Newsflash⚡ directly copies the world’s top headlines and imagines the stories behind them.
This story examines the nature of work and reward over the course of a lifetime, and the limitations of human understanding.
If what you know can’t be explained, there’s nothing you can do.
If what you know can be explained, there’s nothing to do at all.
It was this strange middle ground that Johannes Ernst had built his life from. He liked to think his father had said it to him, but in fact, he did not remember. It was a confusing principle, and Johannes was not often confused. The basic point was one of communication: how to challenge the ideas of other people, without them deciding that you were insane? You had to be careful, because one false step was all it took - nothing travels faster than a verdict of insanity passing through a crowd. So you had to be careful. Perhaps this is what his father was trying to tell him - what you know, you know, and there is no clear way of sharing it. Perhaps it was not even his father who had told him in the first place. In any case, whoever it was, they were almost certainly not talking about particle physics.
Johannes was a level-headed man. When he was twelve, he had seen something. And he had seen it again when he was thirteen-and-a-half. And again when he was seventeen. And then when he was eighteen, and nineteen, and then again when he was twenty. By the time he had finished his studies, he was seeing it everywhere, all the time, like an uninterrupted radio broadcast that only he was capable of receiving. As far as he could tell, nobody else could see it. And something told him nobody else ever would.
What he saw could not be described; the closest word in the English language was “magic.” But if something could only be described as magic, it was usually only interesting to artists. And Johannes was a level-headed man, at the turn of the twentieth century, halfway through a doctorate in sub-atomic particle physics. It was not a time to be a magician - it was a time to practice science. But this was only encouraging to Johannes. That is what science was for, after all: firmly and irreversibly weaving the impossibilities of magic into the human understanding of reality. So, he decided, this is what he would do.
It took thirty-seven years. Johannes married, had two children, and worked in the hours when they were not awake. During the day, he built his laboratory. He was skillful in proving his hallucinations, taking on research grants and projects that would support his final experiment. He was always busy. He published many papers. He hosted conferences and gave lectures. He protested immigration laws that prevented the free flow of the world’s brightest minds. And throughout that time, he told nobody about his visions, he told nobody about the magic he could see. It was not yet time; it still could not be explained. He became the longest-standing member of staff at the laboratory. His hair began to turn white (which, he thought, looked good on a scientist). He cooked dinners for his wife at the weekends. He moved through his life with purpose, repetition and simple focus. There was still a lot left for him to do.
One evening, Johannes retired to his study, after the (momentous) discovery that antimatter would, as expected, fall downwards with the pull of gravity. So many experiments like these had passed. Some had taken months. Others had taken years. But with each one, with each peer-reviewed paper - with each new piece of scientific proof - the magical world in which he lived became more concrete, more reliable, and less insane in the minds of others. Of course he could never tell people what he saw - he still wouldn’t. They would probably still decide he was crazy, even now. And Johannes was a level-headed man. There is nothing you can do if what you know cannot be explained.
But, sitting there, behind his many journals, papers and a collection of the day’s news reports, Johannes thought: better to have it this way. Better to have some work to do. Better to know what it is you are working for. Better to have something to read, to wake up and have something to write. Better to keep some of the magic to yourself.
True, what he saw could not be explained, but still, he thought - better than having nothing to do at all.
Read the original story (BBC News): Scientists Get Close to Solving the Mystery of Antimatter
The views expressed in this publication do not reflect the views of the author. The stories themselves are based on imagined events. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is fictitious and should not be taken as representative.
I don't think I fully understand anything I see! 🤔