One of my weird beliefs is that the things physicists tell us about the world should be taken seriously, and if we do take them seriously our world abruptly becomes much more fun.
we ourselves are made up of intangible mystery
Physicists tell us that there is no bulk, there is only information. ‘Matter’ is made of molecules, and molecules are made of atoms, and atoms are made of subatomic particles and subatomic particles aren’t particles at all, they’re waveforms, or probabilities, or concepts, or something but they’re definitely not little marbles that bounce off of each other. We can say they’re energy, whatever that means, but we can also say they’re information, bits of code that interact with other bits of code in predictable ways that cumulatively add up to what we optimistically call the ‘laws’ of nature.
This is non-intuitive. Deep down, most of us live in a Newtonian world where gravity controls everything and the apple in our hand is made of tiny tinkertoy molecules. If we think at all about atoms, we tend to visualize them as miniature solar systems, with electrons and positrons orbiting a nucleus. This is the picture often presented in school textbooks, but it is astoundingly wrong – there is no way to effectively visualize subatomic structures because they don’t look like anything.
Acknowledging this truth, letting it sink in, can be a little frightening because it means that we live in a world with, literally, no solid ground; everything we observe is made up of intangible mystery and in fact we ourselves, the observers, are made up of intangible mystery.
The fact is, we live in a completely inscrutable world, a world where literally anything can be true. For if there are no little bits of matter, most of the limits we place on reality are meaningless. A world without bulk is a world where realities can overlap and William Blake was merely being observant when he said,
“… a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.”
In fact, Blake and all the other visionary mystics that have graced humanity’s existence seem to be on to something – their visions of deep unity, of paradises and other realms existing along side our quotidian lives, of immortal selves that transcend the body, are more in line with the true nature of reality than the Newtonian sleep of our daily existence.
Many of the phenomena that so puzzle us are easily explained by a world in which anything is possible. The UFOs that are seen by 1,000s every year, the supernatural intrusions of gods, demons and ghosts, the mysteries of crop circles, Bigfoot, dark matter and, well, everything can all be as firmly grounded in the same sort of fungible reality that we exist in.
But suppose all this folderol is actually the case, and we really do live in a world of overlapping realities and mystic visions… how do we profit from that knowledge? If any conceivable reality is as potentially real as the one we live in, what prevents us from living in a reality that conforms in every way to our personal vision of a perfect world? As near as I can tell, the answer is… nothing prevents us, nothing at all.
Did you like this essay? You’ll love my books!
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“But suppose all this folderol is actually the case, and we really do live in a world of overlapping realities and mystic visions… how do we profit from that knowledge?”
Write a book, obviously.
Thanks for the comment, BF. The book will be out shortly. And btw, I enjoy your antics on Facebook.
Love the ending: “…what prevents us from living in a reality that conforms in every way to our personal vision of a perfect world? As near as I can tell, the answer is… nothing prevents us, nothing at all.”
Whenever someone gets uptight about “rules”, I remind them that this is all made up — every bit of it. So let’s figure out the objective of the rule, and head in that general direction. Got that from Benjamin & Rosamund Zander’s book, “The Art of Possibility.” It’s a good quick read.
I often think that the bulk of the universe is contained within each and every indescribable molecule/atom/tiny universe. Whether they are separate, parallel universes or each portal into the infinitely small leads to the same infinitely large space/energy/time combo, obviously it’s impossible to tell at this point, but it’s great to try to relate some of these vague theories with the current/outdated latest mathematical models (string theory, etc.).
I know, string theory might have been proved wrong already, but there’s still a lot of mathematical/physics models out there that could result in some very bizarre actual models for reality.
I also realize that this theory was expressed in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” by Vincent Schiavelli as Mr. Vargas (I think?), but I assure you I thought of this idea before watching the movie.
Anyway, I find it as easy to think of “infinite bulk” as “no bulk”. Funny how a lot of things work that way…
P.S. The format of this site is great, by the way. Very eye-catching.
Thanks for your kind comments, Ane and CT. Ane, I’ve been about to read the Zander book for a couple of weeks and your recommendation put me over the top.
CT, I read that string theory was actually used to successfully predict an experimental outcome recently, so I guess it’s still going.
cheers,
Angus
Excellent observations and, such a scary truth. The simple fact that, “nothing prevents us from living in a reality that conforms in every way to our personal vision of a perfect world” means there are some people walking around with some strange visions. But that is exactly the point isn’t it? The only way a person can change their experience, their “life”, is to accept responsibility for creating it in the first place.
Angus,
I think your site is great! So keep me in your list of supporters and hang on to my e-mail…It’s been oh what….about 30 years? Yet it appears we both chose a similar path with different scenery, to have the same type of zest for alternative views of life. Your writing skills remind me of Richard Bach’s stories, without the stories, just a straight forward discussion. It’s refreshing and very good.
Great to be in touch again,
Geoffrey Malcolm Patterson
Thanks Geoff! After we ran across each other on Facebook, I was surprised how well I remembered you—do you still have the fish jaw necklace?
cheers,
Angus
I love the philisophical implications of modern physics, but to me, it always seems a little far away from my reality when it is evoked on galactic or subatomic scales of existance. I mean to a fly water tension is a greater force than gravity which is far from my experience and flies are the size of solar systems to atoms, let alone an electron or a quark. It’s just sooo…. far away.
I’m a little more comfortable in the organic world of biochemistry and even there the world is disintergrating from form into information. If one takes the modern view of the body as a system that is continually rebuilding itself then chronic disease can only be understood as misinformation repeating itself over and over in the newly rebuilt system that is the body.
According to Bruce Lipton, ie. Biology of Belief and other writtings, biological information is not some predestined DNA code of conduct, but the expression of that code which can be strongly influenced by the human mind.
What prevents us from living in a (healthy) reality that conforms in every way to our personal vision? It is our beliefs that prevent us, of course, and if we can change our beliefs we can act like the alchemist in Ted Chiang’s “The Merchant and the Achemists Gate” and “search for tiny pores in the skin of reality, like the holes that worms bore into wood, and upon finding one he was able to expand and strech it the way a glassblower turns a dolop of molten glass into a lon-necked pipe…”
Its a beautiful site & blog Angus. May it bore a lot of wormholes into many, many minds.
David