I argue that science, as currently understood, is only one of a potentially infinite number of “modes of understanding” of the world. Not every attribute of the universe, and possibly a vanishingly small fraction of them, can be captured by the methods of traditional science. Assuming that reality is one, philosophy, religion, and art all illuminate different but complementary aspects of the truth. I speculate that the next big intellectual challenge for humanity will be the integration of these diverse ways of knowing into a unitary understanding of the world, with rational inquiry as the guiding principle. This process will likely foster inclusion, diversity, and creativity, and reconnect human beings and society at large with their lost sense of purpose and meaning.
Nature as an Infinite Kaleidoscope and the Limits of Science
Thank you very much! An inspiring, deep and critical essay that gives impetus to the mind to look for a way to overcome the modern conceptual - paradigmatic crisis of the metaphysical basis of fundamental science, manifesting itself as a "crisis of understanding" (J. Horgan "The End of Science", K. Kopeikin "Souls" of atoms and "atoms" of the soul ").
First essay you write:
"... You are a witness to the entire history of the cosmos, from its birth to this very moment, and you know that his perfect dance is set by indestructible laws."
Why "laws" and not one "Law"?
Recall the Axiom of Tradition:
"In the Beginning was the Logos..."
In the Dictionary of the Ancient Greek Language by I. Dvoretsky, the word LOGOS has 34 bushes, i.e. over a hundred values. And what is the most important of them? This is "logos" = "law", which permeates both science and society, uniting them. That is, "Logos" must be understood broadly, philosophically in the spirit of Heraclitus as a MetaLaw that governs the Cosmos (the Universe). And the "laws of nature" that Science gives us are only partial representatives of the Law/Logos and the studied phenomena of Nature.
Galileo, in his famous quote about the "mathematician-language of Nature", gives us a hint for "grasping" (understanding) the primordial structure of the "language of Nature", namely:
<<Egli è scritto in lingua matematica, e i caratteri son triangoli, cerchi, ed altre figure geometriche, senza i quali mezi è impossibile a intenderne umanamente parola..>>
In the first place is the "triangle", as a figure that allows you to understand the "language of Nature". And remember also Plato's "celestial triangle"...
It is the "celestial triangle", its modern dialectico-ontological interpretation that makes it possible to understand matter in a new way (in the spirit of Plato's ideas) and taking into account all the problems in the foundations of knowledge: MATTER is that from which all meanings, forms and structures are born (material and ideal ). Only having "grasped" (understood) the ontological structure of matter as an integral generative process, we will be able to understand ("grab") the ontological structure of the existential (absolute) space, its ontological and gnoseological dimensions.
No wonder the philosopher Pavel Florensky left us such a testament: “We repeat: worldunderstanding is spaceunderstanding.”
Thus, we will be able to build step by step "a super-unified field theory that describes both physical and semantic manifestations of the World." (mathematician and philosopher Vasily Nalimov "The Self-Aware Universe"), to solve the problem of the ontological substantiation of mathematics (and therefore knowledge in general) as an "archi-difficult" one. and the "hard problem of consciousness." And in the end, imagine the "three worlds" in a single mathematical symbol, which Galileo Galilei suggested to us, solving all the "difficult problems", and continuing to unravel the "secrets" of Nature as a single integral generative process.
I fully agree with you:
"Stepping out of the science bubble, with its emphasis on objective phenomena and a functional understanding of reality (but without abandoning critical thinking and rational inquiry) will be needed in order to reconnect us with a deeper sense of meaning, and allow us to really feel “at home in the universe”
Good luck in the Сompetition!
Thanks a lot for the inspiring essay!
Can I ask some questions out of curiosity?
It seems that you are arguing in the spirit of Spinoza that there is one (whole) truth, i.e. one complex world and all our sciences, arts, etc.. capture aspects of it. Does that imply that you assume there is one objective view about the world that we all could agree on? Where does subjectivity enter? For instance, do you think that after creating your "holistic theory" (or whatever you want to call the ultimate theory), we will be able to understand and feel other people's qualia? You also write that the optimum theory should contain some mysteries we will not be able to resolve, which ones would fall into that category?
All the best for the contest!
the beige bandicoot.
Hey Vladimir, thank you for taking the time to read my essay, and for your kind comments.
Like you, I am sympathetic towards the idea of the Logos (In the beginning was the Word ...) and therefore to the existence of only one true Law of Nature, of which all others are partial expressions. In a way, this is the question at the heart of the essay: can we find such a Logos, i.e. can we find a holistic theory of the universe that can encompass all of its attributes, not just the mathematical? I don't know if such a thing is possible. If it is, then it is appropriate to talk about The Law, which uniquely determines the overarching structure of the world in all its manifestations. If not, then Nature is more like a patchwork of different domains governed by different laws, that somehow peacefully coexist and never clash. I think the first option is intellectually more pleasing, but, whatever the case may be, the point remains that mathematical structure is only one of many ways to look at the world, and a formula, no matter how clever, can never exhaust the contents of the world.
I am glad you liked my essay. Thank you for commenting.
Hey Bandicoot, thank you for taking the time to read my essay, and for your inspiring questions.
It seems that you are arguing in the spirit of Spinoza that there is one (whole) truth, i.e. one complex world and all our sciences, arts, etc.. capture aspects of it. Does that imply that you assume there is one objective view about the world that we all could agree on? Where does subjectivity enter?
I personally don't think Spinoza's idea is at odds with the existence of subjectivity. I think human beings have an essence, which is determined by the particular history of evolution on Earth, and almost certainly the structure of the laws (or Law, see my reply to Vladimir's question) of physics. This means that human beings share a common set of attributes, and in particular a common aesthetic sensibility, and are therefore attracted and moved by the same kind of things, but not necessarily in the exact same way. No two individuals will ever be exactly the same, which is where subjectivity enters. Having said that, while I believe that many different things could be called beautiful, and are beautiful, subjectively, to many different people, I do also believe that there is a meaningful distinction to be made between what is beautiful (or artistic) and what is not, so I would personally endorse the idea of "objective beauty", defined as something that speaks to human beings, even if only a subset of them, even if only to one (there are some limits here dictated by morality I won't go into right now).
For instance, do you think that after creating your "holistic theory" (or whatever you want to call the ultimate theory), we will be able to understand and feel other people's qualia? You also write that the optimum theory should contain some mysteries we will not be able to resolve, which ones would fall into that category?
We might be able to understand how qualia arise, and we might be able to classify them, but I don't think we will ever be able to feel other people's qualia, let alone other species' qualia (we can never answer questions like What is like to be a bat?). Even if we could build such a holistic theory, I don't think at all it would be omnipotent, quite the contrary. This theory would be the best we humans can do in our quest to understand the world, but it would still be subject to our (many) limits. One of these is we can only feel our own qualia. Other hard limits (mysteries) are our inability to see the world outside mathematical or poetic/literary archetypes: there might be other ways to look at the world, unknown to us.
I am glad you liked my essay. Thank you for commenting.
Andrea Palessandro
Thank you very much for the more detailed answers, Alizarin Viper, much clearer now and definitely an inspiring and interesting viewpoint!
This was an awesome essay! Parts of it reminded me of Stephen J. Gould's idea of Non-overlapping magisteria.
Are you familiar with/sympathetic to NOMA?
Dear LadyBug, thank you for taking the time to read my essay. I am glad you liked it.
Yes, I am definitely sympathetic to Gould's idea of non-overlapping magisteria. Science tells us about facts, or happenings, in the world. Religion has a completely different approach: it deals with meaning. Facts by themselves have no meaning, and that is the reason why our society, being a thoroughly secular and technological one, is so utterly devoid of purpose. We have all the knowledge in the world, and no idea what to do with it.
The role of religion (or philosophy) should be to tell us what this all means, what all the mindless facts amount to. I think we are in desperate need of it. I know I recognize that need in myself.
As many correctly point out, NOMA also means that when religion starts dealing in facts, or science in meaning, monsters are produced.