WIS: Circle
The Paid Newsletter, with a Full Segment Available for Everyone!
Hello everyone! Welcome to this edition of Written In Stone [WIS] - the newsletter normally written entirely for paid Members. However, over the past few weeks I have been making the opening segment available to everyone, in its entirety, and since the feedback I have received has been positive? We’re going to keep doing it, at least for the time being. Again, the entire segment will be available, no pay-wall mid-article.
It always annoys me when that happens.
Sent and posted every week, WIS is a free-flow of candid thoughts and raw ideas, with very little filter, and it has become my primary Substack publication. So…
If you’re not already a paid member, join us! It is only $30 a year (or $5 a month on the monthly) to support my work, and you get this nifty newsletter every week!
Yep - this is 52 issues a year! Neat, eh? So join me today!
Enjoy this free segment, available for all readers…
Prime Cut: The Circle
On June 8th, 2024 I posted The Page of *P, which is a (literal and metaphorical) page from my - still upcoming - book. That page opens with this…
The entirety of the All - in every form and on every level - is without beginning and end. As the perfect circle is eternal so too is the bursting cycle of creation and re-creation; it ignites, it creates, it expands, it retracts, it collapses, it ignites... timeless and flawless and relentless.
With that noted? Enter ‘science’…
Physicists Predict When The Universe Will End in a Reverse Big Bang
Science Alert
Calling it a “Big Crunch’, they are getting closer to my thought processes…
If recent discoveries that dark energy is evolving hold any water, our Universe will collapse under its own gravity on a finite timeline, new calculations suggest.
Based on several recent dark energy results, a new model finds that the Universe has a lifespan of just 33.3 billion years. Since we are now 13.8 billion years after the Big Bang, this suggests that we have a smidge less than 20 billion years left.
So close… but not quite there yet.
First of all, let me be clear on one thing: I have never been a proponent of the ‘Big Bang Theory’ (I mean the hypothesis, not the comedic TV show). Now, my rigid skepticism was never based on specific religious or spiritual assertions about how everything began, but on active-minded thought.
Simply put, it did not - and does not - make sense to me.
To be fair, I am not any kind of ‘scientist’, nor do grasp the ins-and-outs of all the crafty word-salads they serve to explain their theories. It has been my experience, however, that if an idea cannot be explained for a person with a basic-yet-sound intellect to grasp, it is oft not even worth the time it took to conjure up in the first place.
And there are far too many holes in the ‘Bang’ for me to embrace it. Consider this: they claim that a piping-hot ‘singularity’ somehow appeared (no one explains, in any cogent manner, exactly how that occurred), then magically - with no known catalyst, for no particular reason whatsoever - ’banged’ and started expanding. As is did so, it fired up all of creation as we know, and will keep expanding forever and ever.
And people say those ‘of faith’ have whacky ideas? ‘Science’ comes up with some hard-core doozies as well.
Then we also have the Law of Conservation of Energy, which is basically, “Energy cannot be created nor destroyed, merely transformed.” If this is true (and it IS a universally accepted axiom), then - under the “bang’ paradigm - all the energy in the entirety of existence was released in that moment, then expanded outward.
So how can the universe keep expanding - again, for infinity - if energy cannot be created to fill those new spaces being created? Eventually, you are going to run out of energy, which makes it impossible for ‘eternal’ expansion to continue.
See my point? Again, I am no scientist (and I am sure they have very creative - if mind-numbing - explanations), but if it does not make sense?
It. Does. Not. Make. Sense. Call me whatever derisive names you want, it matters not, but if a theory is to be considered an ‘absolute’? An individual of reasonable intelligence and inquisitive mind should be able to at least understand the basics.
So, this latest study opens broad possibilities. They are now (at least) suggesting it is possible that the universe WILL reach a point of unquestionable ‘return,’ and eventually start collapsing upon itself. Where I think they get it wrong, however, is in the notion that everything will just ‘end’ in a ‘Big Crunch’.
Now, let’s revisit a snippet from what I quoted above…
As the perfect circle is eternal so too is the bursting cycle of creation and re-creation; it ignites, it creates, it expands, it retracts, it collapses, it ignites... timeless and flawless and relentless.
While I came up with the concept on my own many years ago, I eventually learned it already been explored, and had name: “The Big Bounce”. In this theory, The All expands as far as it can go, then - like a rubber-band once its tension-capacity has been maxed out - snaps back, collapsing upon itself.
In my own interpretation, once the universe reaches that end point of tension the entire thing will begin a quick (relatively speaking) yet cataclysmic retraction. As it continues, all the energy (which exists in all of existence) will continue to gain speed, until the collapse in final.
And all that energy, coming together in a violent collision, ignites an explosion… a ‘bang’ if you will. And the creative process begins anew. Again.
Under this paradigm there was no beginning, and there will be no end - just one cycle after another, each being one of creation, expansion, and retraction. And to further my hypothesis, no energy is created or destroyed with the ‘Bounce’ - it is transformed, in the most intense way imaginable.*
“Law of Conservation of Energy”? Covered.
And that makes sense to me.
And if you are thinking I am crazy, asking yourself, “How is this even possible?” The answer has already been provided, right in front of us, and is found in our most basic of geometric shapes.
A circle.
Indeed, with a perfectly-created circle it is impossible to determine its beginning, or its end. It is constant, one cycle after another. You can study it, meditate over it, trace it, pray about it, even hook it up into a computer… does not matter, you will never be able to discover its starting point.
It is - in a very literal, tangible sense - eternal. As is The All.
I know this is a little outside my usual fare, but how frequently do I get a ‘science’ story into which I can really sink my teeth? As such I wanted to share my thoughts, because I find it exciting. While I do think scientists may be starting to get tired of the rigidity of the field, and ready to reexamine theories of old, it is clear they still have a ways to go before accepting the ‘Bounce’ as fully plausible.
But at least they are willing to use active minds, and question the ‘settled science’. Considering how dogmatic that community has become, the fact they are finally ‘questioning’… anything? It is very encouraging, indeed.
What a great time to be alive…
Thank you for reading this free segment of Written In Stone; I hope you enjoyed it.
Asterisks…
*This theory - as I initially formulated, and later interpreted, it - does not attempt to cancel the existence of a ‘Creator’, nor does it obliterate the ‘Bang’ - after all, under the ‘Bounce’ paradigm, there is STILL a pretty righteous ‘bang’. It just fills obvious holes in the latter theory, while acknowledging it is possible there could be a higher power at work.
No one’s proverbial ‘sacred cows’ get skewered, and we might - MIGHT - be on the cusp of an amazing discovery.
As I said, a great time…
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