Out There

Some would say that what is "out there" is very close to "our description of the world and ourselves within it" - only a few phenomena cause illusions. Some would say - it is very far, even questioning the mere existence of it. The rest will glide within the spectrum of those two extremes. What is "out there" appears to be a question of a personal belief. We actually do not know.

Our instruments are constructed on the concepts of our everyday experiences. Consequently, the same phenomenon - the electron for example - is either detected as a particle or as energy. A possibility of phenomena that belong to neither of these two concepts should not be excluded.

This uncertainty is highlighted in areas outside our everyday experience as in quantum physics where our concepts of time, space, cause and effect or matter and energy dissolve into nothingness. Such difficulties indicate flaws in "our description of the world and ourselves within it" that governs what and how we perceive. This line of thinking leads us to some interesting questions. Are there things "out there" that are inadequately incorporated in "our description of the world and ourselves within it" or that were never part of it? Can we then perceive them or detect them through our instruments? Indications are all over the place, but until we change "our description of the world and ourselves within it" we will not be able to see them or to build adequate instruments to detect them. Before the change we may have our beliefs, but after the change we will have knowledge.

Some organisms have enormous genomes and studies indicate an accumulation of "junk DNA" created through mistakes in multiplications. Humans appear to be on the "tidy" side and a possibility of a better "DNA Expression" replacing a previous, bulky one should not be discarded.

Changes in "our description of the world and ourselves within it" occur naturally and could be followed through history even to the genetic level. However, a deliberate, systematic and interdisciplinary effort should yield much better results. (I would refrain though from interfering with our genetic makeup in an attempt to resolve contradictions in quantum theory. We might end as Schrödinger's cat.)