Meso-reality and the Special-case God

The universe is a single unified reality. Nevertheless, it is sometimes useful to consider the universe to be comprised of a continuum of realities, stretching all the way from cosmic reality on the one hand to quantum mechanical reality on the other.

At the massive level, cosmic reality depends on such things as the speed of light being relative to the observer and the curvature of spacetime. At the other extreme, quantum mechanics represents a different reality where deterministic cause-effect relationships vanish and discernible particles crumble into probabilistic clouds.

Both these extreme realities are difficult to grasp for the ordinary human being. This essay attempts to explain why.

Human beings, in course of their early evolution, had to create a mental model of the universe in order to engage with it. This reality, which I call meso-reality (or "middle" reality), is a substantially simplified form of absolute reality and very much subject to the physics of earth itself in terms of parameters such as physical scale (not too big nor small), gravity (just right to retain an atmosphere), temperature (not too hot nor cold), and composition of elements (just the right mix for carbon/water based life). In meso-reality, time and space are orthogonal, time is directional and cause-effect relationships are clear, predictable and repeatable.

Meso-reality has helped humankind negotiate its way through history and in explaining and dealing with the world around us. It pervades our thought, language, most sciences and arts. Meso-reality is simple and common sense-based, and can be readily understood by the man-on-the-street. However, in order to be reasonably simple, meso-reality presents a vastly oversimplified view of reality.

Up until the early 20th century, humankind did not consider that other realities could exist. However, the Special Theory of Relativity laid the ground for a new model for the fabric of reality that was shocking to many. By the middle of the 20th century, it was increasingly evident -- at least to the physicists, mathematicians, and cosmologists -- that there were other realities.

However, these other realities needed a special language for modeling them--the expressive and universal language of mathematics. The language of meso-reality is too insufficiently expressive to represent or deal with these other realities. Trying to represent other realities in meso-reality language is as absurd as trying to write a treatise on Theology in a 'language' such as Java, as Java is completely inappropriate for the purpose, having been designed for writing object-oriented computer programmes.

This brings us to the inevitable conclusion that it would be impossible to present commonsensical views of alternative realities, as these would seem fundamentally counterintuitive to the ordinary person. The 'common man' is therefore not destined to understand alternative realities in their fullest sense. It is only with sufficient grounding in mathematics that these realities be represented, explained or taught.

Mathematics is thus a universal language: if we were to encounter a civilization from a planet of a very different size -- where gravity, scale and chemical composition would be very different from ours -- the physics of life would be radically different, but the mathematics of reality would be identical. While meso-reality is specific to local physics, the mathematical abstractions of reality are universal and absolute.

If meso-reality represents a truncated, oversimplified, special-case model of the universe, then it would follow that many of the intellectual artifacts of meso-reality would have no universal value or utility.

In particular, the concept of a universal creator--a popular idea within the framework of meso-reality--would seem to have no role in absolute reality. While it is true that the mathematics of cosmic origin, the Big Bang, is perhaps still not complete (especially that of the first few ticks after the initial singularity), it is, however, clear that there is no 'God factor' in the equations. The concept of an omnipotent universal creator is a consequence of the special-case scenario of meso-reality, and has no relevance outside it. God is as 'real ' as meso-reality.

[15:00 - 16:00, 16 October 2007]

What is Moo?

Zen Buddhism is a unique faith inasmuch as it can live comfortably with contradictions. The Zen answer to a question that cannot be answered straight is 'Moo' (also spelled 'Mu'), a word that means 'nothing' or 'your-question-cannot-be-answered-as-it-is- based-on-incorrect-assumptions'.

A monk asked Joshu: "Has a dog Buddha-nature or not?"
Joshu answered: "Moo."

"Have you stopped beating your wife?"
"Moo!"