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Welcome to No Dimensions, website of
Andrew P. Smith. I am a scientist with a background in neurosciences, pharmacology and molecular biology. Though I currently
do research in the fields of cancer and neurodegenerative diseases, I have spent almost forty years pursuing a spiritual path,
and this site is all about that. Specifically, I explore the relationship of higher states of consciousness to the world as
revealed by science. Can we understand these states in terms of brain function? Conversely, can mystical insights provide
novel approaches to understanding the brain and its relationship to ordinary consciousness? Do they suggest realities currently
(and possibly always) invisible to science? I am the author of several books, both fiction and non-fiction,
all of which touch on some of these questions. All are available at Amazon, some as hard copies, all as kindle editions.
My most recent book, The Dimensions of Experience, is a history of consciousness that argues that our familiar experience
of three dimensions of space and a dimension of time evolved one dimension at a time, beginning with the simplest invertebrates.
Further descriptions, and links, are on this page.
Meditation can be defined as the practice of observing our thoughts objectively.
What if there were a computer program so powerful that it could predict our thoughts as they actually happened? Would
viewing our thoughts in this manner have the effect of raising our consciousness? What if the program could predict
everyone’s thoughts, and presented them to millions of people simultaneously, via the internet? Would there be
a global effect on human consciousness? This is the story of such an experiment.
A group of famous people, each prominent in a different profession, individually disappear
under mysterious circumstances. A UFO contacts the White House, claiming to carry the earth's original inhabitants,
returning to reclaim their land. A secretive spiritual community with a bold plan for world peace lies at the center
of it all.
A detailed discussion of the holarchical view of life, in which higher forms of life
transcend and include lower ones.
Ten myths of meditation, beginning with: it's easy.
The Dimensions of Experience. A Natural History of Consciousness How has consciousness evolved? This book argues that every form of life experiences
itself and the world in a certain number of dimensions, which increase during evolution. The simplest organisms experience
no dimensions, that is, make no distinction between themselves and other forms of life. Higher organisms experience
one, two or three dimensions of space, with human beings also experiencing an extended sense of time that provides permanence
to the world. Review from Kirkus Discoveries: A lucid, thought-provoking and
wide-ranging metaphysical treatise by novelist, scientific researcher and Stanford Ph.D. Smith.
Heralded as “the first complete history of consciousness ever written,” The Dimensions of Experience covers an astonishing amount of ground, from evolutionary theory to postmodern linguistics, physics and even obscure Victorian literature. Smith’s central contention is that ‘the miraculous is much closer to home” than many human beings understand. By this he does not mean a hidden realm of elves and dragons—or any sort of religious transcendence, at least as understood in the biblical sense—but a miracle of dimensions. “However many dimensions there are in the universe, we—all of us, all forms of life—exist in all of them,” Smith argues. “They are all within our reach. What we lack—some species more than others, but again, all of us to some extent—is the ability to experience all of these dimensions.” Over 11 tightly written and edited chapters, Smith goes on to explicate the evolution of consciousness and how we came to understand the world as we do today. He discusses transcendental meditation and the benefits and fallacies therein; he ventures bravely into the world of coral reefs, worm colonies and bacteria, showing how even the simplest of organisms experience life in a range of dimensions. “According to science,” he writes, “the three major dimensions of space are a condition of all existence, within which the entire evolutionary history of earth has played out.” Not so, he counters. The Dimensions of Experience makes the case for a more dynamic form of evolution, where beings evolve through time and space, but also through dimensions we do not yet properly understand. Smith’s great accomplishment is verisimilitude; he holds forth with equal skill on both the biology of proto-organisms and the knottiest work of post-structuralists like Derrida, and he weaves every chapter deftly into a convincing narrative. An engaging, supple scientific text, blessedly free of weighty academic jargon. Favorite Links |
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