Scientific cosmology (as opposed to cultural cosmogony) refers to several sciences, with different aims and methods. Astro-physics studies the matter, energy, and processes that form solar systems and galaxies. The universe now includes all galaxies, including our local group of sixteen galaxies, and the Virgo group of 2500 galaxies, after Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity (1917). The scientific cosmos is finite but unbounded, perhaps spherical, and expanding due to continuous creation of hydrogen atoms (as Hoyle found), at the rate of one atom per three cubic km per year, thus observable only in very large spaces. (extract from Stoneprint Journal 8; NASA space cosmograms archetypes, 2023 April)
Study of the development and ‘age’ of the universe is named cosmogony. But these two chronologies remain at odds: either creation (Big Bang) and eventual destruction at two finite times, or continuous cycles of creation and maturity, as seen in stars. But cosmic ‘age’ could be outside time itself.
Philosophy over science
Archetypal models of scientific cosmology imply that “philosophy must take precedence over science”, and “may save science from itself” or at least from its terms of reference (Peach 1965). Supposed cosmological times, distances, and numbers could be meaningless, except in their own frames of assumptions. Intuitive concepts of culture could be more meaningful, but remain independent of science. The Egyptian paradoxical concept or convention of time before time, zep tepi, remains relevant to cultural and scientific cosmology.
Cultural conventions and scientific conventions remain equally useful, although science could be more misleading, since it is confused with ‘factual reality’ (Peach 1965) of concepts such as ‘Creation’. But “a distaste for metaphysics… should not prompt acceptance or rejection of a scientific theory”. Cultural and scientific cosmology “could have little to contribute to one another”, yet individually, and collectively, we have always used both, and continue doing so.
Edge of time and space
The ‘edge’ of the universe is probably a concept outside space itself. The furthest galaxies we could observe may be moving away at near the velocity of light, and are thus observed in the doubly distant past. Anything further would be out of sight, and perhaps ‘before time’. The Cosmological Principle assumes one universal space, of Euclidean shape or of regular variations in density.
But space and time may be curved (as De Sitter found). Perhaps in a torus or ‘thick ring’ shape, or hyper-folded shape, where matter and energy transform in and out of time, but remain conserved in a finite system by an overall balance between matter and space. More matter could contract the universe by gravity, and more energy could expand the universe.
Edge of knowledge
Scientific evidence that cosmic knowledge is limited by the properties of space, time, and consciousness, includes an apparent limitation in our conscious use of numbers. Our eternal impulse to integrate knowledge into a unified system, and to draw one picture of space, time and energy at micro and macro scales, requires that the fundamental constants of nature use the same numbers and magnitudes (as Dirac, Jordan, and Eddington found, the latter citing Kant).
The radius of the universe and the classical radius of the electron are both 10_39, a pure number. The ratio of electrostatic to gravitational forces between electrons and protons is also 10_39. The number of particles in the universe is also 10_39.
Physics laws may not be inductive generalisations, nor laws at all, but artefacts of our use of metrics (as Eddington found), and perhaps of number itself (Furter 2016 on the archetypal dual magnitude of number 5:20 and 5:21). This view is a-prioristic, ‘without precedent, original’, rooted in our system of perception and thought (Peach 1965), thus archetypal, as Plato (BC 500s) explained in his Cave analogy (p15).
Our knowledge reveals our minds
Eddington had concluded that “an intelligence, unacquainted with our universe, but acquainted with the system of thought by which the human mind interprets to itself the content of its sensory experience [including observations and calculations], should be able to attain all the knowledge of physics that we have attained by experiment. It could not deduce the particular events and objects of our experience, but it would deduce the generalisations we have based on them… Laws of physics should in principle be deducible from an accurate study of our methods of measurement… the laws of [universal] structure [and] laws of nature are thus a product of our thought processes, independent of any empirical investigation.” (see AI section). Eddington developed a new branch of mathematics to find natural structures from cultural structures. He used the number of fundamental particles as 10_79 (a magnitude about twice the ‘universal’ 10_39), and claimed to derive Planck’s constant and the Fine structure constant from this doubled-magnitude number. This finding may imply that matter has an equal complement of energy. Many more fundamental ‘particles’ have since been found in protons, but they consist mainly of different energy fields.
Paradoxes in Kinematical Relativity
Another archetypal theory is Kinematical Relativity, developed by Milne, to derive natural laws from cosmology, instead of the usual approach of deriving the cosmos from laws. Milne arrived at some paradoxes that were rejected at the time, but may yet prove valid in the ‘weird’ world of nuclear energy. Milne had avoided the curved spaces of General Relativity, and introduced a precise definition of distance based on light ray velocity, revealing different time scales for different events. Atomic clocks follow the t-scale, but dynamic clocks follow the tau-scale. Milne’s universe is expanding and finite on the mechanical tau-scale, but static and eternal on the atomic t-scale. This finding confirms one of the evolutionary models of General Relativity by entirely different means.
New knowledge
Knowledge and theory of the physical structure of the universe is closely linked to other elements in our world view. ‘A change in the physical picture can have repercussions outside astronomy’ (Peach 1965). Effects of new knowledge of perception on culture and sciences, were tested by Eddington’s revelations.
Effects of new knowledge are also tested by the new model of structuralist anthropology (Furter 2014 onward). But these effects remain limited to the crowded science of physics, and the deserted science of structuralist anthropology. Experience, including science, influence tech and science itself, which feed back into experience. But neither makes any difference to the core features of culture. This consciousness ‘valve’ could be tabulated as enabling fields, three directly dependent (>) on archetype, and three in feedback loops (<>): Archetype > Nature > Culture > Tech <> Science <> Experience.
Archetype remains the eternal source of nature and culture, never influenced by its secondary expressions such as perception, culture, experience, tech, or science, nor by feedback loops among its cumulative expressions. Only tech and science are cumulative, yet limited by perception.
Science returns to philosophy
Cosmology is the study of the universe, its components, formation, and development. “Modern cosmology is on the border between science and philosophy, since it seeks empirical understanding by complex observation, but also seeks fundamental encompassing answers about nature. ‘Primitive’ cosmology projects local experience and inner experience outward as a kind of animism or magic, in art, ritual, emblems, and myth. But astronomical structures in Africa and Europe from about BC 5000, by many different cultures without contact, project sky features inward. Myths have an internal logical consistence.” (University of Oregon philosophy guide).
Islands of knowledge
The metaphysical tension between Being and Becoming in creation myths of all cultures, remains in current cosmological theories (Gleicer 2017). “Both modes of thinking contribute to the construction of cosmic narratives: mythic and scientific. Several archetypical constructions are replicated in mythic and scientific models. Science narrows its fields by empirical observations.
“The most fundamental unknowable of all cosmic questions remain: the problem of the First Cause. Why is there something, rather than nothing? Science is not equipped conceptually to address such a question and, possibly neither is the [conscious] human mind”. Gleicer concludes: “We must live with our ignorance, surrounded by the mystery of existence, trying hard to expand the shores of our island of knowledge.” Plato and others have solved the ‘first cause’ problem by developing the philosophy of archetype, but theology, physics, and pop culture remain reluctant to adopt the rigours of philosophy.
- This post is an extract from Stoneprint Journal 8; NASA space cosmograms archetypes, 2023 April, 24 pages. Order copies at E8 /$10 /R100 plus delivery cost from Johannesburg, on edmondfurter at gmail dot com
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