Gathering Strangers

Every morning I walk through Whitworth Park on my way to work. At night it's quite an eerie place, the light from the art gallery shining like a beacon among the trees, and there is a sign above the gallery which says "Gathering of Strangers". Increasingly I feel that there are no strangers in the world. We are all connected. 

I had a weird and sad experience the other day because I had been watching the videos from the ANPA conference in 2020 (about which I wrote in the last blog). Why was I thinking about ANPA? Because I was thinking about astrology and physics and knew that Colin Rourke had presented on this. Why was I thinking about astrology? Because I'd had some powerful experiences for which astrological explanations are helpful and soothing. All of these things were necessary for me to start thinking particularly about how brilliant the contributions were from John Williamson - a remarkable physicist from Glasgow. I was first introduced to his work by my PhD supervisor Oleg Liber, who met John at the UK cybernetics society conference. John had been presenting on the fundamental importance of light in physics which formed the cornerstone of his work. I also knew John was ill. Very sadly, and almost at the same time as I was thinking about all this, he died. Far too young. 

He'd been doing remarkable work - particularly in chemistry. (That too is connected to my astrological interest). This is him talking at the 2021 ANPA conference about sub-quantum chemistry. Very noticeable how he sees quantum mechanics as music. We got on very well! The physics is not easy stuff though - but he had spent his life thinking about it, and he definitely knew what he was doing. He was also very interested in education, and wanted to work with me on developing a learning platform around his ideas. We never got around to it.  But now we have AI... and the transcripts from these talks can be easily processed, and re-explained by the technology. This may be important as we move away from traditional forms of academic communication towards more human and trust-oriented scientific practices.  

So I suppose this has put me in a mood which is both optimistic, and melancholic. There are people I am missing very deeply at the moment. And there is a lot going on which is stopping me getting too morbid. It will all work out ok. We are all connected after all. I even started something called "Gathering strangers". No strangers have gathered yet though... But maybe they will. 

But here is "Whitworth Park in the Dark" in the "Claire de lune"...