The last scientist left on earth is in a cave with a scalpel. Determined to finally discover the core of all life he chops off a finger. Bleeding but still alive confirms that life does not originate from a finger, he chops off an arm..... ...[film cuts to] a dead scientist and lots of severed body parts lying on the cave floor.
If science worked it all out....
I think Douglas Adams touched on this with the super computer that given years to think of the ultimate answer to the ultimate question and it said the answer was 42.
It could only be deeply boring and like a bore taking stage at a comedy evening, completely kill the party.
Scientists do some great work, they do enough great work that we let them off all the horrible stuff that comes about. They are in the field because they are interested and this must come from the unknown. Studying life or the nature of reality is a fascinating art which seems to me to be spoiled by accuracy, measurement and laws.
Imagine the meaning of life was (insert equation here) - I'm sure that would even kill the scientists own party. There would be some back slapping and a little internal jealousy of peers but ultimately they and everyone else would soon just say, "hmm, so now what? 42 eh... ...hmm ... ...beer anyone?"
I truly do not think there can be an answer like that but these quests for the smallest particle, the core, the beginning, the plunges into deep space. (of which we have achieved the same as baby Sherpa Tenzing learning to crawl, if that) are random yet very exitable stabs in the dark.
The great mystery starts in us. How can we ever reach a goal where we set out to explore infinite space? How can we break something and expect the bits we are left with to be further indivisible? The mechanistic, materialistic views are to remove piece by piece a car in the hope if finding the one bit that makes it work and to not see that it is the parts in unison that make the car.
Exploring the limitless with the limited.
Psychiatry is a sad example of "if science got it right". Do a search for "Psychiatry:Industry of Death". It blew me away.
ReplyDeleteA movie/documentary. Looks like I'll enjoy that, thanks.
ReplyDeleteAlthough the subject matter is not enjoyable, there is a lot to be taken from man's greatest and most horrific mistakes.
I agree.
ReplyDeleteThis post has another Asbestos Head complement I have to include:
ReplyDelete"Logically, if you divide a second in half and in half again and again, this process continues forever. Likewise, if you divide a chunk of matter in half again and again, there should always be half your last division left over. And mathematicians agree that any number but zero may be divided ad infinitum. Quantum theorists, however, think the process of dividing time and matter reaches its end long before infinity. At some point far past their ability to see, they claim there’s a fundamental particle of matter and a fundamental unit of time of which there is nothing smaller or shorter.
Since it’s crucial to higher math, but impossible to prove or disprove, mathematicians assume infinity in their equations. Likewise, science can never prove nor disprove the necessary fundamentality of any supposed fundamental particle, but every time someone gets a new microscope they think they’ve found the end. I propose instead of always supposing they’ve reached the limit, why don’t scientists take after mathematicians and assume infinity in their experiments? By all means continue the further telescoping and magnification of matter, but concede that each time We’ve seen further into the macro and micro-unknown, technology throws down the gauntlet, and God picks it up with seemingly infinite resources, from galaxies and quasars to stars and planets, moons down through molecules to atoms and protons and quarks and gluons and so on and so forth. The fractal unknown forever taunts Our limited perceptions from afar, no matter how deep We reach, so why not assume infinity until We’re somehow given real reason not to?
Science can only prove what We can test with tools and Our senses, but it’s more likely that ultimate answers lie far beyond Our perceptions and any tools We can fashion to aid them. Even if some Unified Field Theory proved perfectly consistent with Our every observation, I’d still be suspicious of some finite answer’s eerie consistency, and forever wonder if something undetectable lay one step further. Personally the only Unified Theory that satisfies my deepest concerns is Infinity as Truth in all facets of existence. Matter is infinitely divisible, time is eternal, and speed is limitless for something We can’t see. I present Infinity as the Anti-Unified Field Theory, a concept We grasp but can’t understand - it dangles around Our minds taunting Us with its necessary Truths but never allows Us access to it’s eternal complexity, like God."
http://www.scribd.com/doc/6150732/Asbestos-Head
~Eric
www.atlanteanconspiracy.com
www.ericdubay.blogspot.com
I remember relating to that bit (along with many others) as I read your book and half expected you to post it here - glad you did as it makes the point very well.
ReplyDeleteI've read that last line somewhere before. Hmmmmmm.
ReplyDeleteYeah that is definitely a well used line ;)
ReplyDelete