Hydrogen and Religion (with a footnote on sexism)
To see a World in a grain of sand,
And a Heaven in a wild flower;
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.
(Stanza from Auguries
of Innocence)
In the late 1980’s, in connection with some translating from Italian I was doing regularly in connection with my job, it became clear to me that I needed to learn some chemistry, since I had never studied it previously. My daughter teaches chemistry, and she sent me the teacher’s manual of her textbook, and over the course of a very long year I went through it as well as some other textbooks and some “teach yourself chemistry” books until I reached a point where I could handle the translations properly in our area of interest. I mention this limited background because I want to make it clear that, though the basic scientific observations I shall cite come straight from those texts, I make no claims to actually being a chemist.
I do claim to be a Unitarian Universalist, however, and I brought that perspective to my study of chemistry. Frankly, I was dumb-struck and overawed by one scientific fact that I discovered. I want to examine it in some detail with you today.
But, before doing that, with your kind permission I would like to read you a few lines from physicist Brian Greene’s recent book, The Fabric of the Cosmos [Vintage Books, 2004, 569 pages]. I do this in order to help set the focus of my talk. This is a highly technical yet readable book, wherein he examines string theory, dark matter and other exotic and difficult concepts. Yet, on the very first page I found a pleasant surprise, for he talks at length on Albert Camus’ The Myth of Sisyphus, a topic which I and others have delved into previously from this podium. As you will recall, for Camus, suicide or “is life worth living,” is the primary question for humankind[1]. Green expounds:
“I remain convinced. . .that Camus rightly chose life’s value as the ultimate question, but the insights of modern physics have persuaded me that assessing life through the lens of everyday experience is like gazing at a van Gogh through an empty Coke bottle. . . And so, whereas Camus separated out physical questions and labeled them secondary, I’ve become convinced that they’re primary. For me, physical reality both sets the area and provides the illumination for grappling with Camus’ question. Assessing existence while failing to embrace the insights of modern physics would be like wrestling in the dark with an unknown opponent. By deepening our understanding of the true nature of physical reality, we profoundly reconfigure our sense of ourselves and our experience of the universe.” (The Fabric of the Cosmos, p. 5)
I hope to explore one tiny aspect of the possibility of “reconfiguring our sense of ourselves”[2] through one fact from my study of chemistry. The purpose is not to give a chemistry lesson, but rather to try to convey to you, on this beautiful morning, how I found this so very uplifting to the spirit, and how it has helped my understanding of many ancient texts.
One of the principles of Unitarianism Universalism is: Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. One purpose of my talk today is to argue that this interdependent web is not just wishful thinking or some nebulous “pie-in-the-sky” idea that somebody dreamed up to make us all feel good. It has a scientific basis in reality that goes well beyond the obvious fact—in addition to the global warming menace-- that if, for instance, frogs continue to go extinct at the current accelerated rate, we will soon be overrun with bugs and have to contend with numerous other environmental problems that will sadly result. It is much deeper than even that. I also hope to demonstrate that one aspect at least of this fundamental interconnectedness idea exists in one form or another in many other Faiths as well, and thus the various Faiths are more alike than one would at first imagine. Now to the argument.
The scientific fact that astounded me, and on which all the chemistry books agree, is this: Hydrogen makes up about 91 percent of all the atoms (visible matter) in the universe. The other 9 percent is made up of Helium. That means, that all of the other elements we are familiar with: iron, sodium, zinc, carbon, calcium and so forth, and all of the things we use every day that are made from these elements and their compounds, constitute only that one tenth of one percent that is not Hydrogen or Helium.
All the elements of the Periodic Table have been generated throughout the eons, directly or indirectly, from Hydrogen.[3] Hydrogen is, then, very special, very special indeed. Further, since over 90 % of the human body is composed of just three elements: Oxygen, Carbon, and Hydrogen; and since Oxygen and Carbon [as well as all the other elements in the body] all came from Hydrogen, without Hydrogen there would certainly be no human bodies and arguably no life forms at all.
Human beings are often referred to in sic-fi movies as “carbon units”. This is certainly true, but we must remember that as part of innumerable carbon compounds, Hydrogen is present in all animal and vegetable tissue, so, from a scientifically historical perspective, referring to humans as Hydrogen units--once removed--would be more accurate.
Our experiential universe, then, is really composed of Hydrogen, slightly contaminated by Helium, and very little else. The data suggest that Hydrogen may be the basic substance of the universe. All elements heavier than Hydrogen have been synthesized from Hydrogen by nuclear reactions in the stars. As the late Carl Sagan was fond of saying, we are all made of “star stuff”. And that star stuff is Hydrogen and its derivatives.
As I said, all the textbooks agree on the role of H in the development of other elements and compounds. I suspect that some of you, perhaps all of you are well aware of this. Regrettably, I had lived for half a century before I learned it. I was curious to know how this astounding fact was discovered and why nobody talked about it very much. The textbooks were mum on the history; they just stated the fact as if it were obvious and had more or less always been known.
I went elsewhere to research the history and took some solace in the astounding truth that, though I had lived fifty years in the dark, nobody who died before 1925 knew the phenomenal role and abundance of H either, for that was the year it was discovered[4]: Which brings me to my footnote on sexism.
The discovery that H is
the most abundant element in the universe was made possible by British born
Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin in 1925, in her Harvard doctoral dissertation, Stellar Atmospheres[5]. In
it she contends that the Sun and other stars are composed mainly of Hydrogen. Her
professors, some of the leading astronomers of the day, declared that
her thesis was “impossible,” and she was obliged to add a disclaimer to that
effect at the end of her dissertation.
The scientific
consensus at the time, based mainly on spectroscope readings, was that the Sun and
other stars were likely composed of heavy elements such as silicon, carbon and
even iron. Payne read the same
spectroscope lines as the other scientists but concluded they were indicating
H, not iron or any heavy elements, and she was right. She died in 1979 and never
really received the recognition she deserved.
Worse that that, she
was encouraged by her advisors to enter another area of astronomy. Just five years after her dissertation had
been declared impossible, it should be noted, her advisor published her
findings under his own name. (I won’t give you his name—out of spite!)
This is a case study in
establishment arrogance, jealousy, and perhaps sexism. Even now, no one outside academia has ever
heard of Cecilia Payne Gaposchkin.
Clearly, her discovery was revolutionary; it changed the whole approach
to studies on the origins of the Universe and to how elements are formed. So
today we study: Newton’s laws, Darwin’s Evolution, and Einstein’s
Theory of Relativity, but apparently “Anonymous” discovered the essential
makeup of the stars and the genesis of the elements in the Universe. Cecilia Payne was positively brilliant and
doesn’t even get so much as a plaque anywhere.
To return to our
topic: we will not be discussing Albert
Camus today, but we will definitely be looking at some other literature. However, please bear with me as I cover some
more technical aspects and history, for I believe it is very helpful to be
aware of the limits of perspective of our predecessors so we can better
appreciate what they were trying to express.
Just as modern psychology recognizes and marvels at the genius of
Shakespeare’s insights into human motivation and character, though he lacked
the vocabulary and precise concepts of the post-Freudian era. [Even your average cab-driver today can give
you some psychoanalysis on the way to the airport if you like. We are all imbued with words like: subconsciously,
sublimation, ego, paranoia, Oedipus complex, and a host of others to
express concepts for which earlier generations had no words. So, we are being
unfair and presentist in the extreme when we read early texts and dismiss their
ideas as shallow because they fail the express them in our terms.]
What is Hydrogen?
At this point it may be useful to define just what we are talking
about. Briefly. Hydrogen was
discovered in 1766 by Henry Cavendish, a British scientist. It was later
given the name Hydrogen by Lavoisier (1743-1794), from the Greek for “maker of
water”; the reason is that when Hydrogen is burned with Oxygen, the by-product
is water.[6]
In its elemental form Hydrogen exists at room temperature as a colorless, odorless, tasteless gas. The most common isotope of Hydrogen, 1/1H[7] has a nucleus consisting of a single proton. That is, totally unlike other atoms, there is no neutron. There are other isotopes of Hydrogen, and indeed Hydrogen is combined with many other elements to form molecules of compounds: the most abundant and most famous is probably H/2 O: More about that later.
For me, the essential point is that H is the simplest element, yet it led to the most complex. We do know that the temperatures required to make elements are much hotter than our Sun, so our Sun is not making elements.[8]
But, whatever the exact nature of the process of
nucleosynthesis, to me, the fact that such diversity and beauty can have
evolved from the simplest atom is nothing short of fantastic. It is fantastic in the sense that it is
something that nobody could have predicted. It also remains a mystery. As Aldous Huxley once said, “Science has
‘explained’ nothing; the more we know the more fantastic the world becomes and
the profounder the surrounding darkness.”
(Famous Quotations.)
To me it is as though Hydrogen were a crystal prism, which when it is turned reveals all the colors. Of course, the analogy limps because we know that the colors are already in the light and the prism merely brings them into evidence. With Hydrogen, on the other hand, that simple atom with no neutron apparently had it all. Perhaps: including light. Talk about not believing in Evolution: the elements themselves have “evolved,” and it has really been going on since the big bang; that is, if there was one.
Discovering that Hydrogen was the basic substance of the Universe reminded me of Aristotle’s theory of “Hylomorphism” and his concept of prime matter. Aristotle did not know about Hydrogen, but the mystery of change of form intrigued him. That is, you eat an apple, but you do not become an apple. What happens to the nature of the apple that it can become you in one case or a horse in another and so forth? He offered the concept of prime matter, which was the basic substance of everything, but its form was changed depending on which organism had consumed it or combined with it. Today we know that the DNA determines what Aristotle would call the “nature” of an organism, but it is not an exaggeration to say, I believe, that ultimately, Hydrogen or its derivatives is the “prime matter” that nuclear fusion enabled to change to other elements and which the DNA is controlling in organic matter.
Aristotle, then, like UU’s, believed in the interdependent web of all existence. Let’s remember that even through the Enlightenment, science did not really accept this idea. The distinction between organic and inorganic chemistry, for instance, was dependent on the carbon-based units, which were alive, or had once been alive. It was believed --following the vitalist theory--that organic compounds could be made only in living substances. However, in 1828, Friederich Woehler, A German chemist, succeeded in creating an organic compound from an inorganic substance.[9] This was revolutionary, and it showed that the “scientific” distinction between the organic and the inorganic--though useful--was artificial. Matter and life were a continuum--a fact suspected by Aristotle, and long believed by religions and spoken of in literature.
As Shakespeare’s Hamlet says, “There are more things in
Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in your philosophy.” Or, perhaps, by way of a more humbling
reminder of our own reality, in the same play we hear: “A man may fish with the worm that has eat
of a king, and eat of the fish that has fed of that worm. (Shakespeare, Hamlet Act 4, Scene 3)
Let us examine briefly some religions to see how the
interconnectedness—which we believe in and which Hydrogen has created on a
molecular level --has been interpreted and how we can take courage from the
fact that we are not alone and that we are kindred spirits with them.
When ancient Incas and other religions adored the Sun, they were recognizing this simple/complex truth. They couldn’t have known about Hydrogen, or that the Sun converts five million tons of matter into energy every second; that it has a Hydrogen core which during nuclear fusion creates Helium, but they knew that the Sun gave life. Indeed, in his Golden Bough (Gramercy, 1981, pp. 225-233[originally published, 1891]), Frazer describes several mythologies from the Mediterranean and elsewhere, that believed that the Sun could actually impregnate maidens.
One could mention the Egyptian Sun god, RA, belief in which may have evolved into monotheism. Then there is the Japanese Sun god, Amaterasu, considered the supreme ruler of the world, and still the national symbol of Japan. There are also several Indo-European myths that offer such images as four white horses pulling the Sun in its orbit. Many ancient rulers claimed to be descendants of the Sun. Finally, one of the greatest Roman holidays, Sol Invictus, celebrated the “Unconquered Sun,” and it was celebrated on December 25. So the very date chosen for Christmas still shows our historical interconnectedness with each other and to that great Hydrogen reactor in the sky.
The theme of this talk adds nothing of substance to the belief in reincarnation in Hinduism and other religions, since the idea there is that a spirit assumes a different form. However, from a purely physical point of view, perhaps the Hydrogen connection can make the morphology clearer and the mythology less fantastic to the Western mind.
Let me quote a few lines from the five-thousand-year-old Bhagavad-Gita (Mentor Books, 1960, p. 132), where Nirvana is defined as: “. . . a state marked on the positive side by a sense of liberation, inward peace and strength, insight into truth, the joy of complete oneness with reality, and love toward all creatures in the universe.” Knowing about H made that text much clearer to me.
Further along, the Bhagavad-Gita continues: “When, at the end of a time cycle, or kalpa, the universe is dissolved, it passes into a place of potentiality, a seed state, and thus awaits its next creation.” I ask you, from what we have understood so far, what is the most likely substance of that “seed”? Certainly, Hydrogen, with its single proton and no neutron could fill the bill[10].
With respect to Buddhism, I shall limit myself to two quotations from Suzuki: Quoting a Buddhist leader from the Fourth Century:
“Ungan once asked a monk:
“Where have you been?
The monk answered: “We have been talking together on the rock.
The master asked: “Did the rock nod, or not?”
The monk did not reply, whereupon the master remarked: “The rock had been nodding even before you began to talk.”
Suzuki explains: “Nature
is already Man, or otherwise no Man could come out of it. It is ourselves who fail to be conscient of
that fact.” (D.T. Suzuki, Zen
Buddhism, Doubleday, 1956, p. 248.) I would suggest that in a deep sense, Nature
and Mankind are really a “singularity.” Here as well, knowing about Hydrogen
makes this text more understandable. I hope you feel that way too.
References to this interdependent web are myriad and transcend cultures. Let me quote a Chinese sage from the 7th Century, Seng-t’san (d. 606):
Pursue not the outer entanglements,
Dwell not in the inner void;
Be serene in the oneness of things,
And dualism vanishes by itself.
(From: “On Trust in the Heart”)
Now, you might ask, where did I get this quote? From some dusty, ancient manuscript that only lonely souls peruse? No, it’s quoted inside the cover of a popular book, made into a movie just a few years ago: Horse Whisperer, starring Robert Redford. This is manifestly, universal interconnectedness. Normal people (not necessarily scientists) in all cultures can relate to it, we feel it.
Since Hydrogen is involved in beginnings, I would like to take just a few moments to examine Genesis from the Hydrogen perspective. The Bible begins: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth; the earth was waste and void; darkness covered the abyss, and the spirit of God was stirring above the waters.” (Genesis I, 1-2.) One could make the common sense argument that if there was a void, how could there be waters? However, we now know that many sub-atomic particles are passing unseen even through what we call a vacuum, and that nothing is really empty. Since we also know that water is Hydrogen (and Oxygen made from Hydrogen), to say that there was water in the original void makes the mythology much more understandable. Furthermore, it wasn’t until 1784 with the work of Henry Cavendish, that science itself learned that water was not a basic element. Remember the Greeks: Earth, Wind, Fire, and Water?[11] Since, as we know, Hydrogen means maker of water, using water in this mythology, was certainly the best word available to render the concept.
A little later Genesis continues: “Then God said, ‘Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters to divide the waters.’ And so it was. God made the firmament, dividing the waters that were below the firmament from those that were above it. God called the firmament Heaven.” (Genesis, I, 6-8) Now, a Philistine might ask, “How can you make a firmament (stars) out of water?” Well, we know, right?
Please allow me one final quote from Genesis: “Then God said, “Let the waters below the
heavens be gathered into one place and let the dry land appear.’ And so it
was.” (Genesis I, 9)
Again, taken literally this myth seems to suggest that the waters were pushed to the side so the land could be seen. That raises the question: Where are the levees? Obviously, since Hydrogen, the maker of water, is also the maker of land and everything else, in scientific terms the land could well have appeared because it came from the “water.” Not by magic, or necessarily by anything supernatural, but by the power of Hydrogen reaction.
Now, someone might be thinking: Wetzel is defending ancient texts, reading in modern ideas trying to give credibility to the incredible. Well, I would like to suggest that that is not the case. I am simply taking my cue from Joseph Campbell and trying to understand without preconceptions what they were trying to say. What I am saying is that Genesis might be intuitively using the word water as a kind of element with the potentiality for creating other elements that H had in fact done. My limited study of chemistry has given me a new understanding of the reality that the mythology is trying to convey. It is still a myth or religious belief, not science, but I am humbled by it.
This idea of the interconnectedness of humanity, the stars, and water is found also in the Koran. For instance, in the eighty-sixth (LXXXVI) Sura, which is titled “The Night-Star,” we find:
“So let man consider of what he was created;
he was created of gushing water...”.
I leave it to the theologians to explain why the creation of mankind from rushing water is given in a Sura titled The Night-Star. There is no apparent connection, but I have given you mine.
Finally, let me quote Blake again, and I ask you kindly to consider this text now in light of the arguments I have presented:
To see a World in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower[12].
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.
(Stanza from Auguries of Innocence
By William Blake—1757-1827)
Einstein once said: “The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.” (Dictionary of Quotations) Following Joseph Campbell’s tremendous work on mythologies, might we not say that science might often serve also as a refinement of mythology?[13]
We have seen that
Hydrogen has given life and all visible matter. What else? Well, of
course, we have the H-bomb, whose famous “father” was that
Hydrogen-unit-once-removed, know as Dr. Edward (Ede) Teller. For many years it was quite possible--and
one must admit it is still possible--that the H bomb can end life as we know
it. Besides being a tragedy, it would
be, we can now maintain, somewhat ironic.
To paraphrase: H giveth and H
can taketh away.
Now, at a moment
when the very air we breath is threatened more seriously than ever by burning
fossil fuels and other carbon-based smoke, even Americans who do not believe in
the interdependent web of existence
will still have to admit, someday perhaps from behind their oxygen masks, that
we are certainly “connected” to each other. Further, when the ozone layer is
being threatened by chlorofluorocarbons,
which are actually (Hydrogen-based) halogenated hydrocarbons, what can
one say that is positive about Hydrogen?
Well, I believe
that if we are to be saved, at least from air pollution due to transport
vehicles, Hydrogen is the only ultimate answer. As you know, unlike any other combustion, Hydrogen fuel is
essentially non polluting.
So, in the beginning
was Hydrogen, in the most realistic, physical and biological sense, Hydrogen
created us. It may well be that it will
keep us from suffocating to death.
Some may indeed wonder if the interconnectedness-interdependence continues in any special way beyond the grave. Today, when we have a profusion of books on the “Near-death experience,” this is a hot topic; people are naturally curious. I believe this has always been so, and I have found it profoundly strange that when Lazarus was raised from the dead after four days in the grave, nobody asked him: “Lazarus, tell us: What was it like?” Apparently, Eugene O’Neil found this curious as well, for he wrote a play (1927) called, “Lazarus Laughed”. He laughed, he says, because “it was all so simple.”
Ladies and gentlemen, if Hydrogen is a model, it really is as profoundly simple as can be. We are totally interdependent, because in Hydrogen we are one.
Now, I hope that the next time you enjoy a glass of water to slake you thirst, you will ponder the mystery and power of the Hydrogen within it that is giving you life, and how it connects us to everything and to each other. Thank you.
* * * * * * * *
Presented to the NCUU, Lecanto, FL, May 21, 2006
--By Joe Wetzel
[1] Of course, Green does not imply that Camus was the first to raise the question, rather, that Camus raises it in a special way for the modern age by looking at an old myth with a completely un-traditional, positive attitude. The question recurs regularly throughout Western literature. We will recall that Socrates said that the unexamined life was not worth living, we have Hamlet’s immortal phrase: “To be, or not to be, that is the question.,” etc.
[2] This concept should become clearer as we proceed. However, as a backdrop, let’s imagine the “sense of themselves” of people living in the middle Ages: the world was flat and stationary; the Sun moved around it, the stars were fixed in the heavens to illuminate our nights, etc. Now, we can still sit by a brook and enjoy the serenity as they did, but we know that we are also moving at tremendous speed: the Earth spins on its axis at over 1000 mph; the Earth orbits around the Sun at 65,000 mph; and the Sun with us and all its planets is moving around the center of the Milky Way galaxy at nearly 500,000 mph. Clearly, we simply can’t view “ourselves” in the same way they did. Likewise for those who learn more about the origins and the composition of the Universe.
[3] Some might argue that recently discovered elements such as, neptunium, fermium, rutherfordium, meitnerium, etc. were not made during the eons. Yes, but the point is these are mostly “transuranium” elements; so, they are made in the laboratory by bombarding uranium, which came from Hydrogen. Thus, they are in the same chain coming from Hydrogen as all other elements.
[4] Just imagine: Einstein published his Special Theory of Relativity in 1905 and his General Theory of Relativity in 1915. That is, even he did not know about the extent of H in the Universe when he gave us his tremendous insights. Of course he didn’t need to know and the two topics are not directly related, but I found it a very curious and interesting fact of history.
[5] Her brilliant dissertation is highly technical and covers many other aspects of star formation and composition as well, but these are beyond the scope of this paper.
[6] When Hydrogen was
discovered in 1766, by the British scientist, Henry Cavendish, he called it,
inflammable air. At the time of this discovery
of H, some thought it to be pure “phlogiston”.
Phlogiston comes from the Greek for “burned,” it was the name given to a
hypothetical substance responsible for combustion and other processes, by
George Ernst Stahl in the early 18th Century.
Joseph Priestley, a famous Unitarian and discoverer of Oxygen, noted
that when H was exploded in a chamber, moisture remained on the walls. He ignored this and persisted in the
“phlogiston” theory that his oxygen was really “dephlogisticated air” when
other chemists had abandoned it in favor of the Oxygen theory of
combustion. Priestley was unaware,
though others soon realized, that he had proved that air was a compound of
hydrogen and oxygen, not an element as had been believed since even before
Aristotle. In any event, in 1781
Cavendish confirmed that water was formed when Hydrogen was burned, and
Lavoisier coined the French word, hydrogène,
from which the English word is derived.
Lavoisier got it from the Greek, which means maker of water.
[7] For the technically minded: Naturally occurring hydrogen consists of three isotopes: hydrogen-1, or protium, 99.985%; hydrogen-2, or deuterium, 0.015%; and hydrogen-3, or tritium, a minute trace. Tritium can be produced artificially; it is radioactive, having a half-life of 12.26 years. H is the lightest chemical element, has the highest heat conductivity, and the highest coefficient of diffusion of all the gases. It also has the lowest boiling point. Under proper conditions, it combines directly with most of the lighter elements and with many of the heavier elements.
[8] It should be pointed out the our Sun is not making elements today except helium. Element making likely occurred a few hundred thousand years after the Big Bang. Our Sun is c. 20 million degrees. To get the proton-proton chain going requires temperatures in excess of 100 million degrees—possible only in imploding stars. When they finally break up, (as super novas) the elements are released.
[9] He heated an inorganic compound, ammonium cyanate. From this procedure, he found that the organic compound urea was formed. Innumerable synthetic products that we use every day were made possible by this new knowledge.
[10] Some will no doubt argue that the “real” seed would be sub-atomic particles such as neutrinos, muons, quarks, wimps, etc. They have a point. However, in dealing with the matter of which we are made I have chosen to stop the chain of causality at the atom, H. This is because until the sub-atomic particles, typically moving randomly, actually coalesce into atoms, we have “potentiality,” not matter that leads to us. Those particles are really “exotic” matter and if we get into that area, we will also have to discuss dark matter, dark energy, etc. Then we will see that all the matter resulting from H is only fiver percent of the total mass of the Universe: That is, what we can see is only 5 percent; but Dark Matter, which we cannot see, makes up twenty-five percent, and likewise invisible Dark Energy makes up about seventy percent. OK. But to me, H is to our existence as a grain of wheat is to a loaf of bread. If we want to talk about bread—where it comes from and how to make it--, we do not have to get into osmosis and the Sun or other processes. They are interesting and worthy but an entirely different subject. Likewise for sub-atomic particles and exotic matter—whatever the latter is composed of, which is still a mystery.
[11] Of course, Aristotle added
a fifth element, ether, to explain certain cosmic phenomena. I wonder what Aristotle would have said if
he were alive today and knew about Hydrogen.
[12] This image can operate on many levels. As only one such, I feel that Blake could well be imagining a view that has been made possible literally only recently by high mathematics in the form of fractals. Each image of a fractal, however small, when exploded by PC software can include the total image, likewise for any part of the image.
I am reminded of a recent children’s’ film, “The Grinch Who Stole Christmas”. This movie begins with a winter scene, then focuses with a super-close-up on a single snowflake. The camera enters the snowflake to reveal a whole world with its own characters, and the entire action of the film takes place therein. When the story ends, the camera pulls back to reveal the original winter scene in “our” world. Blake would have loved it, probably alone amount his contemporaries. Today, these possibilities are readily accepted even by children...
[13] The idea of a single element responsible for all matter, life, light, is hinted at, I believe in John, I, 1-4 : “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God; and the Word was God. 2. He was in the beginning with God. 3. All things were made through him, and without him was made nothing that has been made. 4. In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” St. John is certainly not talking about Hydrogen. But speaking literally, he is talking about potentiality and Hydrogen certainly had within it the what was needed to create all the elements. So, to a great extent, the Biblical text may have a parallel in science.