Bereshith: Science Fiction

Bereshith: Science Fiction

This week we start the Torah again  It starts at the beginning, the Lrd creates heaven and earth. The Torah  is a very old, carefully  preserved document.  It survives on the basis of what we can do with it. the lessons that we can learn from it.  It is not a science text, nor is it a science fiction story

And he Lrd said: Let there be light! and there was light.

This  means  that  something can be created by  a mere statement. Now we live in an era in which that is (almost)  literally true.  A set of statements  to a computer can create complex machines, 3 D objects, DNA.. The internet, the phone system, the street  lights work by virtue of a set of statements in computer code.  Is this the dream of those that studied Sefer Yetzira? The( magical) power of properly uttered words.  With the right code you can build your dream, get rich.

 We each create our own world.  with words, the words we say to others, the words we read and write: our world of relationships, our worlds of poetry, our view of the world.

I think of the speed of lilght. The Michelson Morley experiment  that proved the absence of a medium for light ( the ether) and calculated the speed of light  [c]( 186,000 miles per second, 3 X 10E8 meters per second) .  It is the square of that quantity (  9 X 10E16)  that is the conversion factor between mass and energy  ( E=mc**2),  .  This is the basis of the potential to destroy the world in minutes ( the atom bomb). A big light, then never light. Light breaks where no sun shines.

Science is a branch of mythology. Science creates models of reality  with an emphasis on mathematics  Science claims truth by virtue of its utility:; it works to predict important events and create useful objects.  The Torah is a useful object that is outside the realm of modern science.  It is useful to recognize a far greater power than than the human.  It is useful to believe that that that power cares about people and interacts with history.

May this new year be blessed.