Okay, this week’s post is going to get a little nerdy.
And it’s going to kick more than a few sacred cows down the hill…
(Probably all of them.)
So if you’re easily distracted—or easily offended—better give this one a pass…
It’s about Einstein’s struggle to create his theory of gravity.
And what he had to let go of in order to get it.
The role that metaphysics play in physics…
And how spirituality can let go too, and evolve into something better.
It all starts back in 1913…
Einstein was working on his general theory of relativity.
The one that eventually overturned Newton’s theories of gravity…
And gave us black holes, and Big Bangs.
And ushered in the modern era of space exploration and cosmology.
It’s become one of the two pillars of contemporary physics.
But in 1913, all that was still on the horizon…
In 1913, Newton’s theories still reigned.
And Einstein was frustrated and stuck.
He had already completed his special theory…
The one that made E=mc2 famous. (That theory is “special” because it describes a universe without gravity.)
He knew that gravity wasn’t a disembodied “force,” as Newton had envisioned…
And that it caused objects to fall along geometric lines in spacetime.
And he knew that he was almost to the right answer.
But there was one problem that he simply could not resolve…
It was a problem with coordinate systems.
And with the nature of empty space.
It was a problem with metaphysics.
And a principle called general covariance.
General covariance is the idea that a theory should not rely on any particular coordinate system in order for it to work.
Think of the way that we use latitude and longitude to navigate the Earth…
We chose to make the meridians run through the poles—the parallels follow the equator—and we placed the Prime Meridian in London.
But we could just as well have run the meridians through Alaska. And dropped the Prime Meridian in Vegas.
It might feel a little wonky, but it would still work. We could still use a GPS, or sail across the Pacific.
A coordinate system is a coordinate system.
It doesn’t change the Earth itself.
Well, the same thing applies to physics…
Changing coordinate systems shouldn’t change the underlying physics.
Unfortunately, that was precisely the situation that Einstein was running into…
Changing coordinates did change the physics.
And he was despondent over the result.
So much so that he tried to “spin” his way out of the situation, like a cornered politician.
It’s a situation that all of us can learn from…
But in order to understand what really happened, we have to talk about the nature of space itself…
Einstein in a Hole
The thing about space is that we all think about it in an “obvious” way…
Einstein included.
We imagine space like an empty container…
Filled with energy and light and little lumps of stuff.
Take all the stuff away… and you’re left with empty space.
Add the stuff back in… and you fill space up again.
Sounds familiar, right?
It’s the metaphysics of common sense.
And it works just fine for everyday life.
But for Einstein? Not so much…
See, the thing about turning gravity into geometry, is that gravity doesn’t just tell the things in space how to fall…
The gravitational field itself curves and changes with the shape of the space it fills.
Think about the Earth again…
Latitude and longitude, and the shapes of the continents on a globe.
Well, that globe is a three-dimensional space… And the continents look a certain way when we draw them on a sphere.
If we draw them on a flat map, it changes the way they look…
When we look at the Earth on a two-dimensional plane—like a Mercator projection—it distorts the map around the poles.
Greenland and Alaska and Antarctica all look much bigger than they really are.
It changes the shapes, and changes the geometry.
And that was bad news for Einstein…
Because it wasn’t just flat spaces and round spaces, like maps and globes…
There were an infinite number of possible spaces to contend with!
Imagine your map of the Earth printed on silly putty…
You can bend it and stretch it, and wrap it around anything you like…
Every new thing you do to it changes the shapes of the continents in new and different ways.
The coordinates bend and curve in every possible direction.
Well, that’s what Einstein ran into when he tried to make his theory generally covariant…
Every possible space changed the geometry of the field—thus changing gravity itself.
And worse: his theory couldn’t predict the shape of the space that gravity would fill!
Any more than your silly putty can predict the shape of the object that you’ll wrap it around…
And so Einstein gave up.
He couldn’t get general covariance to work.
So he did the next best thing…
He tried to defend his failure and spin the situation into a victory!
He constructed an elaborate argument—known as the hole argument—in an effort to show that the reason he failed was because his theory couldn’t be made generally covariant.
And more, that it was undesirable to even try.
Because if a generally covariant theory of gravity couldn’t make unique predictions about the geometry of spacetime, then you shouldn’t want a generally covariant theory of gravity!
It was quite a spin! Enough to make any politician or media mogul proud.
Thankfully, he failed at that too…
A Sentence Without Words
By the middle of 1915, Einstein was coming to terms with the fact that his hole argument wasn’t going to fly.
So he let it go, and went back to working on general covariance.
But this time, he went all the way back to the beginning…
And started questioning his assumptions about the empty spaces that were causing the problem in the first place.
What was “empty space?”
Can you even talk about “spacetime” if there’s nothing in it, and nothing moving, and nothing changing?
If there are no relationships or interactions? Nothing to be measured or observed?
He realized that even though he could bend and stretch the gravitational field—like silly putty—over an infinite number of underlying shapes…
Everything in the universe would just bend and stretch with it.
Stretch the coordinates at the poles, and Greenland doesn’t really get bigger…
It’s just a distortion on a map.
So the shape of the underlying coordinate system didn’t really change the universe itself.
The only thing that did that, was the shape of the gravitational field.
And that suggested a much different solution to the problem…
What if the shape of the empty spacetime didn’t matter… because there was no such thing?
The actual universe works just fine…
So what if empty space is only a problem in our imaginations… because “empty space” is only in our imaginations?
And so he let it go.
And with that simple shift in metaphysics, Einstein crawled out of the hole that he’d been stuck in.
And came to a conclusion beyond even his wildest expectations:
The gravitational field didn’t fill spacetime…
The gravitational field is spacetime.
“Empty space” was nothing but a misguided idea.
Like a sentence without words.
If you take all the words out of a sentence, you aren’t left with an empty sentence…
And if you take the gravitational field out of spacetime, you aren’t left with an empty spacetime…
You’re left with nothing.
Einstein had spent two years trying to predict the structure of a sentence with no words in it!
Only to realize that he’d been chasing a metaphysical mirage.
The initial paradox that had left him so distressed was no paradox at all…
All he had to do, was let go of an idea that didn’t really mean anything anyway!
And there are three important lessons in that…
1. Metaphysics matter.
I can’t say it enough. I can’t stress it enough.
Metaphysics matter.
Every major stumbling block in physics begins with metaphysics.
It was true for Einstein. And it’s just as true today.
Because the math and science are just a formalization of our ideas.
If the ideas are warped or broken or irrelevant…
Then so are the equations, and the physics, and the practical science that follows.
And the same is true of spirituality and spiritual practice.
2. Less is more.
Over the centuries, we’ve eliminated one metaphysical excess after another.
In many ways, the evolution of physics has been the process of letting go…
Of petty laws and dualities. And superfluous substances.
And Einstein contributed to that endeavor more than anyone…
First he banished the rift between space and time…
…and with it, the rift between energy, momentum and mass.
…and the rift between electricity and magnetism.
…and the privilege of “the present moment.”
Then he banished the Newtonian “force” of gravity…
…and the notion of a pre-existing spacetime manifold.
…and the limits of a static universe.
He spent the remainder of his life trying to banish the concept of physical matter entirely.
A persistent and pernicious bit of fluff…
(And he was no fan of the “quantum wavefunction” either!)
In the end, he never did finish what he started…
But a hundred years on, Einstein’s legacy has shaped every aspect of our lives.
There’s not a scrap of modern technology that doesn’t rest, directly or indirectly, upon his insights.
But his true genius isn’t found in all the things that he added to the world…
It’s in all the things that he helped the world let go of.
And spirituality could learn a thing or two about that.
Which brings us to the final lesson…
3. Metaphysics must be used responsibly.
Metaphysics are essential to every aspect of life.
But there’s still a right way and a wrong way to use them…
Einstein learned the hard way:
Metaphysics are like coordinate systems.
When used correctly, they tell us where things are.
And how to get there.
But…
And this is the important part:
They never tell us what things are.
Or why things are.
The system of latitude and longitude can tell you where you’re at…
But not why you’re there.
It can tell you how to get to Chicago…
But not if you should actually go there.
Both science and spirituality rely on metaphysics.
They always have, and always will.
But they no longer rely on them in the same way.
Good science uses metaphysics to locate and navigate.
To make maps of relationships—and move from one perspective to another.
Spirituality and religion, and old-fashioned science, use them to explain…
To tell you what things are—and why things are—and why you should do the things you should do.
Heat is comes from the caloric, which flows from one object to another…
Healing energy comes from chi, which flows from one being to another…
Substances can be depleted…
Therefore, you must manage the flow of energy.
Gravity is a force, which reaches out across empty space, and draws things together…
The Law of Attraction is a force, which draws experience into your life…
Forces shape the universe…
Therefore, you must visualize responsibly.
And that’s just the relatively harmless stuff…
Start delving into more serious subjects, and the stakes go up.
God made the universe. He punishes the wicked, and rewards the righteous…
Therefore, you should work to uphold His will.
The universe is nothing but “physical substances” and energy…
Therefore, spirituality is an imaginary holdover from the past.
It’s all the same process…
Every holy war… Every religious schism… Every zealous atheist, trying to prove materialism using science…
It’s all the misuse of metaphysics.
Physics has (mostly) learned its lesson…
But no one else has.
Life Without Cows
Historically, every time we invoke a new law or force or substance, it’s because we don’t yet understand what we’re dealing with.
And every time we eliminate a law or force or substance, our understanding of the universe grows deeper and more beautiful and more elegant.
It’s the path to unification.
In life and science and Self.
Now, sometimes adding things on is a necessary step—like adding the nuclear interactions in physics.
Or claiming that the material world is an illusion—to call attention to something else.
But they’re all just a placeholders, until we understand things better.
Eventually, they’ll all fall away…
The number of substances will be zero.
The number of laws will be zero.
The number of dualities will be zero.
And the number of symmetries will be one.
I’m just sorry I won’t live long enough to see it happen…
In the meantime, we’ve got some work to do…
Spirituality is choked with excess metaphysical baggage.
So much so, that it’s hard to imagine what it would even be without it!
But that’s no excuse to keep dragging along the status quo.
Sooner or later, we have to let things go…
So how does spirituality outgrow its addiction to old-fashioned metaphysics?
Help us Explore deeper perspectives? And Express who we really are?
And Engage in relationships that matter?
How does spirituality join the modern world?
…without just rolling over and succumbing to “brain states” and neuroscience?
Or losing all its magic?
These are the questions that I’ve been obsessed with for the last two decades…
I can’t say that I’ve found all the answers.
Barely any, actually.
But I’ve got a couple good ideas…
And if you’ve made it this far, you’re probably gonna like’em…
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In any case, thanks so much for stopping by! – \m/ – Z
About Zach Herbert
I teach people to do cool things with their consciousness, and break their brains with beautiful ideas.
Professional heretic. Unlikely mystic. Host to rebels, misfits and independent thinkers.
Find out more here. And follow me on Facebook at:
Somehow I had managed to skip this post until just now. This, so so much this. I could go on and on about this topic for a long time. Fun fact about me – I can tell when I’ve reached my intoxication threshold once I start talking everyone’s ears off about theoretical physics, the nature of matter, the Copenhagen interpretation and WSM theory. This is the stuff that really gets my neurons firing. Epic Nerd – achievement level unlocked, haha.
But seriously….dying to hear your ideas! Need more input!
And dude – you are also a lover of Black Metal?!? Frakking excellent!!
Talk about a cliffhanger… Can’t wait for the next post! Seriously, you shock my brain cells into hard, hard work and, as a result of that, in shifting my awareness. Love you for that!
Allso, a big ‘thank you’ for explaining complicated matter so well.