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“The conception of objective reality has thus evaporated…into the transparent clarity of mathematics.”– Werner Heisenberg
No absolute reality. No objective truth.
Your reality is yours to create, your truth is yours to prefer. Gone are the days of stifling dogma and righteous rules. Everything is relative now, it depends on perspective and choice. This educated and broad-minded philosophy of relativism underpins the functioning of our post-modern world. For the ardent activists for relativism, such choice is a hallmark of freedom. Freedom of thought and of expression. Freedom of world views. You can think whatever you like, be whatever you want to be, as long as it makes you comfortable, serves you well, and hurts no one. Sounds so lofty and benevolent! Why not? If you can make educated, reasonable claims about it, it’s true.
So everything is true then, and nothing is. Religion or atheism, Christianity or Islam, Communism or Capitalism, Democracy or Theocracy. Every man fights for the validity of his ‘rational choice’, atheists prove god does not exist, while religious apologists try to prove ‘he’ does. Zealots fight for the supremacy of their god over others’, sects fight over their more authentic prophets. Capitalists abhor communists, democratic countries deride theocratic states. Religions, culture, values, world views, philosophies, political ideologies – all causes of conflict. Everything you prefer is true if you can prove it, and disprove something you would rather not have, with an educated sounding argument.
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The problem with this benevolent philosophy of relative truths is multi fold. First, rationality and reason are themselves suspicious measurements of truth. A single phenomena can be framed in more than one rational framework and be entirely convincing in all. Second, reality appears relative because one can create many APPROXIMATIONS of truth , in the absence of deepest fundamentals .
Same phenomenon : Many laws & Many meanings
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Nothing about our world escapes the fuzziness of relativity, not even hard, solid sciences. Physics has proved this dilemma to be murkier than any other science, and if the frontier guards of human intelligence say this, you must take notice.
Remember the simplest problems of our school level physics, where we had to calculate the final position of an object, given its initial position, its speed and time traveled? The most basic Newtonian equations; what could be contentious about that?
It turns out the same problem can be framed in a different paradigm of tiny, sub-atomic particles, to arrive at the same answer. So, what is the dilemma then? You will see.
Even Quantum mechanics can explain how an object moves from an initial to the final position, but from a very different point of view. So where Newton assumes that an object will always travel in a straight line, QM says there could be many probabilities for an object to take many paths of travel. That it ends up travelling in a straight line is a matter of the highest probability. The straight-line path will have the highest probability because it requires the least energy.
Do you see the troubling dichotomy of meaning here? Newton’s ideas assume that the world is deterministic, while QM says the world is non-deterministic. Same phenomena, different frameworks, polarising implications.
So is our world a determined one or not ?
Both frameworks are logical, rational. So are both true?
Both are true according to physics. Or are they?
Both APPEAR true, at their relevant scales. Even if one is more fundamental than the other. Quantum Mechanics, the physics of sub-atomic particles can apply to the human scale,while Newtonian mechanics cannot translate to the smaller,sub-atomic scales. QM is fundamental, while Newtonian mechanics emerges from it. So there are emergent laws and more fundamental ones, all consistent at their scales .
Yet , even the known fundamentals might just APPEAR true. There could be more. There has to be.
Approximations of the Truth
This chart below illustrates the three broad categories of object sizes in the universe, along with the relevant mechanics that apply.
Now there are different laws in consistent operation at these three differing scales of our universe. Einstein’s Relativity mechanics applies to black holes and light speeds, Newton’s Classical mechanics applies to our cars, rockets and stones, while Quantum mechanics applies to the world of electrons and quarks. Each set of laws is different, well defined and consistent at its relevant scale. Does this mean that our universe is, relative and truth depends on perspective? No, not so.
Each one is valid, but each is an APPROXIMATION of some deeper mechanics at play. That is why physicists are hunting, untiringly, for a ‘Theory of everything ‘, a ‘Grand Unified Theory’, one that can unify the mechanics on all scales. There is no doubt about its existence even if this theory is still out of grasp. Also, as the times show, it might not be revealed with our current physics. The two strongest contenders, String theory and Loop Quantum Gravity are hazy theories at best, not very satisfying.
Despite the hazy theories, one thing is certain. There are unknown fundamentals, deeper than what is already known. So what is known, I repeat, is some APPROXIMATE description of the truth. And approximation is not truth.
Hence, this relativity is a workable, functional approximation, at the relevant scales.
Like all relativity in life must be too.
There is something deeper, more accurate, more unifying. There has to be.
Can’t trust reason : Appearances could be deceptive
So space- time consistently follows Newton’s laws, but there is more to it than that. Newton’s physics is compelling in its rationality, but it is incidental , emerging from deeper fundamentals . It does not reflect the complete truth. In fact to take matters deeper still, our 3-D space-time is a holographic projection of information from a 2-D surface. It is actually a consistent, law abiding illusion.
So then, a compelling truth might just be an illusion. Rationality and reason non-withstanding.
To put it plainly, most frameworks of reality have been CONJURED up from what seems reasonable to our senses. Physicists too conjured up one system of laws, only to realise there could be another.
The reason I make this argument is to question the infallibility of reason and rationality as the only measurement of reality, of truth.
Also, we harbour sincere, righteous beliefs about being rational people, but such rationality may be a matter of preference. Culture, time, economics, religion influence our reason more than we would like to believe. There was a time when slavery was reasonable, as was the condition of women to be non-voting secondary citizens . Not very long ago , the church had valid reason to rule over science, didn’t it? In some cultures punishing children physically is still a normal part of childhood while in others it can cause troubles with law. In some parts of the world an abhorrent practice like female genital mutilation is a rite of passage still. Marrying out of cast is dilution of genetic purity, a woman covered from head to toe is the sign of the natural order of the world, a polygamous relationship is a key to balance.
The proponents of many of these weird ideas, to you and me, make forceful arguments to support their case! Tradition morphs into reason, many times, while we are unaware.
Established science has ultimate authority over knowledge . Yes, even that . Maybe this idea and many others harboured by the progressives our world could be abhorrent to a more progressive alien civilisation. Who knows.
Hence, not only is rationality an incomplete measure of truth, we might be fooling ourselves about being rational. Then, we cannot trust choices which arise from reason. We might be deceiving ourselves, with our own logic or another’s we endorse. About trivial matters or of life’s profound questions. About meaning, purpose, culture, religion and even about God.
In effect then, my religion vs yours, my culture vs yours, my lifestyle vs yours or my world views vs yours might be useless debates. Not righteous and well-deserved, but a colossal waste of time and thought.
Beyond relativism and rationality : The need for deeper fundamentals
Research is on to unearth the ‘Theory of everything’, a set of physical laws which will explain phenomena at all levels. The most basic, most fundamental framework. There has to be an objective world ground, a solid foundation to explain all other systems, laws, ideas.
So why can’t there be an objective paradigm for human existence? For our lives? When the relativism of religion, culture, lifestyles, Gods, choices, might be false and illusory? When rationality is not enough to understand truth?
So am I then endorsing a dogmatic set of rules to get rid of relativism? No way. Relativism is a definite, welcome step-up over the numbing freeze of dogma. We have been judicious to leave the ignorance of dogmatic religion, culture and world views behind us. However, what we now need is a step up from relativism itself.
Relativism is a better position overall, but it cannot be an ULTIMATE position. It creates chaos, which will rise to unimaginable levels, if encouraged further. Chaos is a natural outcome of relativism, but then, as you see, relativism itself is unnatural.
This suggestion might sound like sacrilege in a world obsessed with celebrating diversity and plurality, but don’t you see relativism arises from ignorance? From ignorance of deeper truths?
Come to think of it, if relativism was organic, would it be producing such immense conflict in every aspect of our lives, from the trivial to the profound? No. The unending plurality of cultures, religions, political ideologies, lifestyles only induce tension and war of all conceivable scales. A lot of time is being spent in the modern world managing and balancing the effects of relativism, time which could be spent productively elsewhere. It’s an unfortunate double whammy that this management often fails.
So you see, relativism feels ideologically comforting,but it is counterproductive overall. There has to be something more, a step up from it.
There has be a consistent theory of life, the same for everyone. The most fundamental framework to explain all other frameworks. A grand unified theory of human existence . It‘s the need of the hour, just like a ‘Theory of everything’ for science is.
It’s clear that different fundamentals and laws can express the same phenomena adequately. Hence, what we might then need is a fresh set of fundamentals.
A different starting point. A totally different point of view. One that is reasonable yet not plagued by the limitations of reason.
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