THE ROLE OF SCIENCE IN YOUR SEARCH FOR PERSONAL MEANING
by Todd Duncan, Science Integration Institute
Introduction
Science has had an uneasy relationship with the human desire for personal meaning
and significance to our lives. It is sometimes tempting to conclude we’d all be better off keeping the two topics confined to separate categories that make contact
only if absolutely necessary.
But science
and meaning are connected
in a fundamental way, which artificial categories can never completely keep apart. This connection is forced upon us by
the remarkable success of the
scientific process in uncovering new
information about the universe in which we are
immersed. We want any meaning we construct
for ourselves to be on solid ground, to be based on the “real world.” Science has worked so well that it
is difficult to deny it a central role in
telling us about how the world
really is. Even if we sometimes don’t like what we think science is telling us, because it
may conflict with some ideas on which we happen to base our current sense of meaning,
we feel obligated to pay attention and look to it
as a source of information about
the meaning we seek.
Evidence that many people sense this
can be seen both in our fascination with science
and in our reactions against
it. What are millions
of people looking for in such science books as Stephen Hawking’s amazingly popular
A Brief History of Time, and in other
similar works of popular science? Many intuitively sense that science must have an important impact on the search for meaning, which may
be why they turn to such books for answers. Most, I suspect, are disappointed in one way or an- other. Abstract approaches to
“theories of everything,” while certainly
important in the search to understand the universe and ourselves, have a
hollowness to them that always leaves us
wanting. In one sense they profess to
offer the whole story. But in another, more intuitive sense, we know they can never be the whole story because they leave out what is the
very stuff of life to us.
These descriptions of the universe seem too far removed from our experience, with
nothing that brushes against the universe
as we experience it in everyday life, the one in which we make choices and seek meaning and a place for ourselves and our thoughts. Science
provides a mental map of the universe, but it is in many ways an unfamiliar and unhelpful
map, without clear connections to
the concepts we operate with in our immediate experience. Most glaringly, it seems to lack a clear
“you are here” marker needed to place ourselves
within the framework of the map and use it as a guide to the choices we
face in life.
This
situation may explain
some of the vigorous resistance to scientific ideas and
the continued popularity, despite strong evidence
against them, of so-called “pseudosciences” such as
astrology, creation science, psychic
phenomena, or quantum healing. They
address directly the daily concerns of
life, and thus offer something we have a deep and real need for,
which science seems not to provide.
We feel that even when all possible scientific questions have been answered, the problems of life remain completely untouched.
—LudwigWittgenstein
We all operate within a framework of
concepts that make sense of the world to us, which we use to formulate our
goals, hopes, and dreams, and to seek ways to overcome problems and obstacles as we build our lives. Certainly
the universe out there has much to say about all
this, but it’s hard to figure out what it says when our
scientific description exists for us as a remote framework without clearly
articulated connections to the concepts
with which we operate in daily life. So we live in a
disconnected state: abstract and evolving
knowledge of the grand universe on
one hand, and the immediate need for a guide
to our individual choices on
the other hand. How do we bring these
together, so that we can guide our immediate choices from a perspective that
is informed by and connected to the big picture?
These connections exist, but they are
easily disguised, lost in the abstractions. The links are difficult to maintain even for sciences that specifically describe
us, our bodies and mental processes. In some way we remain detached from these descriptions,
still not quite feeling they tell us much about
the essence of the world as we experience it.
For sciences that describe distant places and distant times,
the links can seem almost impossible to maintain. The
connections must be consciously made, the
insights from science explicitly
appropriated into our day-to-day awareness of who we are and how we interact with the world. We can learn to think not of the scientific universe out there, far away
and long ago, but right
here, where we live and experience
the world. The big bang,
for example, happened here, in the little region of space we can now hold in our hands, as well
as out there in regions that
are now 10 – 15 billion light years
away. We are just now receiving the glow from a condition once experienced billions of light years away, but that condition was also experienced right here, a long time ago. Bizarre properties of electrons and atoms and photons described by quantum theory can seem abstract and detached, until we
realize we’re talking about us, too—our atoms, the air we breathe,
the sunlight which sustains us. Many of the remarkable
insights from science remain abstract,
disconnected from our personal worldviews which are the maps we use to guide our
choices and our lives. But this need not always be the case.
I suggest that the meaning behind our individual lives, which science
can help us uncover, is not
to be looked for only in regimes where
our current scientific understanding is stretched or incomplete—in exotic
theories of the early universe, in black holes
and warped spacetime and the arcane mathematics
of grand unified theories. It is found, rather, in the “ordinary
world”—the world in which we live every
day, but which really is so full of
mystery and wonder that it seems inappropriate
to call it ordinary. Once we learn to live with a full awareness of our connections to the universe we are a part
of, I think it’s safe to say the world will never seem ordinary again.
_________________- The author then defines his intent and goal in writing this book:
My goal in this short book is to illustrate that the seemingly opposing aims of “personal meaning” and “consistency with science” need not be in conflict. On the contrary, the process and insights of science can act as a valuable filter and guide to developing our sense of being part of a bigger context, within which our lives have meaning. We live our lives motivated and guided by a set of beliefs about how the world works and how we connect to it. These connections are all around us, in every action and every assumption about what is important for us to do. And science, while certainly not capable of providing all the answers, has a great deal to say about these assumptions. We just need to be aware of how to use the science, and what to look for.
My hope is that someday science will play a much more central role in our varied individual efforts to construct an overall context for our lives. I hope we will learn to see new discoveries in basic science not as detached and esoteric curiosities, justified by the vague possibility of technological spin-offs, but as crucial pieces or steps in the process of uncovering humanity’s role in the cosmos. My aim is to help bring this day closer, by offering a point of view from which science can be seen as an important tool in your personal search for meaning in your daily life. Along the way, I also present some concrete suggestions for putting it to use for yourself.
- Continue reading this brilliant book by downloading it in PDF here:
http://www.scienceintegration.org/books/eordinaryworld.pdf or ask me to email it to you.
- Additionally, what follows is an article from A Writer's Life:
The beep beep sound of Sputnik (mp3)
There is something indefinably magical in space. Mankind has looked upwards for centuries, always wanting to know more. Where did we come from? Why does the rain fall? What Gods make lightening? What have we done to make the Gods angry? What are stars made of? How did the universe begin? How will it end? How can we see further and further into a mystery always just beyond reach?
Ancient civilizations had cause to fear the sky. In the modern world, however, we have lost any sense of fear and wonder about that which suspends our tiny planet in the vastness of space and time. The ability for the majority of us to experience the universe first hand is small. Astronauts are heroes because they dare to step into the vastness that has frightened and awed and puzzled mankind since our first ancestor rose onto two legs and looked towards the sky.
Did dinosaurs ponder the wonders of space? Fish? Lions? Horses? Even the small one-celled amoeba? The creatures of this world don’t need to ponder space because they are space. Instinctively, they know their connection to the universe, something we forgot long ago when we chose to divide and accept ‘he’ is different than ‘me’.
So why does the sound of a machine beeping in space open up such a vast emptiness inside me? Awe that, even though the sounds were recorded over 40 years ago, makes me shiver, forces me to admit I, too, am part of the wonder of the universe. Sounds which make me feel something opening inside me in a way I have never experienced before; connects me to the universe in a way I never imagined possible.
I am, you are, every living thing in this world and beyond, not to mention rocks and chairs and books, and computers are made of starstuff. We see solids when, in reality, the atoms from which we are made are simply gathered together and pretending to be the solids called ‘me’ or ‘you’ or ‘Fido.’ The same as a star 40 million light years away is pretending to be the solid called ‘star.’ I am ‘me,’ but I am also Sputnik, forty years ago, sending the sounds of infinity back to the’ me’ on earth listening this very moment.
What awe would fill this world if we all understood, down to the tiniest particle of our being, that we aren’t different. We are all made of the same stuff as the stars. We all feel that deep instinctive pull towards knowing, understanding, who we are and where we belong in this infinite universe.
Perhaps that is what the beeping of Sputnik reminds us. Somewhere out there, beyond our sight, in the blackness both outside and inside us, there is an emptiness we all understand – loneliness, fear, death – but we do not need to be afraid. We are one. No matter the vastness between the stars, or between two neighbors, there is always a bridge, always a connection of starstuff binding us together.
- This video shows the launch of Sputnik 1 - October 4, 1957:
- From Wikipedia:
Tracking and studying Sputnik from Earth provided scientists with valuable information, even though the satellite itself wasn't equipped with sensors. The density of the upper atmosphere could be deduced from its drag on the orbit, and the propagation of its radio signals gave information about the ionosphere.
Sputnik 1 was launched during the International Geophysical Year from Site No.1/5, at the 5th Tyuratam range, in Kazakh SSR (now known as the Baikonur Cosmodrome). The satellite travelled at about 29,000 kilometres per hour (18,000 mph; 8,100 m/s), taking 96.2 minutes to complete each orbit. It transmitted on 20.005 and 40.002 MHz,[6] which were monitored by amateur radio operators throughout the world.[7] The signals continued for 21 days until the transmitter batteries ran out on 26 October 1957.[8] Sputnik 1 burned up on 4 January 1958, as it fell from orbit upon reentering Earth's atmosphere, after travelling about 70 million km (43.5 million miles) and spending three months in orbit.[9]
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| Sputnik 1 in space |
