Holt Science and Technology Life Science, Standards Review Workbook Book

There is a well thought out philosophical foundation that the author lays out in this book. The author is going to argue for "The One" of Parmenides (I don't think he cites Parmenides by name but speaks in his terms). Most modern Christian thought puts God outside of the universe (an atemporal, transcendental being of some kind), and makes Man (all people, but I'll use "Man" because that's the way they talked in 1926) completely separate from his creator.

The One is infinite and everything that exists is made of this mind substance and is just a rearrangement of this substance according to Holmes. The Rev. George Berkeley developed a coherent (and probably never properly refuted belief system) that everything that exist is in the mind of God. (If a tree fell in the forest and no one was there to hear it would it make a sound. Yes, of course, it would according to Berkeley, God would hear it). Holmes is taking Berkeley but putting a reverse twist on it, we are the mind of God and God is our mind. He'd would probably agree with the statement that "the Man who thinks is God". That's sort of an Aristotelian sentiment too. Because, in the Aristotelian worldview there is no creation ex nihilo, there is only creation from something, an arrangement of stuff. Since Holmes is starting with the infinite substance being from God he reaches a similar conclusion to the Pagan thought of Aristotle.

Holmes very subtlety reworks Christianity with some of the old Pagan beliefs put back in. Holmes, no longer makes Man an infinite distance from God and our Gratitude can be actualized (under traditional Christianity we can never pay God back fully for the Cross and can only try to be perfect in this life time, but Holmes allows us to be perfect). For Holmes, God is approachable, and might be outside of time, but still part of our universe. Karl Popper realized that Parmenides agrees with Einstein's "block universe" from Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. Time is taken out of the universe when it is looked at from the whole cosmos. Holmes is no dummy. He knows what he his doing and how he connects man to God through the medium of the ether (or in today's terminology I would say the "Higgs Field", which permeates the whole universe and gives all particles which have mass their mass).

Holmes does give a very non-standard interpretation on Christianity. Not that there is anything wrong with that (who wants to study the same old boring stuff?). His thinking does seem to overlap a lot with Quaker thought (probably by far my most favorite of all religions). He also has a whole lot of Mary Baker Eddy in his system, but with what I would call a 'lite' version. Because, he'll say go ahead and think the illness away but go to a doctor if need be.

He thinks there is a medium (an ether) where our thoughts can travel freely about. Our thoughts can effect (and affect) the world. He really likes Jesus, but puts a different spin on Jesus' words than traditional Christianity. Such as when Jesus said "I and the father are one" really means that all of us have the spark of God within us and God has it in us and we are all like the speck in the center of a page completely surrounded by the infinite mind (everything is mind). Duality (mind body dichotomy) leads to errors in thought. The author understands that and discusses some of those problems when he talks about absolutism and relativism. He knows that cause and effect get jumbled together and he replaces that way of thinking with Karma.

The author thinks mystics have always been real (great sages of ages past from all cultures who understand the wisdom acquired from the instinctual use of the mind), and the author thinks psychics of all kinds are real and can tap into the subjective consciousness, the part of the mind that contains the soul and contains our memories and can be accessed by using deduction, the necessary Laws that flow from the universe's (God's) existence. Spirit is that which becomes self aware and is not soul, the soil that allows the Spirit to be actualized.

There's definitely a large self-help component to this book. People who have been through bad experiences and need a helping hand will definitely be able to embrace this book with its positive mental attitude approach (but they first would have to wade through some of the compact language and pseudoscience contained in the book). I suspect that's why people give this book such high ratings. I liked his attitude on good habits and why they matter so keenly in making us who we become, "first the man takes a drink, then the drink takes the drink, and then the drink takes the man". The prayers (or meditations) in the end of the book probably would work for people who are at their wits end and feel they can't take it anymore. To get to the meat of the book, one does have to wade through a lot of psychobabble ('constipation is about recognizing ones freedom", I would say that it's about fiber, but immediately following that he says something intelligent about people with low self worth and how to realize that it is not real. So one has got to take the good with the bad with this book).

This book provides a different spin on Christianity. In my opinion, a more refreshing look, and he is not bad with his philosophy, but there is a lot of babble from the time period he writes which he accepts. I would be fairly certain there are people this book could help, but it is not a science book whatsoever and does have a whole lot of psychobabble with it.