Another Inconvenient Truth

If we are to agree on a simple proposition like 1+1=2, don’t we need to agree that whatever flows from that must be correct also? Doesn’t progress in mathmatics or science depend on this very principle? For example, lets look at the degree of accuracy that has been developed in the scientific community, which is mind boggling. Computer clock speeds have been increasing at warp speed and the second is divided into billionths. Trillionths of a second would become the next reality if it weren’t for one inconvenient fact. Electrical impulses can only travel at the speed of light. It takes an electron longer to travel a foot than it takes to process the information it carries. Therefore computer clock speeds are only limited by the physical distance to remote memory cashes, aka fetch speeds. By taking complex equations apart and sending each part to gangs of high speed computers we can, in effect, already deliver results at rates faster than the speed of light.

To produce trouble free computers each component must be free of contamination or impurities to an extrodinary degree. Clean rooms have contributed to the solution of pollution by using particle counters to measure the amount of foreign particles in the air around the assembly of components. Particle counters sniff out and count individual molecules. This is analogous to finding not just the needle in the hay stack, but the tip of the needle. We can now reliably peer into a molecule to see the atoms assembled there. Further, we can look into the atom to see how it is assembled, and with advanced mathematics we can deduce to an extrodinary degree the particles which make up the electrons and protons which make up the atom.

However, theorists like Steven Hawkings have placed an inconvient limit on how small the most basic of building blocks can be. His string theory asserts that all matter is essentially composed of strings of energy, the size of each described by putting thirty some zeros between a decimal point and a digit. Using really complicated reasoning he has also placed an inconvenient limit on the size of our universe. It seems a universe can only expand to around 18 billion light years in diameter before it reverses and begins contracting again. Fortunately for us however, there seems to be an infinite number of these universes to explore. Our telescopes can see out to about 15 billion light years and we can detect the background radiation left a trillionth of a second after the big bang.

If we take a close look at our bodies and apply some basic plumbing principles immortality may only be a few generations away. Aubrey de Grey has presented an elegant argument which goes something like this: Toxins build up in our cells over our lives and eventually interfere with the cell’s ability the replicate itself correctly. The build up of contamination together with defective cell replication are responsible for aging, and ultimately death. We need only to find ways to remove the toxins from our cells so they reproduce faithfully and we should be able to extend our lives indefinitely. If we remove the artifical roadblocks in areas like stem cell research and the use of them, the process of repairing or replacing worn out body parts will be speeded up dramatically.

Add up all the advances made in testing and measuring and science and technology and we are led to the ultimate inconvenient truth. From the smallest of particles of atoms to the far corners of the known universe we are having an ever closer look. And all of this progress and growth in knowledge has sprung from the simple proposition that 1+1=2. God, for lack of a better concept, is running out of places to hide. Isn’t it time to modernize our religious beliefs? While science has expanded mans’ awareness and knowledge one giant step after another, our religious leaders have steadfastly buried their collective heads in 2000 year old sand. I mean, if people weren’t brain washed from birth into believing increasingly dubious dogma like the earth and heavens being created a mere 6 thousand years ago, if people were taught to reason independantly from the herd (unlike sheep these religious leaders would have us emulate), would that really amount to some sort of catastrophe? Maybe to the people making a good living promoting this drivel but certainly not to a reasonable person. Isn’t it time we recognized people no longer need to be controlled through fear of an omnipotent force, whose authority can never be challenged because it is never direct? Isn’t it true that God is best known by his absence? Don’t Jews and Christians alike owe their phenomenal success to the fact that He never shows His face? Do we really need to blow each other up over who said what 2000 years ago? Can’t we just allow each other the room for our own thoughts and not feel obligated to foist our beliefs on others? The suggestion that one mans theory can convey our souls into a blissful eternity, while another theory only a hairs breath away dooms its believer to unrelenting hell, is shear nonsense. The suggestion that one mortal human has a direct link to a supreme being the rest of us were unfortunate enough to be born without is ridiculously childish. All we need do is look at each other, and our mothers and fathers, to conclude we are all cut from the same DNA cloth. We all , each one of us, must do the hard work of figuring these universal truths out for ourselves and not leave the thinking to others to do for us. In the final analysis, all a person can do in life is gather about himself his integrity, his imagination, and his individuality and then leap into experience.

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About the Author

Bob Parmelee is an avid science fan. As such he has an obvious bias toward believing all the things we fear in life (as the Moody Blues sang about way back when)stem from a lack of understanding. A book by James A. Michener called The Source should be required reading for anyone with a theory about creation.