Well I’ve been studying theoretical physics online with Dr. Sean Carroll these past few months. It’s a subject which has interested me tremendously for years; I started off with Dr. Brian Greene’s The Elegant Universe and never looked back. In addition to Greene and Carroll I’ve read Michio Kaku, Carlo Rovelli, Roger Penrose, and others. However, I never thought I’d be able to appreciate the mathematics of the field. Interestingly enough, with lots of time available to me during the lockdown, I found I was able to. Not only that, I found I was interested in learning more. I stopped my study of mathematics at college calculus because I didn’t even know what I was doing in class. Now, after Sean Carroll’s lectures, I understand the meaning of calculus. Amazing what difference a teacher makes!
I’ve written a fair bit on our incredible universe; I will post some soon.
In the meantime, here is a link to a talk I gave for the Missouri Historical Society this past May on the three rivers of my life, The Mississippi, Ganges, and Seine. I was born not far from the banks of the Mississippi, I’ve spent hours upon hours walking along the Seine, and as for the Ganges? I may never have seen it but its multi-and-mythic-layered meaning and spiritual significance have been a part of my imaginary landscape since I was a child.