Thursday, July 31, 2008

Missed time

So I have not written in some time. I broke my promise to myself to keep up an article every week. Given this is (mostly) personal as no one has been keeping up with this, this entry is essentially useless but I'm doing it both in case there actually is a reader in the future and is curious in the span, and to convince myself to continue. For all the things that I want to write in this, it spans in so many directions and details that it is difficult to find where to start. It spans the largest entities that can be concieved(the brain and the universe) as they are both recursively detailed in infinite many directions.


I do not know why I stopped writing, Whether it was because of the new(well, old) book I am reading (Godel, Escher, Bach), or if it is fear of writing a falsehood (which to be fair i probably already have). But now I believe that a few falsehoods are a necessity in building something timeless and beautiful. I am reminded of an analogy that Dawkins exemplified in The Blind Watchmaker (the analogy originally coming from a chemist who's name is lost to me currently) where he analogized the mystery of the construction of Stonehenge, to the mystery of the formation of the first DNA and protein macromolecules. The stones of Stonehenge are so large and heavy that it would be impossible for men to lift them up to the top of the other stones. Not only that, but there was no known technology at the time of its construction to build it. Although there is this seeming impossibility, Stonehenge exists nonetheless. A similar believed impossibility is in the existence of DNA, although it exists as well. Some like to believe that there was higher intervention in allowing these things to come to pass. "Creation theory" is the main belief among the faithful in explaining DNA and life, while similar theories like to explain Stonehenge (some even have the gall to explain wonders like Stonehenge with aliens).
Now it has been proposed that the stones were aligned and stood by mounds of earth, the top stones could (relatively) easily be pulled up to the top of these mounds. when everything was aligned as was desired, the mounds of earth could quite easily be moved away leaving the bare bones of the henge. Whether of not this is precisely true the idea is what is important. The Stonehenge is the timeless object and the mounds are the buttresses that are forgotten in time. Now whatever it may be, it has been proposed that the timeless entity of DNA was buttressed by lesser entities of dust, salt, acid, and base formations. I wont go into the full detailed explanation of this, as that is in The Blind Watchmaker but the key note that is heard from it is that the evolutionary process is a long term process that did not begin with DNA. It was the result of lower substances evolving. Now as the dirt mounds of Stonehenge were stripped away and forgotten, so are the pre-life evolutionary substances.
The purpose of all of this is to exemplify why I should not fear dropping a falsehood here or there in my explanations because they are necessary peices of the buttresses to my ideas. As long as I can create a strong enough core stripping away a support here or there in the future will not matter. Once I have built the whole structure, i can indiscriminately remove any earthen mounds that are left.

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