Today I was watching a hindi horror movie (named 'Raat' meaning Night). In the end when people start asking how and why questions (with respect to the supernatural) the priest (who helps to get rid of the 'evil force') gives a very impressive answer.
He gives the example of how when we light a lamp in a dark room the darkness doesnt dissappear, its boundries are just thrown back a bit. Similarly what we know (with respect to science, logic etc.) is like a narrow area of light in an infinite black sea of what is unknown. What things lie just beyond the circle of light who knows? How these things affect us, we have absolutely no idea!
People will argue that science will one day explain everything. That one day will not come in our lifetime, maybe not even in our grandchildren's lifetime. But assuming that one special day does come when everything is explained in a balanced equation, the big question then is: will we like the explanations provided. What if the truth turns out to be stranger than fiction? Quantum mechanics already has many such tales which are much more entertaining than any gossip. The way we lay down the rules is not always the way the game is played! Thus what happens when we know THE TRUTH. Will we accept it or will we call it a lie or a mistake and move on in our search?
Most people would counter me by saying that ifTHE TRUTH is a scientific work then it would be testable. Thus the choice of accepting or rejecting is purely cosmetic. If tests prove something to be right then whatever it stands for must be right to. I would ask the people who raise this issue a simple question: How do you test the unknown i.e. how do you analyse something when it changes when you attempt to scan it (Heisenberg's Uncertainity Principle).
Maybe the truth has already been given to us but we choose to ignore it for something that (atleast on the surface) appears to be more 'testable'. Wouldn't it be tragic if 100 years down the line we realise that the 100 year research effort could have been spared ifwe had just reached back into history and tapped the knowledge of the ancients. If we had just started understanding how minds free from the daily assault of TV, radio and the iPod actually worked!
If we had just tried to learn what people already knew after years of dedicated searching (and not just 3 years of post-graduate re-search!).
Whatever happens, whether the darkness is pushed aside or the light of our 'society and science' goes out forever one thing is for sure, that THE TRUTH will most certainly be stranger than fiction and some people will always wonder: what does the darkness hold for us beyond the light?
Azahar Machwe
Bristol 1st October '05
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