Actual Freedom – Selected Correspondence by Topic

12 July 1998

RICHARD: If you have something new and original to say that I have not heard about or read about or thought for myself ... then I will listen.

KONRAD: How about the infinite always being a finite concept, because it consists in every case of the pointing to a border, and a negation? (Look at your own proof of the infinity of the universe.)

RICHARD: That does not fall into the category of something new ... I was asked last year to prove the infinitude of the universe without resorting to that ancient Greek one of going to the border and throwing a spear into ... into what? You are asking a logical question and insisting on a logical answer. As all logic is based upon opposites, it is a ‘problem’ that logic cannot solve. What it goes to serve is to show that logic is limited.

The universe, being unlimited in both space and time, has no opposite. Thus the mind cannot conceptualise infinitude. It has to be lived to be known. One lives it by being here at this place in space and this moment in time as this flesh and blood body only. This is a direct experience of the actuality of infinity and eternity and beats that specious immortality so beloved by the metaphysicians hands down ... for the immediate is the ultimate and the relative is the absolute.

‘I’ can never know infinitude.

KONRAD: How about Olbers paradox? These two things just for starters.

RICHARD: Also not new. In fact, this ‘paradox’, which was discussed in 1823 by the German astronomer Mr. Heinrich Olbers and its discovery widely attributed to him, can be traced back to Mr. Johannes Kepler. Mr. Johannes Kepler, in 1610, advanced it as an argument against the notion of a limitless universe containing an infinite number of stars. The ‘paradox’ relates to the hypothetical problem of why the sky is dark at night. If the universe is endless and uniformly populated with luminous stars then, the proponents of this theory say, every line of sight must eventually terminate at the surface of a star. Hence this argument implies that, contrary to observation, the night sky should everywhere be bright, with no dark spaces between the stars. Various resolutions have been proposed at different times. If the assumptions are accepted, then the simplest resolution is that the average luminous lifetime of stars is far too short for light to have yet reached the Earth from very distant stars [according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica].

July 13 1998:

KONRAD: How about the infinite always being a finite concept, because it consists in every case of the pointing to a border, and a negation?

RICHARD: I was asked last year to prove the infinitude of the universe without resorting to that ancient Greek one of going to the border and throwing a spear into ... into what?

KONRAD: And did you? Where is the argument?

RICHARD: I told the person that that example was the same as the one I learned in high school: ‘what is at the edge of the universe ... a long brick wall? And when you lean on the wall and look over ... what are you looking into?’

*

RICHARD: You are asking a logical question and insisting on a logical answer. As all logic is based upon opposites, it is a ‘problem’ that logic cannot solve. What it goes to serve is to show that logic is limited.

KONRAD: From this I infer, that you either did not answer that fellow on the other mailing list, or you gave an illogical answer.

RICHARD: Not so. I pointed out that the spear throwing example and the looking over the wall example were not examples of the use of logic. They are exercises involving the use of the imaginative faculty of visualisation. I went on to explain that – contrary to popular opinion – infinitude does not just mean endless space and endless time. It means that the planet earth is situated nowhere in particular in space ... which means we are anywhere at all. Similarly, this moment is situated nowhere in particular in time and we are also ‘anywhen’ at all. This means that infinitude is everywhere and anywhere all at once. Thus, any place and any time is whatever one arbitrarily chooses to make it be.

An actual freedom is an enormous freedom.

KONRAD: Although thought is limited, logic, being the description of the laws of thought, is not.

RICHARD: Do you really mean that? Consider what you just wrote and see the obvious flaw in your reasoning.

KONRAD: This assertion is somewhat analogous to the statement, that although in every single case language expresses something finite, the totality of things that language can express is not finite.

RICHARD: Not necessarily so. For starters the single word ‘infinite’ does not express something finite.

KONRAD: In logic this is even more precise. There exists axiomatic systems in logic, containing an infinite number of axioms. These axioms are generated by something called: axiom schemes. These axiom schemes contain, as special cases, every tautology. This can be proved. And since every tautology is equivalent to a number of valid logical arguments, and there is no logical valid argument that is not equivalent to a tautology, this axiom scheme contains implicitly all valid logical arguments. So logic is not limited.

RICHARD: I find logic to be very limited. I can give a high school example: An arrow is shot at the target and takes two seconds to reach the bullseye. After it passes the half-way point, logically it starts to halve the remaining time taken ... a half a second to go ... a quarter of a second to go ... an eighth of a second to go ... a sixteenth of a second to go ... and so on and so on indefinitely. This is the classical example given to shown the infinity of fractions. Thus, logically, the arrow never reaches the target.

Now you know, and I know and everybody knows, that it does ... but logically it never does.

*

RICHARD: Infinitude does not just mean endless space and endless time. It means that the planet earth is situated nowhere in particular in space ... which means we are anywhere at all. Similarly, this moment is situated nowhere in particular in time and we are also ‘anywhen’ at all. This means that infinitude is everywhere and anywhere all at once. Thus, any place and any time is whatever one arbitrarily chooses to make it be.

KONRAD: Let me take a look whether I can make sense of this. Do you know what a hologram is? It is a piece of glass, that has recorded the interference patterns of waves from two light sources. The first is the monochromatic light that is coming directly from a laser. The second is the light that is coming from an object, that is hit with the same light. This is achieved by use of a mirror that lets half of the light go through it to the glass plate, and the other half is directed to the object, that is illuminated by it. The interesting thing is, that when this same monochromatic light falls on this glass plate, and you are also looking through this glass plate, you see the original object, even when it is removed. And you even see it in three dimensions. And if that is not enough, if you break the glass plate, and let the monochromatic light fall on just a piece of it, the whole image appears in just this fragment. So every fragment of the piece of glass contains the complete image! But even this is not all. You can move the object while recording the hologram. As long as you take care that the glass plate rotates while recording takes place, you can record even the movements! What you must do to see the movement of the object is letting the monochromatic light fall on the glass plate, and turn it with the exact speed at which it turned when recording took place. When you study this glass plate, containing a recording of the three dimensional image in ordinary light, the only thing visible on it are interference patterns. So you can say, that at every location of the glass plate the complete image is present. And not only that, you can even deduce, that the flow of time is present on this glass plate, but not as a flow of time, but as a moment containing the complete happenings of everything that happened, happens, and will happen. So if I understand you correctly, you say that the world is not the three-dimensional manifold + time we observe, but there is a deeper structure that causes everything we observe. And this deeper structure is analogous to this hologram, containing in every part of it the structure of the world how it was, is, and will be. And you assert, that in your state of actualism, you are able to observe this? This is more than remarkable. This is unbelievable!

RICHARD: It is unbelievable for I never meant all that at all. I simply meant that 1998 is an arbitrary date plucked out of nowhere for convenience. Also, when scientists state that the planet earth is in the bottom left-hand corner of the galaxy which is somewhere to the top left-hand side of the universe (or wherever) I seriously question their intelligence. We are, as I wrote above, nowhere and ‘nowhen’ in particular ... which is to be anywhere or ‘anywhen’ at all. Infinitude is all over the place and nowhere in particular. It defies logic ... and it is an enormous freedom to live this boundless awareness of being the universe experiencing itself as a sensate reflective human being.

KONRAD: Let me go on with my version of small-talk. There is a simple logical definition of the infinite, and it uses very simple finite concepts. Let me give a simple example from the theory of sets. Suppose I consider the set of all integers, all natural numbers. {1, 2, 3, ... }. And I consider the set of all integers dividable by 2. {2, 4, 6, 8, ... } Now I can form a so – called 1 – 1 correspondence, like this. 1 < – > 2 ... 2 < – > 4 ... 3 < – > 6 ... 4 < – > 8 ... Now I can see, that with every even number there corresponds an integer, and vice versa. I can also express this as follows: I am counting the even numbers. The important point is, that I understand, from this correspondence, that every even number corresponds with every natural number. This is the infinite logical way of expressing it. Or, to say it in a logically equivalent way, there is no even number that does not correspond with a natural number. This is the finite, but logically equivalent way of expressing it. Both facts can also be expressed by simply saying, that the set of even numbers has exactly the same size as the set of natural numbers. So we have two facts. Obviously the set of even numbers is a real subset of the set of natural numbers. With this I mean, that every element of the set of even numbers is present in the set of natural numbers. But on the other hand the set of natural numbers contains elements that cannot be found in the set of even numbers. Still, both sets are, in spite of the fact that they are both infinite, seen to be equally large, for they contain exactly the same number of elements. If you were able to count infinitely long, and you were finished, you can say that you have counted every element of the set, without missing one. This is seen to be true, in spite of the fact that you also see, that such an action cannot be performed in practice. The conclusion of equal size follows from the observation, that every even number corresponds with a natural number and vice versa. These last insights have made some mathematicians define infinite sets by this characteristic. Infinite sets distinguish themselves from finite sets because every infinite set and only infinite sets have real subsets that have the same size as the set they are a subset of. So in general an infinite set is defined as a set containing a real subset of the same size as the set it is a subset of.

RICHARD: I do understand basic mathematical logic ... but what has this got to do with the infinitude of the physical universe? Look, you tell me that before the ‘big bang’ there was nothing, and that past the edge of the ‘expanding universe’ there is nothing, right? Now – since you are a self-confessed worshipper of logic – I will posit to you a similar question by rephrasing the one you posed to me: How about this ‘nothing’ always being only a logical concept, because it consists in every case of the pointing to a border, and then a negation? In other words, you cannot say that ‘nothing’ is unless ‘something’ is first.

Therefore, ‘something’ is what is primary, not ‘nothing’ ... as eastern metaphysics would have us believe. Eventually you will abandon logic – and intuition – and actually be here at this moment in eternal time and this place in infinite space for the very first time.

*

RICHARD: The universe, being unlimited in both space and time, has no opposite. Thus the mind cannot conceptualise infinitude. It has to be lived to be known. One lives it by being here at this place in space and this moment in time as this flesh and blood body only. This is a direct experience of the actuality of infinity and eternity and beats that specious immortality so beloved by the metaphysicians hands down ... for the immediate is the ultimate and the relative is the absolute. ‘I’ can never know infinitude.

KONRAD: Well, don’t you think I did a pretty good job in my example of the infinite set of natural and even numbers?

RICHARD: Being honest with you ... no. It was a valiant – but ultimately futile – attempt to contain the physical universe in an abstract equation.

*

KONRAD: How about Olbers paradox?

RICHARD: Also not new. In fact, this ‘paradox’, which was discussed in 1823 by the German astronomer Mr. Heinrich Olbers and its discovery widely attributed to him, can be traced back to Mr. Johannes Kepler. Mr. Johannes Kepler, in 1610, advanced it as an argument against the notion of a limitless universe containing an infinite number of stars. The ‘paradox’ relates to the hypothetical problem of why the sky is dark at night. If the universe is endless and uniformly populated with luminous stars then, the proponents of this theory say, every line of sight must eventually terminate at the surface of a star. Hence this argument implies that, contrary to observation, the night sky should everywhere be bright, with no dark spaces between the stars. Various resolutions have been proposed at different times. If the assumptions are accepted, then the simplest resolution is that the average luminous lifetime of stars is far too short for light to have yet reached the Earth from very distant stars [according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica].

KONRAD: This last thing is in contradiction with the infinite duration of the universe. For no matter how brief the lifespan of the star is, whenever it exists, it radiates light. Suppose, as you say, that the light of the stars that are present far away has not reached us. And suppose the radiation reaches us only when these stars are already long gone. Then there have to have been stars before this period. No matter how far away the space is, we consider, if we go far enough back in time, there have to have been stars then, whose light reaches us now. These stars are gone, but this does not prevent their light to reach us, and to accumulate in the way I have calculated. So if your argument is valid, the universe is not infinite in time. In other words, even if the lifetime of stars is far too short for light to have yet reached the earth for the very distant ones, the space contained stars before that period containing stars that radiate light that DID reach us. Therefore the simple mathematical argument I have put forward is only refuted if you assume that there has been a period in the past wherein there were no stars whatsoever. But this contradicts the homogeneity and isotropy of the universe in time. And therefore its infinity in time. By reformulating my argument into another one supposed to be equivalent, and then refuting that one, you have not refuted the original argument, but only a straw man.

RICHARD: I beg to differ ... I did not reformulate your argument at all. If you look at your question above you will see that you asked: ‘how about the Olbers paradox’? That is all you put forward ... so where do you get off with this ‘straw man’ business?

KONRAD: You have guts, Richard, to have tried this one. That I must say. This is also, why I like you so much, in spite of our differences.

RICHARD: Oh, there is plenty more where that came from ... if there are infinite stars – and therefore infinite light – there is also infinite space – and therefore infinite dark – which means that one argument cancels the other out. Which is probably why the night sky looks as it does – a nice balance – and a rather pretty display at that. But, so much for logic, eh?

All this while that humans having been attempting to understand the universe logically and intuitively, the universe has been doing its own thing, irregardless of what human think or feel. What one can do, though, is be here at this place in space and this moment in time as this flesh and blood body only and then the universe will be experiencing itself as a sensate reflective human being. This is to experience infinitude as an actuality, rather than thinking out its character or feeling out its nature.

August 01 1998:

RICHARD: If there are infinite stars – and therefore infinite light – there is also infinite space – and therefore infinite dark – which means that one argument cancels the other out. Which is probably why the night sky looks as it does – a nice balance – and a rather pretty display at that.

KONRAD: Well, well. Your resources to find new arguments is apparently another infinity in you. Now, what is wrong with this argument? To begin with, darkness is the absence of light. So, again, no matter how diluted the universe is, the old mathematical argument of the intensity diminishing with the square of the distance, and the number of stars increasing with the third power applies here, too. The light cannot be absorbed by the darkness in such a way, that it disappears. This is because of the law of conservation of energy. All energy that is radiated by the stars must remain somewhere. This argument is now refuted. I am very curious about what you will come up with next.

RICHARD: I am not going to have to come up with anything next as the obvious flaw in your logic above lies in your basic premise. To wit: ‘darkness is the absence of light’. Who says so? We could just as easily say that ‘light is the absence of dark’. If you wish to prove something logically you have to posit an initial fact upon which to build your case and I, for one, cannot buy such a spurious assumption that ‘dark is the absence of light’ as being an established absolute.

Have you heard of the ‘Dark Sucker Hypothesis’?

For years the electrical utility companies have led the public to believe they were in business to supply electricity to the consumer, a service for which they charge a substantial rate. The recent accidental acquisition of secret records from a well known power company has led to a massive research campaign which positively explodes several myths and exposes the massive hoax which has been perpetrated upon the public by the power companies.

The most common hoax promoted the false concept that light bulbs emitted light; in actuality, these ‘light’ bulbs actually absorb dark which is then transported back to the power generation stations via wire networks. A more descriptive name has now been coined; the new scientific name for the device is ‘Dark Sucker’.

This is a brief synopsis of the dark sucker theory, which proves the existence of dark and establishes the fact that dark has great mass, and further, that dark particle (the anti-photon) is the fastest known particle in the universe. Apparently, even the celebrated Dr. Albert Einstein did not suspect the truth that just as cold is the absence of heat, then light is actually the absence of dark. Scientists have now proven that light does not really exist.

The basis of the dark sucker theory is that electric light bulbs suck dark. Take for example, the dark suckers in the room where you are right now. There is much less dark right next to the dark suckers than there is elsewhere, demonstrating their limited range. The larger the dark sucker, the greater its capacity to suck dark. Dark suckers in a parking lot or on a football field have a much greater capacity than the ones in used in the home, for example.

It may come as a surprise to learn that dark suckers also operate on a celestial scale; witness the Sun. Our Sun makes use of dense dark, sucking it in from all the planets and intervening dark space. Naturally, the Sun is better able to suck dark from the planets which are situated closer to it, thus explaining why those planets appear brighter than do those which are far distant from the Sun. Occasionally, the Sun actually over-sucks; under those conditions, dark spots appear on the surface of the Sun. Scientists have long studied these ‘spots’ and are only recently beginning to realise that the dark spots represent leaks of high pressure dark because the Sun has over-sucked dark to such an extent that some dark actually leaks back into space. This leakage of high pressure dark frequently causes problems with radio communications here on Earth due to collisions between the dark particles as they stream out into space at high velocity via the black holes in the surface of the Sun.

As with all man-made devices, dark suckers have a finite lifetime caused by the fact that they are not 100% efficient at transmitting collected dark back to the power company via the wires from your home, causing dark to build up slowly within the device. Once they are full of accumulated dark, they can no longer suck. This condition can be observed by looking for the black spot on a full dark sucker when it has reached maximum capacity of un-transmitted dark ... you have surely noticed that dark completely surrounds a full dark sucker because it no longer has the capacity to suck any dark at all.

A candle is a primitive dark sucker. A new candle has a white wick. You will notice that after the first use the wick turns black, representing all the dark which has been sucked into it. If you hold a pencil next to the wick of an operating candle, the tip will turn black because it got in the way of the dark flowing into the candle. And it is of no use to plug a candle into an electrical outlet; it can only collect dark ... being primitive it has no transmission capabilities. Unfortunately, these original dark suckers have a very limited range and are hazardous to operate because of the intense heat produced.

There are also portable dark suckers called flashlights. The bulbs in these devices collect dark which is passed to a dark storage unit called a battery. When the dark storage unit is full, it must be either emptied (a process called ‘recharging’) or replaced before the portable dark sucker can continue to operate. If you break open a battery, you will find dense black dark inside, evidence that it is actually a compact dark storage unit.

Over to you, Konrad.

August 06 1998:

RICHARD: If there are infinite stars – and therefore infinite light – there is also infinite space – and therefore infinite dark – which means that one argument cancels the other out. Which is probably why the night sky looks as it does – a nice balance – and a rather pretty display at that.

KONRAD: Well, well. Your resources to find new arguments is apparently another infinity in you. Now, what is wrong with this argument? To begin with, darkness is the absence of light. So, again, no matter how diluted the universe is, the old mathematical argument of the intensity diminishing with the square of the distance, and the number of stars increasing with the third power applies here, too. The light cannot be absorbed by the darkness in such a way, that it disappears. This is because of the law of conservation of energy. All energy that is radiated by the stars must remain somewhere. This argument is now refuted. I am very curious about what you will come up with next.

RICHARD: I am not going to have to come up with anything next as the obvious flaw in your logic above lies in your basic premise. To wit: ‘darkness is the absence of light’. Who says so? We could just as easily say that ‘light is the absence of dark’. If you wish to prove something logically you have to posit an initial fact upon which to build your case and I, for one, cannot buy such a spurious assumption that ‘dark is the absence of light’ as being an established absolute. < dark sucker hypothesis joke snipped > Over to you, Konrad.

KONRAD: What kind of sucker do you take me for? A dark sucker?

RICHARD: Only if you continue to believe in the ‘Olbers Paradox’ as being proof that this universe is finite. This is what logic does to you ... everything becomes conceptual. I am waiting for your logic to deal with the ‘infinite light’ versus ‘infinite dark’ actuality ... rather than duck-shove it into the ‘too hard’ department. Have we established that dark is something more than the mere ‘absence of light’ or not? Has it an actuality all of its own? For if you see that it has, as I wrote before, when you see that infinity and eternity are as actual as your toothache then life will become all of a sudden so much sweeter that you may very well pass out from the shock of so much pleasure rippling throughout this flesh and blood body.

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