It struck me a couple days ago that "biology" is literally "the systematic study of life". Certainly it is life science, but what really got me thinking was the systematic part. To merely see something one only has to look; to study something thoroughly you must pick it apart and divide it into its less complex parts. Many times in order to study the life of some organism in biology you must take it apart as well. Poor frog.
I have walked a few feet from the lecture hall, and I can tell the gears are speeding up.
Life happens unlike it does in a biology textbook in the sense that the divisions of mitosis are not as clearly defined as they seem on page 493. One knows that a hummingbird flaps its wings 16 times a second, but even a fast motion camera has a very rapid succession of moment captures. If a moment is divided in half, and that half in half, and that half in half the end will never be reached; there is no continuous moments in the systematic documentation of an event.
My mind has rolled onto language as the basis for communication biological facts and other human knowledge. Writers often struggle to find the right words to describe some phenomena, a feeling, or a touch from our shared reality. Words are simply not enough many times; what they signify is not enough or too strong or just wrong. How can one truly convey the joy of a new relationship, the smile on the face of a loved one, or even the crushing sadness of loneliness? How do you describe others? Yourself?
If you try to think about it, you think you may have it for a second, but then the "realness" of it flashes across the stormy skies. A wisp of smoke and nothing more. But it's not really smoke, now is it? We speak in metaphors. The reality is that words are only representations of ideas, and not ideas themselves. Neither are ideas substantial things themselves. I am reminded of Plato's cave shadows. He must have had too much fun making shadow puppets.
So what then about mathematics? Surely, then, numbers must express ideas accurately, seeing as the same symbol always represents the same value. Then again, a number is only a representative of the idea of say, a carbon atom, or the quantity of books spilling onto the floor of one's living room. A triangle drawn on a whiteboard is only a representative of an idea of a triangle, and not a true triangle.
The number one hundred is nothing in the whole scope of infinity. All of human history exists on a two centimeter-long line on an infinite sheet of paper. If you are trying to comprehend that, you can't. It is impossible, seeing as we have only experienced this finite line.
There is one who can "comprehend" that sheet of paper, one whose mind can go around it all and who also understands every tiny detail. That one can know beyond numbers, communicate beyond words, and create flawlessly. The one is God, who cannot be systematically studied. Unless, of course, it is to vastly limit his abilities to your own perception, resulting in a shadow of a shadow of a shadow. Essentially, to "divide" God up into what aspect one is studying is to put that aspect in a box while ignoring all the others that naturally, simultaneously are. One lessens his complexity in one's own mind in applying such labels.
The truth is no amount of reading, talking, measuring, or praying will accomplish the task of anyone figuring him out. I'm sure he's fine with that - after all, we are beings divinely created and not divine ourselves, but we are perfectly made; "God saw what he had made, and it was good" -Genesis. So God really is beyond our comprehension. Doesn't mean we have to stop trying.
By this point I'm hungry and take a bite of sandwich. At least I can take a solid bite out of that.
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