The purpose of fiction, 822-826

[Michael Bailey]

from the fall 1994 Journal of Anthroposophy:

"Anthropic Principle - a statement of cosmogony in modern astrophysics
in two forms: "weak" and "strong."  The "weak" version claims that the universe
we observe came into existence with initial conditions that would eventually
engender us humans as the observers of that universe.  In its "strong" form,
the principle states that the sum of cumulative acts of observations made by
all human beings is the actual mechanism by which the universe was created.
The term was coined b Robert Dicke, an astrophysicist at Princeton University,
in 1961.  Its "strong" form was championed by John A. [("Zoyd")] Wheeler,
Emeritus Professor of Physics at Princeton and the University of Texas
at Austin."

The article?
"Ecstatic American Cosmogony and the Mystical Anthropic Principle"
by Tom Mellett

Tiny additional quote:
"I was first introduced to the Anthropic Principle in 1976 by Professor Wheeler
at the University of Texas at Austin when he asked me about certain
19th century
German idealistic philosophers such as Hegel, Fichte and Schelling.  He was
especially interested in Schelling's dictum, quoted by Rudolf Steiner in
_The Philosophy of Freedom_: "To know Nature is to create Nature.""

W/r/t reading Pynchon, a (somewhat humorous) application of the
Anthropic Principle
("weak") would be to figure that the text was created in order to
fashion an experience for the
reader...certainly not too far from the truth!

...while the Anthropic Principle ("strong") would seem to indicate
that the text was created _by_ the efforts of the reader -- much as
McHoul and Willis talk of "writing Pynchon"?



On 10/6/08, bandwraith at aol.com <bandwraith at aol.com> wrote:
> Mark:
>
>  "It would fascinate me to have you expound further on the
>  terrific phrase, "literary equivalent of the anthropic principle"...
>
>
>  OK. Bear with me. From the Wikipedia on "Indra's Net":
>
>  "Buddhist concepts of interpenetration hold that all phenomena
>  are intimately connected; for the Huayan school, Indra's net
>  symbolizes a universe where infinitely repeated mutual relations exist
>  between all members of the universe.[5] This idea is communicated
>  n the image of the interconnectedness of the universe as seen
>  in the net of the Vedic god Indra, whose net hangs over his palace
>  on Mount Meru, the axis mundi of Vedic cosmology and Vedic
>  mythology. Indra's net has a multifaceted jewel at each vertex, and
>  each jewel is reflected in all of the other jewels..."
>
>  And Wikipedia quoting Francis Harold Cook, from the same url:
>
>  "Far away in the heavenly abode of the great god Indra, there is a
>  wonderful net which has been hung by some cunning artificer in such
>  a manner that it stretches out infintely in all directions. In accordance
>  with the extravagant tastes of deities, the artificer has hung a single
>  glittering jewel in each "eye" of the net, and since the net itself is
>  infinite in dimension, the jewels are infinite in number. There hang
>  the jewels, glittering like stars in the first magnitude, a wonderful
>  sight to behold. If we now arbitrarily select one of these jewels for
>  inspection and look closely at it, we will discover that in its polished
>  surface there are reflectedall the other jewels in the net, infinite in
>  number. Not only that, but each of the jewels reflected in this one
>  jewel is also reflecting all the other jewels, so that there is an infinite
>  reflecting process occurring."
>
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indra%27s_net
>
>  cf., M&D, p55:
>
>   "Where's Bodine?"
>   "Last I saw of him was out the end of the fore t'gallant Yard, with his
>   Penis in the Jewel Block,- quite enjoying the Friction, to Appearance."
>
>  You may recall that this passage appears in the brief, and by now
>  notorious section, wherein "Boatswain (pronounced Bo'sun) Mr. Higgs
>  is makes a cameo? Notice also, please, that this section begins;
>
>   Cheerily, Cheerily, then, Lads...
>
>  Which might ring a bell? I would say that it's a string hooking up
>  with the opening lines of ATD. Seafarers and Aeronauts, sea and
>  sky, the web is at least four dimensional. But Fender Belly
>  is grounding it, forcing it to be real, just like the Higgs Boson supplies
>  relative mass values to the nodes (particles) of the rigging (of reality).
>
>  Likewise, Bodine succumbs to
>
>   "Mr Higgs's Obsessedness as to Loose Ends"
>
>  but in his own irreducible, individual and undeniably human way.
>
>  Without Bodine, the net lacks significance- an infinite regress of
>  self-reflecting jewels signifying nothing. Which begs the question:
>  Is the universe tuned just so- from the frequency of the smallest
>  planck-length string, to the huge expanses of space- rigged, so
>  to speak- in order to allow for us, and our Bodine-like self absorption?
>
>  Just my way of illustrating the Anthropic Princinple. A more
>  prosaic (and correct) explanation:
>
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antropic_principle
>
>  How that all relates to Bevis' appearance, disappearance and
>  reappearance after experiencing his own "ultraviolet catastrophe,"
>  and, how that might be an indication of p eavesdropping on
>  us all, as a metaphor for the Anthropic Principle- i.e., a literary version
>  of same, is gonna have to wait. Got some business.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>


-- 
"He ain't crazy, he's a-makin' pottery" - Finley Pater Dunne