Peter Russell: From Science to God

"How is it that something as unconscious as the matter of the brain ever gives rise to something as immaterial as an experience?," muses Peter Russell in Peter Russell: From Science to God, a beautiful meditation exploring spirit, science and the miracle of consciousness.

Science cannot explain the fact that humans are conscious, says Russell, and he calls the human capacity for inner experience "the great mystery." According to Russell, who studied mathematics and theoretical physics before he delved into experimental psychology, humans are locked into the view that consciousness itself is somehow created by the brain. He believes that we need to question that basic assumption.

Russell tries to always notice "what is, as it is, without thinking about it," and observes that "our experience of the body is always in the present moment, but our thinking about it takes us out of the present."

Religions seek to open us to the inner world of the spirit, which Russell views as the inner world of the mind. Western science has proved very successful in explaining the world and advancing technology, but Russell's concern is that science has not provided humans with a value system. He calls for integration of scientific understanding with the wisdom of spiritual traditions. "The next great frontier is not outer space," Russell concludes, "it's inner space."