I have no doubt that in reality the future will be
vastly more surprising than anything I can imagine.
Now my own suspicion is that the universe is not only
queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can
suppose.
- J.B.S. Haldane
Humanity has reached a period of evolutionary and
technological adolescence. The transitions brought
about by modern science and technology – tempered with
wisdom and
caution – can lead us to deeper, unexplored paths of
wisdom and experience. Let us not jump to
short-sighted or hasty conclusions in assuming the
extent of Nature itself, for our
knowledge is finite. Nature need not confine itself to
the limitations of our perception. Upon close enough
examination, even the most fundamentally held tenets
of objective
reality break down. What are the implications of these
discoveries? The discordant nature of current
interpretations of physical reality suggests that our
theoretical models are incomplete. It is premature to
suppose that we have reached the last steps of our
journey in understanding the universe. To the
contrary, we have yet to even leave the womb of our
home planet.
Scientific dogma is just as perilous a trap as
religious dogma. The only logically valid position is
to remain open to the introduction of new foundations.
Any deterministic theory will always be an
approximation - a philosophical interpretation of the
boundaries of our empirical knowledge. With the advent
of quantum mechanics, we have refined our
understanding of reality at the price of reaching only
disjointed explanations. But we must always continue
to progress in the face of our limitations, for this
is what makes us human. The most important component
of knowledge is the imagination.
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Received on Fri Apr 15 2005 - 08:31:13 PDT