TO INFINITY AND BEYOND

It’s a little past 9:00 PM and I’ve just returned from my evening constitutional with Lucas the Wonder Dog. We’re at our farm in Windom, Texas, which affords me a wonderful view of the night sky on a clear night like tonight. My old friend Orion is rising out of the east, heralding the arrival of winter. Rigel and Betelgeuse stand opposite of each other both astronomically, describing Orion’s right arm and left leg respectively, and spectrally, with Rigel being a super-hot blue-white giant and Betelgeuse being a relatively cooler red giant. Over my shoulder the grand sweep of the galactic edge connects horizon with horizon, Cassiopeia lounges gracefully on her stellar couch, and the Big Dipper points the way to Polaris. Even the Seven Sisters, the Pleiades, are visible here. Oddly enough, I can only see the Pleiades using my peripheral vision. That gives them a somewhat ephemeral feel leaving me to wonder if they exist at all. I place the blame for my inability to view them directly on the many hours spent staring into strobe lights during my ill-spent youth.

I often pity city dwellers deprived of a view of a sky such as this. Looking at the night sky in the city could lead one to believe that we live alone in a desolate galaxy. Orion is barely visible and the galactic arc, Cassiopeia, the Pleiades, and the Big Dipper cannot be seen at all. But even in the relative obscurity of Windom, light is encroaching from the west and I suspect that, in the course of a few years or decades, the night sky will be devoid of stars here as well.

This stands in stark contrast to the night sky of the high desert. Many years ago I had the opportunity to visit Big Bend National Park. I was staying at Terlingua Ranch, which lies about 10 miles due north of the park as the crow flies. It was the spring of 1997 and comet Hale-Bopp was making its closest approach to earth. One evening I climbed a small hill behind the ranch to watch the sun set. Hale-Bopp sat low on the horizon with its bifurcated tale streaming away from its head, blown back by the constant flow of alpha particles from the Sun. As the sunlight faded the stars began to appear slowly, then exploded out of the night sky as darkness fell. Like in the city it became hard to pick out the constellations but for a different reason. Rather than being obscured by light they were hidden within the millions of stars invisible to city dwellers.

I don’t remember how long I sat transfixed by the sky that night but I do remember being overwhelmed by the immensity of what lay before me. Not only was I looking across unfathomable distances but I was looking back in time. I was looking at the universe not as it is, but as it was. The universe is so huge that we’ve had to invent a new measurement, the light year, to reduce it to our ability to understand. In these terms Mars, at its closet, is only 4 light minutes away and Alpha Centauri, our nearest star, is a mere 4.24 light years away. But does the light year really help us comprehend a galaxy that lies 10 billion light years away; a galaxy that, in all probability, no longer exists? Can we truly understand the implications of light reaching our eyes that has been traveling for 10 billion years?

I was trained as a scientist within a modernist mental construct and, as such, always believed the mysteries of the universe lied within the scope of human comprehension. In my hubris I believed, by applying the scientific method rigorously, anything could be dissected, reduced, and understood. While I still believe the scientific method is the best way to discover that which is knowable, I have come to believe some mysteries lie beyond human comprehension. 

Albert Einstein is best known for his theory of relativity which describes the relationships between light, matter, energy, gravity, and time. But Einstein was not satisfied with his theory and spent the rest of his life struggling to articulate a single grand theory, his Unified Field Theory, that would bring together all the physical properties of the universe into a single mathematical statement. Try as he might, the Unified Field Theory remained beyond his grasp. Was this because a single theory explaining the physical universe does not exist or, as I believe now, lies beyond our ability to understand? 

As I’ve grown older I’ve learned to appreciate the mysteries of life. Looking at life from a holistic, dare I say post-modern, perspective allows me to marvel at that which lies before me without the need to deconstruct physical reality. The universe is beautiful and mysterious and immense and unfathomable, and that is fine with me. 

If you’re looking for me I’ll be out gazing at the stars.