Expanding the Scope of Science
ORIGINS
David Lorimer introduces the Galileo Commission Report
REMIT
The Galileo Commission was founded in 2017 with a view to expanding the worldview of science beyond its limiting materialistic assumptions, which are seldom explicitly examined. A central and widely held assumption is that the brain generates consciousness and is therefore extinguished at death.
Following widespread consultation in 2018 with 90 advisers representing 30 universities worldwide, we have published the Galileo Commission Report, written by Prof Dr Harald Walach and entitled Beyond a Materialist Worldview – Towards an Expanded Science. The report has been widely endorsed as a groundbreaking document, so we encourage you to support our movement by joining the Galileo Commission either as a Professional Affiliate or a Friend. There is also a Summary Report and a Layman’s Report, and a brief summary of the argument is available in a number of languages. We encourage you to read and support Dr Athena Potari’s Call for a Renaissance of the Spirit in the Humanities and to read our edited book Spiritual Awakenings, which documents the transformative experiences of 57 scientists and academics.
A Call for a Renaissance of the Spirit in the Humanities
The “Call for a Renaissance of the Spirit in the Humanities”, written by Dr Athena D. Potari, is a pioneering project aiming to raise awareness regarding how the prevailing paradigm of materialism affects the ways in which knowledge is approached within the context of the Humanities. In line with the Galileo Report, which discusses the importance of liberating the positive sciences from the limitations of the paradigm of scientific materialism, this Call aims at making the case for the Humanities as well. The Call explores how recent developments in scientific studies on consciousness, and the ensuing understanding that consciousness is primary and unified, can inform our understanding of what it means to be “human” with correspondingly appropriate epistemologies, as well as how we approach key areas of human activity, including ethics, politics and the environment.What people say…
Featured book
Featured podcast
Spiritual Awakenings – Marjorie Wollacott & David Lorimer (Eds)
Scholars share the experience of their own spiritual awakening and journey, including encountering challenges to their credibility in academia, if they shared these experiences. Their comments about transformation in values, beliefs, and approaches toward life are very moving, expressing a deep inner wisdom and connection, not only with humanity, but with the earth and cosmos.
Recent News
Britain’s unethical Covid messaging must never be repeated – Dr Gary Sidley
Denying individuals rational choices, and an over-reliance upon subliminal influence, is both unethical and undemocratic. Transparency regarding how government departments use ‘nudge’ techniques is now long overdue.
The Case Against Vaccine Passports and Mandates – Oliver Robinson
In summary, arguments at all four levels analysed here point in the same direction: vaccine passports and mandates must be dropped immediately by any country or state that has adopted them. Vaccines have protected the elderly and vulnerable from COVID-19 since being rolled out, but that does not by any means equate to becoming a requirement for participation in society and the economy. Liberal democracies must trust the foundational principles of informed consent, bodily autonomy and equality of opportunity. We must respect those who draw different conclusions from what remains an inconclusive situation in relation to vaccine side-effects and benefits. The story is still unfolding.
Marilyn Monk on how science connects the whole world
The inability of individuals and society to perceive spiritual reality has, today, become critical. But could our crisis itself be significant? Might it be valuable, even necessary for the evolution of human consciousness?
Axiology of Nature-Consciousness Reality – Mukhopadhyay, AK
Perception cannot change the fundamentals. The fundamentals of the reality across the nature-consciousness spectrum have been described without any filter, and use of any methodological reduction orchestrated or otherwise. Consciousness-as-such, consciousness-as-experienced, and consciousness-as-articulated have been laid bare to accommodate respectively the spirit, humanities, and science. The Multiversity-inspired proposed Worldview takes care of multiple universe(s), our universe, and the four-dimensional world respectively in terms of nondual reality, biological reality and material reality, and in the process constructs an unbroken wholeness of the Akhanda reality. The relevance of the Worldview in consciousness study and the impacts on psychology and psychiatry has been discussed.
Symposium: NDES & THE MIND-BRAIN RELATIONSHIP
Online Friday-Sunday, Feb. 11-13, 11:00 am-4:30 p.m. EST Days 1 and 2 - Experts in near-death experiences (NDEs), psi phenomena, past-life memories, shared-death experiences, terminal lucidity, evidential mediumship, veridical after-death communication (ADC), neurological evidence, and philosophical considerations. Day 3 - Experiencers and practitioners: physician NDErs, an evidential medium, induced ADC therapists, and out-of-body/astral projection experiencers.
Critically review of the ‘Freudian/Kleinian psychoanalytic tradition’ and the ‘Spiritual Psychology/Parapsychological tradition’ – Joe Bartholomew
When we feel down in the dumps and wallowing in the gutter we need minds, hearts, and souls in perfect harmony who can use the eloquence of their voices as finely tuned instruments to inspire eco-heart-felt revolutionary action. That is, if we really want to see social, political, economic, and ecological change and progress in our own lifetimes. John Mason has done a great service to both the Psychoanalytic tradition and the Parapsychological tradition. He has achieved this by uncovering the truth obscured by various factors to produce a more complete picture above and beyond the stasis of perceived circumstance.
