{"id":9944,"date":"2022-06-05T04:18:00","date_gmt":"2022-06-05T11:18:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/?p=9944"},"modified":"2022-06-04T22:23:21","modified_gmt":"2022-06-05T05:23:21","slug":"if-a-tree-falls-in-the-forest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nickichenwrites.com\/wordpress\/sounds\/if-a-tree-falls-in-the-forest\/","title":{"rendered":"If a Tree Falls in the Forest …"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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You probably know the rest of that question. If a tree falls in the forest and nobody\u2019s around to hear it, does it make a sound?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It was mentioned on the radio as I was driving back from a birthday party at my daughter\u2019s house in Tacoma. We\u2019d just finished a fantastic little party\u2014a delicious lunch cooked by one daughter and way too much cake bought by the other daughter. I was full, comfortably full, keeping up with the traffic on I-5 and half-listening to the radio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Sunday afternoons the local NPR station airs Radiolab, a program\/podcast that, according to the hosts, \u201casks deep questions.\u201d Just the thing to listen to on a busy highway! That afternoon they were discussing the origin of the universe and the Big Bang Theory. Yes, I guess that qualifies as being a \u201cdeep question.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m a fiction writer, though, not a physicist, so my primary attention was on the freeway. Until, that is, they started talking about the falling tree in the forest. It\u2019s a fun question, and easy. Right? Even if nobody\u2019s around to hear the tree fall, there are still sound waves. So why were they talking about this question in the middle of their discussion about the origin of the universe, a discussion that had veered off into the even less comprehensible subject (to me) of quantum physics?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, it seems that the answer to the tree-falling question depends on your definition of \u201csound.\u201d Do you define it according to simple science or are you talking about philosophy? And then there\u2019s the added complication of quantum physics. Einstein and his fellow physicist, Abraham Pais, argued about this very question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pais contended<\/a> that \u201cexistence in the absence of the observer is at best conjecture that can neither be proven nor disproven.\u201d I suppose that makes sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Way back in the 18th<\/sup> century, George Berkeley, an Irish bishop and philosopher, boldly stated<\/a> that \u201cTo be is to be perceived.\u201d The lonely tree in the forest did make a sound, though, he believed, because it was heard by God.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I\u2019m neither a scientist or a philosopher or theologian, but as a writer and a former painter, I love the idea of the importance of perception. It just makes sense to me that the world around us should <\/strong>be seen and heard, sniffed and tasted. People should be seen and heard and touched. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Do we add something to a person or thing when we pay attention to it? I don\u2019t know, but it seems wrong to pass up the opportunity. It\u2019s a shame to stay inside with the blinds closed and miss the sunset or the rainbow, to ignore the flower that blooms for a single day or the babbling creek. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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One of the hosts on Radiolab quoted from the bible, Genesis 1:31 I think it was: \u201cGod saw all that he had made, and it was very good.\u201d The point he was making was that maybe creation isn\u2019t finished until it’s observed and appreciated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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