Destination of the species: the riddle of human existence
January 29th, 2010For a year, from when the date was set, I had been looking forward to Friday 29 January, until it was rather soured a fortnight ago by being named as the time when Blair would defend his infamous record over Iraq at the Chilcot Inquiry. On, I hope, a rather more uplifting note, my book ‘Destination of the Species: the Riddle of Human Existence’ is being published today by o-books, which seeks to answer some very fundamental about the universe and the meaning of human existence.
It is a systematic review of all the scientific evidence which shows that the Dawkins and neo-Darwinian view that the universe is driven by pitiless, directionless chance is seriously wrong and misleading. The evidence shows: astronomically precise fine-tuning in the construction of the universe; early life driven for billions of years by symbiotic and cooperative networking, not blindly by mutations; and the spontaneous transposition of matter and energy into new higher organisational states at certain thresholds of complexity both in biological and cosmological systems.
Instead of an analytic, reductionist and arbitrary model of the universe, it uncovers a dramatically different subjective, holistic and purposeful one. The book is not parti pris, not written from the propagandistic viewpoint either of science or religion, rather that of a spiritual agnostic. It is written as a sceptical searching after how all the component parts of human experience fit together within a single indivisible reality, and what that totality means.
The book comprehensively analyses the scientific evidence from the origin and development of the universe, the origin and evolution of life forms on Earth, the absurdly unlikely but probably inevitable evolution of the human species, and the intellectual, cultural, moral and spiritual uniqueness of humans. It repeatedly asks the central question: what does all this mean? What is it telling us?
The evidence shows that religion and science, so far from being incompatible, are in fact mutually complementary, though based on very different paradigms of experience. The book reveals how the latest scientific findings about a designed and purposeful organisation of the universe and of life forms within itpoint to an ultimate reality, not of the human race as the summit of evolution, but of an overarching cosmic plan of which we may be a key part.
February 1st, 2010 at 1:59 pm
I received a pre-publication copy of Destination of the Species for review. You may not have received your contractual author copies yet, so I wanted to bring to your attention that the publishers have left out all the reference numbering, severely reducing the value of your 143 refs. You may want to contact O Books about this!! My Amazon revue (temporarily withheld) suggests withdrawing the book until these are inserted!! Regards, Howard Jones, Brynteg, Whitland, Carms SA34 0BH
March 8th, 2010 at 10:24 pm
i loved listening to you on coast to coast last night. since 1990 i’ve been consumed with everything you talked about last night. i agree with much of what you say except for the point you made about it not being possible to find out what god is. i agree with steven hawkings on this point. you probably assume i disagree with the whole thing, but that’s not the case.
i have an m.s. in physics from a university in america, but unfortunately i’m just like the guy you are defending with aspergers. i discovered a pair of equations that can easily be derived from conservation of momentum and energy for an electron-positron pair annihilation process in a moving frame. both equations begin with mc^2=.
it means god can be summarized for all practical purposes in an 8 word statement.
if copper is high, molybdenum is low, iron.
i don’t read books anymore, but i’m seriously thinking about getting yours because when you talk it sounds the way i feel when i think.
March 8th, 2010 at 11:56 pm
we very much enjoyed your discussion of this material and your views expressed on the Coast to Coast am radio show. thank you for such an effort.
March 9th, 2010 at 3:28 am
I just heard about your book last night on CoasttoCoastAM. I will look for a copy. I am trained, as most US physicians, to believe that science answers all (and who knows, maybe it will) but I’m with you in believing there is a force to be dealt with in the Universe. I wish everyone could go through the first two years of medical school and find the wonder of the human body and it’s magnificence. It is such a complex machine (haha) that it is hard to imagine it occurred by chance. It changed my life and the way I look at the Universe. Keep up the good work, you have already impressed on person a long way away.
Sincerely,
Jeffrey W. Bleakly, MD
March 10th, 2010 at 10:52 pm
Mr. Meacher:
Your interview on Coast to Coast was excellent and I look forward to (buying) reading your book. The only “bad” part about the interview was the interviewer. Mr. Noory is a nice guy, but he was completely unable to ask any of questions that would/could have expand the discussion to an even more enlightening level. Regardless, you acquitted yourself very well.
March 11th, 2010 at 5:13 pm
Dear MP Meacher,
Along with many, I greatly enjoyed your explainations regarding your book and world view on Coast to Coast. I agree that your point of view that the natural laws that govern the function of the universe are to well tuned to be random in their origins. Moreover you correctly stated that for a creator-god to create beings with whom he was to have a meaningful relationship required that there be free choice, free will, on both parts to imbrace or reject the conditions for that relationship. It came through clearly in the interview that you have closely investagated the history and story of the God of the Bible and there we learn that evil in this world is a consiquence of man’s rejection of the condition for relationship. From that wrong choice we see the deadly disease of evil everywhere around and in us today. However, that wrong choice did not deter the God of the Bible from re-establishing the lost relationship. He first promices and then sends a deliver who permanantly deals with the disease of evil in our lives. I am sure you know this story.
I would suggest [I beg your pardon for thinking I can] that you might now investigate whether the eye wittnesses who recorded their observations about Jesus of Nazareth can be believed. In the end we [I include myself] must answer two questions:
1. Does Jesus’ miracles prove that he is The Son of Man?
2. Did God validate his sacrifice on the cross by raising him from the dead?
The lives of the eye wittnesses who saw him raised from the dead were totally transformed. Perhaps these are the kind of people you are longing to find in this world.
March 13th, 2010 at 4:11 am
Hi, another Coast listener, great show. Time originates FROM God, God is OUTSIDE of time, of course it’s so obvious. Can’t believe how long I’ve been pondering this question, I feel so silly now.LOL No wonder I couldn’t grasp it. I’m getting this book. Primeminister Meacher!
Kaf Kensington, songwriter
April 17th, 2010 at 12:23 pm
I was surprised to hear you on coast to coast,enjoyed the show.I live in Chelmsford(UK)we download the shows off of the internet.As you said at the end it is a shame we don’t have anything like it over here in the UK.Cheers
June 28th, 2010 at 11:25 am
Just wanted to say, many thanks for the ‘Destination of the Species’ book. Although I don’t claim to understand all of the science (I know more about cosmology than biology), nevertheless you have brought together the information in a clear and accessible way.
You have explored related questions about the universe, evolution and spirituality coherently. Personally, having asked myself a number of these questions in a far more superficial way, I found this very helpful.
I think at the end I was expecting you to bring it all together in a neatly – tied reconciliation of all the various strands, but wisely I think, you didn’t do this. Instead you leave the reader with paradox – and perhaps paradox is all we have.
Many thanks once again!