© the other press

March 3, 2004

 

 
  

Buddha Shakyamuni once told his
disciples that there were three thou-
sand worlds in a grain of sand.
Christians were taught that the
human body was a microcosm that

looked just like the universe. Daoists _

also believe that the body is like a
miniature universe with all the com-
ponents and energies of the larger
universe. It sounds a little fantastic,
but modern physics has discovered
that these ancient spiritual teachings
are actually very accurate.

One of the big turning points in
human understanding was when
Galileo argued for the Copernican
model of the universe. With bril-
liant experiments, tricky rhetoric,

and politics, he helped to overturn ~

the idea that the universe was a flat

In The
Pagoda

. Extra Dimensions

Matthew Little
OP Contributor

earth with a sun and moon rotating
around it,-and a sheet of sparkles
surrounding the whole thing. He
propelled the idea that the Earth is
one among several spherical planets
moving around the sun.

Later, as we all learned in middle
school science, we discovered that
everything we see, touch, feel, hear,
and taste is actually made of little
tiny particles called atoms.
Interestingly enough, the structure
of an atom is identical to that of a
solar system. As technology has
advanced, we have been able to ver-
ify with greater accuracy that atoms
and solar systems do in fact, look a
great deal alike. In that case, we
might think of a molecule as a
miniature galaxy, and atoms like

miniature solar systems. In that case,
it seams like the old Buddhists,
Daoists, and Christians were really
onto something.

 

 

 

 

 

From this understanding, it turns
out that the human body and every-
thing else around us is composed
almost entirely of empty space. If I
remember the analogy right, an
atoms proton is like a golf ball in the
middle of a football stadium and
electrons are little peas floating
around the back seats. It is like being
in the matrix and everything you
look at isn’t as it appears.

The following is from a website
created by the Particle Data Group,
which was created to teach kids
about science. It provides a way to
understand what we're talking
about, and how there could be a

dimensions. These extra dimensions
could be very small, which is why
we don’t see them. Think about an
acrobat and a flea on a tight rope.
The acrobat can move forward and
backward along the rope. But the
flea can move forward and backward
as well as side-to-side. If the flea
keeps walking to one side, it goes
around the rope and winds up
where it started. So the acrobat has
one dimension, and the flea has two
dimensions, but one of these dimen-
sions is a small closed loop.

So the acrobat cannot detect any
more than the one dimension of the
rope, just as we can only see the
world in three dimensions, even
though it might well have many
more. This is impossible to visualize,
precisely because we can only visual-
ize things in three dimensions!

 

sion. Religions in the west used to
teach a person to have faith and to
believe in the things that couldn’t be
seen. Eastern traditions taught that a
person had to be enlightened before
they could see, and if they didn’t
believe in what they couldn't see,
they were said to have poor enlight-
enment quality. Remember how
they used to talk about angels and
demons, spirits and ghosts?

Maybe those are just fleas on our
tight rope, walking in dimensions
we can’t see, and in directions we
can't move. Or can we?

Why did the ancients believe that
human bodies looked just like the
universe, or that there were three
thousand worlds in a grain of sand?
Why did they describe such out-
landish-ideas that turned out to be
very scientifically accurate? At one
time, nearly everyone believed that a
human being could possess super-
natural skills, and could see and do
things that normal people couldn't
do with their physical bodies. Could
this be true? Could it be that we

universe in a grain of sand.

“How can there be extra, smaller

dimensions?

String theory and other new pro-
posals require more than three space

 

An acrobat can only move
in one dimension along a
rope.

but a flea can move
in two dimensions.

could take a step off the tight rope

 

 

without falling down? We will begin

 

to explore this idea next time.”
Maybe we are just like that guy on
the tight rope, stuck in our dimen-

 

Re: Living History

Brandon Ferguson
OP Contributor

The Fog of War made me think.
There, I said it. The movie, a blend
of fiction and fact (isn’t everything
these days?), tells the story of
Robert Strange McNamara. Robert
Strange McNamara in turn is able
to tell the story of one of the 20th
century's most gruesome eras, that
of American participation in war-
fare before and during the Cold
War.

McNamara should know about
these things—as a tactician for
bombing raids in WWII, it was his
number-crunching genius that
increased the proportional death
count of hundreds of thousands of
Japanese civilians. Then, as the
Secretary of Defense for seven years
under acronym, JFK and LBJ, he
went from being actively in favour
of troop withdrawal to being pas-
sively in favour of Agent Orange
dispersal over the lush jungles of
Vietnam. McNamara was in the
privileged position to not only wit-
ness the brutal realities of war, but
to implement them.

He had trouble _ recalling
whether he personally was the
cheque signer for all those Japanese
and Vietnamese death certificates
though. The Fog of Memory may
have been a more apt title.

What The Fog of War made me
think about was how close we were
to a nuclear war. My apologies to
the Japanese, who were the victims
of the first, and most overlooked,
nuclear war. Just as Canada is 1-0
lifetime in head-to-head battles
against the US, the US is 1-0 in
nuclear wars. Both of these are
facts missing from the fictional
work that is history. Just as
McNamara ripped LBJ for failing

to get out of Vietnam, just as

McNamara told of General
Lemay’s handiwork in carrying out
the McNamara-signed incendiary
bombing raids—it seems that his-
tory is written both by the winners
and by those who outlive their
opponents. ;

But I guess these are birds of the
same feather, or rather, dung piles
from the same horse’s ass.

JFK, and therefore the sub-
sidiary McNamara, saved the
world (read: the US) from nuclear
war in 1962. Fourteen tension
filled days that, if they were to hap-
pen today, would have been forgot-
ten fourteen days later when an
intern was caught swallowing, a
breast was exposed, a midget
Bachelor proposed, or the Gap had
a sale.

What was I talking about? You
and I have both already forgotten.
Our shared history is fading away
right before our eyes. The Fog of
War made me think. That’s it.

Robert Strange McNamara
could not stress fervently enough
how close we came to nuclear anni-
hilation. The latent point that he
makes, and that I share, is this: it’s
a damn good thing JFK was at the
helm of the ship to steer the world
through such an unpredictable
high-stakes game of Risk. Arguably
the greatest president of the 20th-
century, in easily the strongest
nation of the 20th century, JFK
was able to avoid pushing that
ubiquitous button on one of those
fourteen days in 1962. He was a
man of such nobility and valour
that his legacy still intrigues all.
“Today, the third cousin of a sec-
ond uncle of the great-grand-
daughter of JFK was caught steal-
ing Jube Jubes at the local mar-

http://www-otherpress.ca

ket—story at eleven.” He was a
man so good that he therefore
must die. John Fitzgerald Kennedy
saved us all from the mad Ruskies
and his eager military advisors
alike.

Whew. Thank God we dodged
that bullet. But
minute...aren’t there still some of
those nuclear weapons kicking
around? That’s okay—I’m sure
we've got people of similar nobility
and valour at the helm today.
Right? Thousand-year old W, huh?
“Today, future former-President
George H. Bush’s son (read: future
President George W. Bush) was
found snorting blow at Yale while
drinking and driving, skipping out
on National Guard duty—story at
eleven.”

This is what I thought of at The
Fog of War. This was the frighten-
ing moral to the story that I took. I
turned whiter than the rim of W’s
nostril in the 70s. I felt more sober
than W’s morning-after when he
woke up in ass-less chaps to find he
was the President of the last centu-
rys most powerful nation. I
thought that maybe I should never
think such scary thoughts again.
What saved the world from nuclear
war in the 60s was the decency and
morality of Kennedy, McNamara,
ex-US Ambassador to the Soviet
Union Tommy Thompson, and
even Soviet leader Nikita
Krushchey. In the 2000s, we look
around the nuclear playground and
see the decency and morality of
Bush, Dick Cheney, and Donald
Rumsfield, versus your pick of
known terrorists Osama Bin
Laden, Kim Jong Il, Ayatollah
Khameini, or Janeane Garofalo.

The Fog of War scared the

wait. a

  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
    
  
 
 
  
 
 
   
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
   
 
   

bejeezus out of me. Not for its
honest retelling of atrocities long
since glazed over and forgotten,
not for its artful presentation
on the devastation of war, not
even for its tactful pauses
whenever McNamara’s lessons
from Vietnam’s past deserved
Iraq's present consideration.
The Fog of War scared the
bejeezus out of me because
it reminded me that we are _
still in a nuclear crisis.
Every day we run the risk
of no tomorrow.

Robert Strange
McNamara—who I still
am unsure of as to
whether he’s a crazy old
coot rationalizing his
death bed confessions,
or a wise old man ~
imploring us to heed the
lessons of his brave admis-
sions—said that there is only
one hope associated with war. —

No honest military officer
would ever claim to have
never made a mistake, he
said. You can only hope to
learn from these mistakes _
so that even if you are
found in error two or.
three times, you will be
able to prevent the
fourth and fifth from hap-
pening.

But how can we ever hope to _
learn from a second chance when
our generation’s history has been —
given no room for error by his
generation’s weapons?

The Fog of War can be seen, and
should be seen, at Tinseltown the-
atres. Check your Cheerios box

for a $5 off coupon. Robert Strange McNamara