All posts filed under: Metaphysics

π and human suffering

Rede-phi-ning π: On Measuring a Circle

The following investigation is a product of the ongoing scientific inquiry ‘whence human suffering?‘, the same encountering a critical need to call into serious question the long-standing pi (π) “approximation” methodology (ie. of exhaustion) first employed by Archimedes (late, c. 287 – c. 212 BCE), and then by mathematicians and scientists ever since. To begin, the author draws attention to an important inquiry: ‘ does π ever naturally emerge as a product of a square? ‘ If so, it must be measureably so such to negate any/all need/inclining for “approximation” methodology(s) employing the use of multiple straight-edged polygons. Now consider the quadratic: x² – x – 1 = 0 and find it to have positive solution x = (1+√5)/2 which, as the reader may recognize, is the so-called golden ratio (hence: Φ). By expressing Φ in/on a base of 2π (thus generally applicable to rotational motion): Φ = (π+π√5)/2π = 1.618… and then squaring: Φ² = (3π+π√5)/2π = 2.618… we find a numerator difference (being a matter) of a discrete 2π: Φ² – Φ = 2π/2π …

Observer in cosmic mirror: objective observation

The Observer Observed

In a book I wrote some years ago—A Secret History of Consciousness—a reader can find this statement: “We can characterize the advance of science as the sole arbiter of truth by seeing in it the gradual expulsion of human consciousness from its object of study.” What I’d like to do here is to explore what I mean by this, to see where the “reality” behind this dictum has led the human mind and to look at a possible alternative to the methodology that such a view argues is unavoidable.