Cultural Writing. Western science has operated for centuries on the assumption that we can understand the universe without understanding ourselves. We are just now seeking to make the necessary connection between the general laws of nature to those of our own (inner) nature. But the job won't be done with "massive injections of the new consciousness"; we cannot democratize the sacred by cheapening its demands. In A SENSE OF THE COSMOS, Needleman speaks not of the convergence between spirituality and science, but of their separation arguing that ".As in nature itself, organic unity is a reciprocal relationship between separate but interdependent entities. In human life as well, there can be no real unity except through the awareness of real divisions."