Mindwalk is a 1990 film that is set in the magnificent Mont Saint-Michel on the coast of France. Three protagonists engage in a wide-ranging discussion coming from different worldviews and different backgrounds. Jack Edwards is an American politician who has just lost a US Presidential primary and joins his close friend, poet and former political speechwriter, Thomas Harriman in France to get away from the pressures and aftermath of his election defeat. While spending a day at Mont Saint-Michel, they begin a conversation with Sonia Hoffman, a Norwegian physicist who is also in need of a change of scenery after leaving her career after she realized her work was being used in weapons development.
Jack is the well meaning, pragmatic American, looking for practical answers to immediate problems. Tom, the narrator, is a disillusioned idealist who sees the world through a poet's eyes and helps Jack and Sonia connect what they say to each other. Sonia drives the conversation with her thoughts and questions which the others struggle at first to comprehend.
The philosophy Sonia reveals as they wander through the magnificent medieval city built in the Ages of Faith built over the centuries in Europe, is a philosophy of science that is laid out in the book The Turning Point by Fritjof Capra (the brother of film-maker Bernt Capra) that is described as "holisitic" or "systems thinking." This philosophy is not compatible with the Christian worldview, however it rejects the Cartesian worldview and acknowledges that there is something beyond a purely materialistic worldview, a position that too often is the foundation of "scientific thinking" today.
The emphasis on seeing things as part of an integrated whole, rather than parts has a very Catholic feel to it, even if the conclusions of the main proponents are distorted by current thinking regarding evolution and human origins and ends up putting the earth rather than man at the center of its concerns.
However one overall aspect of the film that I came away with is the experience of a "mindwalk" - of thinking and talking though deep, important ideas, and appreciating the connections between many different fields and subjects - It is a kind of Socratic dialogue that predates and prepared the world for the faith-inspired intellects of the Doctors of the Church. A thought provoking movie with ideas that can and certainly need to be "baptized."
Jack is the well meaning, pragmatic American, looking for practical answers to immediate problems. Tom, the narrator, is a disillusioned idealist who sees the world through a poet's eyes and helps Jack and Sonia connect what they say to each other. Sonia drives the conversation with her thoughts and questions which the others struggle at first to comprehend.
The philosophy Sonia reveals as they wander through the magnificent medieval city built in the Ages of Faith built over the centuries in Europe, is a philosophy of science that is laid out in the book The Turning Point by Fritjof Capra (the brother of film-maker Bernt Capra) that is described as "holisitic" or "systems thinking." This philosophy is not compatible with the Christian worldview, however it rejects the Cartesian worldview and acknowledges that there is something beyond a purely materialistic worldview, a position that too often is the foundation of "scientific thinking" today.
The emphasis on seeing things as part of an integrated whole, rather than parts has a very Catholic feel to it, even if the conclusions of the main proponents are distorted by current thinking regarding evolution and human origins and ends up putting the earth rather than man at the center of its concerns.
However one overall aspect of the film that I came away with is the experience of a "mindwalk" - of thinking and talking though deep, important ideas, and appreciating the connections between many different fields and subjects - It is a kind of Socratic dialogue that predates and prepared the world for the faith-inspired intellects of the Doctors of the Church. A thought provoking movie with ideas that can and certainly need to be "baptized."
Some great Mindwalk quotes
Tom: "No saint stands alone"
Jack: "I told him that American voters want their leaders to be dumber than they are, they figure they'll do less harm that way. It's an expensive form of cynicism".
On physics - https://youtu.be/Uec1CX-6A38?t=3659
Tom: "Relationships make music"
Sonia: "Relationships make matter"
Tom: "Music of the Spheres…"
Sonia: "as Keppler said"
Tom: "and Skakesphere before him."
Sonia: "and Pathagoras before him!"
Jack: "I told him that American voters want their leaders to be dumber than they are, they figure they'll do less harm that way. It's an expensive form of cynicism".
On physics - https://youtu.be/Uec1CX-6A38?t=3659
Tom: "Relationships make music"
Sonia: "Relationships make matter"
Tom: "Music of the Spheres…"
Sonia: "as Keppler said"
Tom: "and Skakesphere before him."
Sonia: "and Pathagoras before him!"