Infinity Photo: Robin Wilson
Drawing infinity
‘We tried to draw infinity but we ran out of time. This is as far as we got.'
These are the words of one Harrogate Young Quaker reporting back to the main Meeting on their Sunday morning activity. Robin Wilson had been enthusing them with his fascination for infinity and he has now written a short and wonderful book entitled Of Infinite Beauty: a Quaker explores infinity.
Recently, Robin talked to the whole Meeting following one of our shared lunches and showed us, on screen, some of the beautiful and colourful images in his book. For those – like me – who are extremely wary of anything mathematical there is reassurance in the introduction: ‘there’s a teeny, tiny bit of mathematics… don’t worry… the maths won’t get in the way’. And it doesn’t.
Robin’s especial interest is the Mandelbrot Set and he has used this and his computer to create lovely and amusing designs which made me smile – a lot – as I read through the book. The Mandelbrot Set has much to do with connectedness and can be used as ‘a mathematical parable’.
As Robin concludes: ‘we need infinity in our lives… we may call it God, or ‘the Light’ or Allah or Awareness. But whatever we call it, we can’t live well without it’.
Of Infinite Beauty: A Quaker explores infinity’ by Robin W. Ahlgren (pen-name of Robin Wilson). Available from the author.
