This book points out many of the parallels between modern physics and Eastern mysticism. In particular we can recognize parallels between many ancient mystic ideas and the modern quantum physical findings of superposition (and non locality), the duality of light and matter, and the ultimate non-physicality of nature. For many years there have been cultures that ascribed to these types of ideas as crazy as they sounded when they first hit the physics arena in the 20th century. These ideas weren't really new at all because mystics and the like had believed them for centuries prior. What was not discovered until this last century was the mathematics and scientific evidence to give these ancient mystic religions and precepts any foundation to be taken seriously, especially since most of society had largely given up on that mysticism for ideas such as atomism, newtonian mechanics, etc. This book does a good job pointing out these parallels and thus demonstrates how the pendulum has swung away from those ancient ideas, and has now begun to swing back.

Finishing this makes my brain feel like it just emerged out of a mental marathon!

Don't look to Capra for a highly disciplined discourse on particle physics or the nature of cosmology. Nor is this book a deep exploration of Taoism or other Eastern Religious Philosophy. Rather, it is a fascinating mental adventure showing the ways the two schools of thought often developed in parallel and came to similar conclusions from very different beginning points. The author's own words in the epilogue sum it up nicely. "Science does not need mysticism and mysticism does not need science, but man needs both."That's what I said before reading extensively in physics and cosmology and before watching so many charlatans and the honest but misguided people duped by them try to sell Woo-Woo in place of solid science. I wish I had not written the review above, but I'll let it stand as mute warning to be careful of lay interpretations of science. And a Medical Doctor like Dr. Robert Lanza or a New Age/Alternative Medicine guru like Depak Chopra is not a particle physicist. Their pronouncements on quantum mechanics are no more valid than mine would be if I suddenly set out to perform delicate surgery. It's very true that weird, seemingly mystical things do go on at the tiny scale of the atom where quantum physics operates. It is NOT true, however, that you can scale that quantum weirdness up to the macro level where human beings, planets, galaxies and universes operate, and draw realistic inferences on the parallels between the macro world and Eastern mysticism. Here's a good discussion of the Woo effect and why it should be avoided, provided by British Physicist Dr. Phil Moriarty on the Sixty Symbols Channel on YouTube.