Light the Fear

Me, My Model and I**

I perused Stephen Hawking's recent book and first publication in a decade on the origins of the universe and the likelihood of a coherent theory of everything emerging from modern physics.  

It's a fascinating read for anyone interested in quantum physics and the relationship of mind to matter.

Yes, Dr. Hawking thinks there is an appropriate theory of everything, and he throws his weight behind M-Theory. But he also notes that our own mind's provide a limited mechanism for testing and understanding these theories because, by definition, we must always test the universe using our brains which operate, by definition, by making a model of the stimulus we perceive. 

He says, "there is no model-independent test of reality," and this model-dependent realism has some startling conclusions, including that the laws of nature by which local space is made stable may also be the cause of global instability at the universal level.

"Bodies such as stars or black wholes cannot just appear out of nothing. But a whole universe can." (p. 180)

Hawking is saying that universe creation is an energy neutral function, i.e. the negative energy of gravity balances the energy needed to create a big bang and the resulting matter and motion of the space-time universe contains once created.

To me, and to Hawking I think, this means that universes are common and somehow co-exist, overlap or more importantly, somehow fuse to create the reality that we experience.  

But how?

What about thought?  In my own theories here, I posit structures such as morphic fields and personal and collective thought "atmospheres," but in M-theory terms, I guess my "thought atmosphere" is actually an information-storage and retrieval "pocket" within the membrane.

The Egg Model of the Universe conforms to M-theory's basic principle that everything can be described as a two dimensional "membrane" vibrating in eleven dimensional space.

The two dimensions of the membrane are Energy and Matter, while the eleven dimensions of experiential space are relatable to Flow, Grow and the intersection points between each dimension of the Membrane (each plane in the Egg model) and it's collective counterpart on each side of the vibration.

Thus, an integrated model of the mentally-created universe begins to emerge, and it's an exciting time to be studying and writing about it.  

What do you think?

**"I" may actually be a focused resonance hologram created from the bounded set of infinitely varied universes co-existing in overlapping frequencies, and whose intersection friction (and reflection) is the source of super-gravity (and everything else) in our observable universe.

 

 

Gopher Canyon on the Avocado Highway

September First, Near Future

 An old Chevy Caprice lurches over the hill and races into the canyon, balding tires skid and slide across dry pavement as it swerves in and out of midday traffic spread across four lanes. In the distance, a dark sedan with tinted windows weaves its own path through the cars, rapidly gaining.

 Desert air radiates heat from the asphalt, shimmering in the overhead sun. Far above, a lone hawk circles on the updrafts peering down on the cars surging through the surrounding traffic. Beige granite monoliths dot the steep hills as if carelessly thrown about by an angry giant, surrounded with green and grey scrub brush. Single homes or orchard shelters stand singular here and there, perched high above the freeway slicing through the massive terrain, silent observers to the chase below.  A second sedan screams up from behind, joining the first.

 In the Chevy, Micah Joust stomps hard against the accelerator, then on the brakes, delicately steering around a large tractor-trailer and throwing his companion, Jake Kovach forward hard against the back of the front seat. Jake cradles Peter Whale, an unconscious boy of six or seven in his lap. He pulls the boy’s legs up and pushes him horizontally across the seat. Peter’s limp body barely fits end-to-end.

 “I thought we lost them,” Jake rights himself again, squeezing his athletic frame on opposite sides of the backseat like a spider inspecting the unconscious boy underneath him.

 “Me too,” Micah adjusts the rearview mirror, tracking the sedans with intense blue eyes set in a stocky handsome face. “I think there’re two of them now.”

 “More from the Church?”

 “I doubt it,” Micah swallows hard, studying the rectangular reflection. “These are different.”

 “Clearly, we’re not the only ones who know about him.” Jake stares at the boy’s peaceful face, then raises a hypodermic needle. “Hold steady while I…” The car swerves abruptly, throwing the syringe bouncing away from Jake’s hand; it clatters down and under the front seat. Jack curses.

 “Did you get it?” Micah looks back, then cranks the wheel left, veers deftly around a double semi-truck with two giant cow faces mooing at them from highly polished cylinders connected by a thick support. A sedan speeds by on the other side. The sun glints off the tanks, blinding Micah.

 The featureless black sedan tails the Chevy, easily closing the gap now, swerving around the milk truck, followed behind by its twin. Inside, uniform sunglasses check unseen objects in their laps, then casually extend armed elbows into the daylight, guns poised.

 “Ishi-san won't take us back if we're exposed.” Jake hovers over the backseat’s center hump, his knees grip tightly while his hands methodically search, groping in both wells with arms outstretched, head cranked uncomfortably to one side, frantically sweeping above and under the rugs. “What the hell?”

 “He’s not infected, right?” Micah swerves left, then right again in surprisingly fluid arcs around the cars and trucks, avoiding the sedans. “You could tell, couldn't you? Feel it I mean...” Micah looks back, but cannot see Jake whose head is still below. “We'd both have it now too…” his voice trails off.

 “There’s a polymer residue left in the blood of those corrupted by the Chosen Ones.” Jake pops up, then looks down at Peter, scanning the back seat for something to provoke a drop of blood from the boy without hurting him any more than necessary, any more than has already been done.

 “But we don’t think he’s one of them?”

 “No, no. He’s something new, something…” Jake begins.

 “We don't need to test him to know what they did to him,” Micah grips the wheel with thick calloused hands, glancing back at the blonde-haired, fair-skinned realization of Jake’s recurring nightmare, of Micah’s recurring hallucination, sitting there in the flesh, a boy of unknown origin, a source of unknown power and now a target of unknown enemies.

 “We’ve got bigger problems,” Micah flattens the accelerator. “This is as fast as she goes.” Jake’s head swivels back and forth between Micah and the sedans growing closer in the back window.  “We're not going to make Pasadena; we need another plan.”

 “But Ishiro and the whole team are waiting for us in Pasadena.”

 “I can’t change the laws of physics, Jake. We’re going as fast as we can, and they're still...HOLD ON!"  Micah veers left, but it is too late.

 The sedan slams into the Chevy’s trunk, and the force of the impact hurls the car to the left, rotating it sideways, tires scream for purchase against the hot pavement, claws of some savage animal being dragged backwards by the tail, losing the fight. The first sedan flanks the right, moving to strike again.

 “HOLD ON! HOLD ON! HOLD ON,” Micah’s mouth runs automatically as his arms furiously crank the wheel into the spin, his feet pumping the brakes, on then off, then on again. The Chevy's two right tires momentarily loose all traction and the whole cabin leans to the left. Micah’s stomach falls away, and he stomps both feet on the accelerator again, throwing his whole body wide across the open passenger seat, holding his breath, willing the car to come down.

 Jake crashes head down, legs sprawled akimbo above his arched back, and Peter's unconscious body slumps upside down, neck crumpling sideways with limp arms tangled across a pale face. A sickly sweet taste rises in Micah's mouth, and things seem to move in slow motion, sound stretches into a muted cacophony of silence.  He licks his lips and holds his breath, being heavy, thinking heavy.

 The car careens on two wheels, bumps the curb and lurches to the right, slamming the tires back to the pavement.  Micah jerks back behind the wheel and cranks the car violently one way, then the other, barely missing the first sedan about to strike them and delivering a glancing blow on the second, spinning it out as they speed away across three lanes of traffic all slamming on their brakes. Micah guides the Chevy down the steep embankment in one fluid motion, tacking back and forth to avoid boulders in the scrub desert, a giant metal skier flying down a sand trail and emerging in a scream across the level hard-pack soil.

 Micah and Jake bounce around the Chevy’s cabin, slamming into the shredded ceiling and hollering in pain as steel crunches flesh. Peter’s crumpled form catches serious air as the car does too, tires spinning and gnawing at empty air as the red earth falls away. Jake winces and reaches for Peter, protecting the boy’s head as they slam into the bench seat. The Chevy roars on.

 The sedans untangle themselves from the congested traffic; dark sunglasses lean menacingly out of windows, flash badges and guns, clearing a path to the edge of the highway. The lead car’s buckled hood nudges past a conversion van and drops off the steep embankment in pursuit. It turns sharply left accelerating into the shortest route of intercept, a reckless skier taking the trail straight on, heading down at any cost. As it races, it raises a trail of smoke in parallel wedge to the Chevy’s trail that grows closer and closer, clouds blurring in the stiff breeze.

 Barreling across the desert, Micah reaches the access road as Jake reappears over the backseat, pointing straight ahead and shouting “Look out!” The car nips the edge of a boulder, shattering its mottled surface into shards of stone shrapnel, careening half-over the outcropping and half-through it in a brilliant puff of red and orange and beige and grey. The car shudders and the crunch of metal makes both men flinch; it slows but continues on.

 “That could've killed us!” Jake’s composure slips.

 “Yeah that could have killed us,” Micah wraps his sarcasm tightly around him, a bitter focus that fuels his pumping arms and legs. “As if God's creepy warriors and the clones in the German tanks aren't enough!”

 “I’m not the one who started the blitzkrieg here.”

 As if on cue, gun shots ring out behind them, ricocheting off the thick metal frame of the old car. Both men reflexively duck in their seats, shoulders contracting, necks shrinking to non-existence.

 “Fuck this,” Micah cranks the Chevy's wheel hard to the right descending into the steep drainage gully next to the access road.

 “I was just kidding about the blitzkrieg,” Jake points back towards the highway. “Where are you going?”

 “I don't know—away from them! People shoot, I leave. It’s the kind of guy I am.” The lead sedan descends into the gully following behind them. “We need Plan B Jake, like NOW.” Micah veers around a cave-in but loses more speed. The sedan closes.

 “We discussed this,” Jake begins. “If something got fucked up after we freed him, then you’ll create a diversion, and I’d take him with the suit.” Jake looks uncertainly at the pile of fabric, rubber and wires at his feet, a cross between a wetsuit and a gnarled purple exoskeleton out of some Hollywood monster movie.

 “You’ve never taken anything that heavy.” Micah barely misses a set of rocks, and the sedan hits them hard spewing rock and bending metal and falling back further behind them.

 “We’ve used the suit together, and you certainly weigh more than him.” Jake cradles Peter in his arms, trying to estimate his weight.

 “But you and I were tethered in the control field, both contributing to the suit. With him unconscious, untrained...” The Chevy smashes another rock, lurching violently left. “He’s dead weight.”

  “God saves the brave, right?” Jake leans over the front seat. “Now or never, Mikes.”

 Micah bites nervously on his lip, eyes darting between steering and scanning the lip ahead for a likely path of ascent and in the rear view mirror at the sedans behind them, now within striking distance. “Can’t you do anything with your telepathy stuff?”

 “Not again so soon,” Jake shakes his head agitated. “I'm too excited…and drained. So much is changing; it's all I can do to power the suit…” The car’s front quarter panel is ripped off as they derby across the desert drainage ditch. The sedans are close enough to strike again, waiting to attack, or maybe just waiting for Micah to stop them himself.

 “You’re not going to get to use the suit anyway if we don’t get away from these guys.” Micah’s voice rises.

 Jake steadies himself and focuses his gaze intently on the pursuing sedans. He extends two fingers flat against his temple, holding them a moment as his eyes flicker shut. “Okay,” he points ahead and slightly to the right. “In about three hundred yards, go right.”

 “But Jake, the road is on the left.”

 “Trust me. When I tell you, we'll go left, but for now, GO RIGHT!” Jake leans over, shouting.

 Micah cranks the wheel hard, driving the car right up onto a gradually rising embankment. The lead sedan follows them while the second one draws up next to the Chevy a bit lower in the drainage ditch, surging ahead and trying to box them.

 “Great Professor! Now they're ahead of us. This is rapidly turning into a cluster fuck my friend!”

 “Get ready Micah! Feel me now, and....” Jake points out a lump of dark brown earth against the red brown of the normal desert lying ahead. It resolves into the remains of an old overpass bridge spanning the ditch to another access road above, now long dilapidated and broken, creaking and sagging.

 “That!?” Micah squeaks in a high pitched voice. “You want me to drive across that?”

 “Hit it fast, and we've got a chance.”

 “Oh shit man. I don't know....” The sedan ahead of them in the ditch sees the obstruction and skids to a halt directly under the bridge, directly in their path. Armed men in dark suits pop out, aiming their guns.

 “NOW,” Jake yells, and Micah floors the last few yards up and onto the old frame of the dilapidated bridge. The wood creaks and splits under the Chevy's tires, crunching one last time as it propels the car awkwardly forward. It stampedes up the slope under heavy inertia, spewing shredded remains behind as it careens over and up towards the open crossing.

 Bullets smash the windshield, and it splinters into a thousand pieces, crystalline daggers bouncing into safety cubes of stinging relief. They duck as more bullets whiz through the opening puncturing the ceiling. Micah lurches left against his door, but keeps his foot jammed on the accelerator. The car flies across the last few feet of old wood and shoots the gap, flying for a moment, then falling fast.

 The front half clears the gap, but the back tires crash onto the sedan's hood, forcing the men with guns to dive away from the attacking Caprice, springing in all directions. The front tires gain purchase as the rear tires collapse the sedan’s roof, the final needed boost to crash through the rest of the bridge. The Chevy launches a thousand splinters no bigger than a railroad spike, obliterating the bridge as it bounces out of the drainage ditch and onto the higher road. It swerves hard left to stay on the old roadway and begins accelerating away.

 Already committed in pursuit, the second sedan flies into the gap much faster than the Chevy, but without any bridge left to give it lift. It sails over its crunched twin and crashes head first into the dirt wall, just short of the access road. Sunglasses bang forward in unison as the car jackknifes into the rocky soil then ratchets down with gravity and slides backwards with a dull thudding crunch against the mid panel of the first sedan. The airbags go off.

 Speeding off away from the wreckage, the men whoop and holler, flush with relief and adrenaline. Micah slams his fist into the dashboard. “Hot damn!”

 Jake smiles and peers out the broken back window at their disabled adversaries. Unseen below him, Peter's eyes flutter open. He rubs a groggy fist in slow circles to clear his vision, then looks inquisitively at the men.  They don’t see him.

 “Who are you?” Peter coughs.

This is an excerpt from my upcoming novel Focused Resonance.