Using "is" to describe or characterize this human world, or any aspect of it, can be misleading, because "is" means "equals," and a sentence using the word "is" thus presents itself in the guise of a quasi-mathematical truth.
Math does state the inevitable truths that prevail in the World of Nature, which is a world that is not created by past, present, or future human activity. In the World of Nature, governed by natural laws, whatever exists is, by definition, inevitable. Our science is to "understand" that world, and literally to "stand under" and look up to contemplate a reality that preexists us, and that we may be able to utilize for our benefit, but the essential nature of which it is not ours to modify.
E=MC2, states a powerful truth. This is a truth that was discovered, and that was not created by any human action. A statement like, "Energy is equivalent to mass times the speed of light, squared," is fundamentally different from a statement like, "America is the land of the free and the home of the brave."
All too often, as we discuss the realities of our political life, and as we utilize the word "is" in doing so, we unconsciously impart to the realities we describe a kind of "inevitability" to which they are not entitled.
In human affairs, whatever "is" can be changed. Not always easily, granted, but the realities of our world are not like the realities of math, physics, and the World of Nature.
We make the realities, in our world, so what "is" is only of interest as a current report. "Is" never means, in the human, political world that we most immediately inhabit, that things have to be the way they "is!"
Thank goodness for that, considering the state of the world we have created! Because we have the gift of freedom, there is nothing in the human world that we cannot transform.
Image Credit:
http://www.charbase.com/003d-unicode-equals-sign
This is a semantic discussion about the words "is," "reality," and "truth."
ReplyDeleteE=MC2 is not a statement of truth, it is a mathematical description of observations of the relationship between mass and energy in the universe. The formula F = Gm1m2/r2 is a mathematical description of relationships between masses, not an explanation of how gravity works, so it therefore is no more “truth” than the statement “The sun is yellow,” which is description of how our eyes react to electromagnetic radiation from the nearest star.
The gravest error in human perception is the assumption of duality, that is, the separation between the human world and the “natural” (aka non-human) world. There is no separation. The appearance of separation is an illusion, because nothing humans do is separated from its effects on the totality of the Universe(s).
Humans confuse “freedom” and “free will” with separation between human and non-human, in that humans are perceived as the only living things that can change their self-created world. This, of course, is mistaken. All living things modify the world in which they are co-creators. All non-living things participate in co-creation of the world in which they exist. From the quantum level to the macro level, all “things” are one, united by and through the very fabric of the Universe(s).
“Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead, only realize the truth... THERE IS NO SPOON. Then you will see that it not the spoon that bends, it is yourself.” “The Matrix”