A book by Jim Baggott, Farewell to Reality: How Modern Physics Has Betrayed the Search for Scientific Truth, is not as harsh as it sounds. It tries to separate what is solidly known in modern physical theory from what is speculation. And it does quite a good job, though I don't agree with every conclusion, tendency or bias of the writer.
What fascinates me most now is a diagram on page 78 of the book. It accompanies Baggott's extensive discussion and description of the invisible particles modern physicists have "discovered" or "postulated" (take your pick) in the past 70 years or so. Baggott divides these into 36 groups, with a 37th being not a particle or force but a field, the omnipresent (according to recent thinking) Higgs field. It is what gives mass to the others, the particles and forces, according to the theory which seems to have much acceptance at present.
That leaves 24 "matter particles," divided into 6 Leptons and 18 Quarks, and 12 "forces." One of these 12 is Electromagnetic force. Then there are 3 Weak nuclear forces, and 8 different Strong nuclear forces. What interests me right now about all this is its peculiar correspondences with esoteric or occult or Pythagorean teachings coming down to us from ancient times.
Note that I said "correspondences." Not "identities."
Obviously there are 24 hours in the day, and that comes from, I believe, the ancient Sumerians, or else the Egyptians, or both--probably from the astrologers (who were also the astronomers of that time) who always used a sexagesimal system of mathematics--6, 12, 24, 30, 60, 90, 120, and 360, with all their easy divisions, as the favored numbers. It is fascinating that no one questions the experiential "fact" (or convention if you will) of 24 hours in a day. It is very convenient and seems to have some natural correlation with human convenience, no matter how one might say "It might have been otherwise." But it wasn't.
These 24 were arranged by the Sumerians and Egyptians and Hindus into a system of "rulership" by the 7 planets used by astrologers (including the sun and moon) at that time before the discovery of the telescopically known planets much later. Sunday begins, at sunrise, with an hour ruled by the sun, Monday with an hour ruled by the moon, and so on. The sequence goes on naturally through the week of seven days without a break (168 hours).
And then, of course, there are the universally recognized twelve signs or constellations (though Western astrologers make a definite and clear distinction between the former, based on the orbit of the earth around the sun, and the latter, based on apparent star-patterns). So the 24 "particles" in the diagram and the 12 "forces" add up to 36, a very important number to astrologers and occultists.
The Magic Square of 6 is the Magic Square of the sun, and it is based on placing the numbers from 1 to 36 in a quadrangle with 36 squares within it so that each horizontal and each vertical line adds to the same resultant, namely, 111. This is a wonderfully neat demonstration of some kind of fantastic mathematical logical or natural (take your pick) order which has been called "magical" for good reason, though I will not go into all my reasons for saying that.
Another 36 is that of the 36 "faces" or "decanates" of the zodiac. Each sign (of the 12) is divided into 3--a "decanate" only because it contains 10 degrees out of the total 360). This is another "solar" measurement, as it were, because the zodiac is actually the orbit of the earth as divided according to the solstices and equinoxes, which are phenomena of the relation of the earth to the sun. So the Magic Square of the sun and the sun's zodiac are each divided into 36 portions.
And, after the intensive international and wearisome and confusing and fascinating and perplexing and mathematically challenging investigations and speculations of hordes of theoretical physicists over the past century or more, we have, not 27, not 35, not 37, not 43, but exactly 36 particles and forces in our physically observable universe insofar as it has been subjected to the research of human scientists and their humanly devised instruments. (I leave out the Higgs field, which is omnipresent and neither a particle nor a force.)
Do I really have to sing songs about all this to show that is might be relevant, or interesting, or meaningful? I for one sense that it could mean something pretty extraordinary.
But what that something is is not material for this quick summary of factors I just wanted to point out to you for your own meditation or investigation or speculation.
Hugh Higgins
Cosmic Piper
