Chaos In The Eye Of God from hairylarry's blog
by Larry Heyl
"For a while there the universe was clockwork. All cause and effect. Every action had an equal and opposite reaction."
Dr. Shengwei was lecturing his class. Physics 101. He hadn't started in on the math yet.
"But the more we tried to describe the more complicated the descriptions became. The systems outpaced our equations. We could no longer make valid predictions. Since we saw chaos we described it as chaos. Chaos Theory became the new thing. But it was more of an excuse for why our predictions were failing than a way to make predictions."
"Is the universe clockwork and completely predictable? Or is it a chaotic mess with no prediction possible? Or is it both? 'It can't be both!' you say. But we are looking through the eyes of man. Maybe the human mind is the limitation here. Maybe in the eye of God chaos is simple."
He could tell he was starting to lose them. He could see the big question forming behind their eyes. What does God have to do with physics? They were expecting math but they were getting theology. Einstein said, "God does not play dice with the universe". The students were getting anxious. Uncomfortable. He would have to start on the math soon. Then they would wish he was still talking about God.
"Godel proved that in any formal system complex enough to describe itself, even systems as simple as axiomatic algebra, There would be statements that can't be proven or disproven and statements that hadn't yet been proven or disproven. Godel also showed that there was no way to distinguish between the two. Only God would know whether a statement that hadn't been proven could be proved or not. At least until a man or woman could prove or disprove it."
Dr Shengwei turned to the board and started in on the math. When he looked out at the class the uncertaintly and anxiety was gone. This was what they had been expecting. Now the uncertainty and anxiety was replaced with confusion.
"For a while there the universe was clockwork. All cause and effect. Every action had an equal and opposite reaction."
Dr. Shengwei was lecturing his class. Physics 101. He hadn't started in on the math yet.
"But the more we tried to describe the more complicated the descriptions became. The systems outpaced our equations. We could no longer make valid predictions. Since we saw chaos we described it as chaos. Chaos Theory became the new thing. But it was more of an excuse for why our predictions were failing than a way to make predictions."
"Is the universe clockwork and completely predictable? Or is it a chaotic mess with no prediction possible? Or is it both? 'It can't be both!' you say. But we are looking through the eyes of man. Maybe the human mind is the limitation here. Maybe in the eye of God chaos is simple."
He could tell he was starting to lose them. He could see the big question forming behind their eyes. What does God have to do with physics? They were expecting math but they were getting theology. Einstein said, "God does not play dice with the universe". The students were getting anxious. Uncomfortable. He would have to start on the math soon. Then they would wish he was still talking about God.
"Godel proved that in any formal system complex enough to describe itself, even systems as simple as axiomatic algebra, There would be statements that can't be proven or disproven and statements that hadn't yet been proven or disproven. Godel also showed that there was no way to distinguish between the two. Only God would know whether a statement that hadn't been proven could be proved or not. At least until a man or woman could prove or disprove it."
Dr Shengwei turned to the board and started in on the math. When he looked out at the class the uncertaintly and anxiety was gone. This was what they had been expecting. Now the uncertainty and anxiety was replaced with confusion.
Behind every pair of eyes there was a chaotic system known as a human brain. Was the human brain essentially chaotic or was it only chaotic as perceived by the human brain? In the eye of God even the human brain is simple.
---
Originally published at SFF Short Stories
sffshortstories.com/?x=entry:entry190109-101203
I just turned this into a Mini Zine.
Links
Groups
The Wall