Ramblings - First published March 2020
The picture is a picture of me. I know exactly what I was doing, where I was and how I felt at the
time this was taken. Only I know. What it looks like to you could be different from what it looks
like to someone else. Am I outside the window looking in or inside looking out. What am I looking
at? Am I sitting, standing or even dancing?
Without the knowledge of the “facts” does the not knowing confound a person or is a picture richer for not knowing - allowing narrative and speculation to feed the imagination?
When I was a child I had a science book. In it there was a picture of a rabbit that looked like a duck or a duck that looked like a rabbit. I use to sit looking at it for hours – fascinated by how it could be two things at the same time. Some would say they could only see the rabbit, others could only see the duck. Some could see both. It was the individual that changed or decided what was there but the image itself had no will to be one or the other – it was what it was. Should it have been conscious I imagine it may have been bewildered by the constant scrutiny and misplaced certainty put upon it.
I was recently listening to some mathematicians debating infinity and the ‘infinite number’. All parties were looking at the same thing but some denied calculating an infinite number was possible whereas others were deliberating about methods and equations – one subject but different perceptions made it appear very different to some than others. I found the whole debate bizarre. As a non-mathematician, I may have been looking at things very differently but it occurred to me that they were missing a couple of key questions:
1. Does the number One exist? (We’ll assume - YES)
2. If it does exist, will it exist forever?
If it won’t exist forever, the rest of the debate is irrelevant. If it will exist forever – there is your infinite number right there! Yes, Highlander was right – in the debate of the Infinite “There can be only One”
Like me in the window, the duck/rabbit image and the quest for the infinite, individuals looking can create different stories, understandings and imaginative journeys. Your journey won’t change the innate sate of the subject but it can change what you experience. With good hearts and minds many things that may otherwise pass you by can enrich your life if you see and savour the experiences without necessarily assuming that an analysis of a ‘truth’ is going to be the only acceptable yardstick of worth.
