit the new

‘observer influenced’ reality birthed by Quantum thinking. The new theories are in urgent

need of being humanized—i.e. animated—by human desire, longing, inquisitiveness,

imagination, etc. For example, what exactly exists in the various dimensions, parallel

worlds etc. proposed by contemporary physicists? Are we talking about dimensions

inhabited by the dead or perhaps by the soon to be created? Are some of these

dimensions/universes free of suffering—is there a non-Darwinian Universe for example?

How do these parallel universes/dimensions etc. affect our consciousness? Likewise, can we

access them via the collective unconscious, if so, for what purposes? Are some of these

dimensions inhabited by Gods and Goddesses or fabulous creatures capable of ‘magic’? Do

Jung’s archetypes exist in the Quantum realm or do they exist between the Quantum realm

and ordinary consciousness?20

The creative arts may well be crucial to the humanization

process I’m advocating—they represent an alternative to the cool logic of equations.

Science fiction, of course, has been the main genre relaying the discoveries of the New

Physics to the average person.

Similarly, there are schools of modern psychology quite sympathetic to both traditional

metaphysics and emerging quantum perspectives. I’m thinking in particular of the

archetypal psychology of Carl Jung and the Transpersonal Psychology of the likes of Ken

Wilbur and Stan Grof.21

I have a hunch that something like Jung’s ‘archetypes’ (which I see

as rooted in developmental stages) may structure our day to day ‘personal’ experiences of

consciousness/unconsciousness and relationship in what Bohm calls ‘the explicate order’.

However, it’s also possible that they may have access to the so-called ‘implicate’ order. In

short they may mediate between timeless ‘quantum fields’ dealing associated with ‘potential

futures’ and our more Newtonian experience of a ‘specific’ lived existence in the ‘explicate

order’ (i.e. the life we lead after the collapse of the wave function).

20

See Robert Verdicchio’s Quantum Archetypes: Science, Metaphysics and Spirit (2005) for the first inkling

that archetypes may exist in ‘quantum fields’. The book is patchy in places but worth reading for this ground-

breaking insight alone. Why ground-breaking? Because to my mind the idea links Quantum incursions into

ordinary life to: a) strong emotions (desire, attachment, fear, hope/wish etc.) etc. themselves related to

archetypal constellations (i.e. to archetypal relationships), and b) ordinary development processes catalogued

scrupulously, though in Newtonian-speak, by Developmental and Life-Span psychologists etc. ‘Desire’ and

‘development/growth’, so fundamental to our day to day living may then be seen to motivate ‘wave collapse’

phenomena as well as other types of communication between what Bohm calls the ‘explicate’ and ‘implicate’

orders. Quantum psychology is made instantly relevant to all human beings. 21

Indeed, since the 1960s a large number of commentators have noticed certain convergences between ancient spiritual perspectives and certain aspects of the new Physics. In the realm of psychology, the famous collaboration between Carl Jung, founder of archetypal psychoanalysis and Nobel Prize winning (1945) quantum physicist Wolfgang Pauli helped undermine the scientific foundations of some of the more mechanistic mid-century psychological schools (e.g. Behaviourism and Psychobiology).

Given the fact that Quantum versions of reality are, if anything, more fabulous than the

often colorful cosmologies outlined by many of the world’s spiritual traditions it might also

be prudent for mainstream scientists still enamoured with purely ‘Newtonian’ versions of

science and reality to adopt more tolerant attitudes toward those who hold to spiritual,

mystical etc. perspectives that modern physics is currently unable to categorically disprove.

More than ever we require intense, ongoing ‘dialogue among equals’ between experts on the

‘New Physics’, creative artists of all descriptions, scholars in the Humanities and Social

Sciences, the more progressive thinkers among the ‘Perennialists’ and ‘ethnopoeticists’

(with their interest in global wisdom traditions), and the various transpersonal schools of

psychology (e.g. Jung, Grof and Wilbur).

TRICKSTER AND MUSE AS CREATIVE REVOLUTIONARIES

What does the creativity associated with the trickster archetype have to do with all of this?

An important task carried out by creative individuals throughout history has been that of

expanding the collective consciousness in times of need. In this sense creativity is

inherently unpredictable and critical of systematized justifications for the oppressive ‘status

Quo.’ In this sense, creativity serves a fundamental ‘survival oriented’ purpose. I’m

suggesting that creative activities allow us to ‘access’ material, knowledge, perspectives etc.

resident in the Quantum realms (or ‘Multiversal Mind’)—realms beyond the straight jacket

of time and space as defined by classical physics.

A Quantum influenced contemporary poetics also invites us to confront the many crises of

our age with a more expansive vision of the place of consciousness in the Multiverse. To

my mind, neither the atheistic reductionism implicit to classical physics nor the oppressive

narrowness of vision associated with religious and ideological forms of fundamentalism are

justified by the discoveries of the New Physics, consequently they have little to offer any

Quantum influenced ‘poetic’ and may even represent a deliberate narrowing of perspective

by power-mongers that can only be described, ultimately, as forms of ontologically

generated oppression. My own sense is that acknowledgement by artists/writers/musicians

that they select worlds out of a fundamental unpredictability to matter and mind whenever

they create works of art or literature etc. would be seen as fundamental to Quantum

influenced perspectives on creativity. This implies, of course, a profound sense of creative

responsibility out of vogue among many postmodern writers and artists.22

Concepts influenced by the New Physics have already influenced a number of modernist

and postmodernist literary movements e.g. John Cage’s and Jackson McLow’s ‘chance

operations’, the Fluxists, aspects of the Situationist poetics, Oulipo, as well as the so-called

‘Actualist’ fiction writers e.g. Thomas Pynchon, John Barth, Robert Coover, Margaret

Attwood, etc. However, for me many of these wonderful avant garde innovators didn’t

quite respond to the central epiphany of the New Physics, i.e. what David Bohn described as

the ‘undivided wholeness’ and interdependence [within diversity] of beings and matter

associated with what he termed ‘the Implicate Order’. At the deepest levels of matter it

seems that ‘actuality’ or (potentiality) and ‘possibility’ are almost indistinguishable. To my

22

This would supersede both the ‘realist’ mode which seeks to objectively represent the world as is and postmodernist modes that ignore the world (and deny their role in minute-to-minute world making) instead focusing their attention exclusively on language as a self-contained system. Susan Strehle, in Fiction in the Quantum Universe, uses the term ‘actualist’, a phrase borrowed from Heisenberg, for postmodern literature that she suggests is influenced by the new physics.

mind, only Magical Realism, and perhaps Surrealism with its commitment to the

‘marvelous’, have come close to grasping the profound implications of these insights.

HOW TO GROW YOUR OWN BABY UNIVERSE THROUGH ART AND

LITERATURE

We need to accelerate the postmodern shift from the alienation and dehumanisation inherent

to classical science to a new, more holistic, kind of science—a science, perhaps, in the

service of the all-pervasive consciousness that birthed and maintains the vast Multiverse we

each inhabit as conscious beings. The role of the creative artist in such an epoch may well

be to assist this process via tricksterish imaginative interventions. What is required is a

bloodless deconstruction of the alienated and fragmented modes of consciousness associated

with both scientific and economic materialism, as well as all forms of religious and

ideological fundamentalism.23

In truth all of the great cultural paradigm shifts of history have also been ‘creativity

revolutions’. Civilisations that open up to and encourage the kinds of ‘world making’ and

‘unmaking’ experiments initiated by the Muse and Trickster archetypes have tended to

renew themselves and survive, whereas those that have sought to control or censor the Muse

and Trickster within their creative minorities, have often collapsed. This is because they

eventually come up against what we might term the essential, unpredictable ‘free will’ of

both matter and mind—a free will, we theorise (along with the Existentialists), in the

service of the life force.

If we seek the Quantum Muse and Hermes guide of souls (the Greek trickster God)—or

Kokopelli, Loki, etc.—creative people need look no further than the impulse behind the

creative imagination to in a sense accept, sample, try on, live etc. all the possible realities,

worlds, futures etc. on offer at any particular moment via the Quantum realms. The

archetypes of Muse and Trickster may well be our best guides to particular types of non-

oppressive ‘wave collapse’ (that is livable ‘futures’, ‘worlds’, ‘realities’)—we do not need

some naïve Frankenstein to create a ‘baby universe’ in some sterile lab, nor do we need the

services of a ‘Quantum computer’ busily processing data from multiple parallel universes

all at once. Poets, artists, musicians have been suggesting futures, realities, universes,

moment to moment, for tens of thousands of years. Their ‘baby universes’ arrive in dreams,

reveries, meditations etc. and become solid in poetry, music, art, dance, etc. and ever it has

been.

23

Bohm, David, In Wholeness and the Implicate Order, 1980 [Kindle EBook Location 386] states: ‘Wholeness

is what is real … fragmentation is the response of this whole to man’s action, guided by illusory perception,

which is shaped by fragmentary thought.’

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Author Bio (as at May 2013)

Dr. Ian Irvine is an Australian-based poet/lyricist, writer and non-fiction writer.

His work has featured in publications as diverse as Humanitas (USA), The

Antigonish Review (Canada), Tears in the Fence (UK), Linq (Australia) and

Takahe (NZ), among others. His work has also appeared in two Australian

national poetry anthologies: Best Australian Poems 2005 (Black Ink Books) and

Agenda: ‘Australian Edition’, 2005. He is the author of three books and

currently teaches in the Professional Writing and Editing programs at both

Bendigo TAFE and Victoria University. He has also taught history and social

theory at La Trobe University (Bendigo). He holds a PhD for work on creative,

normative and dysfunctional forms of alienation and morbid ennui.. This article

on creativity and the New Physics (based on the draft of a public talk delivered

June 4th

2012) is fundamental to his developing thinking on Transpersonal

Relational Poetics.