She Would Have Just As Soon Continued Wondering

Dale Chihuly

One of my favorite science writers is Carlo Rovelli, the Italian theoretical physicist and author of a dozen or so books, most of which are concisely written with the lay reader in mind. What makes him compelling is that he writes about those places where the scientist must be a philosopher and vice versa. In our modern world, we've come to fetishize science as the arbiter of truth, but what Rovelli does is revel in the reality that much of science is the act of wondering about the unknown.

As musician Tom Waits puts it, "Everything is explained now. We live in an age when you say casually to somebody, 'What's the story on that?' and they can run to the computer and tell you within five seconds. That's fine, but sometimes I'd just as soon continue wondering. We have a deficit of wonder right now."

Nothing grinds my teeth harder these days than sentences that begin, "Science tells us . . ." I write this fully aware that I've penned dozens of such sentences right here on the blog. But increasingly I find that when someone, including myself, does this, when someone asserts something like, "Neuroscientist's tell us . . ." they are attempting, at least at some level, to replace wonder with certainty. The more I read Rovelli and others (e.g., Robin Wall Kimmerer, David Hoffman, Patrick House) who work on the cutting edge of science, however, the more I come to appreciate that actual scientists tend to begin their sentences with "Our theory leads us to think . . ." or "Anthropologists suspect . . . " or, best of all, "I've come to believe . . ." They leave the wonder in there.

This may not be satisfying to those pity-worthy people who crave certainty. Those who cling, for instance, to the snake oil that is being called "The Science of Reading," often smugly boast that "the science is settled." If it's settled, it's not science, it's dogma. And while dogma may give us the illusion of certainty, it always winds up standing in the way of truth.

Schooling teaches us that the point of questions is answers. Life itself teaches us that the point of questions is wonder.

We had an old-fashioned hamster wheel at our school. Every day, often all day, a child would stop to show their wonder about this strange, out-of-place contraption. It was used by some to explore centripetal force, others included it in their dramatic play, some turned it over and drove it like some sort of one-wheeled vehicle. There was always some new way to include it in their play. One day, as a girl was using the circular part of the wheel as fencing for her herd of little ponies, a well-meaning adult informed her that she was playing with a hamster wheel. The girl asked, "Do we have any hamsters?" When she learned we didn't, she took her ponies elsewhere. Unsolicited answers have a way of shutting down wonder. Like Tom Waits, she would have just as soon continued wondering.

Yesterday, I came across a recently published scientific paper entitled "On the roles of function and selection in evolving systems," written by a 9-person team comprised of astrophysicists, geologists, and philosophers. In it, they propose a "missing law of nature." Of course, a journalist writing about the paper immediately attempted to frame their "discovery" with certainty, saying they "claim they have identified a missing law of nature," when, in fact, they do nothing of the sort. They wonder about it.

From the abstract:

The universe is replete with complex evolving systems, but the existing macroscopic physical laws do not seem to adequately describe these systems.

". . . do not seem . . ." That is an assertion of wonder.

Recognizing that the identification of conceptual equivalencies among disparate phenomena were foundational to developing previous laws of nature, we approach a potential "missing law" by looking for equivalencies among evolving systems. We suggest that all evolving systems -- including but not limited to life -- are compose of diverse components that can combine into configurational states that are then selected for or against based on function.

" . . . a potential "missing law" . . ." "We suggest . . ." " . . . that can combine . . ." Wonder.

When we identify the fundamental sources of selection -- static persistence, dynamic persistence, and novelty generation -- and propose a time-asymmetric law that states that the functional information of a system will increase over time when subjected to selection for function(s).

They do not, as the journalist claims, say they have "discovered" anything, but rather wondered their way into a proposed "law." In other words, they have given the rest of us a hamster wheel to wonder about.

They call this "The Law of Increasing Functional Information."

Building on Charles Darwin's famous theory of natural selection, which suggests that function exists to ensure the survival of the fittest when it comes to living things, these researchers, astoundingly, assert that it may also be applicable to non-living systems. Holy cow! What an exciting idea!

They point out that the universe is made of complex systems, from entire planets to atoms, that perpetuate themselves in ways that look strikingly like Darwin's theory. You can read the paper for yourself, but the part that jumps out at me is their suggestion that one of the ways that the natural selection of systems takes place is through "novelty generation." Dynamic systems of all kinds "explore new configurations which can lead to surprising new behaviors and characteristics." 

Isn't that exactly what children do when they are free to play: Explore new configurations which can lead to surprising new behaviors and characteristics? We know that many, if not most, animals play. Indeed, we are increasingly coming to believe that play is a key driver of evolution in animals. There are even those who have suggested that plants play. And now here we are considering the amazing idea that all of nature's systems -- living and non-living -- play. Not only that, this behavior that, at a minimum, shares a great deal with what we call play, behavior that is on its face non-functional, may be a key part of a foundational "law" describing how the entire universe functions.

That's something cool to wonder about.

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