Sometimes we just have to take someone’s word for facts we cannot personally check. Take neutrinos, for example. I’ve never seen one, but according to physicists, trillions of neutrinos pass through every cubic centimeter of my body every second. Ouch? No. I don’t feel them, the physicists tell me, because neutrinos react only rarely with matter and can pass through the planet just as well as they pass through me. It takes a highly specialized physicist with some expensive sensitive equipment to mark their passing, so I’m told. When Earth was awash with neutrinos from supernova 1987A, for example, a few of them whizzing through deeply buried detectors set off some bells and whistles and a flurry of scientific and popular articles. Yes, I take the word of physicists that neutrinos continuously violate my personal space and pierce me through the heart.
Neutrinos are almost “massless particles” or “oscillations” (they have three interchangeable “masses”) that are virtually impossible for us to feel. Apparently, they cause no damage as they pass through our bodies. We ignore them because they are, as far as we are personally concerned, inconsequential. Would that we could be so insensitive to insults. If we can ignore the “almost” massless particles that penetrate us every second, why can’t we ignore the “truly massless” insults that people hurl at us?
I find it interesting that human insult-detectors are many orders of magnitude more sensitive to the passing of massless insults than neutrino detectors are to the passing of neutrinos. The next time someone or some group throws insults your way, think of those trillions of neutrinos that ceaselessly pierce you without your so much as flinching. Then think of adjusting the sensitivity of your insult detector. You don’t need a detector that interacts with massless insults.
Neutrinos are almost “massless particles” or “oscillations” (they have three interchangeable “masses”) that are virtually impossible for us to feel. Apparently, they cause no damage as they pass through our bodies. We ignore them because they are, as far as we are personally concerned, inconsequential. Would that we could be so insensitive to insults. If we can ignore the “almost” massless particles that penetrate us every second, why can’t we ignore the “truly massless” insults that people hurl at us?
I find it interesting that human insult-detectors are many orders of magnitude more sensitive to the passing of massless insults than neutrino detectors are to the passing of neutrinos. The next time someone or some group throws insults your way, think of those trillions of neutrinos that ceaselessly pierce you without your so much as flinching. Then think of adjusting the sensitivity of your insult detector. You don’t need a detector that interacts with massless insults.
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