From Field Notes to Theories to Heresies

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FROM FIELD NOTES TO THEORIES TO HERESIES

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TODAY'S QUOTE:

"The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking."

-- Albert Einstein, from "Physics and Reality" (1936).

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Thursday
May 31, 2007
The Darling Buds of May

Dear Pam,

Here are some thoughts which have passed through me since our phone conversation on Tuesday evening. Even though I'd planned only to leave a couple of two-minute messages in your voice mail box, I'm glad that you picked up and that we ended up talking for a half hour or whatever it turned out to be. Part of the serendipity of our inexplicable 40-year platonic bond of solidarity has been, for me, the equally inexplicable inspiration which sometimes flows my way from out of it when least expected.

"From field notes to theories to heresies" may be a thought-journey that exists only in my imagination. Still, it does exist there. But is it really a thought-journey as much as it is an evolutionary process that takes place in both real time and imagined time?

But what I'm describing here is a predominantly inductive process, while Einstein's thought-journey tended to be predominantly deductive. Using it, he was able, as we all know, to extract from Nature several bookloads of Principles containing as Promethean a fire as was ever brought down to our species. Can an analogously Promethean fire be extracted from Nature by the bookload of Principles pertaining to the stuff of Galen Green's field notes, the stuff of cultural anthropology? Perhaps not? Perhaps that is the "very much reality" to which T.S. Eliot was referring in "The Four Quartets" when he warned through the voice of "the bird" that humankind cannot bear it.

And yet, this principle still obtains:

NO TRUTH, NO JUSTICE. NOT JUSTICE, NO HAPPINESS.

-- as does this principle:

THE GREATEST GOOD FOR THE GREATEST NUMBER IS THE CLOSEST THING TO HAPPINESS WE DARE STRIVE FOR AS A SPECIES.

In today's title, however, I didn't mention "principles," but rather "theories." That's because I sensed (rightly or wrongly) that "theories" was a concept that would come across to my readers as less presumptuous than "principles." And yet, I chose to say the word "truth" in the body of my discourse, even though we've all heard it misused and otherwise appropriated by liars of every stripe since the world began.

Had I world enough and time, I'd get around to saying all that I mean to say. But I don't, so I shan't. Instead, I'm going to leave you with this cryptic piece of suggestion to encourage, affirm and perhaps even cheer you:

Revisit, when you find yourself with a minute or two now and then, the biblical books of Job & Psalms & Proverbs & Ecclesiastes. Based on the substance of our Tuesday evening conversation, I honestly believe that it might help more than you'd expect. All I'm suggesting is that you read it purely for pleasure; any wisdom to be found in this ancient "Wisdom Literature" of an essentially oppressed peoples is likely to seep right through to perform its healing function.

I imagine that it shocks -- and even disappoints -- both my supporters and critics to hear me recommending to anyone that they read any portion of The Bible. But we find ourselves living in an age which is repeating history because it never knew it in the first place. If patriotic peasants like you and I are to enjoy this ride, we'll need tools beyond the imagining of these sleepwalkers who oppress, revile and slander us. Tools such as:

ECCLESIASTES, PROVERBS, PSALMS & JOB,

&Galen


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