What Does The Movie “What The Bleep Do We Know” Mean?
Physicists, biologists, and the occasional chiropractor tell us how quantum physics and neuroscience support an ancient view on consciousness.
You create your own reality.
Your reality is based on “how you observe the universe!”
So then is reality really in the eye of the quantum observer?
When a movie gets rave reviews as a mind-blowing flick about quantum physics, it’s worth checking out.
And if you’re a modern thinker you’ll know for a fact that quantum physics is wacky stuff.
So enjoy the film’s jelly-baby graphics, amazing storyline, and that Gabor sister channeling a warrior spirit from Atlantis.
You’ll even applaud the wedding Polka scene — there’s just not enough Eastern European folk culture in contemporary film.
What the Bleep Do We Know draws heavily on the role of the observer in quantum physics.
The Bleep in a Nutshell:
1. Quantum physics tells us that reality isn’t fixed — subatomic particles only come into existence when they are observed
and
2. Our mind has enormous potential, but we only use a small part of it for conscious thought, and we miss a lot of what’s going on around us
so, in a leap of creatively edited logic
3. If your mind is the “observer” that quantum physics talks about, you should be able to choose which of the many possible realities around you comes into existence — you can create your own reality, and probably come off anti-anxiety medication to boot.
We’re always being told we don’t use our brain to its full capacity. And any Cognitive Behavioural Therapist can help us to change the way we see things by changing our thought patterns.
Where the Bleep Quotes:
The Effect of the Observer
“Quantum physics calculates only possibilities… Who/what chooses among these possibilities to bring the actual event of experience? Consciousness must be involved. The observer can’t be ignored.” Amit Goswami (PhD) in What the Bleep Do WeKnow?.
Particles Popping Into & Out of Existence
“Physical reality is absolutely rock solid, yet it only comes into existence when it bumps up against another piece of physical reality — like us, or a rock.” Dr. Jeffrey Satinover (psychiatrist, PhD candidate in physics), in What the Bleep Do We Know?
The bits and pieces of matter that make up sub-atomic particles (protons, neutrons and electrons) don’t exist in any handy, measurable way unless they’re interacting with one another. Once they do bump into each other they form their regular little selves.
“Particles appear and disappear — where do they go when they’re not here? One possible answer: they go to an alternative universe where people are asking the same question: ‘where’d they go?'” Fred Alan Wolf, PhD in What the Bleep Do We Know?
Particles are fluctuations — the rules of physics say it’s perfectly fine for them to exist at some time and/or place and to be non-existent at another time and/or place.
About Our Minds Perceiving Reality
“Your mind can’t tell the difference between what it sees and what it remembers” Dr Joseph Dispenza (Chiropractor ) in What the Bleep Do We Know?
Dr. Dispenza claims in the movie that brain scans — PET (Positron Emission Tomography) and Functional MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) — show that the same part of your brain lights up whether you’re looking at something or just remembering it. But it’s quite a leap to say the brain doesn’t know the difference between vision and memory.
“Our brain receives 400 billion bits/second of information, but we’re only aware of 2000 bits/second. Reality is happening in our brain all the time — we’re receiving it but it’s not being integrated.” Andrew B Newberg, (MD, Radiologist), in What the Bleep Do We Know?
The figures are a bit rubbery, but the idea that we’re only ‘aware’ of a fraction of our brain’s activity is both correct and a huge relief.
What could be worse than being aware of every tiny detail that your brain handles — from phosphate levels to heart rate and hair growth. It’d be like being the CEO of a massive company and having to listen to what every single employee was doing every minute of every day. Staff meetings are tedious enough — give me a conscious mind with a decent filter device any day.
Our subconscious brains are doing really interesting stuff and we’re missing out; if only we could be masters of our destinies.
“We only see what we believe is possible — Native American Indians on Caribbean Islands couldn’t see Columbus’s ships [sitting on the horizon] because they were beyond their knowledge”
Dr. Candace Pert, in What the Bleep Do We Know?
About us not seeing things in front of our eyes if we’re not looking for them. A classic experiment on visual processing involves asking people to watch a video of 6 people passing a basketball, and press a button every time a particular team has possession. Invariably only about half the people tested ever notice a woman in a gorilla suit walking across the middle of the screen during the game.
About our Minds Affecting Reality:
The movie gives at least two examples of experiments which have shown the power of the mind-affecting reality.
The Effect of Meditation on Violent Crime in Washington, DC.
John Hagelin, Ph.D., describes a study he did in Washington in 1992. 4000 volunteers regularly meditated to achieve a 25% drop in violent crime by the end of summer. He claims the drop was achieved. Hagelin won the 1994 Ig Nobel Peace Prize.
The power of thoughts on water
“If thoughts can do that to water, imagine what our thoughts can do to us” observed a fan of Dr. Masaru Emoto in the movie.
Dr. Emoto takes photos of crystals formed in freezing water. According to his books, water exposed to loving words shows brilliant and attractive patterns, while water exposed to negative thoughts forms incomplete patterns.
