"When we contemplate the whole globe as one great dewdrop, striped and dotted with continents and islands, flying through space with other stars all singing and shining together as one, the whole universe appears as an infinite storm of beauty." –J. Muir
I used to comprehend my awe of the world, appreciation of beauty, and wonderment of life through the framework of faith, of religion, and at the very least, of some higher, magnanimous being. Yet the more I read Dennett, the more I am coming to understand that the world can be viewed as beautiful, miraculous, awe-inspiring – in it of itself. In fact, the removal of an omnipotent god makes the existence of life that much more incredibly astounding. How have we come to see, to hear, to think, to experience the world – to interact with the world, to try to understand the world? These are amazing feats. These are results (unintentional results, mind you) of nature as a designer – or to reduce potential personification, of mathematics as a designer. Engineered biology. Mathematics does not merely transcend language, it transcends existence. This viewpoint actually seems to make life less complicated by removing any façade of higher meaning or purpose. Suddenly we are just here. Our worries, fears, frustrations: meaningless. It is as George Eliot wrote: "What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other?" Perhaps that is all we really need to do in life: be kind to one another.
Another concept that has recently caught my attention is the idea of tensegrity. I came across it initially in the context of biology (cf. “Tensegrity II. How structural networks influence cellular information processing networks” by Donald Ingber), but soon traced its roots back to architecture and design. In fact, Ingber was a Yale undergraduate who happened to take a sculpture class and found interesting parallels with Kenneth Snelson’s sculptures and his cancer cell cultures. Ah yes, the hidden benefits of a well-rounded education. Beautifully compelling, both as an art form and as a scientific theory.