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The Spectrum of Subtle Energies

      As usual, let's first touch bases with the wisdom traditions, then see how their profound insights might be updated with AQAL.

      Common to many traditions is the idea that, in addition to a spectrum of consciousness, there is a spectrum of energy. One such spectrum runs from gross physical energy, to etheric energy, to astral energy, to psychic energy, to causal energy. Without, at this point, arguing the details, let's simply accept that as a type of subtle-energy spectrum that might exist.

     In a general sense (which we will refine as we go along), these 5 levels of energy are essentially correlated with the 5 levels of consciousness (e.g., as presented in fig. 1). According to the traditions, these energies are not the same as consciousness; consciousness cannot be reduced to these energies; nor can these energies be reduced to consciousness. Rather, these levels of energy accompany and support their correlative levels of consciousness (so that a gross energy is the support of gross consciousness, a subtle energy is the support of subtle consciousness, a causal energy is the support of causal consciousness, and so on).

      You could represent the energy spectrum very much as in, say, figure 2 (physical energy, vital energy, mental energy, soul energy). Every level of both consciousness and energy higher than the lowest level (or "matter") was completely trans-material (metaphysical, supernatural). These energies were said to form concentric spheres of increasing expanse, but they are themselves, in every essential way, non-gross-material (or ontologically pre-existing and separable from matter).

     The essential points of that formulation can still be true, and are true, I believe. But with the naturalistic turn in the AQAL matrix's self-understanding, we can recognize that many of the items that the premodern traditions believed were entirely trans-material or meta-physical are actually correlated with complexifications of matter, not a mere transcendence of matter.

      We suggested that this naturalization of metaphysical occasions has three important components: complexity of gross form (in the UR) is correlated with an increasing degree of consciousness (in the UL), and, in the UR itself, a subtilization of corresponding energies. We can depict this, somewhat crudely, as in figure 7.

      In this figure, we see that the energy fields thought to be hovering metaphysically beyond matter actually emerge in intimate correlation with complexifications of matter. These subtle fields cannot be reduced to matter, but neither are they ontologically disconnected from matter altogether. The ghost disconnected from the machine is actually intimately correlated with the degree of complexity of the machine. Every mind has its body. Subtler, more sophisticated mind simply means subtler, more sophisticated body. As we will soon see, the traditions (particularly Vedanta and Vajrayana) had a very profound understanding of the relation of gross, subtle, and casual consciousness with gross, subtle, and causal bodies—but they did not fully grasp connecting hypothesis #3 (namely, the relation of all of that to the complexifications of gross matter).

Figure 7. Complexification of Gross Form Is Accompanied by Subtler Energies.
click to enlarge

      The missing, connecting link is suggested in figure 7. In this figure, we simply assume the existence of the energy spectrum as given by the traditions (physical, etheric, astral, psychic, etc.), and then do something the traditions themselves could not do: take advantage of modern science and correlate the emergence of these subtle fields with the evolutionary record, and thus track the correlation of subtle energies with complexities of gross forms. Here is a brief elaboration of what we find (as summarized in figure 7):

      The earliest forms of evolution—such as quarks, electrons, protons, atoms, and molecules—are accompanied by the four, major, gross energy-forces: electromagnetic, gravitational, strong and weak nuclear . It is common to refer to these as "physical" energies or "gross" energies, and that is fine, as long as we remember that these "physical" or "material" energies are not the whole of matter-energy, but simply the lowest levels of matter-energy (i.e., the lowest levels of mass-energy in the UR quadrant). Generally speaking, gross energies surround their associated material bodies in various sorts of fields; the energy itself, in its typical form, propagates as a wave/particle event.

      With the emergence, during evolution, of the complex material forms that we call "life" (starting with viruses and prokaryotes), a more subtle energy—often called "etheric"—emerges. As indicated, these etheric energy fields are said to surround the physical energy fields in a holonic fashion (i.e., as spheres of increasing expanse).

     Note: in AQAL metatheory, the manifest Kosmos is composed of holons in various perspectives. A holon is a whole/part—or a whole that is simultaneously a part of other wholes—e.g., a whole atom is part of a whole molecule, which is part of a whole cell, which is part of a whole organism, etc. Individual holons, all the way down—atoms, quarks, fermions—possess a spark of sentience or prehension, so that all individual holons are sentient beings. All individual holons are also what Whitehead called " compound individuals ," or individuals compounded of junior individuals: a cell is a compound individual, compounded of molecules, which are compound individuals compounded of atoms, which are compound individuals compounded of....

     When any occasion (or holon) is looked at in a first-person stance ( as an "I" or sentient being), then we find the types of phenomena listed in the UL quadrant (such as prehension, feeling, impulses, awareness, consciousness, etc.) When that same holon is looked in a third-person or objective fashion ( as an "it" ), then we find the types of phenomena listed in the UR quadrant (such as a holon's mass, morphic form, and energy, all of which can be described in third-person or "it" terms, unlike the UL, which can only be described in "I" terms). We are at this point tracing the evolution of holons by looking at their exterior forms of matter and energy (i.e., events in the UR quadrant) as they emerged in the course of evolution.

     The general stages of this evolutionary emergence are suggested in figure 7 with regard to their UR forms. When a holon is looked at in a third-person or objective stance, we find that material bodies—such as atoms, molecules, cells—are surrounded by energy fields which are, by connecting hypothesis #3, correlated with increasing degrees of complexity of gross material form. Each of these energy fields—physical, astral, etheric, etc.—surround and envelop their junior fields just as their associated material forms surround and envelop their junior forms (e.g., a cell envelops molecules, which envelop atoms, etc.). Thus, the compound individuals and their associated energy fields are both "holonic." We will return to these points as we proceed.

      As evolution continues to produce a complexification of gross form, types of life emerge that begin to interpret environmental stimuli in very sophisticated ways, using organ systems such as a neural net and a reptilian brain stem. With the emergence of a brain stem and a paleomammalian limbic system, an even subtler energy—called "astral"—also begins to emerge. "Astral" can mean many things, but it particularly means a powerful emotional energy field—subtler than physical and etheric—that pervades the living organism (e.g., running through the acupuncture meridians) and also extends beyond it, enveloping the physical and astral fields in a holonic expansion. (We will see these holonic energy fields when we come to a Burr diagram, below.)

      But, again, it is not that these energy fields are radically meta-physical, because if they were, then all of these fields (because they would not in any way be bound to physical objects), could and would be surrounding all physical objects, whereas in fact, these fields only emerge with (and surround) material objects of a corresponding degree of complexity. A rock does not have an emotional field; a worm does not have a mental field, and so on. Taking advantage of the modern (or naturalistic) turn allows us to anchor these fields in nature without reducing them to nature. A natural history of these energy fields shows that they emerge in correlation with the degree of complexity of gross form, and both of them together (the form and its corresponding energy) are the UR correlates (or the observable exteriors) of the UL increase in degrees of consciousness. The forms and energies can be seen in third-person perspective (they are the "it" components, or the objective components, of all morphic units, or holons seen from the exterior); the consciousness can be known only in first-person acquaintance (as the "I" of holons seen only from within).

      To continue the natural history of subtle energies: at the point where the evolution of increasingly complex gross form produces a triune brain, a yet subtler energy—known as "psychic"—emerges. "Psychic," in this case, simply means "thought fields," which are said to be produced by sustained mental activity. These fields surround and envelop the physical, etheric, and astral—but they ONLY emerge in, through, and around material forms that are complex enough to include triune brains.

      The important point is that all of those fields—physical, etheric, astral, psychic—are an inherent part of the corresponding holons in the UR quadrant. That is, the exterior of an individual sentient being (atoms to ants to apes) consists of the individual morphic form and its related energy fields. Since every holon is actually a compound holon, then each holon contains all of the previous subholons in its own makeup, each of which has its own interior prehension (UL) and exterior form and energy field (UR), and all of which continue their own relatively independent existence, but now enveloped and subsumed in the embrace of the higher holon whose subcomponents they now are—holons within holons, fields within fields, energies within energies, endlessly.

      This is why the consciousness, forms, and energy fields are all holarchical. They are all nested hierarchies of transcend and include. In the exterior domains, which are marked by their extension in spacetime, you can actually see many of these holarchies: in the UR, cells physically envelop molecules, which physically envelop atoms. Likewise, in the UR, the psychic energy field surrounds and envelops (transcends and includes) the astral field, which surrounds and envelops the etheric, which surrounds and envelops the physical....

      Harold Saxon Burr, the Yale physiologist who was one of the first great pioneers in the scientific (or third-person) study of energy fields, often used a diagram like figure 8, which represents experimentally detected energy fields.

Figure 8. Burr Diagram of Energy Fields.

      Let me emphasize that this is a highly schematic diagram, simply to show what is involved. It includes a " P-field," or any gross physical energies associated with this body; as well as an " L-field" (or "life-field") and a " T-field" (or "thought-field"). Note the holonic character. Of course, none of these energy fields are merely local, or confined simply to a physical and localized space. The local aspects of these energy fields—represented by the shells in the diagram—are simply the areas of highest density of the fields (or, alternatively, the areas of greatest probability of finding the signature energy). But many of these local aspects can indeed be physically detected with various instruments (e.g., Burr, Motoyama, Tiller). Also, well-known and highly respected psychics (e.g., Michal Levin) often perceive these energy shells in essentially the way Burr depicted them—fields within fields within fields. This is not to say they do not appear in other ways, only that the Burr diagram captures some typical and important aspects of these energies.

      The point is that, on both the interior and the exterior, evolution is indeed, in many significant ways, holarchical: it is transcend and include. And thus the holonic milestones of ongoing evolution and development—in consciousness, in complexification of form, and in energy-field emergents—show a nested hierarchical pattern: the whole of one wave becomes a part of the whole of the next. In this regard, Plotinus was right on the money: development is envelopment.

      Because each holon or compound individual contains or subsumes the matter and energy of its subholons, we can use a few more diagrams to schematically indicate what this might mean. With reference to the Burr diagram of holonic fields, each individual holon, as it emerges, has its own gross material form plus its associated energy fields: the greater the degree of complexity of the material form, the more energy fields surrounding it (hypothesis #3). This can be indicated as in figure 9.

Figure 9. Holonic Matter and Energy.

      In this figure, which represents actual occasions when looked at in an objective, third-person stance (i.e., holons in the UR quadrant), we can see that each level of increasing complexity of gross material form transcends-and-includes (or subsumes) its junior levels of material form—but all of those levels are compound individuals in their own right, and thus all of them retain their own energy signatures, so that the compound individual itself is compounded of both its previous, junior, material components (represented by the solid spheres) and their associated energy fields (represented by the surrounding shells).

      Although we have been focusing on individual holons and their energy fields in the Upper Right, the AQAL nature of all holons clearly implies that there would be, in the Lower Right, systems of collective energy fields associated with social holons, and I believe there are (we will return to that topic in later sections).

     By the way, there are no energy fields in the Left-Hand quadrants, of course, because those are aspects of holons that are first-person feelings, awareness, consciousness, and so on, whose exterior (or Right-Hand) correlates are mass and energy. All holons have four quadrants, which means all holons have interiors of consciousness and exteriors of form and energy (e.g., even subtle consciousness has a subtle body, and causal consciousness has a causal body, etc.), but consciousness is not itself energy, nor energy consciousness.

Terminology

      As is no doubt obvious, when it comes to subtle energies, terminology very quickly becomes a major problem. There is, first of all, a bewildering variety of terms now being used for these phenomena; second of all, there is a large variety of phenomena being proposed; and third, there is a proliferation of theories attempting to explain the phenomena.

      We have to start somewhere, so I am going to make a few semantic suggestions. These are suggestions only.

      One of the first items we need to address is the simple fact that, in any classifying scheme, the number of "levels" is rather arbitrary. In measuring temperature, for example, we can use a Fahrenheit scale (in which case there are 180 "degrees" or "levels" of heat between freezing and boiling water), or we can use a Celsius scale (in which case there are 100 levels). Which is correct? Both are fine, as long as we know which we are using.

      The same is true of levels of consciousness, levels of material complexity, and levels of subtle energy. This is not to suggest that something real isn't there, but simply that how we slice it up is largely arbitrary. The only thing that is not arbitrary, according to hypotheses #2 and #3, is that whatever the number of levels of consciousness, there are the same number of levels of matter-energy: they are the interior and the exterior of the same event.

      I am going to present some suggested terminology in two installments: first, a list of the minimum number of energy levels that we seem to need in order to cover most of the relevant issues; and then later, a more refined taxonomy involving families, genera, and species.

      There seem to be, at the present state of our knowledge, at least seven, major, different levels of energy. These roughly correlate with the seven chakras. They are indicated in Table 1, along with their suggested terminology. We will return to a refined taxonomy below.

Involution and Evolution

      Before we turn to some refinements of this scheme, there is one last major item that needs to be addressed, an item that has probably caused more theoretical trouble than any other single item, not only in the area of subtle energies, but in the overall area of spirituality and mysticism and their relation to modern science.

      Namely, where is the quantum vacuum located in that scheme?

      According to modern quantum and relativity physics, the amount of vacuum density energy contained in a single hydrogen atom is greater than the amount of all other energy stored in all known stars. In other words, a whole lot. Various intriguing facts about quantum reality, such as that one, have led a long string of scientists—from LeShan to Capra to Zukav to Wolf (and dozens who shall go nameless)—to in effect equate the quantum vacuum with something like spirit, supermind, the Tao, Brahman, the Void of Buddhism, and so on. The result, in my personal opinion, has been calamitous.

      To begin with, let's touch bases with the traditions and see where they might situate quantum realities. In QM theory, the wave potential is a vast source of creative energy that gives rise to denser material particles, including, eventually, particles such as quarks, electrons, and protons. It is this "creatrix" nature of the quantum potential that has led many scientists to equate it with a spiritual potentiality, a type of vast field of infinite potentials that is unbounded spirit or limitless consciousness itself.

      If that were the case, then the sequence of evolution would be something like this: out of the spiritual/quantum potential comes subatomic particles, which eventually gather together into atoms, which then gather together into molecules, which then form cells, which then form organisms.... In other words, in that scheme, the higher the level of evolution, the farther away from God you get.

      Something is clearly not quite right with that scheme. But once you (mis)identity spirit with the quantum potential, there is no other way to go. Precisely because the quantum potential is not actually a radically formless or nondual domain, it cannot serve as anything resembling a genuine spiritual reality, but rather is simply one aspect of a manifest realm that itself has qualities and quantities, and hence is not the radically Unqualifiable.

      The wisdom traditions are in strong and virtually unanimous agreement on this point. We already saw the general view of the traditions concerning emanation (or involution). Even if we use the simple 5-level version, it becomes very obvious what the quantum potential actually is.

     In involution or creation, radically unqualifiable Spirit decides to play a game of hide-and-seek, and hence "forgets" itself and throws itself outward to create a manifest world of manyness and otherness. As we saw, the first thing pure Spirit creates is soul, which then throws itself outward to create mind, which throws itself outward to create life (or prana), which then throws itself outward to create insentient matter (quarks, atoms). At the end of that ontological sequence, matter blows into existence as a crystallization and condensation of prana.

      In other words, the quantum potential is not spirit but prana. More technically, the quantum potential is not spirit-as-spirit, it is not spirit-as-soul, it is not spirit-as-mind, but rather, the quantum potential is spirit-as-prana, which gives rise to spirit-as-matter.

     What the QM formalisms are catching a brief glimpse of—in a merely third-person, abstract, mathematical form—is the staggering power of etheric-astral energy, out of which, as a sedimentation and crystallization, the entire gross material world arises. One version of this is: when the Schroedinger wave function collapses, prana gives rise to matter. But however we conceive it, that is the particular interface being activated.

The Two Truths Doctrine

The Problem

     Such, in any event, seems to be the simplest and easiest way to unite the best of the wisdom traditions and modern science in this particular area. On the other hand, the simplistic and dualistic notion that there is, for example, an implicate order (which is spiritual and quantum) and an explicate order (which is material and Newtonian) has caused enormous confusion, and is still doing so. But even David Bohm, who introduced that notion, eventually ended up tacking so many epicycles on it that it became unrecognizable.

     We just saw that, for the traditions, the energy side of the Great Chain of Being means that prana is implicate to gross mass-energy (which is explicate to prana). In turn, psychic energy is implicate to prana (which is explicate to psychic). And, of course, the causal is implicate to the psychic (and all lower) dimensions—"causal" is called causal because it is the cause, the start, the creatrix of the entire manifest sequence. Thus, each dimension in the Great Chain is implicate to its junior and explicate to its senior—a notion clearly spelled out by theorists from Fa-Tsang to Plotinus to Schelling.

      But if you absolutize physics (i.e., if you confuse the two truths [see below]), then you will collapse the entire Great Chain into merely one implicate and one explicate order. And one of the many problems with that crude scheme, as we saw, is that if you equate quantum realities with a type of ultimate spiritual Creatrix, then as that "spirit" gives rise to atoms, which give rise to molecules, which give rise to cells, which give rise organisms, and so on, then the higher the evolution, the farther away from God you are getting.

     Bohm vaguely realized this—and realized that his "implicate order," precisely because it was set apart from the explicate order, could not actually represent any sort of genuine or nondual spiritual reality. He therefore invented a third realm, the "super-implicate order," which was supposed to be the nondual spiritual realm. He then had three levels of reality: explicate, implicate, super-implicate. But because he was unfamiliar with the subtleties of Shunyata (see below), he was still caught in dualistic notions (because he was still trying to qualify the unqualifiable). He therefore added yet another epicycle: "beyond the superimplicate," to give him four levels of reality.

     Slowly Bohm had worked his way back to a crude version of the traditional Great Chain, which maintains that each senior dimension is implicate to its juniors. But all of this was supposed to be based on physics, which meant that Bohm was actually involved in a colossally reductionistic game that devastated the actual intermediate levels of the Great Chain (e.g., level 2, which is addressed by biology, and level 3, addressed by psychology, are all reduced to hidden variables in QM formalisms of gross matter-energy). This is not the union of science and spirituality, but the union of bad physics with bad mysticism.

Suggested Solution

      As suggested, this equating of quantum (or subquantum, or string, or symmetry) realities with some sort of nondual Spirit is perhaps the single biggest theoretical confusion in the entire field. First, because it confuses the nature of involution and evolution, and hence confuses the beginning of the involutionary sequence—namely, causal spirit—with the beginning of the evolutionary sequence—namely, the vacuum potential (or some such), which actually represents spirit-as-prana, not spirit-as-spirit. In chakra terminology, this view confuses the enormous creative potentiality of Kundalini coiled at the base of the spine (muladhara) with Kundalini at the top of the crown (sahasrara). We already know they are both Kundalini; but the muladhara is simply not the same thing as the sahasrara.

      But second, and more important, it violates the two truths doctrine.

      In the final analysis, the traditions are very clear that the "first step" in involutionary manifestation is indeed a nondual Mystery and cannot in any way be adequately captured (or even hinted at) by conventional truth, including any sort of science, leading-edge or otherwise. The reason is that the great traditions from Parmenides to Padmasambhava are unanimous in what Vedanta calls the "two truths" doctrine: namely, there exists absolute or nondual truth, and relative or conventional truth, and they are of radically different orders. Relative truth is concerned with states of affairs in the finite realm, such as "water molecules contain one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms," or "the Earth is 93 million miles from the Sun," or "the quantum vacuum potential in one angstrom of space is equal to 10 ^2300000 ergs," and so on. According to Nagarjuna, Shankara, and Plotinus, you can make definite true or false statements about such finite events, and truth in the relative realm is indeed a search for those conditions under which relative assertions are true. This is relative, finite, or assertoric truth.

     Not so absolute truth, about which literally and radically NOTHING may be accurately said in a noncontradictory fashion (including that one; if that statement is true, it is false). The great transcendental dialecticians—from Nagarjuna to Kant—have thoroughly demolished any such attempts, showing that every single one of the attempts to categorize ultimate reality (as, for example, by saying it is a quantum energy potential) turns on itself and dissolves in ad absurdum or ad infinitum regresses. They are not saying that Spirit does not exist, but simply that any finite statement about the infinite will categorically not work—not in the same way that statements about relative or conventional truth will work. Spirit can be known, but not said; seen, but not spoken; pointed out, but not described; realized, but not reiterated. Conventional truths are known by science; absolute truth is known by satori. They simply are not the same thing.

     For Nagarjuna, the Real is shunya (empty) of all such categorizations. For Shankara, once the world of maya is created, you cannot make any statement about maya whatsoever: when you are in maya, everything you say is false; when you awaken, there is no maya—in either case, you cannot make a statement about maya (nor, therefore, about the "creator" of maya). For Plotinus, the "One" is " not a numerical one"—in other words, the "One" is only a poetic metaphor for Suchness, not an actual model of Suchness. (The vacuum potential, on the other hand, is a model, not a metaphor.)

     In short, there is nondual or absolute truth, and there is relative or conventional truth, and one simply cannot take an assertion of the latter and apply it to the former. When we use finite words to try to represent ultimate Suchness, the most we get is poetic metaphor (or metaphoric statements), but the absolute is known only by a direct realization involving a transformation in consciousness (satori, sahaj, metanoia), and "what" is seen in satori cannot be stated in ordinary dualistic words, other than metaphors, poetry, and hints (if you want to know God, you must awaken, not merely theorize). Conventional and scientific truths, on the other hand, are assertoric, not metaphoric; they work with models, not poems; they are finite, dualistic, and conventional—all of which is fine when addressing the finite, dualistic, conventional realm.

     The Upanishads concur: nirguna Brahman is "one without a second," not "one among many." The vacuum potential has a second (or an "other," namely, gross matter); but Brahman has no such second, and therefore Brahman certainly cannot be identified with quantum anything. It cannot be known by assertoric or metaphoric knowledge, only by awakening. Even to call Brahman "infinite" is to miss the point entirely, since the word "infinite" only has meaning by virtue of its opposite ("finite"), and therefore even statements like "formless, empty, infinite, unqualifiable, nondual" are actually dualistic to the core. Zen tries to hint at this by saying that the absolute is "not two, not one."

     Unfortunately, the physicists who started equating quantum realities with the Tao were simply ill-versed in the philosophical subtleties of the great traditions. Oddly, the original and pioneering physicists themselves—from Schroedinger to Planck to Einstein—refused to make that confusion—refused, that is, to identify the findings of quantum or relativistic physics with any sort of spiritual reality (as I found out when I edited all of their writings on the topic of spirituality: see Quantum Questions: The Mystical Writings of the World's Great Physicists). Again, they were not denying Spirit—just the opposite—but they recognized that assertions about the relative realm are not of the same order as those about the absolute realm, and hence confusing them harmed the cause of both.

     The vacuum potential, then, is part of the relative, finite, manifest realm. For just that reason, it can be studied by science. It is a reality that, in at least some ways, is apart from other realities; it has qualities; it has quantities; it has dimensions. None of those statements can be predicated of Suchness, in any way other than poetic metaphors. However, precisely because the etheric, astral, and psychic fields are indeed part of the manifest realm, they are the proper object of study of science. No contradiction is involved in saying that the quantum vacuum is the protrusion into the gross realm of its immediate senior, implicate order: namely, prana.

      Doing so helps us, I believe, continue to move toward a truly integral theory of subtle energies.

Summary of Quantum Realities

      Following the great philosopher-sages (such as Nagarjuna, Plotinus, and Shankara), we can summarize the reasons that any sort of quantum or subquantum events are not Spirit:

1. Any quantum reality has some sort of characteristics, qualities, or dimensions that set it apart from manifest matter; but Spirit is radically shunya of drsti (empty of any and all qualities, including that characterization itself)—e.g., quantum vacuum has vast energy, spirit is unqualifiable.

2. Any quantum reality is different in some important ways from gross matter; but Spirit is not different from any manifestation, but is rather the Suchness or Isness of whatever arises.

3. Quantum reality has an opposite (e.g., non-quantum reality), but Spirit is radically nondual.

4. Spirit is dimensionless; quantum reality is merely in a different dimension.

5. And, most important, quantum material energy comes directly out of prana, not out of spirit (i.e., matter crystallizes out of spirit-as-prana, not spirit-as-spirit).

      On the other hand, realizing that quantum-relativistic-gross events are the surface events or manifestations of an etheric energy field allows us to adequately account for these events in a way that is consonant with: the great wisdom traditions, the leading-edge of science, the body of knowledge of subtle energies, and their AQAL reinterpretation. Gross mass-energy is a surface manifestation of etheric fields, which are surface to astral-psychic fields, which are surface to causal, which is the mysterious first film on spirit's Original Face as it manifests a world, moment to moment to moment....