Rupert Sheldrake

Rupert Sheldrake is a biologist and author, and the originator of the hypothesis of morphic resonance. The source archive page on his work presents him as a Cambridge-trained researcher in biochemistry and plant physiology who later developed a general theory of form and habit in nature.

Role in the source

Sheldrake is the central figure of the source. The archive page is organized around his proposal and his exposition of it, and the claimed evidence it presents is the evidence he associates with the hypothesis. The page is sympathetic to his position.

The hypothesis he proposes

Sheldrake proposes that nature contains morphic fields — organizing fields that shape the form and behavior of systems — and that similarity of form or behavior between successive similar systems is transmitted by morphic resonance, described as a non-energetic process. He frames this as formative causation: causation by the repetition of form rather than by energetic mechanism. See Morphic Resonance, Morphic Resonance: The Nature of Formative Causation — Memory, Instinct and the McDougall Controversy and Formative Causation.

Books

The source lists numerous books by Sheldrake, including A New Science of Life, The Presence of the Past, The Sense of Being Stared At, Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home, Seven Experiments That Could Change the World, and others, as well as co-authored works with Terence McKenna, Ralph Abraham, Matthew Fox, and Chris Carter. The source does not describe editorial responses to these works.

Evidentiary status

The source is a bibliography page listing Sheldrake's books and does not supply experimental evidence or controlled replications. The claims associated with the hypothesis are contested in mainstream science, but the source itself provides no experimental detail to evaluate. See Morphic Resonance: Formative Causation, Behavioral Fields and the Proposed Tests.

Note on scope

This page records only what the source supports. It does not assert that morphic resonance is established, and it does not attribute to Sheldrake any claim not present in the archive material.