I sat up, blinked, wiped my eyes. Glanced at the window... what the?
Why is it so unclear? I want to be able to see outside.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
I quickly get up, walk over to the closet where I keep the new window cleaner that... no, don't think about it!
Walk over to the window, give it a quick spritz. Wipe, and... nothing.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Well, this cleaner is a piece of garbage. Unless maybe... I quickly walk to the door, step outside.
And the entire street is filled with fog, the world seems absolutely coated in the stuff. It's like something out of a dream.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Well. I wasn't expecting that. But maybe, maybe this could just speel out the answer. The meaning of life, the secret of the universe, the -
I need to... get a coffee, get an aspirin. I've been drinking too much right before bed, I feel like the drunkenness gets me in the right state of mind for my search for the meaning of life.
Right. That's it. It has nothing to do with her
Shut up! We are not thinking about her.
Maybe I should just stay like this. Skip the aspirin, skip the coffee. It just feels so much easier. When I walk around like this, with this fog in my mind, life just seems so much clearer, so much easier...
That's it! I've got it, I've finally figured out the meaning of life. I can’t believe it took me so long to realize it, it’s been staring me in the face this whole time.
Wait a second. If I know the meaning of life, why would I share it with you? I’ve already had enough betrayals.
Don’t talk about it!
-hyperbole out.
Ok, fine. You really want to know? I don’t think you really do, but if you insist…
The secret is rather simple – the clearer something is, the vaguer it is. The more lucid, the less so.
Think of the dream – the only reason everything looked so foggy was because the window itself was clear. Had the window been a bit less clear, had it had a little bit of metal in it, it would have just been a mirror, would have clearly shown the inside of the room.
Or perhaps a better example – had the window been colored, been intentionally fogged, been a little more opaque – I would have seen the same view, whether there was a fog or not.
The more you see, the less you do.
Without the aspirin, without the coffee, I may go through life without thinking, without understanding, but I also don’t have to feel all of life’s complications, don’t have the ability to be confused by them.
Honestly, I think Alexander Pope described it in his Poem A little learning is a dangerous thing by describing how after each success, one just finds another mountain beyond, the more one knows, the more there is to know.
Actually, the whole first stanza probably describes it best:
A little learning is a dangerous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again.
Fired at first sight with what the Muse imparts,
In fearless youth we tempt the heights of Arts,
While from the bounded level of our mind
Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind;
But more advanced, behold with strange surprise
New distant scenes of endless science rise!
So pleased at first the towering Alps we try,
Mount o'er the vales, and seem to tread the sky,
The eternal snows appear already past,
And the first clouds and mountains seem the last;
But, those attained, we tremble to survey
The growing labors of the lengthened way,
The increasing prospects tire our wandering eyes,
Hills peep o'er hills, and Alps on Alps arise!
Or perhaps the quote from Aristotle - 'The more you know, the more you know you don't know.'
We need only look to the science of everything to understand it. Einstein wondered how the world worked, came up with general relativity. That seemed to contradict Newton’s understanding of gravity, so he came up with special relativity (It’s very special. Though aren’t we all?)
Then scientists wanted to understand how little things fit together, so they came up with quantum mechanics.
But… that contradicts general/special relativity, so they came up with superstring theory, which is missing more than it has.
At the end of the day, the clearer our view, the more fog we see.
Now actually
-hyperbole out.
