Michael Talbot’s 1991 popularisation of the holographic-paradigm idea — the proposition, developed independently by physicist David Bohm and neuroscientist Karl Pribram, that the universe and the brain may both be hologram-like structures in which every part contains information about the whole. Bohm’s implicate-order physics and Pribram’s holographic model of memory and perception are the book’s two scientific spines; Talbot extends the framework outward to near-death experiences, lucid dreaming, synchronicities, miraculous healing, stigmata and the paranormal more broadly.
The book is one of the founding texts of the New Age "quantum consciousness" subgenre and was particularly influential on Gregg Braden, Lynne McTaggart and the wider What the Bleep generation. The Bohm and Pribram material is real physics and real neuroscience; Talbot’s extension to paranormal phenomena is where mainstream readers and scientists part ways with the audience. Talbot’s death from lymphocytic leukemia in 1992, at age 38 and shortly after publication, has kept the book frozen at this synthesis rather than developing further in his own hands.
Contents
The Brain as Hologram
The Cosmos as Hologram
The Holographic Model and Psychology
I Sing the Body Holographic
A Pocketful of Miracles
Seeing Holographically
Time Out of Mind
Travelling in the Superhologram
Return to the Dreamtime
Reception
A crossover bestseller of the early 1990s and one of the founding texts of the New Age "quantum consciousness" subgenre, particularly influential on Gregg Braden, Lynne McTaggart and the wider What the Bleep generation. The Bohm and Pribram material is real physics and real neuroscience; Talbot’s extension to paranormal phenomena is where mainstream readers and scientists part ways with the audience. Talbot’s death from leukemia in 1992, shortly after publication, has kept the book frozen at this synthesis rather than developing further.
Frequently asked
What is The Holographic Universe about?
It is Michael Talbot’s 1991 popularisation of the holographic paradigm: David Bohm’s implicate-order physics and Karl Pribram’s holographic model of the brain, fused into the proposition that the universe and the brain may both be hologram-like structures in which every part encodes the whole. Talbot extends the framework outward to near-death experiences, lucid dreaming, synchronicity, stigmata and miraculous healing.
Is the holographic universe theory accepted by physicists?
David Bohm’s implicate-order physics is a serious if minority interpretation of quantum mechanics, and Karl Pribram’s holographic memory model is an established hypothesis in neuroscience. Talbot’s extension of these ideas to paranormal phenomena (NDEs, psi, stigmata, miraculous healings) is not accepted by mainstream science and is where most working physicists and neuroscientists distance themselves from the book’s wider claims.
Who was Michael Talbot?
Michael Coleman Talbot (1953–1992) was an American author born in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He wrote three non-fiction books on physics and mysticism — Mysticism and the New Physics (1981), Beyond the Quantum (1986), and The Holographic Universe (1991) — as well as several horror novels. He died of lymphocytic leukemia in 1992, aged 38, a year after the book’s publication.