Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe

by Brian Greene

Einstein’s capacities set an unmatched standard for tapping into nature’s rhythms. And yet, although his legacy can be summarized by a handful of mathematical sentences—terse, precise, and sweeping—Einstein’s forays into the far recesses of reality did not always begin with equations. Or even with language. “I often think in music,”1 is how he described it. “I very rarely think in words at all.”2 Perhaps your process mirrors Einstein’s. Mine doesn’t. On occasion, when struggling with a difficult problem, I have had a sudden flash of insight reflecting some or other brain process beneath conscious awareness. But when I’m cognizant, even when using mental imagery to see my way toward a solution, it would be a stretch to say words are absent or to draw an association with music. More often than not, I make progress in physics by fiddling with equations and collecting conclusions in ordinary sentences I write out longhand in notebooks that fill one shelf after another. When I concentrate, I often talk to myself, usually silently, occasionally audibly. Words are essential to the process. Although I find Wittgenstein’s summary, “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world”3 too broad in its scope—I have no doubt that there are vital qualities of thought and experience that stand outside language, a point we will return to later—without language my capacity for certain kinds of mental maneuvers would diminish. Words not only express reasoning, they vitalize it. Or, as s...