There is a reason for stars, planets, baseballs and marbles being spheres, but when Emerson wrote his fascinating essay Circles he didn’t know about plasma life forms though Mel Gibson may have been aware of them. However, I’ve always credited Emerson with his towering intellect having a degree of prescience about many things and he was certainly aware of crystal balls which may have had their origin in the plasma life forms as spheres being studied by physicists while those involved with metaphysics know them as paranormal orbs. And perhaps what existed as the seed of the universe was an orb.

Plasma Life Forms - Spheres, Blobs, Orbs and Subtle Bodies by Jay Alfred, Life-Like Qualities of Plasma will leave some people numb trying to absorb the possibilities, since any study of such things is not only steeped in physics but metaphysics as well. Mention of transparent and translucent orbs is to be found in ancient texts as well as more contemporary literature often described as behaving like intelligent entities and have a history of appearing in photographs. I recall someone sending me copy of a photo in which three small orbs appeared looking like soap bubbles that she said were not seen when she snapped the picture. Since she was a professional photographer I had no reason to doubt her story, especially since such occurrences are so commonplace. And no, not all are the result of indulging in magic mushrooms.

Now I do have my Val Saint Lambert crystal frog, but it just doesn’t seem to have the essential characteristics needed for scrying. It just sits there with nary even a ribbit out of the critter, and despite the reputation of crystal skulls I believe nothing can take the place of a crystal ball. I’ve checked out the various purveyors of crystal balls online and haven’t quite made up my mind yet whether to purchase one, my frog having failed to deliver.

Wonderful SciFi classic; The Blob, and I still enjoy it for the classic it is. But the actual physics and metaphysics would have orbs being more likely than some gooey substance; however an orb would not have fit the plot so well. Yet the science being brought to bear on the idea that life began on earth as energized orbs is absolutely fascinating, as is an electrical charge used for in vitro fertilization:

“During in vitro fertilization the human embryo is given an electrical jolt to spark-off cell division. The purpose of this routine electrical intervention is not known. All is known is that cell division is unlikely to occur in the absence of this electrical intervention. According to plasma metaphysics (Our Invisible Bodies, 2006), this electrical spark is necessary to generate a plasma bubble which acts as a catalyst during embryogenesis. Unlike a biomolecular environment, a plasma environment allows long-range correlations, without which a 3 dimensional structure could not be projected from a 1 dimensional gene. An embryo within a human body is protected by the plasma bubble (i.e. the physical-etheric double) of the mother and inherits a bubble within this environment. (In this process, it acquires what the Qigong literature refers to as ‘prenatal qi’.)”

Fascinating, especially “The purpose of this routine electrical intervention is not known.” Those of us who credit the Bible story of Creation being drawn from facts have no trouble with the claim that God is a spirit, that the spirit of God energizes life, is in fact the source of all life. My own thought of the soul not being formed at birth but needs to be nourished and tended like a seed has its basis in distinguishing between spirit and soul, that while the soul that sins may die the spirit does not but continues in continuity with God our Creator. That some such spirits may take the form of orbs that have been observed here on earth is still the stuff of the metaphysical and paranormal, but scientists are doing some remarkable research and making some astounding discoveries about orbs that hold some hope of bringing these studies and beliefs together.

As to the soul, I’ve always liked John Wayne’s line in The Shootist “My soul is what I’ve made of it.” But it takes time to grow a soul in my opinion, just as it does any earthly plant. There may be an age of accountability based on this growth of the soul. And the monsters among us that prey on women and children may be satanic creatures without a soul. I do believe Satan exists, and I believe he plants his seeds of evil as Jesus described in the Parable of the Tares. In supposing such a thing I admit to believing the germ of life can be satanic in some instances.

Whatever happened that became the story of The Fall in Genesis there is no mistaking the curse came down particularly hard on women. And if that old serpent in The Garden was the Devil, he seems to take particular delight in targeting women. I just wonder, for example, if Mortimer Adler looked at the paucity of women in the U. N. and decided if they were not found worthy of leadership and representation there why should they be represented in The Great Books?

Whatever it is that energizes life and departs at death is beyond our present state of science to identify and explain. But great scientists of imagination like Michio Kaku encourage me that answers may be forthcoming, though with this caveat: There remain things in the universe not only unknown, but perhaps unknowable. However, I believe scientists may have to become more open minded concerning things like paranormal orbs and crop circles. We simply do not know what energy is, we do not understand the forms it takes or how the universe holds together. There is this thing called gravity, but we do not know what it is.

No one can dispute the observation by Jesus that it is impossible by some exercise of the mind to add an inch to our height, but with the increasing power of computers his comment that the very hairs of our head are numbered by God, that not a sparrow falls to the ground without it being known by God becomes quite believable.

In my opinion the knowledge of many things of ancient people could not have been gained by observation alone anymore than one of them could add an inch to their height by an exercise of the mind. They could not have discovered iron and learned to work it by either accident or observation. The constellations and planets could not be discerned by their unaided eyes no matter how long they stared at the heavens. Knowing this I conclude the knowledge of the ancients was gained by revelation of some kind from some unknown source much as we find in the Bible concerning certain things.

As heretical as it is I do not believe the greatest of scientific discoveries like those of Kepler and Newton came by their unaided genius; I believe they came by these monumental ideas through revelation. And I ask myself, to what purpose these revelations from whatever source? The world continues to be filled with evil and violence and the greatest of our scientific achievements have not solved the problems of evil and violence. We have the knowledge to destroy ourselves, but lack the wisdom to save ourselves.

For some of us the last chapter of the Bible suffices to assure us all turns out well in the end. But in the meantime here in the Kern River Valley we not only have the annual Turkey Vulture Count, we have an annual Butterfly Count also. While the vultures serve a utilitarian purpose in nature, I think I will just sit back and enjoy the butterflies for a while. And should I happen to see one in an orb I don’t believe I’ll be all that surprised. After all, both seem quite reasonable as expressions of God and I never ask myself, why the butterflies? I simply take delight in them. I can’t do anything about the huge plume of smoke from the fire south of me here in Bodfish; I can’t put out the fire. But I take encouragement from the butterflies; that beauty will prevail over ugliness in the end.