Conscious Astronomy

Published March 31, 2024. L Brown, author.

Radical new theories

Historically, astronomy has expanded our consciousness, both in ancient as well as modern times. The new discoveries in astronomy are opening the way to a new form of human spirituality, including the fantastical idea that the Universe itself may be conscious. The physical universe ceases to be an unconscious object when observed and explored by conscious minds. Based on recent studies of evolutionary connectedness to a changing and growing universe, a new spirituality, if fully realized, has the potential to transcend ancient ideas of a supernatural creator and create in each individual an expanded consciousness.

It is worth having even a small telescope to see the rings of Saturn, the moons of Jupiter, the phases of Venus, and small details on the surface of the moon. With a proper sun filter, you can see sunspots. The human brain typically analyzes millions of creative data points to stimulate creative thinking. By observing the heavens, we actually learn a new way of seeing and thinking. To observe is to voyage through time, to rekindle that sense of wonder we remember from childhood.

Astronomers find observing to be relaxing and stimulating, intellectual and emotional — in the widening of the range of thought and understanding, in the pleasure attending the discovery of distant objects in the Universe, in the delight over the beauty and order revealed by the telescope in star systems that would otherwise be invisible. And all you really need to be an astronomer is to start looking up!

“Who are we? We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people.”— Carl Sagan

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