Infinite Realities iv - Conceiving the Infinite
November 19th 2007 10:18
What is an infinite reality?
When we look around we realise we normally deal with finite realities. We pick-up a stone and it has certain dimensions which you can measure without any difficulty. The other side of that stone is that it’s a finite reality: it has a certain, delimited mass and that’s it.
But when you look into the sky on a clear day or night, would you see the expanse before you as finite, like the stone above? Probably not. If we ask ourselves how far does the sky above goes we will probably answer ‘forever’. The problem then is to conceive this ‘forever’.
We have trouble thinking of infinite realities and I think that is mostly because we have a practical, finite thinking type of mind. If we pick up another stone of the kind above we will have two of them while before we had one. This we can think of easily.
Our minds work on the principle of positive and negative, yes and no, black and white and so on. With these concepts we play and make mathematical operations. It would be easy to think that, because the idea of infinite is something we cannot a priori conceive, something that does not belong into any positive and negative pairing, we cannot also operate on it.
But let’s look into the clear sky again.
If you had the means to travel unlimitedly through space and you sent you ship to the known edge of the Universe, assuming that this is infinite in size, what would you find there? If you stopped to watch, you, I imagine, would find another as much space to travel through. If you made another travelling, what do you think you would see? Probably the same, and probably that would go on forever. At least, that’s as I conceive the Universe.
In other words, we would not be copping with the sight or knowledge of the entire Universe as an infinite reality, but would be ok with portions of it taken one by one.
Conceivably, if our space ship keeps going on, we keep adding to the known dimension of the Universe. That is, what we cannot conceive in total we can conceive in piecemeal. Infinity then becomes a question of keep going forward forever, which is something that may transcend us.
Does this mean that an infinite reality could be a collection of finite realities? Or, better even, that a sum of finite realities that can be extended forever, is an infinite reality?
To express this in a formula, the size of an infinite reality such as the Universe could be expressed this way: (A B C) x N being A, B and C the portions of the infinite we can picture and N a factor to express its infiniteness. So, A, B and C added together and multiplied by the infinite factor N would express an infinite reality. Obviously, the more piecemeal elements of your observation of the infinite reality that you can add to the formula, the more accurate it would be. So, (A B C D) x N is more accurate than the prior formula.
In a way, it could be said that the infinite is a question of the number of observations we can make. Whether we zoom out into planetary space or wether we zoom into the atomic world, the question certainly is how far can these realities go, but is also how much can we observe of them.
In the space ship above, wherever its crew goes new observations could be made and our knowledge of the dimension of the Universe would increase. The question then would be: how many more observations could be made? I think the number of possible observations would just always match the space ship crew intrepidness and we would just keep adding more items of increasing precision to our formula.
So, we could conceive an infinite reality such as the Universe, as an infinite succession of finite realities allowing for an increased knowledge of the Universe’s extent, or just as a reality which allows for an infinite number of observations.
When we look around we realise we normally deal with finite realities. We pick-up a stone and it has certain dimensions which you can measure without any difficulty. The other side of that stone is that it’s a finite reality: it has a certain, delimited mass and that’s it.
But when you look into the sky on a clear day or night, would you see the expanse before you as finite, like the stone above? Probably not. If we ask ourselves how far does the sky above goes we will probably answer ‘forever’. The problem then is to conceive this ‘forever’.
We have trouble thinking of infinite realities and I think that is mostly because we have a practical, finite thinking type of mind. If we pick up another stone of the kind above we will have two of them while before we had one. This we can think of easily.
Our minds work on the principle of positive and negative, yes and no, black and white and so on. With these concepts we play and make mathematical operations. It would be easy to think that, because the idea of infinite is something we cannot a priori conceive, something that does not belong into any positive and negative pairing, we cannot also operate on it.
But let’s look into the clear sky again.
If you had the means to travel unlimitedly through space and you sent you ship to the known edge of the Universe, assuming that this is infinite in size, what would you find there? If you stopped to watch, you, I imagine, would find another as much space to travel through. If you made another travelling, what do you think you would see? Probably the same, and probably that would go on forever. At least, that’s as I conceive the Universe.
In other words, we would not be copping with the sight or knowledge of the entire Universe as an infinite reality, but would be ok with portions of it taken one by one.
Conceivably, if our space ship keeps going on, we keep adding to the known dimension of the Universe. That is, what we cannot conceive in total we can conceive in piecemeal. Infinity then becomes a question of keep going forward forever, which is something that may transcend us.
Does this mean that an infinite reality could be a collection of finite realities? Or, better even, that a sum of finite realities that can be extended forever, is an infinite reality?
To express this in a formula, the size of an infinite reality such as the Universe could be expressed this way: (A B C) x N being A, B and C the portions of the infinite we can picture and N a factor to express its infiniteness. So, A, B and C added together and multiplied by the infinite factor N would express an infinite reality. Obviously, the more piecemeal elements of your observation of the infinite reality that you can add to the formula, the more accurate it would be. So, (A B C D) x N is more accurate than the prior formula.
In a way, it could be said that the infinite is a question of the number of observations we can make. Whether we zoom out into planetary space or wether we zoom into the atomic world, the question certainly is how far can these realities go, but is also how much can we observe of them.
In the space ship above, wherever its crew goes new observations could be made and our knowledge of the dimension of the Universe would increase. The question then would be: how many more observations could be made? I think the number of possible observations would just always match the space ship crew intrepidness and we would just keep adding more items of increasing precision to our formula.
So, we could conceive an infinite reality such as the Universe, as an infinite succession of finite realities allowing for an increased knowledge of the Universe’s extent, or just as a reality which allows for an infinite number of observations.
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