This is the story of the attempt by Wolfgang Pauli (1900-1958) to reconcile physics with religion. In his twenties Pauli proposed two radical ideas that solved the problem of the structure of the atom earned him a Nobel Prize. Their significance in the present context derives from their novelty: Since they departed so dramatically from the conventional wisdom of the time, seemingly emerging from nowhere, they raised the question of their origin.
Around age thirty Pauli suffered a psychic crisis for which he sought help from Carl Jung. The brief but successful therapy introduced Pauli to the emotional side of his personality, which he had hitherto suppressed in favor of his intellect. It also initiated a lifelong collaboration with Jung. The analysis of his dreams suggested to Pauli that a source of new concepts in physics might be found in the irrational side of his mind -- irrational, in this context, meaning beyond reason but not contrary to it.
In order to test his hypothesis Pauli studied the works of the Johannes Kepler, who combined a modern approach to science with strong religious beliefs. Pauli concluded that Kepler’s heliocentric hypothesis was not based on observational evidence at all, but on the mystical identification of the Sun with God, a conviction that led naturally to the assignment of the Sun to a central place in the universe. This reading corroborated Pauli’s belief that dream images and other irrational mental processes contribute substantially to the formation of new scientific concepts. He thought that he had found the bridge from the irrational world of myths and dreams to the rational, scientific point of view in the concept of symbol, a term that also plays a central role in Jung’s psychology.
Pauli saw the history of Western thought as a dialectic between two points of view -- the rational and the mystical. He suggested that until the seventeenth century these were balanced, but with the enlightenment the harmony was upset and the purely rational view prevailed. In this imbalance Pauli found many of the ills of modern society. He longed for the return to a more wholesome relationship between science and religion, which he believed to be the true destiny of humanity. To this end he envisioned a new, all-encompassing view of nature that would include rational and irrational modes of perception in equal measure.
By the time of Pauli’s premature death had not yet embarked upon the formulation of his unification. However, from his correspondence, which has been edited and published in German, we can glimpse some of the elements of the project. He explicitly rejected two extremes -- the complete separation of science from religion, and total immersion in the mystical experience of oneness with the universe. During his lifetime, Pauli’s fervent quest for spiritual wholeness was unknown to the public and ignored by his colleagues. Today, with the debate between science and religion once more in full cry, Pauli’s visionary pursuit speaks to us with renewed relevance.