Head and Heart: A Personal Exploration of Science and the Sacred

by Victor Mansfield

Book Overview

This unusual book tells the story of an astrophysicist's search for meaning from psychological, philosophical, and spiritual points of view. Mansfield weaves personal memoir with clear scientific discussion and quotes such famous thinkers and writers as Steven Weinberg, Jane Goodall, Joseph Campbell, C. G. Jung, Nelson Mandela, Robert Frost, and the Sufi poet Rumi. In plain language, Mansfield explores radio astronomy, the nature of time, relativity,...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0835608174
• ISBN13: 9780835608176
• Release Date: July 2002
• Publisher: Quest Books (IL)
• Length: 295 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

A Meditation on Science and the Soul

In "Head and Heart", Victor Mansfield explores the relationship between the objective rationality of science and the noetic revelations of religion. Mansfield is that rare combination: a scientist of impeccable credentials (he is a Professor of Physics at Colgate University), and a deeply spiritual man who is well-versed in eastern and western religious traditions. His book is about the crucial need for harmony between these two aspects of life that are usually at war with each other, and he recognizes that they must be harmonized internally (head and heart) as well as externally (science and spirit). This very rewarding book lets the reader share in Mansfield's remarkable personal quest.

Bridge to a Brave New World

As one who writes about Jungian psychology and the feminine principle, I am very taken with this unique and brave book. Mansfield, an astrophysicist who is as scholarly and logical as they come, is also a spiritual warrior at the vanguard of a new breed of men who understand the need for uniting the objective, scientific masculine mind with the personally meaningful sacred wisdom of feminine heart. It takes an unusual degree of consciousness to avoid the trap of taking sides over this, one of the most deeply ingrained splits in the Western mind, and Mansfield is a rare scientist with the wisdom and courage to bridge the gap. In this book, which is an artful blend of personal story and scientific theory, he begins by differentiating between the masculine and feminine principles to illustrate their value as metaphors for head and heart, science and the sacred. In Part II he demonstrates how these opposites meet and interact in such controversial and mysterious phenomena as astrology and synchronicity. Having experienced many synchronistic events myself, I found this section especially interesting and affirming. Finally, in Part III he discusses ways of relating head and heart. The result is a subtle weave of the latest findings of science with the progressive thinking of today's most sophisticated philosophers, psychologists, and authentic spirit persons into a harmonious, balanced, and unified theory about the nature of reality. This book is a must read for serious seekers and deserves to be placed alongside those of our most advanced and enlightened thinkers.