I am pleased to welcome my friend, colleague, and renowned mystery writer Camille Minichino, who today launches her third series with, The Probability of Murder. Writing as Ada Madison, she introduces her latest sleuth, college professor Sophie Knowles.
It's an honor to have Ada Madison stop by at "The Wisdom of Les Miserables" as she continues her whirlwind launch-day blog tour. Get the full scoop about Camille/Ada, her noms de plume, and her crime solving protagonists on her website.
It's an honor to have Ada Madison stop by at "The Wisdom of Les Miserables" as she continues her whirlwind launch-day blog tour. Get the full scoop about Camille/Ada, her noms de plume, and her crime solving protagonists on her website.
Small Truths, Great Truths
Where do you go when you need wisdom and a good quote? To a Nobel physicist, of course. Niels Bohr, born the year Victor Hugo died, and a pioneer in atomic structure, kept me up all night wondering about this observation.
I thought blogging about it might help, or at least spark a good debate:
“There are two kinds of truth, small truth and great truth. You can recognize a small truth because its opposite is a falsehood. The opposite of a great truth is another truth.”
It's clear how this works for a small truth. It's Monday, March 12, 2012 is a small truth. "It's not Monday, March 12, 2012," is clearly false, at least for a day. Small truths are simple, and often temporary, it seems: He's tall. I'm hungry. It's freezing outside.
What about the great truths? Say, one of the great truths of the Bible? In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
What would be its opposite? That the heaven and the earth created God, for example?
Now I get it. This fits in with my understanding of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality, 1929): "It is as true to say that God is permanent and the World fluent, as that the World is permanent and God is fluent."
Who's to say which of these statements is the truer? They're both great truths. We can live wisely by either one.
I'm reminded of an old cartoon where the dialogue goes like this:
Character 1: "Do you think humans on earth are the only intelligent life in the universe?"
Character 2: "Either way, it's a sobering thought."
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Alfred J. Garrotto is the author of the suspense novel, The Saint of Florenville: A Love Story.
Ah - I love Whitehead - brings back fond memories of grad school philosophy. And before that college discussions with Camille on the great truths!
ReplyDeleteThanks for visiting, Mary! I, too, remember late night discussions around this topic.
ReplyDeleteAnd thanks, Al, for hosting me today.