Now you see it...now you don't.

I think that I will start a lot of posts off by how amazing I think that the world is and how hard it is to comprehend. The more that I ponder and study it the more I find I will likely never understand. The fact that the way that we understand things is by using our senses of sight, smell, touch, sound and taste inevitably means that the majority of the universe is incomprehensible. Instead of sight we must substitute laws, rules and reason. Instead of observing phenomenon directly we must detect how they react and affect their surroundings.

As a summer intern at the NIH, my research required the use of microscopic metal beads with attached antibody. By adding the beads to flask of cells they helped to initiate cell proliferation. However they eventually needed to bet extracted, so what is the best way to manipulate a bead that is roughly 2 microns thick? Use a strong magnet of course. Most of the time the quantity of beads was so big (several million) that small wisps of rust colored beads could be easily seen by the naked eye. On occasion, however, the solution would be only 5 to 10 ml and thus only require an amount of beads that would be impossible to see with the naked eye. However, I knew that the magnet would still attract the beads. I knew that the electromagnetic forces would still allow me to complete my experiment. Even without being able to see the beads being removed, they were.

So we know about magnetism. We have seen the effects of other forces like gravity, electricity and friction. But imagine all the forces that are so common to our everyday lives that they are yet to be discovered and given a name. A book doesn't slide off of a table spontaneously because of friction and that same book doesn't start shooting pieces of pages off because the molecules of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen are held together by covalent forces.  Still further, the book does not combust spontaneously because those molecules are held stable by the attractive and repulsive forces of the protons, neutrons and electrons. But where then does it stop? How far down do the building blocks reach? If atoms are made up of protons and neutrons what are they made up of and what forces hold them together? Quarks? Strings? Higgs Boson particles? And in turn what makes and holds those particles?  The study of the sub-atomic universe is only trumped by the unknown accompanied by the expanses of the universe.

The universe is so large, sometimes it boggles my mind that scientists even feel comfortable putting numbers to how many stars or galaxies there are.  As astounding as the multitudes of physical heavenly bodies are I still wonder about the unseen elements at play in the universe.  Einstein's theory of relativity and others associated with that have helped to explain the interactions of these planets, but just as with the particles of the atom what other forces are involved?  How do these massive bodies interact with each other?  How does something so small as a black hole have a mass greater than most suns?  What force holds all that mass together and allows it to exist?

So here we are, stuck between the infinities.  But is that not the most exciting place to find ones self?  On a journey to bettering ones understanding and forwarding the race as a whole?  Unfortunately, not everybody can become an astro-physicist or construct an particle accelerator. However, that does not mean that a person inquisitive enough cannot discover the mysteries of the universe.  Striving for the next discovery or beating the previous best is what makes us human.  The moment that we sit back and let someone else figure it out, or let someone else take the risk we loose that part of us that could have done it. So let us always ask questions.  Let us ask what next, and why, until we find a deeper understanding that wasn't there before.  Most of all we must have the courage to take a risk and put ourselves on the line for the sake of advancement.