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Manu Joseph became a journalist because he didn’t have to crack any objective-type entrance exam to be one. His first novel, Serious Men, is the winner of The Hindu Best Fiction Award. It is one of Huffington Post’s 10 Best Books of 2010, and was shortlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize 2010. He is the editor of Open. EMAIL AUTHOR |
Sometimes, there is much joy in not knowing what we are talking about. I know my friends are wallowing in the entertainment of beer-induced philosophy when they use any of the following expressions—hunter-gatherer, game theory, Schrödinger’s Cat and String Theory. The last two concern theoretical physics, which has almost replaced literature as the source of intoxicated male introspection (‘What is life? Pass me the peanuts’). In fact, today, theoretical physicists have a greater claim to be regarded as philosophers than writers. It is as if we have outsourced our pursuit of truth to them. And they are doing a great job, which is to entertain us with the God Particle, multi-dimensions, dark matter, dark energy and other such things. (It is not their intention to entertain us, they are serious people who spend their entire careers trying to prove what they believe is true, though they are very fondly aware of how exotic they sound). Entertainment is important to us, the lay people. Our pursuit of truth, contrary to all our claims, is actually a pursuit of entertainment, the reason why we have been able to sustain it for centuries in different guises.
At the heart of theoretical physics today is the most expensive experiment man has ever undertaken—The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) near Geneva. It is a tunnel within a circular tunnel, about 27 km in circumference. Here, subatomic particles will be accelerated to almost the speed of light and collided to see what happens. The idea is to find the splinters of subatomic particles, and among the splinters scientists hope to observe the most sought-after particle—Higgs Boson, a theoretical prediction that will help us understand the origin of mass in the universe.
It was called the God Particle in a book by Nobel laureate Leon Lederman. Journalists loved the term so much that Higgs Boson quickly entered public space as the God Particle. Though it made the Vatican nervous and inspired many books and films and theories of doom, the God Particle is a disproportionately dramatic term for just another important guess of theoretical physicists.
Scientists hope to observe small black holes in the tunnel, a prospect that has infused the fear in some people that black holes will gobble up the whole planet. Scientists also hope to observe extra dimensions.
Some strange things have happened to the LHC. It is believed to be jinxed. In September last year, after it finally began operations, it shut down due to serious technical glitches. Also, a technician died when a heavy piece of equipment fell on him. An employee was arrested for terror links. All this has given rise to rumours that something paranormal is at work. Two highly regarded scientists with no history of ever having sought psychiatric help have now said that the reason why the LHC is so jinxed is that ‘nature’ does not want mankind to discover the Higgs Boson. They say that the future has infiltrated into the present to stop us from discovering the Higgs Boson.
They are not the first scientists to propose that the flow of time can be reversed. There are equally crazy things that reputed scientists have said—because they can get away with most of it. They can substantiate their claims in a language that seems reverential to us because we do not understand it. That is also one of the reasons why philosophy is today firmly in the hands of scientists. They have with them a potent mix that philosophers need—the aura of intellect, the ability to entertain, frighten you with the complexity of their arguments, but give you a peep into a minor exotic strand that will help you gas about it with friends. The success of the film The Matrix is not very different from the reason why theoretical physics is so popular among those who do not understand it.
Not everyone believes that the LHC will discover anything that will change our idea of reality. Stephen Hawking has a bet of $100 that the LHC will not throw up the Higgs Boson. May I humbly present my bet—Rs 1 crore that the LHC will not throw up black holes or extra dimensions. This is not the confidence born out of not having a crore. (I promise I will find the money. You find the dimensions.) It’s just that if there are extra dimensions, money would have no value. I will walk the rest of my life in the trance of knowing that there is really something out there.
OLDER COMMENTS FIRST
4 COMMENTS
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Of course there are more dimensions than you can count on three fingers.
Let's say from a distance of 500 metres, you see something that looks like a piece of string, suspended between two poles. It's unidimensional -- you can only go left or right on the string.
But when you come a little closer, you realise the string is actually a hosepipe, and there's an ant crawling around it. Suddenly, your string has acquired another dimension. And as you peer even closer, you notice a termite drilling through the pipe. There, you get your third dimension as well.
So mister, just because you can't see them doesn't mean the dimensions don't exist. When you're swinging your hand in the air, you've passed through all 16. It's just that owing to their diminutive size, you can't see them. They're all tucked away in the fabric of space, taking shelter under the Planck's constant (10*-43 m). So go easy on the money. And try acid. It always works.
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Thank you for an interesting article, but I was surprised by the lack of mention of the notion of The Third Culture. C.P. Snow was the first to discuss this idea which has subsequently been brilliantly exemplified in John Brockman's book, The Third Culture (more info on http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/). The drivers of the third culture are not just theoretical physicists (Roger Penrose, Paul Davies). They are also philosophers (Dan Dennett), evolutionary biologists (Steven Jay Gould, Richard Dawkins), mathematicians (Marvin Minsky), geneticists (Steve Jones), cognitive scientists (Steven Pinker), businessmen (Daniel Hillis), and others, and they've usurped the position of traditional literary thinkers.
These intellectuals are not concerned with how the implications of their work affects some favoured philosophical doctrine. Traditional philosophers would never have dared to air any opinion that appeared contradictory to their philosophy. Today, however, you can have a Chomsky who is left-wing in his politics, but innatist in his linguistics. Try catching your traditional left-wing intellectual dabbling with concepts of innateness and nativism. This means that third culture intellectuals are not only attempting to do what traditional philosophers did (answering the who, why, how questions), they're also changing the way we philosophize and bringing philosophy out of the closed circuit of literary intellectuals.
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Mr. Manu Joseph
I am an ardent fan of yours ever since I was asked to look up for your write ups in Outlook travellerr as a model as I was assigned to write about on Badami, Ihole and Pattadakal of Karnataka.
The first sentence I read of yours is.."There is something odd about these trekkers who climb 3000 ft high cliffs on week ends but stand in line to get into the lift to reach their office on the third floor. No wonder we are searching for intelligence elsewhere in the planet." I think it was great introduction to me. I was floored and went about telling everyone I assumed liked a good piece of writing. Later I liked your article in Outlook about private Hindi films, shown in tents, with the marriage videographer being the cameraman. I thought you were brilliant while reviewing Steve Vaugh's autobiographyin The Economic Times where in you said of Bradman,",, well, what can you say about a person who can see the ballsplit second earlier and has all the time to get into the right position and hit wherever you want" You have rightly exposed the the cricketers and drooling cricket writers.
Regarding the article on particle physics, I fully agree with your argument because I am a fan. I am not sure about the safety of your Rs one crore. The investment on the tunnel experiment is so huge that they might fake something to get your Rs one crore. They badly need to recover their investment.
I wish you all the best - M N Chakravarthy
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Dear MN,
While I am flattered I am very certain the Bradman line you attribute to me is not mine. :-)
And, I feel my Rs one crore is very very safe.
Warm regards
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