Omer Learning: Day 32

I have been learning to see G-d’s presence in the physical laws governing the universe. One thing I’ve learned from my job is how hard it is for people to make rules. No matter how hard rulemakers try for clarity, precision, and harmony, it’s not unusual for their results to be inelegant, contradictory, or susceptible to different interpretations. When rules go into operation, it takes time to figure out how they apply, and they have consequences the rulemakers did not foresee. Sometimes the rules create problems of their own. The world changes, and before long, it’s time to rewrite the rules again.

The universe’s rules are not like that. Matter, energy, and the laws they follow came into being with the universe itself, and have stayed the same ever since. Some important parts of the universe’s fabric — numbers like pi, phi, and e, for example — are beyond human ability to understand, and can only be approximated. Others — like electromagnetism and gravity, relativity and quantum mechanics — are in tension that humans have yet to resolve. Yet the rules are comprehensive, and they mesh perfectly: When a particle is subjected to magnetic and gravitational forces, it doesn’t seem to have to wait for a decision on what to do.

If the universe’s rules transcend human understanding, and work more perfectly than ones human intelligence could devise, why not infer something beyond human understanding and intelligence beyond them? As Maimonides says, knowledge and love of G-d flow from knowledge of the universe, and contemplation of His works.
–Steve Schwartz