Singularity;  Anima Mundi                     June 25, 2022

Curated by Jicky Schnee

Singularity--a hypothesized singularity of infinite density before quantum fluctuations caused the Big Bang and subsequent inflation that created the
Universe.
 

Anima mundi--(English: soul of the world) according to several systems of thought, an intrinsic connection between all living beings, which relates to the world in
much the same way as the soul is connected to the human body.

If Stephen Hawking’s theory of Singularity and Georges Lemaître’s theory of The Big Bang are
accurate, then reason dictates that since all was originally the same densest point of matter, every atom, flower, animal, human, planet and the entire cosmos derive from the same source and are intrinsically interconnected. Plato identified this as Anima Mundi (One World), “a Living Creature, one and visible, containing within itself all the living creatures which are by nature akin to itself.” Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote about it in his book The Oversoul and Jung called it Unus Mundus (Latin for one world), the underlying concept of a primordial unified reality from which everything derives.  Finally, poet Marie Howe recently wrote about this concept beautifully in her poem, “Singularity, (after Stephen Hawking).”

 

SINGULARITY
by Marie Howe (after Stephen Hawking)
Do you sometimes want to wake up to the singularity
we once were?
so compact nobody
needed a bed, or food or money — 
nobody hiding in the school bathroom
or home alone
pulling open the drawer
where the pills are kept.
For every atom belonging to me as good
Belongs to you.   Remember?
There was no   Nature.    No
them.   No tests
to determine if the elephant
grieves her calf    or if 
the coral reef feels pain.    Trashed
oceans don’t speak English or Farsi or French;
would that we could wake up   to what we were
— when we were ocean    and before that 
to when sky was earth, and animal was energy, and rock was
liquid and stars were space and space was not
at all — nothing
before we came to believe humans were so important
before this awful loneliness.
Can molecules recall it?
what once was?    before anything happened?
No I, no We, no one. No was
No verb      no noun

only a tiny tiny dot brimming with 
is is is is is
All   everything   home

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Artists: Francesa Di Mattio, Nin Brudermann, Jicky Schnee, Anthony Akinbola, Justin Lowe, Josh Tonsfeldt, Joe Concra, Shaun Acton, Luis Robayo, Chris Victor