I would rather live in a world where my life is surrounded by mystery than live in a world so small that my mind could comprehend it. – Harry Emerson Fosdick
Space, Nature and Humans astound me–that we function together at all. The fact that humans have actually been able to live, breathe and evolve for thousands of years on this planet in this Universe is a mystery in itself. As Jean Cocteau states, "Mystery has its own mysteries, and there are gods above gods. We have ours, they have theirs. That is what's known as infinity."
I just want to give you one brief illustration for each of these areas that fill me with awe and wonder, which form the basis of my desire to learn, as Neil Armstrong suggests. "Mystery creates wonder and wonder is the basis of man's desire to understand."
SPACE
If you are not yet familiar with the astounding photos that NASA has been making available to us from space, it's definitely worth your time to see for yourself. Planet Earth truly is a spectacular host for us in a spectacular, ever expanding infinite Universe. We live at the edge of mystery, as J. Robert Oppenheimer suggests. "Both the man of science and the man of action live always at the edge of mystery, surrounded by it."
NATURE
Imagine this: Bees, with a brain the size of a grass seed, and therefore minimal neural circuitry, can find solutions to complex mathematical problems that occupy supercomputers for hours. In a brand new scientific study, the bees were found to solve the complex mathematical Travelling Salesman Problem (studied in theoretical computer science), in which they have to figure out the shortest route possible.
These ‘mysterious' findings of this study highlight for me several points that are not mentioned in the summary of the study, which was carried out by scientists at two universities in London, England. It soon to be published in The American Naturalist.
First, the human understanding of its environment, despite all the facts, knowledge and information we've gathered, continues to be limited and spotty. Second, the brain may not at all be the key to the answer scientists are seeking. What if the answer lies in the invisible realm, of the ‘infinite mind,' as I refer to it? How intriguing is this mystery to you?
HUMAN
About ten years ago, the field of Neuroplasticity, which became generally acceptable only in the 1990s, began to intrigue me. The idea of the brain's capacity to change and adapt had been proposed off an on since the turn of the 19th century. Only fairly recently, though, have the neuroscientists moved away from the concept of the ‘fixed' or inflexible brain to a brain that seems to be able to rewire itself in infinite ways.
Why am I bringing this up here? Our own bodies, especially the brain, and our mind remain largely a mystery to us, including the scientists. We can send people to the moon, or work on international space stations. We can build minuscule computers with incredible powers and build instantaneous virtual social networks throughout the world.
You will be in awe and wonder, I bet, when you watch this short video about a girl whose entire right hemisphere was removed-half of all the brain functions, as we tend to assume. Welcome to the mystery.
Of course, many books and studies continue to be published now on the subject of the brain and mind. Stay tuned for more information about this topic from me as I will be writing about the connections between the physical brain, the heart and the gut as relating to the mind.
Finally, I'd like to leave you with a few words of wisdom that might support you to stay engaged in the Mystery Challenge.
QUOTATIONS to contemplate MYSTERY
* People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child-our own two eyes. All is a miracle. - Thich Nhat Hanh
* Wonder is retained by wise pondering. - Ravi Zacharias
* Don't you see what's at stake here? The ultimate aim of all science to penetrate the unknown. Do you realize we know less about the earth we live on than about the stars and the galaxies of outer space? The greatest mystery is right here, right under our feet. - Walter Reisch
* The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. - Albert Einstein
* All is mystery; but he is a slave who will not struggle to penetrate the dark veil. - Benjamin Disraeli
* A day spent without the sight or sound of beauty, the contemplation of mystery, or the search of truth or perfection is a poverty-stricken day; and a succession of such days is fatal to human life. - Lewis Mumford (1895-1990), American historian and philosopher of science and technology
* It began in mystery, and it will end in mystery, but what a savage and beautiful country lies in between. - Diane Ackerman
* Heisenberg, Max Plank and Einstein, they all agreed that science could not solve the mystery of the universe. - Harry Dean Stanton
* Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature. And that is because, in the last analysis, we ourselves are a part of the mystery that we are trying to solve. - Max Planck
* The possession of knowledge does not kill the sense of wonder and mystery. There is always more mystery. - Anais Nin
* Scientific views end in awe and mystery, lost at the edge in uncertainty, but they appear to be so deep and so impressive that the theory that it is all arranged as a stage for God to watch man's struggle for good and evil seems inadequate. - Richard P. Feynman
* People travel to wonder at the height of the mountains, at the huge waves of the seas, at the long course of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars, and yet they pass by themselves without wondering. - Augustine
* We are so impressed by scientific clank that we feel we ought not to say that the sunflower turns because it knows where the sun is. It is almost second nature to us to prefer explanations . . . with a large vocabulary. We are much more comfortable when we are assured that the sunflower turns because it is heliotropic. The trouble with that kind of talk is that it tempts us to think that we know what the sunflower is up to. But we don't. The sunflower is a mystery, just as every single thing in the universe is. - Robert Farrer Capon
* No; we have been as usual asking the wrong question. It does not matter a hoot what the mockingbird on the chimney is singing. The real and proper question is: Why is it beautiful? - Annie Dillard
* Look at those cows and remember that the greatest scientists in the world have never discovered how to make grass into milk. - Michael Pupin
* A morning glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.--Walt Whitman
* You will find something more in woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from masters. - Saint Bernard
* Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. - Rachel Carson
* If your heart is straight with God, then every creature will be to you a mirror of life and a book of holy doctrine. No creature is so little or so mean as not to show forth and represent the goodness of God. -Thomas A'Kempis
* Nature is full of genius, full of divinity; so that not a snowflake escapes its fashioning hand. - Henry David Thoreau
* Stuff your eyes with wonder ... live as if you'd drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It's more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories. - Ray Bradbury
* The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. - Eden Phillpotts
* I thank you God for this most amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees, and for the blue dream of sky and for everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes. - e.e. cummings
* We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and to know the place for the first time. - T.S. Eliot
* The real mystery of life is not a problem to be solved, it is a reality to be experienced. - J.J. Van der Leeuw
* Wonder begins with the element of surprise. The now almost obsolete word 'wonderstruck' suggests that wonder breaks into consciousness with a dramatic suddenness that produces amazement or astonishment. ...Because of the suddenness with which it appears, wonder reduces us momentarily to silence. We associate gaping, breathlessness, bewilderment, and even stupor with wonder, because it jolts us out of the world of common sense in which our language is at home. The language and categories we customarily use to deal with experience are inadequate to the encounter, and hence we are initially immobilized and dumbfounded. We are silent before some new dimension of meaning which is being revealed. - Sam Keen
* The ultimate mystery is one's own self. - Sammy Davis, Jr
* It is important to have a secret, a premonition of things unknown. It fills life with something impersonal, a numinosum. A man who has never experienced that has missed something important. He must sense that he lives in a world which in some respects is mysterious; that things happen and can be experienced which remain inexplicable; that not everything which happens can be anticipated. The unexpected and the incredible belong in this world. Only then is life whole. For me the world has from the beginning been infinite and ungraspable. - Carl Jung
All day I think about it, then at night I say it.
Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing?
I have no idea.
...who is it now in my ear, who hears my voice?
Who says words with my mouth?
Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul?
I cannot stop asking. - Rumi
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