Chapter 1: the ship

The ship: spaceship Universe

Since you seem to have the necessary courage, curiosity or ingenuity to come on-board (or maybe you just have some free time and want to have a look?), you should really get to know the ship we will be traveling in. Or on. Or with. Depends on what you prefer. It’s your choice.

Ok, so you have heard a little bit about the ship before, but that certainly isn’t enough. Remember, we are about to go back and forward in time (billions of years!), and our “traveling” will take us both to the very beginning of space-time as we know it, but also as far into the future as possible. We will visit distant planets, get out of our own galaxy, and travel through the Universe. We will cover billions, trillions, quadrillions of kilometers or miles at a given time, whenever we go from A to B and then jump to C. So shouldn’t you know a little bit more about what we will be traveling in/on/with before we go on such a mind-blowing journey?

Think of it as an airplane safety demonstration. Literally. Imagine whatever cabin crew members you prefer - speaking whatever language(s) you find most informative, and wearing the clothes and giving out the smiles that make you feel truly available to listen. Made-up or not, men or women - maybe a mixture of them. They can be as old or as young as you like, and/or you can mix them at will. It’s really up to you. But make sure you picture every lazy and/or sophisticated haircut, every walking sound. Including the way their lips move as they now talk among themselves. In a minute or so, they will start telling you about this unique ship with all the state-of-the-art features that will assure that the various journeys will be as smooth and enjoyable as humanly possible. Still, before they do that, you should definitely name them. Believe me, they will become much more real if you do it. You can call cabin crew member 1 whatever you want, and cabin crew members 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 also whatever you like. You can even make up names for a much larger team, or - if you think that’s appropriate - name them all the same.

Ready? Welcome aboard.

- Ladies, gentleman, and all life forms aboard, - says cabin crew member 2 - a very good morning. And a very good afternoon. And a very good evening. We hope you can hear us loud and clear, and that our message is being fully understood in whatever language you prefer. We are here to tell you a about the safety features of our spaceship Universe that we will be using today. Please take a couple of minutes of your time and pay full attention, even if you are a frequent flyer in similar spaceships. This is important.

- Our spaceship today is not being piloted by anyone in particular - continues cabin crew 3, now taking the lead -, but it is indeed being piloted by all of us. This may sound a little bit confusing, but as you will soon find out, this is truly the safest way to travel through the Universe. It allows each and every one of us here in this spaceship the chance to question and decide on the direction, the speed, the amount of time being travelled backwards or forwards, which galaxy or planet or star we are heading to, and to pick which route to take.

- Indeed, this spaceship is not at all like an ordinary ship - announces cabin crew member 1, coming out of nowhere - because unlike ordinary ships, you are free to get out and come back in at will. At any time. And when you do it you will be able to freeze time. So even if a year passes in your perspective (your rest-frame), we will all still be here, exactly when and where you left us. Unless you want to fast forward or to your preferred time/destination.

- But as you probably already expect - adds cabin crew member 3 -, we are obliged to comply with all the international rules of safety for all life-forms and capable-of-thinking non-life forms. We would therefore appreciate your full attention regarding these.

Are you really still picturing the complexity of the cabin crew members, as they try to provide you with some really important information about what you have just stepped into? Have you even considered the possibility that they are not life-forms, but perhaps very advanced robots? Would you prefer to picture them as somewhat humanoid, but clearly alien? Are they all relatively close to you? Can you distinguish between their voices? Do they have particular accents? Are you already questioning their “rules”?

However you picture them, you should still focus on the complexity of their gestures, on the emotions on their faces, the unique ways in which their bodies, hands and eyebrows (if you picture them with hands and/or eyebrows, of course) try to ease the communication. This will warm up your imagination, complex thinking and will get you deeper into this journey (and you will need all of these for what we are about to go through). Most importantly though, it will stress the fact that communicating is not just about words or pure information. And regardless of all the information that the cabin crew members will tell you next, you should also remember that while rules are great (they will provide you with some) - as long as they are simple, only a few, and they work well for everyone - they must be understood instead of remembered. But you must also remember that part of being human, and thinking/feeling, in general, is being capable of both creating and disobeying rules. So really, now that cabin crew member number one, clearly the funniest-looking of them all (or did you picture he/she differently?) is walking slowly towards you to brief you a little bit more, try to focus on why, rather that what.

Maybe next time you hear something similar on an old-earthy-like airplane you will do the same (i.e., you will concentrate on why), and maybe even ask yourself “why don’t they tell people that they shouldn’t inflate life vests inside of the airplane because that can make it harder/impossible for them to go through the emergency exit, instead of just saying you must not inflate your life jacket inside of the airplane?”.

- At the end of this spaceship - and by that cabin crew member number 1 means at the end of this book - you will find more specific information about all the destinations that our spaceship will be going through today, their proposed order, and what to do in the case of an emergency.

- Most of all - continues cabin crew number 4 -, you really should not leave the spaceship without making at least one single question about what you have heard, thought, seen or imagined. That is because a journey without a question or a challenge is a journey that has no meaning, and this journey, almost by definition, is supposed to be meaningful. So before you leave this spaceship (which, by the way, and as we said before, you can leave at any moment) just ask yourself a question. Doubt something. Ask. Think. It can even be about the use of a particular word. But it can also be about what makes up this ship. About why you are picturing me the way you are right now. As our journey carries on, you will probably be inspired to ask arguably much more compelling/deep-meaning questions about why do we think we know what we know. What makes up most of the Universe, why our galaxy is the way it is, or exactly why should you be reading this and taking this journey.

- And yet, every question is an important question - says cabin crew member number 3. It’s not just about the fact that there are no dumb questions. You see, this spaceship, this time machine, will only have fuel to travel trough space-time if you ask questions. This thing works on questions,  on curiosity, on doubt, on wealthy skepticism, and if at any time you think you have all the answers, it will simply disintegrate, and you will either disintegrate with it, or go back to a life with 100% certainties where you think you know everything and are certain of it. A life which is based on a complete and utter lie.

- So please, in the interest of your safety - continues member 2 - do not stop asking questions and never leave without one. Open your mind, but look carefully at every single thing that you let in. The bottom line is that you should not discard anything in advance, but you should also not take anything for granted.

- As you will soon find out, or perhaps re-discover, while making sense of things makes us feel better and more secure, it often leads us to believe we know a lot, when we clearly don’t. And there are very little things which are more potentially dangerous than a belief that is not backed up by anything.

- Whenever people believe in something it does become real for them.  It is real. And that’s not just a problem of having a weak, vulnerable spaceship: it’s the perfect recipe for a huge spaceship crash, killing not only everyone on-board, but perhaps the native life that exists in a foreign world we might be visiting. So take this simple note with you: whenever you feel like everything makes sense, or whenever you think you know a lot about something, press “delete all”, because most likely you are being fooled by your own brain and its passion for order, while, in fact, you still don’t know anything at all.

- So, again, welcome on-board. We appreciate your business and hope you have a very nice trip with us.