FEMININE COSMOLOGY

by Amara Graps

Fiorella Terenzi wants to remind us that our ancient cosmological mythology was of the mythological Goddess being the giver of life and representing all time and space. Our ancient and current cosmological mythology affects our world view significantly.

Since this section links cosmology, mythology, and religion, I will start by defining these terms.

Some Definitions

Cosmology can be roughly defined as the study of the origin and evolution of the Universe. However, humans couldn’t distinguish between the galactic and large-scale universe and our Solar System until the invention of the telescope (when scientists began to determine the structure of our galaxy and nearby galaxies). Therefore, until the invention of the telescope, cosmology was the study of the motion of solar system objects such as the Sun, Moon, comets, planets etc.

Mythology can be roughly defined as stories that serve to unfold part of the world view of a people and/or explain a practice, belief, or natural phenomena. Myths can coordinate the living person with the cycle of his/her own life, with the environment in which he/she’s living and with his/her society. Mythological thinking in our species’ history first appeared

the service and worship of the supernatural or deity(ies). The deity(ies) worshipped are usually those described in a myth. Unfortunately, many people interpret literally the myths, instead of seeing them as merely symbols. “Facts of the mind made manifest in a fiction of matter,” Maya Deren, Joseph Campbell’s colleague, once said.

The first avenue that I wish to explore here is: The God Mythology versus the God-Goddess Mythology and how that affected our ancestral view of the Universe. Since I’ve been thinking about these ideas off-and-on for close to a decade, I will use this opportunity to synthesize some of my thoughts. Therefore, what follows may or may not be what Fiorella had in mind. (Reader beware!)

Mythological Gods and Goddesses

The myths of a culture create and become part of the character of a culture. You “do as your gods do” because the symbols in mythology ultimately refer to YOU (i.e. your interpretation). Your deities’ concerns are your concerns, and vice versa. So if a culture viewed the heavens as extensions of themselves, their lives will follow that concept. Likewise, if people in a culture live their lives with philosophies that contain far-reaching views, their mythological deities will contain those views too. So I think that the cosmological myths and deities of particular times and cultures are very revealing and important in understanding man’s cosmological views throughout our history.

I wanted to change my course from being a professor, to that of being an entertainer. I wanted to entertain with science, astronomy, to sing about quantum physics, I wanted to make people dance!

at the time of Neanderthal man. Because our ancestors spent so much time outdoors, and the human eye tends to organize hundreds to thousands of points of light, such as that from a night sky, into ordered patterns, cosmological mythologies probably appeared very shortly thereafter.

Religion can be roughly defined as

About 5000 years ago, the mythology of the ancient agricultural world was dominated by the “Goddess of Many Names.” This deity’s concern was mostly of the earth’s fertility and life, i.e. giving life, nurturing life, taking life. This female, as “giver of forms,” had progeny who were also other gods and goddesses. The Goddess and her offspring were viewed as

inseparable from the natural world. For example in the ancient Lower Egyptian culture, one of the goddess’ progeny was “Nut,” the heavenly sphere. There was a timeless quality to this mythology, in that life was an ever-returning cycle, and time had no beginning and no end.

Beginning around the second millennium B.C., various nomadic herding tribes from southeastern Europe traveled across Asia Minor and the Near East to the Indus Valley and began invading and assuming control of the lands and temple-cities. The chief gods of these Indo-European invaders were hunting gods and sky gods. A complex fusion of their cultures took place during which the matriarchal patterns of the goddess myths were incorporated into, but not entirely suppressed, by the more patriarchal ways of the Indo-Europeans (“Aryans”). The resulting myths were revealing in that numerous “encounters” between the gods and goddesses took place, for example, Zeus seduces various nymphs. At this time also, the main Mother Goddess deity was divided and dispersed into at least six less-powerful goddesses, for example: Athena, Aphrodite, Artemis, Hera, Demeter, Persephone.

Coming out of this mixture was a powerful warrior culture centered on the city of Mycenae, which flourished between 1600 and 1150 B.C. Also, at around 1200 B.C. came the Dorians, new invaders from the northwest, who were militarily superior, and who insisted on a firmly patriarchal mythology. The myths from this time reflect this conquering mentality such as Apollo slaying the snake Python, and Perseus slaying the serpentahed Medusa. A consequence of the patriarchal mythology was that the power of the Mother Goddess was permanently diffused.

I’ve now told you about the general mythologies of this time period. How did the cosmological mythologies change through these same periods?

Before 4000 B.C., the goddess mythologies flourished in small communities with the image of the Goddess as the axis of the Universe.

Beginning around 4000 B.C. the earliest cities were constructed, larger communities emerged, a differentiation of professions began, and gods and god-

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desses started to play a bigger role in these peoples’ lives. As the tall ziggurats were being built, the people looked up more than ever before. The priests watched the skies and noticed a mathematical regularity in the passages of the seven “spheres” (the sun, the moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn). The priests translated this cosmic order into civilized human life, where royal ceremonies paid homage to these spheres. In nearby Egypt at this time, similar civilizations were also constructed.

The mythological cosmology of the cultures at this time were very rich. Once the mystery of the night sky in these cultures revealed a cosmic order, the human response in these cultures was just as vast. Their response showed a deep recognition of the human body as being a duplicate in miniature of the macrocosmic universe. A general belief was that, by conforming perfectly to ones own virtue, as the animals do to theirs, as the plants do to theirs, the sun, the moon, the planets and the stars do to theirs, a person at once supports the universe, and at the same time is supported by it. This sort of cosmology is what results when goddesses have a large part to play in a culture’s myths.

When the invaders arrived, and along with them, their gods, the harmony was broken. The gods that they brought were black and white, good and evil, light and dark. Where formerly the myths contained planetary cycles, marking days, nights, months, years and eons of unending time, now the myths contained a straight timeline with a beginning, a middle and a prophesied end. So when you cut the female goddess out of the myths of a culture you get a totally different culture. I don’t think that the cosmological myths since that time have been nearly as rich, intricate, and supportive. This may reveal something of our culture today, as well.

References

Campbell, Joseph, Transformations of Myth Through Time, Harper and Row, 1990. Campbell, Joseph, The Inner Reaches of Outer Space, Harper and Row, 1986. Campbell, Joseph, The Power of Myth (#5: The Goddess), Mystic Fire Video, 1990.

Woolger, Jennifer and Woolger, Roger, The Goddess Within, Fawcett, 1987.

Bringing a Feminine Aspect to Science

Fiorella Terenzi also wishes to bring a feminine aspect to science. But I don’t know that that means! Does it mean that science is performed differently or with untraditional methods and approaches? Does it mean that it is practiced within a more human-centered ethos? Does it mean that she would like to see more women scientists? (Actually, I think we all would!) So the second avenue that I wish to explore here is the role that religion played in the science education for an elite group of people who were mostly male. Again, I may or may not have interpreted what Fiorella had in mind. (Reader Beware Squared!)

Women have not had a large role in

with activity. In the seventeenth century, the Newtonian cosmos emerged and is mostly what we use today.

The mathematically-based sciences, such as physics, have had roots throughout scientific history that were deeply entwined with religion. This connection has been strong even after the seventeenth century. I know, you are probably saying to yourself: “But WAIT, how could the physical sciences and religion have such a close association?! Wasn’t Galileo trying to break away from the Church?”

Unfortunately, from the thirteenth century through the eighteenth century, the prominent scientists of those times were consciously aligning themselves with the Christian churches. Galileo’s ardent hope, in fact, was to gain the Pope’s endorsement. Other prominent scientists such as Copernicus, Kepler, and Newton were deeply religious men who created

Unfortunately, from the thirteenth century through the eighteenth century, the prominent scientists of those times were consciously aligning themselves with the Christian churches.

the sciences for most, or all, of the existence of science. Even in historical instances, when women were influential in other areas, they have not been able to gain a significant entry in the hard sciences. You may say that it was simply because of the prevailing sexism of the times. However, the reasons are more likely due to the church dominating much of our ancestors’ scholarly endeavors. That made a large difference in the science gender percentages, as I will show you.

For about 1500 years, up until about the seventeenth century, the Western cosmological perspective was dominated by Christianity. The earth was at rest at the center, and a series of heavenly crystalline spheres orbited carrying the sun, moon, planets, and stars. Each of these spheres had an associated religious entity such as angels, archangels etc. Beyond this sealed cosmos was the heaven of God, where spirits of all sorts were vibrantly buzzing

their cosmological systems by reconceiving the Judeo-Christian god as a “divine mathematician.” The scientist Cusa believed that to study mathematics was to study the mind of God. Roger Bacon promoted science as a means to terrorize unbelievers and to interpret the Scripture.

These religious links made it close to impossible for women to enter the scientific arena. The higher education that was a part of the resurgence of learning in the late Middle Ages was available only to men training for the Church. These universities provided education for the clergy, and since women were not eligible for clergy positions, there was no place where the women could learn mathematics and science.

In the eighteenth century, science and religion finally began to separate. There now remains a somewhat secular environment with some scientists viewing themselves as a kind of scientific

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priest. Recent well-known physicists have even presented their work as a quest to illuminate the mathematical plan of Creation that is of divine origin (Einstein, Hawking). And the Theory-of-Everything proponents may have quasi-religious rather than scientific goals.

A culture of physical sciences that encourages both men and women to pursue different kinds of goals would be a good thing. More variety. Since science is a culturally-directed pursuit, it would be beneficial for all to have women involved in determining what science is, how it is practiced, how to put it to use in our lives, and what are its ideals and goals. I hope this dream isn’t too far off.

References

The main premise and all of the material in the “Bringing a Feminine Aspect to Science” section came from:

Wertheim, Margaret, Pythagoras’ Trousers, Times Books, 1995.

Aristotle’s Cosmology?

Fiorella Terenzi’s new book: The Sensual Universe will paint cosmological objects with a human face. Galaxies will gravitate towards each other because they are in love. Comets will pass through our inner Solar System like artists with infrequent creative expressions. This sort of human interpretation may have appeal for young people, and indeed, it could be a fun and amusing concept for many adults. But I worry that this sort of science presentation could be misleading to those who don’t know the science facts any better.

Her approach is very similar to Aristotle’s cosmos. In Aristotle’s cosmology, everything strives towards an ideal appropriate to its nature. A stone drops to the ground because it wants to return home. The Earth and other celestial bodies orbit in circular paths because the circle is the perfect shape and these celestial bodes want their paths most suited to their heavenly nature.

It would be a step backwards, scientifically, to present such material as fact. Since I’m certain that Fiorella wouldn’t want it to be accepted this way either, I only have one piece of advice about her

future literary presentation. BE CLEAR! Separate the fact from the fiction and make sure that these amusing ideas are presented as simply amusing ideas and NOT FACT. And I hope her book succeeds!

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to S. Coyote and T. Stanley for our discussions regarding these ideas in this Feminine Cosmology section!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Amara Graps is a computational physicist and consultant working on numerical analysis, scientific research, and technical writing projects for companies as well as government laboratories (NASA-Ames), and universities (Stanford). Her work experience, primarily in astronomy, astrophysics, and planetary sci

ence research, was gained from her current cooperative agreement at NASA-Ames, where she has been associated for ten years, from Stanford University, and from previous jobs at the University of Colorado and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She earned her B.S. in Physics in 1984 from the University of California, Irvine and her M.S. in Physics (w/computational physics option) in 1991 from San Jose State University. She is currently writing software for the Solar Oscillations Investigations (SOI) Project at Stanford University, modeling processes in the primitive solar nebula for a project at NASA-Ames, and is preparing to move in 1997 to Heidelberg, Germany to work on a Ph.D. project about comet dust.

Graps can be reached at 22724 Majestic Oak Way, Cupertino, California, 95014 USA; by email: agraps@netcom.com; or World Wide Web: http://www.amara.com/

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