Dark Matter

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In an earlier post, I wondered, "Is ki real?" Is ki an actual thing, or is it just a concept?

I teach aikido to college students. So I hesitate to write about science as if I know anything, because I know I will be challenged! But I offer this:

Only a small part of the electromagnetic spectrum is visible to the human eye. We are all familiar with ultraviolet and infrared rays or waves and the ways in which they can be used: gamma rays, X-rays, infrared heat lamps, microwaves, and radio. Infrared light was only discovered by humans in 1800 and ultraviolet in 1901. But animals such as bees and snakes have sensed these parts of the spectrum for eons. How might a snake's ability to find prey or a bee's ability to find nectar have been described or understood before we had instruments to perceive these wavelengths?

Dark matter is a discovery that has only recently become known to non-scientists. Only 50 years ago, in popular culture at least, dark matter was the stuff of science fiction; in many ways it still is. As with infrared and ultraviolet light, its existence was originally postulated to explain observed behavior. We have since developed instruments that allow us to "see" and measure infrared and ultraviolet light, but we have nothing that will allow us to directly measure dark matter. Its existence can only be inferred based on the motions of galaxies and other astronomical "objects." Yet dark matter is estimated to account for 83% of the matter in the universe (maybe).  Astrophysicists seem to be overwhelmingly in agreement that dark matter's behavior is very strange, yet that something like it must exist.

So, given an awareness of the limitations of human understanding of how the universe is fabricated, does the existence of ki seem so impossible?

Thanks to Max Strom for inspiring this post.

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