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Karin Louise Hermes posted an update
There probably aren’t that many quantum theorists here from STEM disciplines, but I wanted to bring this in for the purpose of:
1. metaphors
2. meanings for design/chaos/order and “spacetime”
3. the Indigenous knowledges across different languages and spaces that may be more “advanced” than Western design, namely that “seafoam” or “foam of the sea” is a translation to the Andean creator deity Wiracocha, the “ordenador” or “creador” of the universe. In Spanish “ordenador” is also the word for “computer,” while the other name to Wiracocha is Pachacamac, which translates from Quechua to “maker” of kamay “energy” to pacha “spacetime.”
I’m interested in these metaphors and dialogues across cultural knowledge systems, and this Andean/Quechua context in particular, because it maps on to philosophy and physics in words now used in English-language research. Relativity and spacetime and quantum computing are very recent formulations in “Western science” of the past century, but Andean pacha is spacetime and relationality/relativity of spirit and matter (aka energy and mass).
The numerous pre-Columbian cultures in the Andean region left no “writing” but their material cultures demonstrate hydrological engineering feats and “non-monetary” societies, with the impacts of the El Niño phenomenon being key to some of these features significant to adapting to changing climates and holistic thinking/being/doing. Maybe there was good reason for not “inventing the wheel,” in the sense of cars killing the climate…
Would love to connect with anthropologists or others familiar with these ideas, especially of estuaries, spacetime, and energy/spirit, across and beyond my main/original regional focus of Southeast Asian and Oceanian cultures. I also happen to have recently started research/teaching for “Philosophy of Science” at a German university that does quantum and nano technology, with my first course being “Decolonial Metaphysics.”
https://bigthink.com/hard-science/nothing-exist-quantum-foam/
bigthink.com
"Nothing" doesn't exist. Instead, there is "quantum foam"
Quantum physics shows that there is no such thing as "nothing." Even in a vacuum, particles can blink into and out of existence.
3 Comments-
not that many quantum theorists–yet!
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Welcome Karin it’s good to see you here. And these are important questions. I’m personally fascinated by ideas in comparative metaphysics. I can think of instances I’ve encountered in India that are also quite mind-bending, and nourishing from an ecological vantage point. The Tamil word for history, for example, is வரலாறு or varalaaru, literally “the river of what comes.” So time is a river in a more than metaphorical sense here. We have a discussion Forum here on the platform, this would be a great topic for a thread, if you’d like to start one.
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Thank you for the warm and encouraging welcome, still finding my bearings again but am happy to spread the word to more environmental humanities and anthro and multimedia/design contacts to collect here, as other social media becomes less social! When posting this as my sort of intro of “here I am,” I was reminded of how I brought in the nano optics of bird feathers for metaphysics and design in the last EDC discussion I popped into before, as well as estuarine mangroves in the first one (I think I only attended two…).
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