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The Romance of Reality: How the Universe Organizes Itself to Create Life, Consciousness, and Cosmic Complexity Hardcover – June 28, 2022
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According to the prevailing scientific paradigm, the universe tends toward randomness; it functions according to laws without purpose, and the emergence of life is an accident devoid of meaning.
But this bleak interpretation of nature is currently being challenged by cutting-edge findings at the intersection of physics, biology, neuroscience, and information theory—generally referred to as “complexity science.” Thanks to a new understanding of evolution, as well as recent advances in our understanding of the phenomenon known as emergence, a new cosmic narrative is taking shape: Nature’s simplest “parts” come together to form ever-greater “wholes” in a process that has no end in sight.
In The Romance of Reality, cognitive neuroscientist Bobby Azarian explains the science behind this new view of reality and explores what it means for all of us. In engaging, accessible prose, Azarian outlines the fundamental misunderstanding of thermodynamics at the heart of the old assumptions about the universe’s evolution, and shows us the evidence that suggests that the universe is a “self-organizing” system, one that is moving toward increasing complexity and awareness.
Cosmologist and science communicator Carl Sagan once said of humanity that “we are a way for the cosmos to know itself.” The Romance of Reality shows that this poetic statement in fact rests on a scientific foundation and gives us a new way to know the cosmos, along with a riveting vision of life that imbues existence with meaning—nothing supernatural required.
- Print length320 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherBenBella Books
- Publication dateJune 28, 2022
- Dimensions6.25 x 1.13 x 9.37 inches
- ISBN-101637740441
- ISBN-13978-1637740446
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Editorial Reviews
Review
—Michael Shermer, author of Why Darwin Matters and The Moral Arc
“This is truly a book for the 21st century—the ‘century of complexity.’ It is a quite remarkable synthesis of all my favorite things!”
—Karl Friston, neuroscientist at University College London
“What would happen if you tried answering every fundamental question about our existence? Why did life emerge? What is consciousness? Free Will? Self? Knowledge? Information? How do all these concepts fit together? Bobby Azarian’s new book is the answer to life, consciousness, cosmic complexity, and everything.”
—Roman Yampolskiy, director of the Cybersecurity Lab at the University of Louisville and author of Artificial Superintelligence
“Bobby Azarian's new book is an impressive tour de force on the scientific territory of the origin of life . . . This is a comprehensive book that will nourish the science hungry and will offer guidance for the young and aspiring scientist.”
—Adrian Bejan, J.A. Jones Distinguished Professor at Duke University and author of The Physics of Life: The Evolution of Everything
“The Romance of Reality is a scientific book with epic psychological implications: How thrilling to realize that the existential bleakness of our reductionist worldview is finally being superseded by the realization that we are in fact nested within rapturously self-organizing systems within systems, in a grand ballet of emergent complexity.”
—Jason Silva, philosopher and former host of National Geographic’s Brain Games and Origins
“Bobby Azarian's The Romance of Reality is an audacious state-of-the-art examination of the unfolding of our universe and our place in it using a complexity lens . . . Bobby's startling new synthesis is well-researched and provides a profoundly hopeful path forward for humanity.”
—Jim Rutt, former chairman of the Santa Fe Institute and host of the podcast The Jim Rutt Show
“Some of the most powerful moments in life are the sudden realizations of new insights, where concepts and ideas simply fall into place and answer fundamental questions. The Romance of Reality delivers several such epiphanies in a highly engaging style.”
—Dominik Schiener, cofounder and chairman of the board of directors, The IOTA Foundation
“Bobby Azarian has pulled off the impossible. He has woven together entropy, information theory, and complex adaptive systems to put the life of this cosmos into a single big picture.”
—Howard Bloom, author of The Lucifer Principle and The God Problem
“This book begins to solve the mysteries of the universe . . . Is life random and devolving or complex and evolving? We’re at a pivotal moment in our quest to find out. As Azarian brilliantly explains, the universe is waking up through us. This book will help you do likewise.”
—Cenk Uygur, creator of The Young Turks
“The Romance of Reality maps out a mind-expanding path from reductionism to emergence, offering ‘a radical new cosmic narrative’ that revels in the sublime beauty of evolution and our plausible collective participation in it.”
—Richard Doyle, Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English at Penn State and author of Darwin’s Pharmacy: Sex, Plants, and the Evolution of the Noosphere
“This book achieves what many assume to be impossible. It takes some of the most difficult and profound concepts there are—What is life? What is consciousness? In what ways is free will real? What is reality?—and provides accessible and enjoyable explanations, while always respecting the depth of these topics.”
—Adam Safron, postdoctoral research fellow, Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research
“Azarian’s The Romance of Reality is an exhaustive and thorough exploration of many of the biggest theories about life and its place in the universe.”
—Johnjoe McFadden, professor of molecular genetics at the University of Surrey and author of Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology
“The Romance of Reality makes accessible the essence of a little-known scientific revolution currently sweeping the research community. This revolution makes clear our relatedness to the universe and is destined to provide further answers to all our big questions.”
—John Campbell, author of Universal Darwinism: The Path of Knowledge
"This book was superbly thought-provoking and opened up to me whole new vistas of possibility about the big questions of philosophy and science. I’d highly recommend it for readers interested in the meaning of life, the universe, and everything."
—Bernie Gourley, The Introverted Yogi
About the Author
Product details
- Publisher : BenBella Books (June 28, 2022)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 320 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1637740441
- ISBN-13 : 978-1637740446
- Item Weight : 1.12 pounds
- Dimensions : 6.25 x 1.13 x 9.37 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #339,188 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #54 in System Theory
- #395 in Cosmology (Books)
- #537 in Astronomy (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Bobby Azarian is a science journalist and a cognitive neuroscientist with a PhD from the Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study at George Mason University. He has written for publications including The Atlantic, The New York Times, BBC Future, Scientific American, Slate, The Huffington Post, and Aeon, and his research has been published in peer-reviewed journals such as Human Brain Mapping, Cognition & Emotion, and Acta Psychologica. His blog “Mind in the Machine,” hosted by Psychology Today, has received over 8 million views. Azarian worked on Season 2 of the YouTube Premium psychology-based series Mind Field (as a consultant and researcher), which helped the show win its first Emmy nomination. He is based in Arlington, Virginia.
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On p. 258 he asks readers to take a look at the well-know American philosopher, Thomas Nagel, and his book Mind and Cosmos and the concept that we, and scientists as well, may need non-physical laws to "more appropriate to describe them as new laws of physics, as Shroedinger suggested in his book What is Life."
It's a long and thoughtful book that ought to be a 'daring' read for all of us, whether we go to church and have a Faith based Life, or whether we currently claim we are atheists or scientists.
Our understanding of life, the universe and our own biological system appears increasingly to function somewhat like the unified Gaia theory where we are somehow, and somewhere, tied together in 'computer' feed-back loops, and with the accelerating changes in every area already visible with AI insights, it is not unlikely that human kind will, in part, increasingly be interfaced with digital systems. Nor is it unlikely that humankind will have small colonies on the Moon, or several planets before the end of this century.
Mr. Azarian has done an exemplary job leading thoughtful readers through the deeply controversial moral, faith and scientific theories that underpin our current basis for living together. Young people especially, can benefit from re-thinking some of the premises they want to base their lives on.
Azarian, among other things, is a science writer, as well as a scientist, so it is no surprise that the writing is meticulous. There is not much about the theories surrounding the origin of life that is not addressed at some level. As a writer/journalist, however, he understandably drops a lot of names, both in the interest of full disclosure and not wanting to take more credit for his ideas than he thinks is due. (He comes off as a humble man in awe of his subject matter.) It’s an admirable objective but I personally found the constant barrage of names that most of us are unfamiliar with a bit distracting from the arguments he makes. A general disclaimer in the beginning might have addressed all his concerns more productively.
The author, an obviously brilliant person, also spends a lot of ink addressing the revulsion among scientists, particularly atheists, with anything remotely leaving the door open to spiritual, supernatural, or teleological explanations of anything. Although I am not religious and fully support the pursuit of science, I do believe that this bias does generally impede valid scientific discovery.
It also greatly complicates the language that scientists use, exaggerating the many divides that exist between scientists and the people they should be educating, like me. One example: “The integrated evolutionary synthesis, which serves as our unifying theory of reality, is based on the evolutionary epistemology – universal Darwinism – universal Bayesianism framework…” He goes on to admit that this is an “entirely-too-long name,” but that is how the book unfolds nonetheless.
What I took away is that the second law of thermodynamics, relating to the inevitability of entropic decay, applies to the real world we live in but does not assure life’s eventual cessation. Rather, the universe, according to the poetic meta-naturalism theory, largely due to the second law, is wired for ever-increasing intelligence that could hold the decay at bay indefinitely through scientific discovery. (That may not apply to humanity as such, however.) Life does not come about by chance. It is destined by the laws of science.
I do fully endorse Azarian’s worthy attempt to consolidate different scientific theories and worldviews. He works hard to overcome the contradictions between them. This is important because I believe that science, like many other things in our world (e.g. medicine, education, careers) is becoming too specialized. By going deep and not wide we are not only missing the forest for the trees, but we are missing the tree for the bark.
All told I believe this is a good read for the scientist and layman alike. It takes some patience and a very open mind, but the questions raised are worthy of the time and effort. Not quite a five, for the reasons stated, but close. (The difference may be an example of the measurement problem in quantum physics.)
Did he convince me? There was little that he wrote that I reactively disagreed with. I came away, however, thinking that we have a lot more to study and think about. And, to my way of thinking, you can’t ask any more from any book. Time well spent.
Top reviews from other countries
I’m so great full that Bobby Azarian produced such a useful book. I read it from cover to cover and even got the Audible version. Just super.
There should be a 6 star category for books like The Romance of Reality.
Informationalself.com
Knowledge has been accumulating without consciousness for billions of years in the form of DNA. This knowledge has manifested itself in the ability of organisms to survive.
Conscious beings arose who accumulate and spread information with intent, thereby accelerating the process. The ever expanding reach of these beings will spread through the universe.
The argument is really not credible.
Just as consciousness emerged from the machinations of the DNA, the author predicts that the internet will develop its own intelligence through the interactions of all the beings that use it.
Eventually ever-expanding levels of consciousness will permeate the entire universe.
The book starts to get tedious as its fantasies expand.
How does the author explain the fact that we can’t even get intelligence and knowledge effectively from one part of the works (never mind universe) to another?
How does the author explain the efficient spread of stupidity and lies e.g. Trump?
It seems equally likely that all will end in catastrophe. Mankind is facing threats such as nuclear annihilating and weather disasters. New threats may arrive with advanced technology. It is optimistic to think that these will not put and end to it all before this book’s predictions come to fruit.