After chemists crystallised a new chemical for the first time, it became easier and easier to crystallise in laboratories all over the world. After rats at Harvard first escaped from a new kind of water maze, successive generations learned quicker and quicker. Then rats in Melbourne, Australia learned yet faster. Rats with no trained ancestors shared in this improvement. Rupert Sheldrake sees these processes as examples of morphic resonance. Past forms and activities of organisms, he argues, influence organisms in the present through direct connections across time and space.Individual plants and animals both draw upon and contribute to the collective memory of their species. Sheldrake, now Director of the Perrott-Warwick Project supported by Trinity College, Cambridge, reinterprets the regularities of nature as being more like habits than immutable laws. Described as 'the best candidate for burning there has been for many years' by Nature on first publication, this updated edition will raise hackles and inspire curiosity in equal measure.
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About the Author
Dr Rupert Sheldrakeis a biologist and author of more than 80 scientific papers and ten books, including the bestselling Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home. He was a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge and a Research Fellow of the Royal Society. He haswritten for numerous newspapers including the Guardian, where he had a regular monthly column, and for a variety of magazines,including New Scientist and the Spectator.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful
By JCPC
Format:Paperback
For anyone who feels there's "more to life" than our present scientific view lets on, and doesn't want to float away in a mystical denial of reality, this book is just what's needed. Rupert Sheldrake almost certainly does not have all the right answers but more importantly he is asking the right questions.
As a medic and PhD engineer, I am sure that future generations will look back at our present mechanical model of life and say "How on earth did they think this would explain the observed facts?" This is your chance to be in at the beginning of phase 3 in the understanding of biology (phase 1: it's all a mystery; phase 2: it's just chemistry...).
The most mind-expanding book I've read in the last year.
As a medic and PhD engineer, I am sure that future generations will look back at our present mechanical model of life and say "How on earth did they think this would explain the observed facts?" This is your chance to be in at the beginning of phase 3 in the understanding of biology (phase 1: it's all a mystery; phase 2: it's just chemistry...).
The most mind-expanding book I've read in the last year.
29 of 32 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
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Length:
8:38
Mins
As the late American Attorney General, Robert F. Kennedy, once stated in a speech he delivered in South Africa decades ago, "Moral Courage" is the willingness to incur the backlash of your own peer group for the sake of the truth as you see it.
Dr. Rupert Sheldrake has demonstrated such Moral Courage for decades, himself - standing up under the poorly substantiated ridicule of the scientific community for his daring theories of Formative Causation, Morphogenetic Fields, and Morphic Resonance, which contradict the unproven (but generally accepted in mainstream scientific circles) material reductionist theories of a random, chaotic and mindless universe giving birth to an equally random and mindless process of abiogenesis and evolution.
This book is the up-to-date compilation of his more than 30 years of research and experimentation. It will surprise, challenge and enlighten you.
Dr. Rupert Sheldrake has demonstrated such Moral Courage for decades, himself - standing up under the poorly substantiated ridicule of the scientific community for his daring theories of Formative Causation, Morphogenetic Fields, and Morphic Resonance, which contradict the unproven (but generally accepted in mainstream scientific circles) material reductionist theories of a random, chaotic and mindless universe giving birth to an equally random and mindless process of abiogenesis and evolution.
This book is the up-to-date compilation of his more than 30 years of research and experimentation. It will surprise, challenge and enlighten you.
25 of 28 people found the following review helpful
By C. G. Boden
Format:Paperback
A scholarly work which would be a meaty read for an A-level science student, giving a clear view of the new approach to sciences pioneered by James Lovelock, Bruce Lipton, and the author inter alia. I was given this book by an intelligent friend who was unable to get through it.
The book is well structured. In 220 pages of thesis he describes several poorly-resolved questions in biology and presents his theory of morphogenetic fields. He applies it convincingly to biological problems (why things grow into a certain form, inheritance of form and behaviour, instinct and learning) with a sprinkling of chemistry (crystal growth and form) and physics (upward drift of melting points). There follows an appendix suggesting ten experiments which could prove the existence of morphic fields and 53 pages of notes references and indexes.
Despite his very well thought out theory and the interesting subject matter, the style, language and terminology that Sheldrake uses (perhaps through necessity) in this book are unlikely to appeal to an "average person". I much preferred and enjoyed his "Seven Experiments that could Change the World" which is a much lighter and more accessible read, yet simply describes his "morphic field" in a far more interesting way.
The book is well structured. In 220 pages of thesis he describes several poorly-resolved questions in biology and presents his theory of morphogenetic fields. He applies it convincingly to biological problems (why things grow into a certain form, inheritance of form and behaviour, instinct and learning) with a sprinkling of chemistry (crystal growth and form) and physics (upward drift of melting points). There follows an appendix suggesting ten experiments which could prove the existence of morphic fields and 53 pages of notes references and indexes.
Despite his very well thought out theory and the interesting subject matter, the style, language and terminology that Sheldrake uses (perhaps through necessity) in this book are unlikely to appeal to an "average person". I much preferred and enjoyed his "Seven Experiments that could Change the World" which is a much lighter and more accessible read, yet simply describes his "morphic field" in a far more interesting way.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
A great book
Rupert Sheldrake looks as the inner workings of nature and I enjoy his books. I can see why people who are alternative like them, because he is demonstrating the wonders of nature... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Lisamay
5.0 out of 5 stars
The New Age scientific revolution begins
A New Science of Life by Rupert Sheldrake, Blond & Briggs, 1981; Paladin, 1983; 238 ff
This book was written by Cambridge biologist Rupert Sheldrake during the time he... Read more
This book was written by Cambridge biologist Rupert Sheldrake during the time he... Read more
Published 7 months ago by Dr. H. A. Jones
2.0 out of 5 stars
Potentially good content, very badly written.
When struggling through this book, I can see some of the ideas Sheldrake is trying to put forward. It's good that he is trying to answer some of the questions we all have in the... Read more
Published 15 months ago by Jerusha Black
3.0 out of 5 stars
A New Science of Life
OK. It's all here - the only problem is that the cover has fallen off. This is a first! Could you have glued it back on before the product was sent?
Published 20 months ago by CraigG
5.0 out of 5 stars
A New Science of Life
The fact that this is the second copy I've bought speaks for itself - a fascinating argument that has to be spread widely.
Published on 13 April 2011 by Alison
4.0 out of 5 stars
A New Science of Life
This is a really interesting book, explaining as it does some of the more strange things that occur in life. It is both entertaining and well written. Read more
Published on 6 July 2009 by P. Nightingale
5.0 out of 5 stars
Sheldrake Still Going Strong
A new and updated edition of this important work first published in the eighties. Addresses some of the difficulties present in the mainstream Darwinian theory of evolution.
Published on 3 Mar 2009 by P. Southwood
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