An Idea

[austintorn@aol.com]

WE ARE MOST FREE WHEN
WE ARE ASYMPTOTICALLY CO-JOINED

The strong family unit, as the three quarks,
Is bonded by the power of its grouping,
But, loses identity if the home breaks—
Other pairs soon forming after divorcing.

Or comes the prison of solitude,
Chained to isolation with fortitude,
Floating, lost, without effects of affects,
Losing the identity conferred by others.

Within the proton, gentleness becomes strength,
For the members are free to explore at length,
Never smothering, but building unity,
The unit’s direction adding to the one.

The strong force grows weaker near the quarks,
And so we may observe them someday,
Shining in their primordial glory—
The beginning of all things composite.

Identity is not lost in the co-joining—
True loves don’t crowd the hearts of the others,
But, rather, look outward, in the same direction,
Close, joined, but don’t block the others’ section.

It is a seeming arithmetic violation,
That in summation we become greater;
We don’t merge, having supported freedom,
Yet still share the same good vibrations.

Love matures when partners let it flow beyond—
Free to wend its way to places dear and fond.
Love’s butterfly prospers when winds blow free;
Unconditional love never binds—it bonds.

[austintorn@aol.com]

AFTER THE STARS HAVE GONE—
THE FINAL, SILENT DARK?

THE LAST CHANCE SALOON (CASINO)

Entropy is always the winner in the end,
When there’s no more money left to lend;
Meanwhile we stabilize, in nature’s way,
Rearranging resources temporarily.

Going beyond our very old obsession, so vast,
Of how it all began, back in the distant past,
But, retaining our search for meaning, from that,
We nw turn to how will it all end, this and that,
Whether becoming collapsed, expended, or flat.

Is there is some deep meaning in all that?

Yes, for it is there in that future distance,
We’ll find, or not, the end of our persistence—
Whether or not we are at all forever resistant;

Whether all that was, and what was did and done
Will be of any long-lasting benefit to anyone,
Of what destiny awaits, if there ever was one.

Endings are important to us, for what we’re about,
Because we believe that how things turn out
Implies what the beginnings ultimately meant,
Of what, or not, is our place in the firmament.

As an ambitious species of nurture and nature,
We are now and always pointed toward the future,
For, of the three forms of the chimpanzee:
The common chimp, the bonobo, and us, we
Are the only chimp who went beyond the trees,
And, more importantly, even out of Africa, freed,
By that exodus, which laid down, indeed,
From that experience, the urge and the need
To move on, exploring, ever planting another seed.

The horizons on Earth sufficed us, as in “time”,
For many millennia, but now the horizons’ climes
Are broadened, through cosmology and physics,
And so they can well inform us of our prospects.

The future matters to us, for very basic reasons:
We wish to offset our mortality, our pleasin's,
To know if humanity’s works, for every season,
Will be remembered, or lost; for nothing, even.

(To be continued, as the rest is not yet written,
Nor is the future, but we’ve got some vision.)

[austintorn@aol.com]

The Final, Silent Dark Marches On…

Time hurls a million waves of is displacement
At us, yet we are still there—our replacements:

Time, ever gray with age, hurls its changes, then,
‘Gainst existence’s rock, time and time again,
The entropic seas denuding the sands,
Yet, energy is preserved via science’s wands.

Reminiscence weathered, but could ne’er wither,
For, in those mists of time; yesteryear yet appeared.

Would the prospect of a “Big Crunch” bring on phobia,
Such as an ever more confining claustrophobia?

Seems a better thought, somehow, though no picnic,
But more pleasing, if the universe(s) were also cyclic,
Although then all would still be really crushed
And forever lost, gone headlong into the rush.

We expect cycles, for all the days and seasons
Embedded this in our ancestors, into our reasons,
Since, at least, the periodic supplies some rhythm,
A pattern—the rolling hills of lives onward driven.

As for the cyclic, endless repetitions, they, too,
Would seem to revolt more of us than just a few;
As, too, perhaps, would some infinite abyss of time,
Which, too, grants us neither reason nor rhyme.

Does the drama go on forever, or does it end?
What do the visions of the future portend?

Doesn’t it all have some purpose meant—
A goodly end of all of it to us might it present?

Is our higher mammal time, certainly,
But of such short parentheses within eternity?

It’s only a finite time, then, which, too, tends
To horrify many, and more, as the universe ends,
Such as told by Robert Frost, a name of chill:
In heat or in cold, known as fire or ice, still.

Should we not believe in God since nothing lasts?
Well, if nothing lasts, then of what our purpose past?

Is a purpose really required, so constructive,
Or would that be really quite restrictive?

No realm could really be special or sent,
Its becoming being of some specific intent,
For, all arrived here of causeless accident.

Is there anything wrong with the freedom to be,
Anywhere, any how, or any time during eternity?

No.

Should we rail against the law of entropy,
The “heat death” of thermodynamic energy,
The second of its final laws, we see,
Because it would destroy all of history?

Well, there are so many ways for disorder to be
Than any one ordered state specifically.

Would even a heaven on earth become a misery
If it, as it might, contain no more novelty?

Must there be an end to our revelry?
Can’t we, at least, hibernate eternally?
Won’t all matter, too, last eternally?

Will Shakespeare’s works live on, paternally?
Is this not a Wagnerian struggle for eternity?

(to be con't)

[austintorn@aol.com]

Do I dare post the next parts concerning the future/end of the universe?

Would anyone dare to read it?

Prof, Max, Felix, and all—where did you go?

[austintorn@aol.com]

(Interlude)

THE TIME CAPSULE

Since one million years had just passed by,
They, of the future, prepared to open, nigh,
The absolutely sealed container’s prize,
Of a capsule made so carefully that it did survive
Without damage, being totally impregnable
To any outside influence imaginable.

They expected to see, perhaps, some old relic,
But certainly nothing alive that could tell of it,
For it would be hard to imagine, even then,
That some organism could keep on going its ken
Over its course of a million years later,
Sealed inside this tight container,
Unable even to exchange energy’s spark,
This metabolism being the hallmark
Of life and all that quacked or quarked…

And, so, they did not at all expect something
In there that would be flapping its wings,
Gasping for air, or anything at all of life’s song,
Wondering what had taken so long.

Well, they were right and they were wrong,
For in the time capsule that was planted so long,
Several things had with it come along…

One was a plaque, of numbers low and high,
And containing some primes and pi,
Another, some essays of the future—
Some, like Austin’s, quite mature,
Along with maps and other items of the world
From those times when the oceans swirled;
But, the last, one perhaps not intended,
Was a microbe—an extremophile—
Laying there quite contented all the while!

Well, they soon laughed, loud and long,
For they were in between right and wrong
About what could survive from so long ago,
For, it was really walking mighty slow!

!
!
V

BACTERIA:
THE BACK DOOR TO OUR STOMACH’S CAFETERIA
AND THE INVINCIBLE RULERS OF THE EARTH

For two billion years in the Archaean world, bacteria
Were the only forms of life. Algae, or Cyanobacteria,
Learned to absorb water molecules, dining on hydrogen,
But releasing oxygen as waste; photosynthesis began.

The world began to slowly fill with “poisonous” oxygen,
But not right away, as it first combined with iron then,
Producing iron oxide that sank, that on the bottom lay,
In primitive seas, the world literally rusting away.

After 2 billion years, the atmosphere had some oxygen;
A new kind of cell arose. Some oxygen-using organisms
With organelles produced an energy much more efficient.

This was the endosymbiotic event of a mitochondrion
Which made complex life possible, by a liberation
Of energy from food, feeding on nutrients we take in.

We need them but they don’t need us, for without them
We couldn’t even live for two minutes.
They don’t even speak the same genetic language
As the cells in which they live.

These eukaryotes are old and unknown visitors
Within our homes who’ve stayed on for a billion years.

In another billion years they learned to form together
Into complex multicellular beings, yet, still this world
Of the small was to ever live on and rule the world.

At dinner, Louis Pasteur used a magnifying glass for
Searching for microbes in his food, until invited no more.

There are 100 quadrillion bacteria within us & upon us,
Ever grazing on our flesh and digesting our food bus.
The Earth is not our planet, but theirs; they let us live.
They even purify our water and keep the soil productive.

A single bacterial cell can generate 280,000 more a day.
They can also share information, taking a piece away
Of genetic code from any other any time. They swim
In a single gene pool—an invincible superorganism.

They live in caustic lakes, in Antarctica, in boiling mud,
And even thrive seven miles down in the Pacific Ocean;
In sulfuric acid, too, and in a 166-year-old bottle of beer,
And can even gorge themselves on plutonium nuclear.

Bacteria were yet alive in a sealed camera lens stowed
On the moon for two years, but they seemed a bit slowed.
Some were even found two thousand feet below the Earth
Dining on what’s in rocks, like iron, sulfur, and dirt.

Some frozen ones were even revived from the 3 million
Year-old permafrost of Siberia, and even one older than
The continents, was resuscitated, a 250 million-year-old
Bacterium that had been trapped in a salt deposit hold,
Two thousand feet underground in New Mexico, maybe.

[Bogie]

Do I dare post the next parts concerning the future/end of the universe?

Would anyone dare to read it?

Prof, Max, Felix, and all—where did you go?

I did. It reads like history preceded by the poor future archaeologists who find our sealed golden time capsules.

(Interlude)

THE TIME CAPSULE

Since one million years had just passed by,
They, of the future, prepared to open, nigh,
The absolutely sealed container’s prize,
Of a capsule made so carefully that it did survive
Without damage, being totally impregnable
To any outside influence imaginable.

They expected to see, perhaps, some old relic,
But certainly nothing alive that could tell of it,
For it would be hard to imagine, even then,
That some organism could keep on going its ken
Over its course of a million years later,
Sealed inside this tight container,
Unable even to exchange energy’s spark,
This metabolism being the hallmark
Of life and all that quacked or quarked…

And, so, they did not at all expect something
In there that would be flapping its wings,
Gasping for air, or anything at all of life’s song,
Wondering what had taken so long.

Well, they were right and they were wrong,
For in the time capsule that was planted so long,
Several things had with it come along…

One was a plaque, of numbers low and high,
And containing some primes and pi,
Another, some essays of the future—
Some, like Austin’s, quite mature,
Along with maps and other items of the world
From those times when the oceans swirled;
But, the last, one perhaps not intended,
Was a microbe—an extremophile—
Laying there quite contented all the while!

Well, they soon laughed, loud and long,
For they were in between right and wrong
About what could survive from so long ago,
For, it was really walking mighty slow!

!
!
V

BACTERIA:
THE BACK DOOR TO OUR STOMACH’S CAFETERIA
AND THE INVINCIBLE RULERS OF THE EARTH

For two billion years in the Archaean world, bacteria
Were the only forms of life. Algae, or Cyanobacteria,
Learned to absorb water molecules, dining on hydrogen,
But releasing oxygen as waste; photosynthesis began.

The world began to slowly fill with “poisonous” oxygen,
But not right away, as it first combined with iron then,
Producing iron oxide that sank, that on the bottom lay,
In primitive seas, the world literally rusting away.

After 2 billion years, the atmosphere had some oxygen;
A new kind of cell arose. Some oxygen-using organisms
With organelles produced an energy much more efficient.

This was the endosymbiotic event of a mitochondrion
Which made complex life possible, by a liberation
Of energy from food, feeding on nutrients we take in.

We need them but they don’t need us, for without them
We couldn’t even live for two minutes.
They don’t even speak the same genetic language
As the cells in which they live.

These eukaryotes are old and unknown visitors
Within our homes who’ve stayed on for a billion years.

In another billion years they learned to form together
Into complex multicellular beings, yet, still this world
Of the small was to ever live on and rule the world.

At dinner, Louis Pasteur used a magnifying glass for
Searching for microbes in his food, until invited no more.

There are 100 quadrillion bacteria within us & upon us,
Ever grazing on our flesh and digesting our food bus.
The Earth is not our planet, but theirs; they let us live.
They even purify our water and keep the soil productive.

A single bacterial cell can generate 280,000 more a day.
They can also share information, taking a piece away
Of genetic code from any other any time. They swim
In a single gene pool—an invincible superorganism.

They live in caustic lakes, in Antarctica, in boiling mud,
And even thrive seven miles down in the Pacific Ocean;
In sulfuric acid, too, and in a 166-year-old bottle of beer,
And can even gorge themselves on plutonium nuclear.

Bacteria were yet alive in a sealed camera lens stowed
On the moon for two years, but they seemed a bit slowed.
Some were even found two thousand feet below the Earth
Dining on what’s in rocks, like iron, sulfur, and dirt.

Some frozen ones were even revived from the 3 million
Year-old permafrost of Siberia, and even one older than
The continents, was resuscitated, a 250 million-year-old
Bacterium that had been trapped in a salt deposit hold,
Two thousand feet underground in New Mexico, maybe.

I really consider the lowest forms of life the most adaptable and am not opposed to discussions of panspermia, at least within a solar system and maybe throughout a given galaxy. And if it happens on that scale I have no qualms in discussing the possibility that bacteria, the extremophobes, could just be the seeds of life that might result in populating our known universe. Who knows?
[quote]

[Profpat]

"I really consider the lowest forms of life the most adaptable"

Hi Bogie;

I agree the cockroach will probably inherit the earth. Decapitated it can live for 2 additional weeks before it dies of starvation.

Best,

Pat

[Profpat]

Do I dare post the next parts concerning the future/end of the universe?

Would anyone dare to read it?

Prof, Max, Felix, and all—where did you go?

I read all the posts on my thread Austin, Spring break time.

[austintorn@aol.com]

I read all the posts on my thread Austin, Spring break time.

Hey, great, and Bogie's here, too.

I have to say though, that the upcoming parts about the future of the universe will be really scary, with no more humor to ease the reading. You might want to take off for spring break in Florida or Mexico right now!

[austintorn@aol.com]

… too late.

(the future continues…)

Science can settle whether a Last Day
Is ever going to come this way.

Only a decade or so ago, with some consternation,
We discovered the universe’s large acceleration,
This expansion even increasing, onto some thin disaster,
The galaxies getting further away, ever and ever faster…
Then, one last snapshot taken, for all to remember.

The accelerating expansion of the universe’s rafters
Means that the universe will cool even ever faster,

So, any conceivable forms of the future’s life prolongers
Will have to keep themselves ever more cooler,
Think more slowly, and hibernate ever-longer.

One day the protons will fade away,
Leaving but dark matter, electrons, and positrons.

The Waves of the Ancient Swells
Of Time’s Forgetting Tides
Swept Ever On…

As Time, now hoary with age,
Hurled forth its ashen change,
The charge ever san, pale and colorless,
That force born to summon decay, so endless,
‘Gainst Nature’s Universe each and every day;

Time and time again, Time fed all upon,
In its bloodless, white and waxen way;

But, this everlasting rose would not fade,
Its luster even brightening by the day,
Ever unsuccumbing to the sickly, peakèd
State draining drawn the life away.

Entropic seas yet denude the mountains,
Yet, this enduring flower, never-endingly
Has cast Deathly Time aside, for now,
Ceaselessly somehow thriving on,
To that which was the near imperishable,
The flame of beauty still inextinguishable,
Forever celebrated as immutable,
Gaining its seemingly perpetual permanence
From the undying love of the glorious truth.

Yet, everything was moving apart, cooling off,
The big slowdown not really so very far off;
Ultimately, even the black holes of late
And the lightless planets would dissipate.

The primordial soup, once so rich and hearty
Was now a thin gruel that couldn’t serve the party.

One day, every particle would be moving away
From every other particle, so much out the way
That they won’t even be able to see one another;
Thus, for all intents, motion will have ceased forever.

Our spurt of life, followed by an infinite stretch
Of dark equilibrium, was but the briefest sketch—
A warm and fuzzy stage, so interestingly active,
Whose time, relatively, was but infinitesimive.

Yet, we were there, in all our glory,
For whenever else could we be?

In the future, uncounted societies of
Overlapping minds accumulate, with love,
In island redoubts, their preserved data burning
With a vital remembrance, in which, returning,
Past is the present and future, they all reliving
The data, even animating it and ever altering.

Without any new enrichments, the present and future
Reprise the past, in this retreat from external nature.

Their candles would have been nearly invisible to us,
They enduring, by diminishing, so as not to exhaust.

They made few new memories, a kind of blind sight,
For whatever realities had ever existed out of sight
Of their own mental structures were now fractured,
And thus not much different from those manufactured.

(to be con’t)