The history of biology traces the attempts of biologists over the years to add another level of theory to explain the growth and form of open systems (any system that interacts with its environment be it human, animal or plant).
The question is, what makes a particular plant, animal, human, assume the form, the shape that it does. How does an oak tree know to grow like an oak tree? How does a Jack Russell grow into a Jack Russell and not a Dalmatian? These were questions that were being asked with full knowledge of a mechanistic biology of life i.e. protein synthesis, genes, DNA and RNA structure.
The search was for another level, a force that could give a living organism the potential for development and a specific form. Sheldrake’s hypothesis of formative causation puts forward the theory of an organism with its own organising field of structure and activity that is called a morphic field.
Morphic resonance
These fields are influenced by what he calls morphic resonance. The morphic resonance is that of the structure and activity of an organism of a similar kind, from the past – the organism has a memory of being and acting maybe, like a dolphin, being in the sea and being part of a school of dolphins. It is an inherent memory of, in this example, of dolphiness.
Sheldrake goes on to describe other fields, such as fields of information, social fields, mental fields, and cultural fields.
These fields are influenced by what he calls morphic resonance. The morphic resonance is that of the structure and activity of an organism of a similar kind, from the past – the organism has a memory of being and acting maybe, like a dolphin, being in the sea and being part of a school of dolphins. It is an inherent memory of, in this example, of dolphiness.
Sheldrake goes on to describe other fields, such as fields of information, social fields, mental fields, and cultural fields.
Fields of information
Sheldrake talks of fields of information, and the words that we usually connect with information, like programs or instructions. But morphic fields do not transfer information in the same way as, for instance a genetic code. These morphic fields carry information for the organism, society or culture, and with the help of morphic resonance also inherent memory, over space and time.
Sheldrake talks of fields of information, and the words that we usually connect with information, like programs or instructions. But morphic fields do not transfer information in the same way as, for instance a genetic code. These morphic fields carry information for the organism, society or culture, and with the help of morphic resonance also inherent memory, over space and time.
Social fields
If we look at societies and cultures in terms of morphic resonance it allows a broader context within which to understand them. The resonance of the past informs the activities and life of the present ‘….to think of the past as pressed up, as it were, against the present, and as potentially present everywhere.’ (Sheldrake 1988 p 112).
The past becomes present within communities through the building of a cultural history of a group of people, over a period of time. It becomes the present through the myths and archetypes of a particular culture, and through ritual, initiation and the ceremonies of life.