Recently, an article appeared in Popular Mechanics magazine, one which made mention of a report written some 40 years ago which involved the strange possibility of converting our minds and bodies into a laser beam of sorts that could transcend spacetime, and in doing so, provide us with intuitive knowledge about our universe; in addition to allowing us to somehow connect to multiple energy fields. The project of which these seemingly obscure ideas were a part, The Gateway Project, was originally one that was the brainchild of Robert Monroe, a radio producer who had previously studied the effect of certain sound patterns on human consciousness.
As esoteric and possibly downright strange as such a study might be, still it at least may tangentially involve a question which has seemingly hung over both materialistic science and experiential consciousness, as well as their possible unification for some time now. That is, how to potentially unify empirical science with the possibility of a transcendent consciousness? Or to stand the question on its head, how might one in fact use rational thought and empiricism to prove the existence of a consciousness that is somehow otherworldly in nature? Or to put an even finer point on the matter, is such a thing even possible or necessary?
Mentioned in the article were several techniques and practices, adopted over the years, by which people might control their minds and their bodies; among them being biofeedback, transcendental meditation, kundalini yoga, and hypnosis, all of them being concerned with simultaneously controlling one’s mental energy in conjunction with one’s bodily processes. In addition, nearly all of them claim to assist someone in achieving a larger awareness or state of consciousness. However, at the same time, with none of these, it would seem, has someone been actually able to prove to others, through an account of their personal experience, that that transcendent experience is indeed real, and not simply a product of their imagination; which means of course that that missing link between empirical science and experiential consciousness still does not exist.
More than anything, what most likely stands in the way of that occurring is that the expansive, transcendent consciousness alluded to in the article can’t possibly exist on the other side of cognitive, logical proof. That is, it must be experienced through the depth of one’s impressionistic life simply because by definition it exists beyond thoughts, words, ideas, or any attempt to describe it. So if this is so, how might someone demonstrate to another person, beyond any sort of empirical proof that the expansive consciousness which they have experienced is real? That is to say, can actual consciousness effectively pass from one person to another as validation of the larger consciousness which one has experienced?
Ironically, a potential key to answering this question may actually exist in the midst of an experiment conducted in the late 1700s by a British physician and physicist. Thomas Young decided to study what would happen to a beam of light if it was observed passing through a double-slit barrier. Would it change its behavior so to speak if it was observed doing so compared to it not being observed? What Young found was that if it was observed passing through the barrier, the light beam would choose one of the slits to pass through, while if it was not observed passing through the barrier it passed through all possible slits simultaneously. In other words, mere observation of the light beam in effect changed its behavior.
Therefore, it terms of human beings, it would appear that the question which needs to be asked here is if it might be possible for a mental state of full creative absorption and heightened attention, one which is devoid of any further action, to not only change the reality in which one lives, but likewise be passed on to another person through a consciousness which is fluid. If it is indeed possible for this to occur, then it also seems possible that a larger, transcendent consciousness which one person is experiencing might then be shared with someone else as confirmation that this larger awareness actually exists.
Furthermore, if this fluid consciousness could actually be passed from one person to another, then this type of confirmation, it would seem, might in fact abrogate the need for the sort of empirical validation of a transcendent consciousness discussed here previously. Consequently, it might likewise mean that the proof that certain mental, emotive, or larger expansive states of consciousness actually exist could in fact become real in a whole new way. This would appear to be something that we all should consider in lieu of contemporary discussions of a consciousness or intelligence that some believe can be proved to exist through A.I. or other virtual approaches to reality which are increasingly becoming part of all our lives.