An ambitious spiritual manual that remains unconvincing as science.
A book argues that a proper understanding of electromagnetic energy bridges the gap between the human and the divine.
According to the authors, the whole cosmos is made up of matter and energy. Electromagnetic energy, the consequence of electricity passing through a magnetic field, is the lever by which God governs all things. (God also communicates with the human world through billions of neutrinos that radiate from the sun, though the precise mechanics of their operation remains unknown.) Within the human brain, electromagnetic energy generates a soul, and the crucial atom of life resides in the medulla oblongata. And just as there is a God particle that corresponds to the soul—the Higgs Boson particle—there are two that relate to the human gene: a “sene” and a “mene.” The moral implications of this interpretation of electromagnetic energy are wide-ranging; the authors contend that prayer, meditation, and worship can increase individuals’ connections to God and ultimately improve their lives. For example, “prayer creates a vacuum state of mind” that allows for a greater receptivity to God’s energy. The authors’ ardent wish is that the popular promulgations of their views will alleviate the moral turpitude that plagues the world, creating the possibility not only for world peace, but the establishment of heaven on Earth as well. The philosophical aims of the writing team—Tapan K. Chaudhuri (Physics of God, Universe, Humankind, and Peace in Family, 2015) and debut authors Tushar K. Chowdhury, Tandra R. Chaudhuri, Sree Taposh K. Chowdhury, and Srimati Bulu Rani Chowdhury—are impressive. (The first three collaborators are scientists.) The authors aim to construct a “theo-science” that empirically grounds human spirituality. But very little of their argument is based on scientific experimentation—the role of science in this study seems to be as a source of metaphors. For example, they describe the way a family is like an atom—comprising three parts working in stable harmony—but that has nothing to do with atoms themselves. Similarly, parents are compared to solar cells, children to television receivers, and human minds to smartphones. However clever these analogies are, they’re not the result of scientific inquiry and they are often presented in frustratingly vague but confidently self-assured prose.
An ambitious spiritual manual that remains unconvincing as science.Pub Date: Dec. 20, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5450-9046-6
Page Count: 109
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 11, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.
Lessons about life from those preparing to die.
A longtime hospice chaplain, Egan (Fumbling: A Pilgrimage Tale of Love, Grief, and Spiritual Renewal on the Camino de Santiago, 2004) shares what she has learned through the stories of those nearing death. She notices that for every life, there are shared stories of heartbreak, pain, guilt, fear, and regret. “Every one of us will go through things that destroy our inner compass and pull meaning out from under us,” she writes. “Everyone who does not die young will go through some sort of spiritual crisis.” The author is also straightforward in noting that through her experiences with the brokenness of others, and in trying to assist in that brokenness, she has found healing for herself. Several years ago, during a C-section, Egan suffered a bad reaction to the anesthesia, leading to months of psychotic disorders and years of recovery. The experience left her with tremendous emotional pain and latent feelings of shame, regret, and anger. However, with each patient she helped, the author found herself better understanding her own past. Despite her role as a chaplain, Egan notes that she rarely discussed God or religious subjects with her patients. Mainly, when people could talk at all, they discussed their families, “because that is how we talk about God. That is how we talk about the meaning of our lives.” It is through families, Egan began to realize, that “we find meaning, and this is where our purpose becomes clear.” The author’s anecdotes are often thought-provoking combinations of sublime humor and tragic pathos. She is not afraid to point out times where she made mistakes, even downright failures, in the course of her work. However, the nature of her work means “living in the gray,” where right and wrong answers are often hard to identify.
A moving, heartfelt account of a hospice veteran.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-59463-481-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2016
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