I’m very proud of this success. Within one year 500 copies of “Kwantumfysica, informatie en bewustzijn” sold through the regular bookshops in The Netherlands. Copies sold through my own network of friends, acquaintances en students following my lectures are not counted here. The work was certainly not in vain.
In the meantime I am steadily working on the English version to which a new chapter on consilience is being added. This is going to be the introduction to that chapter:
14 Consilience
From Wikipedia:
“In science and history, consilience (also convergence of evidence or concordance of evidence) is the principle that evidence from independent, unrelated sources can “converge” on strong conclusions. That is, when multiple sources of evidence are in agreement, the conclusion can be very strong even when none of the individual sources of evidence is significantly so on its own. Most established scientific knowledge is supported by a convergence of evidence: if not, the evidence is comparatively weak, and there will not likely be a strong scientific consensus. “
In this book, starting with the scientific revolutions of de 17th century and, following the threads of its developing history until today, we have arrived at a perhaps baffling and remarkable result, hard science – physics – today is not in conflict with the idea of the existence of an of the body independent consciousness, also called the survival hypothesis. On the contrary, it supports it.
However, should this idea only surface after studying quantum physics and nowhere else in the science domain, this support would be as whacky as a table supported by only one leg. Therefore, the question is, is survival supported by published scientific research in other domains? Indeed, it is. Some of this research was already mentioned in preceding chapters. It is time now to pay a little bit more attention to all published and reviewed evidential material concerning consciousness being independent of the material body.
Paul J. van Leeuwen graduated in applied physics in Delft TU in 1974. There was little attention to the significance of quantum physics for the view on reality at that time. However, much later in his life he discovered that there is an important and clear connection between quantum physics and consciousness.
What he learned between then and today resulted in a post academic course in quantum physics for non-physicists. A little bit later he decided to put the contents of that course, and more, in a book published in Dutch: Kwantumfysica, Informatie en Bewustzijn – and started a website on the subject. He translated the Dutch version of his book in English, titled: ‘Quantum Physics is NOT Weird’.