The Living Universe - Duane Elgin [8]
Although the transition to industrial society and hyper-rationalism have largely severed it, I believe we are opening to a new level of connection with nature, particularly in science. From the electron microscope to the Hubble telescope to the human genome, we are transforming how we look at and understand the universe and ourselves. The more we look, the more we are finding the universe to be a place of breathtaking immensity, astonishing subtlety, and unfathomable mystery.
Cosmophilia: Love of the Universe
The term biophilia was first used by Erich Fromm to describe a psychological connection and sense of affiliation between humans and other forms of life. The eminent biologist, E. O. Wilson, has popularized this term and used it to describe our innate urge to affiliate with other living things. In feeling a sense of kinship and connection with other forms of life, we take a quantum leap forward in our motivation to care for all living things.
We can expand this feeling of connection and appreciation of life to the entire cosmos—a word that was first used by the Greek philosopher Pythagoras to describe our universe as a living embodiment of nature’s order, harmony, and beauty. Building upon the concept of biophilia, we can create the word cosmophilia. Cosmo-philia describes the kinship and affiliation we feel with the totality of nature and our experience of felt connection with the harmony and beauty of our universe. Our relationship with the universe involves both biophilia (love of other living things) and cosmophilia (love of the universe in its wholeness).
Naturalists have looked deeply into the nature of the universe and have come away in awe of her beauty and aliveness:
Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.
—JOHN MUIR, EXPLORER AND NATURALIST
I believe in God, only I spell it Nature.
—FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT, ARCHITECT
A feeling of profound and intimate connection with nature and the universe is a theme that emerges from reflections by astronauts:
On the return trip home, gazing through 240,000 miles of space toward the stars and the planet from which I had come, I suddenly experienced the Universe as intelligent, loving, harmonious.
—EDGAR MITCHELL
When I was the last man to walk on the moon in December 1972, I stood in the blue darkness and looked in awe at the Earth from the lunar surface. What I saw was almost too beautiful to grasp. There was too much logic, too much purpose—it was just too beautiful to have happened by accident.
—GENE CERNAN
There is a vivid feeling of connection and communion that we can experience with nature at every scale—from a small flower to a galaxy. With cosmophilia, we feel our direct immersion in the subtle field of aliveness and energy that permeates the universe.
That we live in a living field of existence is an ancient insight. Only in the last few hundred years has science disengaged the modern mind from this view by asserting that matter is lifeless and space is but an empty stage. Now the tools of science are bringing into question the assumption of a non-living universe. Just as we are beginning to consider whether the Earth is a unified, living organism, we are also beginning to ask whether the universe is a single, integrated, life-form. The meaning of the phrase is complex, but a useful definition is that a living universe is a unified and completely interdependent system that is continuously regenerated by the flow-through of phenomenal amounts of life energy whose essential nature includes consciousness or a self-reflective capacity that enables systems at every scale of existence to exercise some freedom of choice. We will consider all of these characteristics and more in Chapter 2.
Does Aliveness Make a Difference?
What difference