A New Science of Life

Why do many phenomena defy the explanations of conventional biology and physics? When laboratory rats in one place learn how to navigate a new maze, why do rats elsewhere seem to learn it more easily?

Rupert describes this process as morphic resonance: the past forms and behaviors of organisms influence organisms in the present through direct connections across time and space. Calling into question many of our fundamental concepts about life and consciousness, this reinterprets the regularities of nature as being more like habits than laws.

First published in 1981, it was fully revised and updated in 2009. Alex Gomez-Marin reflects on the book's impact after 40th in the biology journal BioEssays: Facing biology’s open questions.

Reviews

"As far-reaching in its implications as Darwin's theory of evolution." — Brain/Mind Bulletin

"Morphic Resonance poses a serious challenge to traditionalists and is a most welcome book about how we see the world and how we should head off into the future." — Marc Bekoff

"Books of this importance and elegance come along rarely. Those who read this new edition of A New Science of Life may do so with the satisfaction of seeing science history in the making." — Larry Dossey, MD

"Morphic Resonance is destined to become one of the landmarks in the history of biology. It is rare to find so profound a book so lucidly written." — Bruce H. Lipton, PhD

"Sheldrake is an excellent scientist; the proper, imaginative kind that in an earlier age discovered continents and mirrored the world in sonnets." — New Scientist