BM07 Version
Date:
A
HOLOMOVEMENT METAPHYSICS AND THEOLOGY
by
Kevin J. Sharpe
Mailing
Address:
The
physicist David Bohm has proposed and promoted controversial theories. These
are not only in physics - hidden variables, quantum potential, holomovement,
Aharonov-Bohm effect, and so on - but also in metaphysics. Many writers align
him with new age philosophy and some with Thomism; no agreement appears.
In
this work I will briefly describe Bohm's holomovement metaphysics and develop
it further. In particular I will discuss what the theory could say about cosmic
evolution. As such the essay introduces a metaphysics rooted in science. I then
look at its theological potential.
THE IMPLICATE AND EXPLICATE ORDERS
Since
I have described Bohm's metaphysics in previous publications, I will only touch
on his more well-known ideas.[1]
Central
to his metaphysics is the idea of the holomovement. It is basic to reality;
"What is is the holomovement".[2]
It has two emphases. The first concerns the movement part of the word
holomovement. Bohm does not take something static and rigid as the basis for
his new order. He wants to build it on activity. The second part of the
holomovement is undivided or unbroken wholeness. The word holomovement uses the
prefix holo from the Greek meaning whole.[3]
Bohm suggests each region of space and time contains the total order of the
universe, including the past, present and future.[4]
The
implicate order is for Bohm a more general term than the holomovement. The
holomovement is an example of an implicate order. It carries an implicate
order. The word implicate comes from the verb to implicate, to fold inward.
Reality as implicate means any portion of it involves every other portion.
Everything folds into everything. Each part of it contains folded within it
information on every other part. Each region contains the total structure of
the universe, the whole.[5]
The
holomovement is an unbroken and undivided whole. Thus all forms of it merge. We
cannot separate them. In the holomovement's wholeness, nothing limits it. This
means we cannot define or measure it because to describe or specify it is to
divide it. In turn this suggests a theory can only concentrate on an aspect of
the holomovement important in a limited context. Only through the
holomovement's particular appearances is it known, and then only glimpses of
its shadow are possible.[6]
That
shadow is often the explicate order. The implicate order, the holomovement, unfolds.
Certain aspects of the holomovement lift into attention,
come into relief.[7] It
produces parts which appear independent. The explicate order is the reality
made of these items - which may or may not interact with each other. They
create the stable, independent and lasting world of parts. They are the
explicate order of our experience.
The
content of the holomovement unfolds as the explicate world. For a particular
context what comes from the holomovement is something we perceive as, in Bohm's
terms, an ensemble. In it each part relates to the whole.[8]
Holonomy (the law of the whole) will always limit the breaking of a situation
into independent parts. They come from a more basic whole and in the end are
not separate.[9]
To
describe something you begin, according to Bohm, with the holomovement. Then
you draw from the holomovement a situation which is broad enough to make the
description adequate. So the context itself plays an active role in unfolding
the aspects of the holomovement important to it. Certain aspects are important
for a given context while others are not.[10]
This
is because in most contexts the implicate order does not fully become an
explicate order. Everything does not unfold at once. Within any given situation
there may be several different explicate orders which cannot emerge together.[11]
This contrasts with the Cartesian view. Here some all-including intelligence
(God) can in principle embrace everything at any moment.
NONLOCALITY AND THE HOLOMOVEMENT
Another
pair of ideas in addition to the explicate/implicate orders develops this
metaphysics further. It is locality and its opposite nonlocality. A nonlocal
effect happens when an event affects a simultaneous event far from it.
Nonlocality is the opposite of the common-sense "principle of local
causes" or the idea of locality. This says that what happens in one place
has nothing to do with what happens at the same moment at a distant place.[12]
The connection or influence between two nonlocal events is one that has no
normal explanation. There are no physical forces acting between them. A normal
connection between them cannot travel faster than the speed of light. It takes
time to travel and so the influence between them cannot be instantaneous.
The
idea of nonlocality has received considerable attention recently. In the early
1980s Alain Aspect carried out a version of an experiment proposed by Einstein,
Podolsky and Rosen in a 1935 publication.[13]
Several others, including Bohm, helped refine the theoretical and practical
sides of the experiment so it could become a reality.[14]
The results show that nonlocality exists at the quantum level.[15]
There
are close connections between the two pairs of terms, locality/nonlocality and
explicate/implicate (or holomovement).
Locality
is a restriction, a special or limiting case of nonlocality. Nonlocality, for
instance, does not rule out local influences, but universal locality rules out
nonlocal ones.
Similarly,
the explicate order emerges from the implicate yet is
also within the implicate. This is because the implicate order allows for
separation of events while they relate within a larger system. But the explicate does not accept that everything relates to
everything else.
Nonlocality,
which allows for instantaneous connections, is similar to an implicate order.
It suggests one way for relating everything in an implicate order. That
nonlocality and the implicate order or holomovement have this in common is not
surprising since Bohm uses the implicate order idea to explain nonlocality.
Thus
there are close connections between the ideas of implicate/explicate and
nonlocality/locality. These are the basic ideas for the holomovement
metaphysics and this is as far most descriptions of it go. But there is more.
MOVEMENT IN THE UNIVERSE: FROM NONLOCALITY TO
LOCALITY
There
are several movements through time in Bohm's universe. These movements
help further develop the holomovement metaphysics.
Tucked
away in their reflections on their metaphysics and physics, Bohm and his
colleague Basil Hiley hide a key. Nonlocality came first in the evolution of
the universe. In the early stages after the big bang, nonlocality locked
together all the particles in the universe.[16]
When it began to expand, the particles collided and caused locality. Locality
and separation go hand in hand.
In
the explicate universe there is a movement over time. It goes from nonlocality
to locality, associated with the expansion of the universe. Although related,
this movement is different from the continual folding and unfolding of the
explicate order into and out from the implicate. The
move from nonlocality to locality has now gone so far that in the macro world
there is little nonlocality. Almost everything relates in a local or classical
manner. Exceptions are at the quantum level.[17]
Why
should nonlocality produce locality? Hiley shows how it results from collisions
between particles. Thus, it comes about from the laws of physics applied to an
expanding big bang universe. Another requirement is irreversibility: the
universe is moving in one direction and cannot retreat to where it was earlier.[18]
The
rise of locality, therefore, does not need a mystical explanation. It is
unnecessary, for instance, to invoke Bohm's idea of fragmentation as the source
of locality. Embedded in the implicate order, fragmentation could unfold into the explicate to cause separation and locality.
There
are two other movements in the universe besides that from nonlocality to
locality.
MOVEMENT IN THE UNIVERSE: INCREASING ENTROPY
The
universe uses energy right from the initial moment of the big bang. In the
language of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, entropy increases, it always
increases. For instance, the appearance of locality from nonlocality produces
entropy. Locality is at a lower energy level, in general, than is nonlocality
because it is less organized. To start with, it does not have nonlocality.
Increasing
entropy is the second movement of the universe through time. The universe is
winding down and scattering its energy. The history of the universe is
irreversible.
MOVEMENT IN THE UNIVERSE: INCREASING
COMPLEXITY/NONLOCALITY
I
have introduced the terms locality, nonlocality, implicate (holomovement),
explicate, and entropy. They relate in various ways, some of which I discuss
above. There are other terms yet to introduce, and further relations between
them to examine. A picture is beginning to emerge of a pair of ideas: locality,
separation and entropy are on one side, and nonlocality on the other.
The
other terms balance the pairing on the nonlocality side. One of the pair of
opposite arrows through time includes increasing entropy. Opposing it is
increasing complexity, the increase in complexity-consciousness. The term
evolution describes it. It says some parts of the world are building up rather
than running down.
The
work of Ilya Prigogine and Manfred Eigen is important in describing this
evolutionary movement.[19]
The universe started with extremely high energy and the tendency to lose it.
The universe was simple although it produced more complex objects such as suns
and planets that store and spend energy. All these objects run down. On the
other hand we see around us biological, social, even chemical and physical
systems which increase in energy. Prigogine shows these systems are inevitable
given physical laws. A system which uses energy, is
unstable, and changes chaotically can settle at a stable point with a higher
energy level. A system, that is, can become more complex. It does so, and thus
satisfies the Second Law of Thermodynamics, at the expense of its environment.
The environment takes on more entropy to make up for the system's energy growth
and stability. So the net entropy of the system plus its environment increases.
The
evolution of complex systems such as Prigogine describes assumes the
irreversibility in the Second Law of Thermodynamics. In this it is like the
requirements Hiley lists for the development of locality from nonlocality.
The
key characteristic of evolution, of the increase in complexity of a system, is
internal connections. That the universe is becoming more complex means some of
its parts are connecting more and more with each other. Different elements come
together to form wholes or systems. Then systems come together to form
supersystems. But the parts of a system connect more in the system than when
separate. Further, this connectedness is like the implicate order. Complex
systems involve their parts not only in connections and movement (constant
change) as in the holomovement. They also more subtly reflect these qualities
in their self-regulation, life, self-maintenance, defense, and so on. Thus the
implicate holomovement makes its appearance in the explicate order.
A system is also more nonlocal than its parts.
This is because the whole causes the elements to behave in special ways as
clusters, all together, or individually. Relating over distances though not
connected by immediate physical contact is a form of nonlocality. Whether it is
instantaneous and of the quantum type, is a matter to explore. Thus nonlocality
reemerges at the macro level having succumbed to locality near the beginning of
the universe.
There
has been a development over the life of the universe in two directions. One is
the increase in entropy and locality. This reflects the increase of separation
between objects and the winding down of the universe. The other is evolution
leading to increasing complexity and the gradual increase of internal
connections. This reflects the advent and development of life and complex
systems.
Several
qualifications are in order. First, evolution or growing complexity may not be
exactly the same as increasing nonlocality. The two movements are similar but
not the same. The movement toward increasing complexity continually happens (as
does the increase in entropy). It is of two types. The first is from initial
unity and simplicity to more forms of matter. The second comes from
Prigogine-type processes. The universe houses systems and organisms which
become more numerous and complex over time. On the other hand, the increase in
complexity does not parallel the increase in nonlocality. This applies
especially in the first phases of the universe. In fact nonlocality decreases
once locality initially appears.
Similarly,
increasing locality associated with increasing separation does not start right
at the beginning of the big bang. This differs from entropy. The two are not
the same.
There
are two opposite and related movements of the universe. One is evolutionary
toward complexity and increased connectedness (nonlocality). The other is
toward locality and increased entropy.
I
have outlined an evolutionary metaphysics and its underlying ideas of
nonlocality and the holomovement. I believe it shows promise. It may provide a
clear basis for developing an approach to the universe, life and consciousness.
In doing so it speaks from and to the modern scientifically-based world. It may
also speak from and to the world of traditional religions. To move in this
direction merits further exploration. In particular, it has theological
potential as seen in the next sections which focus on the relation of God to
the holomovement.
GOD IN A HOLOMOVEMENT
METAPHYSICS
An
extensive comparison of Bohm's ideas to Christian theology comes from Robert
Russell.[20]
He notes an interesting bridge between Bohm's ideas and theology, namely that
for Bohm God is the holomovement. This God, Russell says, need not be personal.
On the other hand this approach need not lead to pantheism, the belief that
everything is divine. Bohm's ideas "point to
transcendent...features of nature which could correspond to divine
presence." On balance, Russell concludes, Bohm is probably closest
to a panentheist image of God. God contains the universe.[21]
Russell
has an incorrect understanding of the divine in Bohm's metaphysics. Bohm does
not believe God is the holomovement or that God contains the holomovement. For
Bohm the divine is beyond the holomovement, beyond all implicate orders. God is
beyond them in ways that defy our ideas. In Bohm's scheme the holomovement is
part of the created order.[22]
I prefer to explore Russell's interpretation of Bohm although it veers from
Bohm's ideas.[23] I
wish to develop the holomovement as an image of God.
Other
religious thinkers have also equated the holomovement with God. David Trickett
is an example. He thinks Bohm sees an individual human as a sort of image of
the implicate order. Then he asks whether God is a projection of this image of
the implicate order. "If so, just what is the nature of this God?" He
also wants to understand the relations between God and such aspects of the
implicate order as human beings and nonhuman nature.[24]
There is much appeal to the image of God as the holomovement.[25]
In
the rest of this essay I will explore only a few of the results of the
holomovement model for God.
ELEMENTS FOR A HOLOMOVEMENT THEOLOGY: GLOBAL
NONLOCALITY
Nonlocality
is an important part of Bohm's metaphysics for theology. Its theological users
lean toward a global nonlocality: everything connects with everything else. It
is instantaneous and defies normal explanations. Nonlocality feels like the
all-embracing being of God who is omniscient and omnipotent, not restricted by
space and time.
Many
topics in theology could use the nonlocality idea. For example, Russell
suggests nonlocality as a model for the church. Or nonlocality might be a
withinness and equated with the Spirit of God. When associated with the
holomovement, nonlocality injects a creativity into
the idea of God's Spirit.[26]
And the Trees Clap their Hands is Virginia Stem Owens' mystical
meditation on the physics of Bohm and others. For her, energy, the spirit, the
implicate order, is "by far the largest `part'...of matter....It is God's
life that flows through the arteries of the world, that seeps in the
capillaries enclosing each quark, that sustains being at every moment."
Further, "It is God who thinks the whole, rounded thought of the universe.
And as one thought, its nature, its total order, is indeed implicit."[27]
Global
nonlocality is a way of talking about ecological togetherness too. We are all
in this together. If any part suffers, we all do. Each of us connects with
everything else.[28]
David
Peat's book Synchronicity explores global nonlocality in a Jungian way.[29]
Connections can be at the subconscious level; sometimes they become conscious
and we feel a foreboding or something similar. Theology might pursue Peat's
path.[30]
The
above are examples of how theology might use global nonlocality. One must be
wary, however. Global nonlocality extends the nonlocality idea of current
quantum physics because the latter may only apply to the quantum world.
Nonlocality may be more global. At present its global use is a
metaphysical idea which does not have physics' experimental support.
This
section has discussed the theological usefulness of nonlocality rather than of
the holomovement specifically. Bohm uses the holomovement to explain
nonlocality, be it at the quantum level or global. Theology could find both
ideas useful.
THE HOLOMOVEMENT GOD AS CREATOR
In
particular, theology could use the holomovement idea as a model for God.
Several matters follow directly from doing this.
To
start with, there are two ways to take it. The weaker is to make the relation
between God and the world like that between the holomovement and the arena of
human experience. The God-world relation is like the implicate order-explicate
order relation. Many purposes only need this. Other purposes require something
stronger. They need that God be like the holomovement. Exploring the theology
of the holomovement God often needs the latter.
Second,
God contains the world as the implicate contains the
explicate. The explicate comes from the implicate and
folds back into it. The explicate is a particular part
or restriction of the implicate. Further, as the explicate folds back into the implicate, what happens in the explicate order affects
the implicate. Thus the world and human beings can affect God.
For
theology, God is the creator of the world. In the new model this is also the
task of the holomovement. So describing the activity of the holomovement is
describing the activity of God.
Traditionally
there are two ways of talking of God as creator. The first is of God creating
out of nothing at the beginning. The second is of God continually creating the
world and all that is in it, moment by moment. Both forms of creative activity
are present in the holomovement model of God.
Consider
first the idea of God initially creating the universe. The point of the
Christian doctrine is that the universe and everything in it depend for their
existence on God. This has its parallel in a holomovement theology. The
explicate order depends on the implicate for its
being.
The
other part of the doctrine of creation has to do with God's continuous
creativity or creating. Tradition calls it God-the-sustainer. The holomovement
language provides a means for talking of this creating in both the human and
natural worlds. Bohm describes the holomovement as continually unfolding
itself. It thus creates the explicate order of our experience. The holomovement
God is continually making each item, relation, feeling, and so on, in the
world. God does this moment by moment. God does it by unfolding the potential
in the implicate holomovement which itself is God.
Russell
points out this parallel too.[31]
He says Bohm thinks of the universe "as an objective, self-contained,
[connected] whole....[It is] a unit of infinite
complexity. Nothing can arise out of nothing". Everything in nature comes
from something else. Everything is the product of strings of generations. This
idea, Russell suggests, is similar to the belief that everything depends for
its existence on God's sustaining power. Everything depends on the continual
activity of God as creator.
God
is not the only creator. When they take part in the activity of the
holomovement, humans and other beings create the explicate order along with
God. One could say we participate in the divine creativity by reaching into the
holomovement in our creative acts.
The
God who is the holomovement is not only everything that is potential. Part of
God is also the mechanism by which that potential becomes actual.
The holomovement model says how this mechanism works. It thereby describes how
God works. Scientific laws are descriptions of the way God works. The laws do
not have any power themselves. Neither do they refer to Platonic-like powers
which exist as part of or at another level from the world. They describe the
action of God. Thus, a holomovement theology describes how God brings each
moment into existence.
THE TRANSCENDENCE AND IMMANENCE OF THE
HOLOMOVEMENT GOD
Discussion
on the creator God leads to talk of mystery and transcendence. And this leads
to spirituality.
The
world, according to Bohm, has an endless depth. In his words, there is a qualitative
infinity to nature. That the implicate order unfolds into the explicate order
of our experience means we can never know the world in full. The unfoldings can
always be different; they are only partial. Thus despite the success of our
knowledge, nature will always elude us and be beyond our comprehension. All
explanations are imperfect. The qualitative infinity of nature means the
holomovement metaphysics is not going to produce a mechanistic, anti-religious
explanation of everything.
Mystery
will always face us. Our sense of the wonder, and of
the corrupt depths into which humans can fall, are on target. There is more to
life and to all and everything than we can grasp.
The
qualitative infinity of nature means the holomovement God will always transcend
us and our explicate world. The holomovement eludes our knowledge. All we can
have are glimpses into the unknown which is both reality and the creator God.
But this transcendence is not absolute where we can know nothing of God. We
just cannot know everything.
The
holomovement God not only transcends our human world. God is also immanent by
continuously bringing about each event of the world of our experience.
Everything bears the mark of the holomovement. Everything is in God.
The
immanence and transcendence of the holomovement God are
the root of spirituality: we feel and sense something more within ourselves and
our experience. We feel and sense an otherness which also connects closely with
us. Holomovement theology expects a wealth of such spiritual experience. The
difference from tradition is that this understanding of the spiritual is not of
a wholly other. It is natural, but it does differ from us.
THE PERSONAL GOD
The
holomovement God is personal. One personal attribute we give to the holomovement
is agency. It does things; we say the holomovement creates the explicate order
by its unfolding. We can go a lot further. In fact, we can move quite beyond
Russell's conclusion that the holomovement God need not be personal. God has to
do with human hopes and creative desires. Our emotions, thoughts, feelings,
hopes, fears, relationships, joys, and so on, are part of the explicate order
which we experience. Yet they come from the holomovement. The subjective as
well as the objective unfold from the implicate order. The two classes of
experience are not distinct but partial views of reality.
It
is also possible to think of God as transcending personal attributes. Many
people think of personal qualities and experiences as the highest order
possible for beings and organisms in the world. But human beings are only parts
of the whole which is the world. And the world is a system whose features are
difficult to fathom. The whole, God, not only includes human attributes but, by
being a whole, goes beyond them.
The
holomovement God is the source of all our objective and subjective experiences.
Thus God could relate to us personally. Whether this happens and, if it does,
what form the relation takes, are subjects for theology to ponder.
A
related topic is consciousness. Suppose consciousness comes from the evolution
of the brain into an extremely complex system whose parts are very closely
connected. Suppose it is not a thing, but is a property of such an internally
connected system as the brain. The holomovement is more complex and internally
connected than is the brain. So one could think of it as
having the highest form of consciousness. It might even be pure
consciousness. Bohm says consciousness is of the material world and arises from
the holomovement.[33]
Each person's consciousness participates in the universal consciousness (of
humanity) found within the holomovement. The previous argument suggests a way
to support and understand Bohm's view. God's consciousness transcends ours.
CONCLUSION
I
outlined the basics of Bohm's holomovement metaphysics and showed how to extend
it to include movements within the universe through time. Then, by thinking of
the holomovement as God, I raised some ways for developing a holomovement
theology. This theology has rich potential. Yet much reflection is necessary
before rating it more fully. Morality is only one subject for further
exploration. There are also veins not tapped in the above theological outline.
For instance, there was no mention of the movements in the universe. Filling
out this theology is the task of future writings.
ENDNOTES
ABSTRACT. The holomovement metaphysics of David
Bohm emphasizes connections and continuous change. Two general movements
through time in the universe extend Bohm's ideas. The universe started nonlocal
but increases in locality. (Nonlocality is where two simultaneous but distant
events affect each other.) There is a similar increase in entropy. The opposite
movement is an evolution toward increasingly complex systems which exhibit
internal connections and a type of nonlocality. This metaphysics produces a
theology when its underlying holomovement becomes a model for God. Several
topics naturally follow. These include global nonlocality, God as creator,
God's transcendence and immanence, and God as personal. The theology shows
promise but needs further development.
KEYWORDS.
David Bohm, entropy, holism, holomovement, metaphysics, nonlocality, systematic
theology.
VITAE.
Kevin Sharpe is a professor in the
[1]Kevin J. Sharpe,
"Relating the Physics and Religion of David Bohm,"
[2]David Bohm, Wholeness and
the Implicate Order (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980), p. 178.
[3]B. J. Hiley, "Towards
an Algebraic Description of Reality," Annales de la Foundation Louis de
Broglie 5 (1980): 78, 94.
[4]Bohm, Wholeness and the
Implicate Order, p. 177.
[5]David Bohm, "Quantum
Theory as an Indication of a New Order in Physics. B. Implicate and Explicate
Order in Physical Law," Foundations of Physics 3 (1973): 146-47.
[6]David Bohm, "The Implicate or Enfolded Order: A New Order for
Physics," in Mind in Nature: Essays on the Interface of Science and
Philosophy, ed. John B. Cobb, Jr. and David Ray Griffin (Washington:
University Press of America, 1978), p. 40.
[7]Bohm employs the verb to
relevate.
[8]David Bohm, Basil J. Hiley
and Allan E. G. Stuart, "On a New Mode of Description in Physics," International
Journal of Theoretical Physics 3 (1970): 176.
[9]David Bohm, "The
Implicate Order: A New Order for Physics," Process Studies 8
(1978): 93; D. J. Bohm and B. J. Hiley, "On the Intuitive Understanding of
Nonlocality as Implied by Quantum Theory," Foundations of Physics 5
(1975): 99. Sal Restivo and Michael Zenzen, "Holonomy in Physics and
Society," Man-Environment Systems 11 (1981): 177-83, use Bohm's
concept of holonomy as the basis for a general metaphysics; see also Steven M.
Rosen, "David Bohm's Wholeness and the Implicate Order: An Interpretive
Essay," Man-Environment Systems 12 (1982): 9-18.
[10]Bohm holds metaphysical
beliefs which cause or inspire or come from his above ideas. I have described
them in previous publications (e.g., Sharpe, David Bohm's World). They
include: reality has an endless depth; the parts of reality relate to each
other; the whole and all pieces of reality are constantly in process, in
movement; the movement of reality is creative; and reality divides into levels.
This is not all of Bohm's metaphysical base.
[11]F. A. M. Frescura and B. J.
Hiley, "The Implicate Order, Algebras, and the Spinor," Foundations
of Physics 10 (1980): 11-12.
[12]H. P. Stapp, "Theory of
Reality," Foundations of Physics 7 (1977): 314.
[13]Alain Aspect, Philippe
Grangier and G,rard Roger, "Experimental
Realization of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm Gedankenexperiment: A New
Violation of Bell's Inequalities," Physical Review Letters 49
(1982): 91-94; A. Einstein, B. Podolsky and N. Rosen, "Can
Quantum-Mechanical Description of Physical Reality be Considered
Complete?" Physical Review 47 (1935): 777-80.
[14]David Bohm, Quantum
Theory (New York: Prentice-Hall, 1951).
[15]Sharpe, David Bohm's
World, describes this more fully.
[16]B. J. Hiley,
"Cosmology, EPR Correlations and Separability," in
[17]Hiley, "Cosmology, EPR
Correlations and Separability," p. 188.
[18]Hiley, "Cosmology, EPR
Correlations and Separability," pp. 188-90.
[19]Ilya Prigogine, From
Being to Becoming: Time and Complexity in the Physical Sciences (San
Francisco: W. H. Freeman and Co. 1980). Bohm compares his and Prigogine's ideas
in his "The Implicate Order and Prigogine's Notions of
Irreversibility," Foundations of Physics 17 (1987): 667-77.
[20]Robert John Russell,
"The Physics of David Bohm and its Relevance to Philosophy and
Theology,"
[21]Russell, "The Physics
of David Bohm", p. 153; David Bohm, "Hidden Variables and the
Implicate Order,"
[22]David Bohm, "Response
to Conference Papers on `David Bohm's Implicate Order: Physics, Philosophy, and
Theology,'"
[23]I do this for reasons I have
outlined in previous publications, e.g., Sharpe, David Bohm's World.
[24]David G. Trickett, Review of
Wholeness and the Implicate Order by David Bohm, Process Studies
12 (1982): 53-54. See also B. D. Josephson, "Science and Religion: How to
Make a Synthesis?" Perkins Journal 36 (1983): 38-39; he suggests
equating God the orderer of nature, the intelligence behind the scenes, with
the implicate order. Patrick A. Heelan, "Space as God's Presence," Journal
of Dharma 8 (1983): 78-84, surveys the place of God in metaphysical
schemes, including Bohm's, which derive from or relate to contemporary physics.
See also Ted Peters, "David Bohm, Postmodernism, and the Divine,"
[25]This concept for God may not
be all that different to the one Paul Davies proposes in God and the New
Physics (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983). It does not mean, of
course, that God is restricted to our concept of holomovement or whatever
symbol we choose. God may well be more than our concepts of God.
[26]This does not counter the
distinction Peters ("David Bohm, Postmodernism, and the Divine," p.
209) makes that for Bohm the implicate order is matter and not spirit. It is
posing a question using Bohm's categories without necessarily being honest to
Bohm's own terminology.
[27]
[28]Charles Birch and John B.
Cobb, Jr., The Liberation of Life
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981).
[29]F. David Peat, Synchronicity:
The Bridge Between Matter and Mind (New York:
Bantam Books, 1987).
[30]In doing so it competes with
transpersonal psychology and parapsychology.
[31]Russell, "The Physics
of David Bohm," pp. 151-56.
[32]
[33]David Bohm and Ren,e Weber, "The Enfolding-Unfolding Universe: A
Conversation with David Bohm," Re-Vision 1 (1978): 24-51.