The Tao of Physics summary

For Eastern mystics, deep spiritual experiences shape the way the universe is perceived. Interestingly enough, physicists in the early twentieth century felt much the same way as they explored the atomic world.

In fact, modern physics, in general, has revolutionized the worldview put forward by classical practitioners of the field. But first, let’s consider what physics was like in its classical incarnation.

You’ve likely heard about Hinduism and probably don’t know much about it. That’s only reasonable, since Eastern religion and philosophy generally have a rather esoteric aim: the attainment of deep mystical experiences.

Hinduism emerged in ancient India and uses as its main spiritual guide the Vedas, a collection of scriptures written between 1500 and 500 BC by a variety of anonymous sages. The religion’s core message is that everything and every event in the world is simply a different expression of the same ultimate reality.

There are two basic aspects of ancient Chinese thought. First, since the ancient Chinese were a practical people, their philosophies centered around social life, morals and government. But to complement this pragmatic focus, ancient Chinese philosophy also has a mystical side, which offers transcendence of the social world into a higher state of consciousness.

In the sixth century B.C., these two sides developed into distinct philosophical schools. The first, Confucianism, revolves around social organization, while the second, Taoism, is all about the observation of nature.

People tend to divide things into distinct experiences, objects or events. We distinguish between table, chair and soul to help us cope with and navigate our everyday environment.

However, for the Eastern mystic traditions of Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism, such distinctions are illusions, none of which are a fundamental characteristic of nature. Rather, for these religions, the universe is characterized by a basic unity.

In classical physics, space and time are clearly delineated concepts. According to this school of thought, humans live in three-dimensional space, which is independent of time.

In modern physics, however, no such separation exists; Einstein’s theory of relativity unifies both space and time, leading to a new view that all measurements of the two concepts are relative.

To the Eastern mystic worldview, the notion of the world as a dynamic, ever-changing place has long been an essential feature. And now, for modern physics, and quantum physics in particular, the universe can be understood in a largely similar way.

For instance, according to quantum physics, or the study of the atomic and subatomic world, particles are in perpetual motion. The reason for this is that whenever subatomic particles find themselves confined to a small section of space, they begin to move around. Not only that, but the smaller the area, the faster they move.

The full and the empty, matter and space – in classical physics, these two concepts are clearly separated. However, in the nineteenth century, with the discovery of the concept of the field by Michael Faraday and James Clerk Maxwell, such an understanding began to shift.

The first field to be discovered was the electric field, a condition in space induced by a charged body that exerts force on any other charged body in the same space. However, the real rupture came when this concept of the field became associated with the force of gravity.