"The unbelievably vast and the infinitesimally small, eventually meet."
~ From the film, The Incredible Shrinking Man
It is a mathematical fact that the casting of a pebble from my hand alters the center of gravity of the universe."
~ Thomas Carlyle
"Things lie hidden in their opposites..."
~ Al-Alawi
A new breakthrough in physics is giving new credibility to the arcane sciences. Dr. Christopher Monroe and his colleagues at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colorado did an interesting experiment with a single atom.
Through the results of this experiment they proved that one atom can simultaneously exist in two vastly separated places! Scientists have known for some time that in the quantum world, a single object can exist in a multiplicity of forms and places. Of great fascination is that not only can a single object exist in more than one place, but also these two manifestations of a single object can respond instantly to each other's experiences.
For many centuries, one possible sign of a Sufi saint is that he or she has the gift of bilocality, or being able to appear at two places simultaneously. There are many stories of Sufi Sheikhs performing this wonder. Yet we can go still further in our explorations, and posit that if there is ONE ULTIMATE REALITY, then this new science is showing that ONE THING can manifest into an assortment of shapes and locations.
Dr. Monroe and his colleagues separated a single beryllium atom into different shapes in space. However, Dr. Monroe's true feat in this experiment is that he separated the two states of the one atom by a relatively enormous distance! Quantum events (such as what we have been speaking about) usually occur in the "micro scale" world, in other words, these events do not noticeably affect our everyday, mundane world.
Nevertheless, Dr. Monroe separated one beryllium atom so far apart that it represented a transition from the domain of quantum mechanics to the everyday "normal" world. In short, Dr. Monroe discovered a BRIDGE!
"Every atom bubbles the mystery." ~ Fakhruddin 'Iraqi
From the point of view of the scientific community, nothing is proven yet. A useful theory or model behind the experiment is not proof, they would point out to us. Ultimately (in the scientists view), we can prove nothing. Scientist do not speak of the Laws of the Universe. They speak of theories, i.e. the "theory" of relativity, the "theory" of evolution, and even the "theory" of gravity. Thorough testing is done to eliminate the variables and to find an alternative explanation. If the theory is testable, and the results of the test are shown to be repeatable and predictable, then a scientist would say it is verified. However, scientists know better than to expect a theory to be infallible, and so they keep it in the verification zone indefinitely.
Sufis now have a way to understand in a scientific sense, how by affecting the subtle realms, in other words, the quantum "micro" world, they may establish a releationship with the gross realms, in other words, the everyday "macro scale" world. This may provide some glimpse into why such tiny events such as lighting one candle, can provoke the universe into healing an entire human being.
From ~ The Sun at Midnight: The Revealed Mysteries of the Ahlul Bayt Sufis, pgs 470-471
Laurence Galian
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