Uses new research about the brain to explore how we can transcend our current physical and cultural limitations
• Reveals that transcendence of current modes of existence requires the dynamic interaction of our fourth and fifth brains (intellect and intelligence)
• Explores the idea that Jesus, Lao-tzu, and other great beings in history are models of nature’s possibility and our ability to achieve transcendence
• 17,000 sold in hardcover since April 2002
Why do we seem stuck in a culture of violence and injustice? How is it that we can recognize the transcendent ideal represented by figures such as Jesus, Lao-tzu, and many others who have walked among us and yet not seem to reach the same state?
In The Biology of Transcendence Joseph Chilton Pearce examines the current biological understanding of our neural organization to address how we can go beyond the limitations and constraints of our current capacities of body and mind—how we can transcend. Recent research in the neurosciences and neurocardiology identifies the four neural centers of our brain and indicates that a fifth such center is located in the heart.
This research reveals that the evolutionary structure of our brain and its dynamic interactions with our heart are designed by nature to reach beyond our current evolutionary capacities. We are quite literally, made to transcend.
Pearce explores how this “biological imperative” drives our life into ever-greater realms of being--even as the “cultural imperative” of social conformity and behavior counters this genetic heritage, blocks our transcendent capacities, and breeds violence in all its forms. The conflict between religion and spirit is an important part of this struggle. But each of us may overthrow these cultural imperatives to reach “unconflicted behavior,” wherein heart and mind-brain resonate in synchronicity, opening us to levels of possibility beyond the ordinary.
About the Author(s) of The Biology of Transcendence
Joseph Chilton Pearce is the author of The Crack in the Cosmic Egg, Magical Child, and Evolution’s End. For the past 25 years, he has taught about the changing needs of children and the development of human society. He lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia.
Praise for The Biology of Transcendence
“This is a masterpiece of science and spirit, love over law, and the stunning biological truth of the capacity for transcendence that the universe has placed within us. Here, in brilliant and incisive words, is the foundation for a new mind and a new world.” - Jean Houston, author of A Passion for the Possible and Jump Time
". . . an engaging blend of scientific research and personal accounts of altered states, [this book] outlines the anatomy of levels of consciousness." - Fran Shaw, Parabola, Fall, 2003
"Rarely does a single book encompass such far reaching vistas and disturbing revelations as The Biology of Transcendence." - Robert Simmons, The Metaphysical Guide to Tucson Gem & Mineral Shows 2004
