Emanational Physics.

clearing up the mess of modern physics

The second edition of this rare, self-published text proposing to correct modern physics by reframing it metaphysically. Described as a not-for-sale edition limited to 100 copies, this one was sent to Allan R. Sandage, who determined the first reasonably accurate value for the age of the universe and was considered 'the greatest and most influential observational astronomer of the last half-century' (New York Times obituary, November 17, 2010). An introductory letter from the author is loosely inserted.

Stephen Harrison is somewhat mysterious, but he seems to have been a technology consultant in Washington D.C. and the author of three self-published books: The Mind/Brain Problem, Artificial Intelligence: A House Built Upon the Sand, and The New Monadology. We can locate no institutional copies of Emanational Physics, and only one institutional copy of any of the other books: The New Monadology, at Purdue. Harrison's obituary, which described him as a philosopher aged 96, appeared in the Washington Post on March 16th, 2016.

The contents of this volume comprise an elaborate, conservative-leaning, and pseudo-scientific critique of relativity, quantum mechanics, and materialist conceptions of human consciousness. As Harrison writes in the preface, 'It is no secret that the state of theoretical physics & cosmology is replete with contradictions and paradoxes… What is chiefly wrong with physicists is that they are metaphysically light-weight'. He goes on to explain that, 'undaunted by my limited grasp of modern physics, I decided to blunder in, and try my hand at clearing up the mess'. The appearance of a second edition only six months after the first was occasioned by 'my very recent discovery of literature sources critical of relativity… it seems it is not easy to publish material contrary to the Establishment Doctrine...'.

Among the 90 recipients of this text (who must have been thrilled) were some of the most prominent scientists of the period, including Roger Penrose, Murray Gell-Mann, Steven Weinberg, Stephen Hawking, Freeman Dyson, and John Archibald Wheeler. A number of humanities scholars were sent copies, among them political philosopher Paul Gottfried, theologian Thomas F. Torrance, historian of science Stanley Jaki, and religious philosopher Richard Swinbourne.

Most remarkably, at least a few of them engaged seriously with Harrison's text. In the preface he thanks 'a number of readers who sent in their comments in response to the original'. Mathematician Joseph Gerver is specially praised for 'his very detailed commentary on a number of points'. And not only did neuroscientist and philosopher Raymond Tallis read Emanational Physics, he cited it in his 1991 book on consciousness, The Explicit Animal.

Second edition, typed letter signed from the author loosely inserted; comb-bound photocopy (28 x 21.5 cms); title on yellow paper, illustrations, charts and graphs throughout, one coloured by hand, the author's name and address in pencil partially erased from the title, occasional additions and corrections made by taping or pasting in new slips of paper; Original brown paper covers, the upper cover with a plastic window for the title and "BK Dynamics" embossed in gold. The author's Directed Technologies business card, with the address corrected by hand, is stapled to the upper cover, very good condition.