Meru Foundation eTORUS(tm) Newsletter
Number 30 – 28 October 2005
Copyright 2005 Meru Foundation
Edited by Levanah Tenen

NEWS

In the last two issues of eTORUS, Stan and I both commented on how essential it is for us to present Meru research in a professional context. This is why we are now concentrating on our investigation of Sefer Yetzirah (and related works), with the goal of publishing a translation-and-commentary of this important book that will break new ground.

I am pleased to announce that we have just been presented with another opportunity to reach a professional audience. Here is an excerpt from a letter of invitation we received from Dr. Richard Amoroso a few weeks ago:

* * * * *
  "I am preparing a co-edited volume with Karl Pribram and Basil Hiley anticipated for release . . . in 2006. The book is titled: "The Complementarity of Mind and Body: Realizing the Dream of Descartes, Einstein & Eccles". . . . [T]he core theme of the book is about Cartesian dualism / interactionism. . . . [W]e think a chapter extending work on your paper "The God of Abraham: A Mathematician's View" would be a good addition to this volume.

  "Many 'luminaries' in the field like Henry Stapp, Fred Alan Wolf, and Menas Kafatos have already submitted chapters. . . ."

* * * * *
Being published in such illustrious company is a great honor. It will allow us to present our newest material -- developed as part of our exploration of Sefer Yetzirah -- in the best possible context, and will serve as a "warm up" for our own book. I will release more details about "The Complementarity of Mind and Body" as they become available.

Meru Lecture DVD's
As mentioned in the last issue, we are in process of converting our classic Meru lecture video series to DVD format. The content of the DVD's is the same of the videotapes, but they are more convenient because they have DVD menus -- and because they're DVD's, which means they can be viewed on DVD players or on computers. We now have three of our five live lectures available: "Geometric Metaphors of Life", "The Alphabet in our Hands, Part 1", and "Squaring the Circle". The remaining two lectures, "The Alphabet in our Hands, Part 2" and "A Matrix of Meaning for Sacred Alphabets" should be available by the end of November. At present, these DVD's are only available through Meru Foundation. The price for a single DVD is $29.95, plus shipping.

As a way of helping Meru Foundation, we are offering eTORUS readers the opportunity to pre-order our entire 5-DVD set, for $120 plus shipping ($10 in the continental US). I will ship the three DVD's currently in stock immediately on receiving your order, and the remaining two as soon as they are ready. You might consider ordering DVD sets as gifts for the coming holiday season. Your pre-payment of the entire $120 for the 5-DVD set will make a big difference in our resources, in being able to continue our work without interruption, and in making plans for the winter months.

To order this 5-DVD set from www.meetingtent.com, please proceed directly to our "product order" page at
https://secure02.ipowerweb.com/~meetingt/store2003/agora.cgi and select the "5-DVD Meru Lecture Video Set." To find out more about Meru lecture DVD's, go to http://www.meetingtent.com/MeruVideo-DVD.html .

***************************************

INTELLIGENT DESIGN
(c) 2005 Stan Tenen

Friends have recently forwarded to me various materials -- including a very professional DVD -- advocating "Intelligent Design" as a substitute for evolution.

Don't be taken in.

Intelligent Design claims that cellular structures cannot have evolved, because they are too complex, and require simultaneous mutations.

This claim is specious. There are two fundamental problems. First, it's bad science; and second, if the logic presented is followed through on, it inevitably leads to a compound god (incompatible with the Unique God of the Ten Commandments). Opponents of Intelligent Design claim it is a stand-in for either "creationism" or "alien" design.

With regard to the appearance of impossible simultaneous coordinated developments -- sadly, the cell biologists and bio-chemists have not kept up with developments in physics and math. Only a few years ago, mathematicians thought it was impossible to produce Penrose tilings, because they required simultaneous coordinated developments. It was thought that there was no possible way for different parts of a developing crystal, for example, to coordinate with other parts, so that the overall structure would be complete without fissures, defects, and faults.

As it turned out, even after the mathematicians had cautioned that these patterns could not occur in nature, they were discovered in nature. And no "intelligent designer" was required. The Penrose tilings are naturally adjacent in a higher dimension -- which is apparently where they organize. So the impossible became possible.1

Magicians make use of this all the time. They lead us to believe that all of the possible explanations have been blocked, and that what we see must be magic. But it is never the case. All that the magician has done is come up with something that we haven't foreseen. The argument for "Intelligent Design" is thus actually the argument of theorists who, not knowing their own limits, believe that if they can't figure it out, it must be magic.

The "intelligence" of Intelligent Design is intended to be confabulated with "information". This is what leads to the necessity -- consistent with this theory -- of an embodiment of an intelligent multi-talented (compound) god. Intelligence is the result of the use of information, but it's not the same thing as information.

Information is the fuel of intelligence. It's not the engine, it's not the car, and it doesn't tell the car when and where to go and stop.

Physicist Roger Penrose, writing in his Pulitzer-prize winning The Emperor's New Mind, tells us that plant life gets the information it needs to organize itself as a living thing from the difference in information carried by the collimated photons the plant absorbs from the sun, and the diffuse and dispersed photons that the planet radiates back to the sky. The plants stand in a negentropic (meaning "makes order") information gradient, extending from the sun to the shield of the sky.

Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, the founder of Chabad Chassidism, writes in Shaar Hayichud Vaehemunah (Gate of Unity and Faith (Tanya), first published in 1796) that "Hashem/Elokim is a Sun and a Shield", and then goes on to use language that parallels the language Roger Penrose uses 200 years later.

In Jewish tradition, Hashem/Elokim ("Lord God") is undifferentiated and utterly Singular. This is the proclamation of the Sh'ma: "Hear, O Israel, Hashem is our God, Hashem is One". (Hashem="The Name"=Lord; Elokim=Elo-him="God"). This ideal "Echad" ("One"; singular, unique Unity) tolerates no differentiation ("a jealous God"), and no qualities knowable to us (beyond Singular All-Inclusiveness).

In Torah tradition, the information gradient that leads the natural world to the evolution of life (and us) derives directly from the fact that Hashem/Elokim is undifferentiated. If there were any differentiation, then the negentropic information gradient would be degraded, and we wouldn't have "All-there Is". There would be gaps in reality, and gaps in nature. It is only because Hashem/Elokim is utterly Singular and Unique that the universe can contain the full span of diversity. (What I mean by this is that there is a complementary transform relationship between the singularity and the spectrum.2)

Intelligent Design requires god to apply a structured logic to the world, in order to force evolution. This structured logic, which is claimed to lead to the logic of DNA, must come from a structured logic. Logic has components, or it's either trivial or not logical. The proponents of Intelligent Design are thus attempting to walk us down a garden path to an embodied (compound) god.

God is the source of information -- and this information3 is the fuel of intelligence.

Bible tradition -- monotheism -- requires a Singular and unembodied (non-compound) God.

I think it's important to discuss the implications of Intelligent Design, because Intelligent Design is now being promoted by the President of the United States. Science classrooms all over the country are being assaulted with what amounts to a teaching that claims that one belief system is scientifically true, and the public -- almost all non-scientists -- is buying it.

This is an assault on science, which means it's also an assault on the future of our society -- and on the true roots of our traditions of faith. The fact is, when all is said and done, Intelligent Design "damns by faint praise."

Stan Tenen
Sharon, MA
October 2005

1See page 4 of physicist Lisa Randall's new book, "Warped Passages: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe's Hidden Dimensions". (500 pp. Ecco Press, 2005). For a review of this book in the current issue of "American Scientist", see
http://www.americanscientist.org/template/BookReviewTypeDetail/assetid/47317

2See my essay, "The God of Abraham: A Mathematician's View", at
http://www.meru.org/Noetic/GdofAbrhm.html.
See also the graphic on the Delta Transform at
http://www.meru.org/Posters/DeltaFunction.html

3(Often via the "unseen hand" of geometric boundaries)

******************************************************************

FEEDBACK

I hope you enjoy this Meru Foundation eTORUS(tm) Newsletter.

We welcome your comments and suggestions, and would like the opportunity to speak with you personally.

If you have comments or questions, please send an email to Levanah Tenen at <meru1@well.com> with your phone number and a good time to call -- or, please call us at 781-784-8902 (Boston area).

If you no longer wish to receive Meru Foundation's newsletters, please send email to Levanah Tenen at <meru1@well.com>, and include "Unsubscribe" in the text of the message.

Thank you for your interest in the work of the Meru Foundation.

******************************************************************
The Meru Foundation eTORUS(tm) Newsletter is copyright 2004 Meru Foundation. All rights reserved.
Past issues of eTORUS(tm) are archived online on the Meru Foundation website at
<http://www.meru.org/Newsletter/journalindex.html>.

You may duplicate and pass along this newsletter in its entirety, as long as you include the above copyright notice and the contact information below. Please send comments and questions to <meru1@well.com>.

Meru Foundation research offices:
Research Director: Stan Tenen Secretary-Treasurer: Levanah (Cynthia) Tenen
PO Box 503
Sharon, MA 02067 USA
Voice: 781-784-8902 eFax: 253-663-9273
Email: <meru1@well.com>
Website: <http://www.meru.org>

How to order Meru Foundation Videos and Products:
Visit our secure-server website at <http://www.meetingtent.com> OR
Fax your order to 1-253-663-9273 OR
Email: <meru-custsvc@sprynet.com> with a subject line of "Meru Product Order"

To order by phone:
In the U.S., call toll-free 1-888-422-MERU
Outside the U.S., call 1-781-784-3462

EUROPEAN AND PAL VIDEO ORDERS:
To order PAL versions of Meru Videotapes:
Email Ron Engert in Germany at <ron@tattva-viveka.de>
German readers may also visit Ron Engert's Meru website:
<http://www.meru-info.de>

Go to Meru eTORUS(tm) Newsletter Index

Go to Meru Foundation Home Page

Go to www.meetingtent.com

Contents of this page are ©2005 Cynthia Tenen or ©2005 Stan Tenen, and licensed to Meru Foundation, POB 503, Sharon, MA 02067 USA.
Email inquiries to the Research Staff at: meru1@well.com
To order Meru Foundation materials, go to www.meetingtent.com
For Customer Service, call 1-781-784-3462     or     email to meru-custsvc@sprynet.com