Write-A-Thon Day 1

E Equals MC Scared

By Donaya Haymond

The multiverse theory in physics states that there are an infinite number of universes, each one slightly different from the others, so that every possibility, every action and reaction, is explored somewhere, somehow.

In many universes, including our own, Albert Einstein is the greatest physicist of the 20^th century. He is acknowledged as one of the most intelligent men ever lived, and, even with his flawed personal life that included multiple infidelities, a kind and basically good man.

According to the multiverse theory – one of the theories that came after him, and would have troubled the same man that claimed “God does not play dice with the Universe,” – there is at least one plane of existence where he heard the news of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the newspaper. Perhaps in this same reality he had a slow sinking feeling when he realized it was his work, his breakthroughs in science that allowed this swift cut of the Gordian’s Knot this war had become.

There is at least one universe where he quietly whispered, “Oy vey,” and needed to go for a walk to clear his head. There is at least one where he did not manage to eat anything for the rest of the day. There may be ones he looked at the trees, the grass, nature outside, and wondered if one day all would be blighted by fallout.

It is possible he managed to calm his feelings of guilt and sorrow, knowing that this bold stroke probably saved the world from years of further war, this horrendous war that had claimed so much he loved. Or, in the chill of his grief and feelings of responsibility, he could have simply mourned. He could have mourned for the innocents of Japan who had not decided to fight this fight, who were merely born in the wrong place at the wrong time. He could have mourned for the children as yet unborn, whose genetic code would be warped by radiation, and who would have parents with all kinds of cancers and traumas, a great scar in their history.

He would have feared for what this meant for the future, a harbinger of another world war fought with nuclear weapons, which he predicted would lead to wars afterwards being fought with rocks. He might have had an inkling of the frightened decades to follow, hovering over buttons and having nightmares of a thousand, thousand mushroom clouds born of the two original parents.

He could not have known, unless some divine revelation showed him; that the Cold War never would ignite; that at least once freedom and democracy would peacefully erode at the harsh walls restricting whoever it could. Maybe the cosmos will never be kind enough for such visions to ever take place.

Did he embrace a friend or family member silently? Did he sleep at all that night? Did he stalk empty rooms, wondering if he did the right thing, if they did the right thing, if there could have been some other way, if knowledge is worth it for its own sake, if tools should be built when one cannot foresee all their uses?

The price of fame, as history has shown, is the public illumination of what the famous would rather have remain private woes. The price of wealth is constant demand upon it by those who wish to benefit from the wealthy. The price of beauty is a steady numbing to praise, a devaluation of all other of the beautiful person’s virtues. The price of knowledge, of adding to humanity’s store, is having on your shoulders everything that results from that knowledge, good or bad.

Some universes he regretted this more than he was able to resign himself to the bleak reality. In other universes, it was the other way around; he allowed himself to be consoled with thoughts of hands needing to get dirty, certain things that had to be done for the sake of a greater mercy.

Universes being infinite, there must be at least one where no bombs were dropped in the first place. There must be at least one that diverges even further, with no Albert Einstein born, no World War II, some other cities targeted, no cities targeted, more cities targeted…Again, though, the cosmos is probably not kind enough to ever let anyone see these differences and results, let us pick and choose which one we want to live in. Or with.