Bose-Einstein Condensate, Paganism and Spirituality

This Tuesday I was watching a documentary titled- " The Race for Absolute Zero " on NOVA on PBS. It narrates the story of modern science's quest to reach " Mt.Zero" or achieve absolute zero ( 0 Degee K) It started with efforts to liquefy gases like chlorine using high pressure. But for a long time scientists failed to liquefy the more common gases like oxygen, nitrogen and hydrogen. They called them "permanent gases" and could not explain why these gases could not be liquefied. Van der Waal theoretically explained that it needed more than high pressure to do so - lower temperatures. Using this knowledge and the "cascade" process James Dewar, a Scottish scientist became the first person to liquefy oxygen, nitrogen and hydrogen but was not recognized for his efforts at a level he desired. In fact it was a Dutch scientist ,Heike Kamerlingh Onnes , who was honored with a Nobel prize for his efforts to successfully liquefy Helium, a then recently discovered gas.

Liquified Helium called superfluid Helium or Helium II had very unusual properties- it could leak through otherwise impervious vessels, "creep up vessel walls with seemingly no viscosity, create "perpetual" fountains, etc. Other elements when cooled to near zero degree K also showed strange cryogenic properties including superconductivity- the abolition of resistance to flow of electricity-causing them to levitate over a magnet and move forward - a concept that gave birth to the idea of "wheel-less"transport.

Strange things happen to atoms at near zero temperatures. They tend to change from discrete particles to have wave like character and as temperatures go down further these waves get longer and start getting intertwined with each other making it difficult to identify a single atom from another- what they describe in the program as a "loss of individual identity." Such a state is known as the Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC)


Here's a transcript from the program :

In the quest to reach colder and colder temperatures, physicists in 1995 created a remarkable new form of matter—neither gas, nor liquid, nor solid—called a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). First envisioned by Albert Einstein and a young Indian physicist named Satyendra Bose in the 1920s, BECs reveal properties of quantum mechanics—their atoms seem to merge together and lose their individual identity, behaving less like discrete particles and more like waves. If you're having trouble picturing this, not to worry; even physicists who work with BECs find them mind-boggling. " (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/zero/atoms.html)

So how does it all relate to spirtuality?

Well, I am reading a book on Paganism titled 'Paganism-An introduction to earth centered relegions" by Joyce and River Higginbotham. They decribe the two fundamental concepts of paganism as Interconnectedness and Blessedness. All things in this universe are interconnected and none have flaws in them. The physical reality is just one aspect of reality that we perceive in time and space. As we go deeper below the conscious physical level we can experience other realities and appreciate the interconnectedness of the entire universe and finally reach a "Ground State" when we have lost all sense of identity. It sounds very similar to the concept of "Maya" in Hindu philosophy to describe the physical reality and the attainment of "Brahman" - the supreme ground state in the universe. We can, through our efforts, attain such states and come back to the present state with all the wisdom achieved by the transitions that transcend time and space.

The laws of nature as we understand them and theorized by scientists from the time of Sir Issac Newton have tried to explain the interactions of physical forces of nature. But as the Bose-Einstein condensate and properties of matter at extreme temperatures reveal,there might be different concepts and dimensions needed to explain such phenomenon. Time and space maybe just two dimensions that we understand in this physical reality and many more might be understood in the future. The String and M- theories predicts at least 10-11 more. We might have to transcend this physical realty and its constrains to understand and appreciate them.Time and space might be irrelevant in those dimensions Who know once we have figured out all of them we might better appreciate concepts like God and Divinity. Until such "time" we might have to depend on and be at the mercy of the whims of the external "God" and the forces of nature. I believe science would take us there but for that science has to reinvent itself to look beyond the physical realities using concepts and tools not traditionally used in pursuit of "scientific" truth.