{"id":528,"date":"2014-03-16T13:52:58","date_gmt":"2014-03-16T19:22:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/?p=528"},"modified":"2014-03-18T09:54:58","modified_gmt":"2014-03-18T15:24:58","slug":"when-did-the-universe-begin-or-did-it-and-what-are-we-doing-in-our-little-piece-of-it-and","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/when-did-the-universe-begin-or-did-it-and-what-are-we-doing-in-our-little-piece-of-it-and\/","title":{"rendered":"When did the universe begin\u2014or did it? And what are we doing in our little piece of it? And \u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_538\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 586px\"><a href=\"http:\/\/apod.nasa.gov\/apod\/ap041121.html\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-538   \" alt=\"Click image for larger photo and more info\" src=\"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/galaxies-colliding.jpg\" width=\"576\" height=\"432\" srcset=\"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/galaxies-colliding.jpg 640w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/galaxies-colliding-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 576px) 100vw, 576px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Two galaxies colliding.<br \/>Credit: Debra Meloy Elmegreen (Vassar College), et al., &amp; the Hubble Heritage Team (Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy\/Space Telescope Science Institute\/NASA)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Theoretical physics doesn\u2019t come easily to me, but Sean Carroll manages to put more of it across than I\u2019d have thought possible for someone whose math education stopped at intermediate algebra. His book <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/0452296544\/?tag=stephaniegold-20\" target=\"_blank\"><i>From Eternity to<\/i> <em>Here:<\/em><\/a>\u00a0<em>The Quest for the Ultimate Theory of Time<\/em><i> <\/i>asks the question: Why does time only move in one direction?<\/p>\n<p>The answer, says Carroll, is connected to the phenomenon of entropy, which also goes only one way: it increases. Exploring this connection leads him through some of the deepest questions scientists ponder: relativity, spacetime, quantum physics, the nature of the universe, and, ultimately, the meaning of human life. Why are we here? Is it by design of someone or something? Carroll rejects the argument from design. He sees us \u201cnot as a central player in the life of the cosmos, but as a tiny epiphenomenon.\u201d Meaning and purpose don\u2019t arise from any \u201claws of nature\u201d created by a divinity; they\u2019re for us to determine. And he takes pride in the scientific struggle to understand those laws.<\/p>\n<p>But I have another question: should we even be asking?<\/p>\n<p>It turns out that these same grand questions were hot philosophical topics during the Buddha\u2019s time. Many people wanted him to answer them, but he refused. There is a list of 10 of these \u201cunanswerable\u201d questions (14 in some traditions), including:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Is the universe eternal or not?<\/li>\n<li>Is it finite or infinite?<\/li>\n<li>Are the soul and body the same thing or different?<\/li>\n<li>Does an enlightened person still exist after death?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And so on. The Buddha explained that trying to answer these questions doesn\u2019t help end suffering but actually increases it, and furthermore doesn\u2019t lead to awakening, or enlightenment. The questions are only a distraction.<\/p>\n<p>Nor is he the only sage to take this position. A very highly realized teacher I was fortunate to see several times\u2014said to be enlightened himself\u2014was asked, \u201cWhen did the universe begin?\u201d He responded, \u201cThe question is meaningless: there is no time and space.\u201d When someone else wanted to know, \u201cWhat is the meaning of life?\u201d he said, \u201cYou can\u2019t ever know the answer to that, so why think about it?\u201d<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_535\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"width: 412px\"><a href=\"http:\/\/hubblesite.org\/newscenter\/archive\/releases\/2004\/07\/image\/a\/\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-535       \" title=\"Click image for more info from HubbleSite\" alt=\"Click image for more info from HubbleSite\" src=\"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-1024x1024.jpg\" width=\"402\" height=\"402\" srcset=\"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-150x150.jpg 150w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-300x300.jpg 300w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-92x92.jpg 92w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-100x100.jpg 100w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-200x200.jpg 200w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding-400x400.jpg 400w, http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Galaxies-colliding.jpg 1600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 402px) 100vw, 402px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Never before seen galaxies that existed shortly after the Big Bang, billions of years distant, photographed by the Hubble telescope. Credit: NASA, European Space Agency, S. Beckwith (STScI), and the HUDF Team. Click image for more info from HubbleSite.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>So why did I want to read the Carroll book? Because I <i>would<\/i> like to know the nature of the universe, especially since that might shed light on the nature of the self, another of those unanswerable questions that interests me even more.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ve struggled a bit with this desire to <i>know<\/i>, and concluded that my interest isn\u2019t just metaphysical; it\u2019s practical. That is, I don\u2019t want simply to define the self in absolute terms, but still more to understand how the ways we conceptualize it affect us, as individuals and as a society. We may aspire to the realm of the absolute, but we also lead everyday, relative lives, and on this plane how we define our self is important, because it determines how we live, and our impact on everyone around us.<\/p>\n<p>No doubt knowing the answers to the unanswerable questions would enable us to construct an absolute definition of ourselves. But since we can\u2019t, best to admit that all the definitions we have made are relative. So perhaps the best answer to the questions in the title of this post is: Who knows?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Theoretical physics doesn\u2019t come easily to me, but Sean Carroll manages to put more of it across than I\u2019d have thought possible for someone whose math education stopped at intermediate algebra. His book From Eternity to Here:\u00a0The Quest for the Ultimate Theory of Time asks the question: Why does time only move in one direction? The answer, says Carroll, is connected to the phenomenon of entropy, which also goes only one way: it increases. Exploring this connection leads him through some of the deepest questions scientists ponder: relativity, spacetime, quantum physics, the nature of the universe, and, ultimately, the meaning[&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,22,40],"tags":[79,86,81,80,83,87,84,85,82],"class_list":["post-528","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-buddhism","category-inspiration","category-social-issues","tag-cosmology","tag-enlightenment","tag-meaning-of-life","tag-nature-of-time","tag-physics","tag-relativity","tag-time","tag-unanswerable-questions","tag-universe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=528"}],"version-history":[{"count":30,"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":563,"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528\/revisions\/563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stephaniegolden.net\/writing_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}