I am depressed
Again.
This time the condition has not been brought on by the texting generation's favourite phrase. Nor due to the intimation of my God's infirmities and inabilities.
The last one is not true; not exactly anyway. I have been informed that my God is an elaborate hoax and not by a school drop-out domestic help.
Let me begin at the beginning, although considerable uncertainty surrounds what exactly was the beginning and what existed before the beginning. It is what Physicists call a "singularity" which is a code word for "I don't know and would prefer that you don't ask". Physicist-parents refer to their extremely wayward offspring as "singularities". Ordinary parents do not so refer to their children because they - the parents - are unaware of what singularity means and think it is the state of being single. Isn't that the purpose of all technical jargon: to confuse the uninitiated and confound the unfamiliar? Anyway, getting back to the very "beginning", I have just been informed that there was no beginning to begin with.
You see the idea of "beginning" mattered to the creationists or the "bubble theorists" who thought that the universe started like a bubble and kept expanding like one, darkly implying that like a bubble it would one day burst too. They preferred to remain silent about the drop of soapy water which became the bubble. The Steady-Statists preferred to think of a universe without a Beginning or End which is fine so long as you are dealing with the middle, but can get to be embarrassing when near the extremities. This view vibed well with some Hindu traditions that posited gods with neither beginning nor end; Such views conveniently closed their eyes to the myths about gazillion gods who were born, grew up and died just like any human. Now I am told that a beginning or an end exists only in our minds and are not "real" or "absolute".
I preferred a world where starting somewhere if I went in some direction long enough I would reach the End with no further progress possible. A world that had length, width, depth and, thanks to Einstein, Time. I am now informed that Time and Space do not exist but are just my mental constructs, a result of my "consciousness". This last-named is a concept much beloved of men like Deepak Chopra and J.Krishnamurthy. It is particularly upsetting to have one's orderly world of mathematical certainties turned upside down by the wishy-washy stuff of Krishnamurthy, Chopra et al.
Mine was a world in which given the "Initial Conditions", I could compute my state any time. With a fair amount of precision. Mine was a world where Radios, Lasers, LCD TVs, MRIs and PET Scans, all worked and entertained, diagnosed and even cured. I thought I understood how these worked - well, not quite, but I knew vaguely the principles on which they were based and could comprehend, if someone explained them minus the maths. It was a world in which if I learnt the right maths, and tried hard enough I could explain the Universe - well, not all of it, but all except before the Beginning and after the End. So long as you didnt want to know where everything was and what they were doing at the same time, I could explain everything, give or take a few "anomalies".
Now along comes someone who is not even a Physicist ( a medical doctor, for pete's sake) and says the whole thing is a trick of our minds.
Enough to depress anyone I would imagine.
Again.
This time the condition has not been brought on by the texting generation's favourite phrase. Nor due to the intimation of my God's infirmities and inabilities.
The last one is not true; not exactly anyway. I have been informed that my God is an elaborate hoax and not by a school drop-out domestic help.
Let me begin at the beginning, although considerable uncertainty surrounds what exactly was the beginning and what existed before the beginning. It is what Physicists call a "singularity" which is a code word for "I don't know and would prefer that you don't ask". Physicist-parents refer to their extremely wayward offspring as "singularities". Ordinary parents do not so refer to their children because they - the parents - are unaware of what singularity means and think it is the state of being single. Isn't that the purpose of all technical jargon: to confuse the uninitiated and confound the unfamiliar? Anyway, getting back to the very "beginning", I have just been informed that there was no beginning to begin with.
You see the idea of "beginning" mattered to the creationists or the "bubble theorists" who thought that the universe started like a bubble and kept expanding like one, darkly implying that like a bubble it would one day burst too. They preferred to remain silent about the drop of soapy water which became the bubble. The Steady-Statists preferred to think of a universe without a Beginning or End which is fine so long as you are dealing with the middle, but can get to be embarrassing when near the extremities. This view vibed well with some Hindu traditions that posited gods with neither beginning nor end; Such views conveniently closed their eyes to the myths about gazillion gods who were born, grew up and died just like any human. Now I am told that a beginning or an end exists only in our minds and are not "real" or "absolute".
I preferred a world where starting somewhere if I went in some direction long enough I would reach the End with no further progress possible. A world that had length, width, depth and, thanks to Einstein, Time. I am now informed that Time and Space do not exist but are just my mental constructs, a result of my "consciousness". This last-named is a concept much beloved of men like Deepak Chopra and J.Krishnamurthy. It is particularly upsetting to have one's orderly world of mathematical certainties turned upside down by the wishy-washy stuff of Krishnamurthy, Chopra et al.
Mine was a world in which given the "Initial Conditions", I could compute my state any time. With a fair amount of precision. Mine was a world where Radios, Lasers, LCD TVs, MRIs and PET Scans, all worked and entertained, diagnosed and even cured. I thought I understood how these worked - well, not quite, but I knew vaguely the principles on which they were based and could comprehend, if someone explained them minus the maths. It was a world in which if I learnt the right maths, and tried hard enough I could explain the Universe - well, not all of it, but all except before the Beginning and after the End. So long as you didnt want to know where everything was and what they were doing at the same time, I could explain everything, give or take a few "anomalies".
Now along comes someone who is not even a Physicist ( a medical doctor, for pete's sake) and says the whole thing is a trick of our minds.
Enough to depress anyone I would imagine.
Well, well. I am elated.
ReplyDeleteA literary critic once justified a case of what to me is plagiarism as "synchronicity" - two people getting the same idea, even if separated by time and space. I never understood the etiology of the word, even its Jungian aspect.
So George Berkely and I seem to be brothers of synchronicity, whatever the etiology of the word, maintaining that the universe exists only in my mind - mind you, my mind, not even Berkeley's. Berkeley never existed outside my consciousness.
If that does not confuse you enough and add to your depression, know that the bubble universe exists only on the surface: there is nothing within the bubble nor without. Space has no meaning in other places - a singularity?
So the bubble, rather the surface of zero depth, is my phantasmagorical domain. Know that you and even your depression exist only in my mind. You don't exist by yourself. Your depression is only a feature of my mind. The Google server which helps you read this is a creation of my consciousness.
But then I will you to be happy. In my mind.