to so tune the inner ear and risk ourselves in hearing that we might better apprehend the mysterious Keepers of Wisdom.
This land of the inscape is a vast and mysterious place. To grasp some of the treasures and mysteries that can be found here we sometimes have to make a journey into the ultimately strange and unpredictable corners of the universe.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened.
Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past. 19
Our final journey is one into the most mysterious of all, a journey into the strange diversity of our multiple worlds.
Writers of science fiction have long toyed with the idea of multiple universes existing side by side (or perhaps in some other spatial relationship). Passing from one universe into another, their fictional characters discovered each universe to be strangely different from the planet with which they were familiar, yet, at the same time, there was something vaguely common that allowed them to recognized basic principles that operated in each world.
In a very different context, puzzled by the anomalous behaviour of subatomic particles, several physicists have begun work on their own understanding of parallel universes. They point out that time honoured classical theories, which form the corner stone of our understanding of how things are, are simply inadequate to explain the bizarre findings of quantum physics and general relativity. One report suggests:
Scientists now believe there may really be a parallel universe - in fact, there may be an infinite number of parallel universes, and we just happen to live in one of them. These other universes contain space, time and strange forms of exotic matter. Some of them may even contain you, in a slightly different form. Astonishingly, scientists believe that these parallel universes exist less than one millimetre away from us. In fact, our gravity is just a weak signal leaking out of another universe into ours. 20
Albert Einstein’s theoretical work on space-time introduced us to the concept of Holes, 'black holes in space,' yet as one scientist noted:
Einstein realized that the black hole had another surprise. The hole wasn’t a hole after all – it was a tube connecting into another possible universe. As Einstein and Rosen first stated it there was a ‘bridge’ through a black hole to anywhere and anytime. 21
Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung would be quite at home amongst researchers who are not adverse to the idea of parallel universes. That is not to suggest that they proposed a multiplicity of universes exterior to ourselves, but rather to acknowledge that they drew attention to the multiple worlds that live within each one of us! As mysterious as any parallel universe and just as difficult to describe they were convinced of a sphere that existed just beyond the horizons of our conscious awareness. Sub-conscious or un-conscious that world might be, yet everyday it plays a powerful role in the way we think about ourselves, see others and make choices.
It is now time for us to puzzle over this mysterious, strange world of our personal parallel universe, our
Land of the Unconscious.
Several years ago, when my children were young, we had a pet bulldog. At every opportunity the children brought the dog into the house and included her in their games. Each time I found the dog in the house I opened the door and shoed the dog outside. This continued for some time until one day my wife asked me, “Why do you always chase the dog out of the house?”
Without me even thinking about it I replied, “Because dogs have fleas!” She stared incredulously at me and then we both started to laugh. I had never consciously thought that our pet had fleas and therefore needed to be outside. Yet as I heard myself speak the words I remembered my grandmother, addressing me as a child, and telling me not to bring her dog
This land of the inscape is a vast and mysterious place. To grasp some of the treasures and mysteries that can be found here we sometimes have to make a journey into the ultimately strange and unpredictable corners of the universe.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened.
Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past. 19
Our final journey is one into the most mysterious of all, a journey into the strange diversity of our multiple worlds.
Writers of science fiction have long toyed with the idea of multiple universes existing side by side (or perhaps in some other spatial relationship). Passing from one universe into another, their fictional characters discovered each universe to be strangely different from the planet with which they were familiar, yet, at the same time, there was something vaguely common that allowed them to recognized basic principles that operated in each world.
In a very different context, puzzled by the anomalous behaviour of subatomic particles, several physicists have begun work on their own understanding of parallel universes. They point out that time honoured classical theories, which form the corner stone of our understanding of how things are, are simply inadequate to explain the bizarre findings of quantum physics and general relativity. One report suggests:
Scientists now believe there may really be a parallel universe - in fact, there may be an infinite number of parallel universes, and we just happen to live in one of them. These other universes contain space, time and strange forms of exotic matter. Some of them may even contain you, in a slightly different form. Astonishingly, scientists believe that these parallel universes exist less than one millimetre away from us. In fact, our gravity is just a weak signal leaking out of another universe into ours. 20
Albert Einstein’s theoretical work on space-time introduced us to the concept of Holes, 'black holes in space,' yet as one scientist noted:
Einstein realized that the black hole had another surprise. The hole wasn’t a hole after all – it was a tube connecting into another possible universe. As Einstein and Rosen first stated it there was a ‘bridge’ through a black hole to anywhere and anytime. 21
Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung would be quite at home amongst researchers who are not adverse to the idea of parallel universes. That is not to suggest that they proposed a multiplicity of universes exterior to ourselves, but rather to acknowledge that they drew attention to the multiple worlds that live within each one of us! As mysterious as any parallel universe and just as difficult to describe they were convinced of a sphere that existed just beyond the horizons of our conscious awareness. Sub-conscious or un-conscious that world might be, yet everyday it plays a powerful role in the way we think about ourselves, see others and make choices.
It is now time for us to puzzle over this mysterious, strange world of our personal parallel universe, our
Land of the Unconscious.
Several years ago, when my children were young, we had a pet bulldog. At every opportunity the children brought the dog into the house and included her in their games. Each time I found the dog in the house I opened the door and shoed the dog outside. This continued for some time until one day my wife asked me, “Why do you always chase the dog out of the house?”
Without me even thinking about it I replied, “Because dogs have fleas!” She stared incredulously at me and then we both started to laugh. I had never consciously thought that our pet had fleas and therefore needed to be outside. Yet as I heard myself speak the words I remembered my grandmother, addressing me as a child, and telling me not to bring her dog
Similar Books
