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Picking up right where we left off, is matter even capable of organizing itself?
If you believe in materialist reductionism, you say that the universe is only matter,
matter and forces. And the forces are not matter, but I'm happy to overlook that
inconsistency for now. In the first half of the lecture, we saw how a materialist
reductionism applied to biology, states that DNA is everything.
All you need is the DNA and a bag of chemicals, and you can make
any life form you want. Yet, as shown in the first part, this theory runs into some major
problems, confusions and contradictions when applied to even a simple worm.
Many previous civilizations would say that we are stuck on these very basic questions, because we
are looking in the wrong place for the answer. We keep wanting the matter to produce the form,
but what if matter cannot, on its own, produce form? Another idea
is that forms and shapes are imposed upon matter, or made available to matter. To illustrate this,
let us look at some examples that are often rolled out as proofs of self-organized matter.
The Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction is given often as proof that matter
alone can self-organize. Here, a simple chemical preparation
cycles through beautiful alternating spirals. Some point to the growth of crystals as
an example of self-organized matter, such as geodes, or growing rock candy at home.
But without exception, in all these laboratory cases the researchers are spending many hours,
setting up specialized equipment that creates very special conditions.
They then flip a switch and say voila, the matter has self-organized, and I'm like,
no, you just spent months carefully arranging things, imposing a form from the outside.
You have in fact proved that matter cannot self-organize. In the case of crystal growth, in
graduate school we spent many months trying to grow protein crystals for our
X-ray diffraction experiments, and I can tell you from experience that most of the time,
nothing forms, and it is only through very carefully controlled conditions and
obvious artistry, that crystals form, once again showing that matter does not
self-organize. So where do form and shape come from? An older body of ideas
states that shape and form are imposed upon something
from the larger world of which it is a part. For example, the cell in the liver has
its form and function because it is part of the liver,
and has very clearly defined jobs to do in the larger body of the liver. If that
cell were part of a different world, say part of the stomach, then that cell
would have a different shape. The organs themselves each have their particular
forms, only because they are part of the body and have clearly defined jobs that they each do
for the body. The very idea of proper shape only has meaning for something
that is part of a larger body. That is the only way you know if you have the right
shape. That is the only way you know if you are doing the right job.
When something breaks its connection with the larger world, then it can no longer have a proper shape.
The cancer cell has broken its connection with the larger body.
The cancer cell has no shape, no function. The cancer cells are still connected to the matter
of the body. The substance of the blood still flows to the cancer.
There is not a material disconnection. There is instead a disconnection of
purpose and function which leads to a loss of shape and form.
I realize this is a different way to think. I have pondered it for many years and I
still find it elusive. We are so immersed in centuries of thinking
that matter explains everything. It can be challenging to think
that form and shape are quite distinct from matter. Shape is something that can be imposed
upon matter, or made available to matter. But shape is not matter and shape does not come
from matter. In living systems there are proper shapes. It's not arbitrary. A frog toe
must have a certain shape to be part of a frog foot, which must have a certain shape to be
part of a frog leg, which must have a certain shape to be part of a whole frog.
Once we have seen a frog, it is obvious when any part is mis-formed or not doing the right job.
Instead of asking questions about how DNA can cause shapes and functions, we should ask,
what is it about the environment that will call forth different ingredients from the DNA?
Do we have any evidence that form exists without matter?
In corona discharge imaging, we place an object inside an electric field of several
kilovolts per centimeter. The object distorts the flow of electrons which
produces a very beautiful image of the object. When you place a leaf
between the plates, you see the structure of the leaf. The image on the left shows the corona
discharge picture of one such leaf. You then cut off the top part of the leaf, you choose a
new cover plate and film so that there is no contamination from the previous image,
and you make a new coronal discharge image. The image on the right shows what you get.
Much of the part that you cut off is still visible. In one study 137 leaves were
photographed from 14 different species. 96 of the photographs
showed at least some image of the section of the leaf that was removed.
How could that be, since the matter in that section is missing? The form exists
independent of the matter and is detectable through electric fields
and the flow of electrons. I personally think that the electric field is
a mediator for the form. I do not believe that the electric field is the source of the form,
but this hypothesis can be checked in further experiments.
These results might also remind you of a hologram, where every small section of a hologram
film contains the entire picture. Although holograms can be easily
explained using physics, I personally am always amazed every time I see one. I am baffled
that they actually exist. I cannot get my head around the fact
that each part of the hologram picture can actually be used to recreate the entire picture.
In these leaf experiments we see the same thing, where a remaining part of the leaf still,
somehow, contains the information needed to construct the entire leaf.
It is the same with the planarian worms. A remaining part of the worm, somehow,
still has the pattern of the whole worm, which the matter then fills in.
Let us leave the world of biology, forget about DNA, clear our heads and look at all this
in an entirely different setting. Consider the snowflake. Stunningly beautiful - millions have been
looked at and so far, no two are exactly the same. Endless variations
within a theme. You may have heard or assumed that physics or maybe chemistry has explained
how snowflakes get their shape. Not so. The origin of snowflake morphology is a mystery.
I have marked off two sections on this snowflake picture. Look at the two red circles, then look at
the two yellow circles. How did the two red regions know to make the same shape?
How did the two yellow sections get the message to make their shape? There are trillions
of molecules separating these regions. That is basically infinitely far away if you are
a molecule. And it's not just two regions that get the message
from infinitely far away, it's six regions for every feature that end up looking the same.
I propose that the overall form of the snowflake is imposed upon the freezing water
all at once. Like a New England contra- dance hall, forming and unforming to the caller and
the music. I think that the entire pattern exists in an electric field at the region where
the snowflake forms. I'm not saying that the electric field is all by itself the cause,
or the origin of the form, but I do think the electric field is a mediator,
or a translator of the form into matter. Maybe somebody could help us by doing electric field
snowflake experiments. We already have good evidence that crystal growth is disrupted by the
presence of pulsed microwave electric fields, which shows that electric fields are involved
with crystal formation. To take the next step in snowflake research,
we must see that the large-scale shape of the snowflake is not coming from the
individual water molecules. And why would you want it to anyway? If you are a scientist,
why would you want to explain this enormous elaborate shape arising from isolated molecules
that cannot know anything about each other? In closing, I will ask aloud,
Dr. Clarage you seem to be saying that matter alone is not sufficient to explain
everything, and that we must consider this other principle called shape,
or form. Yet you never clearly define what this is, or where it comes from. To which I reply,
but neither can you clearly define exactly what is matter or where does it come from. And I really
do not see how form is any less obvious than matter. So perhaps we should change
the terms of the discussion and ask why would anyone want to describe
everything with only one principle called matter? Why is that preferable to having also a
second principle, of form? If you say that it is obvious that having only one principle
is simpler. I will say, oh man, really? I just spent all this time showing experimental evidence
why matter alone leads to all kinds of complications, confusions, and outright
contradictions. I have been researching the origin of forms in nature for several decades.
I have found that none of our current sciences are very good at describing how form arises,
be it geology, physics, chemistry, biology, astronomy. There is a substantial amount
of hand waving when it comes to describing how the form of things
arises. For example, in astrophysics we do not know why solar systems form
with a certain number of planets. Why the spacings between the orbits
closely follows an exponential spiral. Why the planets have their particular sizes.
Why the star has its particular cycle of magnetic patterns, etc., etc. This question is so difficult
for astrophysics that it is generally ignored. I think all our sciences are weak in this area
because we are looking in the wrong place for the origin of forms and shapes. We keep wanting the
matter to organize itself. I think that is a dead end.
To get out of this dead end two questions can be useful. The first is,
why would you, personally, want a worldview where matter organizes itself?
And I hope you can answer this for yourself, and not from some physics video you saw,
or a book that you read. The second question is, in your personal experience,
in your life, what useful functions or procedures have you personally seen come about
spontaneously, with no effort? When your purpose changes, your shape changes.
Purpose is causal. It makes things happen. A more useful and meaningful
cosmology would include that. It is my hope that I have helped convey some of that message.
Thank you.
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