The Ages of Sand
I read this very interesting transcription of a lecture that Douglas Adams gave at a conference in the late 90's. It's entitled 'Is there an Artificial God?'. He talks about some of his ideas of where our notion of God came from and also some personal opinions on it. That is interesting, but I found another idea that he brings up more interesting. The four ages of sand.
The ages are regarding our intellectual evolution throughout the years and how many of it is related to sand. I will summarize it here, but you should really take some time to read what he has to say, it's very intriguing and different.
The First Age: Up until the 15th century or so, we would take our view of the universe and the world around us from the church. Some high officials told us what to believe, told us we were not to question them, and so on. But someone took some sand, made it into glass, then formed the glass into a lens, and then made a telescope. This was the first time we were able to truly view the heavens with real accuracy. From this simple sand, we realized that the Earth was not the center of the universe, in fact it's not even the center of anything really, except for us. This was a revolutionary and counter-intuitive realization on our part.
The 2nd Age: Then, we took this same sand, and made microscopes. So instead of peering upwards and outwards, we began to peer inwards and discovered that our 'solid' world which we had taken for granted, on the sub-atomic level, is mostly made of nothing. This is another realization which is just as, or if not more, counter-intuitive.
The 3rd Age: After a few years, we began to take this sand, and process it into crystalline silicon, from which transistors, IC's, and the computer was created. This, again, completely revolutioned our world. We now understand from simple programming, that very complex and amazing results can come from a few lines of very simple code. The computer does much of the math and bitch work that we previously coud not do before. From this, we began to really understand complex ideas such as evolution. Instead of waiting generations for evolution to take place, we could simulate it and run the iterations very quickly to really see and understand this powerful process.
The 4th Age: He links this age with the internet (which is connected with computers and fibre-optic cable which of course come from sand). This mass communication has, as we all know, revolutionized our means and efficiency of accomplishing previously time-consuming tasks. Of course, one could write an encyclopedia on how the computer and the internet has changed our society and how we view the world, but I assume you understand.
So, out greatest intellectual achievements have really come from sand, the ground up rock that the Earth has stored and processed over billions of years. Very interesting idea.
I really recommend this lecture to anyone who really wonders why we believe, why we must regard God as an invisible creature who takes human forms, etc.
It is clear that talking about defacing the omniprescence of God is a very contrversial topic, and he understood this too, he ends the talk with 'You are now free to begin hurtling chairs around'. He really does have a good sense of humour.
I'm comin home tomorrow!!!! I'll see everyone real soon. read. think. enjoy. peace
The ages are regarding our intellectual evolution throughout the years and how many of it is related to sand. I will summarize it here, but you should really take some time to read what he has to say, it's very intriguing and different.
The First Age: Up until the 15th century or so, we would take our view of the universe and the world around us from the church. Some high officials told us what to believe, told us we were not to question them, and so on. But someone took some sand, made it into glass, then formed the glass into a lens, and then made a telescope. This was the first time we were able to truly view the heavens with real accuracy. From this simple sand, we realized that the Earth was not the center of the universe, in fact it's not even the center of anything really, except for us. This was a revolutionary and counter-intuitive realization on our part.
The 2nd Age: Then, we took this same sand, and made microscopes. So instead of peering upwards and outwards, we began to peer inwards and discovered that our 'solid' world which we had taken for granted, on the sub-atomic level, is mostly made of nothing. This is another realization which is just as, or if not more, counter-intuitive.
The 3rd Age: After a few years, we began to take this sand, and process it into crystalline silicon, from which transistors, IC's, and the computer was created. This, again, completely revolutioned our world. We now understand from simple programming, that very complex and amazing results can come from a few lines of very simple code. The computer does much of the math and bitch work that we previously coud not do before. From this, we began to really understand complex ideas such as evolution. Instead of waiting generations for evolution to take place, we could simulate it and run the iterations very quickly to really see and understand this powerful process.
The 4th Age: He links this age with the internet (which is connected with computers and fibre-optic cable which of course come from sand). This mass communication has, as we all know, revolutionized our means and efficiency of accomplishing previously time-consuming tasks. Of course, one could write an encyclopedia on how the computer and the internet has changed our society and how we view the world, but I assume you understand.
So, out greatest intellectual achievements have really come from sand, the ground up rock that the Earth has stored and processed over billions of years. Very interesting idea.
I really recommend this lecture to anyone who really wonders why we believe, why we must regard God as an invisible creature who takes human forms, etc.
It is clear that talking about defacing the omniprescence of God is a very contrversial topic, and he understood this too, he ends the talk with 'You are now free to begin hurtling chairs around'. He really does have a good sense of humour.
I'm comin home tomorrow!!!! I'll see everyone real soon. read. think. enjoy. peace
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3:10 PM
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