Chance and accidents, indeterminism and prayer. A conversation with Rupert Sheldrake

Mark Vernon - Talks and Thoughts

Randomness and luck, fate and providence. How do these facets of life relate to one another? Or is everything, actually, mechanically determined with synchronicities, say, being no more than coincidences?
In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon discuss the ways in which philosophers and scientists, ancient and modern, have imagined and explored notions of causality and sympathy in nature, alongside fortune and calamities.
The ideas of Aristotle and Boethius provide a striking background against which to consider more recent scientific work.
Rupert also demonstrates how fields can influence seemingly random effects using a Galton Board - a remarkably profound analogue for, say, practices such as prayer.