“It is evident that the ideas of permanent truth-value and fluctuating truth-value apply in reality to symbolic forms and not to propositions or propositional functions.” Alfred N. Whitehead & Bertrand Russell, Principia Mathematica, 1912.
We know, a priori, gross matters
In a world Principia Mathematica.
(i.e., e.g., limit f(x) = L)
We know such things as schizophrenia
And other pathologicals,
Of ribosome and chromosome
The physiology of the neural cell.
And for those evenings
When we’re drinking late
Metaphysical esoterica of time and space.
We know there’s work at nine
Dinner at eight.
These things we know
As Newton knew, F/M = A.
Or do we play the ingénue?
For Newton dreamed so long ago.
With hypertrophied cerebellum
We can’t define an electron’s spin
Or point to some particular place it’s in
Or, knowing place, predict its subsequent behavior
Whether wave or matter, matter-wave.
Symbol bound we fumble with infinity
The BIG BANG!
(A scattering of energy spun outwards
From some dense and smoldering core
Radiating-coalescing-transubstantiating.
Tyche leering, leaning on the wheel
Careening toward unknown and inconceivable shores.)
Do we hear cacophony
In this music of the spheres?
So certainly did we proceed
From premises to hypotheses
Hypotheses to theories
That we were taken unawares
By Einstein’s relativity
And Heisenberg’s uncertainty.
Uncertainty?
Who could have made a universe imperfectly?
We are such things as quantum dust
And strings that vibrate in the dusk
As night descends
We are alone, together, at the end.
Senescence, not graduation
Was the degree of our initiation
Into a universe of vague uncertainty
Where death lay waiting.
A reality we could not transcend
An immortality we did not intend
To end so damned abruptly.
Without recourse we cast our fate.
As we forsake the security of faith
For truth which does depend
Upon the vagaries of probability.
Our insatiate tenacity
For knowledge and veracity
Seem to devolve
Into that fearful dark abyss
Where theories translate to hieroglyphs
And galaxies dissolve.
Of late, gross matters seem insignificata
In a world post Principia Mathematicata.
We know, a priori, gross matters
In a world Principia Mathematica.
(i.e., e.g., limit f(x) = L)
We know such things as schizophrenia
And other pathologicals,
Of ribosome and chromosome
The physiology of the neural cell.
And for those evenings
When we’re drinking late
Metaphysical esoterica of time and space.
We know there’s work at nine
Dinner at eight.
These things we know
As Newton knew, F/M = A.
Or do we play the ingénue?
For Newton dreamed so long ago.
With hypertrophied cerebellum
We can’t define an electron’s spin
Or point to some particular place it’s in
Or, knowing place, predict its subsequent behavior
Whether wave or matter, matter-wave.
Symbol bound we fumble with infinity
The BIG BANG!
(A scattering of energy spun outwards
From some dense and smoldering core
Radiating-coalescing-transubstantiating.
Tyche leering, leaning on the wheel
Careening toward unknown and inconceivable shores.)
Do we hear cacophony
In this music of the spheres?
So certainly did we proceed
From premises to hypotheses
Hypotheses to theories
That we were taken unawares
By Einstein’s relativity
And Heisenberg’s uncertainty.
Uncertainty?
Who could have made a universe imperfectly?
We are such things as quantum dust
And strings that vibrate in the dusk
As night descends
We are alone, together, at the end.
Senescence, not graduation
Was the degree of our initiation
Into a universe of vague uncertainty
Where death lay waiting.
A reality we could not transcend
An immortality we did not intend
To end so damned abruptly.
Without recourse we cast our fate.
As we forsake the security of faith
For truth which does depend
Upon the vagaries of probability.
Our insatiate tenacity
For knowledge and veracity
Seem to devolve
Into that fearful dark abyss
Where theories translate to hieroglyphs
And galaxies dissolve.
Of late, gross matters seem insignificata
In a world post Principia Mathematicata.
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