Unity as the Foundation of Reality
Why Mystical Thinking Is Gaining Ground in Science
What do medieval mystics, quantum physicists, and modern psychologists have in common?
More than you might think. While our world drowns in data and algorithms, an ancient idea is quietly resurfacing — one that unites spiritual traditions and cutting-edge physics alike: everything is one.
British writer Aldous Huxley called it the Perennial Philosophy — a timeless perspective that sees a living, experiential unity behind the diversity of forms and facts. Surprisingly, this idea is now re-emerging not just in temples or poems, but in the laboratories of contemporary science.
✦ The Quiet Return of an Ancient Idea
Nearly every spiritual tradition — from Vedanta to Christian mysticism, from Sufism to Zen — arrives at the same core insight: everything is connected. The ego dissolves, the boundary between “self” and “world” fades, and what remains is an overwhelming sense of unity.
“Tat tvam asi,” say the Hindu scriptures — you are that.
Mystical texts describe a felt oneness behind the surface of things — a unity that isn’t abstract, but directly experienceable. Taoist thinker Zhuangzi wrote of a state in which “Heaven and I were born together; the ten thousand things and I are one.” Sufi poet Rumi echoed the same truth: the drop is the ocean.
The tone may differ across traditions — but the content doesn’t.
For a long time, the West had little patience for such language. Science focused on measurable facts — and achieved astonishing things, from vaccines to space travel. But something was missing. Data alone couldn’t explain why humans long for connection, or why loneliness can be as harmful as disease.
✦ Why Ancient Mysticism Suddenly Feels Relevant
In recent years, the Perennial Philosophy has regained traction — not in theology, but in science itself. Three major trends are opening the door:
Data overload is demanding coherence
We know more than ever about individual parts — from DNA sequences to dark matter. But raw data becomes knowledge only when we grasp the relationships between things. The Perennial Philosophy offers a framework in which connection matters more than isolation.Science is shifting from particles to relationships
In quantum physics, reality isn’t complete without factoring in the relationship between observer and observed. Everything is linked through an unseen layer — physicist Carlo Rovelli calls this relational quantum mechanics.
In biology, researchers like Suzanne Simard have shown that trees share nutrients through fungal networks — a "wood-wide web." In neuroscience, Karl Friston’s predictive brain model sees the brain as entangled with its environment in a constant loop. Each example undermines the classical view of separate, self-contained objects.Experience is once again a valid research subject
For decades, science dismissed anything it couldn’t measure — like feelings or subjective states. But now we know: what we experience matters.
Researchers like Richard Davidson combine brain scans with personal accounts to study the effects of meditation. In psychedelic studies, Robin Carhart-Harris found that the intensity of a unity experience — not the dose of psilocybin — was the best predictor of recovery from depression.
Long ignored, subjective experience is returning as real data.
✦ What Is the Perennial Philosophy, Exactly?
So what is this “oneness” that science is now circling back to?
On the surface, traditions vary widely. A Buddhist meditates on emptiness, a Sufi dances to rhythm, a Christian prays in silence. Yet mystics from every tradition report the same event: the boundary between self and world collapses, revealing a vibrant whole — and the experience often leaves a lasting ethical imprint.
This sense of unity shows up across time and cultures. In late antique Alexandria, Plotinus wrote about The One, the source of all things. Meister Eckhart called it “the awakened gaze” — the capacity to see the divine in everything. Vedanta philosopher Shankaracharya described it as the discovery that the Self is identical with Brahman, the living absolute.
Today, in a digital age flooded with fragmented truths, this idea is resurfacing — not through mystics, but through physicists. Carlo Rovelli and David Chalmers now take seriously what used to be laughed off as mysticism. In The One (2023), physicist Heinrich Päs suggests the entire universe may be a single, unified whole — and that our perception of separate things is just that: perception.
✦ From Plotinus to Panpsychism
The mystical experience of unity is often wrapped in religious imagery — but its underlying structure is universal. It expresses a deep interconnectedness among all things.
Swiss philosopher Frithjof Schuon summarized its essence in three points:
There is an ultimate reality beyond all forms
Every tradition expresses it through symbols and rituals
Human beings have the capacity to directly perceive it
Even without the religious context, the pattern is clear: unity, diversity, recognition.
What’s striking is that this way of thinking now echoes outside of spirituality — in the fringes of science itself. Philosophers and neuroscientists with no religious affiliation are beginning to ask: What if consciousness isn’t just a brain function — but a feature of reality itself?
Neuroscientist Christof Koch, co-developer of Integrated Information Theory, has called consciousness “a fundamental property, written into the fabric of the universe.”
What these scientists are discovering — independently of any tradition — lines up almost perfectly with what mystics have been describing for centuries: consciousness is not a byproduct, but a foundation.
✦ The Comeback of a Forgotten Wisdom
We live in a time of extraordinary knowledge — and extraordinary disconnection. We know how to split atoms and model financial markets, but often struggle to make sense of ourselves.
How do we feel at home in a world we understand rationally, but not always existentially? Technology accelerates. Meaning lags behind.
In this light, the Perennial Philosophy isn’t a nostalgic escape — it’s a framework for reconnection. A way to integrate data, relationships, and lived experience into one coherent story. A lens through which science, ethics, and perception are no longer separate domains, but facets of the same whole.
A reminder that what we’re searching for — just maybe — is already within us.
What this philosophy offers is not a final answer, but an invitation. To pay attention. To experience. To reconnect.
It suggests that insight doesn’t come from knowing more — but from learning to perceive differently.
And maybe that’s the most radical shift of all: That knowledge is no longer something we only look for out there — but something we begin to recover from within.