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Speaking of alternate universes....
Oct. 29th, 2003 01:34 amWatched a special Nova double episode tonight, about the rise and fall of string theory, and phyisicists' attempts to find a Unified Theory of Everything-ing-ing-ing-ing (sorry about that... it just seemed to call for reverb).
And I couldn't help wondering, yet again, if this search for the "One Rule to rule us all" would have become the obsession it is if Christianity had not become the official religion of Europe, and if monotheism in general never evolved to be the default religious assumption of Western culture (i.e., the cultures where most of the technology and study devoted to this question developed).
Even if we take it as given that all the quantum physicists and all the astronomers are staunch atheists, and try, with all their might and main, to strip all religious thinking from their observations today, that doesn't mean they were atheists at six years old, when they were forming their first concrete views of the world as the society taught it to them, or that they are immune to all cultural assumption. I mean they (the American ones, at least) read "In God we trust" on our money just like the rest of us (and British scientists still sing "God Save the Queen"). That's got to have some effect on their concept of what reality is, and their biases regarding how "reality" works.
Imagine that our default cultural assumption was closer to Shintoism, with myriad spirit beings and Otherworlds paralell to our own that we can glimpse now and then, but not see directly. Would a single Unified Theory of Everything be so important in such a world? Would it even make sense?
A few weeks ago, on NPR's "Science Friday," they were discussing some of the new astronomical findings and theories, including the idea of multiple big bangs, with multiple universes, each with its own set of physical laws. And one of the panalists said something to the effect of: Well, of course, if there are other universes, ours must be the only one to support life. And I couldn't help thinking: "How do you reach that conclusion -- and why do you feel the need to?"
Isn't that just an extension of the old Abrahamic idea that God has placed us in the center of the universe, and that we're the only ones with souls who worship Him, while the rest of the inert universe revolves around us? We may not be at the center of the universe in the physical sense, anymore, but that idea sure does put us at the perceptional center. If Earth is the only planet to support life in the universe, or if our universe is the only universe among many to support life, then we can be the only ones to look outward, and wonder, and find meaning. We are still the pinnacle of Creation, and the center of it all.
Just some midnight rambles...
And I couldn't help wondering, yet again, if this search for the "One Rule to rule us all" would have become the obsession it is if Christianity had not become the official religion of Europe, and if monotheism in general never evolved to be the default religious assumption of Western culture (i.e., the cultures where most of the technology and study devoted to this question developed).
Even if we take it as given that all the quantum physicists and all the astronomers are staunch atheists, and try, with all their might and main, to strip all religious thinking from their observations today, that doesn't mean they were atheists at six years old, when they were forming their first concrete views of the world as the society taught it to them, or that they are immune to all cultural assumption. I mean they (the American ones, at least) read "In God we trust" on our money just like the rest of us (and British scientists still sing "God Save the Queen"). That's got to have some effect on their concept of what reality is, and their biases regarding how "reality" works.
Imagine that our default cultural assumption was closer to Shintoism, with myriad spirit beings and Otherworlds paralell to our own that we can glimpse now and then, but not see directly. Would a single Unified Theory of Everything be so important in such a world? Would it even make sense?
A few weeks ago, on NPR's "Science Friday," they were discussing some of the new astronomical findings and theories, including the idea of multiple big bangs, with multiple universes, each with its own set of physical laws. And one of the panalists said something to the effect of: Well, of course, if there are other universes, ours must be the only one to support life. And I couldn't help thinking: "How do you reach that conclusion -- and why do you feel the need to?"
Isn't that just an extension of the old Abrahamic idea that God has placed us in the center of the universe, and that we're the only ones with souls who worship Him, while the rest of the inert universe revolves around us? We may not be at the center of the universe in the physical sense, anymore, but that idea sure does put us at the perceptional center. If Earth is the only planet to support life in the universe, or if our universe is the only universe among many to support life, then we can be the only ones to look outward, and wonder, and find meaning. We are still the pinnacle of Creation, and the center of it all.
Just some midnight rambles...
