There Are Places in the World Where Rules Are Less Important Than Kindness: And Other Thoughts on Physics, Philosophy and the World

by Carlo Rovelli

We don’t know who we will encounter tomorrow in the street, we don’t know the causes of many illnesses, we don’t know the ultimate physical laws that govern the universe, we don’t know who will win the next election, we don’t really know what is good for us and what is bad. We don’t know if there will be an earthquake tomorrow. In this essentially uncertain world, it would be foolish to ask for absolute certainty. Whoever boasts of being certain is usually the least reliable. But this doesn’t mean either that we are completely in the dark. Between certainty and complete uncertainty there is a precious intermediate space—and it is in this intermediate space that our lives and our thoughts unfold.

To construct the new, I have heard it said, it is enough to violate rules and liberate oneself from the deadweight of the past.

One studies, continues to study, studies still, then one day, through study, a strange sensation surfaces: but it can’t be, it can’t be so, there is something that does not work out. At that moment, you are a scientist.

Just as understanding where rain comes from or what causes lightning prompted faith in the existence of Zeus to evaporate, so too the understanding of how life evolved and diversified on Earth has vastly multiplied the number of atheists in the world.

There is no trace of any of this in Lucretius. There is no fear of the gods, no intentionality or causes in the world, no cosmic hierarchy and no distinction between the Earth and the heavens. There is a profound love for nature, a calm immersion in it, a recognition that we are part of it ourselves; that men, women, animals, plants and clouds are organic parts of a wonderful whole, a tissue without hierarchy. There is a profound universalism, and there is the aspiration to think of the world in simple terms. To be able to investigate and eventually understand the secrets of the physical world. To be able to learn more than our fathers and forefathers knew.

Above all, there is a measured and passionate defense of the notion that existence can be serene even though it is limited; that we should not fear death, precisely because there is nothing beyond death. And that we should not fear God, because, even if He existed, He would be too busy with more momentous things to be distracted by us, such irrelevant grains in a boundless cosmos.

When at last with limbs intertwined They enjoy the flower of their youth And the body anticipates already the pleasure to come And they have reached the point at which Venus Sows seed in the field of womankind, They tighten against each other avidly, Mingling the saliva in their mouths And, pressing lips against teeth, Each inhales the breath of the other— In vain, since nothing can detach from her body, He cannot penetrate it with his entire body, Losing himself in that body.

Nāgārjuna’s thought is based around the idea that nothing has existence in itself. Everything exists only through dependence on something else, in relation to something else. The term that Nāgārjuna uses to describe this lack of essence per se is “emptiness” (śūnyatā): things are “empty” in the sense that they do not have autonomous reality; they exist only thanks to, as a function of, with respect to and in the perspective of something else.

Is it me who sees a star? Do I exist? No, I am no exception to the rule. Who is it who sees the star, then? No one, says Nāgārjuna.

So is emptiness the only reality? Is this the ultimate reality? No, writes Nāgārjuna, every perspective exists only by depending on another, it is never the “ultimate” reality, and this includes his own perspective: emptiness is also devoid of essence; conventionally so. No metaphysics survives. Emptiness is empty.

in order to fight evil you need to know it and to understand it.

For me this came as a revelation that allowed me to grasp something about the mindset of the political right that I had always struggled to understand. A main source of the emotions that give power to the right, and above all to the far right, is not the feeling of being strong. It is, on the contrary, the fear of being weak.

Otherwise, if you can’t do any of this, please stop deceiving us with saccharine illusions, and leave to men and women of goodwill the responsibility of bringing real, useful gifts to the world. Just as my parents used to do with me.

If we discover a bomb that has remained buried beneath what is now a children’s playground, we do not leave it there because “it might not explode.” If a fire breaks out in a cellar, a reasonable person looks for a fire extinguisher, calls 911, escapes from the building. Whoever says, “But there is no certainty that the fire will spread, therefore let’s calmly carry on with breakfast,” is a cretin. And yet this is precisely the attitude taken by those who argue that the problem is not serious, because we have no certainty regarding the climate.

The bounds required of our hero may be many, but their number will be finite.

I don’t like people who behave well because they fear that otherwise they might end up in hell. I prefer those who behave well because they value good behavior. I don’t trust those who are good for the sake of pleasing God. I prefer those who are good because they actually are good. I don’t like having to respect my fellow men and women because they are children of God. I prefer to respect people because they are beings who feel and suffer. I don’t like those who devote themselves to others, and to justice, thinking that in this way they will please God. I like those who instead devote themselves to others because they feel love and compassion. I’ve never liked feeling in communion with a group of people standing in silence inside a church listening to a service. I like to feel in communion with a group of friends; talking with them, looking into their eyes and their smiles. I don’t like emotion produced by nature because God has made it so beautiful. I like to feel moved by it because it is beautiful. I don’t like to feel consolation in the idea that I will be welcomed by God after my death. I like to look directly at the limited length of our lives, to learn to look at our sister, death, with serenity. I don’t like shutting myself away in silence to pray to God. I like silence in order to listen to the infinite profundity of silence. I don’t like to thank God: I like to wake in the morning, look at the sea and thank the wind, the waves, the sky, the fragrance of plants, ...