Synchronicity, Science, and Soulmaking: Understanding Jungian Syncronicity Through Physics, Buddhism, and Philosphy [Paperback]

Victor Mansfield (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 31, 1998

The central motif running through fascinating and thought-provoking book is Jung's most misunderstood concept, synchronicity. By deftly meshing his interpretation of synchronicity with key concepts in quantum physics and Middle Way Buddhism, Victor Mansfield brings about a radical shift in our worldview.

"a masterful treatment of the subject matter. The physics was well-done and understandable. ... I liked the interspersion of powerful synchronicity stories throughout the text -- it kept bringing the reader back to the mysterious and marvellous domain of synchronicity". -- Dennis Merritt, PH.D. Jungian Analyst

"Mansfield has brought the mysterious realm of quantum physics together with the insights of Buddhism in clear and simple terms. Definitely a book to take with us into the next millennium". -- Michael Toms New Dimensions Radio

Product Details

• Paperback: 270 pages
• Publisher: Open Court (December 31, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0812693043
• ISBN-13: 978-0812693041
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #912,107 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

69 of 70 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating: the best "new science" work in decades, September 4, 1998

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[e-mail] (Texas, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Synchronicity, Science, and Soulmaking: Understanding Jungian Syncronicity Through Physics, Buddhism, and Philosphy (Paperback)

This book is a fascinating excursion through contemporary quantum physics, buddhist emptiness, and Jungian psychology. Much ado has been made in pop-science about the failure of the Cartesian dichotomy and the search for quantum-informed world-views, quantum physics and its possible effects on health, consciousness, the nature of reality, and so on and on. Some of it is rather interesting. But most of those works remain at the level of sympathetic magic, turning on mere analogies. This book was written by a practicing physicist and buddhist, and next to it, the highly influential (but much over-rated) "Tao of Physics" pales by comparison. The author delves deeply into what it might mean to our world-view to take seriously the non-local nature of physical reality and the fundamental connectedness of the universe, as implied by Bell's theorem, buddhist "dependent origination," and synchronicity. If, like me, you remember learning about Kant and the death of metaphysics, you will find the description of Bell's theorem as "experimental metaphysics" (p. 75) simply staggering. And if nonlocality does prevail in our universe, it provides some support for Jung's concept of synchronicity, not just for explaining those eerie coincidences but as an enlarged perspective on linear cause-and-effect. Remember that Jung was not a physicist so in some ways his theory needs to be informed by a physicist. And anyone who's had a powerful synchronicity experience knows how radically it can upset our day-to-day notions of physical reality and causality. Much of the virtue of this book is that it isn't just some philosophical arguments and popular science spiced up with a few graphs and equations. The book creatively weaves a view of physics, mind, and causality around descriptions of the lived synchronicity experience of various friends and colleagues. For example, the "Philosopher's Stone" describes a woman's shamanic experience of discovering a stone face by a lake-shore (pp. 161-165). "The spirits of the lake love to hear their old name," she was told, "They respond." So she chanted. Well, they responded by directing her, via feeling warmth on a cold day, to a small stone face laying on the shore (see cover photo). It turned out to be named Singing Stone, from an old Native American story about a woman's search for her true self, and the stone itself "a compelling carrier for the archetype of the self." The story about Jung's "Aion" spontaneously leaping several feet off a bookshelf (p. 162) is equally astonishing. I'm a little surprised the author doesn't discuss Everett's "many worlds" interpretation of quantum mechanics--after all, it gets rid of the need for a external observer of the universe by postulating the existence of all alternative event outcomes, with some rather obvious connections to transmigration. Despite my sympathy, I also have to wonder about the merit of this connection with "soul-making"--after all, buddhists don't believe in a soul, and Jungian individuation is a quite different goal than Eastern liberation (p. 212). But, given Jung's highly ambivalent attitude toward Eastern liberation, that is a question that *no one* has answered yet. The author deserves a great deal of credit for even addressing that issue, let alone for writing such an interesting book so clearly at odds with normal materialistic science. Even if all you got was the beautiful drawing of the Indian god, Ganesha (p. 74), the great photo of the impish John Bell (p. 122), or the fabulous picture of Pauli and Bohr, both middle-aged and merrily spinning a top like a couple of schoolboys (p. 10), this book would be worth its price. I strongly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in Jungian synchronicity, or more than a passing interest in either of the other 2 topics. In fact, if you're reading this review, maybe now is time to buy the book!

39 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Update to Capra's 'Tao of Physics', April 7, 2000

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nonamespecified - See all my reviews

This review is from: Synchronicity, Science, and Soulmaking: Understanding Jungian Syncronicity Through Physics, Buddhism, and Philosphy (Paperback)

We need more multidisciplinarians like Mansfield and Capra these days. The story of Pauli and Jung is as fascinating as that of Bohr and Einstein, it seems to me, and deserves a book and a movie all its own! One omission in this book, is the connection between the 'kundalini' experience and synchronicity, as the former is well known to stimulate the latter, giving rise to a common phenomenon known as 'synchronicity storms'. Another omission is discussion of the schizophrenic experience of living in a totally synchronistic universe, which the book 'Madness and Modernism' by Sass describes quite well. As Dr. Peat says, Synchronicity is a key 'anomaly' in the worldview of science these days, and as much as critics like Victor Stegner would like to pooh-pooh it as totally subjective, (which merely begs the question of the locus of 'meaning' after all), it does seem to point to the 'bridge between matter and mind'. Science has far too rigidly adhered to Newton's adamant 'Hypotheses Non Fingo' in banishing all discussion of 'meaning' from physics. i.e. the 'meaningless universe' of Stephen Weinberg et. al. is merely an artifact of an ad-hoc methodology, not an inherent attribute of Nature. 'Meaning' is where it's at, after all! And why *should* it be purely 'objective'?

25 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mindblowing introduction to mind and matter - do you exist?, September 2, 1999

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[e-mail] (Nottingham, England) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Synchronicity, Science, and Soulmaking: Understanding Jungian Syncronicity Through Physics, Buddhism, and Philosphy (Paperback)

I approached this book with initial scepticism due to its subject matter; quantum physics and mentalism. However, this book is so gracefully written that it guides the reader with relative ease through Einstein's special relativity and seriously questions reality as we know. This book is thought provoking in the utmost - well worth it.