Harold Carr

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Sun, 01 Feb 2004

Five Cosmologies - How/Why - Knowing/Being - Poetry

Cosmogony and Cosmology Defined

The universe exists so we talk about it as a totality using the word `cosmology'.

Cosmology: The study of the physical universe considered as a totality of phenomena in time and space.

Likening the universe to ourselves we posit the universe was born and grows using the word `cosmogony'.

Cosmogony: The astrophysical study (or theory) of the origin and evolution of the universe.

We will use the word `cosmology' to mean both the origin and evolution of the universe and as a totality of phenomena.

Cosmology 1 - Gods and Goddesses

Ovid, in Metamorphoses, gives us a beginning, a tale of strange shapes from the beginning until now, "First Kaos, a tightly packed ball of mud and seeds. No land nor sea nor sun nor moon with its borrowed light".

The Popul Voh gives us multiple beginnings and endings.

Cosmology 2 - Ptolemy's Perfect Circles and Aristotle's Earth, Water, Air and Fire

Eternal finite perfection set in motion by a prime unmoved mover. The earth must be in the center because it weights the most. Water floats on the earth, air above earth and water, fire - the lightest - above it all. A simple (albeit with epicycles) dome enclosing us in the center - eternal and unchanging.

Cosmology 3 - Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo : The Center Shifts

Doctor Copernicus, while preparing astrological charts in order to rebalance his patient's humors, felt the mathematics for Ptolemy's cosmos was too complicated. By moving the sun to the center, but retaining perfect circles, he reduced the number of epicycles from eighty to thirty (but the Ptolemaic math was still more accurate at predications).

But chapter 10 of the Book of Joshua say, "... and the sun stood still, and the moon stayed ...". How can the sun stand still if it is at the center? How can the sun be at the center since the earth is heaviest? Anything heavy would crash down on earth to assume its natural place at the center of the universe. You can't contradict revealed scripture (even though scripture contradicts Aristotle in Psalm 148: "praise him, ye heavens of heavens, and ye waters that be above the heavens".)

Kepler, using Ptolemaic Brahe's observations, changed the motion of the planets around the sun from perfect circles to ellipses. The epicycles disappeared and mathematical predications were more accurate.

Galileo, using his telescope, saw the moon's mountains and craters - a lighter heavenly body, but like the earth, floating in the sky. Aristotelian universe destroyed. He saw moons orbiting Jupiter, proof that not everything goes around the earth. Ptolemaic cosmological proven wrong. For this he is imprisoned although he argued, "the Bible teaches us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go".

Over time, using parallax, the universe changed from a dome with the earth at its center to the Milky Way. Everything is contained in our flattened disk of stars including our sun which we circle. Our galaxy is the eternal universe.

Cosmology 4 - Hubble, Standard Candle, Red-Shift - the Universe Grows - and is Born, Cosmic Background Radiation)

Parallax can not figure the distance to nebulae, fuzzy objects in the heavens. Nebulae were viewed by some as nearby gas clouds. But Hubble, using a Cepheid variable star as a standard candle determined the Andromeda nebula was far beyond the edge of our galaxy. Our universe instantly expanded. Finding more Cepheids in Andromeda, Hubble determined the nature of the nebula and changed its name to Andromeda galaxy. And there are countless other galaxies. Our place in the universe is inconceivable small (but still stable).

Hubble, examining the spectrographic fingerprints of the stars, saw a shift of colors toward red like a siren rushing away. All galaxies are flying away - the farther away the galaxy the faster it moves. Running this rushing away in reverse we come to a beginning, the big bang. The universe is born (not eternal nor unchanging). The cosmic background radiation testifies to that moment. Although born, perhaps it will last forever.

Cosmology 5 - The Universe Dies

Knowledge of death. This is where we are today, as explained by Charles Seife in his book Alpha & Omega, The Search for the Beginning and End of the Universe.

Cosmology, Social Beings and Poetry

What is the difference between "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep", and the big bang? Knowing the difference would be an answer to Heidegger's metaphysical question, "why is there something rather than nothing?".

The difference is profound. Do we live in a universe created by a god who promises us an eternal place in Christian heaven? Do we live in a universe created over and over again by gods who tire of us and destroy us to try again (Mayan)? Do we live in a mysterious universe which surpasses reason? We know much of how the universe works but we don't know why.

The "why" of the universe is the province of Bataille's nonknowledge. Of a Zen finger pointing to the moon.

It is ours to live in a state of nonknowledge. We can never know the ultimate "why" but we can be it.

Being, rather than knowing, enables us to deal with morality and ethics. Why be ethical if we can't know why? Words can't answer. Being can.

That's where poetry comes in. Poetry uses words to to exceed them. A poem does not mean, it is.

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Harold Carr

Harold Carr