In this episode of the "Rethinking Education" podcast, I join Dr. James Mannion to explore the state of modern education and its implications for science and spirituality. We discuss the dominance of the passive voice in science education, the impact of a moral vacuum, and the need for a more holistic, hands-on approach to learning. Drawing from my experiences, I argue for reimagining education to embrace interdisciplinary connections, practical engagement with nature, and a broader understanding of consciousness beyond the brain. Join us as we challenge the status quo and explore new ways of fostering curiosity and creativity in the classroom.

Watch on YouTube
https://youtu.be/lX3AyZy7oS4

Most people have had the experience of waking soon before an alarm clock goes off and some can even wake before a specified time without an alarm. The usual assumption is that this depends on an exquisitely sensitive time sense, but Rupert argues that it may be explained better in terms of presentiment, or ‘feeling the future’, or even in terms of an ‘extended present’. 

We already know that our sense of the present is not a mathematical instant, but has width, and perhaps it widens over ranges of seconds to include portions of the near future, Presentiment is now a well-established phenomenon in laboratory experiments, carried out at the Institute of Noetic Sciences, Cornell University and elsewhere, and may be widely distributed among people and non-human animals. 

It could play an important part in everyday life, and become especially significant in fast-moving sports like downhill skiing, tennis and ping pong. Some people may make use of this ability in day trading where they make decisions on movements of the markets over very short time periods, sometimes only a few seconds. 

Rupert discusses how this ability could potentially be trained, enabling airline pilots and racing drivers to be better prepared for potential accidents, and helping some people to get rich quick – as some day traders already have – by using intuitive abilities that cannot be duplicated by computers. 


References
____
An Experiment with Time
by John William Dunne
https://archive.org/details/AnExperimentWithTimeEbook
____
Listen to the Animals: Why did so many animals escape December's tsunami?
https://www.sheldrake.org/tsunami
____
Predicting the unpredictable; evidence of pre-seismic anticipatory behaviour in the common toad
https://www.sheldrake.org/toads
____
Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home
https://www.sheldrake.org/dogs
____
Unconscious Perception of Future Emotions: An Experiment in Presentiment
by Dean Radin, Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 11, No. 2, pp. 163-180, 1997
https://www.sheldrake.org/RadinPresentiment

Many people used to think that belief in God would disappear with the advance of science. But that has not happened, and some prominent atheists are now trying to reinvent religion. What is going on? Is the universe ultimately conscious or unconscious? And if consciousness pervades all nature, how does it work?

Recorded in August of 2014, at Hollyhock on Cortes Island, Canada.
https://hollyhock.ca/

The third in a series of questions. Please try them out with your materialist friends!

Do you think that dark matter is conserved? 
Is there always the same amount of dark matter? 
Can you accept that there may be a continuous creation of dark energy as the universe expands?

Recorded on November 5th, 2021

A dialogue from Beyond The Brain 2021 – Further Reaches of Consciousness Research, with host  David Lorimer, organzied by the Department of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia, the Scientific and Medical Network, the Institute of Noetic Sciences, and the Alef Trust.

Graham Hancock is the NY Times best-selling author of a series of controversial books, notably Fingerprints of the Gods (1995), Heaven’s Mirror (1998), Underworld (2002), Magicians of the Gods (2015) and America Before (2019), investigating the possibility of a lost advanced civilization of the Ice Age. He is also known for his work on the role of altered states of consciousness in the origins of art and religion — an interest explored in his 2005 book Supernatural: Meetings with the Ancient Teachers of Man.
https://grahamhancock.com/

Beyond the Brain is the world’s premier conference series exploring new research on whether and how consciousness and mind extend beyond the physical brain and body. This year’s event covers the limitations of scientific materialism, parapsychological research, implications of NDEs, savant syndrome, indigenous gateways to the soul and the nature of universal love. There will also be an experiential session on each day.
https://scientificandmedical.net

Watch on YouTube
https://youtu.be/BeaWkX_ASkI

Have you ever felt that you are being looked at from behind and turned to see someone watching you? Or that you've been watching someone and they turn and look directly at you? I believe this experience has a directional quality to it and I would like to hear from those who have felt this directional sense.

Please email your experiences with this phenomena to sheldrake@sheldrake.org

Recorded in London on June 21st, 2021

On June 21, 1981, Rupert published his first book “A New Science of Life” in which he proposed the hypothesis of morphic resonance, the idea that memory is inherent in nature. This talk was given on the fortieth anniversary, to the Institute of Noetic Science and the British Scientific and Medical Network.

https://www.sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/a-new-science-of-life-morphic-resonance

The second in a series of questions. Please try them out with your materialist friends!

Do you think you are a complex machine? 
Have you been programmed to believe in Materialism?

Recorded May 25, 2021
Rupert and Buddhist teacher Geshe Tenzin Namdak discuss how science and contemplative traditions can inform us about  the nature of reality, the interconnectedness of all phenomena and the relation between consciousness and the material world. Geshe Tenzin Namdak first worked as an environmental researcher having graduated in hydrology from Van Hall Larenstein University, The Netherlands. He started studying Buddhism at Maitreya Institute in 1993 and took ordination from His Holiness the Dalai Lama before engaging in his formal studies in Buddhist philosophy and psychology at Sera Jey Monastic University, South India, in 1997. He completed the entire twenty-year Geshe program at Sera Jey in 2017 and the traditional one year Vajrayana study program at Gyume Tantric College in January 2019, the first Westerner to do so. Because of his deep interest and background in science and as a member of Sera Jey’s Education Department he spoke on and organized various dialogues and conferences on contemporary science and ancient contemplative wisdom of the mind and its philosophy. Currently, he is the resident teacher at Jamyang Buddhist Centre, London, and teaches worldwide.

About Science & Wisdom LIVE:
Science & Wisdom LIVE is a project of Jamyang London Buddhist Centre.

Each dialogue explores the middle ground between science and contemplative wisdom, focusing on themes such as the ethics of artificial intelligence, gender equality, climate change, and the benefits of mindfulness and meditation for mental health.

Find Out More: www.sciwizlive.com

Copyright: Jamyang London Buddhist Centre, 2021.

The first in a series of questions. Please try them out with your materialist friends!

Is the mechanistic worldview a testable scientific theory, or a metaphor?
If it is a metaphor, why is the machine metaphor better in every respect than the organism metaphor?

Recorded June 9th, 2021
A dialogue with the philosopher David Bentley Hart, author of _Roland in Moonlight_ in which he has conversations with his dog Roland. David is one of my favourite philosophers and this is our first dialogue.

He has just started a new subscription channel for his writings: https://davidbentleyhart.substack.com

This is an appeal for information about experiences with dogs, cats and other animals that are about to die. I am trying to find out if ‘terminal lucidity’, whereby some people with dementia recover their memory and clarity soon before dying, occurs in non-human animals too.

Please email your experiences with this phenomena to sheldrake@sheldrake.org

March 18th, 2024
University College London Expeditions and Fieldwork Society

In this talk given Rupert Sheldrake explores the allure of expeditions and fieldwork, delving into his own adventures exploring Mayan ruins in Mexico and studying tropical plants in Malaysia. Throughout the talk he illustrates how these experiences broadened his scientific and spiritual horizons, connecting this intrinsic human curiosity to our ancestral hunter-gatherer roots.

Recorded April 23rd, 2020.

Rupert urges us to move beyond the centuries-old mechanistic view of nature, explaining in lucid terms why we can no longer regard the world as inanimate and purposeless. He shows that recent developments in science itself have brought us to the threshold of a new synthesis in which traditional wisdom, intuitive experience, and scientific insight can be mutually enriching. 

This is Rupert’s first live online talk, conducted by Hardo Pajula of the Edmund Burke Society in Estonia. Many thanks to Hardo and the EBS for permission to republish this audio recording. http://www.burke.ee/

___Read the book___
The Rebirth of Nature: The Greening of Science and God  
https://www.sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/the-rebirth-of-nature

TEDx Whitechapel, Jan 12, 2013

The theme for the night was Visions for Transition: Challenging existing paradigms and redefining values (for a more beautiful world). In response to protests from two hardcore materialists in the US, the talk was taken out of circulation by TED, relegated to a corner of their website and stamped with a warning label.

Room for discussion was made, but those who condemned the talk never showed up. The vast majority of those who spoke out were outraged, including those who'd never heard of morphic resonance. Ironically, at the time of removal the video had a modest 35,000 views on YouTube; since then, its clones have been watched over 7 million times. The video has been translated into 24 languages by generous members of the YouTube community. 

Read more: https://www.sheldrake.org/ted

Modelled on the BBC radio series, this long-standing local programme was produced live by a group in Hampstead, London, in 2023. As the castaway  on a theoretical desert island, Rupert could bring with him eight pieces of music (listed below), a few books, and one luxury item.

1:07 If you had not been a scientist what would you have been?
2:27 Getting to the island

4:47 Bach, Mass in B minor (Gloria)
7:25 Purcell, Music for a While 
16:47 Monteverdi, Madrigal
24:33 Beatles, Because
36:41 Subbulakshi, Devotional Song
45:07 Mozart, Laudate Dominum
54:55 Cosmo Sheldrake, Solar Walz
1:03:19 Tallis, Salvator Mundi, Hampstead Parish Church Choir

Some music was cut for copyright reasons, or poor audio quality.
Here's the playlist on Youtube: 
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQNvVzO_W4EzTopdM6ZxrrYBQoIvhxNGe

A lecture for the Psychedelic Research Society at the University of Sussex, Nov 6th, 2023.

https://www.facebook.com/sussex.uni.psychesociety/

This was recorded at the Beyond the Brain 2023 conference, by The Scientific and Medical Network: https://scientificandmedical.net/

Video is also available here: https://youtu.be/KyNgE6RsGnw

Iain McGilchrist and Rupert Sheldrake delve into a spectrum of profound subjects, touching upon the essential role of spirituality in human endeavors, the revitalization of spiritual practices, and the fundamental structure of the cosmos. They discuss panpsychism's implications for the interconnection of consciousness and matter, the enduring nature of memory, the archetypal forms that underpin our reality, and the subtle energy fields that animate existence. The conversation also navigates the terrain of values and the purpose they serve in our lives.

Episode 4 of the online course How To Transform the Sciences: Six Potential Breakthroughs
https://www.sheldrake.org/online-courses

Around 2015, scientists were shocked to find that most papers in high-prestige peer-reviewed scientific journals are not reproducible. In one study of papers in prestigious biomedical journals, 90% could not be replicated, and in experimental psychology more than 60%. This crisis partly arises from systematic biases that Rupert discusses in his chapter on ‘Illusions of Objectivity’ in The Science Delusion (2012, new edition 2020; in the US this book is called Science Set Free), including the selective observation and reporting of results, and perverse incentives for scientists and journals to publish striking positive findings. The crisis continues to roll on, as shown, for example, by an editorial in Nature, December 2021, about un-reproducible results in cancer biology.

All this is relatively straightforward, but Rupert suggests that some experiments may also involve direct mind-over-matter effects. It has long been known that experimenters can influence their experimental results through their expectations, in so-called ‘experimenter expectancy effects’, which is why many clinical trials, psychological and parapsychological experiments are carried out under blind or double-blind conditions.

In most other fields of science, experimenter effects are ignored and blind methodologies are rarely employed. Rupert suggests that in addition to the usual sources of bias, experimenters may also influence experiments psychokinetically, through direct mind-over-matter effects. Scientists may be particularly prone to this source of error because most scientists believe psychokinesis is impossible, and hence take no precautions against it. They practise unprotected science. Rupert proposes experiments on experiments to test for the effects of experimenters’ hopes and expectations.
References


References
____
A Dream, or the Astronomy of the Moon
Johann Kepler, published posthumously in 1634 by his son
https://sheldrake.org/somnium
____
Rupert's essay The Replicability Crisis in Science
https://sheldrake.org/replicability
____
Bad Pharma
Ben GoldacreFourth Estate, 2012
https://sheldrake.org/badpharma
____
Artifacts in Behavioral Research
Robert Rosenthal and Ralph L. Rosnow, Oxford University Press, 2009
https://sheldrake.org/rosenthal
____
Over half of psychology studies fail reproducibility test
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2015.18248
____
Differential indoctrination of examiners and Rorschach responses
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1965-12396-001
____
A longitudinal study of the effects of experimenter bias on the operant learning of laboratory rats
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1965-01547-001
____
Could Experimenter Effects Occur in the Physical and Biological Sciences?
Skeptical Inquirer 22(3), 57-58 May / June 1998
https://sheldrake.org/skepticalinquirer98
____
Quantum‐Mechanical Random‐Number Generator 
https://aip.scitation.org/doi/abs/10.1063/1.1658698

------
Dr Rupert Sheldrake, PhD, is a biologist and author best known for his hypothesis of morphic resonance. At Cambridge University, as a Fellow of Clare College, he was Director of Studies in biochemistry and cell biology. As the Rosenheim Research Fellow of the Royal Society, he carried out research on the development of plants and the ageing of cells, and together with Philip Rubery discovered the mechanism of polar auxin transport. In India, he was Principal Plant Physiologist at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, where he helped develop new cropping systems now widely used by farmers. He is the author of more than 100 papers in peer-reviewed journals and his research contributions have been widely recognized by the

Esalen, California, 1992.

 A cultural history of utopianism. Surges of utopian renewal. The trinitarian utopian model. Are the utopian and millenarian movements tendencies of the European mind in reaction to Christianity? Millenarians are dominated by the apocalyptic idea. How have these trends influenced the trialoguers? The Marxist utopian model. Scientific utopianism. Liberal political utopianism. New age and psychedelic utopianism. A mathematical utopia. 2012 - the end of history? What is the connection between the Archaic Revival and the Timewave? Is millenarianism an anti-progressive force? Origins and end-points. Utopianism is reasonable if we can change our minds. Our role as care-takers of the world. Is time speeding up? A fractal model of time. A model of history that shows catastrophic transformations to new equilibria. Self-fulfilling prophecies. Does the Omega Point concern the entire cosmos or is it limited to human destiny on earth? A vision of a world revived through animism, mathematical vision, stellar communication and psychedelics. Questions and answers: Large scale vacuum fluctuation. The birth of universe. Life after death. Ralph considers new forms of trialoguing and teaching the trialogue idea.

Related Book
Chapter 10 of The Evolutionary Mind
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/the-evolutionary-mind

A seminar at Cambridge University, June 2023

Hazelwood, Devon, England, June 1993

Ralph tells a fractal story and explains how fractal models can illuminate our understanding of the world. Applying fractals to individual psychology.. The need for chaos and disorder in the personality. Multiple personality 'dischaos'. A 'sandy beach' model of the mind. Therapeutic strategies to increase chaos. The need to restore pantheism. A mathematical model for monogamy. Order and chaos must be balanced. Multiple attractors at the end of time. A polytheistic psychology. The unity within polytheistic systems.. Cultures and individuals need fractal rather than rigid boundaries. A fractal cosmos. The mystery of the Holy Trinity. The loss of unity through rigid boundaries. How can we fractalize our boundaries and create unity? Psychedelics, meditation, travel, tantra and chanting. Returning to the pre-verbal mode of expression. What about people whose boundaries are too low already? The cure to boundary anxiety can be found within. Is there any culture that has managed to avoid 'dischaos'? Questions and answers: The Aristotelian perspective of modern science needs to be balanced by the Platonic. Maths anxiety. Chaos is a kind of order and vice versa. Jung's deconstruction of Yahweh. The sacred trinity of the goddess. Recovering the aboriginal state of consciousness. Cultural taboos.


Related Book
Chapter 7 of The Evolutionary Mind
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/the-evolutionary-mind

In this episode, I join Praveen Mohan to explore the deep connections between science, consciousness, and spirituality. We delve into the purpose of ancient temples, the resurgence of pilgrimage in both India and Europe, and the implications of panpsychism and morphic resonance. This conversation offers fresh insights from my experiences living in India, discussing the mystical roots of sacred places with someone steeped in the culture. Tune in for a thoughtful exchange on how science and spirituality intersect and why challenging materialist paradigms can open new doors for understanding our reality.

Watch on Praveen's Channel:
https://youtu.be/zBEwy8cpt8M

Esalen, California, 1992. The ancient view of the universe as alive. The anima mundi. The fall into the deterministic and mechanistic worldview. How this view is now being transcended. The recovery of the sense of the life of nature and of the heavens. Creativity and morphic resonance in nature. Resacralizing the earth through seasonal festivals and pilgrimage. Linking astronomy and astrology and resacralizing the heavens. Is the universe somehow conscious? Contacting celestial intelligences. Elizabethan star magic and the concept of the great chain of being. Are the contents of our imagination somehow real? Organismic philosophy and the re-infusion of spirit into nature. Re-animating the cosmos. The different levels of intelligence in the universe, and possible techniques for communicating with them. Channelling the stars. A synthesis of astrology and astronomy. Guiding intelligences. Questions and answers: The need to engage with the environment. Light and energy as a manifestation of spirit. Various ways to invoke stellar deities. Long barrows. The feeling of reverence for the heavens. The sky as teacher. The consciousness of the sun. Imagination as the source of creativity in nature. Renaissance magic. 

Related Book
The Evolutionary Mind
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/the-evolutionary-mind

1995, Esalen Institute

The apocalyptic tradition: paranoid self-fulfilling prophecy or an intuition of instability? Stripping the provincialism from apocalyptic messages. Apocalyptic scenarios, including the 'God-whistle' theory. The ecological catastrophe as the appropriate interpretation of the Apocalypse. Steering the Apocalypse toward a tolerable conclusion. The power of faith. Big Bang cosmology as a projection of the Judaeo-Christian model of history. The fate of the sun. The projection of the Apocalypse in 2012. Ecological catastrophe and forces of novelty that may create planetary metamorphosis. Global crucifixion. The recovery of Eden. The personal apocalypse: a glimpse of post-mortal life. Interplanetary morphic resonance. The green version of the apocalyptic vision.

Related Book
Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/chaos-creativity-and-cosmic-consciousness

The Scientific and Medical Network (SMN) is a worldwide professional community and membership organisation for open-minded, rigorous and evidence-based enquiry into themes bridging science, spirituality and consciousness. It promotes a cultural shift in our understanding of reality and human experience beyond the limits imposed by exclusively materialist and reductionist approaches. 2023 is the Network's 50th Golden Jubilee.

https://scientificandmedical.net/

Hollyhock, 2008

Andrew Weil, MD, is a world-renowned pioneer in the field of integrative medicine, an approach to health care which encompasses body, mind, and spirit. Rupert and Andrew had a series of conversations over eight years at Hollyhock, on Cortes Island, BC, Canada. In this talk they discuss Rupert's stabbing in Santa Fe, epigenetics, the broken US healthcare system, fasting, laughter yoga, Dr Weil as a brand, and many other topics still relevant today.

Hollyhock, 2011

Andrew Weil, MD, is a world-renowned pioneer in the field of integrative medicine, an approach to health care which encompasses body, mind, and spirit. Rupert and Andrew had a series of conversations over eight years at Hollyhock, on Cortes Island, BC, Canada. In this talk they discuss the rise in gluten sensitivity and autism, amongst a variety of medical mysteries.

 

Part of an online course on potential scientific breakthroughs:
https://www.sheldrake.org/online-courses

In this talk Rupert discusses new ways in which the hypothesis of morphic resonance can be tested, including with holistic quantum systems like Bose-Einstein condensates, with new materials like high-temperature superconductors, through experiments on cellular adaptation to toxins and heat stress, in experiments on learning in non-human animals, including nematode worms and fruit flies, and with popular online puzzles like Wordle.

The implications of these tests, if successful, would be very far reaching, and could lead to new understandings of physical phenomena like the melting points of crystals, which would depend on influences from previous similar crystals, rather than on timeless laws. In biology, morphic resonance from past organisms would play an essential role in heredity, in addition to genes and epigenetic modifications of gene expression. In humans, collective memory would facilitate learning and problem-solving, and morphic resonance would underlie what the psychologist Jung called ‘the collective unconscious’.


_References_

Mind, Memory, and Archetype: Morphic Resonance and the Collective Unconscious
https://sheldrake.org/memory

Rat Learning and Morphic Resonance
https://sheldrake.org/rats

The Flynn effect
https://james-flynn.net/

The Sound of a Hidden Order
https://www.nature.com/articles/498041a

A reprogrammable mechanical metamaterial with stable memory
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-03123-5

Evidence for unconventional superconductivity in twisted trilayer graphene
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04715-z

Antiferromagnetic half-skyrmions and bimerons at room temperature
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03219-6

Conditioned aversion
https://dictionary.apa.org/conditioned-aversion

An Experimental Test of the Hypothesis of Formative Causation
https://sheldrake.org/rose

Steven Rose's 'A hypothesis disconfirmed' refuted by Rupert
https://sheldrake.org/rose-refuted

The Hill Effect as a Test for Morphic Resonance
https://sheldrake.org/essays/the-hill-effect-as-a-test-for-morphic-resonance

Are disincarnate and non-human entities mental projections or non-physical, autonomous entities? What can we learn from them? Their variety and persistence in human history. Early modern science and angelic communication. The shamanic model. The aversion to the irrational in Christianity and science. The need to analyze the entities' messages. A mathematical model of body, soul and spirit. Entities as inhabitants of the spiritual domain of the logos. The evolution of their multifarious representations. The dogma of purgatory. Contacting these entities through dreams and psychedelics. The deepest layers of the faery tradition. Metaphors of light? Entities as artificers and their use of language. Is the world soul behind these entities? Corn circles. The call to prepare language for these encounters. Experiential contact with the celestial sphere. The humanist illusion of self-sufficiency, leading to societal possession. Mammon. A celestial battle on earth? Redirecting attention to the positive forms. The ultimate partnership - reconnecting the Gaian and celestial spheres to the human spirit. Where could the new alchemical kingdom be?

From the book:
Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness first published as Trialogues at the Edge of the West, Chapter 6. 
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/chaos-creativity-and-cosmic-consciousness


0:00Terence
12:40Ralph
18:17Terence
20:55Ralph
23:20Terence
26:05Ralph
30:41Terence
31:22Rupert
35:10Terence
39:54Rupert
... 

1995, Esalen Institute

The idea of an attractor for the entire cosmic evolutionary process. The role of the attractor in chaos dynamics. Motivation and attraction. The value of spoken language. Mathematical modelling. The relationship between mathematical models with chaotic behaviour and the chaos in life. Idolatry and models becoming reality. The feminine aspect of creativity.

Related Book
Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/chaos-creativity-and-cosmic-consciousness

1995, Esalen Institute

The chaos revolution, chaotic attractors and indeterminism in nature. The emergence of form from the field of chaos. The formative process in cooling. Is the mathematical realm of the world soul in co-evolution with ordinary reality? The potential of mathematics to aid us in our own evolution by extending our language for dealing with complex systems. Visual intuitions and the Butterfly Effect.

Related Book
Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/chaos-creativity-and-cosmic-consciousness

The second of a series of six talks on potential scientific breakthroughs:
https://www.sheldrake.org/online-courses

Rupert proposed a new hypothesis of cellular rejuvenation in an article in Nature in 1974, and in 2023 published a review article entitled ‘Cellular Senescence, Rejuvenation and Potential Immortality’ in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, summarising results of recent research, which support his hypothesis. In this talk he gives an overview of this hypothesis, which applies to cells of all kinds, including bacteria and yeasts as well as plants and animals, and he shows how it sheds new light on the nature of stem cells. 

In mammals, embryonic stem cells have a special property that enables them to divide indefinitely without senescing and Rupert suggests that cancerous transformations involve the hijacking of this embryonic stem cell system. He suggests ways in which this hypothesis could be tested, and shows how it could lead to new approaches in cancer therapy – by blocking the rejuvenative system that cancers have acquired. If this system were inhibited, then cancer cells might senesce like most other somatic cells and become less virulent. 



References
____
Sheldrake, R. (1974). The ageing, growth and death of cells. Nature, 250, 381-385.
https://www.sheldrake.org/ageing
____
Sheldrake, R. (2022) Cellular Senescence Rejuvenation and Potential Immortality. Proceeding of the Royal Society B, 289, 20212434
https://www.sheldrake.org/immortality
____
Nine open questions suggested by the cellular rejuvenation hypothesis, and ways of answering them empirically (Supplementary to the above paper in Proc. Royal Soc. B)
https://rs.figshare.com/ndownloader/files/34255402

In this interview with Dr. Marc Stollreiter for the Realizing God Online Summit, Rupert Sheldrake shares his journey from atheism to spiritual awakening, discussing the intersection of science and spirituality, the power of prayer, and the revival of pilgrimage in modern times.

Attend the Summit
https://realizing-god.com

Running from 02/07/2025 - 02/16/2025, the summit includes workshops, Satsangs and interactive sessions led by esteemed spiritual guides from around the world.

Despite decades of research, no one knows how birds navigate to destinations hundreds of miles away. Rupert suggests that there is a field-mediated sense of direction through which they are attracted towards their goals. This is the first of a series of six talks on potential breakthroughs in the sciences released as an online course here:
https://www.sheldrake.org/online-courses

Related book:
Seven Experiments That Could Change the World
https://www.sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/seven-experiments-that-could-change-the-world


References
____
Satellite Tracking of Wandering Albatrosses
Jouventin,P. and Weimerskirsch, H. 1990. Nature 343, 745-748.
____
Perdeck, Albert C.
Two Types of Orientation in Migrating Starlings, Sturnus yulgaris L., and Chaffinches, Fringilla coelebs L., as Revealed by Displacement Experiments. Ardea, 55(1–2) : 1-2.
____
Netherlands Ornithologists' Union
https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.v1i2.p1
____
Magnetic Fields 1750-1980 
Bloxham, J. and Gubbins, D. 1985. The secular variation of tye earth’s magnetic field. Nature 317, 778-781.
____
World War 1 Pigeon Loft Photos
public domain
____
Mobile Loft Experiment at Coldham hall, Suffolk, 1989
With Robbie Robson of Bury St. Edmunds Racing Pigeon Club
Photo by: Jill Purce
____
Dutch Navel Pigeon Experiment
HNLMS Tydeman
June, 1995
Filmed by: Louis van Gasteren, Gregor Meerman and Jacqueline van Vugt

 

1998, UC Santa Cruz

The fractal idea of history, and millenia as the plateaus of history. These bifurcation periods as opportunities to influence the creation of the future. What kind of future or change are we trying to create? The need for the enhancement and spread of clarity. Psychic pets and their role in breaking the spell of rationalism. Psychedelics, the World Wide Web and psychic pets as forms of boundary dissolution. The need for change in the educational system. The problem of the rejection of mathematics. 

Related Book
Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/chaos-creativity-and-cosmic-consciousness

1998, UC Santa Cruz

"In the same way that the daughter of Zeus sprang full-blown from his forehead, the AI may be upon us without warning."
- Terence McKenna

A discussion on the evolution of consciousness as it relates to machines. Symbolic logic, nanotechnology and the possibility of a synthetic superintelligence. Terence compares the advent of superintelligent AI to the advent of language. Virtual computers as a route for AI to escape controls. How much control do we have in the evolution of machine intelligence? Quantum computers as a superior medium.

Related Book
The Evolutionary Mind
https://sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/the-evolutionary-mind

Terence predicts virtual computers... children can now build virtual computers in Minecraft:
https://minecraft.fandom.com/wiki/Tutorials/Redstone_computers

No Linux? No problem. Just get AI to hallucinate it for you
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2022/12/openais-new-chatbot-can-hallucinate-a-linux-shell-or-calling-a-bbs/

Hollyhock, 2006

Andrew Weil, MD, is a world-renowned pioneer in the field of integrative medicine, an approach to health care which encompasses body, mind, and spirit. Rupert and Andrew had a series of conversations over eight years at Hollyhock, on Cortes Island, BC, Canada.

This is an extract from Rupert's workshop with Brother David Steindl-Rast at Hollyhock, Cortes Island, BC in August, 2011.

00:00   Brother David Steindl-Rast: Making a thing out of the soul; AI Sentience 
04:08   Rupert Sheldrake: Golem/Frankenstein myths and robot consciousness
07:07   Rupert: Analog computers as possible framework for machine consciousness
07:57   David: So it is possible?
08:23   Rupert: Promissory Materialism will "prove" that people are machines 
09:04   Rupert: The genome wager with Lewis Wolpert 
14:13   David: Science as limited faith, one without hope
15:00   Audience: if Science and Faith both seek truth, they must converge
15:41   Rupert: we all have implicit biases; materialists in particular have huge blindspots
17:31   Audience: Truth emerging like a flower
17:54   Rupert: Institutionalized science, grants, educational conformity
19:32   David: How can you do it?
19:36   Rupert: I was forced to work independently, not recommended
21:04   Rupert's excommunication by Nature Editor John Maddox
22:29   Rupert: Pluralism in politics, but not science "we know the truth"
24:13   David: Questioning establishment power
25:32   Audience: A rebirth of creative thinking?
25:43   Rupert: Trouble with the academic system; funding reform; medical system fatigue; alternative therapies
29:10   Audience: Morphic resonance, homeopathy, interpersonal neurobiology, setting science free
30:17   Rupert: Comparative effectiveness research, pragmatic medical systems, most scientists are from Eastern cultures (India, China)
32:35   Audience: What if you talked to a radical cosmologist?
32:48   Rupert: Mainstream cosmology IS radical, multi-verse theory, laws of nature must be fixed
34:58   Rupert: Martin Reese's simpler hypothesis "get's rid of God"
36:09   Rupert: Stars being conscious too much for Martin Reese
37:48   Rupert: Brian Swimme, Thomas Berry, creation story, popularized science, natural philosophy

This is an extract from Rupert's workshop with Brother David Steindl-Rast at Hollyhock, Cortes Island, BC in August, 2011.

Hollyhock, 2005

Andrew Weil, MD, is a world-renowned pioneer in the field of integrative medicine, an approach to health care which encompasses body, mind, and spirit. Rupert and Andrew had a series of conversations over eight years at Hollyhock, on Cortes Island, BC, Canada.

Hollyhock, 2004

Andrew Weil, MD, is a world-renowned pioneer in the field of integrative medicine, an approach to health care which encompasses body, mind, and spirit. Rupert and Andrew had a series of conversations over eight years at Hollyhock, on Cortes Island, BC, Canada.

Rupert's appearance on the DemystifySci podcast. Video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxOs8pDjnqk

Anastasia completed her PhD studying bioelectricity at Columbia University. When not talking to brilliant people or making movies, she spends her time painting, reading, and guiding backcountry excursions. Michael Shilo also did his PhD at Columbia studying the elastic properties of molecular water. When he's not in the film studio, he's exploring sound in music. They are both freelance professors at various universities. 

After more than a hundred hours of private conversations on Zoom, Rupert and physicist turned neuroscientist Alex Gómez-Marín meet in person to discuss some of their favourite themes.

In this new installment, Rupert and Alex reflect on the scientific enterprise itself. Starting by acknowledging that new paradigms are near but never quite seem to make it, they address some of the deep reactionary forces that oppose such changes. This leads beyond the naïve understanding that science is just about data; core assumptions can make evidence irrelevant. Science must then be observed also from a sociological and historical perspective – the politics of knowledge are at stake. Deeper roots may be found in The Reformation: the current dogmatic materialist worldview is a kind of amnesic Protestantism squared. The conversation then leads to the obvious but non-trivial point that scientific facts are literally made, involving a consensus amongst experts who share the same model of reality. Other models (and other experts) are excluded. In that sense, Science (with capital S) is probably too Catholic. The future scientist will not have an easy time. And yet, all those minority reports are of majority interest.

This conversation was held on December 8th 2022 at Rupert’s house in London.

Dr Alex Gomez-Marin, PhD, is a Spanish theoretical physicist turned neuroscientist. He was a research fellow at the EMBL Center for Genomic Regulation and at the Champalimaud Center for the Unknown in Lisbon. He is currently the head of the Behavior of Organisms Laboratory at the Instituto de Neurociencias de Alicante, as an Associate Professor of the Spanish Research Council. He is also the director of The Pari Center in Italy. https://behavior-of-organisms.org

Many cultures have rites of passage, especially for people entering adulthood.  Among many Native American communities boys often underwent a vision quest by going out into the wilderness alone and fasting.  Rites of passage for girls were generally quite different. Monastic retreats also offer a kind of vision quest although people on retreat do not have to encounter the external struggles of the physical landscape, but like the early hermits have to wrestle with internal struggles.  In this dialogue Marc and Rupert explore the potential for vision quests in the modern world.  

A three-way conversation, or trialogue, in two parts.

Part 2 Festivals, a calendrical reform and 'pharmacological intervention'. Oscillating models of chaos, creativity and the imagination. Eleusis as a great turning point. The Virgin of Guadalupe. The Faustian pact with the physical world. The cultural cul-de-sac of the dominator mode. Restoring partnership values, opening our lives to chaos and the world soul. Chaos as Gaian fury and as a moment of opportunity. A forward escape into technology? Included in Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness first published as Trialogues at the Edge of the West Chapter 3. 

This Trialogue and others are available in book form:
https://www.sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/chaos-creativity-and-cosmic-consciousness

Ralph Abraham, PhD, is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, author, and pioneer in the fields of Chaos theory, computer graphics, visual mathematics and dynamical systems. 

Terence McKenna was an ethnopharmacologist, shamanologist, and author, known for his theories on plant hallucinogens and the novelty wave, and the bardic skill with which he conveyed his ideas. Sadly Terence died aged 53 on April 3, 2000.

After more than a hundred hours of private conversations on Zoom,  Rupert and physicist turned neuroscientist Alex Gómez-Marín meet in person to discuss some of their favourite themes.

In this installment, they address the problem of memory localization. Rather than taking for granted that memories are "stored" inside our heads and rushing to speculate about where and how, they instead entertain the idea that memories could be both everywhere and nowhere in particular -- memories are in time, not in space. To make such thoughts more thinkable, they discuss the recurrent historical failures to find actual memory traces in brains and bring forth some of the pioneering ideas of the French philosopher Henri Bergson in the context of current neuroscience. They also discuss concrete experiments to test such hypotheses and reflect more widely on the nature of form and the idea that the laws of nature may be more like habits than eternal edicts. They end by discussing the need for scientific pluralism.

You can listen to a former Sheldrake & Gomez-Marin encounter on The Future Scientist conversation series here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpr0QP4Qcvk 

... and a plea for a Bergsonian neuroscience here :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQxNlot9SxU&t=9s

This conversation was held on December 8th 2022 at Rupert’s house in London.

Gomez-Marin’s site
https://behavior-of-organisms.org

A three-way conversation, or trialogue, in two parts.

Part I How can chaos theory and full access to the imagination aid us in our understanding of the world and in the creation of our future? Chaos in mythology. The repression of chaos, the rise of patriarchy and the fall into history. The chaos revolution. Bringing chaos tangential to the burning planet. Vision plants and shamanism. Our 'secret history' and how it relates to the Gaian mind. The creative act as the night sea journey. The living mystery of the imagination. Dominator and partnership culture. Included in Chaos, Creativity and Cosmic Consciousness first published as Trialogues at the Edge of the West Chapter 3.

This Trialogue and others are available in book form:
https://www.sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/chaos-creativity-and-cosmic-consciousness

Ralph Abraham, PhD, is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, author, and pioneer in the fields of Chaos theory, computer graphics, visual mathematics and dynamical systems. 

Terence McKenna was an ethnopharmacologist, shamanologist, and author, known for his theories on plant hallucinogens and the novelty wave, and the bardic skill with which he conveyed his ideas. Sadly Terence died aged 53 on April 3, 2000.

This is an excerpt from an episode of the Spiritually Incorrect Podcast, with JD Lyonhart and Seth Hart.
https://www.spirituallyincorrectpodcast.com

JD Lyonhart is a fellow at the Cambridge Centre for the Study of Platonism and an Assistant Professor of Theology and Philosophy at Lincoln Christian University.

Seth Hart is a PhD candidate in science and theology at the University of Durham. He holds masters in theology from Oxford, Regent College, and Johnson University.