Holographic Universe and brain

 David Bohm was sitting on the porch of his house, with his feet up and watching the sun set, when the group of scientists came. 

One of the senior scientists said, “We went to the Himalayas to tell the Rishi that his assertion regarding the world being interconnected was true. But instead, he gave us a new statement “Brahma Satyam, jagat mithya” which means that the Creator is true but the world is untrue. This sounds contradictory because if the creator is true, how can his creation be a mirage or untrue? Well, till now all that the Rishis said has been correct, so we kept quiet and have come to you for answers.”

Bohm sat upright and smiled, “The latest studies in physics and neurology points to the same. Let me explain about these new frontier of science and soon my friend, Karl Pribram, one of the greatest neurophysician, will be joining us and he can add a few things.”

“Earlier I had told you about how existence is not static but rather in a constant state of flow and change, kind of invisible ether from which all things arise and into which all thins eventually dissolve. Indeed, even mind and matter are united. I call this theory as the holomovement. The terms holo and movement refer to two fundamental features of reality. The movement portion refers to the fact that reality is in a constant state of change and flux as mentioned above. The holo portion signifies that reality is structured in a manner that is very similar to holography. The universe is like a hologram.” Bohm asserted.

So, in order to understand what that means, we need to have some idea of the components and structure of a hologram. There are several explanations, but here is something of the idea. To construct a hologram you need two beams of light (lasers). One beam will bounce off the object that you want as a hologram, and the other beam will shine directly onto the special photographic plate or film. The interference patterns of those two light sources will interact on the plate. They swirl around and do not look like anything in particular if you are looking at the plate. If, however, you shine a laser beam through the plate of film, the object will be reproduced in the 3-dimensional form of a hologram. And furthermore, if you tear the plate apart and shine the beam of light through any of the pieces, the whole object can be reproduced. So, in essence, each part contains the patterns for the whole picture. 




An analogy to this is the broadcasting region of a radio antenna. In each smaller individual location within the entire area, it is possible to access every channel, similar to how the entirety of the information of a hologram in contained within a part.

Another analogy of a hologram is the way sunlight illuminates objects in the visual field of an observer. It doesn’t matter how narrow the beam of sunlight is. The beam always contains all the information of the object, and when conjugated by a lens of a camera or the eyeball, produces the same full three-dimensional image.

Bohm explained, “The tangible reality of our everyday lives is really a kind of illusion, like a holographic image. Underlying it is a deeper order of existence, a vast and more primary level of reality that gives birth to all the objects and appearances of our physical world in much the same way that a piece of holographic film gives birth to a hologram. 

Just as every portion of the hologram contains the image of the whole, similarly every portion of the universe enfolds the whole.This means that if we knew how to access it, we could find the galaxy in the mind. We could also find Krishna doing his dance with the gopis - because in principle the entire past and implications for the whole future are also enfolded in each small region of space and time. Every cell in our body enfolds the entire cosmos. So does every leaf, every dust, every dew.... 



This was fascinating. They had never heard anything like this, before. 


The scientists huddled together and closer to Bohm, hanging on his every word. One Indian scientist said, “Yatha  Bramhande , Thatha Pindanda”, which means that all that is in the Universe is also in the human body. Now, with your theory of the holograph, this seems true.”

Bohm nodded and added, “If you remember my earlier explanation of the Implicate and Explicate Order, then you will realize that a piece of holographic film and the image it generates are also an example of implicate and explicate order. The film is an implicate order because the image encoded it its interference patterns is a hidden totality enfolded throughout the whole. The hologram projected from the film is an explicate order because it represents the unfolded and perceptible version of the image.”

There was a horn and a car entered. It was Stanford neurophysiologist Karl Pribram, someone who had also become persuaded by the holographic nature of reality. It was getting chilly and the group shifted to the heated drawing room.

After the introductions, Pribram started, "I was puzzled by how and where memories are stored in the brain. After understanding the concepts of holography, I am now convinced that the human brain can be modeled as a hologram. For decades, numerous studies have shown that rather than being confined to a specific location, memories are dispersed throughout the brain."

An old scientist remarked, “I know for a fact that in a series of landmark experiments in the 1920's, brain scientist Karl Lashley found that no matter what portion of a rat's brain he removed he was unable to eradicate its memory of how to perform complex tasks it had learned prior to surgery. The only problem was that no one was able to come up with a mechanism that might explain this curious whole in every part nature of memory storage.”

Bohm jumped in the discussion, “Our brains are smaller pieces of the larger hologram and our brains contain the whole knowledge of the universe. So, you can see how each mind has a limited perspective of the universal hologram. Our brains are our windows of perception. Each mind always contains the whole picture, but with a limited and unclear perspective. We each have different experience in our lives, but each perspective is valid. Our brains mathematically construct objective reality by interpreting frequencies that are ultimately projections from another dimension, a deeper order of existence that is beyond both space and time. The brain is a hologram enfolded in a holographic universe.” 

Pribram suggested," The processes involve electric oscillations in the brain's fine-fibered dendritic webs, which are different from the more commonly known action potentials involving axons and synapses. These oscillations are waves and create wave interference patterns in which memory is encoded naturally. In a hologram, any part of the hologram with sufficient contains the whole of the stored information. This model allows for important aspects of human consciousness, including the fast associative memory that allows for connections between different pieces of store information and the non-locality of memory storage (a specific memory is not stored in a specific location i.e. a certain neuron)"

“The brain is like the laser beam that shines through the holographic film to interpret the patterns. Therefore, depending on the direction and frequency of the beam that you send through the film, a different hologram will appear. So, if applied to the brain, consciousness literally becomes the co-creator of the reality portrayed depending upon its angle of perception.” Pribram continued his explanation simply.

Bohm was excited, “Therefore, mind contributes to the phenomenon of creation of reality itself, not just to the knowledge of it. Every action starts from an intention in the implicate order. In other words, in the implicate order, as in the brain itself, imagination and reality are ultimately indistinguishable. Therefore, intent and consciousness in the mind can ultimately manifest as realities in the physical body. So it appears that through the use of images, the brain can tell the body what to do, including telling to make more images, to influence our health and control our physical form.”

The leader of the scientists, a young handsome man of around 40 called Jack Duncan got up and said, “Thanks David and Karl, for all these mind-altering theories. We now understand that jagat or the world is a mirage and a projection – a maya. All that the Rishis were saying is being proved correct. How can that happen, these guys have no research model, no technology and no rigorous experimentation? Can someone explain, please?”