The Pattern of the Cosmos: Physics and Philosophy in the

Poetry of T.S. Eliot

Ms Maddie Geddes-Barton

Ms Geddes-Barton began by explaining how during the turn of the 20 th Century

two revolutionary scientific theories relativity and quantum mechanics repainted the rational and easy to picture world of Newtons Laws to create the
more abstract world of modern Physics today. With the downfall of Newton
began the weakening in the division between science and art. Newtons theories
came with it a sense of materialism, where the world is really what it is: an
objective world in its very essence at the atomic level made up of well-defined
particles. Art at the same time sought to break the constrictions of reason with
creativity, by breaking the truth embedded in laws which governed the universe
precisely as a whole.

Ms Geddes-Barton continued to discuss what the people made of Physics in the

1920-30s, namely, why should we believe what science says about the world?
She points out that theory can predict, comprehend, and see connections
between things that seem completely separate in the universe; for example,
planetary motion and falling objects on Earth are both the same phenomena of
Newtons inverse square law. However, the problem of what the real truth is still
lay at stake; she quotes Sir James Jean, who wrote, a model [in science] is a step
away from reality. This brings her to her conclusion that the ultimate purpose of
Physics is not to find out what the world really is, but to look for and study
patterns using Mathematics.

The pattern view states that it the stuff we are made of is not nearly as
important as the processes and interactions which take place between them. An
example was drawn with the human body: all of the atoms we were made of at
birth had most likely all been replaced by different atoms after about eight years;
however, we are still us, meaning that it is the behavioral patterns which define
our identity, not each labeled individual atom which we were or are composed of.

T.S. Eliot believed that one cannot decompose these interwoven mechanisms of
the universe into individual components and realized that the system of the
universe can only evolve with time, with the exception of Mathematics itself.
Poetry also requires time, as words only move in time the words live once read,
but die instantly when the reading stops it only becomes a poem when each
word infuses with other words, hence needing a process and not just individual
components to create the music which we feel. Eliots Four Quartets capture a

unique pattern in complex rhythm and rhymes which occur around the middle of
stanzas it is hard to distinguish patterns with verbal explanation, but the
process of reading enables one to feel these inexplicable lines of music. Eliot
tried from the poem to convey that we feel patterns, but cannot describe them,
drawing parallels to the fact that mathematical equations alone may construct
but cannot describe everything in the universe. Moreover, the cyclic pattern of
some of Eliots poems causes the past and future to be linked not only from
beginning to end, but from end to beginning he plays strongly on the concept
of memory and how there is no process without our short-term memory piecing
together all the events and comprehending them. She asked us to listen to this
statement: the sense of the sentence I am saying cannot be understood without
its beginning, or, in others words, without memory. The past affects and future,
but the future also affects the past, blurring the once believed uni-directional
timeline; reading the phrase reconcile in the stars at first may sound positive,
but after being rhymed with scar it develops a negative nuance later in the
poem.

Ms Geddes-Barton gave an intriguing talk on the interface between Physics and

poetry, and how the scientific revolution sparked new inspiration for art. The
world only exists through processes in time written by Mathematics, but the
universe is much more abstract than which could be determined solely
objectively using numbers.

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