Comfort zones. I wonder how many people have settled into these during #lockdown? I have been blessed by friends who via the medium of interpretive dance (social media) have kept me relatively awake with quizzes, music suggestions and witty banter. It has also pleased me that the term “food porn” has become a socially acceptable hashtag along with its anti-slogan hashtag “not food porn”. This is how my lock-down has rolled. But now we are asked to tentatively return to some semblance of normality and I am looking to prick my consciousness back into fully functioning, which is why I am about to vent about math… bear with me if you have the courage.
I used to say without compunction that I hated maths. I have a form of date dyslexia that means I swap numbers around (ie. I might think three but write down four). It happens mostly when I am tired or stressed. I once compiled a Diary Dates page for a publication and would frequently get cold and frankly intolerant emails about publishing the wrong dates. I would break into cold sweats when proofing the thing. Until I discovered quantum physics and, in particular ‘Bell’s theory’ but I’m jumping ahead here.
I need to mention my daughter’s primary school teacher who once berated me for my hatred of maths and told me that I would only infect my daughter with this disease if I continued to behave in such a manner — well she had a point. There is no such thing as a person who can’t do maths, but there is such a thing as a person who has not learnt the basic foundation rules of maths, said aforementioned teacher and proceeded to teach both pupils and parents alike… wonderful woman — it became quite a rallying cry in Primary Schools for a while. When she discovered I still added up figures in my head (or tried to) before checking with a calculator, she clapped her hands in delight and forgave me for suggesting that the school should give more time over to teaching children how to present themselves in public, be confident to speak loudly and clearly (and slowly) or how to use a microphone and how a song, or play or presentation can be improved by not making the children stand in one long line… I digress.
I once worked in the Arts for a national youth arts agency that gave me a Region and a medium sized budget and had me travelling around the South East meeting, training and conferencing with some incredibly interesting, diverse and fascinating people. One day I was at a conference in a venue in the grounds of Canterbury Cathedral delivering a session on learning styles, my point was that ‘one size does not fit all’ and that theories come and go but each individual child has individual needs and that whilst it may seem impossible to tailor education to a million different needs you can’t just put ‘learning’ into a box.
It was, unsurprisingly an open-ended presentation and it spilled over into lunch (which was very nice indeed, thank you). In my presentation I had somewhat bravely used a maths equation, turns out my group consisted of (amongst others) a scientist, two ex headteachers with maths degrees, a local government officer responsible for schools, with a background in finance…. you get the picture.
I was safely ensconced in a conversation about Bishop Stephen Langton who is buried half-in and half-out of Canterbury Cathedral (History) when the scientist turned to me and said “You’re a photographer?” (I sometimes use my own photos and sketches in presentations). He had my attention. “You’d be interested in Bell’s Theory”, he continued. Oh shallow me. My brain went ‘Bells?’ — ‘Church Bells?’ Then, ‘Oh! I had an uncle with the surname Bell this will be interesting…’ Don’t judge me. So began a journey into the heady and creative world of quantum physics and maths such as never before… Mind blown.
For me, Bell’s Theory is like an explanation of humanity, how we see and view and judge each other differently even when looking at the same thing/person/ideology from seemingly, the same stand point. I am going to poorly attempt to explain from a non-scientific viewpoint the theory but if you want a really good scientific, visual and audient education in Bells Theory start here, these guys at minute physics nail it
How does the universe decide which light photons to let through and which ones to block? What is the hidden variable that means that the maths doesn’t add up ? (Oh how I resonated with that one:0). Oh look, just watch the You Tube video.
This Bell’s theory example delves into the passage of light photons which when passing through, say a polaroid filter (sunglasses, photo filters) some of the light gets blocked. When you put another filter behind the first and hold it up to a light source the amount of light that passes through depends on the angle (rotation of the second lens). At 90 degrees rotation, 50 percent of the light is blocked but given that each lens has blocked only 15 percent of the light — it doesn’t add up and when you add a third lens voodoo occurs. I love how in the video the scientist talks about a ‘wiggle line’ of travelling light photons and how the cells ‘entangle’ — don’t we love how creativity makes science more exciting!
The point about Bell’s Theory is that like quantum physics, which is multi dimensional, the universe cannot simply be ‘quantified’ by fact-based math. Just as we, human beans are mini universes, defying logic and straightforward equations. We have these hidden variables. Which is why in todays society when, economists and politicians consistently try to pare things down to simple equations they will never deliver and often fail. Oops, digressing again.
So, for a softer example: Two good friends (entanglement) can meet another person but have completely differing views of that new person (wiggly lines of travel and degrees of angle) and therefore more or less of that persons hidden variables are exposed to the two friends depending on their perspective. Energy, light, matter.
Oh? Was that a yawn? Okay, enough. This all started when a friend posted one of those visual maths questions/problems on bookface where you have to find the missing sum. Mindful of not allowing my math trauma headspace, I started to give it some consideration. I cannot tell you how much sleep I lost over trying to work out how people came up with the numbers they came up with, even though I didn’t know the answer — although I have learnt the theory — that is that you are not seeing what is there. Said kind friend did attempt some gentle tips but this is the one that spurned this current stream of consciousness; “the eyes and mind are in cahoots to deceive you so be careful… it’s that sneaky brain lying to you despite what the eyes see…then, like all good maths you have to disregard what you think you know and work backward”.
Somewhere in that timeline of a hundred-plus guesses and groans and befuddlement I am certain someone mentions “Bells Theory”. I took myself out of my dis-comfort zone and went on a re-discovery of science and humanity which ended with the stinging news that the whole thing had been solved in three minutes by the friends mother. That was both a kick in the teeth and a whoop! for the female brain and one smart lady.
But also it reminded me of the other transformational part of that lunch-time conversation way-back-when, at some point I had mentioned my ‘date dyslexia’ using my Diary Dates experience as my example. The scientist shook his head and said, perhaps you need to look at this differently and find the hidden variable — what if it isn’t you? I went home, on a high of light photons and the beautiful alignment of art and science.
Later that week, I turned detective, pulled out three back copies of the Diary Date publication and matched them to the emails sent to me listing the dates — the dates I published were the dates given. However, another person was also emailing offering different dates. It wasn’t me — entirely. It was the chaotic way information was offered and then organised. Next time I collated the Dairy Dates page — I pointed out the anomaly. Science is awesome.
JLB July 2020