New Evidence of Morphic Resonance – Rupert Sheldrake

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so I guess what I was getting at earlier
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in this question was the morphic
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resonance 50 years later have we come
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around has there been more and more
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evidence now stacking up saying that
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there is a lot more than just this
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material world
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well it's a very good question and you
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know if I
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um have I mean to take it as the big
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picture the answer is I wish there was
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more evidence than there is i I've spent
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all these years trying to get research
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done on morphic resonance um it's been
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unbelievably difficult to get anyone to
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do it within universities or scientific
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institutions because it's been
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proclaimed a heresy anyone who does it
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is afraid of losing their job their
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grant you know being attacked by
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skeptics and so forth so it's been
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extremely difficult to get the work done
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i mean I've tried in many ways to do it
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i can't get lab space in universities
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myself i mean I'm I'm able to do
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research as long as it's field research
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but for morphic resonance which is about
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memory and nature to do morphic
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resonance experiments you have to
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compare what happened in the past with
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what happens now and to get any
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convincing evidence you have to keep the
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conditions constant because all sorts of
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things change in the world for example
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morphic resonance says that it should be
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getting easier to learn skateboarding or
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surf or wind surfing or computer
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programming or to play particular video
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games
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um well it is getting easier to do all
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those things there's lot of evidence uh
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but it's not the only factor you know
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there is videos instruct there's
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improvements in the technology there's
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better teaching methods to tease out
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morphic resonance from all those things
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is difficult there are areas where there
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is consistent evidence over the years
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one area for example is in IQ tests
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people have been doing very similar IQ
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tests for more than a hundred years and
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I predicted in the 1980s that with IQ
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tests uh the score should be going up
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the average score should be going up not
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because people are getting smarter the
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the not because their actual
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intelligence quotient or IQ is getting
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higher but because the tests are getting
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easier to do because so many people have
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done the tests and I couldn't get the
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data when I tried to look at this in the
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1980s but a psychologist called James
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Flynn uh did exactly this analysis
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shortly after that and found that all
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around the world average scores on IQ
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have been going up and up um since the
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19 when they first came in 1918 all
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through the 20th century these scores
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were going up and up and up at least 30%
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increase in average IQ spoke scores but
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no evidence that people are actually 30%
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smarter you know by other criteria
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they're not smarter um and so there's
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been a real problem for um conventional
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psychologists to explain this thing
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which is called the Flynn effect um some
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have said that it's because you know
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people have had more protein as children
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but you know that might have applied to
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Japan where they had more protein in
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their diet through the 20th century but
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not to America where lots of people were
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eating meat all the time through the
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20th century then some said it was
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because they getting smarter because uh
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they had more practice with tests uh but
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evidence showed that that wasn't really
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a very good explanation some said they
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were getting smarter because they'd seen
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more TV but the other evidence showed
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that actually TV tended to have a
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dumbing down effect um so there's been a
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long controversy about the nature of the
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Flynn effect in in IQ and I think that's
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one example of a morphic resonance
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effect i think morphic resonance may
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also be happening before our very eyes
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in phenomena like Wordle the New York
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Times uh word puzzle it's a fiveletter
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word puzzle a new puzzle is uh published
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every day by the New York Times and
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there's a student here in Britain who's
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been looking into this recently one of
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the anomalous things is that far more
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people get word right first time every
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day than you would expect by
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chance why no one knows why i mean this
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is an ongoing project she's looking at
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this as we speak uh but this is an area
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where you can actually do research in
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the field you don't have to have a lab
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to do research on Wordle because New
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York Times produces something called a
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Wordle bot every day which gives in real
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time updated value on how people are
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doing in the test as the day goes on and
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then the next day there's a new word so
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the whole thing's replicated day by day
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so that's one promising area for
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research
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but I've now found a new way of doing
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this research which gets round the taboo
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in the academic world uh which is that
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um there are now companies that do te
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testing routine testing for corporations
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usually for drug companies sort of
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outsourced research companies uh and uh
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I have a an experiment starting very
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soon on morphic resonance in the
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evolution of antibiotic resistance in
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Ecoli the bacterium Eoli
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um I have a funer who's paying for this
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I have a lab here in Britain that's um
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where they're planning to do it they
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should be starting soon of course I
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can't foresee what the results will be I
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mean I've designed the experiments and I
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hope they'll show a morphic resonance
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effect but um I can't be sure the the
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whole point of research is you don't
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know what's going to happen you have to
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wait and see what happens but this is
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now the way forward I think doing
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research in commercial laboratories
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where their motivation is not getting
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ahead in the academic world and they
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simply do a good job you have a contract
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you pay them and they do the experiment
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to a design an agreed design um and
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that's exactly as I think science should
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be done and it's done by competent
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technically competent people and at last
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I found a way of getting around this
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taboo i only discovered this last year
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that this was a possible way forward um
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so I'm actually quite excited about it
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so the answer basically in a nutshell is
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that there's a lot of circumstantial
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evidence for morphic resonance some of
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which I discuss in my books including
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the Flynn effect in IQ test scores but
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there's been very little actual
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experimental research uh because the
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sociological um taboo is so strong
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within the scientific community there
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have however been quite a number of
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tests in human psychology and I
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summarize those in the new edition the
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third edition of my book a new science
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of life which in the US has been
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retitled morphic resonance there's an
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appendix there with 10 new tests for
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morphic resonance and a summary of the
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research so far so this is very much an
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ongoing research program it's a
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scientific hypothesis and it's a
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testable hypothesis I I think that's
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what science is meant to be about one of
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the problems that skeptics have is that
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they what they hate uncertainty domatic
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skeptics want to have a worldview that's
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certain they want they're
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fundamentalists really they want they
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want certainty and morphic resonance
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isn't certain it's not certain is true i
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mean I've been working on this for
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decades i'd love it to be true but
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actually I'm not certain it's true it's
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a hypothesis a testable hypothesis but
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what the skeptics do is they frame it as
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a claim that I'm claiming this is true
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and they're going to say no it's not and
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where's the evidence i'm not saying it's
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true i'm saying it's a possibility a
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hypothesis is a possibility it's
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possible it's true if it's true and if
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the evidence supports it it has enormous
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ramifications and implications through
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the whole world world of nature of
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understanding chemical and physical and
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biological and psychological processes
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um it says that the so-called laws of
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nature are more like habits it has very
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very wide ranging ramifications if it's
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true but the key thing is to do the
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experiments and find out whether this
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hypothesis is actually supported by them
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as the circumstantial evidence appears
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to support it but you know there's not
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enough evidence yet for anyone including
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me to
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know wow i think you found a a brilliant
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way to test this with the E.coli so the
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thinking is that um if E.coli E coli
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becomes resistant in one area of the
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world or in one lab on the other side of
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the world it will suddenly start to
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become more resistant over there right
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yes and there's already circumstantial
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evidence that antibiotic resistance when
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it's evolved in one place turns up
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somewhere else um there's already in the
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ep the literature on antibiotic
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resistance this is already known but of
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course in the real world you can't be
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sure that someone hasn't just flown
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around the world carried the res
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resistant germs with them people working
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in epidemiology
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uh some of them think there really is
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something mysterious and unexplained
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going on but without specific evidence
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you can't be sure uh nevertheless it's
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very suggestive and I I think that the
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evidence makes me think this may well be
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happening that once um E.coli or any
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other bacterium has developed antibiotic
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resistance in one place it'll be easier
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to develop it in another place and
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morphic resonance you see also has
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implications for epidemiology of
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diseases like COVID morphic resonance
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would say that if a lot of people
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recover from a a new respiratory
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infection like COVID the antibbody
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system is activated and that might make
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it easier for other people to activate
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the antibbody system and to overcome the
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disease so what does this morphic
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resonance predicts is that um virilent
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new viral diseases will get less
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virilent over time even if you don't
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have um vaccines for them um they'll
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become and even if people haven't been
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vaccinated they'll get less virilent
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over time through a kind of morphic
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resonance effect on the immune system on
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the way that people respond to the
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infection
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and that seems to be the case with a lot
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of respiratory diseases flu colds COVID
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uh keep evolving um and they become much
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less aggressive like the famous Asian
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flu around 1918 it became um I mean it
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killed millions of people but it was
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before they had modern
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vaccine systems to deal with it and um
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it faded away um and COVID was
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certainly an extremely dangerous disease
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to start with but it's faded away but
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you you can't actually in this case as
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in most real life cases decide how much
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of this is a boric resistance how much
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of it because of
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vaccination and some countries where
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they had very little vaccination it's
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also faded away so I'm certainly not a
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vaccine denier um or I mean I had the
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vaccines myself i'm certainly not part
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of a kind of conspiracy theory about
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vaccines but I do think morphic
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resonance has implications for
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epidemiology of respiratory viruses as
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it does in many other areas
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while you were saying uh all these
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different ways of measuring morphic
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resonance you've made me think of
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possibly another different way to test
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it um it sounds like a lot of the
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methods are observing how people are
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learning and you know they take a test
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over time and they get better at taking
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that test but it seems to me just
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observing culture and and people that
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were actually having like a a collective
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amnesia we're forgetting to do things
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that we used to know how to do like type
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or read you know now everybody gets
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their information through videos and
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quick little videos they're not reading
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books anymore there's a whole list of
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things that kids aren't doing that a kid
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100 years ago would do they're not
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socializing they're not making eye
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contact and it seems like we might be
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forgetting how to do things so maybe if
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kids in America are forgetting how to
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make eye contact because they're on
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their phones all day maybe kids in
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Tasmania will suddenly struggle to make
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eye contact i'm not sure
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well I mean more resonance would spread
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bad habits as well as good habits and it
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would tend it tends to reinforce
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patterns of behavior that are often
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repeated they become it's about the
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spread of habits um and I think some of
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it is actually built into our everyday
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life i mean it's I think a lot of
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morphic resonance is hiding in plain
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sight for example if you look at the I
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look at the computer keyboard in front
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of me the layout of the keyserty K wer
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ty the querty layout was developed by
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Remington typewriter company in in in
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the 19th century in the 1860s or '7s and
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the reason they developed this layout
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was because letters that were frequently
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typed next to each other if the there
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were bars going to hit the page if they
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were near each other they got jammed so
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Q would very rarely appear next to W so
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um if they'd put QU it would have got
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jammed more often than he put QW so it
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was to do with the actual ergonomics of
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the mechanism of 19th century
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typewriters with sort of bars going
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across with the letters on them so they
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developed through trial and error a
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keyboard layout that's actually not at
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all intuitive i mean there's no if
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you're learning to type it's not obvious
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why it should be
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q y u i o p on the top row um it's not
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at all obvious it would be more logical
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to have it A B C D and with with the
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advent of electronic uh word processors
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you know all the mechanical reasons for
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this layout on
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typewriters no longer valid because
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there's no mechanical moving parts in
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the computer and interestingly when
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computers first came in and word
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processors a lot of psychologists tried
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to develop more rational um
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keyboard systems that would be easier to
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learn for typing um and you know much
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easier systems A B C D or ones that were
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ergonomically designed to work better
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with two hands they used all the
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principles of ergonomic design and they
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tested them out on people who hadn't
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learned typing before obviously if
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someone's already learned the querty
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system they've got habits and it's hard
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to break habits that are already
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established and what they found was that
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actually the querty thing was easier to
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learn than these new improved ergonomic
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designs completely
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counterintuitive because it shouldn't
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have been easier to learn but from the
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morphic resonance point of view it makes
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total sense that millions of people had
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learned to type using these keyboards
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with that layout which made it easier
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for other people to learn and so one
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example of morphic resonance is in front
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of us every day every time we look at
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our computer or our keyboard um in the
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layout of the letters on on on the
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keyboard so I think there's hundreds of
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examples of morphic resonance around us
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all the time it's that's what's so
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frustrating i can see in front of me
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evidence for it all the time but it's a
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matter of pinning it down in a way that
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is you know conclusive scientifically
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that's the difficult bit which requires
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special experiments
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yeah it seems so hard to test this and
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isolate it um for one I'm I'm never
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going to look at my keyboard the same
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again now um well it's not that hard to
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do actually to do tests for it for
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example um I was talking to someone who
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developed um a music program it was
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something to do with jazz and you could
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learn to play jazz instruments on the
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key you learn to play saxophone and
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things on the computer and they had this
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program that was successful a lot of
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people learned it and they each time
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they brought out a new version they had
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to make it harder because people were
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learning there was a kind of competitive
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element how fast can you learn and
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people were just learning quicker and
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quicker so you had to make it harder and
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harder to keep that kind of competitive
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element of of making it hard to learn so
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I think a lot of video games um are
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probably showing these morphic resonance
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effects all the time the thing is it's
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difficult to test in that case because
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if you have a new video game and you
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have lots of people learn it it means
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that people who've never come across it
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before should learn it quicker than they
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might otherwise have done but the
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trouble is video games are now spread
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all around the world and so you can't
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actually isolate people from these
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things which spread on the internet
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almost immediately so everyone can see
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the new game and learn by watching
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videos of other people doing it so it's
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very hard to tease morphic resonance
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apart from all these other effects which
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lead to the acceleration of learning the
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acceleration of people acquiring skills
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in new games including video games
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