Complexity and life

It is not impossible to believe in intelligent design (or a creator) and the science of complex systems at the same time.

The most beautiful structures on Earth and in the universe are what we would call "natural"... and we believe they are beautiful because they contain patterns of such irreducible complexity, such beauty and intricacy that seemingly cannot be imitated and have no finite depth.

The more you investigate these patterns in the natural world, the more complexity emerges.

It is like inspecting a leaf and finding patterns of veins that get smaller and smaller while being of equal density the entire time — a set that is everywhere dense. Or many of the structures in nature which Buckminster Fuller talks about.

When we describe beautiful music we note that the instruments blend together, or of well-spoken language, fluency. This is the language of flow. Each note, or word, flows into the other, but the contribution of each distinct part is a necessary constituent of the "meaning" of the whole piece.

This is the language of movement: the motion between small primitives and grand abstractions. It is the union of discrete parts and a Whole that decsribes them. And movement is the essence of all things. If entropy, heat, the movement of particles, is so important for physicists, it must be so!

This Whole to which we all belong, and the feeling of oneness with the Whole, is God. Beyond denomination and belief.

If one rejects this proposal, if one reduces the schema of the universe to accidental chance, they must tread carefully to avoid losing the point. It is easy to reduce everything to just matter, just the accident of the Big Bang, as a way of saying "Ah, yes! I know this. I have categorized it. I will neither fear nor love it." It is the view that the universe has no particular meaning.

If a scientist does not stop to ponder with awe at the beauty of the infinite number line itself, the elegance of DNA sequences rendered into music, and so on, they risk becoming a cynical automaton.

Take for example the distribution of prime numbers on the square root spiral, pictured below. There is an irreducible, unknowable quality to it that inspires wonder and awe.

The sensation of the enlightened mathematician's discovery is almost the same as the shaman's revelation. It is a glimpse of knowing. This experience belongs to those who believe in truly universal laws.

Its best outcome is a deep sense of spiritual unity with others. Its worst outcome is a feeling of superiority that comes from a belief that knowledge can be owned by the ego.

A Creator is not a deliberate force acting from the sky, raining down hell and judgment. It is rather the very patterns that constitute us, we the Universe. The Creator is ourselves, as we are "just" atoms, and so on. But more than "just" atoms, we are atoms arranged beautifully. And beautiful objects, or beautiful subjects, are worthy of respect, exploration, and admiration.

Above: The seated Buddha and the Mandelbrot set.

Your creed does not matter. But your sense of unity with the world must not be lost.