I hope you all had a great Labor Day weekend. Mine was excellent, although not terribly productive. But hey, it was a holiday weekend, right? Surely those don't have to be productive.
I did manage to crack a few books as research for my work in progress. At this point, I have to digress and put in yet another plug for libraries. A few weeks ago, I came across a book on amazon.com that I really wanted to look at for my current manuscript. I'd had an idea of someone using insulin in an attempted murder, but I needed some ideas on how this might be done. Lo and behold, I found a book called The Insulin Murders, a historical overview of cases in which insulin was used as a weapon. I really didn't want to spend $30 on it, however, especially when it might not really help, or might not be what I thought. I looked it up in Worldcat and found it was only in about five libraries in the U.S. I hesitated putting in an interlibrary loan request for it where I work since a) I wondered if this would be too much trouble and b) you hate to ask at work for a book about murders and how they're committed. People might start looking at you funny and avoiding you.
Actually, though, our interlibrary loan guru didn't bat an eye. So let me reassure you--interlibrary loan folks have seen it all. Don't hesitate to ask. She also got my book for me within a few days, all the way from Vermont.
Next, I've mentioned being interested in time travel--again, for a story I'm working on. The other day it suddenly occurred to me to wonder if there were any serious scientific books about the possibility of time travel. Turns out there are quite a few. I ordered a couple of them through our library and they came just in time for the long weekend.
So I spent some time over the weekend reading about...time. I discovered one basic fact. The concept of time is a lot bigger than my brain. I think the side of the brain that does physics is completely dormant in me. It may actually give off no measurable brain waves.
I also came away with a sort of awe and wonder of how big our universe is. Turns out, there are more dimensions of space and time out there than we can imagine. And just think, God is not only big enough to imagine it all, He created it all.
I'll probably be telling you more on this subject. It's fascinating stuff. I think. Assuming I understood any of it.
Books I'm reading about time and time travel:
Time Travel in Einstein's Universe: The Physical Possibilities of Travel through Time, by J. Richard Gott III
Enchanted Paths and Magic Words: The Quantum Mind and Time Travel in Science and in Literary Myth, by E. C. Barksdale
What God Knows: Time and the Question of Divine Knowledge, edited by Harry Lee Poe and J. Stanley Mattson
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Don't feel badly, Robin. My brain is totally dead in all areas of math and science, not just physics. LOL But as for dimensions of time, I had a professor in college who drew a triangle on the board and wrote "time" in the triangle. All the open space around it represented eternity past and future. The professor used it as a reminder that God is absolutely sovereign. The picture in my brain has just stuck. But as for interlibrary loans, I do those quitet frequently. I just request them online instead of constantly asking the folks at the library.
ReplyDeleteWow, just the thought of reading about the actual scientific theories and possibilities of time travel makes my brain hurt. :-) But I'm proud of you for stretching those brain cells. Lately I've been avoiding my research books. I have a great one, highly recommended, that I bought, used, for a pittance on Amazon, called A Distant Mirror, on the Middle Ages. The last time I tried to read it I almost fell asleep, so I decided to just look up the facts I need as I go. ;-)
ReplyDeleteThat's completely incomprehensible. I wonder if we could do time travel Back to the Future style and be transported to 1985.
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