This document is for the discussion of the cosmology of the Realm of Esoterica
'First Draft of Esoterica Cosmology for review:' The cosmology of Esoterica is based on Killer Shrike's San'Dora Cosmology. This section details the hypotheses of the Chamber Philosophick (A learned society in the style of the Royal Society) on the nature of the multiverse. The Chamber Philosophick considers itself the foremost (mortal) expert on the nature of the multiverse. Note on terminology:
I have named things simply for convenience and to give some flavour. If you've got better suggestions please shout out (e.g. 'Underworld' needs sorting out)! I have left some sections quite brief for the time being, but we can fill them out at a later date. Previous discussion on cosmology can be found in the history section of this page (see revision 30). 5lippers, 2009/09/22 03:15Thoughts on the edits? Killer Shrike, 2009/09/23 00:30Hi Shrike, I think the edits are sheer genius and love the style! I was reading Sergi's article with a big grin on my face! Awesome! ;-) I think we’ve found our narrators so I’ve added some flavour text (in the same sort of vein) to a couple of the other pages. 5lippers, 2009/09/23 02:15
EditNature of the Multiverse
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It is a commonly held view amongst us of the Chamber Philosophick that the nature of the Cosmological Truths is intrinsically unclear and perhaps unknowable by merely mortal minds and tools (including language). However we also believe that though all explanations are ultimately inadequate to the task of attempting to describe something so fundamentally incomprehensible, nevertheless some comprehension (or at least the comfort gleaned from even the illusion of comprehension), can be gained by asserting some analogy or constructive structure to the amorphous void of our lack of provable knowledge.
Or, as my predecessor in past centuries the esteemed cosmologist Henrietta Illias Harmann once said (perhaps more succinctly), "All models are flawed, but some models are useful.", and we couldn't agree with her more.
And on that subject, as subscribers of this worthy scholarly periodical most assuredly already know, Harmann conducted many studies and dimensional explorations and was quite prolific in regards to producing scholarly documents detailing her observations and experiences throughout her career. However her final work on the subject, Harmann's Theory of a Spheroid Cosmology, generally referred to more directly as Harmann's Sphere in practice, is considered to be the most canonical and serves as the basis of the most commonly adhered to conceptualization of the so-called "multiverse" in academia.
To recap, the Sphere concept analogizes the multiverse as a "sphere" of infinite boundaries, with an inner Core only slightly less infinite than its nigh-infinite circumference, aka the Rim.
Of course, most people don’t really know what Harmann was going on about and she herself was quick to point out the deficiencies of this logical construct in her preface, but since no one has yet come up with anything compellingly better this model remains the most popular for purposes of scholarly discussion.
In addition to the aforementioned Core and Rim, Harmann’s model consists of Vim, Planes, Reflections, and the Between.
Vim is the term Harmann used to describe the fundamental substance from which the multiverse itself is built. That is to say, the underlying stuff from which all other things both concrete and abstract are composed.
The Core is a seething chaos of Vim in its most basic, material form. The Core is raw, primal, muddled and uncontrolled and inhabited by sentiences formed from the very building blocks of primal forces.
The Rim represents Vim in its purest or highest form and is thought of as being composed of pure ideas and concepts and inhabited by vastly powerful entities composed of pure energies, which are often conceived of as gods among lesser, corporeal entities.
Between the Core and the Rim, metaphysically speaking, the multiverse is comprised of an assumed infinite number of Planes that radiate outwards from the Core towards the Rim. Harmann further conjectured that Planes closer to the Core tend to be more muddled, disordered and primal whilst those closer to the Rim are more aligned with certain ideals but she could neither prove nor disprove this idea and the supposition is not considered to be integral to the larger model. Many scholars consider the conjecture to be effectively unprovable, particularly considering countervailing evidence that members of the Chamber Philosophick have collected in our ongoing quest to understand the Multiverse which indicates that Planes can vary greatly in size. While some are effectively infinite others are quite small and this tendency towards bigness or smallness and the observable state of relative primalness or surreality seem to be independent of any supposed proximity to the concept of a Core or a Rim to the (admittedly limited) extent that we are able to measure the actual existence of either.
Moving on, Planes (sometimes called dimensions) tend to have specific "rules" particular to them which determine how things work within the Plane; some Planes seem to be fairly normative but some have extremely unusual and potentially even unique behavior or "rules of reality" which we in the Chamber refer to as a "Paradigm". The Chamber Philosophick is uncertain about where these rules originate from or what enforces them, though we do our best to identify and catalog them whereever they can be observed.
An ancillary theory on the subject is Udi Blaka's proposed Law of Proximity which posits that Planes that are "closer" to each other along the Core / Rim axis are more likely to share similar rules, however field evidence for this is weak at best. I feel that it is important to stress that, despite the popularity of the Law of Proximity, Planar "closeness" is an extremely arbitrary measure in the multiverse and that different investigations of the Chamber Philosophick have produced widely different results both in favor of and against this theory. Suffice it to say, this area of knowledge is entirely theoretical, and perhaps will always remain so, and pet theories on the subject abound.
Within individual Planes, the Chamber Philosophick believes that Planes most often are comprised of a primary reality which we term a "Realm", and one or more sidereal realities which we call "Reflections".
Reflections (sometimes called alternate realities) are parallel versions of Realms they are associated with that have some common characteristics but often separate Paradigms. The most commonly documented type of Reflection seen in many Planes are dark realities that at least partially mirror their related Realm physically but which are inhabited by spiritual remnants of deceased inhabitants of the main Realm; such Reflections and their inhabitants also tend to evince life-draining properties that some scholars refer to as "negative energy" which they propose to be oppositional to a "positive energy" which supports life. However, that's a subject for another day.
In the large the Chamber Philosophick is uncertain as to what role such dark Reflections play in the wider multiverse if any, and Harmann conveniently dodged this aspect of Planes altogether in her papers, though with a smile and a wink. However the frequency with which such Reflections are found to exists is so high across Planes that many scholars remain convinced that there is some special importance of which we are currently unaware.
More to the point, we of the Chamber tend to call this type of dark Reflection a Gloom or a Limbo, though individual Realms usually have their own terms or concepts or mytho-religious connotations for such Reflections.
Finally, Harmann describes the "space" that exists outside of Planes as the "Between". Whilst the Chamber Philosophick agrees that the Between irrefutably exists; in fact many of us have traveled through it at least once in our cosmological studies; as a body we remain unconvinced that there is evidence to support the assertion that the Between actually separates the Planes as proposed by Harmann. There is sufficient observed behavior to support the alternate interpretation that the "Between" actually permeates all things and is composed entirely of inert or turgid Vim....."
- excerpt from the preface of the Cosmological Philosopher's Annual Omnibus ECY 789, written by Sergi Lätdoro, Annalist for the Chamber Philosophick |
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