A few months ago, a friend of mine lent me two books, both of which I somewhat hurriedly finally consumed in the last week because she asked for them to be returned for other friends to read. I'll ignore my regretful complacence in not reading them sooner and as it happened, I was (now in my opinion, quite fortuitously) able to finish both before finally returning them to her last week.
Both books were fascinating beyond measure and allowed me to go on the journey from the intricacies of the Cosmos all the way right down to the complex ecosystem of the Gut. I adore the fact that the mind has such capacity for travel across such different worlds and on that concept alone, I imagine I could write a whole other post, although for now I've decided to narrow it down to the first book and its ongoing and wonderful aftermath - Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson.
This is an incredible book about a subject I've always loved. The Universe and all its mysteries have always fascinated me on countless levels - the sheer size of this mysterious entity in which I somehow reside, the scale of such a thing in reference to Earth which in itself is a mass of histories, concepts, beings, and everything we could possibly imagine and more; the billions of galaxies and billions more celestial bodies and objects that reside within it; the composition, evolution and sheer beauty of all those objects; the capacity to see, observe and learn from them all... I could really go on, but ultimately, it is an area that I and millions of children before me have always looked upon with such awe and interest.
Incredibly, I just remembered one of my favourite literary encounters as a kid. There is an Aussie book called My Place in Space by Robin Hirst and Sally Hirst. In it, a little boy and his sister are catching the bus home and when asked by the driver where they live, the boy says, 'Home.' When the driver mocks him for not providing an address, the boy then proceeds to give the most epic address ever.
Ok, I've now literally just re-looked up the book and purchased it on my phone and am in the process of re-reading it. The edition I've found is an updated edition which now includes Pluto's change in status from a planet so thankfully the book is still accurate and only goes to show the continuing evolution of our scientific knowledge. Another update I've noticed that I think I have correctly remembered, is that now Henry and his sister both contribute to the address where previously it was just Henry talking while his little sister sort of just did funny things behind him. It reads a tad clunkier if you remember the original, but is a nice change, particularly if it does encourage more little girls to feel less left out by notions of Astronomy.
Returning from that brief but fun detour into one of the likely roots of my personal interest in space (mind travel is awesome, no?), I've since read a fair amount about astronomy and astrophysics. I took an Astronomy Gen Ed course at uni, I've read books, I've watched documentaries and read tons of articles, however as years have passed, my overall retention of information has been pretty poor because despite being an area of intense interest, it has been far from one of any real personal focus. When I get to read about, I read about it, that's it. I have had to live life, work and of course focus on things of more importance than my own wish to broaden my cosmic understanding.
Then about two years ago, a friend of mine introduced me to the star gazing app on her phone. It hadn't yet occurred to me to search for an app to let me do this and it was awesome. That evening, we sat on top of her Coogee rooftop and looked at the stars and planets in a way I hadn't really done since my Gen Ed observation nights. Unfortunately, at the time, I didn't have enough space on my phone so when I downloaded the app, it kept crashing and I ended up having to delete it. It wasn't until April of last year when another friend mentioned his own app whilst telling my friends and I that Jupiter would be visible that I attempted to download the app again, this time on my newer phone. Since then, I've used the app and enjoyed the added convenience of getting to engage more with the Night Sky and more particularly in the last few months since I've begun taking more photos of the various planets on my phone.
In the wake of this recent resurgence of engagement and interest, reading deGrasse Tyson's book has been one of the most enjoyable things I've done this year. That is not an overstatement. I loved it so much. He takes the reader through the fundamentals and the history and he did so in a way I found so surprisingly comprehensible after other books have left me completely dumb and overwhelmed by how little I understand and how much more I have to learn to simply understand a sentence. Don't get me wrong, I still had a few moments like that while I was reading the book, but overall, I found each page fascinating and found that it all made some form of logical sense to me from one concept to the next. While taking me along the cosmological journey through time, space and theory, it explained concepts that I had previously held vague ideas about, like neutrinos and the lengths and functions of the different waves. It re-introduced me to planetary trivia that I'd long forgotten, like Jupiter's vital role as our protective Big Brother. It allowed me to finally get jokes I'd heard on TV about spherical chickens in a vacuum (frankly, this book made so many Big Bang Theory references suddenly make worlds more sense!) and it gave me insight into everyday things I knew existed, but hadn't fully understood, like the fact that InfraRed and UltraViolet were the bookends to ROYGBIV. Reading this book was the most fun I've had in a long time while learning so much.
This, combined with my most recent shift in overall life objectives and plans, particularly around reading much more and writing much more, left me with a brain thrilled and primed to find out more, to fill in the gaps that the book could not possibly cover if it were to be aimed at 'people in a hurry'. One of the most fascinating points he makes in the book is how much everything we learn only leads to more questions and more debates between the experts in the field, highlighting that science isn't so much filled with indisputable facts as is so often over-simplistically touted, but rather a field rich with ongoing theories, tests, findings, analyses, questions and debates and constantly reminding us of what we know and don't know.
Due to my literally being 'in a hurry' to finish this book and the other lent to me, I moved on to the world of the Gut straight after, but having finished that the day I finally returned both books, I have looked up more reading and decided to delve into an area that would make sense for me to look into considering my own personal beliefs, the relationship between Cosmology and Theology. I ended up on this excellent page in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy by Hans Halvorson, a professor from Princeton. Brilliant read leaving many papers to read in its wake, I highly recommend it. It does an awesome job of laying out the historical cosmological models and the various arguments put forth by many of the field's minds, past and present, regarding these models' relationships to the notions of theism and atheism. Again, a cornucopia of debate and insight (often leading me to turn to Google for some of the concepts that once again baffled me!) that again highlights that concepts that have been widely accepted are still being challenged, like the Big Bang, which is challenged by both Loop Quantum Cosmology and String Theory. Of course, even taking the Big Bang as the prevailing model, interpretations of its either confirming or not confirming the existence of an omnipotent creator also vary and the debates go on.
The more I read, the more I want to read, and so I shall. I'm charging myself with a lot here, but my brain is enjoying every second of it and only feels more energised by its sojourn into the astrophysical world to fill its existing knowledge gaps by embarking on a better acquaintance with the basics of Physics. Youtube has proven a fun start considering visual demonstrations of motion and force better aid my physical and spatial comprehension. When I got home last night, after getting briefly distracted by a TED Talk on Organic Chemistry, I ended up on the Crash Course about motion in a straight line. Then this morning, I ended up going on a fun journey through the principles of flight, Bernouli's Principle and existing questions around that principle, Newton's Third Law of Motion, the means for travel into space and ultimately ending on a thought experiment about removing the existence of Time (not the man-made measurements of time, mind, rather the sequential nature of events). For just this Sunday morning alone (worthy of a whole post in and of itself, which I fully intend to start after I take a break), I'm grateful to Mr deGrasse Tyson and to my friend for lending me his words in the first place.
I'll end this post with another video I watched this morning of the man himself on the Late Show with Colbert.
His energy is infectious and his final point is a really good one, but admittedly, it's not one that will keep me up at night so much as it just reminds me that as much as we can know, there will always be something else, something new, something missed and while that can be disheartening for some, I see it as simply a statement of reality. Our limitations will always exist and we will only ever be able to grasp what little we can but what we have grasped thus far is endlessly fascinating and always will be and therefore provides only more motivation to keep searching, learning and shifting what we need to shift - just as we did when we found out the Earth was round, when Germ Theory was discovered, when we learned that the Universe was expanding as opposed to being in a steady state, when we learned about subatomic particles, when we learned that Pluto wasn't actually a planet... and basically every other time paradigms shifted. On personal, individual scales, we often find we have to do this all the time and while I couldn't possibly begin to have deGrasse Tyson's level of perspective on the matter, I tend to find that what we understand about our more visible, more immediate world constantly shifts and I keep having to incorporate that understanding into my perspective and any resulting attempt at a worldview. I've undergone countless 'paradigm shifts' in my own character and I know this will only continue with time and experience and I have faith that those entrusted with the search of these bigger answers will have the capacity to survive and learn as they have always done.
This is why I love science and this is why I love life.
