The Unchanging Universe

Heraclitus declares the being (that which exists, nature) but identifies it with becoming, but Parmenides declares just the Being; only what is, is, what is not, is not. All “follows” from that: change, he argues, is logically impossible and so what is, is one and unchangeable! This dazzling absolute monism is in daring disagreement with sense perception, but curiously it has found a well-known genius as a supporter. Emboldened by his theory of relativity, Einstein considers the universe as a four-dimensional “block” (a space-time continuum like a loaf of bread) which, remarkably, contains all moments of time (of past, present, and future) always, and where change is an illusion. He said, “For we convinced physicists, the distinction between past, present, and future is only an illusion, however persistent.” In the block universe, the past is not gone, it is present; and the future, like the present, is, well, present, too.

The Changing Universe

Everything is constantly changing, and nothing is ever the same, Heraclitus proposed, and in accordance with Logos, the intelligible eternal law of nature. Thus, everything is in a state of becoming (in the process of forming into something) instead of being (reaching or already being in an established final state beyond which no more change will take place). This means that things, permanent things, no longer exist—for they contradict his theory of constant change—only events and processes exist. His doctrine has found strong confirmation in modern physics, for, according to it, absolute restfulness and inactivity are impossibilities. Points in Einstein’s four-dimensional space-time continuum are events, and so are the quarks and leptons—for, unlike in deterministic Newtonian physics, matter in probabilistic quantum physics lost its permanence and identity because of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Moreover, all happenings, evidence suggests, are consistent with a single universal law.

Epilogue

Our quest for knowledge began with our evolution as a species 200,000 years ago. We hunted and gathered, painted on caves, told stories, domesticated animals and plants, wondered about nature, gave birth to civilization and religion, picked up writing, philosophized, and engaged in science. In fact, we keep on doing all these wonderful things and continue to learn more and more, but, why should we? A student of Euclid once asked, What would I earn if I learned geometry? If you should earn from what you learn, here is a coin, Euclid responded sardonically. But, really, why should we learn? Because we can, might be the best answer, but also because the journey of knowledge is infinitely interesting. Nonetheless, in front of the wisdom of the universe, we should remain always humble, for as many learned people have come to know (Democritus, Socrates, Russell), we might be wrong on just about everything.

Atomic Connections

Epicureanism has served as an intellectual bridge between ancient and modern science. Lucretius, a devoted Epicurean, composed a didactic poem about Epicurean philosophy that has “taken over the whole of Italy.” Epicureanism “was a significant trend in Hellenistic times.” “The echoes of this battle [between the atomists and their critics, e.g., the Aristotelians] were heard [sporadically] in medieval Europe, and it flared up again with great intensity in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.” Then, Epicureanism was revived when a copy of Lucretius’s poem resurfaced, inspiring various Renaissance philosophers, who had inspired the Enlightenment philosophers. Galileo cited Lucretius’s work to compare the Epicurean physics of falling bodies with Aristotle’s and his own. His book inspired Newton, an atomist himself, who in turn inspired Einstein, who had proven atomism theoretically, and who inspired everyone after him. Rightly then, “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.”

Atoms of Matter and Energy

Perhaps the greatest scientific achievement of antiquity, possibly of all time, was the realization of the atomic nature of matter. “There are but atoms and the void,” Democritus proposed. And he understood the great diversity of material objects as complex aggregations of uncuttable atoms, the building blocks of matter, moving in the void, the empty space between them. Leucippus invented the atomic theory, and Democritus, a true polymath and a prolific philosopher, developed it extensively. Uncuttable (the actual meaning of atom in Greek) are also the modern elementary particles of matter, the quarks and leptons, and although void is a controversial concept still, a kind of void is required to explain nature. Leucippus’s and Democritus’s notion of indivisible (atomic), discrete particles without substructure has endured and, according to modern physics, is still one of the most remarkable properties of nature. Could space and time have an atomic nature, too?

Numbers and Shapes

Pythagoras initiated the mathematical analysis of nature, a cornerstone practice in modern physics. “Things are numbers” is the most significant Pythagorean doctrine. It signifies that the phenomena of nature are describable by equations and numbers. Therefore, nature is quantifiable and potentially knowable through the scientific method. The Pythagoreans quantified pleasing sounds of music, right-angled triangles, even the motion of the heavenly bodies. The “Copernican revolution” (heliocentricity) is traced back to Pythagorean cosmology. But, finally, Einstein’s relativity clarifies a popular misconception related to it: that “the earth revolves around the sun (heliocentricity) is correct,” and that “the sun revolves around the earth (geocentricism) is incorrect.” Plato was inspired by Pythagorean mathematics, but he replaced “things are numbers” with things are shapes, forms, Forms, a noetic description of nature known as the theory of “Forms.” The quantum-mechanical wave-functions—mathematical forms that describe microscopic particles—are the Platonic Forms of quarks and leptons.

It’s Fate—Maybe

Since everything is made of atoms, then the behavior of all living things must be dictated by the laws these atoms obey, the laws of nature, Democritus thought. In fact, no biological system hitherto has violated this general realization. Schrödinger’s book What Is Life? alludes to that by contemplating the physics of living cells and of life. Of course, nowadays the specialized fields of biochemistry and biophysics have been constantly verifying this idea. Does such a realization, however, mean that the laws of nature have an influence on human free will? That is, when one decides to eat pizza instead of Chinese food, has one really decided what to eat, or has “one’s decision” been predetermined by the laws of nature? Generally, do humans have free will or not? Regardless of how history gets written (deterministically, via chance, via free will, or some combination), it is time that “we” consider it.

Paradoxes of Nature

Parmenides’s insinuation of an unchanging universe is assertively supported by Zeno with various logical paradoxes that question the very nature of plurality, space, time, and the reality of apparent motion. The dichotomy is his most famous paradox. To begin a trip, say, from here to the door, a traveler must travel the first half of it, but before she does that she must travel half of the first half, and in fact half of that, ad infinitum. Since there will always exist a smaller first half to be traveled first, Zeno questions whether a traveler can ever even start a trip. Zeno’s analysis is logical; on the other hand, things everywhere appear to be moving. Hence, either Zeno’s reasoning is wrong or appearances are deceptive. Empowered by the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics, it will be argued that, at best, the phenomenon of motion is experimentally unverifiable!

Cosmic Justice

Anaximander thought water is a bad idea for a primary substance of the universe because it’s not neutral—it has an opposite, fire. And opposites destroy; they don’t generate one another. If everything in the universe were initially water, it would be impossible to have its opposite, fire, ever created because water destroys fire. Thus, quarks and leptons can’t be primary, for they have opposites, their antimatter versions, and as opposites, matter and antimatter annihilate, not generate, each other. Anaximander taught everything is generated from the apeiron: a timeless, neutral substance, encompassing the universe and constantly transforming into competing transient opposites, but with measure to preserve the cosmic justice—without absolute dominance by either opposite. In physics, it’s ubiquitous energy that’s constantly transforming into competing opposites—matter and antimatter—with measure. Curiously, however, matter (“water”) is more plentiful than antimatter (“fire”). Why? Nobody knows. Where’s the cosmic justice?

The Quest for a Theory of Everything

Thales’s question, What are things made of?, is still the most difficult in physics. He reasoned that despite the apparent diversity and complexity in nature, all things are made from the same stuff (water), and everything obeys a common set of unchanging basic principles (water’s transformations). Thus, nature is characterized by a certain sameness or unity between all things, however diverse they appear to be. Presently, according to the standard model of physics, everything is made from quarks and leptons. And the plethora of diverse things is partly due to their transformations. Thales’s quest for sameness is modern physics’ search for a theory of everything. It tries to unify the four fundamental forces of nature—the electromagnetic, the nuclear strong, the nuclear weak, and gravity. The challenge of this undertaking is to find a quantum version of gravity. String theory claims to have succeeded, but its hypotheses are still experimentally unverified.