Does light have being? We say that the sun emits light. Hence, the sun emits something. A something is a being. But is light a being? It seems wrong to suppose this, even if only in words. What is the difference between Man and a giraffe? Following Heidegger, all we can say is that Man is that being that describes in words the issue it finds with its own being. Hence, dear Heidegger, there is no reason to believe that the giraffe has no squabbles over its being; it just doesn’t tell us anything about it. Does sound have being? Clearly, something falling from a great height, on crashing against the ground, emits a sound, hence, emits something – a sound. A something is a being. Hence, the sound emitted by a crashing object should have being. But is sound a being? That too sounds fallacious. Light travels and sound needs space. Let’s assume it all started with a loud bang. That assumption would have to rest on a prior assumption that would have to assume that there already happened to exist an open dimension, namely space. But how would space have opened up? Through distance. And now what is distance if not that which is caused by the travelling of light? Hence, sound is a dimension of light. (Which is not the same thing as saying that light and sound are the same.) We just said that light travels. Travelling takes time. Light opens the dimension of Time. More conclusively, Time is Light.
And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
The Holy Bible: Genesis. 1:3-4
Seemingly, God entrusted light with everything… appearable. Now we have to have faith in the conclusiveness of that fact that states that the speed of light is a constant. The speed of light ought to be the only true constant! Light appears and makes appear. And light travels in order to appear and make appear. This defines the indissoluble morphology between light and time. Light is not a being: clearly, something entrusted with everything’s appearance cannot itself be a being, and neither can it be the sum of all beings. Is light then a mode? Light can only be in itself a non-modal modality. What mode could encapsulate the non-modal modality that is light? Light travels and therefore takes time. The non-modal modality that is Light operates in the mode of history (earlier we said that time is light; henceforth, time, as history, is the prescribed unit of speed of light). What, therefore, would be a suitable metaphor for this kind of existence? Theatre.
Even though alterity and the Other also play a role in this make-believe, they do so out of a separate volition. The Other is.
(The programme tries its best to introduce the Other into its totality.)
Hypothetically, and yawningly, we can also ask: but is the world always as such?
Featured Image:
Ship. February 2022 at Sliema, Malta. Photograph by the author.
References:
The Holy Bible. Genesis. 1:3-4. King James Version (1611). Bible Gateway [online]. Available at: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%201&version=KJV [accessed 15 March 2022].
