The Living Universe by Duane Elgin Read Free Book Online Page A

renewed roughly every five days, and the outer layer of your skin every two weeks. We receive a new liver approximately every two months, and the bones in our body are fully replaced about every seven to ten years. Clearly, an important attribute of any living creature is continuous regeneration. When we look for evidence of regeneration in the universe, what we discover is so stunning as to be virtually incomprehensible, even to the modern mind accustomed to great marvels. Simply stated, it appears that the entire universe is being continuously regenerated at an incredibly high rate of speed.
    Until recently, the dominant cosmology in contemporary physics held that, since the Big Bang nearly 14 billion years ago, little more has happened than a rearranging of the cosmic furniture. Becausetraditional physicists thought of creation as a one-time miracle from “nothing,” they regarded the current contents of the universe—such as trees, rocks, and people—as constituted from ancient, non-living matter. This “dead-universe” theory assumed creation occurred only once—billions of years ago, when a massive explosion spewed out lifeless material debris into equally lifeless space; “life” then somehow mysteriously emerged as non-living atoms inexplicably organized and grew themselves into ever more complex forms (molecules, cells, organisms).
    In striking contrast, the living-universe theory views creation not as a one-time event but as an ongoing process. The entire universe is maintained moment-by-moment by an unbroken flow-through of energy. A regenerative perspective suggests why there is so much energy flowing through the universe—it is needed to continuously recreate the entire universe, including the fabric of space-time and matter-energy. 12
    If we go to the heart of an atom, for example, what we find is almost entirely empty space. If the central core or nucleus of an atom were expanded to the size of a golf ball, the electrons that circle the core would extend outwards a mile and a half. The electrons that circle the nucleus of the atom are moving so fast—several
trillion
times a second—that they manifest as a blurred cloud of motion. Beneath the solid surface of material objects, an extraordinary flow of activity is occurring. If you were to look at a yellow dress for just one second, the electrons in the retinas of your eyes would vibrate with more waves than all the waves that have beaten upon all the shores of all the Earth’s oceans in the last 10 million years. 13 Physicist Max Born writes, “We have sought for firm ground and found none. The deeper we penetrate, the more restless becomes the universe; all is rushing about and vibrating in a wild dance.” 14
    The deeper we look into the heart of matter, the less substantial it seems. Upon close inspection, matter dissolves into knots of energy and space-time whose dynamic stability gives the appearance of enduring solidity. It is amazing that this hurricane of flowing motion comes together to present itself as the ordinary world around us. As giants, it is easy for us to overlook the ongoing miracle that is taking place at a microscopic level.
    If we go into the heart of space, what we find is dynamism, energy, and structure. Space is not a pre-existing emptiness waiting to be filled with matter; rather, like matter, it emerges anew at every moment. Space exists as actively as does matter. Both are infused with the all-sustaining life force. Empty space is a dynamically constructed transparency filled with immense levels of energy and motion. Einstein wrote, “We have now come to the conclusion that space is the primary thing and matter only secondary.” 15 Erwin Schroedinger, father of quantum theory, stated it this way:
    What we observe as material bodies and forces are nothing but shapes and variations in the structure of space. Particles are just appearances . . . Subject and object are