Editorial June 15, 1987 Issue

Discerning the invisible

Michael D. Rissler

An invisible God and a visible humanity is perhaps the most puzzling dichotomy in life. The division suggests that man is orphaned in a world he hasn't created and doesn't understand. As a result mankind has sought relentlessly to discern the cause of all existence.

The urge to see worlds yet unseen by the unaided eye has moved mankind into the vast telescopic reaches of space as well as into the interior reaches of the electron microscope, where the dim outline of atoms has been drawn. Yet as each refinement of instrumentation brings new objects into view, there always remains just out of sight something more.

Mathematician, inventor, and essayist Jacob Bronowski termed this phenomenon "the crucial paradox of knowledge." Increasingly sophisticated technical refinement, Bronowski observed, brings no final conclusion. "We seem to be running after a goal which lurches away from us to infinity every time we come within sight of it." Bronowski, The Ascent of Man (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1973), p. 356.

Enjoy 1 free Sentinel article or audio program each month, including content from 1898 to today.

Send a comment to the editors
NEXT IN THIS ISSUE
Poem
A taste of heaven
June 15, 1987
Contents

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit