The Garden of Cosmic Speculation 9780711225381, 0711225389, 9780711222168, 0711222169

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'A

% THE GARDEN OF CHARLES JENCKS

*>(

created

y.

irchitectural critic

and

*:;He

his late wife

;ape. that, after her "

)

death

a larger project, ao

Jc elements

of

'

r

_Th'the Borders are ^

tlosmic Speculationi^^conceived ^ ^Stplore certain 'i.

What

are

fundamental aspects of

atoms made

How does DNA make

^nceive of them?

panism and why garden?

^

In

and how

of

is

it

essential to

dialogue with eminent

cosmologists, and biologists, including

physicists,

Paul Davies, Lee Smolin, and Steven Rose, Charles

Jencks has created a series of new, expansive,

visual

metaphors that challenge misleading and frequently misunderstood concepts, such as the "Big Bang"

and the

"Selfish

Gene."

The garden uses nature intellectually

sense

to celebrate nature, both

and through the senses, including the

of humor.

What emerges

is

a

new language

of

landscape design based on twists and waves, optical

and sudden

illusions,

universe

the

quite

presents a view of

surprises.

It

different

from the standard

show

mechanistic model; the complexity sciences to

it

be more dynamic and creative than previously

conceived.

The garden abstracts cascade

a terrace

shows

isitor

matter, '

^11

new world

view.

the distortion of space

caused by a black V

this

A

water

of steps recounts the story of the universe,

hole, a

and time

"Quark Walk" takes the

on a journey to the smallest building blocks of

and a series f.-^^tqt

of

sweeping landforms and lakes

geometry while echoing

visually

the

'tish hills.

-al,

"

and questioning, the Garden of Cosmic ^ull

of ideas

and games, associations

Jencks weaves together larden's creation of

his personal

and an investigation

recent

science,

ght on the

using

new ways

r

dlL-TIB 712. 6094147 Jencks 2003 The g specurfftro

,^^31111022729527

./

THE GARDEN OF COSMIC SPECULATION IS A LANDSCAPE OF WAVES, TWISTS, AND FOLDS, A LANDSCAPE PATTERN DESIGNED TO RELATE US TO NATURE THROUGH NEW METAPHORS PRESENTED TO THE SENSES. Landscape of Waves

—Linearism. mixed media, 30 x 40

in.,

1995.

•* »:.i

r

V

-'^

^M%

I' ")^%r.^ii^l

'fH

s>>v

f%

IT IS

PARTLY BASED ON THE

NEW SCIENCES OF

COMPLEXITY DEVELOPED WITH THE AID OF THE

COMPUTER OVER THE LAST TWENTY YEARSSTRANGE ATTRACTORS THAT ORGANIZE SUCH THINGS AS THE FLOW OF WATER, THE MOVEMENT OF

SOIL,

THE PATTERNS OF WEATHER. The Snake Mound

with the

Henan

Attractor inscribed.

."Mm-

'

m U

:i

A

9^

U

^-

DNA UNDERLIES ALL

LIFE

AND COMES

IN

SEVERAL STATES, SUPERCOILED OR CONGESTED AND UNFOLDED BEAUTIFULLY IN THE DOUBLE HELIX.

WE HAVE SHOWN THESE OPPOSITE

QUALITIES BECAUSE THEY EXIST

IN

NATURE AND

ARE NOT MERE HUMAN PROJECTIONS.

«^^

.^^.^t^ljp-:-

'h

\ '^*^

WORKING WITH SCIENTISTS, GARDENERS, CRAFTSMEN, AND FRIENDS WE HAVE DESIGNED ELEMENTS THAT CELEBRATE DISCOVERIES OF OUR TIME— SUCH AS DNA— WHILE ALSO QUESTIONING THE REIGNING METAPHORS DERIVED FROM THEM, SUCH AS THE SELFISH GENE. A GARDEN SHOULD NOT ONLY PRESENT THE NEW WORLD-VIEW BUT ALSO HEIGHTEN OUR RELATIONSHIP TO THROUGH THE SENSES. IT,

DNA Garden

of the Six Senses, aerial perspective, Liane Wilcher

and Charles Jencks.

'^ ^.'.^

Mm u

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b... vEi"

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p'^,-..,"' i'*j5*-v .,..:?.>^;^-,^.-'f-

i'Av^if

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...

:::

^^^Z-

y.^

•^.#i.^?;.i

fi*&--:

^ ^

W

% ^'t'^^'

-

laid

Long Walk, an

>9w*;j^

v--yr^v.

u/

Clare's

'

eclectic Paradise

Garden

out as an undulating path hidden from the

house, bordered by rhododendrons, hostas, of the valley

the lawn thick

is

and flowering shrubs. At the end

many

a bank with

different

lily

of

types of

moss. ,v

jt4

^Jei?^

,

r'p.^

Af^

4-i

':.;yri^

llo\\inj^ Taoisi

mouiuanis

loiio

srrinj^ thr local laiidscaiic in

loi'

Siollaiul

ol

pail

'I'his

Ills.

low,

aiul

\alli.'\s.

iiuiaphor

a liiiiiiri apt

(ill

li(|uid |aws,

those

bigger water dragon. The earth eaten b) the water.

arbitrar), but the

it

It

forms have siibset|uently been absorbed by

riotous nature.

Because bulldozers so easily produced linear and drop-hke

we conceived

shapes,

be revealed.

what

is

or

I

Or

w

sketches of the

I

hole

site,

form which had an underlying

metaphor

new language of Partly it came out of

slugs or, better than any image, a

the site and earth -moving a

when drew

that, at least,

thought: there emerged eight or nine blobs, or serpents,

worms, or

abstract

the area as having a hidden order waiting to

that

and

partly, as

was beginning

to

logic. I

shall explain,

form

my mind,

in

came from

it

"a landscape

of waves."

During those long summer nights, when I

we would

1:30,

it

stayed light

till

argue over which way the program should go. In

the back of Maggie's

mind was

a radical plan for

of Portrack around and approaching

with

it

turning the layout

a long,

meandering,

tree-framed avenue that would pass on one side of the Dragon Lake.

She had heard Anthony Archer- Wills give

and

artificial

waterfall

at

along with

lakes

on water gardens

and got the idea of having him construct

Portrack. This she did, overseeing the

Hugh

composed them

work

a

carefully

Hastings and his team of earth-movers. They

gingerly put in place

little

a talk

at:iont

as if they

ten large Dumfrieshire boulders

and

had always been there, and then created

island that also looked eternal.

a

"The Land of the Immortals"

was the Chinese reference, but one would hardly recognize the allusicjn

unless

it

was pointed

Maggie always favored

out.

OPPOSITE, top: Maggie's sketch of Cluden Mills river in

which

waterfall

.

we swam,

opposite, center:

that

became

and

Falls,

The Dragon Wall

in

the Yu Yuan, Shanghai, with

a figurative head at the end of an undulation.

In

spite of the fact that

Chinese connoisseurs considered such explicitness sculptural rocks give

welcome punctuation

with other metaphors.

dinosaurs, have subsequently

As

if

vulgar,

images and

to a garden, above

the undulating dry-stone wall at Portrack,

coded

1987, a nearby

a model for her excavations and

and elsewhere,

and

this

lef-t: In

image

is

to confirm the idea, birds, ancestors of

made

nests

in

our dragon heads.

33

understatement and, where appropriate, conventions. This led to our

was bored with

she,

major disagreements.

first

Scottish

to

sensitivity I,

more than

however convincing

traditional design,

its last

exemplars had been, and saw no reason to repeat anything done well for three hundred years. "Don't reinvent the Georgian spoon, buy approach. She, by contrast, wanted one of the great

my

one," was

Leon

radical traditionalists,

Krier, to

do an extension

main

to the

house. He, a good friend, was not only drawing seductive city plans to reconstruct a fragmenting Europe, but also leading a vast

army of

followers, including Prince Charles, in his charge back to the past.

In fact,

Leon

sacrifice

something of

is

themselves to an idea he

When we

stern lawgiver.

and

a visionary

also part

is

Don

Quixote, part the

have our periodic, heated discussions

him

"Ayatollah," a designation he accepts because he

his

criticism

drawing

and inventiveness. Krier

style and, as

who

prophets

like all

we

will see, she

knows

I

call

I

value

influenced Maggie's

also

was not

go very

to

from

far

the traditional view until after she started painting with Cecil CoUins

and worked on

from

In any case,

invention has

my

at least

programmatic gets tired. So

scheme with Frank Gehry.

a

—

background,

I

main

that

we had

a tentative

which might be brought

novel have one plot, or

The

First Plot

are

made

went

to

work on

new

five or

into a narrative. Should a

over time, gardens create the stories by

made, and what

garden on the

a

agreement over the

many?

a

is

garden,

we

of the senses, a heightening of the way

Imagine

I

the other

—The Senses of Sensual Knowledge

Because they are

which they

when

either can drive design forward

now

areas

that architectural

two opposite sources: the formal and the

wormlike grammar of the Dragon Lakes, six

knew

moon

or

on

a

or Mars, with only a few colors. There

if

not the celebration

perceive the universe?

dead planet, such is

nothing

much

as

Venus

to

touch

except hard, dusty surfaces, and no scents except the occasional stench of a volcano. Minimalism, sensory deprivation, nothing to perceive,

little

growth of the mind. By

contrast, the earth

seems

to

be designed to stimulate every nerve ending and external organ that can pick up a signal. Flowers clearly amplified the senses of smell

and sight when, some 140 miUion years ago, they came on the scene. Their strong

polychromy contrasting with

green background, would have startled

all

the predominantly

the sentient creatures had

they been keeping records and, to further the fantasy

stimulated

new

them

and longer,

to look harder

briUiance.The same shock of the

by the new power of perfume;

it

as if

it

might have

hypnotized by the

new would

have been created

would have dominated

smells of rotting flesh and inert matter. Since flowers

perform

a sexual function, they

senses, for instance, hearing

—

the

performing their frenzied dances. 34

must

also have

sound of

the usual

came

to

heightened other

insects buzzing

and

—

lookm^^

piool thai

tiiriluT

toi'

Us

|irmiai>

lluni^^hi

1)1

i>h\i()Us

(.oiulusion

Ird

no

is

dial

t|iu'siioii

llu'

li'diii

ihr

iiosr

sense ol lasir

Thus,

iiul.

iiisiruiueiu

mil)

\\

on

ima^iiu'd

I

iiioudi, hand, ears elc.

ihis

— reaching

hree/e like insect feelers. Later

in

as

ii

is

of

tor an

lo lie us sensually

is

organs

j^ianl

j^usl

program

iiiiiial

made

—

out, perhaps lightly

nose, eyes,

waving

in the

understood the extraordinary way

1

our senses transform impulses of energy into feelings, and

Madelon Vriesendorp drew

friend

and

kililicii

a

foolstep or a

a

die

Ix'

1

T'liis

iiioiilh,

\\\v

siiur, loiuinrl)',

hose major fimction, inherenll),

cosmos.

die

food.

ol

cck'hraU'd

is

siiu'll

senses could

five

ilu'

lo

sriisoriuni,

kiuluMi v^aiik'n.Tlu'rr

plaiiiu'd: a

Willi lu'ihs dial ivlcasr llu-ir ihtIhiiu's

w

hiiill

tiillivalion

[hv sense of

vjartlon aloiiv^ wiili

a

ilir

UmI al\\a)s

soiiu'diiny^ dial Maj^vjir

is

lion,

liiiii.

nu'

a ^^ardrii

image

surrealist

a

of

my the

magnified senses. Tiie question

became how

extend the senses on to

to

plane, to the level of thought, logic,

with

and understanding. One night,

thesaurus in hand, Maggie and

a

whole

We

site.

found

it

was possible

on

hii

1

program

a

to relabel

all

and

also a different use of the

garden became, quite place

by

where you grow what you high walls of

its

became its

the

logically, the

dark,

a

tree cover

Garden of

eat.

the kitchen

Sense, the

court, surrcninded

Crow Wood, because of behavior of its mad crows, became

The

and the

All these

Thus

Common

The tennis

existing

Garden of Taking Leave of Your Senses,

and confusions.

"sense."

abnormal

fast-growing cypress that Maggie hated,

the Sense of Fair Play. tall

word

for the

the existing

functions, and parts of the garden, with a normal and sense,

a larger

a place of illusions, tricks

puns "made sense"

in

terms of their use

and thus we had two different codes, two related programs. There was the narrative of the

and more, and the sense.

The

five senses, later

faculty of the

augmented

mind analogous

to six

to a physical

uses had a lot of applications in a garden: the vague

latter

impression of giving "a sense of security." hi halian gardens the surprising

jet

standing over

of water which the gardener releases it

(gia d'aqua)

ycni are

heightens the "sense of humor." Then

one could imagine the discernment and the meaning of a word

when

its

(^f quality,

"sense."

The

the "sense of value,"

logic

was compeUing,

leading quickly from one area and subject to another. As the

site

plan on the next page reveals, these different "senses" divided

up

the landscape into overlapping gardens.

top: Flowers

and

birds

worid an escalation collage

is

in

sensuality:

million

years ago, bringing to a green

polychromy, scent, and sound. This

a step on the Universe Cascade (see page 218), painted by

Jencks. far

waves

emerged 140

into

left:

A General Sense

of Anticipation.

Lily

Senses transform energy

neuronal events of the brain that have to be interpreted by the

mind, left: Drawing of the senses by Madelon Vriesendorp.

35

THE N1TH

The whole garden, with its

underlying metaphor

later

and

Common

DNA Garden;

the

is

visible

here with

—a landscape of waves.

In

the

The New Kitchen Sense Garden, the Six Senses

middle, reading from right to

Garden, the

work,

Sense

left,

are:

of Fair Play (tennis court);

Below the tennis court is the Universe Cascade, Symmetry Break Terrace, Black Hole Terrace, and Soiiton Waves. the Sense of Twist (Snake Mound).

Crow Wood, where

Sense and sensibility, sense and nonsense. In a

thousand crows make their nest in large sycamores and elms,

there a

in

1

was

atmosphere

a bizarre, eerie

that

reminded us of Bomarzo,

6th-century Italian garden. This strange landscape has sculpted,

huge stones on the

site,

of the Titans, the open jaws of

a battle

Hades, an elephant with a castle on leaning

such an acute angle that you lose balance. Maggie and

at

had gone there

1970s before

in the

came upon stone

evoked the wilderness

we

heart

its

thrown

being

as

to create a

James

been on show

at

program

the

model building

mock-up of

London

in

Crow Wood. To continue

and

a bizarre stair for

the

theme of

climbing up to

we

poem by

a

disorientation,

I

put

and nature

The symbolism of

—

coding As

few

I

was

we

if to

prove

"cosmogenic

lintel,

from

a

—words,

building,

an idea carried throughout

—

a first

first

sculpture,

example of

cross-

art."

The Nonsense

its title.

and

christened the

medium somewhere between

and landscape

to christen

silver

Thus the structure was an important

step in creating a hybrid architecture,

media

different

interact in surprising ways,

the rest of the landscape.

literature,

it

and displace the meaning of

Baudelaire, both underline

the pavilion.

Neue

on

"The Nonsense." Words covering one

folly

was

deck. Because this

its

platform was unusable in a conventional sense,

whole

that

his

designed an abstract columnar screen in alternating black,

our

in 1986. Since they

did not have a use for this fragment of a building, plinth in

for

it

exemplar of post-modernism, had

Academy

the Royal

sort of love tussle

new form of disorientation.

Stirling's

Staatsgalerie in Stuttgart, that

undergrowth and

garden called "Taking Leave of

a

re-erected part of a

out.

the

some

in

wildness. Thus

woodland of crows became

Your Senses." This was At

engaged

giants

I

had been cleaned up and

it

we pushed through

sanitized for tourists. As

strange

back, and a tipped house

its

suffered, over the years, a

One day Leon Krier and his wife Rita Wolf came Maggie and me, so we took them to Crow Wood to see the

indignities.

to visit

building, a structure Krier might have had a very oblique role in creating. Krier

in the late

1

had been

970s but,

as

a key

draftsman in James

was well aware, they had

I

several issues including design credits

on Prince

Charles.

fallen

the public thought of his housing

like "a

1930s wireless"

H^Mb^^^HI^^^^B^'TI-—,^ri^^^^^^^HB»

(that

and had

. *

.-?.,-•

London, saying the

is,

.

an old-fashioned

commissions. The

him

"

and the leaning house, are some

of the

many

esoteric

1,

A

•

•'.

I-

•

.'

architect

Bomarzo Garden, c.1560, created by Count Orsini near Viterbo, Italy. The hell's face with its quote from Dante ("All Hope Flees"), the battle of the Titans,

-

and popular

* 1

themes mixed 38

in this

L

^

-v

^•^

British

i

out over

radio set). And, as far as Stirling thought, the Prince had kept

from getting any more

'^

Stirling for not caring

tried to stop Stirling's project for the center of

scheme looked

Stirling's office

and the influence of Krier

The Prince had attacked

enough about what

il^m^BH^^HK. ;//

sensual garden of mysteries.

1

comparing

(.Duntori'd h)

Style

Wars

Whrn what II

a

was picked up on

iluu

Kur,

c\pei.iril. Pulling; a lon;^

iliuMibs

Wood,

pa^^t's oi

down. A week

lali'r,

as

sa)iiiv^

"How

There was The Nonsense, wilh

smashed through glass.

The

rool, a tangle

its

Ayatollah's

deeonsirut lion

he

t)l

broken wood,

Thumbs Down was

dishkeil

the broken braneh fitted like base.

But

what was

offending branch had

worried about

imagine

that

it

ilie

moved its

its

would be

the

one below

becomes

a

its

its

Maggie and

that

was I

the

the

The way

that

the

had always did

would score

reconstruction, and so

it

we

a bull's

settled

nature has

time more kindly, putting up shoots ihrcjugh a

major theme

garden, co-creation with nature always in itself

Judgment, catastroptie, co-creation. Leon

thumbs down. A week

It'd,

little

original pristine tangle. Subsequently

words. In

in

wa)';

pedinu'iu o\er die

nonsensical

it

hraiith

leaves, metal,

iilarl)

branch above The Nonsense,

in again, this

falling

reall)

uphill!

lallen

eye. Luckil), insurance [laid for

back into

new angled

a

("row

motor

a

irei'

detonslriu

further

h

gave

In-

lo

like

had had

ealastrophe was, liowi'ver, (|uile beautitul. panic

tlassital

ugl),"

lonv^

a

tlir

miu

prril)

was walkin^^ owv

I

in

lahloids.

liie

was

heard an explosive noise ihai sounded

I

aeeideiit.

and

ilu- Iroiit

sliiiwrd KrierTlu' NoiisiMisr his respoiisr

1

1

tMiailcs lo Hitler, an rscalaiioii

later

the

struck the building. Today nature

first is

Krier

gave The Nonsense the

of several catastrophes at Portrack

slowly taking over.

39

Sl§

*

:X„:

amk r\

'IT':

'^ti^jS;^

/

T^ f

I

•

^OfSSO *^

p

AVER

THE NONSENSE The

front of

Stirling

The Nonsense was designed by James

from fragments of the Neue Staatsgalerie

designed by Charles Jencks, was

Stuttgart; the back,

based on a

triangular geometry. Stirling's pavilion

never intended to be used, so lookout

was

makes

its

was

conversion into a

functionally nonsensical; for instance,

reaching the top, the view also

sitting difficult.

is

blocked by a

The steep

steps,

beam

on

that

designed

stair is

while the syncopating

for single

alternating

squares

gray also disorient the sense of balance.

in

in

The words are from a poem celebrating the confusion

of

senses,

the

Charles

Baudelaire's

"Correspondences," which describes forest of

symbols

that mix

reality

as a

up the senses:

La Nature est une temple ou de vivants

piliers

Laissent parfois sortir de confuses paroles;

L'homme

y passe a travers

des

forets

de symboles

Qui I'observent avec des regards familiers

Les parfums,

Confusion,

les

.

.

.

couleurs et les sons se repondent.

synaesthesia,

between everything

in

or the

the world

correspondences

—and

yet a crystal

order.

top:

James

Stirling,

CJ, Maggie, and Eduardo Paolozzi.

41

Common Sense through the The Nonsense and

the time

form of disorientation,

common sense, the of Hume and the

common

problem with that

is,

to

be

even

is

that

it

Yankee

the

first

program

Maggie and

up

I

all

as if the plot

can become too

were

The

derivatives.

you

common, growing

are

a laboratory.

marked

Such was

for the kitchen garden, but hardly the last one.

produced

six or

seven layouts,

of which

all

we ended

rejecting because of their conventional nature.

However, one of these concept of nationhood:

I

became

was

it

particularly

is

a tradition

fond

of, a

play

on

the

new

of Scottish landscape

design which recaptures the wild, romantic countryside of the Highlands,

it

conceptually not that different from the English

is

Picturesque and, as far as

garden

been

that has

could determine, there has never been a

I

and

entirely

distinctively Scottish. At the

same

time, there are paradoxes to our perception of tradition. As the

historian

Hobsbawm

Eric

customs, coined

at

has

the time of

written,

Queen

many

stone slabs which

a grid

relatively

Victoria, have

wove through each

plants, like a tartan. This

"national."

known

It is

clan patterns

—

or

we

recent

been accepted,

recalls

artifact.

how

at least

an

1

rocks, concrete, brick

other,

and

coupled to the weave of

could claim to be indigenous, even

that the Scottish invented

made them

Walter Scott. Instant tradition

one

made up of

itself

fashionable

most of the

—

tartan,

about the time of

has a long tradition, especially

if

8th-century hoax turned into a real cultural

This was the confabulation of nationalist pride

Poems of Ossian,The Son of Fingal concocted

materials,

—

known

and fauna

flora,

so

were

there

based

instructive

The Ambiguous Words of Natvire Regression or spur to invention

as The

by the poet James Macpherson

—you

could think of instant

two ways. Curiously enough the

tradition in

played a role in one of our designs

many

had

tartan pattern

When we

years earlier.

were reconstructing our London honie, according

to an iconographic

program, Maggie got fed up with symbolism cluttering surfaces, distorting shapes, or simply taking too long to design.

Among

other

fashioned an abstracted book for the face of her

I

library door, but she said emphatically, "This time

symbolism stops

my door!" Ironically, however, when own desk and filing system, she covered

to designing her

at

family tartan, so is

OK

quite

repartee as

long as you are doing

as

we pushed on with our

said, "Enotigh!

On

corners."

—

occasion

and

care.

red

way

the bricks

It

was

called on, particularly

it

gocjd use

skills

[

skill tor

had reached stalemate.

should be stone tartan

slab,

We

them with

he has ruled over ihe other

like

notable

explosions of

1

of

tlie

and

around the

leads tours

luimor

ihal

were

reached an impasse, as

later on it the acceptability

we of

Scottish virtue of patience that he

the next few years because

could not

a

We who

of a building team,

when he

round rock or

remained half-born,

— she

might have made him

head

when Maggie and

was the southern

had to exercise with

in

go around these

among

producing,

did here over the merits of brick, or concrete. But

of the kitchen

and balanced character,

diplomacy and wry sense

his

symbolism

see,

Portrack and he tends

a corporation rather than the skills to

of the

'ceil

Alistair Clark.

in horticulture,

years

thirty

at

His wide-ranging

flares.

he puts his social gardens.

Trained

i

Such was our amicable

an unusual array of begonias that look

features,

head of

a trompe

different versions

intelligent, attractive,

greenhouses for

little

with

had non-negotiable opinions.

she

constructed most of the gardens great love

came

of the tartan pattern was

after half

don't like the

I

an

it

it."

debated in front of the head gardener, Alistair is

it

pointed out rather smugly, "You

I

garden, until one day

mistakenly, as ancient and British. Bearing these contradictions in

mind we worked out

local

appropriate signs,

the idea of turning the plot into a

Although there

"Scottish Garden."

a national vernacular

of

virtues

food. Crops are laid in straight lines, logical categories

the

produced some original work by deriving

precedents for pseudo-tradition leading to real breakthroughs.

predictable. Yet this also can be positive if

—

its

designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh

the

Later

identity.

Scottish Enlightenment. Practicality,

sense

"carrots, peas, potatoes"

by

set off

national

on

and no-nonsense are

straightforwardness

out of ancient Celtic poetry. These proved fruitful in constructing

great virtue of British philosophy at

hard-headedness,

functionality,

— Skottish

wilderness garden, Taking Leave of Your

this

Senses, are a planned

opposite,

Six Senses

c]uite agri'c-

brick,

residual

Maggie and

on which areas

and so the idea of the

which ffirmed the

pattern

structure of later plans.

The Garden

of

linear planting

partly

Common Sense

as a Skottish Tartan.

on Maggie's family

relating to the basic

(see

42

and

sensible grid with

framed by paths that weave through each other; tartan.

The geometry, word play and

opposite words had three more transformations:

Garden,

A

finally

pages 48-49).

first

into a

laws of the universe, then the the

Ambigrammi Game,

still

is

it

Isased

pairing of

Physics Garden

DNA and

Six

Senses

under construction

What we did

those dragon walls a

on was an undulating

agree

we both admired.

new garden game and

called

word

a set ot

ambigrammi. These

.\\\d

this

plays

wall, descendant of

became

the spur iov

and word plo)

are amazingly designed

words

ihai are

s

be read two ways, right side up and upside-down. The) sliow

the

symmetry underlying

words

surprising since

is

social constructions that are accidental, fortuitous

sense, usually of arbitrary length.

Why

geometrical patterns with trees and our body?

man whose

are mostly

connexions of

should they share

Symmetry has been BC,

when

well proportioned body

would

the codified route to beauty since the

Vitruvius envisaged a

that

the universe also underlies signs and

conventional signifiers. This

sound and

lan

thai

first

century

generate circles, squares, and, by extension, temples.

S>Tnmetry means more than the or of Renaissance gardens.

remains

It

after transformation. If

well-designed

certain

transformed, they can

means an you

that

letters

a

down, or back

rotate, shift or mirror-reflect

remain the same when thus

word. Ambiguous from

to front, they are at the

same time very

formal perspective.

An example would be

HA. The H can be

flipped and rotated through

remain the same, while the

and remain meaningful

—

A can

unless

to

I

semantic

clear

the capitalized 1

from

AH

.

.

a .

80 degrees and

only be flipped on a vertical axis

it is

ambiguously redesigned

as a

be read upside-down, based on some designs by John

Langdon. The symmetry of these and. as

a

all

It

half a crossbar. In this case the 180-degree rotation

say,

Ambigrammi

that

whether they should be read right side up, upside-

perspective,

with,

pattern

invariant

become symmetrical ambigrammi.

depends on whether they form

V

of our body

bilateral similarity

was

to discover,

its

letters mirrors

symmetries

in

the universe

important principle: symmetry breaking (see

pages 178-181). 43

HV

would become

.

.

AH, which would be formally

.

but not

semantically meaningful. Several ingenious mathematicians and

designers such as Douglas Hofstader, Scott Kim, and John Langdon

have recently developed a few ambigrammi, and one can imagine

One

the corpus being slowly extended.

exploited

ambigrammi

combined

are

differently

when

into phrases. For a garden art

where

of epigrams

that

is

area that has not been

symmetry and asymmetry

read

that

always

are

opportunities open up. For instance, as one walks a path one

way "no

says "turn on," the other

constantly reverses direction

what

more

is

Words,

landscape, an idea

such

as Ian

a

symbols should reverberate throughout

a

and negative

common

Hamilton

going both ways, and

says "reversal"

to

reversal, thus

48-9 and

(see pages

letters, signs,

it

where one

a gate

at

way

becoming

in positive

ambigrammo

double

it

turn";

many

themes,

basic

179).

Chinese gardens and poet-gardeners

Finlay. In a

garden not

from Portrack he

far

has used single words and short phrases to intensify the feeling of a place or view, or to

in

form

with

a contrast

As Baudelaire

it.

"Correspondences," (see page 40) "Nature

confused words ... except,

for

the

a forest

temple ... of

a

is

of symbols." This idea

enlightened,

was possible

it

insists

also biblical

is

overcome the

to

symbolic confusion. Words, things, and symbols are

perceived

all

united in a garden as they were in the Bible: "In the beginning was the

Word, and the Word was with God, and

That

is

Word was God."

the

quite a symbolic unity.

There are obvious parallels between gardening and creating a

He

cosmos.

God

cutting

up undifferentiated nature into

rightly:

"And God

exactly

named

created the universe as

called the light Day."

the other major aspects

did the garden of Eden, by

and naming them

parts

He brought

—

that

into being

"the night," "the

is

firmament," "the seas," and "the beast of the earth

and the

kind"

cattle after their

(i.e.

and

after his kind,

the categories were logically

and empirically cogent). Then "God formed every beast of the field,

and every fowl of the

what he would

call

air

them." In

effect.

who could also "And Adam called

nomothete-in-chief, the

names

correct:

she was the mother of implies that scientific

heaven and

that

ambiguous position

gave

and order by getting

create

his wife's is

Eve; because

interesting because

such

On

right or

Duchamp and

portrait).

and names them, and by the parts they

44

A

gardener

this act confers

would not have

if

lays

the

right,

somehow hidden The Search

for the

of sciences,

sucli

divided

"river,

"cloud"

out areas, grows

an ontological status on

they had just occurred by chance.

fiinjiLKiqc,

as

has led attidenially to a

modern

all

"

shoun

into

—

as

parts if

a

given

words and signs

God and Adam may cf)nvenlional

its it

power

series

not have

— terms

tomes "tree,"

to be tcjuntered or

(see page 48). Al Portrack

are beginning to accrue to each design, each area.

are evocative as in a Chinese garden,

confusing as in

in

divine creator were speaking sentences

enhanced by words placed against

that

whole

the world's elements, the existing landscape

throtigh discrete things. Each has

some

of Eve

And how does my

linguistics.

digression relate to gardening? While

already

(the

name

the nature of things.

in

Pcrfal

one hand,

would

getting the

This creation by correct namintj, as UinlnTto Eco has

the

Picasso

Adam

gardener has to discover an order already existing,

named

brings them into being, just the as

the other hand, like a scientist or

thus in the

invent an object and category of correctness in one act

Readymade, the Cubist

it

On

is

of a garden,

that the Bible indicates. it

name

either get Eve's

like the creator

artists

name

pre-exist together in a kind of

one can

authenticates things as

way seminal modern

He

living." This

names and things

wrong. The nomothete,

naming

all

Adam to see Adam the job of

and brought them unto

a synaesthetic

poem, some

that are

some

tliat

are

ambiguous

as

—

Willi

\aiuuis plans,

ilu'sr

Conunon

kiu

llir

Scnsr, hc^aii lo ^^row ilillrmit iiuwniii^^s likr haniacles

accreting over generations. Aliliouv^h Maggie aiul il

because of thr laiian iiKidmi. \\r had agreed

had come

1

imporianl

an

to

how we nu'an" we

Think

>.oiii[iri.'lu'nsion

use the sense ol

— seeing

what )ou are saying"

luiii

second sense

is

is

woman

siglit, a

One does sa)',

"You

through her

not regularly

me"; so

toLiili

"You appeal

say, "I

touch

more acceptable "You're permeate

senses

you were

want

certain conditions: "I

shows

tlial

to a

And

the

(hat

then there

man through

to

tcil

is

a

Ins

say, "I smell

But you can

a dog.

can

)()ii

natural nu'taphor of

You would never

say,

under

up" (possess you), or the

)

•d

•^^si^;

^^

.^

^J^l

If^v*

».

•

Hr^.

*

* -V,

1^^

i^-.'

t-^*^"-^ rfi'-^

I-

-

V*-,

' "«!;;»•;"'!-

..">%^;=

kjj^'

f«f^'

£^

i'*^^

UNDULATING WALLS Within an undulating wall,

I

..-

designed three windows focused on three

r*x.

ll\\.-

or six players

game

will

like all

Above two other windows, on is

signs that are appropriate for

was

built

was

both

axes,

t* '^*^fe->^*VC

will start

are

are cut the

and KITCHEN JUSTICE— inevitably

harmony by a this,

it,

PHYSICAL REASON

parallel

HARMONY

a kitchen garden. Reason

square, justice by a triangle,

wail itself

built into

competitive games, nasty. The players

oxymoronic phrases EDIBLE since this

rat^.---:

shake a huge die and chase each other over steps, a

from a central door, above which the words written.

.'> >\ -;

that awaits completion. According to plans, four

form of snakes and ladders with various incentives imaginative and,

-

W.

major axes. The windows are surnnounted by contradictory phrases, part of a garden

i-

circle

—

symbolized by a

Ltni^

old Renaissance

the old side of the garden wall. The

by Hugh Drysdale, accomplished

in

the art of dry-

stone walling.

m.

:if^^

AMBIGRAMM As the players move away from the as

it

will

starting point, the

were, toward the future, a pavilion which

cross various words cut

sometimes,

relativity etc.).

in

is

growing

opponent. The winner but the one

who

are crossed. Here

is

will

in

the yew, they

the stones underfoot (ambiguity, symmetry.

Players

will

chase each

and knock each other backward when they land

first,

Renaissance period

other,

as

be the one who not only reaches the

trick. In

croquet.

on, or pass over, the

invents the shortest sentence from the

the

in

science you are rewarded

far pavilion

words

that

for thinking of

the shortest, most simple explanation that can explain complex

reality.

Occam's famous razor cuts away any extraneous meat from over-fat explanations. one picks up words cut in the stone as one crosses them, there would be perhaps a string of ten. Then, when everyone reaches the If

far pavilion, the articles,

of

winner

is

the one who, adding connective verbs and

constructs the shortest sentence that

Common

makes sense. The Garden

Sense.

The ambigrammi can be read upside-down and sometimes backward. If

you are overtaken by a competitor and knocked backwards, you pick up

the penalty of another word.

Someday

the

game

will

be tested.

}WP-Vf.

r

A«

iV

^i

I

\ \ \ \\ \

\

'^ .3to

'"i

jax

f :»>:

?

#N

.>^-^

Clare and the

Zeroroom

For Maggie's mother, Clare, the answer to the big question was

never in doubt. She was brought up

a

convinced Christian in the

very big and very Cathohc Elwes family of Northamptonshire. Her family estate, called Billing,

was

faith that

children,

to

be the backbone of her

her

she,

was an environment

and

sister,

life.

that gave her the

The youngest of eight

brothers led a

six

charmed

life

h centered upon

suffused with music and country house pleasures,

her parents. Her father was the famous tenor Gervase Elwes, and her mother the redoubtable Lady Winefride. Clare became a

consummate

actress

and

storyteller at the age

of five by sharpening

her performances in front of her appreciative brothers. She, like

Maggie, and our daughter

Lily,

was overlaid by

had

a fierce

laughter-lines

determination in her

and

a vivacious sparkle

eyes, yet

it

as if she

might suddenly contradict the very high-minded values

she upheld.

Her

was

faith

tested by tragedy several times.

fifteenth birthday,

when coming home from

On

the day of her

school, she saw a

headline on a newspaper hoarding: "Famous Tenor Killed." Her father,

then on a singing tour in America, had been dragged under

a train in Boston. This

across her

life,

was

the

first

of the three misfortunes

unpredictable catastrophes that

that cut

came out of the

blue.

Her Catholicism and generosity got her through these rough times partly because they tied her to

wider communities

in

which she

could share the grief Clare's public persona might be aristocratic

and

distant

on

occasion, but she

the average egalitarian,

awkward

instance, she

life,

also closer to

by recounting bizarre

which was unusual by

managed

most people than

and she would break through the

social situations

often about her

was

to stay

of her youth by being taught

away from the at

stories.

ice

of

These were

today's standards. For local school for

most

home.

While Clare was firm

A typical family anecdote concerned her when she was at the slightly advanced age of

marriage, in thirty-five.

1940,

Proud of

Maggie was

When

television.

Keswick

Catholic, but

the heart of English Catholicism, Westminster Cathedral.

Three maiden aunts, hard of hearing and carrying ear trumpets, in the front pew. John,

arrived, instead of saying, "Yes,

The three aunts

lent

I

do," he said, "Volo."

forward and whispered loudly, "Did he say no?

Did he say no?" A few days said

Roman religion, had when the moment of

marrying into the

decided to try his vows in Latin. So

commitment

later a

lawyer arrived

at

Because Clare's very long

set

of

first

legally.

Why?

names, Clare Mary Alice

Cynthia Catherine Celia, had been said in the wrong order. After they had office,

John

—

name

made

if

50

and

said: "Clare, if

we

that's that."

a second,

we

now

upright

I

he said of

Lm now

remember

as

his

own

lying in bed

whom we beliefs, "I

am

and repHcd, "Yes, so

L"

we

as well as Scotland

and

on

to

the garden.

one needs

in a

was brought up

a

double

Ikt

Chinese as well

in

"I'm

a

Buddhist

often di.scussed hybrid belief systems such as

me

day Clare asked

gumboots, tennis

both admired, on

said,

those of the emigre priest Father Bede Griffiths,

One

one evening

Because of

Western culture, she could have equally

Catholic," and

established churcii,

tlic

an Agnostic Catholic." Maggie shot bolt

upbringing, in Shanghai

John's office and

marriage had not been consummated,

the

sat

less certain.

watching the author David Lodge,

being a virgin to that age, she had a very public wedding to John at

the faith ol

in

It

held

rackets,

who settled

in India.

to redesign a small passage that led out a

jumbled mess of too many

coals,

garden pots, books, and the brit-a-brac

country house. A

new cloakroom?

I

decided to use

successful attempt, at a registry

have any children they will have one

have a daughter she's called Margaret Keswick, and

abovf: of

a

Capri

portrait of Clare

Elwes by her brother Simon Elwes on the Island

when she was

cloakroom with

eighteen,

1923.

repeated doorhandles and

right:

The Zeroroom; the

tennis rackets.

this

redesign as a pretext for something entirely other, for preparin\^

one

for the

Since the

garden and testing our uncertain place

in the universe.

16th century, and the Copernican Revolution, whuli

much

displaced earth from the center of the cosmos, there has been

anxious speculation

about

our location,

which

it

hcon

has

customary to equate with our significance. According to

He lamented

engenders

is

the

atomism and mechanism. "An Anainni)

doubt/.Aiid element ot

end with, "They see

Atomies. /'Tis mechanistic

expressed in John Donne's

the loss of Christian wholeness implied by the

World," written in 1611, includes the calls all in

all

leail lo

extreme

|is) \

a

poetry

theories of

"hi thr \ast heavens,

eontronting

it

in

philosophy

fire is

that this/Is

Pieces,

lines:

all

revealed

"And new

the

pliilosoph)

quite put out," and nears

crumbled out again

coherence a

ol

world,

gone." The as

Alfred

to his

new-

North

was "a

soniullrss, stnitless,

ihill allair,

ol niattrr, rndk'ss, inraiiingless."The

i) niv;

idrnlil)

l\\v

niodcrnisni,

has

u hen-

whuh

crisis,

rools

iis

dislocation, the loss ot co ordniaics, a di/zying

philosophers, poets, and scientists continue to

The anxiety

thai

ihenu' ot

his

it.

new

onniipreseni

who made

invoke

wmu-,

"loss of scH in Moilriii hu'iaturr,"

though the idea of cosmic location has an

insignificance and, even it,

laiiT

colorless, nu'irU ihr hni

a siiii(iK-

equation the center means importance, and the peripher) iquals

absurd logic to

Whiirheail

is

.\n

i-xlstciuial

in

atfair.

are we.^", an innonMit (|nesrion, can

holoj^ji^al distress.

wager with

Paseah the Cathoht thinker

expressed

also

Ciod,

angsl

his

at

universe whicii expanded on and on, out of scale

with an) conceivable tiiought: "Le silence eternel de ces espaces

("The eternal

infinis m'effraie." terrifies

some.

me.") hifinite spaces are frightening, even nauseating lo

When

infinity.

It

represented

and

telescope

the

sophistication in the

of

these infinite spaces

of

silenei-

I

reached

calculus

certain

a

was no avcMding the

7ih century there

crisis

could be seen, operated on mentally and even

some

in

architecture, for instance

in

Baroque

llu'

churches of Guarino Guarini. By the 19th century the painter Paul

Gauguin made

it

a subject

Que sommes-nous.' Ou

of one of his paintings: D'ou

ailons-nous.'

"Where do we come from, what

where

are we,

are

These are the big questions, and what better place not in the smallest

when

room

confronting grand questions thus

became

among

in place.

positive to negative.

going?"

to face

them

if

Some people

meditate,

pleasing

irony in

is

and

hats

we

a

coats.

The cloakroom

mixture of the everyday and the unlikely:

a strange

march between doorknobs

tennis rackets, in white jackets,

hold them

house?

in the

on the loo and there

do,

they

venons-nous.'

that

Moldings, which look ordinary, dissolve from

And

place in the universe,

aerial

lilt

photos and drawings, showing our

out slightly from the wall lo confront

you, as they progressively lead from the big picture, our galaxy, to the smaller scale of the garden plan, and then, through the door, into the real garden.

some grounding

Science and religion give us

even

in the

contradictory one, but so too do aerial and

if a

photographs. The ultimate grounding

is

our new

eyes.

universe, satellite

They

reveal

new patterns and ways of reconceiving our place in the universe as a zoom of scales. According to a Pascalian reading this new vision shows that the cosmos is out of scale with us, and that we are not at

the center.

How

spacetime that

Nothing

can

we

conceive of the thirteen-billion-year-old

we occupy? How

in daily

experience

is

another reading, every place

can

like is

it.

at

we imagine

this

scale?

Paradoxically, according to

the center of an expanding

spacetime balloon.

There were other lessons from not to understand until

much

this

later,

jump

when

"Universe Ca.scade," but well befcjre ourselves into another project

excavations

I

into the void that

I

was

started to construct the

this,

which was

Maggie and inspired

I

threw

by the

first

we had made. 51

0S^if'

THE ZEROROOM The Zeroroom: a preparation

for entering the garden.

One approaches through a narrow cloakroom rhythmical F>erspective of tennis rackets

through the

that travel strangely

cosmic place

oiir

in

in

a sequence of eight jumps. square to the

shows we

Way

and moldings

To either side,

spacetime

in

and drawings. These zoom

little

wall.

with a

we

First,

are found

in

a

of the galactic center This

left

are located

is revealed in photos on our present location

the "suburbs" of the Milky

in

about two thirds of the way out. Although

used

scientists often

insignificance, to of fate, that

it

this

The second jump

to underscore our

turns out.

is in

and square

scale,

we

are

the top of the globe. The third

zoom

in

a twist

can emerge.

life

Suburban Galaxy.

photo of the earth, shows

Britain, at

further

it

the only place where

is

The only habitable zone satellite

metaphor

mock our pride,

into the region of Scotland.

in

in

the

Great

shows a

Each

aerial

photo, map. or drawing has a square that refers to the

map

tjelow.

mentally zero

Pascal,

Finally,

garden plan, a

in

we know

connected.

into

easy orientation, so that one can on the present space and time. Unlike

for

mirror,

cut into the

these

two

the jumps

in

coordinates scale

are

reach the

Then one looks straight ahead an image of oneself, and also two eyes in color.

door Below them

band

is

printed a continuous

that only makes sense when you read slowly. lUIUIUIUEYEYEWEYEYEWEYEYEW. You look through the holes of the eye and you see a yew tree, and then

the

landscape.

it

Lost

in

space, you are found

spacetime: you open the door into the garden.

in

Heaven-Hell

When

she was young Maggie had discussed with her father the idea

swamp and

of clearing out a

tangle of small bushes that had

south of the London to Glasgow

just

They often took the night

property.

line,

train

which ran through

row of

planted a diagonal

and

it

an eyesore.

poplars to screen out the trains

tall

diagonal line extended almost up to the bridge going over

this

the River Nith,

where he loved

him and

to fish for salmon. For

family the noise and sight of the train was a disturbance

even caused

fires

psychologically. reflected

—and ought was not

It

to

until

we began

idea

was

to see

as a

it

to suppress

sparks

its

much

when Maggie and

later,

hidden opportunity, but

in the garden," at this

stage the

in

an accident while fishing on the Nith.

suddenly sped backwards and pinned him to the ground.

how

could figure out it

and was trying to

in gear

least

of

many

Clare,

both of

weeks. After John's death

spending more time

in trying to

whom

we changed

in the

The accident

suppose

a

crime, for

the pattern of our lives,

who was now Wagg, who lived

Portrack to be with Clare

at

nearby. Maggie, an only child,

was

as

mother was and the shock of

this

never really

the

hump

remained stunned

without other family, except for her niece, Clare

drew

No one

without any completely plausible

no one saw any point

Maggie or

all

over a

lift it

the wheels caught the ground.

a perplexing mystery,

explanation. But

it

he had ended up underneath the car unless

ground when suddenly remained

It

occurrence reminiscent of the way Gervase Elwes had

died. Apparently, while trying to get his small car out of a bog,

he had put

I

it.

John died suddenly a freak

—

the

be blocked out both visually and

on the extraordinary idea of "the machine

that

was

their

along this track in their

journeys to and from the capital, and John considered

He

grown

devoted to her father left her.

as

her

She often ^kV'r''^

rock that was put up as a memorial with an

little

vr,r'

fi

and the simple words

inscription in Chinese, the initials JK, a cross,

y>i

c-Jiy

'/,

"5th July 1982, Here on the Bank of the Nith, shortly before his

76th birthday."

It

was not the

the place to dwell

ones, In

it

changed

on

life at

its

last

tragedy to strike. While this

impact and implications,

like the

is

not

other

Maggie,

Portrack completely.

1989 Maggie and

I

started

work on

clearing the trees south

of the railroad, leaving the poplars, and digging out a pond for

swimming. Our children, Johnny and and nine, joined

Lily,

in the clearing, but the

by Hugh Hastings and

his

convention

team of earth-movers. As they were I

noticed that

had been cut up into regular

is first

then burn them.

to slice the tree into easily

When

I

then eleven

main work was again done

reshaping the small burn into a large pond, the felled trees

who were

cylinders.

I

two-foot-high

was astounded. horizontal

contrasting with the curves and contortions of the growth.

again 54

I

The

movable sausages, and

inspected the results

There they were: perfect,

little

many of

"We

can't

burn these pieces of scuipinn',

row of teeth. "Their

into a stumpery, into a

so

I

them

turn

had rolled oul.

gave Lily and John a lecture on tooth decay, a pick, a chisel, and

a small bribe,

Devil's

and asked them

Teeth,

a

small

overhanging branches,

\\

to get to

huh

work. The

mound

moss

result

(filtered

(ornied, with the sky, a

became

below

dome.

pickled these stumps with the preservative Cuprinol, so ihey

not rot any further, and

now we

more stumperies were

excavations:

a

large

Once

completely encircle a central but because

I

a

built

path,

large Alisiair

would

from the ofTcuis of

hemicycle surrounding

which culminates

ihe

have an cjpen-air circular temple of

trees. Several

slices

thought of Stuart Kauffman's "order for free" and said to

interiors

let's

a

gianl

and twelve upturned tree:

f)ur

sycamore.

rrxjls.

which

Witches' Brcwms on one reading.

was studying the way

a thicket

of neural nelwork.s

is

—

power

ma)

tlie)

and legenerale.

(.iesUX))

Sueli anil)iguilies ol

lile's

double power need expression. "Creative destruction"; dealh

ior

something new.

With such the

image

("hiiu'si'

arched

mind Maggie designed

thouglils in ot the

the

hriilge,

i

and

Immortals; then

ot the

Wa)'

liasy

to

together, ideas

and

Paradise,

and steppnig stones, the Hard Way.

watertall

a hltle island in

were eoming thick and

We

fast

1

designed an designed

sht'

were working

a

wi'll

and complementing

each othir. The Wilderness Garden began lo take shape and then, as it

contirm our speculation,

to

tree alter

h iilm disease struck

and one

In sjiiie of the objections

of Clare,

l^titi

another crashed down.

and the advice of gardeners, we decided

one against another. They form

leaning

giants

to preserve these fallen

graveyard. Contorted, dead sculptures shoot

and

knobbly arms

their

growing background of

riotously

legs against a

up

spectacular

a

ferns

and

rhododendrons. Maggie had planted gunnera, which, with their

menacing

giant floppy leaves, are

death and a symbolic netherworld started to

and

honey fungus. By

primeval give

Et in Arcadia,

Ego

Maggie and

contrast,

landscape

forest, the first

a literary

it

come

together Clare

had visions of

I

a

the beginning of time and, to

at

theme, the famous painting by Nicolas Poussin,

("Even in Arcadia,

I"):

Death. This area of fallen and

regenerating nature became Heaven—Hell and so

There was one more

had imagined two positive

eat you. Real

however, were worried about the spread of another

Alistair,

disease,

might

plants that

trick nature played

mounds of

tiny

one negative, both

it

on us

has remained. at this

earth covered with moss,

circular temples to nature.

inspired partly by a giardino

segreto

time.

we had

We one

They were

seen outside Verona: a

garden that had grown up around ruined circular walls. Trees

secret

surrounding the walls

hole focused like the lens of a camera

left a

dome overhead. It was an old illusion, proved by the Pantheon in Rome and repeated by earth artists such as Michael Heizer and James Turrell. So we decided to make another on the

sky, creating a virtual

version, exactly surprise. After

supposed to work, they became known

Upside-down

moss

as the Circular Brain.

trees are distvu-bing, contorted in death, but the

tangle of thousands of roots

is

an arresting sight and an interesting

where moss had always grown. But then came the

we

cleared the

in the bowl,

it

nature refusing lo do what

what

which willows might grow

grew

in

rebirth.

our mind

Maggie and

I

for this area

it

by several names: Paradise/Hell, the

top:

Devil's

stumps.

Teeth

When

—

trees

cylinders to transport

River

Styx

(because

come back

it

lo the

(see following pages).

These will return

of the garden

primeval wilderness, the place of death and

called

I

left

the themes have clarified. Decay, Death,

Brooms: the idea

as a

I

—meant we

have called a Wilk:)wtwist, a structure up

and an extraordinary second growth of moss and mushrooms has

Devil's Teeth. Witches'

had always done

it

alone ior several years, and only recently have idea and created

And

of undergrowth and replanted

refused to take root. The perversity of this

transformation has occurred. Today most of the roots have withered

replaced the "neurons."

site

of the

burn flowing through

it),

the

Underground, the Unconscious (because of the murky current),

self-similar

age and

can be turned to other uses

them

into horizontal

(inset),

far left

By the

Nith.

A stone marks the

place where John Keswick died; drawing by Maggie, September left:

imdergroimd and shrouded

distance, the waterfall

As places of primitive

the farmers cut

and burn them. When cleaned up and preserved they

and Destruction. In some cosmologies Heaven and Hell are both in mist or water.

forms of nature transformed from tree

finally fall

a Wedge Bridge— the

Easy

Way

5,

to get across the burn and,

and stepping stones

1988. in

the

—the Hard Way. 55

.-#

-•*

.:

-^\.-.r-^v

•*'*..'*

;\

\

i«^'

,''

,

-

1

#.

•'•-..

^:>'".- >^-

^% r-

>4. >-

.^

>'

>-

:-*~;v

'^M.*

"

^^^*

"'

19

.^ V

..M.^^^^ .^imm

i

n i

r

.

:^

\ ^ff

THE WILLOWTWIST The Willowtwist is a structure made from one single, long sheet of aluminum, cut and split twice so that one arm leans forward, another back and the middle twists to form a central loop. The simplicity of the solution was worked out on a cardboard model that was deflected to give a dramatic rise

also

12^

^-

and

fall.

One enters

at the

low end and walks along a circular path that

goes up and down, while views through the curves frame the pines and

sky.

—

the area to a

more

and dampness. Perhaps the

sheltered darkness,

most recent return of the moss wih be permanent, but certain.

As Ahstair points out, moss often grows where

it

should

and then dies where

it

should

on rocks exposed

not,

nature bends

Snail

to the sun,

damp, sheltered

flourish, in

The

own

its

With

places.

a subtle shift in context,

rules.

and the Poetics of Going Slow

By November 1990, Hugh Hastings and had widened the stream and dug out

his bulldozers

pond, twelve

a

deep enough for swimming. Here,

parts,

from the hole

over the

nutrients, but let

if

there

Hastings'

plasticine

model

tries to

field,

one shapes the earth

"More

in bulldozers,

like a traffic cop,

of earth,

it.

mud

and

produced one

I

it is

hard to shape sand

response

in

site

what has

to

reshape blobs into desirable figures. Using

drawings, models, and, in the

men

Because

day.

one redesigns

precisely,

happened and

string,

a free pile

another and walked out to the building

after

it

from the

benefit

To keep up,

fast.

with an updated drawing every

and gravel

leftover soil,

earth-movers got to work digging out

sculpting the land extremely

and

going to be

is

be a sculptural object, experiment with

it

in

ground? Maggie thought of spreading

in the

thought

I

down

discarded stumps,

like the

where cows and sheep might

fields,

and diggers

feet

was another opportunity. What should we do with the a gift

not

is

it

"Over

sawdust and stakes with

like

an action painter, yelling

to the left," directing there."

flags

dumpers with

at

soil

They may understand the grand

design but they are often too close to the action to see the pattern

emerge.

I

have often found design and

its

realization to

way: you have to continuously remodel an idea, in

and then make adjustments

as

you go

along.

happen

this

many media,

The rewards

are great:

back of my mind was the

which

Because the digging of the

common name Hastings'

I

swimming

hole was moving so

designed the Snail Mound.

in order to

men, and

fast

would soon be working. The a double-curved ascent, lie at

had

to give

it

this

it

from other shapes on which

"Snail" drawings and

two paths

to

that only

meet

at

I

my mind

were

of DNA.This has two

I

when

the

spirals

those

starts,

as

two

Chambord

that if

service

it

used

he saw

down

the beauty of this uiuil nuicli

in a

way

I

the

later,

had not foreseen: during

up with flowers from

separated those going

Another precedent was the oldest pyramidal form

And

Renaissance mound.

whole

a final

in history, the

laUT incarnation, the

its

motive was the function of

which one could move, an

thing, a focus toward

ideas behind the design?

Not

or function in mind, never It

at all:

—

that

tiie

axis for the

various views and a place to survey the I'nure garden. Too

it

life,

that

dialectic;

steps forward

one

had is it

a

the

the double helix

diminishing

way

it

I

me

in turn

many

never design with one reference

would be

a

would destroy the mystery and

would make consumption too quick and

spiral: Tatlin's

illustrates the

dance

often proceeds in a counter

step back, a progress in

an ascent that has descent built into

it.

fits

Another idea

and

in the

Fiesole,

money and

waste of

somewhere

"Go slow" hidden in

is

a

else,

a

place through

surprise of the garden;

easy.

Renaissance garden

that

which one

races

warning sign with multiple meanings:

signs, discover

oxymoron it

at

I

was

mean "Make

on

the

way

but railu-r a place of imaginative exploration.

new

the Renaissance garden

Does

a

noted the importance of slow perception. A landscape

garden should not be to

a

coming down empty handed.

the top and that

of ascent and they reminded

wonderful quality of this

of history's surprising

rhythm,

mound was

memorial

one-liner

several different ideas (see following pages).

of a Utopian design of 1919

A

had designed so

I,

at

designers, following ideas developed in the seminal Villa Medici

thought of the most important shape behind

tower.

would not understand

other.

models showed

an angle.

In

58

I

communicate an unambiguous shape

to distinguish

the French king, Francois

stepped ziggurat of the Egyptians and

and changes would be expensive, Maggie concentrated on shaping the water while

6th-century spiral stairway

an unwelcome guest coming up one way, he could escape

something new may emerge, something better than you could have imagined or designed on paper.

1

later to

ones. "Festina lente"

"Make use in

a

tease out the

was even advised

haste slowly"

—

a

wonderful

garden design (see page 234).

haste in order to prepare so thai

you can

later

lit

triini 11

pmul, U) he surnniiulnl

llu'

annus

\

watrr

b)

anj^lcs. In tau, oiu' ol ihr

ami sha|)es

tliainati/rs discover): une.vpeeled \isias

Anoiher unsuspected bonus

uiio \ie\\.

luound

iriiirs dl a spiral

\

that

is

mound

a

The

il

can

another

"Let's excavate

saiii,

From her

causeway."

a lake is

one

me

of it).

One

Hugh, more

right,

it

obscure a

its

hurry up and cahn down"? A goal

in the garden," or "Just

of s>Tnbolic design

is

provoke viewers into discovering

to

and

latent

even unintended meanings, a provocation that will only work they assume there In this

something there

is

if

way design and discovery amplify each

thinking about the spiral Snail, for instance,

I

other.

As

was

I

happened

be

to

reading about the pavement

maze

captivating idea behind

of presenting the pilgrimage route to

it

at

Chartres Cathedral. This has the

Jerusalem as a type of counter-intuitive play: in order to get to the

Holy City

from

it.

center of the labyrinth the pilgrim has to face away

Once

his goal.

toward to

at the

down

have to go

into

it

you

—not

surprise,

When

in

are forced to

go

up.

easy and counter to expectation.

perplex,

relate the

in the shape

entice,

moimd

confound,

its

shape.

The

tail

slow. The idea as

built is

to

you

make

the ponds,

a

men

few

(though apparenti)

we

designed the

lined with

it

wood

tail

of the

snail

over the deep part of the

edging so that

it

would

allows one to descend almost into the middle

curves extend from the snail-hook

center, then into the

snake mound,

(left).

(right)

to the causeway,

found Maggie atop the

I

digging

a trench:

"More

snail

to the

was pushing the

out of sight, behind

feet

some people thought

that, in

order

actually diverted the River Nith

to say legal impossibility. Bui Maggie's

introducing a hidden source was absolutely right.

It

ponds and landforms an enigmatic atmosphere

—an

concern for

has given the that

is

quite

uncanny, hard to figure out. reflection,

iud

when

I

went on

lo

build other landforms in Edinburgh and elsewhere. The exact shape

of the curves and their fine-tuning

mounds

these

shadows.

It

alive

lights bright carpets

volumes.

One

largely

to

—

is

the

key for creating what gives

edges and defined

sharp

morning or evening

the

is

strength

their

makes them come

sun, a raking light, that

with subtle differences in tone. In certain

of green seem to hover above dark looming

has to sculpt continuous, gentle undulations

—not wobbly

the

skill

profiles.

— "sweet

Such refinements are

of landforms, and their realization was due

of the gardeners working

Brown, Doug McCormick, and

Alistair

Porirack.

at

created

Neil

sharp

these

continuous curves by constantly surveying their work on the turf

from

different

positions.

bad from another and

this Alistair

Since

large

curves

—one

has

ic;

positions, near and

working on

skills

and eye

far,

above

large-scale earth

to constantly revised designs, the next stage

and shaping needed

After

strange

review progress as one goes along,

would do from many

moving according

create

— and can look good from one position and

and below. While Hugh Hastings did the rough,

turfing Self-similar

we had

perspectival distortions

life.

to the water

it

Go

madden, amuse,

of a French curve and brought

pond; then Maggie had keep

The ascent of life has descent

by

a

gives

essential for the success

when going down,

make

did

Not seeing where the burn comes from

climbing the DNA/Snail/Ziggurat you

order to go up; and

slu'

a line

trees,

curves" as the Scots say

I

covered with

some

decided

discover these contradictions of

To

he has to face back

How suitably perverse for the pilgrimage of life.

remint the idea.

contrast,

there, in order to leave,

as

lliis

and

Another truth emerged on

to find.

most dramatic elements

mystery and leads the eye and imagination further back. The

economic not go slow

thai a ihin

day, struggling as usual to get the earth

source was so mysterious that lo

knew

to the right." In effect, she

source.

Maggie

ihal

had

to the

emergence of the water to

she

liasi

of the

water into a satisfactory relationship,

waving and shouting

shapes are

Alisiair

had not occurred to

also thought

looks very

its

salisl)iiiy;

something we never carried through, hut

that

come

e\[)and the poiul and (.reale a

.\\)i\

Chinese garden. She imagined

in a

of trees,

move

hit

and

k

researches in the

causeway cutting across found

was so (|uk

iiiouiul IniiUlinj:^

thai

polished c)liiuler.

like a

,^li'\\

is

siicklenl)

ditlerent in ehan^yiin^ seasons: in the snow, for instance, siniplitieit aiul

shapes

.\nd lo '^CH diffrri'iil

six

just as

much

continuous modification.

landforms, Alistair has sharpened his

for the well-turned

of

own

shadow. 59

'mmtm

^:

y^

^&L-

THE SNAIL Two paths

—a double

helix

—

rise

up the

this:

DNA, the double

Mound on one

side and

fall

goes up and down. Various ideas were

gently on the other so the ascent

behind

Snail

staircase at

Chambord

that allows

two

people to pass without meeting, a ziggurat, the contrary movement of the giant floor-paving International

maze

leftover pile of earth.

and we could see that

were

like

you want

equipment

and material

inevitable: it

We moved the

that this

of connected, curving ponds,

pile

and have

it

it

is

with diggers and bulldozers

naturally

the shape-grammar of rooms

scale, equipment,

approach

to the Third

—multiple meanings that have to be decoded, slowly. Maggie

had dug out an old marsh, creating a series

and a

Monument

Chartres, Tatlin's

at

I

generated blob-curves

had been designing. The

—sand and gravel —make a broad-brush

hard to get earth to within five feet of the place

stay there and accept grass.

western Scotland smear out

all

but the largest

The constant rains of gesture, making design

extremely primitive. Nevertheless, the basic ideas of twists, folds, and

waves

of energy are

in

the mounds.

FOLLOWING page: The Snail or a spacecraft.

60

Mound

in

snow: a polished

cylinder,

:f

-:fi^-

.x3t,

,^"3^

•*-/.-

,*

Waveforms, Twists, and Catastrophes At this point in the garden's creation

was involved

I

another

in

pursuit altogether, an investigation into post-modern theories that

were changing our world-view, some coming from science. Since

was

these explain the direction the landscape the house

where

first

I

necessary as well as a look

is

to take, a detour into

room

at a

house

in the

turned theory into form. As usual with her mother's

house, Maggie initiated the process of change and identified the necessities. In this case

was the need

it

and breakfast room where big table and, Scottish reels.

could

the Christmas

at It

we

was

to

be

a

a

New

room

family

new

the

that a

new grammar

at a

Year holidays, dance

centered on work.

my mind

Functional problems had to be solved, but uppermost in

was the thought

kitchen

meet informally, work

all

and

room,

for a big

of form might emerge from

sciences of complexity. Developed in the

1960s, these

included the study of systems with feedback, such things as

embryonic growth and the change the

geometry of nature

fractal

cosmology and

came

in the weather.

126-7),

pages

(see

Chaos Theory,

of what are also called "nonlinear sciences"

a host

to the fore.

The

first

designs superimposed shallow, curved lines on the pre-

existing square geometry,

and these echoed the

rolling hills of the

landscape outside. The Borders area of southern Scotland

undulating rather than rugged and precipitous, as

The landscape resembles

north.

opposite walls

—

that generated a

jump

accentuate the I

flat,

designed

The problem was

and

to get

a

all

layered

room

—on

organic shape. In order to

and using an underlying structural

learn to fly" "Aye, Mr. Jencks"

warped curve

will

in axis,

a twist

new

further

on the new furniture

There were also conflicting axes of the

fabric.

mesh,

tried out

gently

is

is

it

and

folds in a curtain,

metaphors to be

pleats, inevitable

and

new

the

the curves

on

to

hang off the

ceiling.

the floor and ceiling in

synch with each other, to have the undulations of the

ponder

design into After

seats

for several days

— he never

and think

we had worked

out

were maybe

Maggie wanted another mouiul

daunting

task.

much work

hundred undulations

at

had

that

asked Bobby Dixon, the carpenter

I

responded, "Aye,

something hard

us.

as

Mr

was

a

these curves

when

I

gave

we

unfamihar to

a

improvisation.

model and then he would comment on

method of solving

I

it

the problem. The undulating ceiling it

was conceived

first

in stucco,

but then built in hardboard that was bent over a frame.

He

or

I

constantly take chances and court failure. "If you're going to

innovate Bobby, you have to 64

him

could approximately

method of working, through

a case of such improvisation:

would

he

him, was one of a number of bonds between

united by a different language

would draw and build

a

has done so

resist a challenge,

Jencks," as he always did

to

understand, and our

and invent

all

to do: "I kanna." His Scots accent, as

my American

We were

who

Portrack, if he could pull together

while working on his back. Never one to

me

be resolved,

to

jump

off a

cliff

and, as you're falling,

the

most

felt

confident about trying

satisfying of

our

grammar

twist

liie

scales,

a

ways he can transform

it

oui on

liir

at

many

joint endeavors, for the turves

result

Snail.

water and then, the curve, certain

it

It

We

called

responded to each otIuT,

oihcr,

snakes

the Snake

it

some

3

SO

toward

compressed energy

tiie

Mound,

and twists

feet

in a series of terraces that

twists

warp

something art

looming I

to distinguish first

almost

never suspected. Only

that

later

it

toward the

like a racetrack into is

a

and the self-similar shapes

in these lines

feeling,

rallicr

pasture and the sheep. There

of the ponds. As one moves around them peaceful,

was

of the lake

without being the same. Again, the idea was self-similarity than self-samene.ss.

small

landscape where

70-71). The

(see pages

and the landform echoed rath

from the

a

reality.

correspond with those that bounce light above the columns. There

I

of

refuses a challenge, but

of

did

I

at

a

dusk ihey give

a

slumbering body.

realize that

much

land

and, for instance, prehistoric landforms such as Silhury Hill near

Avebury, and Stonehenge. evoke a bodily presence that must have

been perceived and perhaps even intended.

ABOVE, LEFT Twists

room's axis

is

and

gravity

waves warp spacetime. The main

underscored by the s-twist on the

the furniture set

them. Of course,

up

lines of energy, virtual gravity

real gravity

waves

shift in

ceiling while the

the

warps

in

waves, that radiate from

at this scale are

too small to measure.

but one feels the

way

objects impress their presence on a space as

sending out rays of energy, top left The s-twist in axis,

wood

top right Bobby Dixon, below left

are given

one

twist,

in

if

the ceiling marks the shifts

In light

sculpture,

two sheets

then warped and splayed to create slices of

of

light.

65

WAVEFORMS AND TWISTS The standing image

light,

below,

morphed

is

Symmetry Break

of the

room are shown, near

to the undulations

Twists and

in

in

a

in this

I

the seating and ceiling

warped curves on the

will relate

case

mapping prison

These and the

it

of

riot,

was

how

real

lighting units

then lend

—a landscape of waves.

ceiling underline the shifts in axes.

of the complexity sciences

—show that a sudden change

twist.

body

axes that became an ordering principle

right.

These forms, inspired by one Theory

a female body holding the

Terrace, a connexion of architecture,

and landscape. The two shifts of the

fronn

in

—Catastrophe

a system can be represented by

catastrophes

later

impinged on our

lives,

but

make possible the a wave on still water, a

the theory that fascinated me. Twists

sudden changes

or the point

rage. Twists also occur

within a

system

—

where a stretched sthng snaps, or anger turns in

other natural systems

I

was

to investigate

into

such

as the Mobius strip and the soliton wave: the twisted energy packets that

can

travel

waves I

through each other and keep a

dissipate; solitons

used

this

memory

remember

multipurpose room to work out a

and waves, and applied

of their past. Other

it

new grammar

to the ceiling, walls, floor

elements are pulled together

in

self-similar but not exactly the

and

off-white folds, fractals

of twists

details. All the

whose waves

are

same. Modernists, such as Mies van der

Rohe, had been obsessed by repeating identical forms nature, which, using fractals, varies the form slightly

in

each time

contrast to it

reiterates

the program. Post-modernists were beginning to follow nature into the

realm of

self-similarity.

WAVES

THE GARDEN

IN

waves

Self-similar

twist almost to

a point on the back

before they unfold the other way. The twisting

wave

of the landform

recurs at

all

scales

in

the garden.

mounds

Since constructed

form

shaped by machines they

are

naturally

viscous shapes which resemble what are known as "strange

linear,

Two

attractors" or "chaotic attractors."

of the

Lorenz Attractor, "The Butterfly Effect," with wings, and the

Ueda

Attractor

(right,

its

most

interesting are the

fortuitous butterfly-shaped

above), both of which have inspired

the designs.

Curved and counter-curved shapes are nature, for instance,

many

incessant

by

in

natural activities:

the

meander

sea waves,

structural

of a

river.

of course,

waves on the ocean beach

(see

and often found

Waveforms

underlie so

and sand forms

page

in

left

21); the vortices

by the

caused

pulling a solid object through stationary liquid; the swirls of air currents

where warm and cold result of I

air

meet; and the rock curls evident

a long, slow, geological process

wanted

to create a

new form

of

of

in

mountains, a

movement.

landscape design, one based on the

waves

waveforms

that unite the

atom

ammonites

to sunflowers

—the pattern that connects, a new poetics.

to the galaxy, radio

to brain

waves,

69

>

'^>

THIS PAGE

of

AND FOLLOWING PAGE: Landform

Modern

Art,

for the Gallery

Edinburgh, proposal 2000, completed

August 2002. This design, connnnissioned flat

to enliven a

lawn and shield noise from the side road, faces two

ways: to the Gallery and across the road to

The Dean Centre.

Its

its sister.

connecting "S" form also derives

from the Henan Attractor

(right),

and

its

self-similar

curves that fold inwards. Earth, water, and airflows generate waveforms that self-organize around certain attractor basins this

so there are natural

shape and the way the earth

walk.

between

moved and people

The landform can be used as an open-air

(With Terry Farrell

72

is

affinities

& Partners and

Ian

gallery.

White Associates.)

73

^^^^^^^

ilMliHliil&iiiti*

'^

^

The wave and been

twist

extended

underway

in

at Portello

2002 and 2003.

grammar has further work Park

in

Milan,

Landforms and

separate gardens appeal to different

ages and uses, notably a nursery, of

hypermarket,

residences.

hospital,

and a set

Further changes

design (with Andreas Kipar) are

76

in

likely.

Soliton Waves

Hd\mg been

overtook

trained in

of the Gropius

According to

and

still

I

era,

I

Modern

architecture

imbibed

a kind

follow this priority

—

am

I

we completed

.\fter

tor

to rethink several necessities.

the beginning ot the kitchen oarden and ihe

These

and the occasional

realities led to

another application of the

a series of gates

and running

in Britain today

is

Where once

kept.

there

fields,

fences.

A

there

i\\ isi

bulls.

and \\a\etorm:

sad truth ot tarming counti)

become ugly and

that these necessities have

now

is

by deer, sheep, cows ami

assault

mixture of wooden posts and barbed

asked

.Alistair

rabbits out

waveform

me

to design four or five

of the kitchen garden.

I

some time and had

for

cook and runs Portrack, suggested

gates,

years.

I

Mobius

curves.

template, and

We

— experiment —

it

placed

soliton

could tind

I

could use

I

it

wave

soliton

blown-up drawing, and

a

until the twists gave just the

Sohton waves are particularly interesting because,

as

mentioned,

they can travel through each other and keep their identity, that

dissipates and,

out.

past.

when

By it

contrast, the t)'pical

wave seen on

is

a sohton, a laser

beam

is

and

constant speed for five hundred miles. Solitons were

a

a rare

.\t

a

thasc

soinr

oiiyjiiial lij^iiii'

U

or nine mili-s an

KtI

iliiru

lost

1

i-i^lil

y^iailiiall\

lis lu-iy^ht

one or two miles

t)t

of sonic

in the

K hiv; aiul a tool

clinunisluHl.

ami

wuuiiiigs o|

tlic

Iiannel.

\\a\e. or solilon.

solitar)

Riissrll's

smaller waxes that

and

shape

oM'iall

turbulence.

is

It

it

feedback

betweiMi

canal

were varied

ur.

presented

fences, and, particularly, in a

tlu'

in a layout

of

ten gates.

groii[") ot

terraces, in

Here waves

of energy are shown traveling through the metal elements of

twists.

When

viewed

straight

paradoxically, as an absence of metal

hump

as a traveling

of

reverse

the

is

the

reiiilorie

tlu' ck'lieale eilv^t'

the width or depth ot

resonance would not occ

hrcause the

i(k'nlit)

its

houiKe hack and

treqtiency. This

In the garden, solitons are

wave

it

olnionsl) balanced on

order and chaos: yivail), the

eoiistitiile

kee[is

—

a

on these void

as a

twists are seen,

— and, from

the side,

rather like the curl in a whiplash. Alternating

bands of solid and void, black and white, green and gravel are repeated

throughout

the

garden. The

illusions

provoke

leads the eye

one way

visual

different readings.

Functionally, however, the void or to the hinges, or the other

Modernist commitment

way

to

hump

to the latch

—

hangover from

a

showing how things work. These key

points are ofteri picked out with fossils and a surrounding strip,

my

Mobius

another twist that has very interesting, paradoxical properties

(combining two surfaces into one continuous

surface).

Both

a

pond

theorized by the Scottish engineer John Scott Russell in

had an unusual experience while riding

1

On

one hand,

the

fossil,

and

strips

vibrations, and,

keep out baby

I

was looking

of metal

far

for formal affinities to the spiral

enough

on the other hand,

apart

strips close

to

create

optical

enough together

to

rabbits.

a soliton, as

are the tidal bores that can reach twenty-five feet in height at

a

is,

encounters another, either adds up or cancels

The Red Spot of Jupiter

on

content and function were considerations informing the design.

right expression of an energy wave.

memor)- of the

1.

John

the twists and

to follow

strips

moved them around

in

metal sculpting that was to

c^n

them on

a

a first class

is

showed John my drawings of the

and he bent some metal

keep the

a craftsman in the vicinity:

Gibson. Thus started a collaboration

many

to

had been studying the

McCormick, who

the design of these gates. Hattie

last for

swing gates

the idea that

blacksmith accomplished enough to

alUT

series

or electric fences sagging dolefully.

\N'ire,

ilhiiv^

lo a tool aiul a hall in luij;lil,

had!)

were grand walls of stones cleared trom the

a tatty

i,

tonnal

landforms, there were two big problems: the mass unasion of rabbits,

snll

prfscix mv; Us

lunii'.

always lookuio tor

functional excuses and problems to solve, as alibis

me

end

expression si\oiul,

first,

or rather,

invention. In the garden this led

the

at

of Puritan functionalism.

conies

this doctrine, utihiy

Harvard,

at

it

travel first

834, after he

his horse along the Unicjn

Canal near Edinburgh:

I

was observing the motion of

a boat

which was

along a narrow channel by a pair of horses stopp)ed in

—not

motion;

of violent

it

suddenly leaving

its

it

it

had put

in a state

behind, rolled forward

assuming the form of a large

rounded, smooth and well defined

continued

which

accumulated round the prow of the vessel

agitation, then

drawn

the boat suddenly

so the mass of water in the channel

vNith great velocity, a

when

rapidly

solitary elevation,

heap of water, which

course along the channel apparently without change

of form or diminution of speed.

I

followed

it

on horseback, and

A

soliton

wave

traveling througti

a gate as a twist

in

metal.

77

SOLITON WAVES Soliton sketches from science

show trapped

solitons, and energy waves going through

each

other

— keeping

memory,

a

not

Given the coherence of such

dissipating.

waves, they can do unusual things, such as through each other. Or a high,

pass

intact

thin,

humpbacked

short,

fat

can overtake a

soliton

one, combine for a while as a

and then remerge, as

single wave,

remembered

their

separate

Solitons have been found

in

if

the two

identities.

such diverse

systems as planetary atmospheres,

crystals,

and have been used to create such systems as superconductors and optical fibers. In general they can be considered as focused energy waves or coherent patterns. They can be represented in two basic ways: plasmas,

and

nerve

either as the traveling

as the twist belt.

The

in

a

fibers,

hump

flat strip,

in

a whiplash, or

used

latter is "topologically

"twists" are

—especially

in

through the universe. The twist also appears in

other parts of the garden:

sculpture as the hydrogen

bond (page

as the Sense of Touch (page

Symbiosis

for

(page

(page

Willowtwist

the

in

1

55),

213)

57).

)

/

7

1

'

DNA 1

49),

as support

and

the

in

recurrence

Its

underscores the overall metaphor of the

garden as a landscape of waves. ^/?.

and dark bands throughout the garden set up vibrating patterns and visual Light

/

/

7tr.,.t

^)

Waveforms of energy, alternating waves, waves of light photons that interfere with each other creating overlapping waves. Thus light waves are turned into electrical waves and then brain waves. The waveform and the twist connect us to the atom and to the galaxy to the illusions.

—

—

—which

language of the universe are used everywhere

in

—

is

why

they

the garden.

such as a leather trapped" and

can be eliminated only by an

"Humps" and

/

anti-twist.

two signs

I

have

a series of metal gates

to represent the traveling of

focused energy

BELOW, center:

each

(below) the

Two

not

other,

hump

solitons going through

interacting

(above),

and

that dissipates versus the

trapped twist that can only be eliminated by

an

anti-twist.

.X

V( ->.

'^J

%

.-i.

1^^- ,i

.m*

-Xi"

ytrf^.

v*.*-^

••f^^h

^^^«a

fT^'

'•''*

I

'^

'^:r7'.

/f

.-^k. ->''.%

I

f f •

-'

.-

.••

79

^

The

Gates contain waves of energy

Soliton

moving from

points of focus or structure

tine

here the latch or hinges. They travel across the

gate diagonally, giving a kind of visual energy that is

accentuated by the alternation of

and

black

void,

background. The twists are almost

seems

the gate to the points that hold

open

it.

Mdbius

The

latch

which

fossil,

is

strip, itself

further

takes

4:>-

Sometimes the

least visually, into the

focused by a twisted

up the

wall.

spiral

curvilinear

ammonites and even

soliton

stone

so

and where you

it,

geometry. The fossils are local trilobites.

invisible,

to pass through

an endless form, and a

also

and

and

foreground

white,

the represented soliton

solid

Thus

travels, at

natural

and

designed waveforms are merged.

'-X-.

^"nSI

'fM

iv,1

^^*^^-

./:^-.

Jl

^v?:" ^^v,.

->«-

/ /

\/.

f//

-ff^%i

/ ^>. >r

s

MM

?-

9

?

.5^

< s

'^C

s ^

XCro

J

-r=MiHi

'^

•''

ma.

'4^

y^V, vo't^ Wvv^^

-^

C^^^. /Gthi.

y

-

ii— l(^'''^'--

'UIl

-^

c

i

m.^

^^^»»»n> TH

m

/

!

I

Imm

^ 4

'^t

^

"^^

T

^%

"JjS

es«

'—^_

M? IV'

^Vrv=J

z

k ^

1Ovv J^ i ^^

1

1

s ^

J~ "

1

*«^ I-

-•

:-s

'

R^"""'

^tiA;

.'

.

immnBBM """""'' ""itiiiiiw

iiiiiiii

i

i i ii

iw iii iiHi

i

ii

M ii Mi w iiiiMiiiiiiii i

m ii M

i

l^ikk^M

i, •,.>^.:i.\y:~

>«r«.

82

I

I

^

A LANDSCAPE OF WAVES The metaphor

of a

landscape of waves was carried out

with different densities of light

waves

that

add up

mesh

in

other media, here

layered to create moire interference patterns;

or cancel

each other

out.

83

A

RELATIVISTIC

QUANTUM PARTICLE

PLANCK'S ROI'ATIO

PART THREE: WHERE

God and

the Equations

Necessity is

is

ctcrnii),

not always the mother of invention, but in

a

garden

ii

the spur to build. At Portrack the old, ofT-the-shelf

usually

greenhouse had become too small for the plants growing, so Maggie and he designed size.

THE UNIVERSE GOING?

IS

Involved in work on a book,

for suggesting that

it

I

be placed on

more presence and headroom sheds and Siamese Twins

twice the

concrete block base to give

a

within.

it

also designed the potting

I

two oven-shaped volumes

to

a globe,

round

from the center itself ot all

to the extremes, the

all

forms

to

reflect

We

more

then designed six

from the kitchen garden

to the

pillars to

make

a transition

mounds, and she asked me

most

perfected,

this

in

the

it.

form

of

perfect

and most

like

globes or

at

underlying

pattern.

Seventeenth-century views ot the universe, such as those of the

German astronomer Johannes

based on Kepler's and the

work of

artists

Kepler,

showed

a series

of perfect

one inside the next, whose harmonies

explained the planetary orbits.

by an aunt.

world

Renaissance architects tried their hand

entrances to the kitchen garden, Maggie had previously built several to her

tlir

world bchuul

every direction equally distant

a lathe, in

Platonic figures, nested

on which she placed stone globes given

iiiTnal

the figures."

Virtuall)

circular

from

as

hold the sand and peat needed for bedding plants. To mark

robust square pillars

ilu'

"Therefore [the father and creator] niadf

stayed out of this design except

the back,

at

new one about

a

was

Alistair

our changuig world and

made

My

Platonic imiverse

visible the

from Phidias

to

metaphysics

was loosely

that lay belli iid

Cezanne, architects from Ictinus

to put

something on them.

—what

This was a challenge pedestal?

Since

the

worthy today of being put on

is

three

first

"Renaissance" part of the kitchen garden, subjects

would be

the Platonic

model (Ptolemy's), and

were

pylons

model of the

I

near

a

old

the

thought that suitable

universe, a Renaissance

would be

a constellation sphere. These

in

bronze, and the other three, next to the new, "present" part of the kitchen garden,

would hold

the present view of the universe, and

be in aliuniniun. The Bronze Age versus the Aluminum, or

is it

the

Age of Plastic? beheved

Plato

that

metaphor pleasing created

the

God was

to Christians

universe

the architect of the universe, a

and

architects alike,

left:

he

The equations

that

He

from the imperfect material of the four

elements, but in the image of perfected eternity, that In the Timaeus

and

spells out

that might

this relationship

be on God's mind.

is,

the globe.

betw^een time and

RiGi-m "All is

spheres and

cylinders."

Le Corbusier quotes Cezanne's dictum, and then draws "the

lesson of

Rome" showing

elements.

Platonic

Classicists

and Modernists, with the idea

that the city

is

metaphysics furnished

built

exclusively from these

artists

and

symmetries underlay the universe, and an

art

might be

thereby constituting the most perfect culture. However, nature

is

also fractal

both

and perfect

built

on them,

we now know

and based on symmetry breaking (see page 179)

discoveries that are recent for

architects,

that regular solids

and fundamental. This understanding

is

crucial

a new architecture and landscape design. 85

to Le Corbusier. This

the idea that nature

is

is,

in Cezanne's words,

based on "the sphere, cone, cube, cyhnder," the primary forms, and therefore art and architecture, imitating nature, should be

that

Modern

crystaUized in these forms. Classical and

and Hindu, often followed

to say Chinese

architecture, not

this precept.

was followed

questionable, such venerable metaphysics

Although

at this,

the

them Portrack Seminars, them took religion,

literature,

between science and drawn-out Cold War, pursuing.

Many

whether

particularly

religion, lasting

debate about the relationship

three

hundred

years,

their long,

is

skeptical scientists, such as Stephen

Leon Lederman, have written books invoking God

still

worth

I

and

had

all

a

Ray

up

the field.

Pope, enlist Darwin in support of the Deity's work, obscuring the fact that natural selection is cruel

of nine out of ten species.

and proceeds by the decimation

Some God! The Cold War continues

Griffin,

Richard Falk, and

post-modern settlement, however, the new physics not only

the

appears weirder than biblical miracles,

This truth has been the testimony of nuclear physicists since Niels

Bohr

set

out his famous shock

microworld

in the

1

920s: "Anyone

Theory has not understood

through two different

waves to being

particles

depending on parts of this

as

quantum

how

weird

they are observed: these reality,

Indeed, what

what has become

Scientists use

when

all

the evidence

particles

tunneling through walls

Some

we now know about to

I

the creation of the universe as

I

how much

they could illuminate

as

may

truths of the universe, but they often

have uncovered

fashion appropriate metaphors from them. at teasing

—

By

these

do they always

contrast, theologians

out relevant metaphors and attitudes

to nature, but these representations are

plague on both their houses

some deep

do not know what

discoveries imply in terms of human experience, nor

adept

was

no longer

apt to be true.

A

or a chance to think between them?

Spretnak, David

Portrack

at

(and

still,

Steven

against

the

evolutionary

meeting were collected

in a

book

most of our endeavors

that

would become

Seminars

Portrack

a

clearinghouse for formulating opinion, collectively. Tiie participants already had other outlets and

went

to seminars

contrast,

where publication

we wanted

a place to air

ideas freely without a sense of embarrassment or ownership, a

where they could be debated and modified. A hills

meals might encourage

drink.

and

new

new

be stimulated by

rivers

combined with nnhurried

ideas to emerge:

new brain

alternative to Deconstruction to the garden.

As put

Postmodern" held

cells

would

thoughts plus the liberating potential of

The agenda of Restructive Post-Modernisni and among

goals

its

is

lo [irovide

two

,\n

are relevant

1996 meeting, "Reconsidering the

in the

London's ICA: "[Restructive Post-ModernismJ

at

understands that our view of nature, which had been disenchanted

by the mechanistic paradigm, can now be seen

dynamic and, Griffin put

it,

in

some

sense, re-enchanted.

experience,' each of relations

which

to

all

ilic

wa)

of

feels

and some degree of

According

." .

.

as self-organi/ing.

And, as David Ray

following the process philosophy of Alfred North

pervade the world interested in the battle

each other. Scientists

may be more

is

was not so much

between religion and science

last

Whitehead: "The ultimate uinis

mirror in several works.

At this time, however,

criticize

like

Standard!

according to some interpretations, virtually miraculous,

soon attempted

86

such a phrase

one reading, vibrating the imiverse into

existence out of a vacuum.

and

jumping from

The Standard Model includes even more exotic

ghosts, and, according to

also,

electrons

they cannot quite prove an idea, but

such

My hope

structuralist thinkers

under individual publication.

if at all,

backdrop of Scottish

not shocked by

same time, or changing from being

Model" of the microworld.

points a certain way. things,

the

reached print,

Quantum

is

meeting

a

Darwin edited by the Roses. But

convivial atmosphere

Quantum

it."

slits at

well-known

the "Standard

when

who

Alas, Poor

of that

fruits

understanding the atomic

without going through the space between, or traveling

orbit to orbit

are just the

test for

friends

Maggie's invention,

Ihab Hassan. Later

later

and publicity were paramount. By

weirder.

it is

called, after

of genetic determinism

fashion

psychology). The

and

with increasing frequency. In

abates; old antagonists switch sides

we

and

some were on

A group of

focus.

Our group included Charlene

reigning

Bishop of Oxford and the

background. Some

this

spirituality,

post-modern

marketing since any mention of the Prime Mover moves clerics, for instance, the

and

others ecology

order,

and Hilary Rose organized

many

of science,

to the subject

should explain

conversion of the atheists explained by pragmatists as intelligent

Conversely,

called

house and garden where most of

from the other kinds of deconstructive and

in the

sales.

We

"Restructive Post-Modernism," a phrase meant to distinguish us

cutting

a

reality,

constituted the core of what

Hawking and title,

helped organize

of the Portrack Seminars concerned the global econoni)

geometry was put high on

much

after the

and before returning

place,

and deep

political

Recently there has been

I

meetings on contemporary subjects of debate.

several

Renaissance place in the garden, and the image of God's perfect a pillar.

such questions, Maggie and

Partly to address

the world are 'occasions of

prior occasions.

.

.

.

Internal

intrinsic value are thereby said to

down

|io iln-

inu roworld]."

snch formulations, experience, value, and

self-

organization do not appear solely with the emergence of luinian

beings

—

—

the anthropocentric view of Christianity and

but are found throughout nature, right

atomic events. This view

animism,

because

it

is

down

experience

to

an

elements: for instance, rocks do not think, or

show

to the level of

not to be confused with a

denies

beautiful patterns of self-organization.

absurd to trace sentience below the

level

pre-modern

aggregation

feel,

And

Modernism

it

even is

if

of

they

obviously

of living matter;

bm

ilu-

—

was behind

the atom, and what

using ni)

needetl

that

1')')^

had the idea of

1

oi Paul's last

are

hook,

and contrast

(.iilnunalion

a

Traditional finials weri' out ol

What

By

research to finish off the grt'enlioust' roof, a

i-\[ianse

tille

all.

it

asked him, "Well, what

1

basic laws that rini ilie universe?"

ilir

eantluiales that

1

had

dull

(he

sky.

to

remembering

So,

tlu' (|ut'siion.

llat,

the

on God's mind?

is

There were obvious

equation combining

[iiLked, sucii as Einstein's

energ) and matter, E=MC', but over the course of several months Davies supplied a

more cogent

greeniiouse roof had

may

a thing of the ecjualions?

afford a partial balance,

manner with which

the off-hand

critique

In the event, the

for only twelve.

religious sensibility

a

of about twenty

why make such

obvious question:

.\n

Here

room

list

scientists

may

it

their

treat

discoveries, calling the origin of the universe, for example, the "big

quantum paradigm have the

shown

many

the

way up from

and sciences of complexit)

ot metaphysics

parallel continuities

throughout nature,

atom whose

the self-organizing

all

electrons, in a

metaphorical sense, are always making choices. Freedom and value, as

may

will discuss shortly,

I

one goes up the

increase as

spectrum of complexity, but they are already present reality,

and

this insight leads to a

Obviously not

all

position, because

the base of

at

re-enchanted view of nature.

of those attending the conferences held

we were determined

this

to have an enjoyable debate

and engage outsiders.

We met

engaged them

I

a friend and,

in

a

dialogue about ideas

from time

to time,

we would meet and

correspond. Paul had written three important overviews of the basic

workings of the universe. The

mind not

as

work and

God and

the Nevv Physics,

The

latter

was

to m)-

and

Blueprint

two became fundamental sources

for

my

1

988 and

basic laws

1

992,

was working hard

1

to try to figure out

behind the universe were, and

expression in the garden. Inevitably

I

to bring

them

to

asked Paul Davies several

questions about the origin and shape of the cosmos, the nature of

Portrack

Senninars

1990s. This one. on 1994,

Falk. Sally

Sara

Religion Political

Mr and

Griffin,

post-modernism

The Economic

Allen,

place

Foundations of World Order,"

Griffin,

left to right, FROf^ row:

[unidentified],

\he

in in

June

Mr and

Ann Jacqua, Richard

Anthony Sampson, Peter

Charlene Spretnak,

Par1

•tnCmi^x.

•

methods

pericxdically tried several

from undermining the

ot extermination to

through the garden ten or so times by biblical

command,

them

iluu

sju-d

trains

a day. But in the end, lahhiis, as

always multiplied and went forth.

One

^•—-v

/Jli.

it"

sliould

Waveform

inevitable, so a Rabbit Cabinet for the

memorialize the

Room was

and the

tracks

railroad

ki.i'|->

put together by Bobby Dixon to hold dishes and

skillfully

other necessities and to illustrate a matliematical dieory.

As every gardener knows, rabbits are

some of

a script, cutting out

like ver)- arbitrary editors of

the high points and strangel) leaving

the low. But are they themselves subject to natural editing?

myxomatosis, has been dehberately spread amon^^ iheni

and elsewhere and

It

way

now the>'

ni

periodically limits their numbers. But

it

and decline with

rise

A

a will

of their

own

—

or so

disease,

Scotland still

they

seems.

it

turns out there are rules and patterns that describe the

grow

in

number and

crash.

These reveal the way order can

grow out of chaos spontaneously, something

can be mimicked

that

by computer simulation. The emergent forms are explained by

a

process of population growth called "period doubling." Period

In

the

last

new

twenty years a

kind of equation has

back information

nonlinear variety, which relays

come

to the fore: the

itself.

These second-

into

compete

order equations characteristically have terms which

doubling refers to the doubling of the population cycle, and these

such as those

other,

cycles reveal

some

strange oscillating patterns that are as deep and

beautiful as any Platonic form. Whereas Western art

have been based on the five pure solids, the reveals another kind

of visual grammar, one more fluid and supple,

an order of curves within curves, of densities

and

understanding

self-similarities.

A

of varying

statistical patterns,

mathematical formula shows, for

Here the two competing terms are

how

growth

follow exotic patterns of

as they are pulled to several strange attractors.

generated by the formula Xn+i

sweeping curves

in

may

rabbit populations

property

—

that

=

BXn(l-Xn) and formally

own

have their

beauty and

These are this results a

way

Rabbit Cabinet, which holds dishes not rabbits, makes a feature of

populations

equation and

its

self-similar forms.

imagine

which

is

so prevalent in nature.

up

elsewhere in the room, but always transformed. Why highlight such

growth, period doubling and nonlinearity? Because most of nature nonlinear,

most of the universe shows the supple and subtle

Snake

known

as strange attractors (used in the

Mound). The beating of

the

formations of hurricanes and galaxies,

all

heart,

formation of the

brain

waves,

the

show such order growing

out of chaos, a richer mixture of organization and disorder than that codified in traditional aesthetics. Until the

computers revealed these strange

how

attractors.

such hidden organizational

life

mid-1970s,

until

could not fathom

could arise amid the buzz of

turned into a cabinet here, the equations strangely

resemble birds of prey and the Concorde intention but a

—

and

neither image part of

welcome byproduct of the mathematics.

into

This

order.

One can

counter-intuitive.

numbers might

the total

multiplying,

go

ferrets get to work).

But why should the numbers suddenly return to a

self-similar order with

(or until

similar patterns?

because

is

It

many

rabbits

in

of the math.

It

sounds

implausible, especially

if

you have too

the garden. Nevertheless, the math entails this fascinating

order amid chaos.

If

population,

one wants

to figure the equation out,

B represents

the

the

of

birthrate

X.^

represents

the results with the rabbit cabinet left,

one can see the

four

and

its

and

rabbits,

last Xn+i

last year.

Rather than going through the actual numbers and graphs,

I

illustrate

swirling curves. Starting

from the

basic strange attractors

pulling

the total

population size to one of four places. Then as one reads to the right and

as the female rabbits have more offspring, these attactors bifurcate to eight attractors, then sixteen, this point

and so

forth until the

is

mother has about 3.6 on

the total population could be anywhere within the

parabolic swirls: the system has

chaos determined by

rules).

And

gone

into deterministic

chaos

(that

is,

a

yet this leads to a certain veiled order. This

indicated by the depth of the parabolic swirls, their continuation across

the whole surface and, most surprisingly, the

way

that, at three points, the

three vertical lines, the system returns suddenly to

Then the previous simple order re-emerges before

chaos. As

my

we

upward

quite predictive of the

of their cycles until they

fantastic

is

keep

is

one

first

owls and

average. At

patterns

rabbits

if

because as the

-X-,

represents the prediction tor this year's population based on

Similar parabolic themes of growth and sudden change are taken

is

that,

fluctuate as they climb

Parabolas and their bifurcations swirl across the surface, so the pattern has that "unity in variety"

1

shows some emergent

a chaos that

combination of order and chaos

year's

this recursive

double the length

will

deterministic chaos,

strange

every so often they return to self-similar shapes. The

and

X.i

grows the second one diminishes. The equation

well

instance,

= BXn(1-Xn), which

Xn.i

describes population dynamics.

and architecture

new

the Verhulst equation:

in

each

with

it

bursts into

deeper chaos. But even

—

could be nearly anywhere

some

predictability,

others.

These

some

likelihood that

will

original bifurcations!

a very short period,

for

there,

illustrated far right of

probabilities are, again,

its

when

the cabinet

favor certain

shown by

just

the populations

—there

is still

numbers over

the parabolas, their depth

or thickness.

97

Lockerbie

—Chaos and Catastrophe Never Far Away

Peace and quiet are the two qualities most valued in a garden, a retreat for contemplation.

One of the

things that Virgil did not have

up with when he escaped from Rome

to put

to the countryside

the

are

pleasant

sounds of nature, and agriculture, the

telephone the complaints,

sometimes they go

One evening with

as

was getting

it

and red

explosion was the way

come

to like,

and the screech of low-flying

I

have

jets that practise for

mountain warfare. Portrack

is

in the hilly corridor that

bodies concerned

when

young

complain

the

jets fly

pilots use to train for

to the police

below the

and the

tree lines but,

after a ritual

exchange of animosities and promises, nothing

done. The

regularly take point blank

good

jets

target,

to speak

imploded

many seconds

More extraordinary

fire.

reached

it

sucked into

as if

of

silence

of

ball

llian

tliis

peak and then suddenly

a

vacuum

a

in a

cleaner and then the eerie

—Lockerbie

twelve

is

away

miles

followed by the roar of the earth. Maggie hurried to the Octagon,

a landscape like Bosnia. Locals official

Maggie went out

dark,

garden Maggie saw the sky light up behind Frances' head,

shriek of competing male pheasants. These sounds are punctuated

once every three hours, which

it

As they were walking in the kitchen

Alistair's wife, Frances.

great yellow

train,

and so

apologize,

wrong.

terribly

noisy chatter of swallows, the bleating of sheep, the occasional

by the rumble of the

they

continues. Machines are always audible in the garden today and

was

the constant drone of airplanes, buzz saws, and cars. At Portrack there

We

one.

aim

and the red-spotted Nonsense

at

is

our white house, a

in the

woods,

where up!"

was working, and

I

We

power

Chapelcross has blown

said: "I think

then ran to telephone the police to see

station had, indeed,

been

They answered: "We cannot

say,

hit

if

the local nuclear

by one of those low-flying

we

but

will

you

tell

jets.

was not the

it

nuclear station. Listen to the news."

They knew, but could not

a subtler

tell us.

Curious, the

official

response

to disaster. Efficient, concerned, oblique, opaque.

Lockerbie

turned

that has

has not got over the tragedy of that evening, one

still

name

into a global

it

sudden, arbitrary

for the

nature of catastrophe. Although the wreckage has been expunged

and the visual by

scars healed, the citizens

subsequent actions and media coverage like a

still

—

it

— and

back of their mind

in the

constant bad dream.

In the past, especially in the Judeo-Christian era,

some

read

marked

are

Everyone carries the memories of

fateful event.

this

of the town

meaning

greater

we might

into the catastrophe, perhaps a

have

warning

we

sign for the future or a punishment for misbehavior, but today interpret

it

Chaos plays an

differently.

essential role in punctuating

evolution, for better and worse. Since the to

understand

One

radically

mechanisms

several

theory, supported by

earl)'

980s we have come

changed

ha\e

that

much

1

evidence,

chaotic target practice, comets shooting randomly

at

history,

that nature's

is

planets,

wiped

out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Aiioilur iheor), also wiili

many supporting volcanic action

may have been are

now

signs,

in ilie

is

that

mass extinction was caused by

Deccan Traps area

combination

a

liiis

of India. Either way.

of tiic two, sikIi inipredictable events

more Darwinian

credence to luck

— bad

now we know,

as

if

age,

we

did not give so

luck for the dinosaurs, for

the

first

time,

good kick

jetliner

not predict playcfl out

from time The equation, etched on the the sweeping curves.

98

cabinet, generates the order out of

chaos and

"Fortuna

"

it

on

may

as they

The crash

a street in Lockerbie.

kind of stage: one

to time,

for us. But

can

of the

have been caused by terrorists, but they could

would wipe out tiiis

much

catastrophes

that

restructure history, in positive and negative ways.

Am

it

accepted as playing important roles in evolution. Twenty

years ago, in a

Pan

and

we

— one

construct, and

blown away by outside events

were

Our Hves

called in the Renaissance.

I

was

that

"Virtii"

to

are is.

and

ponder the

balance between these two forces later (see Part Eight, page 234).

—

Gaia and Limited Purpose

Most

ov

what we kuow about the

ot

cosmic history has been learned in the

knowledge

thirteen billion years of

last

hundred

last

years,

amiDsphnii

mass

is

extinctions in the 19th centur),

ilie

last

the universe in the

systems of

radical

VVe

recent.

ver\'

is

we had uuimations ot the origin ot 1960s (when accidentally we discovered the

background microwave radiation), but only since the 1980s did the of evolutionary phase transitions become understood.

ideas

cosmic and natural evolution are seen jumps, something

in

times

in the

garden

In addition

is

called "punctuated equilibrium" by Stephen

punctuated by dramatic

Darwinian model explains

when we

many

see

different ways.

relative

kingdoms.

cosmic and chemical evolution proceeds

these,

to

shifts in the living

according to other self-organizing systems. In spite of

we

all,

it

some

claims

have entered an era

overlapping systems of evolution working in

The most

evolution of planetary

crucial as a

life

new

insight for us concerns the

whole, or what James Lovelock and system

L)Tin Margulis have christened "Gaia." This self-organizing

something of a miracle because,

of

in spite

five

mass extinctions,

despite being hit by asteroids and burnt by super volcanoes, the

always returned

has

propitious for

wounds

(but

The idea of

its

life.

how

could

it

is

is

common

personification a

the

to

itself

The miracle

that the earth

own

"Gaia,"

is it

seems

possibly

know

and

alive

to

many

is

a

know how

threw out

—

and feelings on to nature

as

—

it

to heal

superorganism with

its

a will

ancient cultures. Giving this Earth,

the pre-Greek

f)r

—

that

ensouled. Inevitably

this "pathetic fallacy"

most

anything?).

makes exphcit the animistic metaphor is

of health

state

to

woman's name. Mother

including nature as a whole,

as a projection

all

of nature,

modern

science

of our intentions

reduced the living world to the

mechanistic interaction of particles and dead matter. It

to

was not

imtil

1972

that the situation

moderate

ot

levels

an atmospheric chemist and inventor, pondered views of the earth

how

seen from space and saw just

Compared

unusual the blue planet was.

to the other nine planets in

twenty or so

we had

our solar system, and the

discovered by the year 2000, earth really

is

ni

salt

she

has

needs to be for complex

to

it

oxygen declines

5

1

all,

of gases be

ratio

By the mid-1970s

his

unlikely

its

qualities appeared.

concept of Gaia matured. Along with the

microbiologist Lynn Marguhs, he formulated what

"Robust Gaia Theory," phrased

it

in his

book

as ciistinct

from

its

I

would

more modest

call

the

cousin. As he

Gaia:The Practical Science of Planetary Medicine: "Life,

2

I

percent of

it

goes up

happy accident? Or, has some Designer created

a

earth and set the levels of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen, and

oxygen

in just the right proportions? If so,

by and correct them every time

wiping out 75 percent of and

if not,

what

explained and,

The

is?

if

facts

Either

patiently stand

struck earth with an asteroid,

He

is

in charge, or

He

is

not;

of the finely tuned earth ask to be

not a God-given miracle, what kind

is

it

life?

He

He

did

is

Whatever one thinks of the Gaia hypothesis, some version of

must be

it? it

true.

more

Lovelock's

recent formulation,

made

"Modest Gaia Theory" He explains

called the

1991, could be

in

this in Gaia; The Practical

"The modern expression of James Hutton's

Scienceof Planetary Medicine:

superorganism, Gaia,

is

the Earth seen as a single physiological

system, an entity that

is

alive at least to the extent that, like other

living organisms, at a state

chemistry and temperature are self-regulated

its

favorable for

and Modest versions "alive"

— being to

qualifier

conditions for in their attacks

down

the

life itself

on

from asserting the bio.sphere

to

be

of "systems," and the addition of the

set

to

The main difference between the Robust

the shift

is

a

"alive

life."

extent"

Modern

of favorably regulating earth's

scientists

have been so unremitting

him

to

grows back,

as

Lovelock's teleology that they have forced

the stronger version several times. Yet

it

hardy as Gaia herself Trees

make

the ocean to

rain, especially in the rainforest;

clouds form over

through the right amount of sunlight; and

let

a

thousand other living and non-living systems experience positive

and negative feedback to keep gases

at

the correct proportion: just

almost perfect balance of these and other gases

more

oxygen

25 percent, they spontaneously combust. Could the finely tuned

more Lovelock compared

neighbors, Venus and Mars, the

relative

tlu'

percent, animals suffocate; if

a cosmic freak. The

similar-sized

regulated

kipt the

—around

explosive

its

iiuerlocking

of years.

ot million

to

life

ot

white clouds, the evidence of life, make the earth

with

or

oceans, maintaintd

tlu-

bizarre. Blue water,

it

itself?

tonipelling. For

is

cyberni'tically

constancy of climate and, most impressive

tone

changed. James Lovelock,

an opiiimim tor

ai

su[K'rorgaiusm

tlie

hypothesis,

this

If

Gould and Niles Eldredge explains the usual eons of

earth

.According

Darwinian natural selection makes some sense of gradual

ot

ilimaic

itself."

has kept a host ot inic)oriani d) namies just right lor her prosperity.

—over hundreds

regimes

different

ilir

the

aiul

conditions, and chemical composition

|-)li)sical

lite,

gases

stasis that are

is

)cars

ImIIioii

evolution. For

history in discontinuous stages.

its

models explain

change, while what

that the

as

3.S

where

Different

Jay

many

an optiiiuini for

ai

luaiiitams

level

"the jumping universe,"

instance.

proceeding smoothl) iud

as

have presented

I

Now

(.oiiiposiiion

climate

the

nearl) a trlrologual \n\\, )rt i1h> evidrnn'

This

most

or maiutains

regulates

The hiosphirr

ami ihr

glimpsed

hiosphciv,

the

enough

tcj

make Gaia metabolize

taken for granted

—an

many

is

gifts,

it

that

is

almost invariably

absurdity, a stupidity. As the chief of earth's

worth hc;noring, celebrating, venerating

especially in a garden.

model of Gaia

but not burn up. The

With

a

team of

shows some of these

artists,

I

have constructed a

interactions over the earth's

4. 5 billion years.

99

GAIA These three models Atom. Gala, the

depict, from

billion

is

It

how

this

aluminum model

mesocosm

is

shows order

a self-organizing system where the order of

James Lovelock

happens and, because

is

plinth

so important,

atom and

we

erected an

universe.

Thus the

between the microcosm and macrocosm. is

a supplementary metaphor to "the

Gene," and a more positive one showing that some natural

processes of self-organization favor the planet as a whole.

It

earth had a purpose: to control the proportions of gases

in

balance that of years, for global

is

best for

life.

In

is

as

if

the

the exact

the drawings one can see how, over billions

carbon dioxide and methane

(the

greenhouse gases responsible

warming) have been pumped down, while oxygen

and nitrogen

is

pumped up

stabilized.

The drawings show several in

life,

invented the Gaia hypothesis to

it

of Gaia next to those of the

placed on a

Gaia, Greek for "Mother Earth," Selfish

and the

years ago, grew out of the chaotic gases, dust, and

volcanoes. The scientist explain

to right, the Universe, Gala,

earth, like the fluctuating rabbit populations,

growing out of chaos. almost four

left

the most dramatic way;

first

globe with surrounding gases, spiral of history held

different

attempts to present these truths

as an evolutionary vase form, then as a

pumped up and down, and

up by the sun's energy,

basic giveaway for us:

we

live off

a

its

billionth of

rays of

light.

the energy

it

finally

This

as a is

the

throws out

every day.

^^

firr^iU

65

million years ago, asteroid strike.

Mass TIME LINE

extinction of dinosaurs etc.

years Present

300

3.5 billion

4.6 billion

million

65

Runaway Greenhouse

million

Effect

Tight Coupling

of:

• Life

• •

Chemical elements Physical elements

|E7^'.'

Reading down from the top of the

we can see

(opposite),

of

origin

life

3.8

final

installation

the early, dead planet, then the

billion

years ago, then the very

important "tight coupling" between the three main players:

chemical compositions, and physical

life,

conditions

(represented

metals). The structural members on the four show how Gaia pumped down carbon dioxide roughly,

sides from,

a deadly 20 percent of atmosphere to

present low of 0.03 percent. (Today, unfortunately,

its it

Methane

is

shown

up to

risipio

falling

crucial

its

r'alanced as the

and 21

he

.-

_;.

:are

earth, over

4

Oxygen Methane Carbon dioxide

major gas. Two more important

unciuation: at the bottom of the model .

years the sun becomes 25 percent hotter

and nitrogen

own, one of them a continuous process,

-

billion

oxygen

leveling out,

percent,

Over 4.5

is

again and creating the "Greenhouse Effect.")

rising

Increase or decrease

by the three undulating

out and increase the temperature of

billion years,

by 25 percent.

Nitrogen

of:

m

Miracle

upon

miracle, although the sun has

the earth's surface has not

hotter,

— because

become 25 percent

years of the British Empire, and recorded a few conversations with

the temperature

the family, and John

is

regulated by the planetary system as a whole. Although five mass

model

extinctions have occurred (depicted in the

each were

as if

vacation

Each time, aided by the physical and chemical conditions,

back again. As

bounced back.

have pointed out. Even

mass extinction,

if

does not

it

their equivalent in

in

knowing

that if

go on, and

Last

the

a

new

gases.

There

is

level

it

was

—

I

some mordant

movement, almost impossible. Some

solace

could be done was through such things

of self-organization,

that at least life

show

Because of our sins

start.

we

Atoms

had been trapped and "photographed" but paradoxical

elusive,

aspects

new

was easy

species

love,

takes

and

independently of

these

These,

is

is

aesthetics.

entirely

to

pre-date

they

and

us

the propositions

at least, are

of

levels

I

exist

attempt

Garden of Cosmic Speculation. The biggest

clear in the

speculation of ah

qualities

expression, us.

and

beauty,

that there

work

a teleological activity at

is

though, as Paul Davies' arguments have shown us in the previous it

should be considered

evolve in certain ways. that set

is

It

is

a predisposition

of the universe to

not a single, predetermined outcome

the goal, as the old idea of teleology supposed, but rather a

and

their

all

exact shape

I

more. These

the

all

termed "quantum weirdness."

qualities,

to

some of which

become

tried various

While involved

a misogynist

and

to

fall

in love

my

showing her photos of the aluminum model

how

to the globes

it

—

found

I

it

with them.

passion to Clare.

that

had

would be put down

of Gaia and the universe

are

atoms are

shortly,

in the research,

ways of communicating

constructed and explaining

aspects

because of their

Partly

summarize

will

I

only revealed their

this

been

just

the

hill

next

from the house and well

far

away from the paradise garden she had

created. Tact

demanded

keeping a certain distance and not compromising one garden with another.

I

we had

gave her photographs of the models and

the

following exchange,

of tendencies and limitations that guide evolution along certain

broad avenues. Teleonomy not teleology. Ecosystems and Gaia are evolving toward greater complexity, ever higher and

of organization, like the

levels

purpose, or

telos, in

Gaia as

it

"life

more

stable

of the universe. There

rest

is

a

CJ: Clare,

I

wanted

the greenhouse, the

CK: (looking

at

force" or "vital fluid" in the sense argued by the Vitalists, but

explained U)

me

emergent property of

Trying to Fathom the

all

Atom and

In 1994, because Clare

Explain

for

medium.

it

the

the filmmaker Julie

life

in the Far East

to create

but since a close

Corman, she decided a

on next

to

whole, and

model of

— what's

India,

the atom)

writit'ii

through equations, because

all

Wh)

the

I

way

like

them

lo be

aroiuid the edge?

I

are there these equations?

way you can in reality

it

is

wind showing how

these parts turn in the

would

represent the

never

still.

lively the

atom

is

You can see

atom

always buzzing and jumping around faster than you can see

is;

it's

it.

to

more immediate and

and

the

CJ: Physicists say the only

children. Traditionally

Julie filmed Clare recounting several

incidents of her exotic

of Gaia, the luiiverse as a

don't understand matheinaiics.

to Clare

a portrait,

record Clare's hfe and personahty in palpable

is

properties.

Maggie might have commissioned

was

to their hmit. This

life

was eighty-nine, Maggie wanted

some permanent record of her friend of hers

models

these designs going

the atom,

not a

rather the

show you

to

pushes the interacting variables of

chemistry, physical conditions, and

104

one place or

whose

various subatomic particles are slippery things

obsessively interesting.

—

it

1

ethics built into the

believe,

way

and position escape our instruments. By the mid- 980s, one or two

synergy, cooperation, symbiosis

I

fast

equations that might

as

are probability things. Indeed, atcMiis

Although the

section,

a

that

small size and

its

the probability of an electron cloud being in

another.

known

well

physicists said the only

snuffed out by

weird

qualities

h was

speed, jiggling units of the universe,

true for other

make

ccMiie

and, with several scientists, had constructed drawings of these high-

judgment, customs, or laws. The same,

to

might

it

had finished two years of research on the atom

representing an atom visually was, because of

dinosaurs, an echo of biblical morality and a

harmony

At this point

collectively

complexity

this filming,

memorial and testimony, the filming thus had

a

were working before we transformed them into systems of

human

knew

in remission, she

hydrogen bombs, or

ways we find morality and

universe. Ecological

is

one caused by Gaia not by God.

albeit

In such indirect

affective

was another motive behind

is

robust history will

way of the

Judgment,

a million

too pollutant and

sapiens is

new

Gaia as she jumps to a

beginning of the sixth

end of Gaia. The earth system

by

us,

greenhouse

Homo

are at the

spell the

—by

by

we

today

too robust to be killed off

would go

on

to be at Portrack

possible double role.

There are some ironic lessons here that Lovelock and the Gaians

will

who happened

never mentioned as such. Maggie had had a recurrence of cancer in

1993 and, though

has

Lily,

time. There

at that

the result of an asteroid hitting the earth) the system reasserts itself life

and

CK:

it's

lujt a

thing,

it's

a process.

important

during the

last

CJ: Yes, exactly, you got

it

in one, that's

what

I

am

trying to

show

cosmic processes and how we are connected

in the garden, the

the universe

and

natur^^

— what

are

>our view

s

on

wo

hat

\\

arc

lo

di^inj^.'

me. Charles,

lo

is

book,

a closed

which was more musical and

education,

way. Your designs are fascinating

any views on

because

it.

—

it

mathematical

iu)t

new

it's all

me

to

so

s(.

mo(lrl that

|oliii

hard

core

ol

was

tlirorus ol

tlu'

I'taltoii

ol

atom

a

I

isi

(la)

Irom

(lr\i'lo|H'(l

loree

what

Is

does

doing

Portrack alien lo what )ou lia\c lionc, or

at

atom

trom

w

as a sausage

is

CK:

think

I

alien to

it is

flowers, plants, shrubs,

what Portrack has been

and

perfecdy prepared to try to understand

alive,

while

dead.

It's

I

still

my

it.

And,

it

as

I

hut

known

ever

I'ln

am

I

don't wait until

I've

ith

you tour or

told

—

from what

is

mother-in-law Clare was determined

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