A professor has just finished lecturing at some august university about the origin and structure of the universe, and an old woman in tennis shoes walks up to the lectern. "Excuse me, sir but you've got it all wrong," she says. "The truth is that the universe is sitting on the back of a huge turtle." 

The professor decides to humor her "Oh really?" he asks. "Well, tell me, what is the turtle standing on?" 

The lady has a ready reply: "Oh, it's standing on another turtle." 

The professor asks, "And what is that turtle standing on?" 

Without hesitation, she says, "Another turtle." 

The professor still game, repeats his question. 
A look of impatience comes across the woman's face. 
She holds up her hand, stopping him in mid-sentence.
"Save your breath, sonny," she says. "It's turtles all the way down."

—Rolf Landauer

"What a strange machine man is. 

You fill him with bread, wine, fish, and radishes, 

and out come sighs, laughter and dreams." 

—Nikos Kazantzakis

"I often dream about failing. 

Such dreams are commonplace to the ambitious or those who climb mountains. 

Lately I dreamed I was clutching at the face of a rock, but it would not hold. Gravel gave way. 

I grasped for a shrub, but it pulled loose, and in cold terror I fell into the abyss. 

Suddenly I realized that my fall was relative; there was no bottom and no end. 

A feeling of pleasure overcame me. 

I realized that what I embody, the principle of life, cannot be destroyed.

It is written into the cosmic code, the order of the universe. 

As I continued to fall in the dark void, embraced by the vault of the heavens, 

I sang to the beauty of the stars and made my peace with the darkness."

― Heinz Pagels, 

physicist and quantum mechanics researcher 

before his death in a 1988 climbing accident

The Hole Mountain
or
A Life Without Mystery?

What would life be without mystery? While hiking in the Cajas, I took a photo that surprised me later when I got it home. Somehow, a curved wedge of sky had superimposed itself over the jagged rock face of a mountain. Obviously, it was an error, an artifact of a digital camera in technical confusion.

...Or perhaps not.

What is better, to explain all mysteries away or entertain their possibility? Sometimes the sky where the mountain should be is just a digital error. But must it always be? If we believe that, I wonder what drives such a need for a mystery-free certainty in life. People like that are a mystery to me.

It would be easy to start branding anyone who believed in the existence of mysteries. We could ostracize them if they dared to raise their addled heads or let their voices be heard. We could label them "Mystery Theorists" just like anyone who believes in the possibility of hidden schemes and agendas are now branded "Conspiracy Theorists." Of course there are no hidden schemes and agendas, especially among the elite and power-class of the world. Whoever thinks that deserves their tinfoil hat! Likewise, heaven forbid you ever get labelled a "Mystery Theorist." What immense ridicule you'd open yourself up to -- "Imagine that," they would laugh, "here we have one of those rare, peculiar sorts who actually believes in mysteries!"  Of course, everything is explainable they would insist. Not only is it explainable -- but the way one explains it has to make sense. And making sense has already been defined and agreed upon once and for all by the sensible people. The sensible people got to be the sensible people because they branded themselves so. And that's it. Case closed. Enough said.

My aberrant mountain photo made me think about the mystery of the ghost lighthouse. 

As the tall tale goes, old-time mariners who frequented the waters of the Bismarck Sea off the Northeast coast of Papua New Guinea would argue among themselves about the existence of a ghost lighthouse that shined its light only when ships were in peril. Adding to the mystery, not all ships in trouble saw the light. No one could ever figure out why some did when many didn't. 

Some swore they had seen the light blazing through the rains of angry typhoons while others offered to bet money to cash-in on the fact that no such thing happened. Part of the confusion lies in the fact there was no reliable way to see the lighthouse or find it once it had been seen. Those who had encountered it couldn't guide anyone back to it. They claimed they were lost in storms at the time. Most hadn't been sure of their bearings. All they knew was, whenever the light appeared a ship's captain took evasive action that saved his vessel from ending up broken on the reefs. 

Some industrious chaps, eager to collect on bets, actually led search parties through the islands in the area. Surveys of the coastlines of island after island yielded nothing. Even the best guesses of those who had seen the rescuing light were dashed when surveys of Mussau and Narega Islands found only sand and trees. And so the impasse lasted for many years - so many years that it extended beyond the lifetimes of many of the believing mariners. 

The story was almost forgotten until one stormy day a stranger walked into a bar on the island of New Britain and slapped down a photograph he said was the lighthouse matching the legend. Most ridiculed the man's suggestion. What proof was that, they shouted at him. There were no landmarks to be seen, just a lighthouse. It could be anywhere. Except, as one patron pointed out, there was one extraordinary peculiarity about the man's photo. At first, eager to dismiss the claim, none of the other naysayers had noticed what jumped out at them when given another look. On closer inspection, all had to agree to be dumbfounded. 

This lighthouse in the photo was in a small clearing, surrounded by tropical trees. How odd. Who would build a lighthouse inland? What would be the point? It was ridiculous. Except, as one patron pointed out, it appeared that the top of the lighthouse reached above the treeline. If someone should turn on the light mounted there at night, there was a very good chance it could be seen by ships at sea. Perhaps the surveys of the islands never located the place because the industrious chaps only looked along the shoreline, as was reasonable. But maybe the reasonable was thinking too small. Maybe the ghost lighthouse did exist. At least, this new wrinkle had revived the legend. 

By the time the patrons seriously considered the new evidence, the man and his photo had gone. To this day, there are sailors who swear a light appears on stormy nights for chosen mariners in peril. But to this day, no one can say where the saving light comes from, if it is real, or who turns it on. As one old sailor remarked while puffing on his pipe and walking away, "Fools! They'll never find the damned thing. It doesn't want to be found."

Who knows if the ghost lighthouse story is even true. Most likely, someone made it up -- one of those tall tales to amuse newcomers as they sink into the mysterious darkness of night with drinks around the fire. I'm not sure I'd enjoy being around a group of "Certainty Theorists" who deny the existence of mysteries or claim the unknown is just a collection of things not yet explained by their interpretation of the "sensible." People who are that overtly sensible seem to be in a self-hypnotized state of denial. They can't even see the mystery of why they act that way. For me, the Hole in the Mountain is most probably a digital error of a camera. But it's not a certainty. And I like that. I will always leave open the door to mysteries. I can't imagine a fulfilled life without them.

a sculptor chips away at stone
to reveal the image underneath
so too knowledge of yourself is gained 
by removing concepts

finding who you are by relating outside yourself
is like asking which star has the best position
everything is in the middle 
of where it needs to be
including you when you realize it

when you finally discover 
there's nothing you need do
to achieve the loftiest of spiritual goals,
whatever you do - don't try to do nothing

greater awareness comes from inner balance
inner balance comes from greater awareness
oh where to begin that which is done?

When does a good idea get better?
When a famous person says it, of course.

"Life is great" said by Gandhi or Einstein or even Wayne Gretzky will get traction - even if they didn't really say it. You'll see it quoted in articles, put on t-shirts, chiseled as epigraphs on buildings and statues, or solemnly repeated by valedictorians at commencement ceremonies.

If someone on the street says the same thing, good chance they're ignored, looked at suspiciously, or barked at dismissively, 'Oh, yeah? What the hell's wrong with you? What planet are you on?'

So next time you're standing by the water cooler, gabbing with the guy next door,
go ahead and say your good idea. Announce it loud and strong.

Just remember to attribute it to a famous person.
And be careful what celebrity you pick.
You might just stumble upon a truth you didn't expect.

• “What Orwell feared were those who would ban books.

What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book,
for there would be no one who wanted to read one.

• Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information.

Huxley feared those who would give us so much
that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism.

• Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us.

Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance.

• Orwell feared we would become a captive culture.

Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumble-puppy.

As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny ’failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.’

In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain.
In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure.

• In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us.

Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.”

– Neil Postman
Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
(New York, Penguin, 1985)