The Rigor of Angels: Borges, Heisenberg, Kant, and the Ultimate Nature of Reality

Description

A poet, a physicist, and a philosopher explored the greatest enigmas in the universe—the nature of free will, the strange fabric of the cosmos, the true limits of the mind—and each in their own way uncovered a revelatory truth about our place in the world. [Amazon] 1. Unforgettable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 A man shows up in Moscow with an apparently flawless memory, and Borges writes a story pushing the idea to its extreme, touching on a paradox unearthed by Kant and explored by Heisenberg 2. A Brief History of This Very Instant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Kant’s struggle with Hume leads us back to ancient Greece, where we encounter a very “queer creature,” the instant of change 3. Visualize This!. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Heisenberg discovers discontinuity at the heart of reality and defends his chunky model against Schrödinger’s smooth waves PART II. NOT BEING GOD 4. Entanglements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Citing special relativity, Einstein sides with Schrödinger, and they come up with a crazy thought experiment that turns the physics world on its head 5. Sub Specie Aeternitatis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Back in Prussia, Kant asks what knowledge would be like for an omniscient being, and we are transported to the warring factions of early Christianity 6. In the Blink of an Eye. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Borges turns to the kabbalistic idea of the aleph to get over Norah, and finds new love while exploring the paradoxes of simultaneity PART III. DOES THE UNIVERSE HAVE AN EDGE? 7. The Universe (Which Others Call the Library) . . . . . . . . . 000 As his country flirts with fascism, Borges organizes the shelves of a municipal library he imagines to be without borders 8. Gravitas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Heisenberg’s conversations with Einstein reveal an underlying reconciliation between relativity and quantum mechanics in a vision of the cosmos foreseen by Dante 9. Made to Measure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Kant writes his third and final “Critique,” and his notion of beauty paves the way for an understanding of what guides inquiry in the physical sciences PART IV. THE ABYSS OF FREEDOM 10. Free Will . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Kant’s search for free will in a deterministic cosmos conjures the Roman patrician Boethius, who salvages freedom from fate while awaiting execution for treason in a dungeon in Pavia 11. Forking Paths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 The physicist Hugh Everett has the wild idea that new universes are birthed continuously, and Borges explores the same idea in a spy story 12. Putting the Demon to Rest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Heisenberg defends his decisions during the war, as we consider what his discovery meant for questions of free will and determinism Postscript . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Wherein we see how Borges, Kant, and Heisenberg, each in his own way, worked to undermine the e!ects of metaphysical prejudice Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 000