We will have myself, Lionel Milgrom, Stephan Baumgartner and other galactic superstars but mainly we will be working as a group trying to understand the basis of our discipline. Please join us.
An intro from the Anthroposophical Science Magazine:
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A gathering to contemplate the enigma of potentisation. The Field Centre nr Nailsworth, Gloucestershire. May 23rd to 24th, 2014.
Adalbert von Keyserlingk, the son of the family who hosted the Agriculture Course, recalled a time when Dr Rudolf Steiner was very animated:
For those of us who would indeed like to take science further and coax it out of our materialistic cul de sac it might appear, from the above quotation, that the work has already been done. However, such smallest entities which result from potentisation remain enigmatic and inscrutable. The whole subject lurks restlessly in the dimly lit border between reputable science and exile in the swampy regions of self-deluded fantasy."The most wonderful occasion was when Rudolf Steiner came into our classroom, his face alight with joy and said: ‘Now at last we are able to demonstrate the etheric, because of Mrs Kolisko’s work with very small entities, and we can prove to anyone who wants to see that science can be taken further and can find its way out of the dead end of materialism!’ I shall never forget the joy Rudolf Steiner radiated as he said these words."
Potentisation is one of these disciplines in which the application of the science precedes the pure or theoretical aspects. As a result bringing light to the subject holds great promise both for its own sake and also for improving its worldly application. For instance, imagine trying to build an aircraft capable of flying for 23 hours a day for 20 years with no grasp of stress and strain, and no means to optimise the Bernoulli principle or to predict which fuel characteristics are best. As a homeopathic pharmacist or biodynamic gardener faced with a hundred vessels of clear liquid, impervious to chemcial differentiation, how is one to divine the qualities of each liquid? What tools can one bring to one's R&D department to increase the efficacy of ones products? Are these tools improved by focussing on laboratory sterility, standardisation of materials and processes through mechanisation, the gesture frequency and duration of the potentisation process, the time of day and year ... ??? Or perhaps one would do better to consider the state of the people who are involved in the process. Should this be done in isolation after purification and prayer, or in a jolly group of colleagues? Does it matter if your socks don't match that day? What are the parameters for making an effective potency?
There may be some clues in the later parts of the recollection quoted above:
The continuation of the New Perspectives in Science series of gatherings is also a new start. In previous years we concentrated on hearing each other's speciality elucidated. This brought a certain depth into various areas in which Anthroposophically oriented scientists had made forays. The emphasis in this year's gathering will be on being together to contemplate one single if multifaceted enigma. I imagine it like a team of detectives faced with a whodunnit mystery. Everyone is invited to bring different pieces of the puzzle in the middle between us in the hope - one with no guarantee of satisfaction - that a larger picture can become clearer. In this way one would like to think that the enigmatic and inscrutable can be treated as a potent clue that might begin to bear fruit."He then told us that from the beginning of the fifteenth century people have tried to enter more and more deeply into the dead matter of both the macrocosm and the microcosm, though they had no real aim in this. This had led to the division between belief and knowledge, with the spirit banished to the realm of belief and all things physical to that of soulless knowledge. It ultimately caused many people to be torn apart at the very core of their humanity.
Now, however, a beginning had been made to connect things of the spirit - the etheric being the lowest form of the spiritual – again with physical matter. The conscience of the scientist must also be part of the process. We were able to understand this world situation, both from the matter itself, from the method and the goal, and from the sheer joy in Rudolf Steiner’s eyes."
There will be some expert witnesses to assist us. Stephan Baumgartner has worked for decades to bring light in these regions with using plants as bioassays with the goal of improving the products from the Hiscia laboratories. But such expertise has been kept to a minimum not only out of necessity, but because the emphasis is on colleagial co-researching. I would also like to think that no one would feel excluded because of lack of experience or expertise. If you are stimulated by whodunnits, by the love of mystery and puzzles, by the promise of reintegrating a scientific outcast back into the scientific fold, or by a focussed manufacturing ideal of improving remedies .. all these and more would be very good reasons for joining us in May.
For practical details of the event please go to http://www.naturalscience.org.uk/2014