Wolfgang Smith - Physics and Vertical Causation: The End of Quantum Reality

Praise for Physics and Vertical Causation

This short but remarkably rich work by Wolfgang Smith is a tour deforce , summarizing and synthesizing the seminal texts he has written over the past few decades. OthersIslamic philosophers of Persia in particularhave considered the cosmos, from the invisible to the angelic realms, as an icon and theophany, and have even identified vertical causality with the Divine Will, but these earlier traditional authorities had no knowledge of the sub-corporeal world as a distinct realmwhat Dr. Smith calls the physical. In this remarkable synthesis the author finds a cosmic home for the until-now homeless quantum mechanical domain within the world of traditional cosmology, an achievement of the utmost significance not only for physicists seriously interested in the foundations of their science, but also for philosophers and theologiansand, I might add, not only Christian but also Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, as well as of other faiths. May this book receive the global attention it deserves.SEYYED HOSSEIN NASR, University Professor, George Washington University

Prof. Smiths metaphysical reading of the cosmic icon by way of its Euclidean construction is on a par with Ren Gunons mathematico-metaphysical texts. It even surpasses these in two ways: first, by enabling us to literally see what falsifies the Einsteinian conception of space-time; and second, by empowering us to comprehend the cosmological teachings concealed in both the Old and New Testaments through the rediscovery of the cosmic trichotomy.BRUNO BRARD, author of A Metaphysics of the Christian Mystery

As every historian of the field well knows, we owe much of the enterprise of modern science to the studies of metaphysics and natural philosophy pursued by Christian thinkers during the Middle Ages, for it was precisely then that knowledge of the quantitative aspects of nature was not only proven metaphysically possible, technically practicable, and morally desirable, but whole fields of research were launched that resulted three centuries later in the flood of knowledge and mathematical techniques we still teach today in universities. But nowadays we face the opposite question: is mathematical knowledge the only knowledge available to us? Surely not, and no one is better qualified to guide us masterfully through this field than Professor Wolfgang Smith, who has already offered to the public the meta-physical key to understand the subject matter of quantum physics in his now-classic The Quantum Enigma . The reader of the present book can expect no less than a study that promiseslike its medieval counterparts which opened up the way to present-day mathematical physicsto bear fruit for centuries to come.RAPHAEL D.M. DE PAOLA, Department of Physics, PUC-Rio

The importance of this book by physicist and metaphysician Wolfgang Smith lies in the very reasons that will no doubt make it controversial: it challenges certain fundamental features of modern science, namely its epistemological assumptions, its reductive methodologies, and its ideological premises. In so doing, it embraces a broader and more traditional view of science as Scientia . This harmonizing, principial knowledge is grounded in an epistemology that respects its ontological roots; in methodologies that go beyond the purely quantitative aspects of mensuration and sensory instrumentality, extending to metaphysical and qualitative intelligibility; and in meta-physical foundations that account for the tripartite structure of reality and explain existence in terms of the principle of vertical causationwhich, as Dr. Smith explains, elegantly resolves the quantum enigma. Written lucidly and persuasively, the book summarizes much of his previous writings in the area, and caps a lifetimes work.M. ALI LAKHANI, Editor, Sacred Web

If we define physics as the science of measurement and distinguish it from the philosophy of physics, we are free to interpret the accumulated data of the former according to our own worldview. New experiments and measurements may offer a bit of guidance regarding which philosophical interpretations of the physical data are more (or less) consistent with the ultimate realitybut for the most part it remains an open question whether we can reach that reality by any one particular method. Professor Smiths latest manuscript, taken together with his earlier work, presents a traditional and ontological interpretation of physics with uncommon quality and competence. What is new about this book is the authors thesis that Einsteins theory of relativity does not conform to such an ontological interpretation, which leads him to conclude that the only tenable position is a geocentric cosmology. Critics who refuse to draw a clear distinction between physics and the philosophy of physics will have nothing of substance to contribute to this discussion.ALI SEBETCI, Computational Chemical Physicist

PHYSICS AND
VERTICAL CAUSATION

The End of Quantum Reality

ALSO BY WOLFGANG SMITH

Cosmos and Transcendence:

Breaking Through the Barrier of Scientistic Belief

Theistic Evolution: The Teilhardian Heresy

The Quantum Enigma: Finding the Hidden Key

Ancient Wisdom and Modern Misconceptions:

A Critique of Contemporary Scientism

Christian Gnosis:

From St. Paul to Meister Eckhart

Science & Myth: With a Response

to Stephen Hawkings The Grand Design

In Quest of Catholicity:

Malachi Martin Responds to Wolfgang Smith

(with Malachi Martin)

Rediscovering the Integral Cosmos:

Physics, Metaphysics, and Vertical Causality

(with Jean Borella)

This is a revised and expanded version

of the work originally published as part of

Rediscovering the Integral Cosmos (Angelico Press, 2018)

Copyright Angelico Press 2019

All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted,

in any form or by any means, without permission.

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Cover design: Michael Schrauzer

For Thea

Rest in Peace, Beloved

C O N T E N T S

LE PRSENT LIVRE EST SENSE, EN PREMIER LIEU, servir d'introduction un mode de causalit jusqu'ici mconnu et qui s'avre d'ailleurs omniprsent : ce que j'appelle la "causalit verticale". La question qui se pose immdiatement est bien sr de savoir comment cette causalit nouvellement dcouverte se rattache la causalit dont la physique s'occupe depuis l'poque de Sir Isaac Newton, que je qualifierai d'"horizontale" ; et il suffit de dire, titre de premire orientation, que la causalit verticale entre effectivement dans le champ de la physique, mais d'une manire que le physicien en tant que tel est en principe incapable de comprendre. En effet, comme nous le verrons, la causalit verticale - contrairement l'horizontale - n'est pas quelque chose de quantitatif, ni de descriptible en termes d'quations diffrentielles. Au risque de produire plus de consternation que d'claircissement, on pourrait dire que c'est une causalit qui mesure mais qui ne peut tre mesure elle-mme. Le point crucial est que, mme si l'existence d'une causalit verticale constitue l'une des deux cls qui rendent la physique contemporaine ontologiquement comprhensible, la CV est quelque chose d'invisible par nature pour le physicien, et s'avre donc incurablement philosophique. Elle relve d'ailleurs d'un genre de philosophie qui, l'poque post-kantienne, a t assez dmode : la mtaphysique . Il est donc en quelque sorte ironique que cette discipline prtendument "dpasse" merge la fin du XXe sicle comme le moyen longtemps recherch pour comprendre la dernire formulation de la physique : que cette philosophie soit ainsi la hauteur de son nom comme constituant effectivement une mtaphysique .