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Back on 7th October I posed the question: “Is the Universe a Sphere?” This week, while reading a non-fiction book called Crystal & Dragon which I am reviewing for a magazine, I came across some interesting observation about the naturally occurring incidences of spheres. Here is an excerpt.
“Xenophanes, who was the first philosopher to put forward the idea of a single, supreme deity, believed that He, or rather It, would have to be in the form of a sphere! It is not easy to see how one could test that particular hypothesis, but it is now felt that the cosmos itself, in the most general way, expresses a spherical symmetry.
“It is not only our own planet that is spherical of course, but also all other large heavenly bodies. The Sun and the Moon, in common with all other stars, planets and their accompanying moons, adopt the shape of minimum surface area in response to the power of an attractive force…” Later in the same paragraph, he continues, “Many microscopic creatures, by virtue of their size and density relative to their surroundings, are symmetrical about a point, and some, including bacteria, algae and volvox, are completely spherical, a condition that they achieve by being fairly indifferent to the force of gravity.”
The author concludes that chapter with the statement, “With our present, though very different, notions of symmetry we have almost come full circle, back to those ancient Greek ideas of armonia, of a great ordering harmony that operates between every part of the universe and the universe as a whole.”
Taken from Crystal & Dragon – The Cosmic Dance of Symmetry & Chaos in Nature, Art & Consciousness by David Wade, 1991, Destiny Books USA
Image Credits:
Above Left: http://www.returntogod.com/Science/Dimensions.htm
Above Right: https://el.wikipedia.org/wiki/Υπερσμήνος_Λανιακέα
“Xenophanes, who was the first philosopher to put forward the idea of a single, supreme deity, believed that He, or rather It, would have to be in the form of a sphere! It is not easy to see how one could test that particular hypothesis, but it is now felt that the cosmos itself, in the most general way, expresses a spherical symmetry.
“It is not only our own planet that is spherical of course, but also all other large heavenly bodies. The Sun and the Moon, in common with all other stars, planets and their accompanying moons, adopt the shape of minimum surface area in response to the power of an attractive force…” Later in the same paragraph, he continues, “Many microscopic creatures, by virtue of their size and density relative to their surroundings, are symmetrical about a point, and some, including bacteria, algae and volvox, are completely spherical, a condition that they achieve by being fairly indifferent to the force of gravity.”
The author concludes that chapter with the statement, “With our present, though very different, notions of symmetry we have almost come full circle, back to those ancient Greek ideas of armonia, of a great ordering harmony that operates between every part of the universe and the universe as a whole.”
Taken from Crystal & Dragon – The Cosmic Dance of Symmetry & Chaos in Nature, Art & Consciousness by David Wade, 1991, Destiny Books USA
Image Credits:
Above Left: http://www.returntogod.com/Science/Dimensions.htm
Above Right: https://el.wikipedia.org/wiki/Υπερσμήνος_Λανιακέα
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